Trouble doesn't bug her today.

But right after the end of the class, someone shows up to bug Trouble!

"Ooh, what's the occasion?"

"Trouble, Robin. Robin, Trouble," says Ethan, gesturing between them. "Make friends."

Bella raises an eyebrow at this interaction while she folds up her mat.

"Hi," says Robin.

"Hi!" says Trouble. "Do you like cupcakes? I will make you cupcakes."

"Ooh, I like you already."

"He also does pie," calls Bella, "and delivers."

"Ooooh," says Robin.

"I thought you might like each other."

"I admit nothing."

"Is that unusual?" inquires Robin.

"Unheard-of," says Trouble. He gives Ethan a hug.

Ethan permits hugging.

"Aww," says Robin. "So, Bella, tell me more about this pie."

"It was strawberry rhubarb - on request; I imagine there are other flavors. Arrived at our door at dinnertime. Still warm. Highly recommended source of pie, is Trouble."

"Oooooh," says Robin.

Ethan laughs.

Trouble snuggles him delightedly.

"And I'm also pretty sure he didn't poison us."

"Must've been a slow one if he did."

"Yeah. Maybe next week we start losing our hair, the week after that we come over all spotty..."

Robin laughs.

"I did not poison you! Why would I poison you? I like you," says Trouble.

"You know, I would be surprised but not floored if you considered mild poisoning a sign of affection? You're kind of weird."

"Only to somebody who liked it," laughs Trouble.

"That person is not me," says Robin. "In case you were wondering."

"Hmm, have I met anyone who would like to be poisoned?" muses Bella.

Ethan points at Trouble behind Trouble's back.

Robin catches the gesture and laughs.

Trouble glances at Ethan.

Ethan looks terribly innocent.

"He pointed at you," Bella informs Trouble.

"I figured," says Trouble. "He's not wrong."

"I will think of you if I ever have spare poison lying around and no idea what to do with it."

"Awwww, I'm touched."

"Yes, you will surely cross my mind as I find a way to safely dispose of it."

He giggles. "Awwwwwwwww."

"You're twisted," says Ethan, borderline-affectionately.

"This is becoming clear."

"Isn't it?"

Trouble laughs and hugs him again. "And you made a friend," he says. "I'm so happy for you. We should all play strip poker or something."

"Count me in," says Robin.

"No. Thank you."

"I was actually kidding," says Trouble, "but now I'm not kidding anymore, bye, Bella!"

Ethan laughs.

Robin snorts. And follows the boys out of the gym.

"Hi. What's up?"

"Ethan made a friiiiiiend," he says, grinning. "It's adorable! He's nice to her for no reason! And she kicked my ass at poker."

"Good for her."

"And now Ethan wants her to be friends with Andi, but he can't just put them in the same room and say 'make friends' like he did with me and her, so he asked me to ask you to help."

"I can suggest to Andi that she invite Robin to do stuff, but why does Ethan have an interest in setting that up?"

"Because he thinks it'd make Robin happy. I told you, he's nice to her for no reason. He has feelings. Friend feelings," Trouble says happily.

"This is really unprecedented, huh?"

"Extrrrrrrremely. It makes me happy," says Trouble.

"Even though you're not the one he's being nice to."

Trouble shrugs. "I get to snuggle him and be happy about it, he doesn't mind, Robin thinks it's cute, he likes that Robin thinks it's cute. Works for all three of us."

"That," says Bella, "is a peculiar setup. But okay, I'll mention to Andi this afternoon, she can see if Robin wants to go to a movie with her or something."

"Great," says Trouble. "Thanks!"

"Have you got Robin's number for me to pass along? She's new, won't be in the school directory."

Indeed she would not. She pockets it. "This is an interesting game of hearsay we're playing, isn't it."

He shrugs. "Yeah, I guess."

"Well, see you tomorrow." And off she goes.

That afternoon, Robin gets a phone call.

