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Syril goes to find her at some uppity, gilded establishment he can still barely afford to look directly at, much less enter. The cover charge alone leaves his accounts light and his stomach nauseated. It’s not a club in the way most on the Coruscanti streets would define it—he doesn’t have to squint through a haze of multicolored smoke, or gracelessly flail through a roiling sea of sweat and indecency. The air is crisp and tidy, cold and polished, and it fizzles richly in his lungs with every breath. Black tables and countertops glisten under unfeeling, bright lights. The music is perfume-sweet and inoffensive, a stark contrast to the floorboard-shattering dreck that emanates from pits in the lower levels. The place is Imperial down to the grout between its tiles. It’s as starched, polished and ironed as the uniforms worn by the officers within, which makes the quiet chaos at the ISB table all the louder.
As Syril approaches, he notices that what he’d assumed was an animated conversation between Blevin and Supervisor Jung is, in fact, closer to a disagreement. Sweat has begun to surface at both of their brows, and Supervisor Jung has the tight jaw and set shoulders of a man doggedly pursuing a fight. Whether he yearns to throw punches or to take them, Syril doesn’t know him well enough to say. Supervisor Lagret has stretched one arm out across the table, while the other holds his slumping head in his hand. His eyelids droop, and he appears to be clinging to consciousness with all the power of a whimper. Doctor Gorst sits several empty chairs away from the others, but their neglect doesn’t appear to bother him. He nods sagely at the empty air to his left, turns his head, grins at the empty air to his right, and lets out a cackle that sends a shiver shooting up Syril’s spine.
At the far end, he at last finds who he came to see. She’s easily the most composed of them all. She’s not falling asleep, or picking a fight, or laughing so loudly that it’d rattle the windows of dwellings dozens of levels below. Her posture is pulled directly from an Imperial handbook. Her hair remains in its classical, sleek bun. For a moment, Syril wonders if she’s about to make a fool of him. If she’d been putting on an act, with her call. She’s an unimpeachable talent at everything else, so it seems logical that she could convincingly slur a few words in a manner that’d pluck at his every heartstring. And she’d know he’d show up, especially given the vicious argument they’d had before she’d left for the supervisors’ celebratory gathering.
She’d blamed him for passing along false information about the rebels; Syril had countered, honestly, by telling her his first priority should be sniffing out the mole on his staff and using them to get to Andor, rather than relying on her. Voices had been raised. Insults had been thrown, accusations of betrayal that burned like acid in his veins. And then her comlink call, the one that spurred him to action: I don’t need you. I don’t want… you. I’m having an excellent time, SyrilKaaarn, and I haven’t thought… about you… at all. Notevenonce.
He shouldn’t be here. There’s no reason for him to wander into this gathering place built on the highest rungs of the Imperial ladder. He is still making his climb. The obviousness of his lower station is written into every judgmental gaze that lingers on his Bureau of Standards uniform. It curls every lip and raises every eyebrow and fuels every whisper like a gust of poisoned wind, and he’s likely doing more damage to his reputation than he can ever recover from by permitting his shoes to fall on the floor. But the thought of her wandering home alone, her defenses lowered, her mind dulled, her reflexes slow—he cannot sit idle with the knowledge of her being in danger, even if they’re not… whatever they are, anymore. Not that they were ever anything at all.
Was that call real? Does she intend to humiliate me in front of the entirety of the ISB supervisorship?
Standing behind her seated form, he frowns. Thinks. Waits for the truth to reveal itself because it will, and in her fingers, it does. As they drum out of rhythm, they tell him of her inebriated state. Her pinky and ring finger fall in rapid succession, her middle finger hesitates for several seconds, and her pointer finger rises and falls without making space for her thumb to complete the cycle. She’s… been drinking. Clearly. But for a few quiet moments, Syril gives himself the gift of observation. He separates himself from the hurricane of eternal complication surrounding them and watches her; absorbs the luxurious glimmer of her hair, the sharp lines of her posture, the flawless marble of her neck. She’s altered. Intoxicated. Altered, intoxicated, enraged with him, and still capable of reducing him to a pile of lovesick ash.
The gray-haired man at the head of the table catches him staring. Their eyes lock. Syril’s heart thump-thump-thumps so loudly that it threatens to shake the crystal glasses littering the table. Most of the time, he’s amazed Major Partagaz has never put the pieces together. He’s so attuned to his supervisors, so eager to harden their every weakness into a callous, but he’s never shown a hint of suspicion about Dedra’s forbidden relationship.
