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It was moments like this that Link would shuffle awkwardly, trying to hide the Triforce that glowed through his glove on the back of his hand. Moments where he was a coward.
Kass’s daughters had stolen Princess Zelda away, begging her to let them perform for her, and she hadn’t needed the convincing. Link would have gone with her, not because he was worried about how much trouble they could get in without him (but perhaps he should be), but because he would have loved to see the way her eyes would twinkle at their song, the way she would glow at their harmonies.
But he had questions for Kass. Questions that he should ask her. Questions he was too ashamed to ask her.
“I keep thinking as they get older, they’ll mellow out, but it would appear they are simply growing into their big spirits. Would you agree?” Kass asked.
Link could see them from across the way, play wrestling and real wrestling with each other to get into a formation they could all agree on while Zelda waited patiently for them to begin their performance. They had grown a lot since he first met them, as Rito matured a bit faster than Hylians, but they were still adolescents. Though her back was turned, Link could picture the smile Zelda would be holding back as she watched the girls swat at each other.
“They’re still young,” Link said. “There will be lots of time for them to keep growing.”
Link let his gaze linger just a bit too long.
“Something is on your mind,” Kass said.
Link needed no further prompting. Though he was still a man of few words, he had long since broken his silence from before, and he had no intentions to return to it. “How did you and Amali meet?” Link asked. He fidgeted some more, wondering if the Triforce of Courage would peel itself off his skin for his cowardice or if he should just scratch it off himself.
“We were childhood friends,” Kass said. “Then young sweethearts. Our parents said they always knew we would fall in love.” Kass knew Link wasn’t really asking about Amali, but he had the good manners to play along with the ruse until Link could fess up.
The girls had finally begun their recital for the princess. Link and Kass could hear their voices, clear and sharp, sing true from Rito Village.
“Did you feel you two were destined?” Link asked, keeping his eyes on the singing Rito.
Kass waited a moment to answer the question. “In a way, yes, though I hesitate to use such a heavy word in the presence of one so acquainted with true destiny.”
Link ignored the comment. “Did you fight it? That destiny?” Zelda’s back was turned to him; he couldn’t see her face, and he was glad. If he could see her face, then she could see his, and she would see the intensity of his stare.
“I didn’t want to,” Kass said, making no attempt to hide how he turned to stare at Link. “What’s really on your mind, Link?”
Link closed his eyes for a moment, letting the clear notes from the song jumble around in his head. “She knows I would do anything for her. She knows I… She’s a smart girl. Smart woman,” he corrected himself. She was no more a girl than he was a boy, even if they both still looked it.
“The girls won’t sing forever, Link. If you have a question, ask it.”
Link frowned, unable to face the jolly bard. Kass had known him before he knew himself, passed on to him his own legends until he understood his own myth. If anyone besides Zelda would know, wouldn’t it be him? “You said it was her love for me that awakened her power.” Kass waited for him to continue. The song was coming to a close now. The girls would head back with the princess in tow soon. “Did I love her back?”
Zelda beamed at the girls, clapping and cheering loudly, rushing up to congratulate them on a job well done. Kass turned his attention away from Link to his daughters, who flocked around Princess Zelda, tugging on her arms and dress. Zelda giggled and smiled at them, taking their enthused affections with grace.
“You clearly cared about her a great deal, Link, probably more than anything else in the kingdom,” Kass said to him quietly.
Link set his jaw. He was afraid of that answer, afraid of what he had known deep down was the truth. “But did I love her back?” He asked, unwilling to accept such a vague answer. He needed the truth. He needed to hear it.
Kass clicked his beak, perhaps impatiently. Link began to tap his foot with his nerves. “Not the way she loved you,” Kass said quietly. “Not then, to my master’s knowledge.”
Zelda and the girls began the walk back around to town, each young Rito appearing to spout out questions about being a princess faster than Zelda could answer them.
Link swallowed hard. Anticipating Kass’s answer had not made the words easier for him to hear. “Do you know why?” Link asked. It was a stupid question; he didn’t even want to know the answer, if there was one, but the angry part in him had won control in the moment he asked it, and it was all he could do to keep his mouth shut after asking.
Kass shrugged. “My teacher never said. Only that he was glad her affections went unreturned, as it would have hurt him even more.”