"Hi! It's Andi. I wanted to know if you want to go to see Freaky Friday with me? It's still out in a couple theaters."

"Yeah, all right," says Robin. "Why not."

"Cool, should I ask my mom for a ride or what?"

"Probably," she says, "'cause I know what mine would say and it's not 'yes, dear'."

"Oh, that sucks. Yeah, mine'll take us as long as it's not when she's working, which isn't a big deal since she teaches school. How's tomorrow afternoon for you?"

"Tomorrow afternoon sounds just fine!"

"Okay, how about you walk home with me and Bella and when Mom shows up she'll take us? There's a four o'clock."

"Perfect," says Robin.

"Great, I always meet Bella out front of the school when the bell rings."

"I'll be there," she promises.

"Cool! See you there. Bye!"

"Hi, Andi! Hi, Bella!"

"Rumor has it you're coming home with us and then going off to see some disturbing body-switching movie."

"That's an unusually accurate rumour," laughs Robin.

"Well, it didn't go through many iterations of distortion before I heard it."

"When I asked Mom for a ride she made me check with Bella to make sure she didn't want to come too, but Bella thinks the premise is creepy."

"Well, yeah," says Robin.

"I mean, of all the - do you care about spoilers? This one is technically a remake, I've heard stuff about the previous version. Not to mention there's a book."

"Nah, go ahead," says Robin.

"Of all the ways to heal a strained family relationship, nonconsensually body-switching them has got to be the most deranged. Can you think of anyone in your life who you would get along with better after being dropped into their life and watching them make a hash of yours?"

"No," she snorts.

"There you go. I mean, if Andi and I swapped, we could probably fake each other pretty well, but that's because we're already close enough to not need improvement - anyone who has the disease will be left a ruin by the cure. So, not my movie, but I hope you guys have fun."

"Faking you wouldn't even be hard, I bet. 'Renée, I mean, Mom, are you going to Staples soon, I need more notebooks,'" she says in an uncanny imitation of Bella's cadences.

Bella coughs, and replies, "Mo-o-om, can I have an advance on my allowance, like, twenty dollars, I know bad planning and forethought and adult financial skills but it's important really!" in a likewise spooky mimicry.

Robin cracks up.

"But you look way more like Mom and I look like Dad, we couldn't really fool anyone."

"You look more like Renée when you actually smile."

"Unless you actually switched bodies," says Robin.

"Now that would be an interesting trick."

"Yeah, no kidding," sporfles Andi.

"Potentially fun," says Robin. "I wouldn't mind switching bodies with, say, Ethan. If I knew I'd get my own back."

"What would you do? Do I even wanna know?"

"What do you think I'd do?" she laughs.

"I am not sure I wanna know!"

"Oh, probably dress up in pretty clothes. And then play strip poker."

"Pffff. You are way more adventurous than me."

"I'm more adventurous than a lot of people," says Robin. "I'd say 'than most', but now I've met Trouble."

"Oh, if you didn't know, him and Ethan are having sex. I mean, not right now. Possibly right now actually but that's not what I meant. In case that's relevant to know."

"Thanks," she says. "I wasn't completely sure. Although I have seen them kissing while mostly naked, so it's not a big leap."

"I guess it wouldn't be."

"I take it the strip poker was fun for all."

Robin grins. "Very."

"We both lost embarrassingly to Trouble at the non-strip version, the day he brought us pie, even when we ganged up on him insofar as the rules of poker allow."

"Yeah, he's pretty good," says Robin. "I'm better."

"Supposedly poker is a game of skill? But then I get bad cards. I'm probably missing something."

"Oh, a lot of it is luck. But the rest is how you handle your luck," says Robin.

"Like how?"

"Eh, I've tried to teach it, I get nowhere," she says.

"Well, I'm never betting real money against you, I guess. This is our house," she adds, pointing.

"Yeah, I don't play for real money with people I like."

