Nova placed his hand on Lucas's shoulder. The hand of a man transferring a sacred burden.
"Alright," he said, his voice carrying the specific gravity of someone who has moved through grief and arrived somewhere that feels like acceptance but is actually just a different kind of drama.
"I get it now. You've won her over." He nodded slowly, eyes somewhere distant, like he was looking at a version of his own future that no longer existed.
"So it's your responsibility now. Keep her happy. Don't mess this up. I'm trusting you with something precious."
Lucas stared at the hand on his shoulder.
"Can you stop being weirder than you already are," Gideon said, from the side, his voice carrying the mild exhaustion of someone who has accepted his friend as a condition of his life.
Celia had her arms folded and was looking at Nova with an expression that had moved past irritation into something more clinical. "Forget weird. At this point he sounds creepy. Like a pervert."
