“We’ve been separated for three years.”
He nods slowly, agreeing. “You’ve been gone for three years.”
“If I was gone, where were you?”
“Waiting.” He admits. His gaze meets mine, a deep sadness lurking in his moss-green eyes.
“Oh, Matze.” Tears prick at my eyes at the thought of him all alone, waiting for me to come back, despite feeling as though I had run dry of tears hours ago. “You know, we were both unhappy.”
He shakes his head. “I wasn’t.”
“You were. You were always working.” I sigh. “And so was I.” I offer him a small smile. “It was my fault as well. I was making you unhappy.”
“Nein. You are theonlyhappiness in my life. Onlyyou. Nothing else.”
I frown at him. “Is that why you're here?”
He nods slowly. “I told myself that if you were happy, I would leave you alone.”
“And now?”
He releases his datapad leaving it to float in his lap, his eyes like two deep emerald lagoons, moisture giving them a light sheen. “Alex, you almost… died. You still could die. I’m never leaving you again.”
“You should know Luca and I–”
“I don’t care. I just want you. I need you.”
“I think he cares for me.”
Matthias makes a strained noise in the back of his throat, tortured by my words. I feel as though I ripped his heart clean from his chest as his face contorts.
“Do you… care for him?” he asks, so quietly I almost miss it, his eyes dropping to the data pad in his lap.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to say, ‘Yes.’ But the words catch in my throat, leaving me silent. My mind searches for something to say, but like clutching at smoke, it comes up empty. What we had wasn’t love. Not for me. It was fun, and I felt wanted.
I shake my head. “No. It’s not that simple.”
“How long?”
“Recent. We met in pre-mission training, but nothing happened until we were already up here.”
He nods slowly, thinking, and then he frowns.
“Wait here.”
I laugh, “Where would I even go?”
He dashes out of sight. I can hear the thumps of his feet against the handholds, slowly drifting away until the noise is swallowed up by the station's background noise.
Within moments, he’s back again with a satchel in hand, the brown leather worn and a monogrammed ‘MM’.
“You still have that?” I ask.
“Of course,” he says. “It was a gift.”
“I’m surprised you haven’t thrown it out. Look how old it is now.” I’d recognise the satchel anywhere, but age has not been kind. The leather is worn, the monogrammed ‘MM’ no more of a VN now. But I remember it.
“I got you that.”
