Chapter 31 Stories in a Dark Corner
Every night, I ended up in the same corner.
I told myself it just happened that way. That the table was quieter. That the lamp burned steadier there, less smoke, less flicker.
That it had nothing to do with him already being there when I arrived. That it had nothing to do with the pull I felt for him.
Same seat. Same stretch of shadow cutting across his face. Same slow way he looked up like he’d been waiting long enough to pretend he hadn’t.
I always adjusted the lantern first.
Turned it a fraction. Then another. Until the light fell just right—catching the edges of things, leaving the rest soft and blurred. It gave me something to do with my hands. Something that wasn’t noticing how close his knee was under the table.
He never commented on it.
Just watched, like it was part of the ritual.
Then he’d reach for the bottle.
Careful. Precise. Like pouring cheap rum into two mismatched glasses required ceremony. His fingers curled around the neck, steady as he tipped it, eyes narrowed in mock concentration.
“Don’t rush me,” he muttered once when I huffed at him. “This is delicate work.”
“It’s rum, not medicine.”
“Everything’s medicine if you drink enough of it.”
I snorted, but I didn’t take the glass until he slid it toward me.
Our fingers brushed.
Just for a second.
It shouldn’t have been anything.
It was everything.
I pulled back too fast, curling my hand around the glass like that was what I’d meant to do all along. The rim was warm where his hand had been.
I drank anyway.
—
Some nights, we talked about the day. Who’d caused trouble. Who’d paid too little. Who’d tried to flirt their way out of both. Easy things. Safe things. Other nights… it slipped. Like the tide pulling at something I wasn’t ready to let go of.
“My father taught me to swim by throwing me off the docks,” he said once, like it was a joke he’d told a hundred times.
I looked up from my glass. “You’re joking.”
He rolled the rim of his drink between his fingers, watching the way the liquid moved. “If I made it back, I got supper.”
“And if you didn’t?”
One corner of his mouth lifted. “Then I suppose he saved on food.”
I stared at him a second too long.
Tried to picture it—him smaller, thinner, saltwater in his lungs and no one coming after him.
Something in my chest pulled tight.
“That explains a lot,” I said, aiming for light. It came out softer than I meant.
He huffed a laugh, but his eyes flicked up, catching mine like he was checking if I meant it.
I looked away first.
“My mother,” he went on, leaning back, “used to sing while she patched sails. Loud enough the whole dock could hear her. Said the ship listened better when it had music.”
“She sounds smart.”
“She was.”
The way he said it, it was filled with sorrow. I wasn’t going to push if he didn't want to talk about it.
I turned the ribbon around my finger without thinking. Felt the smooth slide of it, the slight pull when I tightened it too far.
He noticed.
Of course he did.
His gaze dropped, followed the movement, lingered just long enough to make my skin prickle before it climbed back up to my face.
“What about you?” he asked.
Quieter now.
Not a story tossed into the air. Something placed carefully between us.
“Who taught you to do that?” He nodded toward my glass. “You pour like it's something important.”
I shrugged, even as my grip on the ribbon tightened. “My mother ran the only tavern on the island.”
I could smell it if I thought too hard. Citrus peels. Old wood. Smoke soaked into the beams.
I didn’t want to think that hard.
“I spent more time behind the bar than anywhere else.” I twisted the ribbon again, watching it wind around my finger. “She used to say I had a tavern soul.”
His mouth curved, slow and certain. “I believe it.”
Heat crept up my neck before I could stop it.
I took a drink to hide it.
He didn’t look away.
—
Some nights, we built things that didn’t exist. Tonight was about a house by the water that didn’t leak when it rained.
“Where would you put it?” he asked once. “This perfect house of yours.”
“Near the docks,” I said without thinking. “Close enough to hear the tide. Far enough the smell doesn’t wake you.”
He nodded like he could see it. “Windows facing east or west?”
“East,” I said. “I like knowing when the day starts.”
His eyes flicked to mine. Stayed there.
“I figured you would.”
Something in the way he said it made my stomach dip. Like he knew more than I’d told him. Like he was paying attention in ways that weren’t safe.
“Do you miss it?” he asked.
Just like that.
No warning.
I opened my mouth.
“No,” I said.
Too fast.
The word hit the table between us and sat there, wrong-shaped and heavy. I stared at the lamp instead. Watched the flame bend, stretch, recover. Anything but look at him. The silence that followed wasn’t empty.
It pressed in.
Waited.
My hand moved before I thought about it.
Up. To my throat.
Searching.
Nothing.
Of course nothing.
The absence hit sharper for expecting it.
My fingers dropped, catching the ribbon instead. I wound it tight around my finger, tighter, until the silk bit into my skin.
Grounding.
Something I could feel.
Something that was still there.
“Hey.”
His voice cut through, low and close.
Closer than before.
I hadn’t noticed him lean in.
I felt it now.
The shift in the air. The heat of him just across the table, like if I moved an inch, I’d cross something I wouldn’t be able to uncross.
I didn’t look up.
Didn’t trust what might show on my face if I did.
His hand moved.
Stopped just short of mine.
I saw it in the edge of my vision—fingers flexing once against the wood, like he was deciding something.
Then stillness.
He didn’t touch me.
Didn’t pull away either.
Just… stayed there.
Close enough that I could feel it.
“I didn’t mean—” he started.
I shook my head, cutting him off.
“It’s fine.”
It wasn’t.
We both knew it.
But he let it sit.
Let me have the lie.
After a moment, I loosened the ribbon from my finger. The skin beneath it throbbed faintly, a thin line pressed into it.
I smoothed it flat against my palm.
When I finally looked up, his eyes were still on me. Not searching now. Not teasing. Something that made it harder to breathe right.
“We should get back,” I said, even though neither of us moved.
“Yeah,” he agreed.
Still not moving.
The lamp flickered between us, throwing light and shadow across his face, across the table, across the space we kept pretending wasn’t there.
I stood first.
If I hadn’t, I wasn’t sure I would have at all.
And when I walked away, I could feel his gaze follow me—warm as a hand. I was starting to want him even when I knew better.