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Their lives eventually settle into some semblance of normalcy.
He wakes early each morning, the aches and pains leftover from the aftermath of the bombing forcing him to rise far earlier than he’d like. He’s careful not to wake Thaniel or Six as he moves around the kitchen, preparing tea for Thaniel before he slips off to work and breakfast for Six once he finally rouses her.
Mori takes solace in the early morning solitude, uses it to rearrange his thoughts and pin down all the different possibilities he sees unraveling over the course of the day.
There are still gaps in his memory, but Mori finds he doesn’t care to fill in all the missing pieces. He remembers the aching loneliness that had settled over him when he thought he’d lost Thaniel, when the only future he’d seen was one where Thaniel was consumed by marriage and children.
He doesn’t want to remember all the futures that could have existed. Not when he sees a new future unfurling before him, one that he desperately wants to keep.
*
The house feels empty without Katsu rattling around. The octopus had been his sole companion for so long that he can’t help but mourn his loss.
Thaniel misses him as well, though he never says as much. He disappears for hours on end sometimes, returning home with bits of soot-stained cloth containing gears and cogs and smatterings of metal.
“I tried to find him,” he says one day. He leans against the doorway of Mori’s workshop, an awkwardly wrapped bundle in his arms. Mori can see a tarnished tentacle sticking out of the cloth wrappings. It makes something heavy twist in his gut, and the feeling must show on his face because he catches a stray thought from Thaniel wondering if he’s overstepped.
“You haven’t,” he says softly.
“I know you miss him,” Thaniel says. He places the bundle on the table and hesitates before stuffing his hands into his pockets. “I thought you might like to have what I could find.”
He’d known where Thaniel was going each day - couldn’t help but know when Thaniel returned home smelling of gunpowder and covered in ash and soot - but Mori finds the gesture unexpected all the same. Perhaps, Mori muses, it’s because he’s never met anyone who cared enough to acknowledge his feelings. Thaniel may have found Katsu alarming and strange at first, but he still spent days digging through rubble on the off chance that he’d find something to help Mori work through his grief.
He gingerly picks through the pieces of metal and gears, dismayed at how little there is left of Katsu. He doesn’t realize his hands are trembling until Thaniel reaches out and gently sets his hand on top of Mori’s.
He looks up at Thaniel, overwhelmed by the gesture. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“I wanted to,” Thaniel says. He turns Mori’s hand over to lace their fingers together. “Will you remake him?”
He pauses, turning the idea over. It would be simple, he knows, but he doubts Katsu would turn out the same. There’d always be some tiny difference calling out to him, a small reminder of what had come to pass that day at the concert.
“No,” he replies eventually. “I built Katsu because I wanted company. But I suppose I no longer need to worry about that.”
It makes Thaniel laugh, and Mori smiles in return.
“I suppose not. You do have your hands full now that we’ve taken on Six,” Thaniel teases. “Though she doesn’t seem to be as enamored of stealing socks.”
He frowns. “No, she doesn’t, but I suspect she has the potential to be more of a nuisance.”
*
Thaniel adores Six, though it takes significantly longer for her to trust him. Mori privately believes that the gifts Thaniel starts bringing home after work go a long way toward softening her demeanor.
“You’ll spoil her,” Mori chastises. Thaniel has brought home a small cake, claiming it’s a reward for Six’s progress with her Japanese lessons. Predictably, she’s delighted by the treat.
“Did you expect any different?” Thaniel asks. He takes the cup of tea Mori hands him and smiles warmly.
“No,” Mori says. Thaniel presents a tin of cocoa to Mori - the good kind from Harrod’s - who takes it suspiciously. He shakes it at Thaniel. “Don’t think bringing me gifts will convince me to keep her.”
Thaniel hides his smile behind the lip of his teacup and doesn’t respond. He knows Six will become a permanent fixture in their lives.
