Parro and Ange do most of the heavy lifting. I pack everything into boxes, they carry them around, I pat globs of putty to the walls and ceiling for old-boxes-now-turned-into-cubbies to stick there; it's called "maximizing our space" so the customers can stray from the floor, skimming shelves and cubbies up the walls.

Anemon comes by, he's got a degree in art design or something so he's a total expert at interior design too. He laughs after he says that. And Parro makes an eye-rolling motion when he translates "total expert," like Anemon's anything but a total expert. But Anemon acts like he knows what won't cause customer confusion and clogged swimming space, and Ange and Parro listen to him.

We work half into the night, that's fine with me, I can't fall asleep anyway, we put three tables in the middle with big displays of clothing, we line the walls with shelves and make aisles halfway to the ceiling, we hang cubbies overhead and on the upper walls, Ange wanted to putty a table against a wall but that wasn't structurally safe, so I help stick a messy sign in its place for "On Sale Now!" items and we hang baby socks and wooden utensils by ropes from the top of the store, swaying in front of the sign.

We finish half into the night, the four of us bob around the checkout counter studying this...layout we've created. Our half-used blobs of putty wobble on the checkout counter because Ange keeps tapping his hands on the wood in a drum rhythm.

"Can you stop," I sign.

Parro nudges Ange. He stops. "Great job, everybody," he signs.

I can barely see the door anymore from the checkout counter, the shirt display on the table's stacked too high.

"Thanks for helping, Anemon," Parro signs/says aloud.

I can't see half the walls anymore, we put shelves in the way.

Anemon waves his hands, says something, waves his fins frantically and signs "thank you." Then does the flat-hand wobble motion that means "almost" or "not quite."

"He says you're all welcome," Ange signs to me.

One of the cubbies on the ceiling looks like it's about to fall--plus the wooden box clashes with the orange colored putty we stuck it onto.

"Are you sure you don't want us to pay you?" Parro signs/says aloud.

Where are we going to put a big wooden chest for sale, when Da makes those before winter on the surface?

Anemon waves a hand. Says something. Laughs and shows lots of white teeth.

How am I going to organize all Mum's clothing in aisles? Shirts on one side, shorts on the other, or by different sizes?

"He says, this is the rest of his birthday present, since Hamme and Sta paid for the sign," Ange translates.

We should redo the "On Sale Now!" space soon.

"Okay," Parro signs/says aloud. "I'm starving. Let's go to our house, I tried this new fried calamari recipe earlier today and you all have to try it."

Maybe we shouldn't have even put up this "On Sale Now!" section, with the ropes.

Anemon shrugs, says something, and he and Parro swim for the front door--Parro takes down the "We've got big renovations coming!" sign and shoves it into a shelf that wasn't there this evening, then darts outside. I don't think I like these renovations, I'm going to keep thinking the bedposts are in the corner when they're actually in an aisle halfway on the other side now.

Ange goes and locks the door, then he and I swim into the back room, to put away the leftover putty in little boxes. We used hardly any green or pink. The "Par o n An e' " hasn't actually been turned into a table, per Anemon's advice, it's now going to become a shelf in our back room since we turned lots of boxes in here that used to act like clutter shelves into cubbies for the store front.

I'm going to miss having those boxes acting like shelves. Not that I put anything there besides packages of screws and sometimes snacks. I'll still miss their presence there.

We put putty boxes on a shelf with some of Wrass's wood statues, then go out through the box maze. Right before the door, Ange signs, "Anemon just lost his job. So don't say anything, but we're feeding him tonight since he's low on money."

I slow. "Oh," I sign. I hesitate. "What's Anemon's job? Is he a total expert at interior design? Was his job with his art design degree? So Parro was trying to pay him but he said no, why'd he say no if he's low on money? I ate half the kelp cakes earlier, we need more soon. That was random but I just remembered it. How did Anemon lose his job?"

Ange pauses by the door. "That was a lot of questions at once. What?"

I roll out my neck. "What was Anemon's job?"

Ange pauses, like he's listening to something. I catch no vibrations. "He didn't like the job, but it put food on the table. Anemon ran customs on imported goods."

I blankly stare.

"That's where you check food coming in from another city to make sure it's not carrying diseases, and collect taxes on the imported stuff. That's the simple explanation."

"Oh."

"Anyway, long story, Anemon's boss found out he was dating this guy and fired both of them," Ange's movements go choppy, "which is against the law, those stupid Essentialists are...their hormone argument has no validity, there's literally hundreds of guy with guy couples where one will never transition to female, but they'll just believe whatever they want--" he waves his arms about, glaring at the stacks of boxes. "Technically Anemon got fired because the customs office was updating their education requirements but the guy Anemon was dating got fired at the same time so we all know that's a lie."

"Oh."

Ange's arms drop to his sides and he smiles weakly. "Sorry, I didn't mean to rant like that."

"Oh, that's..."

"Let's go, they're probably waiting for us," he kicks the door open and paddles outside. I wriggle my wrist fins, roll out my neck, and paddle after.

"Why'd he say no if he's low on money?"

"Nudibranc, if you were low on money, would you be okay with your friends handing out money to you?"

"Oh, I don't..." I don't really...have friends, Ange, except for your friends, so...I don't know?