Chapter 22 #2
“I’m thinking,” she says, turning to meet his eyes, gesturing to the medication. “About…everything. About how terrifying this was that first night.”
He takes a slow step forward, sliding his hand to the small of her back.
She bites her lip. “It’s not gone, you know. That need, that temptation, will always be there unless we flush these or use them up. But for the first time, I feel like I can breathe without it clawing at me.”
“That’s the thing about demons,” he murmurs. “They don’t disappear. But you’ve faced them. You’ve won. And every day since, you’ve kept winning.”
Nora closes her eyes and lets herself feel the weight lift from her shoulders.
In the quiet of the rehab center, with Theo beside her, the possibility of a brighter future glimmers ahead.
That’s worth more than any fleeting escape the pills could ever offer.
The world outside may still be broken. The temptation may still whisper in her ear.
But Nora is here. Alive. And she’s never letting go of that.
* * *
Wind rattles against the windows of the wildlife center, but inside it’s quiet and warm.
Nora moves barefoot across the cold floor, checking on the animals, feeding the wolf pup they found, and topping off water dishes.
Her movements are careful and deliberate.
The broken ribs that nearly killed her are healing fast, though she can still feel the ache in her chest if she breathes wrong.
She glances toward Theo, where he busies himself with other tasks and a smile curves her lips.
“What?” he raises a brow, catching her stare.
“Nothing. If I tilt my head and squint just right, I feel like I’m getting a glimpse of how you’d be back on the farm.”
“Do you think Wyatt got there yet?”
“Absolutely. He’s probably picked up a few fainting goats along the way, too, so at least your farm finally has some of those.”
He rolls his eyes, talking directly to the penguin. “Can you please fall over dramatically for her?”
The bird fails to respond but they both huff out a few amused sounds before turning back to the morning’s chores.
At first, she had been wary of bringing up the place that he’d been so set on spending the rest of his life at.
He gave up everything for the kind of simplicity that can only be found by working the land and tending the animals in crisp mountain air.
And now it’s all gone. The last thing she wants to do is trigger regret, but knowing that someone else could be there right now, keeping that place running, seems to have soothed a lot of his anxiety.
Sometimes she catches him gazing toward the windows when the snow is falling in thick, soundless sheets, his expression unreadable.
She wonders if he’s mourning all that was taken from him, or if he’s realizing he’s gained something precious and unexpected, just like she does when she thinks of him.
Their mornings now are spent in familiar routines of feeding, cleaning, and handing out medications.
Though Theo still does all of the heavy lifting.
She is stronger every day, closer to normal with every inhale, but if there were a doctor here, he would probably tell her not to pick up anything over five pounds yet.
It’s domestic in its simplicity, this little life they’ve created together.
Nora finds herself smiling between tasks because each one ties her closer to this place, to Theo, to the fragile world they’ve carved out of a wilderness that tried to swallow them whole.
When twilight slips across the snow, the storm outside is building fast, and they settle on the floor in the main room, a row of candles flickering between them.
Nora pulls out the small notebook where she’s written dosage schedules and notes for their charges, and keeps a log of Theo’s headaches.
They’ve lessened now that the stress of her impending doom has lifted, and there aren’t dead people chasing them across the tundra.
“Should we write something for whoever finds this place many, many years in the future? You know, after our hundredth birthdays, of course?” she says, pencil poised.
“Like what?”
“I dunno, like people used to carve their initials into trees, I guess, just something that shows we were here. That we survived.”
Nora writes the first line. Theo and Nora. Year one of the apocalypse. Still alive. Still together.
He adds beneath it: Still hopelessly in love.
She shakes her head with a half laugh, watching him rip the paper from the book and pin it to the corner of the bulletin board on the wall. Maybe they’ll add a line every year, she thinks, wondering how far into this disaster they’ll get before they run out of room on a single page.
* * *
Later, they set the radio Theo repaired on the counter. Static hisses across the wires, as they wait for a connection they may never hear. Nora presses the button, her voice firm but nervous.
“This is Nora and Theo. Our plane crashed in Alaska, but we’re alive.
If you can hear this, if you’re immune, if you’re a scientist working on a cure, or anyone with even a slim hope of fighting this virus, come here.
Come to Barrow. Light a campfire on the top of the sheriff’s station, and we’ll find you. ”
They only receive the steady crackle of white noise in response. Theo squeezes her knee, his shoulder nudging hers. “We’ll try again tomorrow.”
Looking for a scientist in a haystack is what he called this, and he’s right.
They’re putting out a signal with no plan for what comes after if someone actually answers.
She isn’t sure anymore if she wants to help survivors or never see another face except for the man beside her.
There are moments when it could go either way.
Something tells her this isn’t finished, though, and he must feel it too, because he only puts up a token protest at their efforts to flag down survivors.
So they’ll keep trying. No matter what happens, if someone answers today or a year from now…
or never, they’ll be ready, and they’ll face it together.
* * *
By the time the room grows dark that evening, a fresh wind roaring against the walls, they make time for themselves, lighting another row of candles, their glow warm and golden.
