“Yes,” he said, because he was a liar and he was in love and he was a liar preciselybecausehe was in love.
Oh, God, how he wanted to see Cassian smile again.
“Good.” Cassian shut his eyes and let out a long breath. Upon reopening them, he looked at the notebook in James’s lap. “How can you even see what you’re writing? You’re not near one of the lights. And what on earthcouldyou be writing in the middle of the night, anyway? Surely not a letter home if you can barely see the page.”
James huffed a quiet laugh.
“You’re right. I can’t see, really. But I’m mostly writing so that I can remember my ideas better later. I find that scribbling things down helps my brain hold onto them, whether or not I can seeeveryword on the page. Or even whether or not I can see most of them. I, uhm, I figured that out a long time ago.” Pausing, James rolled his bottom lip between his teeth, his cheeks warming at the prospect of sharing more with Cassian. “See, when I was a kid, I wanted to recall my dreams. And so, I’d wake up in the middle of the night, and then, in the cloak of absolute darkness, I’d hastily write down whatever I could before falling back asleep. In the morning, even reading random words like... like ‘chicken’ or ‘marbles’ or whatever it was that I’d scribbled in the nighttime would help me remember the rest of whatever scene it was related to.” He paused. “It’s probably silly.”
“It’s not silly,” Cassian said. “In fact, I think it’s rather clever.”
James’s cheeks burned hotter, and his insides melted into a soupy porridge of want.
“Thank you,” he said softly.
Cassian smiled and knocked James’s knee with his own.
“You only answeredhalfof what I asked, though,” he said, his tone a mixture of playful and chastising that made James’s stomach tumble. “Are youwriting a letter, then? One that you’ll transcribe over to a new sheet of paper tomorrow?”
“I’m... writing a story,” James replied, somewhat meekly.
Cassian cocked an eyebrow. “What, like one of those short stories that they publish in magazines?”
“Yes.” James’s stomach roiled. “Except, well, except mine couldn’t ever be published.”
“Why not?”
“It’s a, uhm, a love story.” James’s heart began to pound. “Between two men.”
Cassian’s eyebrows shot up.
“Sorry.” James winced. “I know that’s... not the most comfortable subject. But I’m really only writing it for myself. And I like men, so I... well, so that’s what I wanted to... to write.”
Cassian only hummed. James began rolling his pen between his fingers.
“I want you to tell me about it,” Cassian remarked after a while.
James stopped twirling the pen. “Are you sure?”
Cassian nodded, the movement nearly imperceptible, as though he could barely force himself to respond, even without words.
“Alright, well, uhm, there’s a sailor,” James said. “He’s inexperienced. But eager to learn. He’s hungry for it. For knowledge. For adventure. But he’s naïve. He has no concept of the types of perils that wait for him in open waters.”
Nervousness twisted in James’s stomach. He paused to check on Cassian, to see whether or not the man might want to hear more.
“I’m intrigued,” Cassian said. “Go on.”
James swallowed thickly. His hands began to tremble a little.
“Eventually, his ship will be attacked. He’ll be taken by pirates. Or, well, I mean, the, uhm, the rival ship, it has more than one pirate. But there’s only one who...”
James couldn’t even make himself continue. It seemed so ridiculous now.
“Who . . . ?” Cassian prodded.
“I can’t.”
Cassian leveled a look. “James.”
