All of a sudden Hassan's hands are on him and they're solid. He can feel the slight roughness, the heat of his blood. And he stays solid. He's felt things that aren't there before, usually when he's half-asleep, but this is different, it has to be. Other people can see him, other people can touch him, this has to be real.

He doesn't flinch. Wolfgang will wince and pull away when people touch him, but never with Hassan.

He can see the swelling around one of his eyes, blood under the skin turning it dark, all the lines in his face he doesn't remember being there before. He can't tell how old he is, but time is less linear here than it is otherwise, and it doesn't matter anyway because he's here. This close, he can even smell him, and has he ever hallucinated a smell before? That's different, too — there's an adult muskiness there he doesn't remember; the last time he saw Hassan, he was fifteen and Uri was twelve.

"Oh my God." Uri puts his hand out, slowly, afraid, like if he touches him he'll burst into a cloud of smoke and disappear, poof. But he doesn't. Uri's eyes fill with tears that spill over immediately. He has his arms around him, suddenly, fiercely, face buried in his neck because God he's crying and people are going to see and think he's weak and how dare any of these people touch Hassan, how dare they, he should kill all of them —

"Oh my God," he says again. "You're tall." And it's weird.