Tap, tap, tap.

She considered the box for a moment, then tapped it against her hand again.

Tap-click, tap-click, tap-click.

Clear yellow this time, not opaque, or mottled, or white with a yellow stripe.

Tap, tap-click, tap, tap-click-click.

It made a cool noise. She wondered if the others had made a cool noise.

Click, tap-clicka, clicka, click.

She hadn't left them in their boxes long enough to find out.

Click-tap, click-clicka, click-tap.

She hadn't sat there contemplating one before this, either.

Knock, knock, knock.

She looked up, a little surprised. "Come in," she called automatically.

Andros stuck his head in as the door slid open. "How are you doing?" he asked, taking in the unruly state of her room and her apparent inactivity. "Need any help?"

She held up the box. "Do you know how many toothbrushes I have now?" she demanded.

He gave her an odd look. "One?"

"Four!" She tossed the little box on her bed and stared up at him. "I have four toothbrushes!"

"Interesting," he said noncommittally. When she just looked at him, he added, "Well... at least they won't get lonely?"

She shook her head. "I have one at home," she muttered, mostly to herself. "I have one here, and one in your room. And now I have another one--this is my fourth toothbrush!"

He sat down next to her, picking up the box with her new toothbrush in it. "Nice," he offered, sounding somewhat amused. "Why can't you just have one that you take with you when you stay somewhere else?"

"Because I'd forget it." She gave him a sideways look. "Like your comb."

"I didn't forget it," he objected indignantly. "I told you, that was Zhane's fault."

"He did your hair, so it's his fault that you forgot your comb?"

"I didn't forget it!" he exclaimed. "He should have given it back. He's the one who forgot."

"I bet that's not what he'd say if I asked him," she remarked.

"Well, honesty has never been his first reaction when it comes to girls," Andros muttered. It was impossible to tell whether he was joking or not.

She reached out, putting her hand over his until he looked up. "Have I--" She hesitated, suddenly self-conscious. She'd meant to ask this for some time, but the moment had never seemed quite right.

"I've never come between you and Zhane, have I?" she asked at last, searching his expression.

He looked surprised. "No, of course not. Why?"

She shrugged uncomfortably. "The longer I know you, the more I realize how close you are. I just--I don't want that to change."

Andros actually chuckled. "I think that's one of the reasons I love you," he admitted, gazing back at her. "Thanks for asking, but no. Nothing could ever come between me and Zhane."

She swallowed, but before she could answer he had lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her fingers gently. "Just like nothing could ever come between me and you," Andros finished, smiling at her.

She breathed out in relief, smiling back. "You're right about that," she agreed fiercely, throwing her arms around him. "I love you."

"I love you, too," he murmured, returning her embrace.

She felt something tap her shoulderblade, and she giggled as she recognized the "tap-click" of her new toothbrush. "Yes?"

"Thanks," he said simply.

There was more in that one word than he had said since he'd walked in. There was also nothing she could say that she hadn't already told him, so she just closed her eyes and hugged him harder.

"Zhane?"

He rolled over onto his stomach, the rough surface of the roof scraping against his bare arms. It wouldn't be long before the wind turned chilly up here beneath the twilight stars. "Yeah," he answered, gazing at her silhouette in the dimness. "What's up?"

She seemed to hesitate, which struck him as strange. Once she started to say something, she said it, and this time turned out to be no exception. "Are we exclusive?"

He blinked at her. "What?"

"Ashley asked, earlier," she said, not bothering to repeat the question. She knew he had heard her. "I said I didn't know."

"Define exclusive," he said at last. He couldn't come up with any definition by which the word would ever apply to them, or at least to him--and when he thought about it objectively, he admitted that Astrea had some of that same restlessness.

She let out a breath of amusement, and he heard her shift a little. "I was hoping you would do that for me," she remarked wryly.

He chuckled. "Maybe Ashley could do it," he suggested, tracing one finger between the roof tiles. "I don't know what she's talking about half the time anyway."

"She said it means commitment," Astrea offered unexpectedly. "She said it means loving one person so much that you promise to never love anyone else."

He paused in his tracing, clenching his fingers into a fist and resting his chin on it. "I suppose she doesn't love her brother anymore, then. Or her parents. Or you, or Cassie, or any of us except Andros."

There was silence for a moment. "I don't think that's what she meant," she said at last.

"But that's what she said," he pointed out.

The whine of an incoming shuttle rode the rustle of the wind, making an artificial counterpoint to the steady drone of insects all around. A lower pitched hum overwhelmed the shuttle's engine noise and he glanced toward the skyport curiously. Through the launch pad lights he thought he could see the bulky outline of a hover ferry, and he wondered if that was the source of the sound.

"I think I love Andros," Astrea said abruptly.

The ignition lights on the hover ferry came up, competing with the skyport's illumination, and he smiled into the night. "That makes two of us."

"But does that mean that I love you less?" she persisted. "If I don't love you enough to love just you..."

"No one can only love one person," he interrupted. "Maybe Ashley says she loves only Andros because she loves him differently than she loves other people. But she does love other people. She wouldn't be Ashley if she didn't."

A quiet purr from below announced the passage of a hover, and he turned a little to stare down at the road. It had been unusually still tonight. He wondered if something that he didn't know about was keeping traffic down.

"I love you differently than I love Andros."

He lifted his head from his fist to regard her intently. Her hair haloed her face, backlit and glowing around the shadows that hid her eyes. "You don't have to be like Ashley, you know."

She didn't answer.

"Everyone is different," he continued, more quietly. "Just because you don't act like her, or feel like her, that doesn't mean that you're any less valid."

"Valid," she repeated. She sounded as though she was trying the word out. It was the same tone of voice she had used to say "exclusive". "True? Worthwhile?"

"All of the above," he said firmly. "The universe already has an Ashley. We need an Astrea, too, or things won't be half as interesting."

"You think I account for half the interesting things in the universe?"

He pretended to consider it for a moment. "You're right," he said at last. "Definitely more. Maybe three-quarters of the interesting things."

She giggled. "I love you a lot, Zhane."

"Love you more," he said flippantly.

"So we're not exclusive." She sounded satisfied with the statement.

It wasn't a question, but he thought carefully about his answer. "I'm committed to you," he said at last. "I love you, and you're special to me in a way no one else is. But I can't say that I only love you or promise that I ever will."

"You wouldn't be Zhane if you did," she said softly, and he smiled at the echo of his own comment.

"I'm yours," he told her, and it was the truth. "In some ways, you're mine. But we don't belong to each other, not completely. That doesn't mean we love each other less."

He offered an amused shrug as something occurred to him. "Maybe it even means we love more, because we don't need to own each other to believe in our relationship."

"Trust?" Astrea suggested.

"Or validity," he said with a grin.

She laughed, and somehow that made it funny. He wasn't sure he had meant it to be, but with her it didn't matter. With Astrea, things just were, and that was one of many things he loved about her. Not just her, but the way he was with her. She made him comfortable with who he was.

"You make me like myself," he said aloud, suddenly realizing he had never told her that.

Her hair fluttered around her face again, and he heard the hover ferry prepping for takeoff in the distance. "You've always done that for me. I guess it's only fair that I return the favor."

Despite her noncommittal reply, he could tell she was pleased. Rolling back onto his back, he looked up at the star spangled sky. "Pick a star?"

She didn't point, but he could tell from the sound of her voice that she had tilted her head back. "That one."

He smiled a little, and the cobalt night breathed cool wind all around them. "That's the one I picked, too."