The farm doesn't lend itself to keeping up with hot town gossip. It's time-consuming and physically out of the way... the farm, that is. The hot gossip is always as subtle as a brick to the face.

This day in town is a day or so after the ruckus.

Tim's only sorry he hasn't had the chance to peek at who got the worst busted face, though he can put names together with the appropriate effort. It should be a relief that his own name's fallen out of fashion; Tim is hauling a crude, iron V-frame out of one house on skids, and he swears he's seen the old man in front of the Center capture the attention of someone with a cool and fresh blossom of a bruise.

And so he thinks, and says,

"So you're Captain?"

The girls were right, Tim thinks in disheartened dullness. Maybe not these girls (but more than likely, also in step with these girls), but the girls back home: the ones who can and have kicked his ass into gear, or have kicked his ass in general for assorted other reasons. They were right all along.

Men are a particular kind of pathetic.

Heap responsibility onto them and watch them all crumble.

Tim can't keep the uptwitch of his lips hidden, though he does the expert thing of following Francis' gaze to the lunk of metal he's towing. He asks, plainly,

"You know about construction, right? You practically braved that blizzard in your igloo."