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“Even with your marshmallow vision, that cloud looks nothing like the cabin. I don’t want to make any wild accusations here, but were you just bringing it up to gauge my interest in being your plus one for the winter?”
Artair grumbled under his breath. “I really miss trying to slip things by bar drunks. Why did I choose to date a journalist?”
“Because I make you go cross-eyed on the regular?” he laughed. “And would they even get the cabin fixed in time for winter.”
“This winter? Gosh no. And besides, I’d want a much longer lead in.”
“How so?”
Despite the shade, there was a sudden glow to Artair’s face. That same one as when he was describing a bag full of berries and roots. “Well, I’d want to get vegetables in right at the start of summer. Maybe even in spring. Cucumbers and tomatoes and anything else I could pickle. I’d want to smoke lots of different kinds of fish, and see if I could make flour from corn, and try some wheat or barley or even rice. And the honey! I’d collect as much as the hive could spare and make lots of different meads, and candles from the wax. I’d want to forage for berries and nuts and any fruit trees that might be in the woods, too—see if we can find something better than sour salmonberries. And that’s not even starting on the repairs. I’ve scoped out the foundations, and it all seems pretty sturdy. But I’d have to figure out how to reroof the?—”
“Damn, babe. You’ve been thinking about this for a while, huh?” asked Luca, brimming with admiration. Despite all their time together, the incredible man still managed to surprise him.
On the one hand, Artair was happy to make things up as he went along. On the other, he could dream up months-long projects that would really test his skills.
On the one hand, Artair was happy to exist in his own company. On the other, he wanted someone important beside him on the adventure.
“Maybe?” said Artair, that familiar shade of self-consciousness. “So... what do you think?”
Among the comfortable heat of the day, another warmth swelled within Luca. It was the unexpected heat of realization. That this man wasn’t just thinking about what they’d be doing this summer, but for the next one, too.
And for many more after that?
As Luca looked into the hopeful gaze of the most beautiful man in the whole world, he pondered what that wondrous winter might look like.
Of him tapping away at his stories, while a crackling fire danced in the hearth.
Of Artair coming in from the cold, with frosty breath and ruddy cheeks, needing someone to warm him up.
Of snowfall and starlight.
Of blankets and hot chocolate.
Of rolling around naked on thick rugs.
Of them—together and blissful.
“Yeah,” said Luca. “That sounds really cool.”
Artair cackled at the awful joke. “God, I really am rubbing off on you.”
Luca walked fingertips down Artair’s belly. “Not yet you aren’t.”
The typewriter smiled back at him in the late afternoon glow, the keys beckoning in a way they never previously had.
Before, it was menace and madness. Rage and regret.
Now, it was golden and grand. Openness and opportunity.
Luca took a new sheet of paper, luxurious across his thumb and robust in the rollers. He replaced the ink ribbon, wanting each strike to carry a weight and a purity into the fiber.
And then, without ceremony, he wrote.
As the letters clacked into cream, he didn’t know if they would be read. If they would be too much and too graphic and too detailed for the mainstream.
All he knew was they were the words he needed to write.
Because this was the truth.
