Keira had brought soup again. Half of it had ended up on her shirt when she tried carrying it one-handed through the door. She didn't comment on it, didn't even notice the stain blooming down her shirt like a badge of honor: she was too focused on the way Void had finally sat herself upright on the bed, a blanket half-draped across her legs, looking like a half-alive ghost girl trying to pretend she wasn't falling apart.
Void's skin had lost that frightening chalky tone from a few days ago. She had some color now and her hair was messy in a way that finally stopped screaming "hospital bed."
"Soup," Keira said, unnecessarily, placing the bowl down on the coffee table with a thunk.
Void raised an eyebrow and gave her a slow, deliberate once-over. "You're leaking."
Keira blinked. "What?"
Void pointed. "Your torso. It's soup."
Keira glanced down, groaned softly, and pulled her shirt out like she could inspect the damage. "Fuck. That was my last clean one."
"You've got, like, twenty of mine in the wardrobe." Void's voice was scratchy, unused, but dipped with that same acid sweetness. Her version of affection.
"Yeah, but this one was the least ugly." Keira dropped onto the other side of the bed with a huff, curling her legs up. "Glad to see you're alive enough to mock me again."
"Glad to see you're still a disaster," Void murmured, but her smile was paper-thin and real. She stared at the bowl. "Thanks."
"Anytime."
A thick, long silence followed. Like words were landmines and neither of them trusted themselves not to step wrong. Void's fingers twitched against the blanket. Keira sat on the edge of the bed, chewing her lip, pretending to pick something from under her fingernails.
The soup sat between them in a chipped ceramic bowl, steam curling lazily into the air taunting them, as if it tried to say "all the time in the world, girls." Void reached out, picked up the spoon, and stirred it - just once. Then she took a slow, almost cautious bite.
The silence stretched.
Another spoonful. She didn't look up. Glancing at each bite like it bought her a little more time to stay here, in this strange, new quiet that didn't shatter things.
Keira just watched her, eyes darting to the bowl, then to Void's face, then back again. Like the soup held answers for the future.
"S'not bad, really," Void muttered eventually, around a mouthful. "Too much pepper."
Keira raised an eyebrow. "You nearly flatlined and you're giving me notes?"
"Someone's gotta keep your ego in check."
Soup finished, and she finally looked up, meeting Keira's eyes. "Thanks. For the soup. For... All of this."
Keira gave a little shrug, but her face betrayed her - too open, too vulnerable. "You sure you're not just using me for my culinary skills?"
Void smirked, lips curling despite everything. "Bitch, I am the culinary skills." She put the bowl aside. "So," she said, voice low. "What the fuck was that?"
Keira blinked, pointing at the ceramic thing. "That? A half-assed miso recipe I found on-"
"The kiss, Kei."
"Oh." Keira immediately forgot how to sit properly. She shifted, then moved again. "Right... That."
Void raised an eyebrow. "You kissed me. Pretty sure I wasn't hallucinating it."
"I did." Keira's voice was suddenly too high, like it had been filtered through embarrassment itself. "Yep. That... Was a thing. A real thing that happened. On purpose. I... Think."
Void just stared at her, waiting. Amused.
Keira cleared her throat. "Look, I-"
"It was good," Void said, softly, not looking at her. "That's not the problem."
Keira turned toward her, startled.
"The problem," Void continued, "is that I just spent a week floating somewhere between dead and not-quite. And you were there. You kept showing up. You fed me. You fucking held my hand when I was shaking in my sleep."
"I didn't want you to-" Keira started.
"I know," Void cut her off, gentler than she'd meant to. "That's the part that kills me. You didn't want absolutely any-fucking-thing. You just... Stayed. Why?"
Keira's mouth opened, then closed. She raised her index finger, then opened her mouth again. Her brain flailed for something cool to say, something smooth, and produced absolutely nothing.
Void watched her flounder and narrowed her eyes. "Okay, what the fuck is that face? You look like you're trying to confess you ate my hamster."
"I didn't- there was no hamster- what?" Keira rubbed her hands down her thighs. "I just- fuck, Void, I already told you why. And I fucking care about you, alright?"
Void went still. Her chest rose and fell once.
"I didn't know how to say it," Keira continued, quieter. "Not before. Not with everything going to shit so fast. But watching you fall apart, watching you almost die, that- fuck, I realized I couldn't just stand back and lose you. I couldn't do nothing."
Void blinked, expression unreadable.
"And I know I'm shit at this. All this- talking. Feelings. I barely survived my own mess. Jenna? She made sure I thought love meant surveillance and control. That love was a leash." Her voice cracked there, just faintly. "But y- you weren't supposed to matter this much this quickly."