Despite his aversion to children, Mori doesn’t truly mind Six. She’s intelligent and curious, and she doesn’t bother him with nonsensical questions. She’s a surprisingly apt pupil as well, though she has more interest in Japanese than she does watchmaking. He leaves the lessons to Thaniel, though he suspects that within a few years the Japanese will be forgotten in favor of learning piano. Thaniel will be pleased by that if it comes to pass.
Thaniel already thinks of Six as his adopted daughter, though he never voices it aloud. It’ll take him years to work up the nerve, just as it’ll take him years before he ever publically refers to Mori as anything other than his landlord and friend.
*
Sometimes, long after Six has been asleep and the rest of the houses along Filigree Street have settled down for the night, Thaniel slips into Mori’s room and curls around him under the cover of darkness.
Thaniel is still skittish about being found out - his thoughts so often stray to his ill-fated wedding night - and were it anyone else, Mori would find Thaniel’s persistent desire to protect him annoying. As it is, he feels an unexpected fondness for Thaniel’s concern, so he indulges in Thaniel’s desire to keep to his own room for the time being.
“She won’t say anything,” Mori tells him. It’s late, and the winter wind whips angrily against the windows, causing him to shuffle closer towards Thaniel. “Go to sleep and stop thinking about it.”
“You can’t know that for certain,” Thaniel says. It’s the one argument he refuses to back down from, and he sighs as he wraps an arm around Mori, kissing his bare shoulder. “She could change her mind.”
She won’t, Mori knows, but Thaniel remains doubtful.
The spectre of Grace and the annulment hangs between them, and Mori is aware that Thaniel will never truly relax until the papers are signed.
There’s no future where they’re discovered by someone who would put them in danger, no future where Grace breaks her promise and turns them over to the police. Six eventually grows wise to the nature of their relationship but by the time she’s old enough to need a room of her own, they’ve long since moved from Filigree Street into a larger house. Thaniel’s sister will always suspect, but she’ll never ask Thaniel about it directly.
Sometimes he sees passing glimmers of a life where Thaniel chooses music over telegrams. In those futures, there are people who will know, but they’re artists and actors and musicians, the type of people used to unconventional lifestyles and willing to keep them a secret.
“We’ll be okay,” he says.
He repeats it again whenever Thaniel voices his doubts, and keeps on repeating it until Thaniel finally gives in and moves all his belongings into Mori’s room.
*
It takes a month for the letter to arrive. It comes midweek, attached to a packet of papers bearing a government seal.
The envelope and return address tell Mori everything he needs to know about its contents. They’ve both been expecting it for some time now, but it distracts him enough that he has to leave the workshop, unable to concentrate. He takes Six for a walk to the park instead. She’s happy for any excuse to explore the world outside Filigree Street, and he’s relieved to have something else occupy his thoughts for awhile.
By the time he returns, Thaniel is home and the letter is opened. Several pages lay scattered across the table.
“What does it say?” he asks.
“Don’t you already know?” Thaniel says.
“Yes,” Mori says flatly. “I was trying to be polite.”
Thaniel rolls his eyes and gestures to the papers. “It’s all pretty straightforward. She wants to meet with a solicitor to discuss the terms. She really is getting the worst of it.”
There’s a thread of sorrow in his voice, and Mori doesn’t want to know whether it’s for Grace or the future Thaniel almost had.
“Will you go in person?” It comes out more snappish than he intends, and he focuses on removing his hat and gloves so that he doesn’t have to look at Thaniel.
“Yes,” Thaniel says after a moment, “it only seems right. Unless you think there’s a reason for me not to go?”
Mori sighs. It makes Thaniel frown, his gaze flicking from Mori to the annulment papers. “Do you….is there some reason why you’re worried? You said Grace wouldn’t say anything about us.”
“It’s not that,” he says. “There’s really nothing you need to be concerned about. You’ll meet her and there’s a chance she’ll say something snide which will make you upset, but nothing comes of it.”
