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Ophelia Prosper was lead bodily down to the buffet table: there were, in fact, cookies as Wisp had promised, and Wisp was immediately involved in grabbing a gingerbread man with a napkin and nibbling off his arms and legs. "You look so cute tonight," she said, after a mouthful of gingerbread was duly swallowed. "Oh my GOD I have a million things to tell you! I can't wait for you to grow! When do you think you'll grow? Being a teenager is like -- it is so much different to being a kid."

She looked flushed and excited, apparently thrilled and happy with her teendom. "It's sad too," she said, "but it's just -- it's so wow. How are you, Phella?"

"Being tall?" Wisp looked a little guilty, as though she had tricked Ophelia somehow. "I'm not actually that tall. It's like, Irelia's way taller than me and even Jace is kind of taller than me, I am kind of a midget all over again, you know? It's like, wow it's weird being taller than you, but you'll probably be taller than me in the end."

She sighed, but her spirits weren't dampened. She giggled at the decapitation of the gingerbread man, and said: "It's pretty impossible to describe. You'll know it when you know it, yo."

Wisp immediately cracked up. And then she patted Ophelia consolingly on the shoulder, taking on the expression of kind and dismissive older girl, flashing her dimples. "It's okay, you'll understand later when you're grown more," she said, "about the romantic mysteries of life. I bet when you grow to teen he'll ogle you a BILLION times more. Maybe even a googleplex. And you'll be like, thanks, now I am going to go buy adorable shoes."

"Oh!" said Wisp, stung, and she nibbled a little at her gingerbread man. She looked geniunely contrite. "I didn't mean to, Phella, I was just like... I mean... it'll be different for you when you're a teen," she added lamely. "I mean, it's just, it's exciting, I want you to be excited too -- I don't think you're a little kid."

She looked somewhat heartbroken.

This was a slightly odd question, and in turn Wisp gave her a slightly odd look: it was akin to asking Wisp, do you still breathe? "I snuck out last night and I painted a whole bus shelter," she said, "I was reading about -- it was just this website about the police and how lots of them know how to break this bone in your armpit that won't show up in a hospital x-ray, so I did a little viva revolution -- I don't know if that's right, I'm not the one who speaks Spanish. I speak bad French. So I did a little la resistance, I guess. So I got mad and painted the shelter."

She was working out what her tag was going to be. She figured a rainbow. Rainbows could be gangsta. I don't think we think the same way any more, she thought, depressed. She asked me if I paint?!

That was better; some of the old glow came back into Wisp's face, and she patted Ophelia on the shoulder. This wasn't entirely patronizing: Wisp had always been a patter. "Sure," she said, "we can sneak out at 3 AM. You ever used spray paint? It's seriously interesting -- it's way clutch. It handles different to anything else. Oh, man, think of all the stuff we could get done together -- we could WAY jam it up to the max!"

Grayson? The name sounded familiar -- Wisp looked blank (which was familiar) until a face met with the name. "Grayson!" she said, satisfied at her own working-it-out. "I haven't seen him come in, Phella. At least Carlisle was easy to find, right? I'll send him over to you if he does come in, yo."

"It's a date," Wisp said confidently.