It’s almost disconcerting just how easily the taste of guilt is drowned out by the warm, casual exchange of conversation with the small Dross family and a drifting aroma of strong, rich coffee.[break][break]

By the time he hands over the captain’s coffee, Alto Mare’s beckoning call is almost forgotten about entirely. Attention snared by the mischievous hint playing across Skyler’s smile and the way a calloused, unhurried fingertip leaves a pleasant tingle in an intentional graze. Blue gaze lingering on silver eyes and curled lips for a fraction too long as warmth furls, of its own volition, in his chest. [break][break]

It’s so easy, that he forgets that it’s not meant to be. [break][break]

Especially as, at the unsubtle prompt by her father, Angelo thinks that it would be nice to be brought around to the Dross’s again someday… [break][break]

“Maybe if I start putting more mushrooms in my dishes, she'll have no choice but to come back here for food...” He says, throwing a smug grin Skyler’s way at her expense, voice laced with some inside joke. [break][break]

Angelo misses a smile hidden behind a mug. [break][break]

---

[break][break]

He's greeted into the living room by a cheerfully wrapped box being launched towards his face like a cannonball. [break][break]

“Sh-“ the courier mutters out instinctually, a curse cutting off as hands snatch out to grab the rectangle parcel, peering around it at Skyler with narrowed eyes. Threatening expression ruined by a mischievous smile that tells her she’s lucky (or unlucky) that her parents are in the room. [break][break]

“What do you mean another one?” A brow is raised in quizzical surprise, already holding onto one more present than he expected to receive. [break][break]

Curiously, the Alto Marian approaches as Skyler beckons him over, looking down as she carefully presses the second gift into his flattened palm. Blinking up at her, Angelo doesn’t miss the flicker of softness in her smile, fleeting but not imagined. Much like the fondness that’s reflected right back at her, in the form of a warm curve of his mouth.[break][break]

“You didn't have to, you know.”[break][break]

Dropping down onto the floor beside her, Angelo opens his presents from the Dross family:[break][break]

From Skyler’s parents he receives a new pair of shoes, specifically for walking. They’re the right size which probably means the sailor tipped them off previously and Angelo genuinely likes them, not just for their appearance but for their practicality, too. His own were worn to shit, after all. He thanks them both, grin honest and appreciative, promising to wear them in soon. [break][break]

Skyler’s own present, to which he unwraps a little more slowly partly to annoy her but mostly because he feels like savouring the moment of anticipation, are goggles for flying. Blue eyes peer out of the corner towards her, smile lopsided and searching her expression for a hint of her thoughts. There's something eager - hungry - in his own, like a window had been opened when it had once been boarded up, urging him to lean out of it and take in a new view.  [break][break]

“I like it,” Angelo affirms, not knowing what else to say as something grips tightly at his chest. Instead, he wraps an arm around her shoulder, uncaring to the audience as he pulls her against his side in a tight but all too brief hug - smothering an itch to kiss her. Later. [break][break]

“Thank you.” I love it.[break][break]

---

[break][break]

“I got you something, too.” Pulling the goggles down to let it hang around his neck, having shamelessly worn them for a good few minutes after fiddling with the straps until he found his liking, Angelo makes to stand with an accidental brush of their shoulders. An indication of how unknowingly close he had come to sit beside his adventure buddy. “Hold on a sec, I left it in my backpack…” [break][break]

When Angelo returns, he brings with him a very small present; wrapped somewhat lopsided and in a bland, brown sheet that looks suspiciously like postal packing paper. An effort was obviously made, albeit with stealthily ‘borrowed’ work stationary at the last minute. Not like he looks abashed by his lack of festive aesthetic. [break][break]

“It’s fine if you don’t like it,” he says, holding it out towards Skyler before tilting the package back towards himself, just out of reach when her fingertips rise to take it. “I’ll just keep it for myself.” [break][break]

Purposefully, he wears an annoyingly playful curl on his lips to hide the strange flutter in his belly; one whispering that he did, in fact, want her to like the gift he had decided on. More than he realised, now that it was close to finally being in her possession. [break][break]

“Merry Christmas, Sky.”[break][break]

Angelo presses the small, featherlight present into her waiting palm, smile briefly softening as his gaze drifts up to settle upon moonlight eyes. Intentionally pulled into her orbit with the transfer of a tiny, clumsily wrapped gift and the private, waiting breath he holds.


[break][break]

+ skyler dross

Angelo could let some convincing excuse roll off the end of his tongue, persuade the sailor that the present sitting in her palm was no big deal. (Which it definitely wasn’t. It didn’t mean anything...) Maybe make her aware that it was only crafted from spare materials left over from the construction of the bracelets that adorns his own wrist.[break][break]

A pointless attempt to downplay the tension that worms its way inside of him, just the slightest too sweet and heavy. [break][break]

But instead, as Skyler runs a finger along the fragments of blue with exposed wonderment dancing across her features, Angelo remains silent. [break][break]

Much too busy remembering how to expel breath from his lungs to consider words, let alone form them. [break][break]

Skyler holds out the braided strands adorned with water stone shards towards him, pointedly untied around her wrist and with an unspoken request in her eyes. There’s a dare there, he thinks, that they both already know he wouldn’t back away from. [break][break]