"Do you play poker with people you don't like much?"

Bella unlocks the house.

"When I want their money."

"Where do you find people with money who you don't like who'll play poker with you? That's kinda specific."

"I knew some back home. Haven't found any here yet."

"Do people keep playing you even after you take their money?"

"Surprisingly often, yeah."

"Huh, how come?" Andi flops onto the couch.

(Bella heads up the stairs.)

"So they figure you win on luck and they keep going till it runs out only it doesn't?"

"Exactly."

"Heh. Where did you find the people you did this with back across the pond?"

"School."

"Makes sense. I'd recommend somebody but I like most of the people I know."

"Well, who don't you?"

"Uuuum," Andi thinks, then shakes her head. "I try not to talk about people behind their backs. Even if I don't like them."

"Okay," says Robin.

"Especially if I don't, actually, since it's more tempting and I don't have productive things to say then."

She snorts. "Yeah. I hear you."

The door opens. "Hello girls!" calls Renée.

"Hi, Mom!" calls Bella's voice from upstairs.

"Hi Mom! This is Robin. Robin, this is my mom."

"Hi, Andi's mom," says Robin, waving.

"Oh, you can call me Renée, it's fine. Are you girls ready to go to the movie?"

"Yeah."

And there is the theater! Andi reminds Renée of when the movie is over, and that Bella will remind her if she forgets to come get them, and then she gets in line.

"Is your mum the forgetful type?" inquires Robin.

"Yeah. Only about some things, but this is that kinda thing."

"Got it."

"We have to be on her about running errands and stuff too. She doesn't let anything get too out of control but she leaves it later than she means to if we're not kind of on her case."

"As long as you manage to get it all down between the three of you, I guess," says Robin.

"Yeah. But we come home from Dad's in August and she's down to a can of beans and a bottle of ketchup and there's four utility bills wedged behind the toaster and her car needs to be washed and the sink's full of dishes. Takes a day or two to straighten out."

Robin laughs.

They are nearing the head of the line. "Have you got cash on you? I can put it on my card and you can pay me back."

"Sounds like a plan," says Robin.

"Two for Freaky Friday please," Andi chirps to the person behind the glass, and tickets are printed and her card is swiped. She tears their tickets apart and hands Robin hers.

"It'll start in like ten minutes, we should find seats," says Andi. "They're numbered, you know, the bills, what else do you usually expect money to do, fold itself into origami birds?"

"I expect it to be different bloody colours and sizes!" she exclaims. "So I don't have to squint at the corner to see the bloody denomination!"

"The portraits are different too. Do you maybe need glasses?" Andi spots the correct theater and heads into the darkness.

"I've been in this country for a sodding week, you think I've had time to memorize the faces on your money?"

"Would you have had the time to memorize new colors? I mean, there would be no reason for the colors to match even if there were colors. Do you like being closer to the screen or farther back?"

"In the middle and a little to the side's my favourite. It'd be easier to remember 'red is one, green is five' or whatever than learn to recognize a bunch of dead blokes and then remember out which one's which."

Andi finds two seats together a little ways in from the aisle, halfway up, and plops down. "Huh, I think it'd be easier to learn which queens are on what or whatever than colors if I moved to England."

"Maybe," says Robin. "But only because you grew up with this bullshit."

"Maybe. Or maybe I'm just good with faces? I can draw, kinda."

"Yeah, could be."

"Caricatures really, not realistic anything and not anything except people. Maybe I'll draw caricatures for a living when I grow up, I don't know. What do you want to do?"

"Rock star," she says immediately.

"Ooh, what do you play?"

"Guitar. I sing, too. Don't know how good I am at either, but it's fun."

"That's awesome. There's a choir at school, they're not any good but it's something."

"I will die before I join a school choir," snorts Robin.

"Aww, why?"

She shakes her head. "Not my kind of music, not my kind of fun."

"Are you going to try starting a band, then?"

