Nadine bit her lip, tasted the sweetness of honey whiskey thick on her tongue. It seemed wrong to her now, all of it. Something in her world had come unmoored, and it took a moment for her to realize that it was her fear of him that had slipped away into the dark. “D’you really think so?”

“Yes,” said Thomas, and reached for the bottle of whiskey at last.

It was good that he was quiet, a sweet relief that he could be unkind. If he had been otherwise she might have fallen in love with him. That night the rain fell and Nadine lay listening underneath the tartan veil of the tent, eyes half-opened in the blackness, dark as sea-deep pearls. Thomas didn’t sleep either, at least not until he turned his head in the stillness to glance at her and asked, very quietly, if she could hear the thunder swelling above them. She nodded mutely, and he closed his eyes. “What does it sound like to you?” he asked. His voice was slurred, drowsy.

I’m going to miss you, she almost told him. The words jumped in her throat.

“Like a wave breaking,” she murmured instead.

Soon his breathing evened out at her side and she remained awake watching him, aware that this may be one of the last times she ever would. Her eyes had adjusted like an animal’s to the incomparable darkness, and they both were still.

It smelled of their unwashed selves, and smoke from the extinguished fire, and rain. Intoxicated, Nadine remained unmoving, tracing the bones of his face with her gaze as if memorizing it for the very last time. Eventually Thomas awoke in the arboreal chill before dawn, turned onto his side once more and told her to sleep now, like the dead. His voice was soft and morning was rising beyond the ocean of conifers, and for a moment Nadine thought she was dreaming after all.