"No," he says, and given that she's not responding to either of them talking, he doesn't think she can hear them at all. Spirits are like that -- when he was a child, he could talk to all of them, but as an adult, he could only see them, sometimes hear them. In Baedal, it depends mostly on how strong the spirit is, not on him.

She's not responding, just watching the playground. It occurs to him that one of them might be hers.

He scoots over to the far side of the bench, leaving room for Tatiana to sit if she wants without disturbing anything.