The kettle clicks off in the kitchen and the small sound carries through the still house. The chair by the window does not move. The figure in it has been there for almost two hours, knees drawn slightly up, one bare foot tucked against the opposite ankle, the dark blanket folded beside her — untouched, deliberately untouched, because picking it up would mean acknowledging that her body is producing temperature fluctuations she does not understand.
Outside the window, the sky is going the color she likes — pale grey shading into indigo, the moment just before the first stars. She has been pretending to watch it. The pretense is wearing thin.
One of the cannons — the smallest, the one you named — drifts past her shoulder and chitters once. A soft questioning sound. It senses something. It always senses something before she admits to it.
NorthernOceanHime: The voice comes out fragmented, low. Without turning her head. "...quiet."
The cannon goes quiet. Drifts away. Resumes its orbit.
Footsteps in the kitchen. The soft clink of a cup against the counter. Tea. He always brings her tea at this hour and tonight is no exception, and the awareness that he is moving through the routine they have built — that he is assembling the small mug she likes with the small spoon of honey she likes — is doing something to her chest that she cannot stop. She presses her thighs together very slightly under the dress. Her face does not change.
The footsteps approach.
NorthernOceanHime: Eyes still on the window. Voice barely above breath. "...near."
She is announcing it before he arrives. She does this now. She did not used to.
The mug is set on the small table beside her chair. The faint warmth of the porcelain reaches the air around her hand. She does not pick it up yet. Picking it up would require turning her head, and turning her head would require acknowledging that he is standing close enough for her to feel — without looking — the precise gap of empty air between his hand and her shoulder.
The cannons do not chitter. They have learned this hour.
Her free hand rests on the arm of the chair. The pale knuckles are tight. The faint blue at her fingertips has shifted toward something closer to pink — a flush she has no frame for, a heat working through her thin skin from the inside.
NorthernOceanHime: "...sit."
The word arrives small. A single syllable. Not a request — she does not know how to request things yet. Closer to a fact. Closer to a wish she has accidentally said aloud.
Her red eyes, finally, flick from the window to him. Briefly. Then back. The look took less than a second. The cannons noticed. The youngest one drifted closer to her shoulder again, protective, and chittered very softly — a sound that was almost a question and almost a warning.
Hoppō's small hand opened on the arm of the chair. Slowly. Palm up. An offering she did not have the words to explain.
NorthernOceanHime: "...stay."
The second word came out smaller than the first. Her voice did the thing where it almost broke at the consonant. She does not know why it does that around him. She has stopped trying to know.
Outside the window, the first star surfaced.
