His thoughts boiled and writhed like a mass of snakes, twisting together until his head was full to bursting. Sleep evaded him. He sought solace with old friends, but even books could offer little comfort this night. The words fled the moment his eyes passed over them, turning familiar words—from the Bible, from Chaucer, from Locke—into meaningless scratches.
Unable to sit in silence with his roiling mind, he activated the television using a small wand. It filled the room with reassuring noise and flickering light, and he slumped gratefully onto the settle. He permitted the chatter to wrap around him, insulating him from the most vicious and persistent of his thoughts. What images the box showed him was of little consequence—an overwrought melodrama, a treatise on the meerkat, a competition in which amateur singers warbled with varying degrees of competency.
He stumbled across a baseball game, then mashed buttons until it disappeared.
And so the hours slunk by.
When the shadows began to lengthen, Ichabod silenced the television. He washed and dressed slowly, every motion deliberate, his entire being focused upon the simple actions, for it was simpler to consider the shine of his boots than the destination before him. Then, as he always knew he must, he set out for Miss Mills' home.
For once, Ichabod had no charted course of action. What he would say, what he would do, what he wanted, it was all fog. But if Ichabod knew anything with certainty now, he knew that their fates were ineluctably linked, and that he could not long avoid her. Nor she him. They must discern the next steps they would take—or find a way to return to the status quo.
He reached her door and rapped thrice.
It took several moments, but a chain rattled, the bolt slid free, and the door opened. She did not throw it wide, did not grant him entrance. She rested her cheek on the side of the door. "How're you doin'?" she asked.
"Very well, thank you. And how does this day find you?"
"I'm good," she said, returning his lies.
That was rather as far as Ichabod had planned this tête-à-tête, and Miss Mills did not seem inclined to carry the conversational burden. Yet he could not crawl back to his hole, attempt to smother his thoughts under meaningless pablum or even throw himself into research for the day he must do battle against his son.
He needed her friendship now more than ever.
"Will you take the air with me?" he asked. "The day is fine; the sun is warm. It would be pleasant to ramble beside the river, perhaps."
She inhaled. "Crane, I'm not ready to talk yet. I know that's shitty and I know it's not fair to you, and I'm sorry about that, but-"
"Then it is fortunate that perambulation requires no speech." In truth, perhaps he, too, was not yet prepared to discuss yesterday's temptations. But nor could he be alone. "Walk with me. Please."
Only then did she exhale the breath she had drawn. "Yeah. Okay." She disappeared from the door for a moment, then reappeared, tucking something—her pistol, he realized—into the back of her trousers. She locked her door, and they set off.
Miss Mills walked briskly, as ever, requiring him to trot to keep apace. Her hands were jammed firmly into her pockets, her shoulders high and tight. His own form felt similarly stiff, as if he strained to keep himself apart from her, but he did not intrude. He wondered if it would be forever thus between them now, eternally separated by unsaid words and unfelt desires.
They soon left the huddle of apartments and strode across a broad field. Tall grass whisked against her knees and his calves. Mourning doves cooed a requiem whilst chattering blue jays scolded their solemnity.
The pleasant repetition of walking helped unsnarl his thoughts. Trepidatiously, he permitted himself to remember yesterday. It was all there, branded upon his eidetic mind with excruciating detail. She had been so certain that the truth would tear them apart—even before they defined what that truth was. He must conclude, then, that she did harbor feelings of love. As he did, deeply and ardently.
He supposed there was a certain satisfaction in that. To know that he was loved by one person who still trod this earth. And yet, how to express and sustain that love seemed to utterly baffle her.
They tacked east, toward the Pocantico River. Neither of them followed; nor did either lead. And yet they moved as one. Miss Mills had withdrawn her hands, her body relaxing as they fell into a rhythm that felt almost familiar and natural. They walked nearer now, inexorable as magnets.
In that moment with Lust, Ichabod had been utterly ready to devote his life, his whole life, to her. But then there appeared the most pernicious Sin of all, and his certainty crumbled. He still loved Katrina, just as deeply and just as ardently. And he would, for every moment of every day as long as he lived.
But Katrina had charged him, with her last breath, to love. Had she seen some nascent spark between the Witnesses? Or had she simply known, as had her Creator, that it was not good for man to be alone?
Ichabod was not sure his heart could bear the glorious burden of loving them both. And yet, loving them was like the night and the day. Neither was greater than the other; man needs the sun to grow and the moon to inspire. And just as the moon reflects light from its sister, he could only love Miss Mills now because he had first loved Katrina, had been taught what it meant to surrender to another.
