"I'll check in with you. But I'm going to give you some space."

Jo stood up then and leaned down to kiss his curls. She breathed deeply, taking in his smell. Harry was looking at the table and he didn't acknowledge her words. She was going to kiss him proper though, say her words. Even if it was the last time.

Jo cupped his chin and pulled his ragged face up. He was weeping and the intense pressure behind her eyes increased. She hated seeing his disappointed hopes rolling down his cheeks. Her mouth connected to his and when she started to pull away, he came alive to grip the back of her neck and hold her against him, long and sweet. He tasted of the sea and she was adrift within him. She hated that she had to bash him on the rocks. When his briny tongue met her own, she gave herself over to the kiss.

It might be their last.

Harry pulled her to him and she was either going to find bruises on her thighs or climb over the table to get to him. She chose the latter. She longed to feel him. The press of his body, all up and down her front came on the roll of a wave. Jo went crashing down with him and found her backside on the table she'd just traversed on her knees and heard the teacups fall and the crack of the porcelain sounded like a pier battered by surf. One was the mug he bought her, that she used at his religiously, with "not paint water' on its side.

It hurt that it was probably broken.

Harry didn't seem to notice the destruction and was pulling down her sweats, murmuring please. At first she was confused, because she was ducking straight under the waves of emotion with him, but she realized he wasn't sure he had permission, not anymore.

She found herself nodding, her throat was clogged with tears like a drain, and she hoped it was to stop them swirling down it.

He didn't even pull her shirt from her shoulders, or his pants off his hips, and it was the roughest press of him into her they had ever had. Usually, from anticipation or preparation, her body was more than ready, and Harry wasn't afraid to go heavy on the lube. This was a different experience. She supposed her body was sending its moisture elsewhere. They should have collected their tears this time, instead of saliva, to wet his way. His initial gentle opening strokes to warm his ready were absent too, and he thrust into the hilt and Jo went lax then rigid against the discomfort. She gripped the table side and bit her lip until she tasted iron.

"Sorry!" He whispered, But she was glad he didn't quiet or even slow, if she felt this for a week in its aftermath, if they were apart, her body would echo with his presence. He'd still be with her.

She let go of the wood beneath her and reached for his chin leaning up against the hold he had on her hip and the other end of the table. Jo had to reach his mouth. She leaned into him like he was a sip of water after a drought. Harry pulled from her just a moment until their eyes connected and she realized he was still crying. He looked at her raggedly and she furrowed her brow on her plea.

"Har-Harry!" Her voice had little volume, but wasted power. "Please."

His hand came off her hip and caught her neck pulling her mouth to his parted lips. Jo wasn't sure it was so much a kiss as a sharing of breath, like they were trying to resuscitate their struggling bond. She tasted his gulping whimpers, or maybe her own. She pulled her eyes open despite the heavy lull of pleasure the communion below was bringing to bear. When she realized his eyes were on her and they were sharing oxygen and occupying the same space, were one flesh, she kept her lids up under the onslaught and sucked in a breath while her body gripped him until her gave what he had to offer. And she was sorry for a moment it wasn't able to create life within her. Sorry for him, for both of them.

Her nails dug into his shoulders and he wasn't able to keep his eyes open while she took all of him within her. Jo held on long past the shivers. Her nose in the hollow of his throat where she sniveled. Harry's arms banded around her shoulders and he gripped both hips, making an X, like a rejection mark on her offer. He had stamped her heart and body certainly.

They breathed together until the chill of the air sent a shiver over Harry.

"Lover?" She questioned and started to move.

"No, not yet." He held her tighter and buried his face in her neck. "Just another minute before you go." The word go passed his lips and he didn't collect a thing, only lost.

"Ok," Jo breathed back into the top of his head and was sorry they were too needy to take clothes off. She'd like to feel his painted skin against her in case.

Her eyes fell closed and she clung back to him.

When he looked up after abridged minutes, his eyes were clear but his lashes wet. Harry pulled back from her body and reached down to pull up her sweats. The nubs on the inside didn't soothe her gooseflesh but prickled the hair trying to use the continuing chill to grow. Jo puzzled over the fact he didn't clean her up, like he usually did.

On the walk to her car though, as she felt him slowly sliding down her thighs she was happy for it. It might be the most she got of him now.