There are half a dozen different futures he sees, all of them slightly different from one another, but none of them concern him in any particular way. His worry stems not from any precognition, but from an old, familiar deep-seated heartache. Mori knows that his loneliness has made him selfish, but he’s at least tried to let Thaniel make his own choices.
“I’d like to give you advice on how to proceed,” he says, “but I’m afraid I’m rather biased about the whole thing. After everything that’s happened, I’m not sure it’s the best idea anyway.”
Thaniel looks at him, and his voice is gentle when he asks, “After everything that’s happened, do you really see a future where I’d willingly leave you?”
Mori pauses, considering. “No.”
Thaniel smiles. “Then stop worrying.”
*
In early spring, shortly after the annulment papers are finalized, Mori writes a letter to Thaniel’s sister. It’s short and formal, an offer to pay for her sons’ schooling and, were she so inclined, an offer of a flat in London to be closer to her children and Thaniel. He frames it, a little awkwardly, as a gift for Thaniel saving his life. It couldn’t be further from the truth, but he figures she doesn’t need to know that.
He doesn’t mention it to Thaniel. It’s a bold gesture - one that borders too much on interference - but he knows how much Thaniel misses Annabel and how much he regrets the distance between them.
When Thaniel mentions that Annabel is unexpectedly visiting, Mori just nods and says, “Yes, I know. Take her to the restaurant two blocks over. She’ll like that one.”
A restlessness settles over him after Thaniel leaves, and it makes Six watch him curiously. “Where’s he going?” she asks.
“To visit his sister. She’ll be moving to London soon.”
She ponders that for a moment. “Is that bad?”
“No,” Mori says. “I don’t think so. I think it might turn out to be a good thing, in fact.”
When he senses Thaniel on his way home, he gives Six some money and shoos her out of the house. She looks at him skeptically, but clutches the money tight in her hand and scampers off without looking back.
Thaniel passes her in the street, and she says something that causes him to smile, quick and amused. The smile lingers as he climbs up the stairs and pushes the door open.
“So,” he says, his tone bemused, “you sent my sister a letter.”
“Yes. ” He studies Thaniel, who watches him with an expression Mori can’t quite define.
“You could have talked to me about it,” Thaniel says, frowning.
“You wouldn’t have accepted,” he snaps, suddenly annoyed. He sends a look in Thaniel’s direction when he opens his mouth to disagree. “I have more than enough money and no use for any of it. I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t mean it.”
Thaniel sighs. “You know you can’t keep making decisions for people like that,” he states, but there’s no real anger in his voice, only fond resignation.
“I’m sorry,” Mori offers.
“You’re not,” Thaniel says, his smile is wry. “Annabel has agreed to all of it, by the way, which I’m sure you already knew.”
Mori lets out a low hum of acknowledgement. “I suppose it’s settled then.”
*
That night, Thaniel sits at the piano and taps at the keys, playing out a melody that Mori half-remembers. Six is already on her way to falling asleep from where she’s curled up in a chair by the fire, her teacup dangling precariously from her limp fingers. Mori rescues it before it smashes to the floor and places it safely out of reach.
He goes to sit by Thaniel at the piano bench after, close enough that their shoulders are pressed together. Thaniel shoots him a small, pleased smile.
“At my wedding to Grace,” Thaniel starts to say, pausing to make a soothing sound when Mori tenses beside him, “Annabel asked if there wasn’t another girl - a poorer one, perhaps - that I might have wished to marry instead.”
Mori snorts. Thaniel shoots him a look, and Mori bites back several of the comments he wants to make.
“She asked again today,” Thaniel continues, “after I explained about the divorce and why you’re now paying for my nephews’ education instead of Grace.”
Thaniel stops playing, resting his hands on top of the piano keys. “I think it’s her way of making sure I’m happy.”
Mori takes his hand, brushing his thumb over the pulsepoint of Thaniel’s wrist. “And what did you tell her?”
“Keita,” Thaniel murmurs, voice soft and fond as he draws him in for a kiss. “Do you really need to ask?”