Page 143 of Homebound
“You’re such a liar.”
“How do you know? I’m the teacher. I get to tell you how you’re doing, and you are to believe me.”
“How can I improve if you aren’t being honest? Listen, here’s an idea! Do you have deaf people on Enzomora? Maybe I can learn your sign language.”
“Not with the five fingers you can’t.”
“Aw, crap.”
Despite the loving companionship, Simon maintained a strict no-sex policy. And maybe he was right. Having to strap themselves to a chair before the act would be a major mood killer.
Only when he was coming off stasis did he allow any sort of intimacy, encouraged it even, probably because he knew how much Gemma hated when he meditated. When his bodily systems shut down to recharge, the essence of him disappeared, and she always got a feeling like she was left completely alone. It was not a pleasant feeling, and every time he checked out - which, thankfully, wasn’t often, - she had to work hard to keep the panic at bay.
And every time he was done, and his energy stirred and filled the hollowed space, she would approach him. He always responded, sleepy, sluggish, the film still covering his eyes. They would snuggle and touch, kissing long and deep and tenderly, filling her heart with renewed hope and peace.
All in all, this dreaded flight wasn’t turning out too badly, and Gemma had gradually relaxed and began to accept her new reality as normal.
But she hated zero gravity with a passion. Every damn thing floated, even dust. Especially dust. Keeping the space clean required ingenuity. The joys of going to the bathroom and maintaining personal hygiene, a challenge in any small space shared with a member of the opposite sex, were magnified tenfold where particles didn’t stay put.
Forcing her mind off the things she couldn’t change, Gemma decided it was time for her daily physical exercise. Exercising was paramount to keep her muscles from atrophying, and it helped her decompress. Besides, she found physical activity to be somewhat fun in this environment.
She anchored her body against the metal pipe that ran under the ceiling and turned upside down. The angle didn’t matter as weightlessness meant up could become down at the slightest push, but Gemma liked to change positions to keep things fresh.
She started with light stretches before progressing to resistance training with the help of strategically tied ropes. Here, her bad foot didn’t matter because there was no weight for it to bear. So there were pros of existing in space, after all.
Simon turned away from the controls and was looking at her. He always did when she exercised. He liked to watch her move, no matter how preoccupied he was. And lately, he seemed to be preoccupied more than usual.
“Look at you. You’re a seasoned astronaut now,” Simon’s eyes were glowing, letting Gemma know that he wanted her.
“Oh, yeah?” she grinned as she raised her leg above her head, which was pointing down for him since she was hanging off the pipe like an arboreal three-toed sloth. “Is that what astronauts usually do?”
“You are a very special astronaut,” he murmured. “You would make your brother proud.”
Gemma’s smile faded slowly. “Hardly. Foy was a trained fighter pilot. He would have been in your chair now. And I’m just… me.” She shrugged slightly. “Along for a ride.”
She realized she hadn’t thought about Foy in a long time. How strange. With her being in space, in a ship, Foy should be on her mind often.
“There you go again, giving yourself little credit,” Simon was watching her intently. “Any brother would have been proud of how well you coped with things you were unprepared for. You kept on going when it got rough. You made some hard choices.”
He was hinting at her decision to leave her old life for him, an alien.
Gemma abandoned her exercise and floated limply in mid-air, tethered to the pipe. For the first time, she tried to really imagine what Foy would have thought of her situation with Simon.
Foy had considered aliens to be the enemy. His job had been to thwart their attempts to invade their home. The line of demarcation betweenthemandushad never been blurred in his mind, and Gemma was pretty confident that Foy had never interacted with an alien beyond shooting at them from his fighter ship. What would he have thought of her if he knew how hotly she burned for Simon, how hard she came when he plunged to the hilt into her wet, willing body, making her writhe in mindless animal lust as he balled her under him, hard and fast and strong?
“They were my choices to make. I have nothing to be ashamed of.”
Simon’s raised eyebrows provoked her into defending herself further. “Life molds us, Simon. I am no longer the Gemma I was when I left The Islands. Had he lived, Foy wouldn’t have been the same Foy I grew up with. Perspectives change. Things you never knew existed become precious.” She gave her lover a direct look and added softly, “Surely, you can relate.”
“Unlike you, I never had a choice to make.”
“You could have easily left Earth without me. You could have escaped the prison long before you did.”
“No, I couldn't have. I made no choices, and I had nothing to question.”
She let go of the pipe and floated to Simon’s chair. Taking his hand into hers, she raised it to her mouth and kissed each long clawed finger.
“Maybe you’re right,” she admitted. “Maybe there wasn’t a choice for me, either. Because every time I feel afraid and start having regrets, I think back to what happened and analyze what I could've done differently. And I can come up with nothing. If time rolled back and I had to do it all over again, I’d still choose you.”
