[He can feel some of that - that fleeting murmur of anxiety bubbling under the surface level contentment. Maybe it's all Aoba's, but maybe not. It reminds him of hours ago, dragging and pushing Bellamy Blake ahead of him from the Ven Diagrams headquarters. And of other anxieties too, farther removed but no more distant: tender like a bruise.
Nirad's grip on Aoba's hand tightens in turn. No. Put those things away, he thinks. It's hard to do it - he can taste the acrid edge of them on his tongue - but for the moment he can force himself to fixate instead on the gentle but persistent lines of Aoba's fingers in his and across his knuckles.]
no subject
Nirad's grip on Aoba's hand tightens in turn. No. Put those things away, he thinks. It's hard to do it - he can taste the acrid edge of them on his tongue - but for the moment he can force himself to fixate instead on the gentle but persistent lines of Aoba's fingers in his and across his knuckles.]
It's fine.
[He sounds sure.]