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Ishmael found herself wandering the backdoor corridor of Mephistopheles again, eleven P.M. sharp, unable to fall asleep. It was simple restlessness now, nothing too serious since the revelations she had forced unto her at the Great Lake, but still it irked the woman ever so slightly.
She paced back and forth, until a door swung open, remarkably quietly for the force put into it, and out burst a lemon-haired girl who almost immediately came sprinting towards her.
Ishmael jolted back on instinct, but it was merely Don Quixote — was she now smiling? Perhaps, indeed. It was nice to see a friendly face, was all she elected to tell herself.
“Ah, Lady Ishmael! It is a pleasure to see thee...” Don Quixote hurriedly says — almost bowling over Ishmael in meeting her halfway through the corridor — “dost thou wish to see the stars tonight?”
“Uh. What?” Ishmael asks.
She stares at Don Quixote, whose face seems to shift more and more into those puppy-dog eyes she’s only seen Don Quixote do when talking about Fixers, until the blonde’s eyes pan down, bashful, an emotion that is even more uncommon from her.
Ishmael sighs. Perhaps this wouldn’t be too bad. She had been enjoying Don Quixote’s company more and more recently (or perhaps she finally decided to stop lying to herself) — much despite what she knew would be the far saner option.
And, regretfully, she could not fight Don Quixote’s skill in puppy-dog eyes. Try as she might.
“Sure.”
Don Quixote looks up and her eyes sparkle, or perhaps they had always been doing that, but either way Ishmael could not help but stare into them and crack a tentative smile in return.
“Excellent, Lady Ishmael! I, Don Quixote, shall take us two to gaze upon the night sky in all its splendour!”
She grabs Ishmael’s hand, and Ishmael turns away ever so slightly before nearly wiping out at Don Quixote’s whisking her away, sprinting down the hallway once more. Ishmael’s legs work faster than her mind, but she can’t help but notice that she is being led in the opposite direction of the bus door.
“Don? This is... the—” she stumbles a little, “fuck- wrong way.”
“Ah, forsooth, Lady Ishmael, for the view from mine own bedroom is far superior than to that of the City’s sky! ‘Tis true, as I have seen both many a time!” she exclaims, and the two reach the door to Don Quixote’s room.
Ishmael looks at the door, then to Don Quixote.
“...that doesn’t mean what you think it does, Don.”
But, alas, Ishmael decides if there was any time she would entertain this, it might as well be this night.
The door is opened and they walk in, and Ishmael quickly faces the “stars” that Don Quixote spoke of — they are glow-in-the-dark star stickers carefully scattered over her ceiling and walls. If anything, she’s impressed at the effort. It matches Don Quixote, that, even if naïve, burning passion the girl seemed to carry everywhere she went. Fluorescent pale yellow, a few shades off from the girl’s hair, yet shining nowhere near as bright.
Ishmael was almost sure a radiance like this was outlawed in the City.
She looks at Don Quixote and smiles. Despite herself, once again, she does not utter even a single sarcastic vowel. “Wow, Don... it’s nice.”
“Thou truly mean it?!” Don Quixote exclaims, staring at Ishmael with a wide smile and gleaming eyes, once again.
Ishmael stared. She stared for a second too long, into Don Quixote’s eyes, and...
“It is. Really.” Ishmael walks into the centre of the room, laying on her back, tracing her hand in the air along the constellations Don Quixote had made up, she assumed, some night on this damned bus.
It would never be as nice as the night sky seemed to be when she was on the Pequod, gazing up at the stars with Queequeg, hand in hand, and foolishly wondering if they could be among them.
But Ishmael looks to Don Quixote, who excitedly jumps off her bed and lays down next to Ishmael, smiling wholeheartedly.
“I shall name the stars for thee then, Lady Ishmael!” she cheers, her left hand grabbing onto Ishmael’s own, her right arm flying skyward to trace those same constellations Ishmael had only guessed for. All as if Don Quixote could read Ishmael’s mind, front to back. As if she did not carry stars brighter than anything in the cosmos in her two eyes.
Heat rose to Ishmael’s cheeks, and she, despite herself, decided she would not mind being among Don Quixote’s field of stars either.
She chuckled lightly.
“Thank you.” A pause. “My knight. Don.”
(Ishmael swore she saw red paint the other girl’s face. But it was too dark to tell, and she, in all her excellence, marked it off as her own infatuation clouding her judgement.)
“Anything thou wishes, my Lady!”
The two laid there, hours ticking past midnight, as Don Quixote would point to a star, christen it a title of its own, and Ishmael would tell a parallel story of her time on the Pequod, at her highest and lowest.
Perhaps she was getting too comfortable with the other Sinner, Ishmael thought.
