Disclaimer: Same old, same old. I don't owe them.
Set during 'A Heart for Falsehood Framed'
One year and some weeks...
She refuses to meet his gaze while she keeps frantically rummaging through her drawers in her quarters on the Andromeda.
He keeps silent, sitting on an edge of her bed, watching her intensely.
She is maybe crying, but doesn't show it – not to him, anyway.
He doesn't understand.
She finally turns around, throwing all sort of things: clothes, souvenirs into a large bag, the shadow of a smile on her lips.
She feels the night growing heavy on both of them. She knows it's late.
He only knows that she's leaving tonight.
She'll take just one year and some weeks worth of feelings with her. There is no time for discussions... She'll see this last job for him to the end... No hard feelings... They'll see each other around! For all it's worth...
-
He can't do much else but wait to hear from her, wandering around, avoiding the Than admiral and the Doge...
She throws her bag into some magnet-cab, asking to be taken to Leydon's place...
He goes to a theater on the drift, watching some holovid, his heart heavy in his chest, unable to follow the plot...
She can't wait to start over...
He thinks of the woman who stood by him for so long now, brave, witty, beautiful...
She keeps thinking of him, too; but a bit annoyed, she'll rather think of the future. Not the past. But there will be other nights for her to follow her dreams.
He just thinks of losing himself in some woman's bed or other...
He'll stay behind with just one year and some weeks worth remembering... He won't forget. And he'll keep waiting for her to come back. It would be so worth it.
-
She just hopes that this story with Leydon won't lead to some harsh awakening, to yet another realization on a bleary morning that the whole thing was pointless.
He struggles to keep the faith in her, that she'll stay true to her word, even though he knows she won't come back afterwards.
She takes her time.
He sits around in Hydroponics, eating cherries and spitting the stones out against the bulkhead, trying to think of schemes to delay the ultimatum.
She looks at her unpacked bag thoughtfully, with weighing eyes.
He sleeps with his doors left open that night.
-
She keeps them waiting.
He listens to the Than, to the Doge, stares wide-eyed at him, this guy who'll take her away, the words 'game over' going round and round in his head.
She suddenly then walks in, kisses him on the lips. Her kiss tells him to play along, to follow her lead, to pay attention. It also tells him to trust her, it tells him that she's back, and that she's back to stay.
He is too stunned to see her, feel her, too eager to get rid of the Heart, of his 'guests', to avoid Tyr's scandalized expression to respond to her kiss in an appropriate manner.
She looks at him amused.
He cuts a funny face, hardly able to suppress a wild urge to laugh out loud. There will later be enough time to talk...
Between the two of them they share - almost to the day - one year and some weeks worth of a second chance...