Page 72 of The Words Beneath the Noise

His mouth twitched. “Fair enough.” He was quiet for a moment, watching the stars. “Do you ever think about what you'd be doing if there wasn't a war?”

“Constantly.” I pulled my scarf tighter. “I'd probably be teaching. Mathematics at some quiet university where the biggest crisis is a student forgetting their homework.”

“You'd be good at that. Teaching.”

“You think so?”

“You're patient. When you explain things, you don't make people feel stupid for not understanding.” He glanced at me. “That's rare.”

The compliment warmed me more than the beer. “What about you? What would you be doing?”

“Honestly? No idea.” He shrugged. “Never really thought about a future before the war. Just getting through each day, you know? Surviving.”

“And now?”

He was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was softer. “Now I think about it all the time. What comes after. Whether there even is an after.”

“There will be. There has to be.”

“You sound very certain.”

“I'm not. But I choose to believe it anyway.” I looked at him, found him already watching me. “Hope is a choice, Tom. Astubborn, irrational choice to believe things can be better than they are.”

“Is that what you do? Choose hope?”

“Every single day. Even when it feels like lying to myself.” I smiled, though it felt fragile. “Especially then.”

I reached for the beer to give my hands something to do, and this time when our fingers touched, neither of us pulled away immediately. Just a moment of contact, palm against knuckles, the warmth of him bleeding through the cold.

“You make it sound easy,” he said quietly.

“It's not. It's the hardest thing I do. But the alternative is giving up, and I'm too stubborn for that.”

“Stubborn.” He laughed softly. “That's one word for it.”

“I prefer 'tenacious.' It sounds more dignified.”

“You would.” But he was smiling now, that rare full smile that transformed his face. “Art.”

“Yes?”

“I'm glad you're stubborn. Tenacious. Whatever you want to call it.” His thumb brushed across my knuckles, so light I might have imagined it. “I'm glad you haven't given up.”

“On what?”

“On any of it. The work. The hope.” He paused. “Me.”

The word hung between us, fragile and enormous. I didn't know what to say. Didn't know how to tell him that giving up on him had never been an option, that somewhere along the way he'd become the thing I was hoping for.

“You're not exactly easy to give up on,” I managed.

“No?”

“No. You're irritatingly persistent. You keep showing up, being decent, making me laugh when I've forgotten how.” I swallowed hard. “It's very inconvenient.”

“Sorry about that.”

“No you're not.”