When Magritta had started preparing for her own death, he hadn’t been freaked out and he didn’t bring it up with her, except for sometimes saying things like, “Wow, this new thing you did in the garden looks good.”

“Thanks,” she would say. “It’s the tomatoes.” Or, “Ivo and I just put in purple asparagus.” When he goes to Magritta’s crèche, she takes him to her balcony and shows him her new tomato plants as they get kundled. Last year her tomatoes were, for some unreason, totally fucked, but this year, so far, they’re—fine?

They walked back inside. She told him an anecdote—a distant figure from her past, the new water filtration unit… Sand wasn’t fully listening. He wanted to, he couldn’t pay attention, he felt bad about it. Mentally, something always came up. ​It mattered less now, that children would leave you. The abolition of the family form—everyone said it was for their gay ass kids, but it had been for the parents as well. Some parents think their bio-kids are boring as shit. And when they do, the reverse is also likely true…

The social, working its voluptuous magic, adjusts.

Ivo was lounging on the balcony drinking an elderflower aperitif.

“I’ll put the beets in.”

“Are you sure? It’s not too early?” Sand looked at his watch. “It’s six.”

“Oh. Thank you. Okay.”

Did she want a winter jacket? Would she need one? The one she had now was fine, just ugly. Once, in Capitalism, she’d bought a sleek white winter jacket that looked like a big egg shell. Making her… the chick inside. Haha. ​Magritta hadn’t always been into infants, but she liked how easy it was to spend time with them at the Collective Child Zone. Spending time there was a pleasantly consuming array of tasks—diapers, social reproduction, whatever. Sometimes you just had to go and hold one, radiating it with your bodily warmth.

He picked up her water glass, which was empty, walking back through the yard, setting the glass down on the crèche kitchen counter and taking a hit of his big, fat joint.

Fuck, we’re out of sherry vinegar. I should have checked. H​e put on a sweatshirt, he couldn’t find his skateboard. ​Oh. There you are.

He began, with great sprezzatura, to glide down the lightly downhill road.