"Maybe someday."

"Sometimes I think about learning an instrument but then I think about all the little seven-year-olds who can play ridiculously well and it just feels embarrassing to start."

Robin shrugs. "Everybody starts somewhere, right?"

"Yeah, I guess. I also don't know what I'd pick up."

"Figure it out, and you could be in my band," laughs Robin.

"Well, what do you need in your band?"

"Drums. Bass. Any instrument that's not a guitar," she laughs.

"Isn't a bass a kind of guitar, bass guitar?"

"A bass is a guitar like a square is a rectangle," says Robin. "Except even less."

"Oh. Hmm. I wonder if Renée can even afford lessons for me in anything, which one's easier to self-teach and cheaper to rent?"

"Maybe bass? Or something weird, I could always use something weird," says Robin.

"The triangle! The didgeridoo! The sousaphone!"

"What in God's name is a sousaphone?"

"Some kind of brass... thing. I don't actually know but it's definitely an instrument."

Robin giggles.

And here is the movie. Well, here are the movie previews, anyway. Andi politely refrains from talking during the show.

"Yeah, it was good! Thanks for coming."

Andi tucks the money into her purse, which is in a state of maximum entropy except for the separate pocket for card-shaped things. "You're welcome! Now we go wait for my mom, I guess."

"Guess so," Robin agrees. "Is she gonna turn up?"

"Eventually. Bella will remind her if she forgets."

"All right."

"What kinda music would your band do if you had one?"

"Not sure," she says. "I mean, I know what I like to sing and what I like to play. I'm not sure what it all adds up to."

"Do you write music?"

"Yeah, some."

"Oooh, can I hear some sometime?"

"All right."

"Cool! When's a good time? Maybe this weekend?"

"Perfect. Sunday?"

"Sure. You can show me your music and we can braid each other's hair and make a whole day of it."

Robin laughs. "Sounds like fun."

"You have great hair."

"You say that, but you've never tried braiding it."

"I bet I can if I try hard and believe in myself and comb lots of water into it."

She giggles.

"My hair is mostly pretty well behaved but it does slide out of ties like it's got a mind of its own."

"Mine would rather eat them," says Robin.

"Delicious hairties! Braid in some licorice for dessert!"

She giggles.

Renée's car pulls up to the sidewalk where they're waiting. "Hi! Did you guys have a good time?"

"Yeah!" says Robin.

"It was pretty good! Let's not go to any magic Chinese restaurants though, okay, Mom?"

"All right. We'll steer well clear. Buckle up, ladies!" And when the girls have buckled up she pulls onto the road. "Robin, you coming back with us or do you want me to drop you off?"

"Oh, I dunno," says Robin. "I wouldn't want to intrude or anything."

"It's no trouble! But if you'd rather go home you have to tell me where to go."

"All right then." Renée changes lanes to aim at the correct street.

"So on Sunday should I come to yours or what? Seems like it might be hard to move a guitar without... vague musical instrument misfortunes happening?"

"My guitar's been through some misfortunes already," laughs Robin. "It can take some more. And Mother doesn't like it when I play while she's home. Might be better to go to your place."

"Okay, do you need to be picked up or can you figure out buses...?"

"Bring on the buses."

"Okay. You probably didn't, like, memorize our house number -" Andi finds an old receipt on the floor and a pencil stub in the cupholder and writes down the Swan family address for her.

"Thanks," says Robin.

"You're welcome! And if you have any particularly inedible hair ties you should bring those."

"I will," she promises.

"I'd suggest nail polish too but you probably can't play guitar when you're waiting for your nails to dry."

She laughs. "Yeah, guitars and wet nails aren't friends."

Andi mimes strumming an air guitar and getting her index fingernail stuck to a string, refusing to come loose.

Robin cracks up.

Eventually they appear at Robin's house.

"Byyyyyye," Andi calls out the car window as Renée pulls away.