Vey says something quietly to Bay, slaps his shoulder, laughs, but as I walk away, I see Bay’s eyes fixed on me over their heads, as if he is trying to stop me, his brows drawn together with that little vertical crease on his forehead. I do not want to make things awkward in front of these guys, so I vanish.
Two hours later, when I am home curled up in my nest and nervously biting my nails, my phone rings.
It is Bay. I hesitate whether I should answer, but I do not. Telling him all of that cost me so much. I know we cannot be together yet and I only wanted him to know I have not given up, and I want to give him time to think everything over, to process it.
So when the ringing stops, I text him.
"What I told you today had to be said, but I do not want anything more right now, I am not expecting any answer. Maybe it is even better if you do not reply, because I want to come to you in the right way, the way we should have been from the beginning. I do not want half measures, I do not want substitutes. Do not forget about me and remember I am working on getting back what was taken from us nine years ago."
There is a moment of silence.
Then one text arrives.
"I understand."
And that is all.
My stomach tightens from stress and a bit of disappointment, but this is for the best, I have to arm myself with patience, a little more, just a little more.
???
At the next therapy session, which takes place a week later, I ask Blue to increase my dose.
Blue seems a bit distracted, lost in thought, his mind clearly somewhere else.
When I make my request, he says nothing at first, only after a moment reacting and answering in a rather absent tone,
"We can raise the dose by zero point eight nanograms, I think that is still within safety limits without risking a cascade reaction in your system, but the side effects may be worse."
"Fine, if it shortens my therapy even by a month or two, that would be great," I mumble.
Blue does not respond. He turns the vial of my blood between his fingers, the one he took for further tests, and before he puts it into the fridge I decide to ask my question.
"Is everything alright? A situation like that attack could really mess with someone’s head. I am sorry you had to deal with that again, it is insane."
Blue lets out a breath and says in a rather bitter tone of someone who has reached their limits, "I have been thinking about changing my entire approach. It occurred to me recently that I cannot trust my own security guards, because none of them are… closely connected to me, which makes it easy to buy them off… the way it happened this time. But what if I hired someone else as my guard?"
"I don’t understand, who would you hire as a guard if not a professional, someone who knows what they are doing?"
Blue turns toward me and adjusts his electronic glasses, faint blue sparks gliding over the surface.
"Never mind, I am just thinking out loud."
"But what you said does not make sense, everybody can be bought."
"Not if the person has a stronger connection to me, if keeping me alive would benefit the person in a way."
I stare at him, slightly gaping. He sees my open mouth and shrugs.
"Forget it. I am just trying to explore different options, and you know how I am, if something does not work in one approach, I try the second one no matter how absurd it may seem to outsiders. That is the kind of scientist I am."
I smile under my breath. "Well, to be fair, it worked in my case."
"Exactly," Blue says with a corner-of-the-mouth smirk. He never smiles sincerely, it is always these dry little half smirks.
Sometimes I am tempted to ask him more about his private life, because everything I know about him comes from interviews where he said he had never been interested in a relationship with another man. Malik called him ‘a monk’ and he indeed seems to have dedicated his life only to work and science. He’s brilliant at this, but… does he ever think about something more?
Well, I’m not sure if there is even space to discuss it. My relationship with Blue is always saturated with conversations about my health and test results, and we rarely touch on anything personal.
