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Totter, Too, Part 1



The work commute was a lot longer than the drive to the supermarket.

It wasn't long enough, though, to completely explain some alien concepts to Totter.

She tried, she really did. But money meant little to the sylph, so insurance meant less. She thought he might be getting a handle on 'job' when they pulled into the parking lot.

What he grasped was that there were going to be people. Not as many as the supermarket, but they'd be there for a lot longer.

As she carried the carrier into the building, Tammy reminded him that he had standing permission to close the windows if he wanted to.

"Thanks, Tammy," he said. He seemed calm. Tammy was a nervous wreck. She still hadn't done anything official about owning Totter.

There'd been an article in the paper about a bloodsport ring's sylphs being found. And everyone in the office knew she'd been called out to that site. The math would be pretty straightforward.

What would she do if they accused her of...? Well, what could they accuse her of? As Esme said, he wasn't registered. She had broken no laws. But there might be rules.

Maybe she should have left him in the- No. Ray had been clear. Keep the sylph close by, always. Until he fully trusts you. Depends on you, more than just tolerates you.

Annie had squeaked something supportive in the background. Or at least agreeable. So she'd keep Totter at hand, and face whatever they had to face.

The accusing looks she'd half-expected didn't happen. Everyone in the office glanced at her, glanced at the carrier and went back to work.

She used the car-mount to lock the carrier to the corner of her desk. Need to get another one of those, probably.

The Monday routine settled in pretty quickly. The difference was when she looked up. Totter would usually be facing her. He'd smile at her and she'd smile back. Or he'd be watching something else going on. His intensity and awe also made her smile.

It had been tempting to bring the Battleship game in. Set it up on the desk and play slowly. Tolliver had a chess set for a game he played by email. But that was one move per lunch.

She'd figure something for him to do. Right now everything was new and different. When he started to get bored, she'd need something.

"So cute!"

Tammy looked up. The administrative assistant, Mandy, had snuck up on them both. She was bent over to look in the window. Totter was crouching down, trying to get out of sight.

"Could you back up a little bit, Mandy?" she asked. "He's having a difficult transition."

"Oh, right, right." Mandy nodded her head in agreement, but didn't move. "I just wanted to see if he had all his fingers and ears."

Totter closed up the window on her side. Her eyebrows popped up a little bit. Then she moved to the side. Totter popped that window up, too.

He looked fearfully out the last one, the one aimed at Tammy. She shook her head a little bit. Mandy circled around, disappointed to find no window on the back of the carrier.

"He's a little overwhelmed by scrutiny," Tammy said. Mandy finally took the hint, put a finger to her lips and tiptoed away.

"What's his name?" Mason was the guy on the next desk over. He gestured towards the carrier.

"Totter," she said.

"Why did you pick that?" he asked.

"I didn't. That's the name he had when I... It's the name he came with."

"Oh." He apparently lost interest in the sylph and went back to his computer screen.

"What?" Tammy asked. In the corner of her eye, she saw Totter listening intently.

"Well, most new owners give the sylph a new name," he explained. "Draws a distinction between old and new owners. They say it helps the sylph come to grips with the fact that there are new rules, that the old ways are gone or over. Change. It supports the change they go through."

"Huh," Tammy said, carefully not looking at Totter. "I would like a clean break from....his history. But that would be up to him."

"You can do that, too," Mason agreed. "You know, what he's registered as doesn't matter as much as what he answers to when you call."

"I suppose not," she nodded. They both went back to work. Totter still smiled at her when she looked up, but he looked thoughtful.

Just before lunch, Mandy came over with a manila envelope. "Special delivery," she cooed. "Someone over-nighted this to you, Tammy!"

She hovered for a second, obviously wondering what was in the mail. But she stepped to the side of the desk farthest from Totter, so Tammy was in the mood to be generous.

What she found was a button. It said, 'No, I will not make him dance.' She laughed, letting Mandy read it.

The other woman shook her head. "Inside joke, I take it?"

"My cousin told me there're things people ALWAYS say when they see you have a sylph. He's cute, he's a handful. They ask if you can you make him dance, if you're the one that caught him, and if you own another one."

"Oh," Mandy said. From her tone, she either remembered her first comment, or she'd been planning to ask about dancing. "Um, your cousin's initials are A&P?"

"No, he's Ray." She looked at the envelope. The return address was kind of small, with a different handwriting for the &P part. A shakier one.

She looked inside the envelope and found a small piece of paper.

It had Ray's name, a Jacksonville, Florida address (Not Gainesville, she had to remember that), and tiny lettering.

