She looks at me for a long moment with that direct, unarmored look. "Can I ask you something else?"
"Yes."
“You have a mandate. I have a reason to disappear. Would you consider a relationship with me to fulfill your mandate, and protect me? Like a contract?”
I frown. Why would she offer such a thing? I look over her and wonder how it is she can keep surprising me.
“You don’t need to do that. You’ve been through enough.”
“Oh, I see.” She drops her head and lowers her eyes from mine. But I still see the crease in her forehead when she frowns.
“What do you see?” I ask, confused.
“I’m not your type. It’s fine. I didn’t mean to be so forward. I guess I’m just all mixed up with everything that’s happened…” She gives a half shrug and an awkward smile, but still won’t meet my eyes.
“Look at me,” I say, then I wait as she pulls together the courage to do as I ask. I think about my next words carefully. “You’re not lacking anything,” I tell her. “Not in looks. Not in mind. I’m not blind, Mia.”
I let that sit.
“But I met you on the worst night of your life. I’m not going to build something permanent on top of that.”
I put my hand over hers, hoping the contact won’t startle her.
“My decision is nothing to do with how attracted I am to you, and everything to do with how I won’t take advantage of you while you are vulnerable.”
She nods slowly, her throat working a little.
“It’s funny,” she finally says. “I don’t feel vulnerable when I’m with you.”
Mia
The words leave my mouth before I've fully decided to say them, and once they're out, I can't take them back. They hang in the kitchen between us, too honest and too raw, and I watch his face do something I don't have a name for.
He doesn't say anything immediately. His hand is still over mine on the counter, warm and heavy and very still, and I'm aware of the way his fingers dwarf mine, the way the weight of his palm feels like an anchor rather than a cage.
"That’s not a small thing to say to me."
"I know."
He watches me for a moment longer. Then he withdraws his hand, slowly, with the deliberateness I'm starting to understand is simply how he does everything.
"You need to eat something," he says. "Real food. Not fruit you push around a bowl."
I almost smile. "You noticed that."
"I notice most things."
He says it simply. The same way you'd say the sky is grey or it's January. And I believe him, because I think he notices everything, all the time, as a matter of professional survival, and I think it must be exhausting.
Pavlina appears from somewhere. She has the quality of a woman who materializes precisely when she's needed and not a moment before. Within minutes, there is toast on the counter, thick-cut and golden, with butter and eggs that smell like they were cracked thirty seconds ago. I realise as the smell hits me that I am ravenous in a way that feels almost violent, like my body has finally caught up with the fact that it's been running on adrenaline and fear for the better part of twelve hours.
I eat without pretending not to be hungry, which is something I would normally do, calibrating my appetite to make it palatable. Usually, I’d take small bites and leave something on the plate to prove I don’t need too much. I don't do any of that. I eat the toast and the eggs and drink the coffee Pavlina refills without being asked. The food fills my stomach like ballast, like something steadying a ship.
Iosif watches me. Not overtly. He's doing something on his phone, scrolling through messages with the focused efficiency of a man whose morning has already been derailed and who is rerouting around the damage. But I catch him looking up twice, and both times there's something in his expression that's not pity or assessment or desire. It’s something quieter than all of those. Something that looks, if I had to name it, like relief.
He's relieved that I'm eating.
Something shifts in my chest. A small, tectonic thing.