They’ve moved the mattress down to the floor so it’s easier to snuggle up together and when he helps her out of her pants, like he does every night so she doesn’t strain herself bending over, she runs a slow hand over his hair, threading her fingers through the soft strands in an unmistakable way that has him looking up at her from where he’s knelt down.
She wears his shirts most days. They’re bigger and easier to unbutton and she makes good use of that feature now, slowly undoing each one until it hangs open.
The desire flaring in his eyes soothes some part of her that worried he may be losing interest after having to spend so much time assisting her during recovery.
It’s a silly thought. It’s not like she would ever stop wanting him if she had to help wash his hair or take his pants off before bed, but she is so used to never being enough for anyone that even now she has to shove that fear away with a hard hand.
Theo is not her first husband or her second. He holds no grudges or resentments. He only loves her. He has proven that time and time again, and tonight she aims to show him exactly how much her heart burns for him, too.
“Are you sure?” His voice catches in his throat as large hands steady her hips.
“I’m sure. I need to be on top. I don’t think I can lie on my back yet, but I feel good otherwise.”
He doesn’t make her promise that she’ll say something if she needs to.
They both know she will. He could be in the middle of an orgasm with his cock stuffed deep inside her, and if she said she was hurting, he would stop.
Instantly. The safety in that is what allows her to relax tonight and ease the ache of her need for him that’s been brewing over these past few weeks.
She wanted him only two weeks in, but her condition hadn’t been kind enough to allow that. It took far longer than she hoped to feel up to anything more than shuffling around the center.
Today, her nerves are on fire in all the best ways, and not an ounce of her tension is related to pain.
The nuzzle of his nose against her lower belly has her eyes fluttering shut, his kiss warm on her skin and his fingers gentle when they caress between her legs, finding a wet patch on her underwear.
She can’t lie on her back for any prolonged length of time yet, but she can stand just fine, and she trusts him to hold her steady, so when he pulls her panties off her hips, she steps out of them easily, bracing on his shoulders with both hands as he works his mouth where she’s soaked.
The angle is restricted and she longs to throw a leg over his shoulder, but that’s pushing it too far in terms of balance.
Hopefully, she spreads her legs apart further, letting out a sharp inhale when he takes the hint and pushes two thick, eager fingers into her, curling them deep as his tongue focuses on the place where her pulse beats strong and hot.
She vaguely remembers promising him a blow job a while back. Instead, he’s the one going down on her. Not that she’s complaining, but she has every intention of making good on that offer later.
“Wait, wait, wait,” she whispers, stilling his head with both hands, the sight of his beautiful face looking up at her, plump lips wet with her arousal, nearly builds her release on the spot. “Not yet.”
She wants him inside her when she comes. They get rid of the rest of his clothes and she drops the shirt she was wearing to the ground before encouraging him down to the floor mattress.
She’s rarely seen anything more inviting than the sight of him hard and swollen, waiting for her.
She can hardly move into his lap fast enough.
It’s slightly obscene how he holds his shaft steady so she can lower herself down onto it.
The moment the thick tip begins to enter her, she can think of nothing else than the familiar stretch of him.
The burn is as intense as their first time all over again.
She takes him in slowly, carefully, letting gravity do most of the work until she’s seated in his lap and so full of him that she could cry from the exquisite pressure.
She unfurls one leg, bending it out behind him, while the other stays under her for leverage, then she’s moving over him, slow and steady, rocking to shift him within her as their lips meet and she swallows his moan as she rides it out of him.
That orgasm she was so close to before still lingers at the edges, begging to be coaxed back into the light.
When the intensity becomes too much, she urges him onto his back, leaning forward, her hands bracing on his chest as she moves faster, angling herself to rub her clit against him as best she can, taking what started as a gradual thing into something slightly frantic.
His hands kneed at her ass cheeks, spreading them apart as he pushes up into her and she lowers back down, but she can’t go as fast as she needs without her lungs burning.
She whines in the back of her throat, slowing her movements to a near standstill.
One of Theo’s many skills is being observant.
He picks up where she left off, moving a hand between them to rub where she needs him as he thrusts up into her.
All she has to do is keep her legs apart and be still and he does the rest, bringing her to the brink and then catching her as she tumbles over, letting her ride his hand and his cock while she spasms before he growls her name into the curve of her throat and the wet warmth of his release starts to spill out at the edges of where they’re joined.
It takes her a moment to catch her breath, but she feels no pain, and her lungs still work while the aftershocks taper off.
They lie tangled for a long while after, sweat cooling on skin, candlelight painting the slopes of their bodies.
He traces slow circles along her spine, his touch a delicate promise made and kept.
Outside, the wind hammers the building and snow slants across the window panes, but in here, wrapped in the steady thump of their heartbeats, the world only contains the two of them.
“You know, I came to Alaska looking for answers. A new beginning. For who I could be on my own, assuming that was my only option now.” She cups his face, dropping a warm kiss on his lips and breathing her next words into his mouth. “What a beautiful surprise to realize I was looking for you.”