Void's expression softened. A fracture in the shell.
Keira gave a weak laugh. "So, yeah. I kissed you. Because I thought maybe that was okay. And now I feel like a dumbass because you're probably going to tell me it was too much, too soon, and I totally get that, I mean you're literally held together by gauze and scar tissue right now-"
"Keira."
"-and I didn't mean to make it weird, I just-"
"Keira," Void said again, firmer. She reached over with a trembling hand and caught her shirt, tugging gently. "Stop talking."
Keira shut her mouth like a switch had been flipped.
Void looked at her with something painfully raw behind her eyes. "I'm not mad."
Keira let out a breath. "Okay."
"I just don't know what to do with it."
"You don't have to do anything."
Void tilted her head. "You sure about that? You kind of kissed the undead."
"Yeah," Keira murmured, smiling now. "But she's such a catch..."
That made Void snort. A quiet, exhausted thing that turned into a cough. Keira tensed instinctively, but Void waved her off.
After a beat, Keira cleared her throat again. "So uh. I was thinking."
"Uh-huh. Dangerous."
Keira side-eyed her. "I was thinking, maybe, like... I could, hypothetically, sort of... Spend more time here?"
Void squinted. "You mean like today?"
"No, like... In general."
Void's lips twitched. "Kei. Are you trying to move in?"
Keira sputtered. "I- What? No! I mean- Maybe? But not in a creepy 'I'm watching you sleep' way."
"You already do that, remember?"
"Not on purpose!"
Void let her eyes flutter shut for a second, exhaling softly through her nose. "Why are you being weird about it? Just ask."
Keira grimaced. "Because you almost died, and if I come at you with, 'Hey babe, wanna U-Haul?' It makes me sound like a sociopathic golden retriever."
Void burst out laughing, surprised and sharp, and had to clutch her stomach from the pain. She winced, but the smile didn't leave.
"Fuck," she muttered. "Don't make me laugh. Hurts."
Keira looked mortified. "Sorry-"
Void reached out again, more stable this time, and took her hand. "Move in."
Keira blinked. "That's not how this works. It's me who's supposed to ask you."
"You're taking too long."
Keira's ears flushed red. "You sure?"
Void glanced around the room, her eyes landing on the cluttered workbench littered with leftover gauze, antiseptic bottles, and various other medical supplies. Her gaze lingered on the stool beside it with Keira's "stolen" hoodie draped over it. She exhaled a dry laugh and said, "You've practically moved in already."
Then, softer - her eyes still fixed on that hoodie, "You're here more than anywhere else. And I..." her voice caught, but she powered through it, "I don't think I want to be alone."
Keira nodded, mouth dry.
Void hesitated, fingers absently tracing the edge of her blanket. Her next words came quieter, like they'd been hiding just under her tongue for too long.
"I want to wake up and know someone's there. Not because they feel obligated, but because they actually want to be."
"I do," Keira said, suddenly serious. "I really want to be."
Void stared into Keira's eyes like they were the last thing she'd see before drowning - something too beautiful, too vast, and far too honest. A gaze that didn't just look back - it unraveled.
"I'm scared," she admitted, inching closer toward Void "Of screwing it up. Or... Being too much and... Not enough. That last relationship fucked me up so bad I don't even know if I can take proper care of someone anymore."
Void tilted her head, just slightly. A dare in her eyes, like she was testing how close Keira was to snapping.
"Says the girl who yanked me back from the fucking brink," she murmured. "You think you're not enough? You jump-started a corpse with nothing but hope and Aura's sketchy-ass stash not even I thought would work. I think you're not giving yourself enough credit. And I want more."
"Shut the fu... What?"
Void surged forward - throwing a punch. Not with her fists, no. With her mouth. Their lips collided with zero grace and way too much feeling, all heat, teeth and sharp exhales. Keira's hands flew up, one gripping the back of Void's neck, the other sinking into the blankets, dragging herself in like distance was a personal insult.
Keira didn't resist. She growled - actually growled - into Void's mouth, her fingers yanking Void's shirt. Their noses bumped, their teeth clicked, but neither pulled back. This was anything but delicate or poetic.
It was hungry.
Raw.
Desperate in the way only people who almost lost each other can be.
Keira kissed like she was mad she cared this much, and Void kissed back like she was mad she ever thought she didn't deserve it.
By the time they pulled apart, cheeks pressed together, panting like they'd sprinted a mile, Void was flushed, furious and utterly undone.
"I want more... Of that soup," she muttered into Keira's ear, voice wrecked.
Keira gave a breathless laugh, her thumb swiping the corner of Void's lips. "You are the most unhinged romantic lead I've ever kissed."
Void smirked, feral and fond. "Get in line, roommate."