Chapter Text
Malta is the mix of sea spray, incense and the fresh fig cakes Nicky pulls out of the oven, Nile is fast to learn. It is the small house on the rocks, far away from the tourists and the busy towns, surrounded by nature and few and far between villages. It is the way the sun warms up the stones behind the veranda where Joe and Nicky spend their evenings whilst Andy and Nile head down to the water.
It is easy to see why Malta is special to the two men, how it is still their house, as much as it can be. It is in the books and drawing utensils Joe has stored in the main room, the sturdy wooden table that shows the markings of centuries, the wild garden Nicky tends to even if they will leave gain soon enough.
It is in the simple but beautiful frame above the heavy dresser that Nicky gets from a shaded, hidden spot in the bedroom. One of Joe’s sketches is preserved behind the glass, showing him, asleep, curled into their hammock. There is a cat drawn to be pressed up against him, head resting on her paws, eyes looking up and out of the picture. There is love in every line that Joe has drawn, love for Nicky, for Lunetta, for their space in Malta.
Nile asks during dinner one night and Nicky pushes back his chair to head into the kitchen. He leaves Joe to explain how they adopted Lunetta. Or she adopted them, he doesn’t know anymore. Maybe, it had been consensual. He listens, from the kitchen as Joe recalls his favourite moments with their cat as they worked to keep Napoleon’s spies from the archipelago, how Luna grew to be the most beautiful moon-coloured cat far and wide, how she took to protecting Nicky from bugs and mice only to drop them at his feet after a successful hunt. Sometimes, Joe swears, he believed she meowed at him in Italian.
It makes Nile laugh and for a moment, Nicky can smile about it, get lost in the memories of the best years they had together.
‘What happened then?’
The feeling is lost, he plummets. The silence from the main room is palpable, Andy is still. Joe sighs and Nicky knows what he looks like in that moment, lines digging into his forehead and eyes sad. He clears his throat, steps back through the door.
‘The natural thing,’ he finds himself saying, ‘that’s what happened. She wasn’t young when she found us. After a few years, she fell asleep next to Joe and went on without us. She had a good, peaceful life here. Lots of mice.’
Joe meets his eyes and Nicky can read a truth in them that he had never managed to admit, that he loved Luna as much as Nicky had, that losing her had broken his heart, too. Nile looks like she regrets asking and Nicky sits back down.
‘That sketch there on the wall, Joe drew it on the first day, after Luna returned with me. He told me ‘Nicolò, we can’t have a cat’ and I – ‘
‘He fell asleep outside and that cat, the cunning little thing, wrapped herself around him. She knew who she had to get on her side,’ Joe adds and his eyes look happier again, ‘And her eyes held a wisdom I had never seen before, so when Nicky woke up I sat him down and I said –‘
‘He said ‘We can have a cat’,’ Nicky adds, grinning as he remembers.
‘And we did.’
Nile doesn’t look convinced they are alright but Andy seems alright. She has heard the story before.
‘Now that you know about Luna,’ she says and reaches for her glass, ‘you should ask Nicky what he thinks of Columbus.’