"As near as I can tell," she told Totter, and Mandy, "it says, 'Totter. Make your owner wear this.' Ve...Vore... Oh! 'Very important! Love, Annie and Pet.' Well! That's nice of them. And they seem to think it's vital, so..." She pinned the button on her shirt and smiled at Totter.

Mandy muttered something as she walked away. She was definitely disappointed about the dancing policy.

Tammy shook her head and turned to Totter's carrier. The sylph was waving his hand the way she taught him.

"A question?" he asked when he had her attention. "What's a cousin?"

"Ah..." She glanced at her computer, thinking of the work she had to do. "I'll have to cover that later. In some families, it's a quick definition. As a Foster, it's a novella."

"Okay," he said agreeably. "What's dancing?"

------

Tammy only went to the office two days of the week. She dealt with the paperwork for the claims she'd investigated, and made appointments for other investigations.

There was also training, both for her job and general business needs. She couldn't wait to take Totter to her performance evaluation. She could imagine interrupting Mr. Williams in order to translate.

"He doesn't know if initiative is a good thing or a bad thing, Mr. Williams. I don't want him to be scared that you're chewing me out."

The other three days, she drove straight from home to appointments, or between appointments. She scheduled openings for emergencies and favors to other investigators. That's how she'd ended up with Totter.

Up to now, she'd sort of considered the driving part wasted time. Sure, it beat being in the office. But there was no one to talk to.

That changed.

The two found a simple drive down a city block to be the source of endless conversations. Totter wanted to understand everything. Tammy wanted the same thing, so she did her best to explain whatever he asked.

It was just that it took so much to explain. Everything depended on assumptions he lacked, or required analogies that required analogies. The good thing was that it put the burden of conversation on Tammy.

Totter would ask a question, then not have to say much of anything for half an hour. It wasn't making him any more accustomed to public speaking, but it was drawing them closer together.

-----

Thursday saw them in the office again. Several of her coworkers swung by to see how Totter was doing.

Some asked Tammy, most asked Totter directly. He answered them back with short sentences. He stood with his back to the carrier wall when he did, but he did answer them.

When they left, Tammy told her sylph how proud she was. He beamed.

There was some talk from the employees about her bathroom breaks. They didn't think she should be taking Totter into the ladies' room.

"I keep the windows covered!" she pointed out when Mr. Williams mentioned it. "He doesn't see anything!"

"It's still, technically, against the rules."

"Well, I can't leave him at home." Totter was looking more than a little agitated. She put a hand over the box.

"Look, if it was up to me-"

Before the supervisor could finish the statement, Mason spoke up. "I could keep an eye on the little guy," he offered. "Leave the carrier there, tell me where you're going, I'll see that nothing happens to him."

"Is that okay with you, Miss Foster?" Williams asked. He seemed a little impatient when she lifted her hand to see Totter's reaction.

It was okay with the sylph. Probably because he wasn't being moved to Mason's desk. But he didn't look as frightened as he had been.

The supervisor took the opportunity to lay down a few more ground rules. Meetings that Totter shouldn't be party to, information he shouldn't access, proprietary data he shouldn't be able to reveal.

Tammy felt more than a little stressed about it. The suggestion that she couldn't have figured most of those out by herself was the worst. The intrusion into her personal life didn't help.

But she kept it all deep inside. Mostly for her sylph's benefit, but it probably helped Williams feel that he'd accomplished something.

"I wonder if that's what parents go through," she said when they got home. She set the carrier down and let Totter out into his cage.

"Are you okay, Tammy?" he asked. She looked down at his face and smiled.

"I'm fine, Totter. You wanna be in the cage or you wanna watch me make dinner?"

"Food," he said with a winning smile. He'd learned that if he asked questions during the cooking he got bites to taste. Sometimes weird, sometimes wonderful, always different. Tammy pretended not to notice how excited he got as she cooked.

She shook her head and reached down. "Men," she said. "If it's not food you want it's..."

"It's what?" he asked after a moment of silence.

"Never you mind," she said. He got comfortable in her hand as she crossed to the kitchen.

After dinner and after the game (she won), Tammy lay down on the floor outside of his cage. She had an idea that maybe if she could exhaust him, he might go a night without the nightmares.

She put her wrist on the floor and started one-handed wrestling. He giggled and fought back. There was no restraint on him, not a moment's hesitation or going easy.

Tammy thought she should have expected that. But she was surprised that the sylph could actually hurt her. If he got a good grip on a finger and decent leverage, he could overpower a knuckle to the point of pain.

