By the light of the moon

happened.'
    'State flower – golden poppy.'
    Jilly wanted to be clear on this: 'He teleported from one toilet
to another?'
    'No, teleportation isn't involved. See – I came back with
my own head, he came back with his own nose. No teleportation.'
    'State tree – California redwood.'
    'Show her your nose, Shep.'
    Shepherd kept his head bowed. 'State motto – "Eureka,"
which means, "I have found it."'
    'Believe me,' Dylan told Jilly, 'it's his own nose. This isn't a
David Cronenberg film.'
    She thought about that last statement for a moment while Dylan
grinned at her and nodded, and then she said, 'I know I haven't
even had breakfast yet, but I need a beer.'
    Shepherd disapproved. 'Psychotropic intoxicant.'
    'He's talking to me,' Jilly said.
    'Yeah,' Dylan said.
    'I mean not at me. Talking to me. Sort of.'
    'Yeah, he's going through some changes.' Dylan lowered the lid
on the toilet. 'Here, Shep, sit down here.'
    'Time to shower,' Shep reminded them.
    'All right, soon, but sit down here first.' Dylan maneuvered his
brother to the closed toilet and persuaded him to sit.
    'Shep is dirty. Time to shower.'
    After kneeling in front of his brother, Dylan quickly examined
his arms. 'I don't see anything.'
    'Time to shower. Nine minutes.'
    Dylan removed Shepherd's bedroom slippers, and set them aside.
'Want to bet which cartoon?'
    Bewildered, Jilly wanted that beer more than ever.
'Cartoon?'
    Head lowered, Shep watched his brother set aside the slippers.
'Nine minutes. One minute for each arm.'
    'Bunny or puppy,' Dylan said.
    Examining the adhesive bandage on her arm, Jilly saw that it was
loose but that it still concealed the needle mark.
    Dylan peeled the sock off Shepherd's right foot.
    'One minute,' Shep said, 'for each leg—'
    Moving closer, Jilly watched as Dylan examined his brother's
bare foot. 'If he was injected,' she said, 'why not in the
arm?'
    '—and one minute for the head—'
    'He was working a jigsaw puzzle at the time,' Dylan said.
    'So?'
    '—and two full minutes to wash everything else—'
    'You've never seen my brother work a puzzle. He's fast. His
hands keep moving. And he's focused.'
    '—two minutes to rinse,' Shep finished. Then he added,
'Cat.'
    'He's so focused,' Dylan continued, 'you can't persuade him to
stop until he's completed the puzzle. You can't force him to
stop. He wouldn't care what you did with his feet because he
doesn't work the puzzle with his feet. But you couldn't immobilize
one of his arms.'
    'Maybe he was chloroformed, like me.'
    Having found no obvious puncture mark on Shepherd's right foot,
Dylan said, 'No. When I went across the street to get takeout, he
was doing jigsaw, and when I woke up taped to the chair, Shep was
still flying through the puzzle.'
    Inexplicably, Shep interjected, 'Cat.'
    'If he'd been chloroformed, he wouldn't have gotten over the
effects that quickly,' Jilly said, remembering the disorientation
that had lingered after she'd awakened.
    'Cat.'
    'Besides, having a chloroform-soaked rag clamped to his face
would have been even more traumatic for Shep than it was for you. A
lot more. He's fragile. After regaining consciousness, he'd have
been either highly emotional or he'd have curled up in the fetal
position and refused to move. He wouldn't have gone back to the
puzzle as if nothing had happened.'
    Dylan stripped the sock from Shepherd's left foot.
    Shepherd's Band-Aid featured a cartoon cat.
    'Cat,' said Shep. 'Shep bet cat.'
    Carefully Dylan peeled off the tape.
    'Shep wins,' said Shep.
    More than half a day after the injection had been administered,
the puncture remained inflamed and slightly swollen.
    The sight of Shep's stigmata sent a shiver through Jilly that
she could not entirely explain.
    She removed her bunny-decorated bandage. The site of her
injection looked identical to Shepherd's.
    Dylan's cartoon puppy proved to conceal a needle puncture that
matched his brother's and Jilly's wounds. 'He told me the stuff
does something different to everyone.'
    Glancing at the wall where the tunnel had been, Jilly said, 'In
Shepherd's case, something way different.'
    '"The effect is without exception interesting,"' Dylan quoted
Frankenstein, as he had quoted him before, '"frequently
astonishing, and sometimes positive."'
    Jilly saw the wonder in Dylan's face, the shining hope in his
eyes. 'You think this is positive for Shep?'
    'I don't know about the talent to... to fold things. Whether
that might be a blessing or a curse. Only time will tell. But