Syril isn’t about to ask questions.
He creeps forward at a respectable pace, his hands behind his back, keenly aware of how high a rank major is and how even despite his promotions, he’s not part of the ISB. The Bureau of Standards rests on a lower rung, and they both know it.
“Mr. Karn,” Major Partagaz notes smoothly. Syril would assume he’d not had a single drink if four hadn’t sat empty beside his hand. At a place like this, service should be swift; the decision to keep the empty glasses there must be intentional. A challenge. “You’re the first Bureau of Standards employee I’ve had the pleasure of welcoming to this establishment. Tell me; is our beloved refuge about to be overrun by fuel purity analysts and redundancy technicians?”
Syril coughs. “I couldn’t say, sir. I’m alone.”
Partagaz’s smile loses its warmth as it stretches his lips. “Good,” he replies. “As I’m sure you understand, at the ISB, we’re protective of our secrets. The Empire’s, naturally, and—" he turns his gaze briefly to Dedra, and then to Syril in turn - “our own.”
Bitter bile rises at the back of his throat. Is this proof? Does Partagaz know? How much does he know? The room grows impossibly loud. Gorst cackles. Jung and Blevin shout. Thud-thud. Thud-thud. Thud-thud.
“Of course, sir,” Syril says. It takes every ounce of his sanity to keep his voice level. “The ISB’s currency is secrets.”
“Indeed.” Partagaz’s smile is a winter breeze, a blanket made from strips of razor wire. He knows. He must know. Why would Dedra tell him? No, Dedra wouldn’t tell him. Even inebriated, she’s too smart to— “Why don’t you join us?” Partagaz continues, sweeping a suggestive hand toward a vacant chair to his right. “Since you’re here, and you’re alone, I don’t see any harm in incorporating you into our humble celebration.”
Sent down from high above his rank, it’s a request Syril has no power to refuse. With a thick, tight swallow, he glides behind Partagaz and sits at his side, across from Dedra. Her reddened eyes focus on him for a breathless moment. Her lip curls. Her fingers stop their imbalanced drumming and go silent as they tuck into a fist. Slurred words slip back to the front of his mind. I don’t need you. I never… needed you. And that’s the problem, he thinks. They don’t need each other, they’ve never needed each other, and yet here he is. Desperate to be needed, or at least to be wanted, or tolerated.
“Can I interest you in a glass of Corellian reserve?” the major asks.
Syril’s only started gluing together a reply when Dedra chimes in. “I doubt it,” she says. Her voice is an octave lower than normal, and her words bleed into each other at the edges in a beautifully imbalanced watercolor of syllables. “He… doesn’t drink.”
Partagaz raises his eyebrows, and a pit forms in Syril’s stomach. She’d never have volunteered such information about him under normal circumstances; would never have sat the major down and explained to him that she and Syril have enough of a preexisting relationship that she knows enough about him to know he loathes the taste of alcohol and reviles its mind-numbing effects. Silently, he waits for the inevitable—an accusation of fraternization, or even an on-the-spot dismissal.
“Is that true?” Partagaz frowns, as one might at a test subject in an experiment that hasn’t acted according to a hypothesis. Syril looks from him to Dedra, who wears her anger openly and proudly as a battle scar. She either wants her superior officer to see how far their relationship has deteriorated over the past few hours, or she’s so far gone as to not care if he sees. His chest tightens. He isn’t sure which is worse.
“I’ll admit I’m not fond of the taste,” Syril says. “Supervisor Meero must’ve heard of my dislike for it as a matter… of reputation.”
At that, Dedra snorts. Syril ignores her, and the sting in his chest that sparks at the sound.
“You don’t enjoy drinking, and yet you’ve found your way to a business renowned for the quality of its alcoholic beverages,” Partagaz notes, leaning forward. “A most intriguing way to spend an evening.”
“Most intriguing,” Dedra echoes. Her gaze stabs at him, sharp, unrelenting. “I was unaware this place catered to officers below a certain rank. We’ve been patronizing it with an assumption of…” she stalls, stares off into the distance as she searches for the right word. “Exclusivity,” she finishes with a beautiful, terrible smirk that does beautiful, terrible things to him. “I believe its standing has fallen, of late.”
“I believe it caters to whoever pays the cover charge,” he retorts, fighting fire with fire. Dedra takes another sip of the tar-colored liquid in her glass. Syril almost tells her to stop—that she’s had enough, and she’s bound to have an agonizing headache tomorrow, and he’s only here to make sure that she gets home safely so she should just go home—but just as his lips part, he catches himself.
