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Not an order or a plea, it’s somewhere between. But though my words are clumsy, they reach Poet and something in him seems to give way. A low gasp bursts out of him and he drives his hips forward, shunting us both in his grip harder than before. Our slow climb hits a peak and I drown in the look on his face as he releases on my stomach. In the whole-body shudder that rocks him. Then I take my own advice—let it out—and finally, finally, I come by a hand that’s not my own.

And I am not quiet. I do shout, I think. I am not sure. Of anything except the sweet violence of it and the white spots dancing in my eyes when it’s over. As I stare at the ceiling, blinking at a world that feels crooked and set right all at the same time.

We clean up. Then I wrap my arms around Poet and the off-kilter feeling goes away. I am still shaking, and I think he might be too, but as he breathes into my neck and his hair tickles my nose, I let it happen. Let it settle between us as easily as the rain hits the waves in a gentle summer storm.

Eventually, I realise I’m rubbing my hand up and down Poet’s spine. That he hums low and deep, as if he likes it. So I don’t stop. I rub my cheek to the top of his head and contentment rumbles through me. Aras says I sound like a bear when I am happy. Or sleepy. In this moment, I am both. I am drifting and I almost do not notice the staccato beat at the pulse point on my wrist.

I’m still lost somewhere warm and too present to be present. Poet reacts before I can. He sits up and peers at the watch that still feels like an alien strapped to my arm. Then his gaze flicks back to my face before he rises and disappears into the kitchen like he belongs here.

Dazed, I blink after him.

By the time I’m upright, he’s back with what I need—a sports drink and the kit he’s rescued from my discarded jeans.

He sets them within easy reach before he sits beside me and turns to find his own clothes. But he keeps a hand on my naked thigh and for a moment, it derails me. My body is mine to understand. Mine to carry and keep safe, and so I always have. And I’ve never shied from the resistance I feel when people hover too close and I feel too vulnerable to share this with them. But in the dim light of the living room, with Poet’s warm palm on my overheated skin, that feeling does not rise. I feel his shoulder warm against mine as he straightens up and realise that like before, at the side of the road, I do not mind this—the intimacy of it—at all.

I fix my numbers. By then, we both have our jeans back on, but I’m not ready to let Poet go.

We lie in the balmy night air, the heat of the day, and of us, still trapped in the walls. Summer has settled properly in Porth Luck tonight. The sea breeze would be warm if I could make myself rise and open the windows. But we are too comfortable, I am too comfortable, and Poet seems bemused by my affection.

He doesn’t evade it, though. For long minutes, hours, perhaps, he is still in my arms, breathing softly as I ghost my fingers over his bare skin. Drifting again, I think I could sleep. I wonder if he could too and how it might feel to wake up in the morning like this. I have not slept all night with a lover since I left Lithuania and even though I have spent years telling Sol different, maybe I do miss it⁠—

The lamp cuts out. Darkness drops over us like a veil. The soft amber light holding us is gone in a split second and Poet startles in my arms, a subtle flinch I feel because I am holding him.

His muscles tighten.

Then his breathing shifts, and though he stays in my arms another second, maybe two, I know he is already gone.

I cannot look away as he orients himself in the dark.

The room.

The door.

Me.

“Poet,” I murmur his name deep and low.

He turns toward my voice as the moonlight finds the back window and spills through the glass to catch the curve of his jaw and the reclaimed peace washing over him. “I think your house is telling me to go home.”

“It would not do such a thing.” I shift onto my side, propping my head on my hand as Poet reaches for his shirt, accepting how it feels to watch him prepare to leave this moment behind. “You are okay?”

Poet tugs his shirt on, obscuring the hand marks I’ve left on his torso. I think he might not answer me. Then he turns to me in the dark. “It messes with my head when my surroundings change shape without warning. Logically, I know it’s no different for you, but to me it feels like losing another layer of myself, even if it’s temporary.”

Understanding settles in my chest. Empathy. I haven’t lived Poet’s life, but I know how it feels to have your existence change in a heartbeat. So I don’t ask him to stay when it is so clear to me instinct is telling him to go.

I roll upright to sit beside him as he finds his shoes, and I come to terms with the reality that another evening with this man has changed me. That I have stepped out of myself and come back someone different.

He ties his old Nikes and snags the bracelet I left on the side table the last time I wore it. “It’s blue. Like the ocean.”

“And yours is the colour of the earth.” I take the bracelet and fasten it around his wrist, so it sits next to his as if they were made to be together. “Ivy is a clever child.”

“She knows things,” Poet says.

The sentence feels unfinished, but he doesn’t elaborate, and my heart knows before I do that our time is up.

I nudge his shoulder. “Come to the kitchen with me before you go. I have something for you.”

9 POET