[ from this post ] [ @healsinheelsx​ ]83. “It’s always been you.“It has?” He

[ from this post ] [ @healsinheelsx​ ]

83. “It’s always been you.

“It has?” Her voice is a tentative murmur, as if she’d somehow thought the reply too candid.

“Yeah. Always.” His left leg pops to its own beat beneath the café table as he scrubs at his hairline with nervousness in his fingertips. “Little funny, innit? Considering how we met.”

“I don’t know if I would use that exact descriptor.” Satya eyes him with—bewilderment, he thinks; he can’t quite place the emotion on her face. “It has been a year since the second Crisis was put to an end. We worked together for the better part of two to make that happen. I… I don’t understand. All that time we spent, why—”

Her brow furrows, and she takes a long pause, seeming to think better of her question. She narrows her gaze to the wine glass by her hand. The golden trappings of her Ministry garb glint in the waning sunlight as she thins her mouth in thought; her crystal earrings are glittering shards, her necklace a circle of starlight.

Jamison raps his prosthetic fingers along the table’s rim. His heartbeat snaps like fireworks beneath the red of his dress shirt. Perhaps he shouldn’t have come.

With a measured breath, she starts again: “If what you say is true,” she says, quietly, a lone undertone above the café’s chatter, “why did you wait?”

He could say I wasn’t sure, but it would be a lie, because he was.

He could say I was afraid, and it would be the truth, because he was.

“Didn’t seem like the right time,” he says instead, and it isn’t quite either; it is a half, a partial, an incomplete.

“And now is?”

Jamison works his jaws and tries to gather himself. He remembers casual comforts at her side while flames devoured vats of midnight oil. He remembers his too eager encouragements when he would see her on the field, and the glorious thrill he’d get when she would return them in full. He remembers being pressed in close quarters, carrying her through injury, her finger against his mouth in stints of reconnaissance; he remembers the sweet aftermaths of shaky combat highs punctuated by the gentle sounds of her laughter—and it hurts.

All of the things left unsaid threaten to spill from between his ribs. They fizz so horribly underneath. The little words he could never quite choke out beside her seem to well up and vie for escape, an anxious hum lining the length of his throat.

No one had ever told him talking would hurt.

He offers a noncommittal shrug. “Suppose it’s better than another year, yeah?”

Something like a smile treats the side of her mouth. “Yes, I suppose it is.”

“Right. So, how’ve you been? Minister, eh? Suits you, I’d say. Must be real nice.”

“Wait just one moment.” Satya splays her hand flat upon the table, and she eyes him with a keen sort of scrutiny. “Are you really going to change the subject so quickly? You’ve just told me something very—very important, and now you want to default to idle conversation?”

“Well, at least I know how idle conversation goes. Talk about work, ‘bout the weather, maybe mention the others and how they are if you’ve heard from ‘em. Y’know, the usual.” He doesn’t need to see his face to know his cheeks are flushed. “This is… different.”

“It is quite different,” she agrees. “Not that I wouldn’t want to know what has happened with you in the past year, because I would, but I’d very much like to address your claim first.”

Jamison squirms in his chair. “My claim? D’you really have to make it sound so formal? Not like I’m submitting applications or anything.”

“I would much rather deal with an application of yours than read through yet another set of incorrectly measured plans,” she says.

He does not know how to interpret that. “You calling me better than work?”

The white-gold of her prosthetic hand suppresses a soft snicker. “I think I am.”

His stomach should not somersault at the thought, but it does, and it feels more delightful than it should. Biting at his lip, he searches the cloth-covered tabletop for something interesting to stare at because looking at her makes his pulse skip twice too many. It feels like he should say something, anything; you’re bloody gorgeous comes to mind, but gorgeousdoes not do her justice (it never has), and she deserves more than paltry banalities. He wishes he weren’t drawing this terrible blank—he has heaps of things he wants to say, and yet his thoughts have dispersed and the words attached to them have become disjointed motes captured only in slats of sunshine.

A brief ghost of movement skirts his periphery. Hesitant at first, and then more insistent. “Has it always?”

He glances upward. Her hand, thin and svelte, reaches between the plates and glasses, white polish brushed on perfect nails.

With a dizzying exhilaration locked within his lungs, Jamison allows his left to close the distance. Black polish coats each one of his.

Her skin is warm.

“Yeah,” he says. “Always.”