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She smiles at you, all teeth, and it strikes you that if you said the right thing, you could provoke another fight in her mesablock. The thought is tempting. Before you can think much about it, you find yourself smiling thinly to match, your head canting to position your horns aggressively. “I —”

You pause, trying to think of what to say. What’re you even doing? Seeing if you can start a fight, obviously. Throwing jars. Acting like some sort of wriggler in the throes of his first pitch crush — oh, no.

What you’re doing is blackflirting, in a stranger’s kitchen, with someone who tried to murder you, and that thought is like a splash of cold water down your back. You blanche, the smile fading, and then avert your eyes from Imnots. Maybe you should apologise, see if that’ll defuse the tension in the air. (But you don’t want to apologise.) “I should go check on the cart,” is what you blurt out instead, and then you abscond.