by the shape of her silhouette.
It would be easy to climb the face of that building. Really easy. Just his own body weight to carry, and there were balconies and ledges every floor and even some grimacing old stone faces for handholds. It would feel like strolling in the park, to climb the face of that building.
So climbing up the stairs inside with her would have felt like … floating. Magically rising above the earth just by the wish of it.
Maybe she knew that. Maybe she didn’t think he deserved anything that easy.
She’d worked hard, too, after all. He pulled out his little metal box and gazed at the three chocolates he had saved for later. His thumbnail traced carefully around the edge of the one with delicate green twining across it, the mint one. She must have worked her butt off, to get this good.
Célie. He smiled. She’d never been afraid of work, or at least not work per se. She’d been afraid of ending up in a mind-numbing job in a factory, but that was why she’d focused hard on her pastry apprenticeship, because it made her happy and proud. Some people would consider pastry work mind-numbing, too, but not Célie. His mind flashed to all those memories of her face when she ran out of her bakery with a box full of something she was so proud to offer him.
Célie. With her burgundy braid and her bright eyes, always so happy and vibrant and bouncy. Sometimes she’d twitch that saucy butt at him on purpose and stick her tongue out at some excuse she’d found to tease him, when she met him leaving his work or he met her leaving hers, and his fingers would itch and he’d shove his hands in his pockets, to save her butt from them.
To make sure that first he became the man she’d really dreamed he would be. Her hero.
He clasped his hands behind his head to get comfortable, gazing in some awe at the wide open sky, the lights sparkling in windows on the buildings rising around him—people changing, eating, arguing, gazing out the windows at the night. He supposed he should go to a hotel until he found an apartment, but he hated to waste money on something stupid like that. He had plans for that money.
Besides, it had been a year since his last leave. And right now, being outside like this, under the non-starry sky of bright Paris, with people of both sexes all around just living their lives , no real menace to him anywhere, instead of in barracks surrounded by the solidarity and snores and problematic temperaments of other fighting men or outside where he had to keep an eye out for snipers or someone smiling coming up to him with a basket of flowers that hid a bomb … it felt so free, it was almost like flying. He didn’t even know if he’d be able to sleep. He might want to pace Paris, see it with all its lights and cynicism and the profound romantic innocence of its sleep.
He turned his head toward Célie’s window again, wondering what she looked like when she slept. Romantic? Innocent? Cynical? Cute. He was pretty sure about the cute part.
He couldn’t see her moving in her apartment anymore. A sigh of wistful arousal ran through him at the thought of her, either in the shower or already tucking herself into her pillow.
“Joss.”
His head twisted at her voice coming from across the street. What was she doing back down here and not in bed? Oh, hey, had she missed him? Maybe even … started thinking about inviting him up?
She crossed the street determinedly as he stood and stopped in front of him, her hands on her hips. “What are you doing?” she demanded.
He looked from her to his jacket in a pillow position on the bench, not quite grasping the question when the answer seemed pretty obvious. “Nothing much,” he admitted. “Just going to take a break for a while.” He’d been up a lot longer than twenty hours at a stretch before. Sleep deprivation to push a man past his breaking point was a key component of Legion training, a well-founded component it turned out later, given what
It would be easy to climb the face of that building. Really easy. Just his own body weight to carry, and there were balconies and ledges every floor and even some grimacing old stone faces for handholds. It would feel like strolling in the park, to climb the face of that building.
So climbing up the stairs inside with her would have felt like … floating. Magically rising above the earth just by the wish of it.
Maybe she knew that. Maybe she didn’t think he deserved anything that easy.
She’d worked hard, too, after all. He pulled out his little metal box and gazed at the three chocolates he had saved for later. His thumbnail traced carefully around the edge of the one with delicate green twining across it, the mint one. She must have worked her butt off, to get this good.
Célie. He smiled. She’d never been afraid of work, or at least not work per se. She’d been afraid of ending up in a mind-numbing job in a factory, but that was why she’d focused hard on her pastry apprenticeship, because it made her happy and proud. Some people would consider pastry work mind-numbing, too, but not Célie. His mind flashed to all those memories of her face when she ran out of her bakery with a box full of something she was so proud to offer him.
Célie. With her burgundy braid and her bright eyes, always so happy and vibrant and bouncy. Sometimes she’d twitch that saucy butt at him on purpose and stick her tongue out at some excuse she’d found to tease him, when she met him leaving his work or he met her leaving hers, and his fingers would itch and he’d shove his hands in his pockets, to save her butt from them.
To make sure that first he became the man she’d really dreamed he would be. Her hero.
He clasped his hands behind his head to get comfortable, gazing in some awe at the wide open sky, the lights sparkling in windows on the buildings rising around him—people changing, eating, arguing, gazing out the windows at the night. He supposed he should go to a hotel until he found an apartment, but he hated to waste money on something stupid like that. He had plans for that money.
Besides, it had been a year since his last leave. And right now, being outside like this, under the non-starry sky of bright Paris, with people of both sexes all around just living their lives , no real menace to him anywhere, instead of in barracks surrounded by the solidarity and snores and problematic temperaments of other fighting men or outside where he had to keep an eye out for snipers or someone smiling coming up to him with a basket of flowers that hid a bomb … it felt so free, it was almost like flying. He didn’t even know if he’d be able to sleep. He might want to pace Paris, see it with all its lights and cynicism and the profound romantic innocence of its sleep.
He turned his head toward Célie’s window again, wondering what she looked like when she slept. Romantic? Innocent? Cynical? Cute. He was pretty sure about the cute part.
He couldn’t see her moving in her apartment anymore. A sigh of wistful arousal ran through him at the thought of her, either in the shower or already tucking herself into her pillow.
“Joss.”
His head twisted at her voice coming from across the street. What was she doing back down here and not in bed? Oh, hey, had she missed him? Maybe even … started thinking about inviting him up?
She crossed the street determinedly as he stood and stopped in front of him, her hands on her hips. “What are you doing?” she demanded.
He looked from her to his jacket in a pillow position on the bench, not quite grasping the question when the answer seemed pretty obvious. “Nothing much,” he admitted. “Just going to take a break for a while.” He’d been up a lot longer than twenty hours at a stretch before. Sleep deprivation to push a man past his breaking point was a key component of Legion training, a well-founded component it turned out later, given what
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