Page 45 of Song of the Abyss
Stilling his thoughts, he poked his head out of the water and peered into her room. He had a fish in his hands, much smaller since she’d wasted the last tuna he’d brought her. But this time, he’d also been stupid. He’d brought a string of oysters with him. It was a foolish idea. A silly hope that bloomed in his chest and one he crushed just as quickly.
She was sitting in front of the consoles, as she called them, Bitsy in front of her face and a projection out in front of her again.
“No, Ace, you can’t go in that way. No, I’m not just saying that. Would you look at the damn schematics again before you just start yelling? Look at it.” Her words were flying on the glass after she said them, but no other voice replied to her.
He laid the fish out and then tried his best to quietly set down the oysters, but they clacked together. The damn shells were louder than he wanted them to be, and the droid must have told Anya he was here. She spun around in the chair only moments after the sound.
It didn’t escape his notice that she turned with a bright grin on her face. One that made his heart thunder in his chest.
“Ace, I gotta go.” That smile shifted into a glare as she turned her attention from him to the glass in front of her eye. “No, I’m not leaving you at the worst time. This is a terrible plan. Come up with something better, and we’ll chat again soon.”
She swiped a finger through the projection before she looked back at him with that bright grin. “Sorry about that. No rest for the wicked, as they say.”
“I don’t understand that phrase.” He pushed the oysters a little closer to her. “I brought you something.”
“I can see.” She slid down from the chair to sit on the floor, as she had many times since he’d brought her here. With her twin tails folded, she picked up the oysters. “Am I supposed to eat them?”
“You can. They are best raw.”
Her little nose wrinkled, and he was concerned by how much he thought it was adorable. The fondness for her that stretched through his chest was almost painful at this point. Arges had been right, he hated to admit. She’d wriggled her way underneath his skin, just by being herself.
Never in his life had he thought an achromo could treat him like a person. But he supposed Anya wasn’t like the other achromos. She couldn’t be.
He smiled at her, not even noticing the expression crossing his face before she pointed at him.
“You’re smiling.”
“I don’t even know what that means.”
“You know what a smile is.” The wrinkles above her nose were now joined by twin dashes between her eyes. A sure sign she was upset with him. “You were smiling at me, but now it’s gone.”
He tried his best to mimic what he thought she wanted, but even he could feel the bared teeth were more a grimace than a smile.
She shook her head. “No, that’s not it. You get little wings around your eyes when you smile.”
“Are you saying I have wrinkles?”
“Yes.” She grinned, and this time he couldn’t help but follow suit.
She stared at him with that goofy expression and he could feel a matching one on his own face. This was stupid. But it sent a thrill throughout his entire body because he kind of loved it at the same time.
He didn’t remember the last time he’d been able to just... be. And Anya wanted that. She seemed to like it when he was himself, even if that self was a gruff bastard with an angry streak. She didn’t mind that he mostly grunted in response to her questions, even though he tried to answer them.
He was rusty at this. Conversing. Being around other people in a way that wasn’t just arguing about plans of attack or a need for violence.
Planting her hand on the floor, she pushed herself a little closer to him. This time, she didn’t kneel on those strange tails. She wrapped them around each other with those horrible bones sticking out in all directions.
“Is that comfortable?” he asked before he could stop himself.
She looked up from the oysters she’d brought with her. “Is what comfortable?”
He gestured up and down her body.
She seemed confused before it dawned on her what he was trying to say. “Oh! You mean my legs?”
Legs, right. That’s what Mira always called them. He had a hard time thinking of them as anything other than tails, but they didn’t work like tails. He knew that.
Frowning, he nodded before reaching out to touch a finger to one of the sharp bones. “They do not seem like they should do this.”