Neither of them said goodbye, the word was ponderous to Jo, like a tipping point she wasn't ready to spill over. It was his decision anyway. She had laid out their stark reality, that they were the milk in the front of the freezer case, and he could choose the earlier expiration date, or reach beyond her for a better timeline.

'I love you' didn't breach their lips either. It was all over their eyes and bodies and hearts.

The drive home was lonely and silent. Jo couldn't even listen to the songs on her phone as a distraction, everything sounded like Harry to her.

At Colin's the exchange was simple, and she had suppressed her emotions and cleaned up her face before going in. Her attire and hair was explainable by the early hour and her sometimes nosy ex let it go. Zoe was happy to see her and chatty in the car. She was telling a story about the new set of clutchables, the small toys she liked to carry in her hands, colin had got her and Jo was following her down her mental trails when it happened.  At a stop light, she looked up at Zoe's last comment.  Jo watched her face and when she looked down into her lap to arrange the world she was orchestrating her hair was in shadow, it looked dark. 

Would Harry's babies have brown hair? Would they come out with the blonde hair Zoe and Ethan had and subtly change to brown, or would they start dark?

Would they have dimples?

Jo shook her head, she supposed that depended on who their mother was. The first several images her mind presented could have been her own, so like features to her own children. As her mind wandered, the imaginary toddlers looked less and less like her, some with gorgeous skin, extremely curly, or even ginger hair.

"Mummy, are you sad?" Zoe asked when they pulled up to their cozy little house.

Jo looked in her rear view where Zoe was looking at her. At first she was curious where the question came from, until she realized that tears had bubbled up and over her waterline. Her face was wet.

"I'm ok, baby. Just missed you." Was all
She could come up with that wasn't a complete lie.

Zoe was a godsend all day, Jo was thankful her own artificial energy was enough to keep up. She forewent her usual tea and slugged down two cups of coffee, and ate toast so she could avoid the stomach ache that was like to cause. It didn't work. Her tummy hurt anyway. It bothered Jo all day, through the drive they took to the ice cream farm that had opened for the season and the hours they spent at the park and Zoe's gymnastics lesson.

When Colin turned up there, she made small talk with him and wondered at the fact that he hadn't questioned her coming to get Zoe so early in the day.

"Sorry about coming over so early. I was missing her." She tried to explain.

He glanced at her neck, and she hoped Harry hadn't bitten her, hoped he had. Anything to keep him on her. "You looked like you had a rough go, and I had work to do. It's fine." He watched Zoe flip into the foam pit and clapped. "You ladies want to grab tea at the pub?"

Jo couldn't imagine eating, so she shook her head. "No, I have to get my lecture slides up for tomorrow. I'm behind."

"When you spend the weekend out that will happen." There was no censure there, which surprised her, but there was curiosity. "Have you got yourself a man, love? That why you turned me down the other night?"

Jo wanted to scoff, because she'd turn him down forever now, even if she was without a man. Was she without a man? That was up to Harry now.

"Jo?" Colin's voice cut through her fog and he was staring at her with a bit of compassion.

"Sorry, just a little overwhelmed. Rough night." Zoe finished up her last turn with her coach and ran over to grab her mother's legs. "Oof! Too strong little girl."

"Like this?" Zoe giggled and made a muscle. Jo giggled and then grimaced when she realized Harry had taught her that.

"Just like that love!" She kissed her hair and enjoyed her hug a little more, took comfort there.

"I'm gonna head out. I'll bring her home Thursday. Want me to feed her?" Colin looked soft when she raised her eyes to him.

His mien made her not be snippy. Though of course Zoe should be fed after gymnastics and on their weeknight dinner visitation. Harry would even—-.

"Yes, please. Then I can bathe her and get her to bed." She gathered up Zoe's things and Colin was watching her as she went. "What?"

"It'll be ok, you will, yeah?" His brow was drawn and she wondered how awful she must look.

"Yeah, just have work and I'm tired, s'all." Jo lied.

When she got the her car, after she had buckled in her daughter, the first thing she did was check her reflection. She had some bags, but it wasn't clear she had put off crying all day, or that she hadn't been able to stomach another bite. Her eyes were a little dull she supposed, but she wasn't sure why Colin was so solicitous.

Harry wasn't feeling that way it seemed though. Her phone was obnoxiously silent all through her evening routine, and her bed was giant without him, though they shared her side of the bed every night.

