Alien Diplomacy

you’re a bird man.”
    Marling beamed. “Yes, my Bellie.” It was interesting—when he smiled like this, his eyes, which were gray, had an almost pearly sheen to them. I wondered if he’d chosen his parrot in part because it was gray in color, too. The look was very pretty, though I couldn’t tell how it happened. Maybe the light hit his eyes differently when he was really smiling honestly. I wondered if other people’s eyes did that. If they did, I hadn’t noticed, but then that didn’t necessarily mean anything.
    “I thought her name was, um, longer.” There was no way I was going to get Rybelleclies out with proper pronunciation.
    He laughed. “It is, but I use her nickname more. You like birds?”
    I didn’t all that much, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “Birds are fine. I’m more of a cats, dogs, and horses girl.”
    “Ah, well, with your name, at least the first is understandable.”
    “Yes.” I tried for something else innocuous to say, since “hey, are you the one planning to kill everyone” and “what’s the status on the supersoldier projects you’re managing” didn’t seem like a wise gambit. “Interesting, what you can come up with when you’re making an anagram, isn’t it?”
    Marling nodded, the pearly sheen leaving his eyes as they wentback to their regular gray. “True enough. Keeps my late wife near me.”
    “Sorry, didn’t mean to bring up sad memories.”
    He shook his head. “Not your fault; you haven’t had to go through losing your husband yet.”
    This was getting uncomfortable, so I was relieved when Leslie took my arm. “The powder room calls. We’ll catch you when we get back in,” she said as she dragged me off. “No need to have to hear him wax rhapsodic about that stupid bird.”
    “I suppose. It’s an interesting name.”
    “It’s stupid,” she snapped. “I think it shows a lack of creativity, if all you can come up with is an anagram of your name when you’re trying to be clever.”
    I contemplated this as we moved through the throngs of people. It was kind of clever, really, though I had to figure there would be a more normal name someone could make out of Cybele Siler. It was a weird name, just as weird, really, as what Marling had named his bird.
    “What’s going on with you and Bryce?” I asked while I played around with the letters in my mind.
    “Oh, the usual,” she said. We left the ballroom. I was still turned around, but I was pretty sure this wasn’t the way Nathalie and I had gone.
    “What’s the usual?” I braced myself for her to suggest that I sleep with her, Bryce, Whitmore, and Villanova on their extra large bed of love.
    “Oh, he’s always complaining about something,” she said as she looked around. I got the impression she hadn’t censored that remark. Sure enough she turned back to me and smiled. “You know how it is.”
    “I guess. Um, you know I know about you and Marion and him and Langston, right?”
    She shrugged. “It’s complicated.” Like the anagrams. I visualized the letters as if sitting on a blackboard, waiting to be used. What else could you do with them?
    “I’ll bet. Look, are we actually heading for the bathroom?”
    “No, I just wanted to get away from them so I could talk to you.”
    “So talk. Really, I don’t know why you’re coming to me with a problem or whatever it is, instead of your friends. Are you and Bryce having a spat or something?” As I said his name I realized I could spell it out with the letters in Marling’s wife’s name.
    I thought about it. Could Bryce be Marling’s son? They didn’tlook that much alike, but they didn’t look that different, either. Without a picture of his mother to compare him to, it was hard to say.
    Leslie nodded. “You’re the one who can help me. They can’t. Great dress, by the way.”
    “Thanks.” I jerked. The flirty compliment. It wasn’t usual at all. Maybe Bryce wasn’t imitating the head man at Titan to suck up but because he’d heard the head man at Titan toss that bon mot off regularly as he was growing up.
    If Leslie noticed that I’d stiffened, she didn’t let on. “So, have you heard about Jack?”
    “That he supposedly killed himself, yes.” I looked at the remaining letters in my mind. They didn’t spell Taylor, because there was no ‘t.’ “Leslie, are you in trouble?” I had a feeling she was, because I had a feeling she was pretend dating Marling’s supposedly dead son. But I wasn’t sure.