“Supervisor Meero,” Partagaz steps in, his voice interweaving amusement with a light scolding. “Mr. Karn is employed by the Bureau of Standards. We must treat him with the respect he’s earned.”
One side of Dedra’s mouth twitches, and she gives a faint hum. Syril’s unsure whether Partagaz is defending him or laughing at him beneath a shroud of professionalism, and either way, he’s ill at ease. His chest aches as he casts another brief glimpse at Dedra. He begs her with everything that he has and everything that he is to get up and leave. You don’t need more of whatever’s in that glass. You need to rest.
Her conduct this evening bewilders him to his core. In the year and a half that he’s known her, Syril has never seen Dedra Meero take a sip of anything with inebriating capabilities. Now, suddenly, she’s downed three glasses and is in the process of consuming a fourth. Farther along the table, Supervisor Jung shouts something insulting. Blevin shouts something insulting back. Supervisor Lagret, soundly asleep, gives off low, rumbling snores at random intervals.
Partagaz appears unaffected by the distinctly un-Imperial turmoil. His expression borders on serene, a handshake concealing a vibro-knife. “If you’ll indulge my curiosity,” he says to Syril, “what brought you here this evening, Mr. Karn?”
Dedra takes a lengthy sip of her drink. As she swallows her lips pull taut in disgust, and her brow furrows. She doesn’t like the taste. Then why— “Yes, Syril,” she says, her distaste of her refreshment replaced by a more permanent and familiar distaste for him. His eyes widen as nervousness squeezes his chest—he should not be Syril. He should be Mr. Karn. “Do justify… your presence,” she finishes with another haughty smirk, and a hiccup that undermines its arrogance. “Since you weren’tinvited.”
She hiccups again. That shouldn’t be endearing, given all the cancerous rays of loathing she’s radiated in his direction throughout this ordeal. All of that aside, he can’t help finding the involuntary little sounds charming.
The enchantment wears off in the silence that follows, and Syril feels a chill creep up his spine. The longer Partagaz speaks to him, the more he has the sense of being dropped into the center of a maze and studied. Of being carefully observed, timed, and judged as he scrambles desperately for freedom. Question after question forms new walls in his mind, and he slams into each as he tries to flee from the major’s mental labyrinth.
Was he obligated to drink because a superior extended the offer? Has he come across as uncouth, unforgivably rude, and damaged his chances at eventual ISB employment? And on that subject, what has the man seated between them made of Dedra’s rather pointed and careless remarks? How many hypotheses is he currently testing? Syril taps his sweaty fingers against his sweaty thigh and tries to find a shortcut through this conversation. Tries to find a weakness in the walls. Tries to find a way out. He takes a deep, soundless breath and listens to Gorst happily chattering to the ghosts on either side of him.
“I’m here in an official capacity,” he says, hoping what he conveys is, in fact, shallow professional regret and not the bone-splintering panic that threatens to shred him to ribbons. “I need to speak with Supervisor Meero. We’ve received some alarming data pertaining to the misuse of Imperial resources in one of her sectors.”
“Well,” Partagaz says, his face frustratingly blank, “that does sound troubling. And this is far from the correct forum for such a discussion.”
Dedra raises an eyebrow, and for a sickening moment, Syril believes she’ll call his bluff. That she’ll bar the exit to the maze and leave him starving, spiraling, clawing fruitlessly at the walls and staring up at the oppressive sky. Their gazes connect. Desperate, he shoots her a barely perceptible shake of his head. To everyone else in the room, it’d be a twitch of the muscles in his neck; to her, it’s a sign. It should be a sign. Dedra, if you’re capable of understanding me, don’t make this worse for us. She’s equal parts stunning and unreadable, her expression a song in a key he’s never heard before, its lyrics in a language he cannot understand. I’m offering you a hand. Don’t slap it away.
“I’ll get my coat,” she says at last, and it’s all Syril can do not to slump over in relief. She’s listened to him. She’s willing to leave this place—to leave this place with him. For the first time since their argument, hope breaks through the clouds in his chest.
“Of course.” He bites back a smile. He shouldn’t be—wouldn’t be—jovial when there’s a supposedly massive crisis unfolding. “Whenever you’re ready, supervisor.”