With steady fingers, Angelo takes the two strings and loops them around one another, pulling the knot tight; creating an unyielding bond, careful to leave enough room for her pulse to breathe. [break][break]

“It's not going anywhere.” Ocean blue twinkles up at her. Although only one set brightens for her. [break][break]

Glad you like it. [break][break]

---

[break][break]

Alone time with Mrs Dross turns out to be a whole different affair than spending a solitary moment with her husband. [break][break]

Skyler’s father makes a willing victim out of him, Angelo finding himself easily endeared by the innocent enthusiasm that rolls off his very large being. Before he realises it, he’s asking about the man’s proud collection of plants even though he has little knowledge on them, not understanding half of the passionate explanations but listening anyway. [break][break]

Her mother on the other hand, with her knowing smirks and mischievous silver eyes that reminds Angelo too much of her daughter’s, has the courier anticipating something. Although what, he is unsure of. [break][break]

So, when he’s requested to help clear the dishes – alone – it feels like an unavoidable matchup that had finally arrived. [break][break]

It doesn’t stop him from feeling just the slightest bit uncertain, like he’s stepping into unknown territory, even if he doesn’t show it as he unflinchingly stacks plates from off the table; sweeping after her with an unassuming expression. [break][break]

Steeling himself as the door clicks behind them, locking him in the kitchen with the mother of the woman he had shared a bed with the night prior, Angelo moves forward to place the stacks of cutlery and silverware on the countertop. He slows as he slots plates into the rack, blue eyes drifting towards the older woman as she quietly yet clearly draws his attention, talking just over the clatter of china tapping together for him to hear. [break][break]

Angelo’s silent for a heavy heartbeat as he returns the gaze, curious but unwavering; even when his throat dries from a weight that lingers behind her words. [break][break]

“You’re not. Really.” [break][break]

She’s not the one overstepping – he is. Growing noticeably close to Skyler, enough so for favours to be requested of him, had never been part of the plan. It was all meant to be temporary. And yet, like many things as of late that revolves around a certain sea captain, he can't bring himself to resist the call… [break][break]

“What d’you need?”


[break][break]

+ skyler dross

There was no favour. At least, not one that was plainly presented on the surface. Marion Dross’s request instead lingering underneath carefully constructed words, with a deeper meaning to be read behind serious expressions and stories told in the shadows lurking within silver eyes.[break][break]

Angelo listens with a rag in hand, going through the mindless motions of drying the cutlery and plates clean of suds before putting them away in their cupboards; thankful to have something to occupy a twinge of restless energy in his muscles as their topic lingers heavy in the air. [break][break]

A picture of Skyler Dross is painted that he has come to know well. One that he admires. Attracts him. That he’s grown to care for with startling speed and ferocity, even. And although he admittedly hadn’t known the sea captain very well before the war, Angelo had come to be acquainted with the scars that she had gathered from it, too. Both physical and a sliver of those that lurk in her mind. Familiar enough to map them out along sun-kissed skin and register when they claim her gaze with distant, ocean fog. [break][break]

But this isn’t just a conversation about her daughter despite the outward presentation and even though she doesn’t directly say it out loud, Angelo can feel his name becoming slowly stitched in there. Attaching him to her in ways that shouldn’t be allowed.[break][break]

The shivering squeak of the cloth rubbing against a glass resonates through him, silver eyes meeting blue – steel connecting with unsettled waves – as the final point is made. [break][break]

“No… She can’t be.” He pauses after a moment hesitation, mouth dry but breathed into the air calm all the same, only for confliction to irritatingly leak through as his voice trails off at the end. “She isn’t...” [break][break]

Because it’s true. He does - more than he really should allow himself - look towards the horizon with a longing pull in his chest. A deep-rooted desire to wander into the luring unknown aching in his wanting heart, to see what lies beyond, maybe along with... [break][break]

'But…' [break][break]

That Word stills on his tongue, weighty as Angelo holds a plate he’d meant to be returning to its cupboard, hands suddenly pausing before he has a chance to make his voice manifest. [break][break]

Because Angelo can’t say it. Can’t tell Marion Dross that she's bringing this up to the wrong person, not after everything that she had just confided in him. Doesn’t want to say it. Even if it's living in blissful ignorance, delaying the inevitable, he's not ready to strike that line in the sand. Not yet.  [break][break]

Marion slips out of his peripherals then and Angelo, staring up at an overhead cupboard with a pinch in his brow now she couldn't see, dispels his thoughts. Now wasn’t the time to think about such things. [break][break]

The last glass is held aloft, ready to be slotted back into its cupboard shelf, when the parting statement is shot through the quiet kitchen like an ice cube suddenly being slipped down the back of his spine. The courier freezes, fingertips squeezing the tumbler as he peeks over his shoulder, blue eyes blinking surprised at a familiar cheshire smile. [break][break]

Angelo, despite having proved to be able to lie and wiggle his way out of revealing his emotions, suddenly finds himself unable to come up with anything. No excuse. No way to save face. What’s the point when you’ve been caught and you both know it? [break][break]

So instead, a sheepish grin curls onto the corner of his lips, guilt for once unmasked. “Yes, Ma’am.”[break][break]

The glass is slipped back the rest of the way into its place in the cupboard. Task finished. Favour… On hold.




[break][break]

+ skyler dross