Chapter Text
The door closed behind them with a soft, final click.
For a second neither moved.
The room felt warm and close, heavy with things neither of them were brave enough to name out loud. Mike set the paper bag on the desk, suddenly finding the pattern of the carpet far more interesting than he should have.
“So,” he said, clearing his throat,
“this is… the room.”
El glanced around with mock seriousness.
“Ah yes. The infamous horizontal, zero-audience kind of room.”
He let out a nervous laugh.
“Very dangerous place. Many people have reportedly lost their ability to form complete sentences here.”
“Tragic,” she said, stepping closer. “We should be careful.”
They weren’t.
His hands found her waist first, hesitant but honest. El’s fingers slid up the front of his shirt, testing, learning again. The air between them changed shape-slower, warmer, threaded with ten years of things finally allowed to breathe.
Mike’s forehead touched hers.
“You sure?” he whispered.
Instead of answering, El kissed him.
Not the careful kiss from the waterfall.
Not the one meant to heal.
This one had memory in it.
And hunger.
Mike let out a shaky breath.
“Okay,” he murmured, half laughing, half doomed.
“Definitely not forming sentences.”
El smiled against his mouth.
“Good.”
For a few stolen seconds, nothing else existed.
A heartbeat later-
His phone rang.
The sound cut through the room like a thrown glass.
Mike froze.
On the screen:
Hawkins Home
El saw it at the same time he did.
“Oh- I have to take this,” he said immediately, already reaching for the phone. “It’s Jane.”
“Of course you do,” El answered without hesitation.
He hesitated anyway.
“I can… put it on speaker,” he said.
“If you want to hear her.”
El’s face softened.
“I’d like that.”
Mike took a steadying breath, forcing his mind away from the warmth still lingering between them.
Mike nodded, swallowed once, and answered.
“Hey, kiddo.”
“Daaaaddyyy!”
The voice burst into the room like sunlight through curtains.
El’s eyes lit up with a sudden spark of excitement, and Mike noticed it quietly.
"Did you see the waterfalls? Were they really loud? You didn’t fall in, did you? Please tell me you didn’t fall in!”
Mike laughed, relief washing over his face.
“I did not fall in. I’m a highly trained adult.”
“Pops said adults are just tall kids with bills.”
El covered her mouth to hide a grin.
“That is… disturbingly accurate,” Mike admitted.
Mike leaned against the wall, phone in hand.
“So, how’s Hawkins treating you, Commander Jane?”
“Good! Pops let me water the garden and I didn’t even flood it this time! And Nana says if you don’t come back soon, she’s gonna put soup in a box and mail it to you."
El smiled at that-soft, private.
She could picture the house she’d been away from for years, the faces she’d missed, and somehow, through Jane’s voice, it all felt like coming home.
“Speaking of coming back…” Jane went on, suddenly serious,
“you’re coming home tomorrow, right?”
Mike glanced at El for half a second.
“Not tomorrow, kiddo. I’m gonna stay a couple more days.”
“More?”
“Two or three.”
There was a thoughtful pause on the other end.
"Okay… but don’t stay too long or Ben’s gonna forget how cool I am."
Mike’s face immediately darkened.
“Benjamin again?”
El bit her lip to keep from laughing.
Jane didn’t notice a thing.
"I told him before the vacation, ‘If you keep eating glue, I’m not marrying you,’ and he said glue tastes like adventure.”
Jane paused thoughtfully.
“I wonder if he stopped eating glue"
Mike closed his eyes like he was praying for patience.
El pressed her lips together, trying very hard not to laugh.
“That kid is a menace to society.”
“He’s just misunderstood,” Jane said wisely. “Like velociraptors.”
That made Mike straighten.
“Hey! Velociraptors were highly intelligent pack hunters with complex social structures.”
“Exactly! Not monsters. Just a little bitey.”
El let out a quiet laugh before she could stop it.
Mike glanced at her, relieved, and kept going.
“Bitey is not a personality trait we encourage in boys who hang around my daughter.”
“Ben is nice!”
“Ben eats glue!!”
“He said it tastes like adventure.”
“That’s exactly the problem.”
Jane giggled.
El watched Mike as he talked-
his shoulders loosening, his voice finding that familiar, easy rhythm.
He laughed, and she smiled back, studying the way he could look stronger and gentler all at once.
A grown man, yes.
But also the boy she had loved once, somehow still standing inside him.
It made something warm ache in her chest.
