Okay
The party was in full swing inside and Erend felt suffocated. All this noise and laughter and it felt wrong because Ersa wasn't there. He thought he'd been doing okay, he thought he had gotten over the worst of it, but the grief, the loss, and the gaping hole left by her death continued to rise up, threatening to choke him. He stumbled to the door and out, unnoticed by all the revelers save one.
The night air was cool against his face. He sat down on one of the benches, grateful for the empty streets.
"You okay?" Aloy, hesitant and concerned.
He took a deep breath, willing his voice to be steady. "Yeah, just needed some air."
A pause. "You're not."
"Not what?"
"Okay. You're pretending to be, but you're not."
"Look, just drop it alright? I'm said I'm fine."
Aloy fell silent, but didn't move, staring down at the pendant she always wore around her neck. "It's okay to not be fine," she said quietly. "You just lost your sister. It takes time."
He remembered abruptly, like a hazy dream, something she'd said when she first arrived in Meridian.
"I lost someone too. At the Proving. The man who raised me. His name was Rost."
At the time, he'd been too wrapped up in his own grief to care, too drunk to be sympathetic or to even understand what had happened. Aloy turned to go back inside. In the light from the doorway, he saw old sorrow etched in her eyes.
"Wait, Aloy . . ." He stood up with a sigh. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap." He glanced back at the open door and the boisterous voices inside. "You maybe want to find someplace quiet? I'd . . . I'd like to tell you about Ersa and maybe . . . maybe you could tell me about Rost."
She nodded, her smile fragile but genuine. "I'd like that."