Damn that court poet, Link thought. Oh, how he would have loved to see Link pine helplessly now.
“There is no reason you cannot love her now without having loved her then,” Kass said quietly. The girls were rounding the corner to the bridge, now. Time was running short.
Link didn’t need the reminder that he could be a different man now than he was then. He had already proved that to everyone, hadn’t he? He talked now. He beat Ganon this time. He didn’t die.
But while he was busy sleeping off his first death, Zelda had a hundred years to get over her unrequited love for him. She had a hundred years to move on. And him? He was only just beginning to dream about the beautiful goddess-woman with the golden hair, the bright green eyes, the soft, soothing voice… he was only just falling for her the way he should have before. Another thing he got wrong, that time around. Another thing he did right this time. Another thing he did right too late.
He had missed his window, he was sure. That stoic bastard wearing his skin a century ago, in his determination to remain obtuse, had missed his chance with the most spectacular woman alive, for no reason Link could fathom outside of sheer obstinance. The fool.
Link wanted to defend himself, as if he even identified with the man in his memories, but the girls were back, and once again, he had missed his window.
“—all those books?” Genli squealed. “You mean they’re just gone?”
“Some of them are still at the castle, actually,” Zelda said as they approached. “Much of the library still stands, although there were a great deal of books that were lost.”
“Girls, why don’t we go find your mother and figure out how we can help her with dinner?” Kass asked, ushering the flock of squealing Rito back to his nest. He turned to give Link a knowing look over his shoulder, one Link would have returned with a glare if Zelda weren’t looking at him right now.
“Is everything okay?” She asked him quietly, her voice so soft he almost forgot what was upsetting him. Almost.
He turned to face her, letting Kass go, pushing him from his mind. He nodded, taking in the look of concern on her face. At least she still loved him like this, like the best friend he could possibly imagine. This was better than nothing, was enough to sustain him. Perhaps she had taken solace in his platonic love for her then like he did now. It was the wrong kind, mismatched, out of sync, but it was nurturing nonetheless, and he couldn’t afford to be picky.
She pushed his shoulder, clearly not believing him. “What’s up?” She asked.
He smiled a little at how easily she could read him, how well she knew his face. “It’s nothing, I promise,” he said.
Zelda turned over her shoulder to look at Kass. “Was he telling you scary ghost stories about before again?”
Sometimes Link wished she was just a tad less smart. “He can’t help it,” Link said. “He inherited it from Benko.”
Zelda rolled her eyes, hooking her arm through Link’s and pulling him back toward the inn. “The only horror stories Benko ever wrote were those goddess-awful sonnets about me—”
“’Princess, how may I speak your name so sweet?’” Link started, because he had convinced Kass to share with him Benko’s entire collection of works, even the ones he wrote to win over the princess. “’My tongue, on which it tastes sweeter than wine–‘”
Zelda released his arm to plant her palms over her ears. “I can’t hear you, I won’t hear you, and I cannot stress just how much that bird bard betrayed me by letting those sonnets fall upon living ears again.”
Link elected to not recite the rest of the sonnet, even though he did like the way it made Zelda’s cheeks darken.
“I mean, who uses the word ‘sweet’ twice in the first two lines?” She continued. They had made it to the inn, and Link started making dinner, but she wasn’t done yet. “It’s just lazy writing, surely even an amateur writer could come up with a synonym to throw in there. And wine isn’t even that sweet, certainly not the wine we had at the castle…”
Link let her ramble on, because the court poet was a bit of a sore spot for her, and he had been the one to bring him up again, and even when agitated, Link liked the sound of Zelda’s voice. For so long, all he had was her voice. Her voice and flashes of memories, disjointed and out of order and always ending too soon. Her voice was proof she was real, was what woke him out of his slumber, was what guided him to his destiny. Her voice was precious for that alone.
“… sure he thought it was flattering, but why in all of Farore’s green forests would anyone think a sixteen year old princess wanted to be compared to the juiciest hydromelon in front of the entire court, I cannot imagine,” she continued, until Link slid her a plate of some veggie rice balls and she paused to scarf them down faster than Link had ever seen her eat before. “Of course, the look on your face when he recited that poem was priceless,” Zelda said, smiling fondly at him. “It was the most emotion I’d seen from you at the time. Even Revali couldn’t goad you that successfully.”
