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“How are you Simon, really?” Alys asked, alone with him at last after the surgery.
“Oh, I’m alright,” he said, “A little tired I suppose, but it doesn’t hurt at all. As for the rest—“ but then he cut himself off with a coughing fit, and a small red rosebud fell onto the bed.
“Well,” Simon said, blinking down at it, “How embarrassing. And it’s only September.”
Alys picked up the rosebud and smiled fondly at it. “You haven’t been keeping up with your medications, I suppose, what with everything,” she said, “Well, this at least is easy enough to fix.” And she leaned down and kissed him.
He went still for a fraction of a moment, and then he was kissing her back, warmly, almost shyly, and she felt something ease in her chest, her lungs freed at last for the first time nearly thirty years.
They broke apart and she breathed deeply. “Goodness,” she laughed, “I had forgotten how good it was to be able to breathe .”
“Mm,” Simon said, his eyes dancing at her, “Although it occurs to me that one of the chief advantages could be how long we might now hold our breaths.”
And he kissed her, and she kissed him, and held him for a long, long moment.
But even healthy lungs must have some chance to do their jobs between kisses, and this time when they separated Simon looked troubled.
“Alys,” he said, “Is it alright? I don’t— I can’t remember all the reasons we could never have this.”
“Oh,” Alys said, and her heart ached for him, and she sat down on the bed beside him, her thoughts turned serious again, “Well, on your side, I cannot claim to know everything that went on inside your head, but I believe the chief impediment was the chip itself. Beyond that, you were thoroughly married to your job, of course, and perhaps you feared endangering me by association. As for myself, an affair with you would, of course, be a scandal, and would have lowered me in many people’s eyes even if I didn’t make the very public and politically fraught statement of marrying you. And, more seriously, some people might have thought I was… selling myself, to buy ImpSec’s favor, perhaps in a bid to win the Imperium for Ivan. You know how people think.’
“But Simon, dearest,” she said, and took his hand in hers, rubbing her thumb across his knuckles, “I have been very afraid that— I have been very afraid, these past few days, and I find that I do not care in the least what anyone might think, or what the consequences might be. And in any case, most of it won’t matter at all until you are quite recovered and Chief of ImpSec again.”
“ If I ever recover and become Chief of ImpSec again,” Simon said.
“Yes.”
“Well,” Simon said, and smiled at her, a real smile that lit up his whole face. It made him look younger, and softer, and more human, and more beautiful than she had words to say, “Well then, it seems there is nothing I need worry about.”
And Alys held his hand tightly in hers and said, “Nothing at all, my dear, nothing at all.”