Jo hadn't meant to precisely break up with him, and she wanted him to take time and think about what he really wanted. She wanted him to get everything he could out of life, and couldn't be with her.

But god she missed him.

The silence was torturous.

Her hiccuping breaths filled the air of the room and his pillow was wet that evening and she wasn't even a little bit sorry when Zoe had a nightmare and she wound up spending from three to six in the morning in her twin bed. Even with the sharp knees and elbows she caught.

If Harry never called again, if they squirmed through the last few weeks of school as something that was, she was going to have to burn her bed, and her studio, and maybe her life down. How could not quite five months leave her so irrevocably changed?

There was a part of her, glinting like a mirage in the desert that screamed in relief. The pressure was off, Ethan never need know and if they could keep it under wraps the danger was passed.

Jo could tell that no matter how far she chased that imagined oasis it wouldn't be there. The relief was buried under a sandstorm of grief. She wrapped her neck in scarves all week, not just to cover the mark, the only visible one he had ever left, but for her to bury her nose in so she didn't inhale the grit.

Plus, Harry had run around wearing it one night, when he had pretended to be a Venetian gondolier in their bed. He's used a broom as an oar and pretended to take her to all the sights. She wasn't even sure where he had pulled the scarf from that night, but she was glad of it.

It smelled of him.

On Thursday, she could see that the quicksand was sucking her under. Jo'd barely slept. She'd tried to paint the night before and found iron pyrite in all the place's and pieces she had gilded. She was definitely the golden fool. 

She had made it through everything she had to do though, that she could say. If there was anything that motherhood brought out of a woman, it was the ability to get your ass up and do what had to be done, even when you had had major abdominal surgery, or hadn't slept in a week, or in this case had learned why they called it a break up.

Jo was definitely falling to pieces, ever so slowly, like the trickle of toys out of Zoe's backpack that had a hole in it.

It's also why she was lingering in her office. Jo had no child to rush home to tend to. It was Colin's dinner night, they had gymnastics as well. Her house would be empty, except with memories and her unsureness, grief.

Her office was a little safer, with the exception of when Harry had come out to her, or run his nose along her neck, they had made this a no-fly zone.  So she could at least hover here. At home, without Zoe she would just ramble, and she couldn't paint, and her phone, well it either wasn't working, or he wasn't calling.

She'd seen him today, the sun was out and she'd caught the glint of gold on his hair from across the quad. He was walking somewhere. He was too far away for her to see any of his details, if he had been sleeping and eating properly, or if he had been putting his indecision, or decision, into color. Whether his fingertips were golden.

If they were, was that a good sign or a bad one?

Jo could see that he was hunched, collapsed in on himself, and he was wearing a light brown jacket though most of the the rest of the student body was bared to the sun. She almost called his name, to see his face, to catch the green glint of his eyes. She'd gone back to contemplating what color they were exactly. Tuesday evening, she'd found herself mixing greens on a palette that she never put to use, but just added to and muddled until It looked like murky pond water. But that wasn't wrong. His eyes, the day she walked out, were murky and dark.

When he was with her, and she need just roll over or open her eyes to see his go lights, she didn't wonder about them so much. Or was entirely too distracted to care exactly their color, so long as they were on her.

Her voice would have been taken by the wind though. Harry would never have heard her, not across meters of verdant grass and chattering mouths. His head did glance up in her direction. But someone walked in front of her and when he came back into hwr eyeline she could only catch his back as he went down the stairs in the art department basement.

Her office was in the same building. They might be occupying the same space, but have as little to do with one another as a worker bee to its queen.

Jo's grading was long since done, and she had been staring at an envelope she should open for far too long. She knew it was probably a resounding yes for the first fellowship she had put Harry up for. It was such a great opportunity and all of the things he wanted but didn't talk about, but she was sure he could get and conquer. It was in Montreal though. It may not matter that he was moving continents now. If he went.

He had to go.

Jo held it. Maybe she should text him? Before they had wound up on the table that day she told him she would check in. This was a reason to contact him, and she needed to check in about his final project.

Her scoff echoed off the wood walls. Jo didn't need to check on him there. He had any number of works that would get him a first. Many she knew intimately. Her pussy was so lifelike and the flesh he created around it and the flower filled garden he brought her out of, so lush and such a great example of how his landscapes had grown, it was good enough to hang on a museum wall, a gallery, definitely to earn him a degree in fine art. It was amazing, he should use that one. Jo was chagrined that it was her anatomy, but could admit it's quality, and her beauty.