With one last glare at him, Dedra stands and moves toward the entrance. Syril watches her go. Her steps remain remarkably even, her shoulders an unbroken line, her chin tilted upward to broadcast her superiority over whomever she’ll order to retrieve her garment. Even when she’s half herself, he’s completely transfixed. Even when she’s unraveled, she’s remarkable. But Syril believes he’s the only one to notice the slight lurch in her gait, the hint of drunken sway when one boot leaves the floor. It’ll be good for her to go home.
He hadn’t meant to slip out of reality or stare, but Partagaz’s voice startles him, so he must have done both. “You’ve met previously.”
Suddenly, it becomes rather difficult to breathe.
“I—” he stammers as the walls close in. They leave him wedged between two steel slabs, straining for every undignified gasp of air as his bones fracture. So close. He’d come so close—they’d come so close—to emerging from this unscathed. Who can say what condition they’ll escape in now? “I’m afraid I haven’t had the pleasure, sir,” he says carefully, slowly, confidently. “I’ve heard of her, but I haven’t—this’ll be the first we’ve worked together.”
“She knows you by name,” Partagaz counters, his lips stretching in an eerily friendly smile that activates Syril’s fight-or-flight response. His legs begin to tremble. His head spins. The growing din of the room collapses beneath a wave of sharp-edged anxiety.
“Then perhaps she’s heard of me, as well.”
“And your professional reputation includes a disinclination to partake in alcoholic beverages?”
His career flashes before his eyes. “I… I’m not sure I understand your implication, sir.”
Partagaz nods, as if he fully understands Syril’s misunderstanding. The man turns his head to gauge where Dedra has gone, finds her stuck in a slow-moving line to retrieve her coat, and returns his attention to Syril.
“I never invest in the personal lives of my officers,” he says, “but I understand there is no reasonable means of preventing them from occurring.” His tone is so straightforward and polished that they might be discussing the weather, and not a major infraction of the Empire’s codes of conduct. “They will, intentionally or accidentally, develop interests that fall outside the boundaries of their work. As long as those activities have no effect on their duty to the Empire, and they understand that the integrity of their position demands undivided loyalty and perfect accuracy, I see no immediate cause for intervention.”
Dedra has made it to the front of the line. Syril’s hands shake, and he pins them beneath his thighs. Is Partagaz blaming him for Dedra’s conduct, or is he indirectly giving them his blessing? Even the possibility of the latter sets his heart to sprinting. “I’m not sure I’ve absorbed your meaning, sir.”
Dedra takes her coat from a red-faced attendant and begins walking in their direction. “Then you’ll need to devote more thought to it, Mr. Karn.”
And with that, Dedra returns to the table. The conversation ends. “Are we… leaving?” she asks Syril, staring at the wall above his head rather than at him.
“Yes,” Syril answers her. He stands on unsteady legs, and pushes in his chair with unsteady fingers, and breathes with unsteady lungs. “Right away.”
“Let’s get onwithit, then.” She hiccups again, and again, Syril reins in a smile. Should he? If he smiled, would Partagaz discourage it? Or would he simply view it as an aspect of Dedra’s life he sees no reason to invest in?
Partagaz stands and extends a hand to Syril. He grasps it firmly, shakes it once, and then disengages. “I’m glad you could join us this evening, Mr. Karn.”
Syril wishes he could say the same, but at the moment, it’s difficult for him to say anything. “Thank you, sir.” It’s all he can manage to eke out.
Then, without another word, he follows Dedra to the exit.
***
Dedra won’t let him sit beside her on the transport to her building, and she won’t let him walk with her through the night-energized corridors and neon-stained streets. But she doesn’t protest when he sits silently in the seat across from hers, or when he walks several yards behind her until she reaches the doorway he recognizes as her own.
To Syril, that’s close enough.
“Why did you… show up?” Dedra drawls as they stand outside her door. “I had it undercontrol.”
“I know,” Syril says softly, because he won’t start a second argument in as many hours. “I know you did.”
Apparently, it’s the wrong thing to say. She stiffens. Her eyes flash. “Don’t do that, Syril,” she snarls. “Don’t.”
A fraction of the magma churning in her eyes cools. She pauses for a moment, as if to catch her breath. Her upper lip twitches. Her fingers flex into a fist, and then straighten, and then form a fist, and then straighten. “You’re so…” She hiccups, waving a hand in the air. “I hate it when you’re so…” He holds his breath and waits to hear what she hates about him. He’s heard it all before, of course, but something about this feels different—more honest, even if it’s originating from a place of intoxication. “Here. Ever since Ferrix. You’re so… here, all the time. Allllllll the time.”