The hydromelon sonnet was particularly bad, Link thought, and he cannot imagine having to stand several feet to the right of Princess Zelda, everyone in their formal attire, as the court poet detailed just how quenched he would be if he were allowed a bite. It had been bad enough to hear it from Kass. He supposed there were some things he was happy to forget. “I’m surprised your father let him stay on staff after that, really,” Link said.
Zelda hummed softly, her eyes far away. “I think he was just glad there was someone around who wasn’t talking about me and Hylia.”
Link grabbed her empty plate from her, and she pulled herself out of her thoughts to meet his eyes. The red flames under the cooking pot danced in the reflection of her irises, and Link wanted to kiss her.
“Thank you for dinner, Link,” she said quietly.
If his fingers would have brushed hers, he would have felt electricity shoot off her skin. “’Course,” he said, busying himself with cleaning up. It always helped, for him to make himself useful, when he thought about kissing Zelda. He supposed kissing Zelda would also help, but his options were limited, and he would make do with what he could.
He was painfully aware of how closely she watched him as he washed the cooking pot and the plates, until he finally finished, turning to face her, delusions of confronting her upon meeting her eyes, but he didn’t have to.
“Can we go for a walk?” She asked.
He nodded, and so she hooked her arm into his elbow once more, and they took off for the woods.
The woods outside Rito Village were beautiful in the evenings. Long shadows of tall trees sent stripes along the ground, sunset fireflies twinkled in the air and reflected onto the glassy surface of the ponds, and the sunset that splashed red, orange, and pink across the sky behind the Hebra mountains was unparalleled in its beauty.
Well, Zelda outshone its beauty easily, but nothing in the entire kingdom could compete with her. Especially not when she was bathed in the golden light of the setting sun, skin glowing in the evening light nearly as bright as she did with Hylia’s power.
“Will you tell me what Kass said that upset you earlier?” Zelda asked, rubbing her shoulder against his. They sat side-by-side against a big oak tree, watching the sky darken as the sun continued to dip farther and farther below the mountain. Well, she was watching. He had been staring. Not too much longer, and they’d be able to see the northern lights.
“He didn’t say anything,” Link said, wondering if it was too late for him to wriggle his way out of this one.
“You know I can tell when you’re lying,” she said, elbowing him now. It didn’t make it easier for him to think, when she kept touching him.
“I asked him something, and he answered. That was all.” She waited for him to continue. He pondered telling her the truth, or perhaps changing the subject enough that she would let it go, at least for now.
She sighed. “I’ll stop prying.”
Link watched a sunset firefly float in front of him, bobbing up and down slowly as it lit up.
“I asked him how he and Amali met,” he said. He wasn’t sure why he said it, exactly, when she had given him such an easy out. Something compelled the words from him. It wasn’t Kass’s answer to that question that had upset him. Zelda would know that.
Maybe he was tired of trying to hide it. He knew she didn’t feel the same, knew he was a hundred years too late, like he had been with everything else, but it was a beautiful night, and Zelda would forgive him for loving her now but not then, right? They could laugh about how terribly they had timed it, how Benko would have been able to write the corniest sonnet about a missed window, about a love lost between two centuries, about how he would have gotten some satisfaction over knowing the Great Hero of Hyrule pined just as hopelessly as a simple court poet did.
And maybe she wouldn’t mind if his hands lingered, if he kissed her knuckles just a little more often, if he made her dinner every night just to see how much she enjoyed his cooking. He would never dare to cross any boundary she set, would respect whatever space she required of him, but maybe she would grant him little bursts of relief here and there, because she did love him too, even if it wasn’t the same way he loved her? Maybe she would never feel the same, because he was a hundred years too late in more ways than one, but she would understand the agony, having been in his shoes before. She would forgive him, would know that he wanted nothing but happiness for her, no matter the cost, like she had for him, once.
“How did they meet?” Zelda asked, pulling him out of his thoughts. Her voice was quiet, like she already knew what was coming. Like she anticipated his coming confession. Perhaps she did. She learned to read him long ago, and even if he believed himself to be a better man than the one stuck on the Sheikah Slate, he wore the same face.
“They were childhood friends. Their parents thought they would marry when they were just children. And then they fell in love, and…”
“And had one of the biggest broods the perch has ever seen,” Zelda said quietly. “I suppose it was destiny for them, hm?” She asked.