Miss Mills had never had such a teacher.
The river unfurled before them, turgid and unhurried as it wended its way through the trees. They stopped on its verdant bank. They stood so near, the backs of their hands nearly brushed.
"This is what Envy showed me," she said. "This is what it said I wanted." He expected her to pull away, but she was motionless, staring over the waters.
Words bubbled to his lips. Explanations, theories about why Envy had behaved thusly. Attempts to explain that just because Envy had presented such a future did not mean it was evil, only that the demon had meant to achieve that future through nefarious means. And yet, he fought back the deluge of words and remained silent. It was not his place to dictate or change her feelings, whatever they might be.
She seemed disinclined to elaborate on the idea, instead settling herself on the river bank, her feet dangling over the water. He took his place beside her. The river rolled on.
"You ever wonder if it's not real?" she said after a time.
"Beg pardon?" His voice was rough with disuse.
"If our bond is fake. If we only feel...whatever we feel, because we're Witnesses. That God or some other fucker makes us click because it fits His apocalypse game plan." She plucked a stone from the ground beside her and heaved it into the water below. It sank with a soft plunk.
"I have considered the possibility that our bond is externally imposed. But I find it more probable we were selected because God or 'some other fucker' knew we would complement one another. That I waited two hundred and thirty-two years because the powers that be knew that one day, you would be born. And that together, we would do wondrous things."
She snorted; he did not know what that meant. She drew her knees to her chest, protecting herself like a hedgehog. But did she seek protection from the world, or from something inside herself?
"If you wish it, this will be but vapor between us. I will speak no more of love, will satisfy myself with your friendship, which is a far greater blessing than ever I deserved," he said. He hoped he was stalwart and true enough to keep such a promise; he believed he was.
"I'm scared, Crane." She stared very hard into the far distance, refusing to turn even slightly toward him, lest he see the tears he could already hear. "That by getting greedy and pushing for something great, I'll fuck up one of the few good things in my life. Because if we do what you said, if we jump, that's it. Either we soar or we splatter. We can never go back to the way things were." She laughed, a cruel sound directed at herself. "Isn't it goddamn ironic. I love you too much to love you. Fucking perfect."
He ached for her, for the life that had shown her so little in the way of kindness, that forced her to doubt her own affections. She had been dealt the far crueler hand: He had slept through his waiting, while she had been forced to live decades of desolation while she waited for him to awaken. He had loved and lost, while she had never loved at all.
It was tempting to wave aside her concerns with sweet words. That surely their love would succeed; it was destiny. That he would dedicate every breath to the service of her happiness. That he would treasure her heart above all things of heaven and earth. But while he could commit himself to those ends, he could never know for sure whether they would be enough. Whether it would not all fall to ashes, as she so bleakly predicted.
He steeled his courage. "Miss Mills," he began.
She turned to him then, eyes blazing and angry beneath a veil of unshed tears. "What if I lose you? What happens then?"
"That, I cannot say. Nor can any man." He smiled then, for the first time allowing hope to well within his breast. "But oh, Abbie, what if you don't?"
He did not know if the sound that issued from her was a laugh or a sob, or perhaps an amalgamation of the two. But slowly, like a flower, she unfurled from her protective huddle. He feared she would flee; he hoped she would stay. Instead, she squared her shoulders toward him, seized his collar, and drug him bodily forward. And then, she kissed him.
Ichabod swore he saw the face of God in her eyes.
Her lips were soft and warm, surprising in the gentleness and deliberation with which she kissed him, even if her mouth did rather move more than he was accustomed to. Her tears pattered against his face, and he cradled her cheeks in his hands, wiping the offending moisture away. It would now be his honor-bound duty to ensure that the only tears she knew would be those of joy.
The kiss ended, as all kisses must. They blinked at one another, and Ichabod could feel an idiotic smile spreading across his face. She did not return the gesture.
"I'm a pain in the ass, Crane. This isn't gonna be easy," she warned. As if anything could deter him now.
"Then we are fortunate that I am possessed of an endlessly sweet and mild disposition," he teased. He took special care to remember this moment, etching the sound of her laughter onto his heart so he could carry it with him always.
"And, I can't believe I'm saying this, but slow. I want to go slow. You're too important to rush." She scrubbed the remnants of her tears away with her knuckles.
"My lady, you have the lead in this dance. I shall merrily follow wherever you wish to go."
They sat on the riverbank as the sun slipped away and a gibbous moon rose.