You hate it when I’m… here? He swallows and attempts to take it in stride. They’re working together to track down Axis and Andor. He has to be here. He has to be with her. She knows that, and aside from the recent unceremonious and semi-permanent dissolution of their mostly professional relationship, she hadn’t seemed to mind his presence.
“Should I go, then?” he asks quietly.
Only after asking does he realize he’ll never be ready for the answer.
Dedra’s expression goes blank. She blinks once, then again, as if he’s doused her in freezing water. Her twitching and fist-clenching ceases. “Yes,” she says. His heart has just enough time to sink before she amends: “No.”
She’s adrift, her coherence dissolving before his eyes. He’s almost ashamed to be talking with her right now; she won’t remember any of it when the suns rise. He’s not at all convinced she won’t collapse in the middle of her apartment’s entryway and wake hours later with her head against the wall, dizzy and humiliated. If he had to, he’d go as far as turning down the covers of her bed for her, extinguishing the lights once he’d ascertained she was comfortable. Then, he could leave her without another anxious thought—but he won’t cross the threshold without an invitation. She’s unlikely to extend one.
“I don’t like this,” she grimaces, her expression a near-pout, and Syril doesn’t know if she’s referring to his existence in general, their current conversation, or her state of being. Given the similarities between them, he thinks it’s possible that she’s never been drunk before—he’s only ever been so inebriated once, and he reviled the experience so wholeheartedly that he’s never taken a sip of alcohol since. He chooses to believe that’s the explanation. It hurts him the least.
“It’ll wear off once you get some rest,” he reassures her. Then, because he can’t resist: “I hadn’t thought you the type to…” he trails off. Any end to the sentence will sound as if he’s judging her, and he isn’t. Her work is stressful, and she’s suffered a major setback, and she’s entitled to process it in whatever way she sees fit. He can’t bring himself to think less of her for such an unusual, self-destructive indulgence, but confusion sinks its teeth in him all the same. “You surprised me. That’s all.”
Her jaw works. She takes an unsteady step toward him. “It’s your fault. Allofit. Your fault.”
His thoughts drain down to their argument, to her suspicion that he’d betrayed her and the accusations she’d made as a result. None of it had been his fault then, and it’s not his place to take the blame now. How is it my fault that you drank to the point that you can barely stand, and practically proclaimed to your supervisory officer that we… are whatever it is that we are? Or were?
“We can discuss this in the morning. Sleep well, Dedra.” He hopes she’ll have forgotten this interaction by then. He hopes she calls him the moment she wakes up. He turns to leave, but the sound of her voice—cold, demanding, a wobbly tracing of her usual steel-eyed ordering—turns his feet to lead.
“We’ll discuss it now.”
He’ll discuss it now.
“Fine,” he sighs, turning around. “If this is about—” he angles his head one way, then the other, searches briefly but thoroughly for potential witnesses. When he finds none, he continues. “Earlier, I gave you the same information I was given from my sources on the ground. It was verifiably accurate at the time. There’s nothing else I can say.” Some of the fog in her gaze blows away, leaving an unreadable emotion just enough space to shine through. Witnessing that, he softens his tone. “Whether you believe me or not, I didn’t betray you. I didn’t lie to you.”
“I know that,” she fires back, advancing on him, as he descends further into confusion. He rummages around in his topsy-turvy brain for an explanation. Why would she accuse him of being a traitor only to turn around and claim she’d always known he’d told her the truth? Eventually, he arrives at an answer that doesn’t quite satisfy him, but it at least lines up with logic.
“You wanted someone to blame.” Someone to point your finger at when it all went wrong. Except that’s not a perfect solution to the problem, either, because she couldn’t have framed him publicly. No one knows about their connection aside from them… and, depending how his words were meant to be interpreted, Partagaz. “Is that it?” He says it angrily, but it’s a genuine question.
“I don’t… needyou, Syril,” Dedra hisses as she steps toward him, and he steps backward. His spine molds itself against the wall of her apartment’s external entryway. It’d take so little effort for him to go—to escape into the abandoned corridor and break free. Liberation could be as simple as silence. As instinctual as walking away. After all, she doesn’t need him. He is, as she so succinctly and cuttingly put it, a traitor and an embarrassment.