“I think Kass saves words like ‘destiny’ for great battles against legendary evils with holy blades and goddess-descended princesses,” Link said.
“He always has had his head buried a bit too deep in the mythology, huh?” Zelda mused.
Link wanted to laugh. That was what he and Zelda had been to Kass for so long, wasn’t it? Legends passed on by an ancient mentor, another’s memories living on only in song. “He helped me fill in a lot of gaps, thanks to that lore,” Link said.
“I’m sure the Yiga would have skinned you alive if you hadn’t heard about my hydromelons,” Zelda deadpanned, and it was Link’s turn to elbow her, turning over to see a mischievous grin pulling her lips upward just a hair, green eyes sparkling prettier than any stars in the night sky, and again he wanted to kiss her, but he couldn’t, and he couldn’t make himself busy, either, so he had to cross his arms over his chest and pout.
“A pity I glared at Benko for that when he wrote it, seeing as it single-handedly motivated me to keep going.” He would tease to buy himself more time before admitting to her. He wasn’t above it. He knew when to admit defeat, knew it was time to come clean, but he’d go down fighting.
“That’s proof he was one of the greats. Unappreciated in life, his works only taking off after his death.”
Link smiled and let himself think for just a moment what it would be like to lean over, to press his lips against hers, slowly at first, to savor the feel of her, the taste of her, to inhale her breath into his lungs, to feel her kiss him back. She would reach up to cup his face, palms soft and maybe even a little shy, and he would wrap an arm around behind her back to pull her closer. Maybe she’d even slide her hand up to tangle her fingers in his hair…
“It was weird, to only be able to see myself through your memories in the slate or in Benko’s songs about me.”
“Goddess, with how many of those memories were from before we became friends, I’d imagine neither source painted you too kindly,” Zelda mumbled.
Link smiled a bit. “Benko was a lot more subtle about his distaste than you were,” he said, and Zelda laughed. Din, he wanted to kiss her, to run a hand up her arm, over her shoulder, behind her neck, to twist gently in her hair. He wanted to feel her body press against his, wanted to feel her heartbeat race in time with his.
“I still can’t believe Benko sold me out like that in his song, the traitor,” Zelda grumbled good-naturedly. Link had been worried, when Kass first performed his song for her, because of the detail it shared, but Zelda had simply blushed delicately at the line and left it at that. Like it was a story about something embarrassing she did at as a child. Like it meant nothing to her now. Because it didn’t.
“I asked Kass if he tried to fight it at all, that destiny.” The words felt like a confession leaving his lips, like an admission of guilt. Zelda did not respond this time, waiting patiently for him to continue. He had to fight to get the words out, as meaningless as they were, as if they would change everything. “He said he never wanted to.”
Zelda reached out to set her hand atop his gently, to rub her fingertips on the back of his hand. His skin burned where she touched him, and he nearly flinched, but he stayed still. Once he told her, she might never touch him like this again. Might never hook her arm around his anymore, might want space. He had to savor what she gave him now, in case it was his last, even if it burned him.
“Link?” She asked quietly, her voice so gentle and soft that he nearly grabbed her hand in his own.
“We fought destiny, too, in our own way, didn’t we?” He said, finally turning to stare at her.
Bathed in golden sunset light, Zelda frowned in concern at him, eyes wide and lower lip pushed out ever so slightly in a pout. He wanted to kiss the pout away, to make her forget her worry for him, to make her feel the same way he did when he looked at her.
“It wasn’t really voluntary at the time, but yes, we certainly fought destiny. But as it turns out, destiny fights back. What’s this about, Link?” She asked, her fingertips stilling on the back of his hand.
“I got some things wrong the first time around, is all,” he breathed, too weak to tell her the truth. The Triforce should just fade away on its own, if he kept this up. It wasn’t a lie; he certainly did get some things wrong the first time around, and she knew that. They both got some things wrong the first time around. That was the whole reason there had to be a second time around.
“Yes, well, I think all of us did, didn’t we?” She said, reaching to slide her hand beneath his, to lace her fingers between his, to give his hand a gentle squeeze. His heart stopped beating.
He turned to look at her one last time in the beautiful dwindling light, and he couldn’t stop his eyes from running down and back up her body just once, to confirm she was there. She didn’t appear to question this, eyes searching his for what he so desperately did not want her to know.
