Page 38 of C is for Captive

“Still fourteen hours?”

“Yes.”

“Was it fourteen hours the last time you checked?”

He gave her a look.

“And the time before that?”

“Amy.”

“I’m just trying to understand how navigation works. Does the planet get closer if you glare at it?”

He drank whatever she’d put in the cup. It was hot, bitter, and unpleasant. She watched as he took another sip.

“It’s terrible, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“I thought so.”

“Then why are you drinking it?”

“We don’t have anything better. I’m trying to convince myself it’s coffee.”

“Coffee?”

“An Earth beverage that brought me immense pleasure.”

“And does this remind you of it?”

“Not in the slightest, but it’s the best I can do.”

He looked at her cup. She sighed and surrendered it. Hers was considerably less bitter.

“You put sweetener in yours.”

“Of course I did.”

He handed it back.

“Thief,” she muttered, but she was smiling.

He liked making her smile. That was another discovery he hadn’t expected. There were a great many things about being with her that he hadn’t expected. He hadn’t expected to notice when she woke in the morning because of the change in her breathing. He hadn’t expected to learn that she hummed tunelessly when she cooked or that she talked to machinery when it refused to cooperate. He hadn’t expected to know precisely how her footsteps sounded in the corridor outside the cockpit.

He certainly hadn’t expected to enjoy being teased. He had spent most of his life avoiding people. Now he found himself constantly listening for this one.

She looked at the display again.

“Are you afraid of what we’ll find?”

“No.”

She turned her head to look at him, but he stared resolutely ahead.

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“I am an excellent liar.”