Her 'ouch' made him leap clear of her hand. But he didn't run. He just stood there beside the cage, watching her carefully.

"Are you okay, Tammy?"

"Actually, I am," she assured him. "You just... caught me by surprise. I never thought you could have hurt me..."

"I'm sorry, Tammy!" And he ran. Towards her, though, to her utter surprise. He grabbed her middle finger and hugged it carefully. "I wouldn't want to hurt you, ever!"

"Well, no really harm." She reached her other hand over to pet him. "It just surprised me, like I said. I suppose I should have checked your strength before we started."

He looked at her, still hugging her finger. She smiled to show him she was okay. He carefully smiled back.

"Okay, let's try this. Push."

A few minutes later, they both felt calibrated. Totter couldn't break a finger, but he could strain a knuckle if Tammy wasn't ready for him.

"We'll call that a pin," she said. "And a point for the sylph team."

"Okay," he said, wiping sweaty hair out of his eyes. "What's a pin for your side?"

She swept her hand out and wrapped three fingers around his legs. He squealed as she lifted him up and pressed him down, a thumb on his chest.

"One..." she drawled. He slapped and twisted. It reminded her of thumb wrestling. Once more, he went straight to full bore resistance. His thigh muscles writhed against her grip. But she was ready for him this time.

"Two," she said. He beat his fists on her thumb, smile wide. They bounced off her nails.

"Three." He couldn't shift her finger or wriggle out of her grip. But stopping wasn't in him. He put both hands on her thumb and tried to push it away.

At "Four," she remembered the goal of the evening. She scooted up a bit on the floor until her face was over his body.

"Five." Twisting her thumb slightly put the end of her nail beside his armpit. With great care and precision, she tickled him. He screamed and flailed.

Happy screeches filled the room as she finished her ten-count. Then she stopped and slightly relaxed her grip. He panted heavily, grinning up at her.

"I need to go potty," he finally told her. She scooped him up and got to her knees.

"Can you walk?" she asked. "Or should I hold you over the sink?"

"Walk," he promised. She put him down in the doorway of the toilet. He grabbed the carrier and staggered inside.

He was certainly exhausted, she noted. Her fingers were crossed as she got ready for bed.

It didn't quite work the way she'd planned. She staggered down the hallway to the usual screams. Then she realized they weren't quite usual. Every other night he'd shouted for Buster.

He was still screaming, but he was calling out her name. She ran to comfort her sylph.

------

Mom was already at the restaurant when they arrived. Tammy put the carrier down on the table and turned the front to her mother.

"Well, hello, Totter," she said.

"Hello, Mrs. Foster," he replied with a little bow.

"Oh, so formal! What do you call my daughter?"

"Tammy," he said, a little confused.

"Then call me Mildred," she said, sticking a finger towards the sylph.

"Okay, Mildred," he said, taking the fingertip and shaking it.

They chatted for a bit. Mildred charmed Totter so quickly he never knew what hit him. In ten minutes he was so comfortable that her offer to sylph-sit didn't scare him a bit.

Then, being the mother she was, she took her daughter ever so slightly to task.

"So, Tammy? What did the doctor say?

"Doctor?" Who was she supposed to have seen? For what?

"For Totter? Considering his background, he really needs a check-up." Which would require a legal identity, Tammy thought.

"And," her mother continued, nodding down at the carrier, "you need to explain what a doctor is."

Tammy looked down to see that Totter had a white-knuckled grip on the bars of the window. She reached out to gently touch a fingertip against his hand.

"Whatever you think a doctor is, sweetheart," Mildred was saying, "it's not what Tammy is going to take you to see."

"It'll be fine, Totter, I swear," Tammy said softly.

"Sure. I go to doctors all the time," Mom added.

"You do?" His eyes were wide open.

"Oh, yes." Tammy went into a zone she was familiar with. Mom discussed her ailments with a certain relish. Totter hung on her every word.

Tammy thought about the Registry.

That would be one of the first things they'd ask at the doctor's office. Or, technically, at the vet's.

Name, gender, Sylph Registration Number. She'd never paid much attention to the legal side of sylphs, but she'd seen the public announcements.

They suggested that unregistered sylphs were passing sedition, disease and data mining software around the world.

Oh, and not registering your sylph made it easier for criminals to traffic them.

She looked down at her sylph, learning the four main ailments affecting her mother's teeth.

Well, if nothing else, she could never forgive herself if he was trafficked. Not again.

But God, she could never put 'Tiny Totter' on the damned form.


Totter, Too, Part 2
Totter, Too, Part 3
Totter, Too, Part 4


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