But I can’t think of a sensible answer, so I say nothing, and keep thinking about Sol instead, all while trying to remember why I wanted to speak to Folk in the first place. But it’s no good. Searching among the searing images of Sol’s head thrown back, his skin damp with sweat, his eyes screwed shut as he clenched around me, I come up blank.
Folk doesn’t seem to mind. Gets me thinking if he’s really so chill, or SBS life made him this way. If underneath it all, he’s as reactive as Mal can be when he doesn’t check himself. But it’s so hard to think about Folk when all I want to do is think about Sol.
He needs me.
Like he needed me last night, but sex doesn’t fix things. It makes good shit better and bad shit more complicated—but how do I know that? Who taught me?
Fuck, I hate being like this. Enough that a frustrated growl rumbles free and I surge to my feet, flexing my hands.
Coffee. I need coffee.
It’s why I came out.
I move to the coffee wagon, aware of Folk at my side, matching me step for step. I buy Sol the real stuff he gave up for my sake, and a vanilla something for Skylar. A tea for Folk without asking him. Because somehow I’m so fucking sure that’s what he drinks.
Milk. No sugar.
Because we never had any.
“Did I talk about Sol, way back when?”
Folk sips his tea, not waiting for it to cool down, soldiers don’t have time for that. “Enough that I knew who he was when I first started knocking around down here without anyone having to tell me.”
“Because I told you what he looked like?”
“It was more than that.”
“How?”
Folk smiles and it suits him. Honestly, he’s hot—on a distant level, I know that. But I feel as little for it as I do Skylar’s pretty hair and moody eyes. Cam O’Brian’s ink and leather. “You told me he was magnetic. That he was like gravity to you. And that he was your anchor to the world. Then you laughed about ocean metaphors and went into one about watching him swim in some lagoon when you were young.”
“Did I tell you I loved him?”
“You didn’t have to.” Folk eyes me over the rim of his paper cup. “Something up between you two?”
He doesn’t mean my dick. And it wouldn’t matter if he did. I’m never going to talk about Sol that way, with Folk or anyone else. “We’re, uh, I don’t know. Evolving, maybe? I don’t fucking know.”
“Okay. How do you feel about the things you are sure of?”
“That’s the stuff that hasn’t changed.” Folk waits me out, giving me space to expand the thought. “I don’t feel differently about him. What’s happening now just seems like it’s been there—or should’ve been there—all along.”
“Have you told Sol that?”
“No.”
Folk doesn’t tell me I should.
Or that I shouldn’t.
He drinks his tea and walks me home like he did a few weeks ago. Easy. Quiet. It’s only when we’re about to climb the beach steps that he puts a hand on my shoulder. “You know, if it feels like it should’ve been there all along, it probably was.” His fingers drum like punctuation. “But maybe looking for the old version of it isn’t what either of you need.”
“What do we need then?”
“Same as anyone.” Folk lets his hand slide away. “Just love each other, hold on, and let whatever else wash up where it wants.”
Wash up. Like the sea. And I remember then, with unsettling clarity, that Folk is an ocean soul too. I don’t know what it means for him, beyond his SBS roots, but it makes me wonder if he has more in common with Sol than with me, and as ever, I feel like I’m missing something when he leaves.
Just me and Fiadh again, I climb the steps with my guardian angel at my feet and walk straight into the path of another.