“One dinosaur fact before you go,” Jane demanded.
Mike didn’t even hesitate.
"Hmmm... Parasaurolophus used its head crest like a trumpet."
“See? Benjamin doesn’t even know that.”
“Well, Ben is uneducated,” Mike said gravely.
El pressed her hand to her mouth to hide her smile.
“He’s not uneducated,” Jane muttered. “He knows dinosaur stuff!"
Mike softened immediately.
“Okay, okay. Selectively educated, then.”
“Better.”
Jane huffed, then added,
“Anyway, I should probably get moving. Nana says if I don’t go outside and play, my brain will turn into oatmeal."
“Tell Nana she’s very dramatic.”
Jane giggled.
“Love you, Daddy.”
His face softened instantly.
“Love you more, bug.”
The call ended.
For a moment the room was just the quiet hum of the heater and the sound of Reykjavík somewhere outside.
El didn’t speak right away.
She looked at him-really looked-
at the man who had built a whole world around a little girl,
who knew dinosaur facts by heart,
who listened like Jane was the center of the universe.
She felt it again-
that strange, undeniable truth:
He had become something extraordinary while she was gone.
Mike rubbed the back of his neck.
“Sorry-Benjamin’s testing the limits of human patience.”
El shook her head.
“Don’t be jealous, Mike. They’re really cute together and…”
“She’s amazing.”
Mike smiled, a little shy now.
“Yeah. She really is.”
Then he frowned again, as if remembering himself.
“But they're cute? Absolutely not. The kid eats glue. Glue, El. Cute is a strong word for a boy who snacks on glue.”
El laughed at that, watching him-
the way he tried to sound serious and failed,
the way his face softened anyway when he talked about Jane.
Something warm settled in her chest.
She stepped closer, reached for his hand.
And this time, when their fingers intertwined, it felt less like remembering
and more like choosing.
Mike exhaled, a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding.
The room grew quieter around them, not empty-just full of things they didn’t need to say.
El brushed her thumb over his knuckles, slow, certain.
Neither of them spoke.
There was no rush left in the world.
Mike rested his forehead against hers, and the distance between them finished disappearing on its own.
Outside, the city went on with its ordinary noises.
Inside, they let the moment decide what came next.
The room was warm and dim, the hour lost somewhere between late and too late. Outside, the city minded its own business. Inside, everything felt impossibly close.
Mike lay there, not quite asleep, not quite awake, learning the shape of a moment he’d never expected to have again.
El lay curled against his side, her arm draped loosely across his chest, as if it had always belonged there. Mike watched the ceiling for a while, listening to the small, ordinary sounds of the room-the heater ticking, a car passing far below, El’s slow breathing.
It felt dangerously close to peace.
He didn’t fall asleep right away.
He was afraid if he did, he might wake up and find it gone.
But exhaustion won in the end.
Sometime deep into the night, Mike stirred.
His body remembered practical things even when his heart didn’t-like the need to get up, to move, to exist as a human being with inconvenient biology.
He carefully slid his arm out from under her.
El made a small sound immediately.
“Mike?” she murmured, half inside a dream.
“I’m here,” he whispered. "Just the bathroom. I’ll be right back”
Her eyes opened just enough to find him in the dark.
“Don’t go far,” she breathed, sleep blurring the words.
He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead.
“I won't.”
When he returned, she had shifted toward his side of the bed as if gravity had pulled her there. He slipped back under the blanket and gathered her close again, her back fitting against him with ridiculous, unfair perfection.
He let himself believe it.
Sleep found him after that.
El woke before the room did.
For a few seconds she just lay there, not moving, collecting the pieces of herself like scattered coins.
Her body complained first.
A soft, honest ache in places she hadn’t felt in years-nothing sharp, nothing frightening. Just proof. Memory written into muscle.
She shifted carefully.
The sheet brushed against her skin and she remembered everything at once.
Oh.
Mike was asleep beside her.
One arm curled loosely around her waist, palm warm against her ribs, his face turned toward the pillow. The morning light softened him-took the edges off the man and let her see the boy again.
She watched him the way you watch something you’re afraid might disappear.
The little line between his brows.
The way his lashes were unfairly long.
The slow rise and fall of his chest-steady, unguarded.
He looked… peaceful.
El realized she had never seen him like this. Not truly. Even years ago there had always been tension, the world breathing down their necks.
