He was already walking.
She looked at his face.
At the expression sitting on it.
At the very specific and very clear look of a man who had spent the last hour tied to a chair being told no in creative ways and had made several firm personal decisions about the immediate future.
Every single smart comment she had lined up dissolved completely.
'I,' she thought.
He reached the bed.
Laid her down on it.
Looked at her.
She looked back up at him from the sheets, hair spread out, city glowing in the window behind him, and she searched his face for the composed version of him, the press conference version, the HAEL version, the one she had been professionally navigating for months.
It was not there.
Not even slightly.
This was the other one entirely.
The one that only existed in rooms like this, with nobody watching and nothing to perform and nowhere to be except right here.
She swallowed.
'I,' she thought again, 'am so completely done for.'