Through his eyes.

Maybe that's why Colin could see something was off with her? Without Harry, was she the woman he saw? Jo loved the way he saw her, painted her, felt her, amplified her. It made her believe she was all the things he painted. More.

Her fingers were opening the envelope with Harry's fate in it when there was a knock on the door.

"Come in." She called unsure what to expect but every hair on her body was standing up, in hopes, at attention.

His hair was lank, greasy enough that most of the curls were weighed down, where there was usually the hint of a dimple perpetually in his cheek, the ghost of an irrepressible smile, now his cheeks were smooth there beneath cheekbones bracing through his skin. His eyes looked a little bruised, like hers had been before she watched a YouTube video on covering them up yesterday. Maybe Harry had no interest or inclination to cover them up. Or any means.

"Hi," he said softly and his dimple went in just a touch, to remind her it was there.

Jo starred and she could feel her eyes welling. Her first inclination was to run to him, but they were in her office. Her feet carried her without her volition and she found herself wrapped up in him. His smell was everywhere and he had on the hoodie she wore at his house when she was too chilled to be naked.

"Hi." She mouthed more than said into the divot on his chest. They stayed there longer than was prudent or made sense, and his arms cinched her tighter.

His cheek was on the top of her head, and when he snugged his face into her neck she could feel his eyes had runneth over.  They were both crying and nothing was resolved and they might be apart.

It was the best she felt all week.

Jo finally unlatched her hands form him and found that she still held his fate in the envelope before them. She had mussed it up a bit and was sorry for it.

"Here." She handed it to him. It was something to do.

Harry looked a little lost, but reached into the envelope he had received. He pulled out the set of pages, and Jo caught a glimpse of the maroon of the foundation emblem.

"What's this?" He asked and Jo was confused by the look on his face.

He didn't look happy or proud or even overwhelmed. He looked sad, as he had since he'd come into her office and now a little angry.

"I put you up for some fellowship." Jo explained simply.

By the brightening of his eyes, she guessed he was getting angrier.

"So not only did you tell me you won't have children with me and that we are temporary, but you've arranged for me to move to Montreal so you don't have to really break up with me?" His temples flexed and his jaw could crack walnuts.

"What? No!" Jo was at a loss. "I submitted the application months ago."

"You wanted to get rid of me months ago already?" That one had a little more blue around the red tone. Just that touch sadder.

"I," Jo gulped. This was not what she expected. "I thought, Harry. The fellowship is a great opportunity. They pay you to go learn about art and to create. In a gorgeous place." She tried to smile calmly to smooth their feelings out, like like praying for calm waters.

"When?" He asked and his voice rose just enough that she was shocked. But not so much that she was worried, yet.

"When what?" She walked behind her desk.

"When did you set up this plan for me to leave you? Get rid of me." His face looked like a Caravaggio s severed head.

"That wasn't my thought, I don't want to get rid of you Harry." She looked at the other seeming acceptance letters on her desk.  He was staring at his feet. "Look at me!" Her voice came out like a kitten mewl.

His eyes caught on her face and though he had touched her, his eye contact felt much more dear, closer. He usually was so in tune with her, her feelings. Felt her out and could articulate her thoughts before she could.

Maybe his own aches had been so acute, he hadn't bothered to think of hers. Harry felt like yesterday's news. Jo guessed she had done the job, scattered his feelings to the wind.

Did he really think it meant nothing to her? She was doing it for him, to give him time to gather his dreams and hopes and decide what he wanted, When, and with whom, since it couldn't be her.

His eyes roved over her poorly hidden dark circles, and her own hollow cheeks and the lank ponytail where she had not bothered to do more than brush her hair.  He couldn't see underneath her clothes, her story there. But she guessed that she was as thin as she had been when he found her gaunt post fever. Food tasted like cardboard.

"Jo," was all he said.

"Does it look like I do well without you?" She hiccuped. "And it's worse now, because I'm awake, you woke me up, before i didn't know any better. Was just numb. Now I know better, and it aches Harry. I don't want you to go away, I don't want to be away from you!"

"Then why are we doing this? Why are we apart? Why send me away?" He put his hands forward in supplication. Jo was glad for the desk between them, or she would have taken them and been done with it. Moved into his arms and life and forgot about the things he'd want she couldn't give.

