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He’s getting frustrated. I can see the little hint of a frown beginning to form, and he’s sighed three times in the last five minutes. Something about the picture he’s working on isn’t cooperating. He’ll look up at me soon, and ask me some question. I’ll need to stop watching him before he does. Need to not let him catch me with that look on my face, or he’ll just laugh at me and call me ‘besotted’.
Not that it isn’t completely true, but it will make him forget the picture and we’ll end up doing something else instead. And I don’t want that. He’s close to finishing and I want to be here watching when he does. I don’t often get to witness that moment of ‘done’, but I’ve learned to tell when those moments are close and that frown of frustration is usually the first sign. If he sticks with it… he’ll work through that stumbling point soon and then I’ll get to see that other expression.
It doesn’t last long before it fades into the one that doubts, but for just a minute, his eyes will be full of this glow of… accomplishment. His old confidence will be solid and alive in his expression, a hint of that rebelliousness somehow mixed in there. Like he’s thwarted some evil power by completing the piece. That little, secret smile of satisfaction will be there and…
He will be beautiful. And whole…
He sighs again, a little more heavily and I look down at the book in my lap, feigning absorption in text I haven’t paid any attention to in over an hour.
‘Heero,’ he asks absently. ‘why the hell do goldfish have eyes that look like marbles? Doesn’t it seem kind of… not very safety conscious?’
‘A design flaw?’ I quip, keeping my focus on my book, making sure he thinks I’m not at all ready to turn in for the night. He snorts in reply and then stretches his arms wide, making his back pop.
‘I’m gonna get a soda, do you want anything?’ he asks before standing to go to the kitchen.
‘No thanks,’ I reply. ‘I’m good.’
I turn a page while he’s gone, not caring if it’s forward or backward, and smile to myself in anticipation.
It won’t be long now…
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