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Mr. Egunyemi wasn’t happy, but Walt grew on him. He watched them with deep eyes, suspicious and terrible until Walt figured out Hollis’s Scotch bonnet problem: indoors instead of outdoors, right before the last frost, in front of a window with the heat jacked up all the way to 85 degrees.

Now he kept bothering them about going to college instead of helping with the build. “Give Walt’s problem-solving brain the workout it deserves,” he said.

But Walt and Hollis wanted to look over blueprints, talk to contractors, test soil, and choose brick. They wanted to feel the sweat slide between their shoulders during a hard day’s labor, wanted to wet the ground with the want of something better. Something new. That made Mr. Egunyemi like them better too.

It took a year for Mrs. Brown to notice their eyes. When they had enough money for her to rest a bit and slow down. They’d come home to drop off some building permits quick before heading off to meet Yulia in the city, when Hollis’s mother caught them by the arm and hauled them close.

“Oh,” she said, leaning in to look. “That’s so strange, Holly. I’ve never seen anything like that before. We should get you checked out, take you to an optometrist or something.”

They looked down at her and shrugged. “I’ve already seen someone about it; it’s not a problem. Doesn’t hurt.”

“Still.” She frowned.

Their ma tilted her head to one side, then the other, looking at them. Then she ruffled their hair and kissed them, whole.