It had been a long day. Rich had patched up double the usual amount of stab wounds leaving him exhausted and more than a little grumpy. He washed up, throwing his gloves and everything else into a bin, before going into his sitting room. He wanted to take the hottest shower in the history of Andromeda, but first he'd better make sure he hadn't missed any urgent messages.
There were only three, all from Reyes and all sent one after the other. Rich couldn't help but smile as he pulled open the first one.
-Bored. Wish you were here.
Rich opened the attachment to find a picture of an empty glass on a table. He hit reply.
-You and me both. Save some for me.
He opened Reyes' second email
-Look, I found an old Milky Way photo of you. Amazing what you can find while digging through old records.
The attached image was of an angry looking brown owl. Rich wanted to be annoyed but, fuck, it really did look like him, didn't it? Where had he even found that picture? Rich typed up his reply.
-Never speak to me again.
Send. At some point when he had been incredibly sleep deprived (or drunk, or both,) he'd set it up so that all his emails to Reyes automatically filled in "love you" at the end and he'd just never bothered to disable it. Seeing that after the message probably ruined the effect somewhat. The next email, which Reyes had sent just seconds after the owl one just read:
-Still coming to dinner tomorrow?
Rich hit reply.
-Yes. I'm bringing whiskey.
Rich tossed the datapad onto his couch. At least he didn't feel as grumpy anymore. It was late but he might still be able to catch a few hours of sleep before he had to get up again at 4am. He went to take a shower, unable to stop himself from smiling. He couldn't bring himself to feel silly about it either. He was too happy.