And yet, he felt no relief at having dodged her question. And why would he? With every passing day, he loved her more, ached for her more, wanted her more. Telling her wouldn’t solve any of his problems, wouldn’t soothe his need to be near her, to see her smile, to make her happy. But continuing to hide it from her would only make it more painful, make the sting burn even worse.
Telling her wouldn’t turn back the clock, wouldn’t get either of them their hundred years back, wouldn’t align the stars that had been born crooked in the universe. But it might ease the ache of his heart just a little.
“Will you forgive me?” He asked first, because he needed her forgiveness more than he needed her reciprocity.
She frowned instantly, sitting up to lean closer to him. “Link, you know there is nothing from a hundred years ago for which I need an apology,” she said urgently.
He smiled, because of course she assumed he meant his previous failings and not his current. She always saw more good in him than there was, when he tried his best to hide it. “Not that,” he said, forcing himself to meet her eyes. “Will you forgive me for not loving you back when I should have?”
She froze, face falling slack at his words. He prepared himself for the punch in the gut, for all the air to be knocked from his lungs and for the earth to be yanked out from under his feet.
“What?” She asked softly, hardly any voice backing the breath. She didn’t back away, frown deepening. She didn’t let go of his hand.
“Will you forgive me for not loving you back when I should have?” Perhaps he should have phrased it differently, clarified. But he had nothing else to say, couldn’t come up with new words in the face of her green eyes so wide.
“I’m not following,” she said, shaking her head just a little. He didn’t miss the way her eyes traced over his face, so fast he wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t so hung on her everything.
“I should have loved you back, before, and I don’t know why I didn’t, because maybe if I had—” He didn’t finish the sentence. He hadn’t had the thought before. Maybe if he had, things would have gone differently. Maybe if he had, it wouldn’t have been too late.
“Maybe if you had what?” She asked, eyes widening just a little, lips parting in anticipation. Goddess, he shouldn’t have looked at her lips—because she didn’t look angry, and he knew it was his own stupid desperation that made him think it, but he swore she almost looked eager.
“Maybe if I’d…” He finally tore his eyes from her lips, knowing he couldn’t be trusted, but her eyes granted him no relief, and he never finished his sentence. He inhaled, and he could smell her—her lavender shampoo, a hint of pine from her trek to Warbler’s Nest, the well-worn paper of a beloved book read a hundred times.
“You think if you’d returned my affections, it would have changed things?” Her voice was soft, soothing, coaxing. He knew she was doing it on purpose, years of political tutoring making her a master with speech, but his head still swam at the thought of her voice that soft on his ear with her body pressed against his.
“Maybe,” he squeaked out, and had he been more in control of his mental faculties, maybe he could have constructed a sound argument. But her hair hung down around her face, which was so close to his that he could count the freckles on her cheeks, could feel her breath on his face, and any sound argument would have required him to stop thinking about kissing her…
“How so?” She asked, shifting her posture to more comfortably face him, keeping her face close to his, and he blinked a few times to try to clear his head.
It didn’t work. “I don’t know,” he said dumbly.
She let him flounder for a moment, perhaps enjoying how obviously entranced he was. “I’ll forgive you,” she said lightly, sitting back against the tree and facing away from him. The northern lights were out now, shimmering in the sky. His head cleared just a hair at her distance, and he inhaled fresh air that didn’t make him think of her. He needed the clarity, he knew it, and yet he soured at the loss of her closeness. “Under one condition.”
She could name her price. “What condition?” He asked, as if he were prepared to deny her. As if he hadn’t just melted stupidly in front of her because she’d been close and held his hand.
“Well, you have to come up with a way to make it up to me, obviously,” she said, almost as if it were a joke.
A way to make up for dying and taking a hundred years to return to her as a different person? “How am I supposed to do that?” He asked, perhaps a touch gruffly. It was a big mistake to have to make up for.
“I thought that would be obvious,” she said, turning her head over her shoulder. “Three sonnets about how I’m sweeter than honey and juicier than a ripe wildberry.”
So it was a joke to her. “I’m serious,” he said, because clearly she wasn’t mad so he could come fully clean. “I’m sorry I was too late, I know it’s too late, but I—”
She mumbled something under her breath that he didn’t catch, and he nearly questioned her on it but she was already sitting up and rolling on top of him, knees settling on either side of his hips and hands gripping his shoulders. He froze, because her body was warm this close in the Hebra cold, and her eyes were so green in the dark, and he could feel her weight on top of his thighs.