But when she looked at the other’s face, she then truly realised just how far deep she was. It was different, this time, she was no longer suffering. It was light, and fuzzy, and she would admit it to herself — she loved Don Quixote, did she not?
She wondered if Don Quixote had realised this shift. Ishmael figured she likely would have. There was always just something under that naïve exterior, no matter the hurdles the fixer-obsessed girl jumped through to hide it. Something enough, to understand her, to see the world and elect to be optimistic anyways.
That was Ishmael’s reasoning, anyways, as to why her fondness for Don Quixote had grown past a simple amusement at the other’s antics, a burgeoning friendship, and that small growing seed that told her maybe Don Quixote was cute, actually.
Ishmael had been staring for far too long. If the other girl took any notice of this, she did not mention it. But it was nice to do. Nice to feel , Ishmael reckoned.
Don Quixote yawned, and Ishmael smiled tentatively. “Tired, Don?”
“A little, my Lady...” she softly hummed, too soft for Don Quixote, but soft enough for Ishmael’s ears indeed.
Ishmael stands up, stretching and yawning for a few seconds. “Mm. Okay.” She motions towards the door, sticking her thumb backwards at it. “I’m gonna head back to my room, then. Have a good night, see you tomorrow, Do-”
Don Quixote rises and grabs her wrist, a little bit too eagerly. “Wait, Lady Ishmael!”
They both pause. “Yeah?”
“Um, I-I...” Don Quixote stuttered out. Ishmael mused to herself that this was another first she had seen from the girl today. Embarrassment? It wasn’t Don Quixote’s colour, anyways — but the pink that Ishmael now swore stained her cheeks she reasoned might just compliment the girl’s face after all.
She nudges Don Quixote, who jumps slightly. “Ah! Mine apologies, Lady Ishmael! I was merely... curious... if thee would so wish to spend the night with me in bed..?” She seems to shrink into herself. It is not shame, clearly (Don Quixote could never be shameful), but indeed still embarrassment, and this only serves to endear her to Ishmael’s soaring heart further.
Oh. “Oh.” Ishmael breathes out. “Uh... sure..?”
Her heart is beating far too fast to seem nonchalant anymore, and she knows this. She stares at Don Quixote. Because the other felt the same, did she not?
They’re both smiling.
“Don, does this..?” Ishmael trails off.
“My Lady, may I...” Don Quixote does as well.
They lock eyes. Each of their gazes trail down, just down slightly, past the other’s nose, to...
“Don.”
“Yes, m-my Lady?”
“Are we thinking the same thing?”
“Ishma-” Don Quixote catches herself. “Lady Ishmael. May...”
Ishmael can hardly wait for Don Quixote’s nerves to cool down. Every second that ticks down in the back of her head, waiting for Don Quixote to finally bite the bullet and say what she wishes to. Ishmael knows. And Ishmael knows she cannot push it.
She smirks nonetheless.
“May I... Lady Ishmael, may I kiss thee?” Don Quixote asks, her voice warbling out shaky notes.
“You may.”
It is clumsy at best — Don Quixote clearly inexperienced, and Ishmael standoffish after her own revelations at the Great Lake, but it intensifies slowly and surely, the wash of orange hair falling over Ishmael’s face being all Don Quixote can think of, and the sparkling eyes when they finally break off all Ishmael will bring herself to look at.
The moment passes, and Ishmael makes true on her promise to herself.
Don Quixote seems to sparkle brighter than not just her fluorescent yellow star stickers, but than those stars Ishmael spent months staring at, wishing for a better life.
She wraps her arms tight around Don Quixote, leaning over slightly, and sighs, satisfied in this moment, in this better life.
Ishmael wonders if Queequeg, up in that great field of stars in the real sky, was watching. She wonders if she would be proud of her.
She would, Ishmael knows. Ishmael knows her own path, now, and it lay in the heart of the blonde woman beaming back at her, who seemed to almost sparkle.
“That- ‘twas... wonderful, my Lady.” Don Quixote sighs contentedly.
She looks back down at the girl in her arms, and kisses the top of her head, a gentle thing.
“Bedtime, Don?”
“Indeed, my Lady! I... It would allow me much joy if I were permitted to fall asleep in thine arms!”
Ishmael smiles a soft smile at the girl, hardly letting her go as they saunter over to Don Quixote’s bed and fall in, shuffling under the covers as Don Quixote wraps herself further in Ishmael’s embrace.
Ishmael had already found her compass, and with it, her freedom.
Summoned pink patches across her cheeks danced with freckles, a waltz only for her lover.
Ishmael’s star was wrapped tightly in her arms, and that in and of itself, was something indescribable.