Instead, he allows Dedra to corner him. As she stands a few pulled-taut inches away, he considers an unpleasant truth; even when she’s all but powerless, she holds power over him. Even when she can barely assemble a coherent sentence, he hangs on her every syllable. Even when she’s intoxicated, he finds her intoxicating. Why? Why had he thrown himself into an airtaxi and paid a ridiculous cover charge and risked his hard-earned career only to stand here and be, as usual, derided? He despises his legs for making no attempt to move. He despises his heart for pattering. He despises his breath for catching.
“I never needed… you,” she continues, red-eyed and unraveling at every normally crisp edge. Her hat has gone askew, its brim tilting at a slight angle, and he stifles an urge to reach out and straighten it. To eternally defend her, and everything she represents, and everything that she is. While he, apparently, is nothing to her.
Her words stab and twist between his ribs. I never needed you. He takes a moment to plot out his next move—how to tiptoe around the Ferrix of it all, and whether he should—and in that moment, she says something that lights an explosive in the already sizzling equilibrium between them. “That’s why… it’s so… incomprehensible.”
Only Dedra Meero, he thinks, could drunkenly stumble her way to the word ‘incomprehensible.’ The muscles of his shoulders pull tight, and his stomach flips. “Incomprehensible?”
She leans in, her alcohol-sodden breath drowning him in flame. “I don’tneed you. I would’vebeenfine on… my own. But you—this… I don’t—I don’t. Need you. But I…” Her hands exert a commanding pressure as they slide up his shoulders, leaving his skin aflame beneath the layers of his coat and suit. They slow and then stop, one hand on either side of his neck. He gives an involuntary gasp as the tips of her fingers brush the strip of his bare skin above his collar. Her pointer finger lands with precision at his screaming carotid.
She looks up at him, perfect in her imperfection, and he forgets every rotten facet of himself that isn’t completely intertwined with her. He’ll be an embarrassment, if he can be her embarrassment. He’ll be a traitor, if he can be her traitor. Stars need darkness to glow, and if he’s the void by which her brilliance shines, so be it.
Then, before he has a chance to open his mouth and ask her with as much delicacy and propriety as possible what she’s doing, Dedra leans in and presses her lips against his.
They haven’t done this. She’s never done this. They’ve circled around it, been pulled closer and closer into its orbit, but now—now all of Coruscant slides out from beneath him, and he falls out of reality and into a bright darkness with her at its center. Builds a home on a planet with her as its sun. Sees her in the briefly lit gap between buildings, his hope, his direction, his inspiration, his light. She tilts her head and gives a rattling shudder of a sigh. He’s frozen. His eyes won’t close. His arms won’t move. The thought tramples through his muddy mind that she might as well be kissing a statue. A lifeless, loveless slab of marble. And she deserves better than that. She deserves every meaningless ounce of him, and he’d surrender himself to her without hesitation, he could, he would, but he shouldn’t — her fingers slide around the back of his neck, her nails biting so mercilessly at the sensitive skin there that he has no choice but to shiver, and at his body’s unbidden encouragement she kisses him harder, slides her tongue and hands and teeth along the line between pleasure and pain, issues him an order with nothing but the clumsy heat of her mouth on his. And he’d follow it eagerly, he could, he would, but he shouldn’t — he’d raise his arms and lock her in them with the inseverable passion of forever, hold her so tightly that nothing could blemish her and no hands but his could touch her and anyone wishing her harm would have to go through him first and she’s kissing him and she’s kissing him and she’s kissing him, and she kisses him as if she’s trying to make him understand something, or answer a question, or break through the surface of a storm-thrashing ocean, and he—
Can’t.
Won’t.
It’s impossible for him to move his head, but he has enough space to raise his arms and slide them up to her shoulders. As gently as his shaking, half-numb hands can manage, he exerts just enough pressure to break her hold and guide her backward a single step. He can’t look at her as she opens her eyes. He isn’t ready for whatever her expression might contain — regret, anger, or rejection. It’s safer to keep his gaze on the ground.
“Not like this,” he whispers, to the carpet, to himself, and to Dedra. His racing heart reaches for her as it pounds. In at least half of his mind, she is still kissing him. Her mouth is still on his, demanding, insistent, yearning. “If you still — tomorrow, when it’s all worn off —” He’s saying so many words, he knows, without uttering a single thing of value. With great effort, he finds the energy to raise his head. She’s turned away from him, turned to face the door with her back straight, her chin high, and her hands, like his, trembling. Every cell in his body burns for her, and he has nothing to stifle the blaze. Nothing to make the burning stop. He wonders if she feels the same; wonders if there’s any truth in alcohol-induced physicality, or if it’s all… incomprehensible.
Then she walks through the door and leaves him behind.