“You and I have been too late for every destiny we’ve been signed up for, and yet somehow we’ve still managed to follow through on them, haven’t we?” He looked up at her, perched nicely on his lap, and he almost didn’t care what pretty words came out of her pretty mouth, but these were important, so he kept his hands pressed against the earth beneath him instead of sliding them up her thighs and resting them on her hips.
He nodded. She was right. Destiny had all but dragged them kicking and screaming out of their failure for their second chance.
“What’s one more we’re late to?” She asked, and it was all the permission he needed to throw his arms around her, pull her into him so he could kiss her, a hundred years too late but not a moment too soon. She melted in his arms, a soft squeak of surprise caught in her throat. Something deep in him wanted to wrap his arms around her tighter, pull her even closer, memorize every curve of her body, but he knew better than to rush. He was late, yes, by a century, but he was here now and there was still more time, and he could kiss her sweetly here for the first time beneath the stars for the first year he lost, and then he could kiss her again harder later for the second, kiss her again slower later for the third, until he ran out of years and he could start to kiss her for the present.
She pulled away, and he let her, held over with the thoughts of kissing her again. “Worth the wait?” He asked, because he’d already made a fool of himself and maybe making a fool of himself again would make her smile.
She nodded, pressing one last quick kiss to his lips, and then another, lingering, and his hand slid down her back to rest at her waist, and the Hebra cold had never felt so warm.
“Just don’t make me wait another hundred years?” She asked, eyes pleading as if she needed to be worried, and he kissed her again in promise.
“Never,” he confirmed, moving to kiss her cheek, her jaw, her neck, until she squirmed enough that he let her loose.
“Then that’s my condition,” she said, eyes sparkling before sitting back down beside him, her side pressed against his so she could rest her head on his shoulder.
He would have preferred getting to kiss her some more, but this was a perfectly acceptable substitute for now, because he would get to kiss her again later. She had asked.
“You could ask for more, you know,” he said, sliding his hand around until it found hers, weaving his fingers in with hers until he was able to hold her tightly. He wanted to pull her hand to his chest, let her feel his heart race for her, prove to her that he’d never make her wait for anything ever again.
“This is plenty, believe it or not,” she hummed, and he did, because he couldn’t think of anything else to ask her for, either.
They sat like that for some time, watching the northern lights shimmer behind a sheer cloud cover that had blown in. Link thought he could maybe fall asleep like this, even in the cold, because she was co close and so warm so his.
“I missed you,” she said quietly, turning her head to press a tender kiss to his cheek. He leaned into it, eager for her touch, almost dazed enough that he didn’t quite hear her.
“You missed me?” He asked.
“You loved me then, too, you silly oaf,” she said, affection glittering in her eyes. “You just had to hide it so my father wouldn’t reassign you.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” He asked, running over all the same memories in his mind for the hundredth time over. He looked so stoic! So unmoved!
“I wanted you to come back to me on your own,” she said, leaning her head against his shoulder once more. She adjusted her hold on his hand, pulling it (and therefore herself) closer. “If I had told you… it would have been another mistake you felt compelled to fix instead of something you discovered on your own time.”
He leaned his head against hers, sufficiently warm with her body tucked so closely next to his. “You’re not just saying this to make me feel better about being an obtuse idiot a hundred years ago?”
She giggled. “No. Why else would you have been so livid about Benko’s stupid sonnets? Yes, they were terrible, and they were inappropriate for the court, but you were also wildly jealous.”
A warmth budded in his chest at the idea of sneaking around with her all those years ago, only in places her father and his loyal subjects wouldn’t see them, stealing kisses in dark corridors or remote linen closets. As soon as the warmth came, it was iced out by the realization that he’d never remember any of those moments with her.
“Can I ask for a condition?” He said quietly, worried he hadn’t earned the right yet. He was the one who had forgotten her. She was the one who had to forgive him.
“Of course,” she said, squeezing his hand.
“Can you tell me everything?” He asked. “Everything I forgot?”
She turned to face him once more, smile mischievous and calculating. “I can do you one better,” she said, shifting herself onto his lap once more. “I can show you.”