"Because it's not fair to either of us. I can't give you what you want." She didn't want to have this fight again. Didn't want to pull their guts out to read the future.

"But what I want is you." He words were as clear as a mountain spring.

"Yes, today, but what about in 10 years, when I look like I'm 50, or 20 when I'm 60? Or when it's time for you to think about what you gave up for me? The baby, maybe closeness with your mum, or Ethan." Jo worried about that a lot. That Ethan and Harry wouldn't be able to remain friends. She worried more Ethan would be angry with her and that precious closeness they had would be gone.

Jo deserved it though.

Harry scoffed at her, "how do you not get it still, Jo?" He gripped his lithe hips. "I want all of you, your gray hair and laugh lines. I want to cause them, be there as they form, paint them." He hung his head and his whole body shook with the force of his exhale. "Jo do you not know how I love you?"

"I think it's the opposite." She shook her head. "You don't know how I love you. Enough to give you the world and away." She walked around the desk and caught his hands, pressed her palms to his. "Do you think I don't want to take every bit of time you'll give me? Every year? I've risked my world for you, set out matches and kindling for anyone to light it up, for
you."

"Jo-"

She was shaking her head, "but I won't risk your happiness and future. You will want this opportunity. And I won't be why you don't get it, you will want children, and I won't be why you don't get them. I won't be your why not!" She gripped his palms. Felt her nails bite it.

"Have you not even considered other options, adoption, surrogacy?" He laced their fingers together. "It doesn't have to be an outright no."

She hadn't, just like she hadn't let herself think of forever. She shook her head, stared at their linked hands. "We aren't ready for these plans, we aren't even clear of school." Then she looked at him. "And not adoption. Somebody needs to bear a little child with your eyes and smile."

"Ok, and that person could be anybody, so long as the DNA is ours." Jo knew her head was shaking already. These were not possibilities she could let herself entertain. Down that road layed madness. Jo knew she would be overcome with hope and the death those dreams died would make her want to walk into the ocean.

"Jo, look, listen, think about it. You can talk to your doctor about harvesting eggs. And then we have time. I thought about it all week. Did research. It doesn't have to be tomorrow, but it doesn't have to be never." He was making a case she judged she could not entertain. It was to much of a tease.

Suddenly Jo's voice rose like a nearby thunder strike, it was white hot with anger. "I've already had my children. You don't want my old ass eggs Harry!" Why was he pushing this? She'd tried so hard to put his needs and future before her own heart, and he was throwing it away with both hands. And it felt like the cracks in her heart the last week had opened, that she'd scored with her sacrifice, were breaking open and bleeding.

"I do though." He gentled. "Just the way you want my eyes and smile, I want your nose and lips." He tried to touch her face and she struck him away. His hands on her would cause a tremor that would make her fall into herself.

"I don't want to talk about this. I can't talk about this." She shook her head and pushed back from him. She'd yelled fairly loud in her office. Was worried about who may have heard; Though it was late on a Friday and most people would be gone. "I wish you wouldn't have come here." That was a lie, she was so happy he had come, she felt like she'd actually benefited from the sunshine he brought.

"I'm not. I needed to see your face and hear your voice. And you aren't either. We are better together. You know that. When you have thought about it, and can talk about it with an open mind. Come to me. But, please, before you say no, think about it."

"And you think about the fellowships. Please, don't turn them down outright because of me." I won't let you. I'm not worth it, she didn't say.

"Ok," he looked at her again, tried for a smile, cupped her face. "May I kiss you?"

She hated that he had to ask. She nodded. His lips whispered over hers, the hesitancy evident. The rush of emotion they brought wasn't gentle in the least, pushed tears down her face like condensation on a glass in August. Jo was crying hard again.

"Baby?" He held her again and it made her cry harder. "Why are you crying like this?"

It was a tease, to taste all she couldn't seem to leave behind. Knew from the beginning wasn't hers to keep and stupidly risked her loves for.

"I can't, I can't talk about this anymore. Please go Harry!" She begged and he reluctantly went, like her will was a parachute taking him in the wind.

She watched him walk out, and collapsed into her desk to breathe, head down, mouth wide.

When the knock sounded and door opened she immediately spoke, "Harry, not tonight, I can't talk about it anymore," her breath sobbed out, "Please."

"Not Harry." Was all Victoria said as she stepped into the office and closed the door behind her.