Now there was only a man sleeping beside her, hair messy, mouth slightly open, completely unaware he was being studied like a miracle.
Her throat tightened.
You’re real.
Last night replayed in fragments-
laughter, clumsy hands, whispered that turned into something else;
the way he’d said her name like it was holy,
the heat of him still clinging to her skin,
her fingers learning the shape of his shoulders all over again.
Heat crept up her neck.
“Okay,” she whispered to herself, “definitely real.”
She winced as she stretched her leg a little.
“Also…yep. Definitely human," she muttered, cheeks burning.
Mike stirred at the sound.
Not fully awake-more like a man swimming up through warm water. His hand shifted on her waist, fingers flexing as if checking whether she was still there.
“El?” he mumbled.
“Shh. Go back to sleep.”
He opened one eye.
“You’re watching me again.”
“Maybe.”
“That’s becoming a habit.”
El smiled.
“You’re an interesting subject.”
Mike groaned and buried his face in the pillow.
She laughed-then winced again when she moved.
He noticed immediately.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t look fine.”
“I look exactly like someone who hasn’t used certain muscles in years.”
Mike blinked.
Then turned bright red.
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.”
“Should I apologize or take a bow?”
She swatted his arm.
“Neither. Just… don’t look so proud of yourself.”
“Too late.”
They lay there for a minute, listening to Reykjavík wake up outside.
Mike stared at the ceiling.
“So,” he said, “breakfast plan?”
“Food sounds necessary.”
“Necessary or life-saving?”
“Both.”
He turned his head toward her.
“I vote something greasy. Or at least heroic.”
“Heroic breakfast?”
“Yeah. The kind that looks at you and says: I know what you’ve been through.”
El snorted.
“You’re ridiculous.”
“You like it.”
She didn’t answer-just chuckled.
Mike cleared his throat.
“So… Jane sounded happy yesterday.”
El’s face warmed.
“She’s amazing. The way she talks-like the whole world is a story she’s in charge of.”
Mike smiled.
“She gets that from me. Unfortunately.”
“And the velociraptor expertise?”
"Jurassic Park. She got obsessed with velociraptors because they were smart. Like, full-on fell in love with them. Wanted to read everything she could find and honestly, it helped her reading take off. I started reading along just to keep up with her, and somehow we both became experts.”
El laughed, sunlight in human form.
Mike watched her a second too long.
El cleared her throat, gathering the robe a little tighter.
“I need to take a shower,” she said, “and you should too… then we’ll go get breakfast.”
Mike raised his hands in surrender.
“Orders received.”
A beat.
“…together?” he added, hopefully.
El turned slowly.
“Together what?”
“Shower... You know.. Purely logistical. Save water, save the planet, save-”
El trying not to smile -and failing at the corners of her mouth.
“Absolutely not, Mr. Wheeler.”
He pressed a hand to his heart.
“Wow. Brutal. Didn’t even let me finish my proposal slides.”
El was already slipping out of bed, grabbing the hotel robe, and Mike watched the whole process with devoted attention.
“You can submit your proposal in writing.”
“That hurts.”
She tied the belt with deliberate patience.
“Behave.”
Mike propped himself up on one elbow, watching with absolutely zero shame.
“I am behaving.”
“Your face says otherwise.”
“My face is supportive.”
At the door she glanced back.
“Mike.”
“Hmm?”
“Eyes up here” she tapped two fingers just beneath her own eyes from across the room, making the point very clear.
“They are. Mostly... I’m just appreciating the local architecture.”
She laughed and disappeared inside, the door clicking shut.
The shower started a second later-water spilling from the showerhead, filling the room with that soft, intimate hum.
Mike fell back against the pillow, staring at the ceiling with a helpless grin.
“Yeah,” he murmured, “I’m in serious trouble."
When El came back out, hair damp, robe tied too casually for his sanity, Mike forgot every thought he’d ever had.
“Your turn,” she said.
"I might need a minute to reboot my brain..”
“Go. Breakfast won’t wait forever.”
He stood, still half asleep, and paused beside her.
“Hey.”
“Hmm?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been this glad about anything” he said, brushing his thumb over her wrist.
El softened.
“Me too.”
Mike leaned in, pressing a quick, warm kiss to the curve of her neck, leaving her faintly flushed where she stood. Then he slipped past her and disappeared into the shower.
The café smelled like fresh bread and strong coffee, the kind of smell that made ordinary mornings feel almost ceremonial. Mike was still studying the menu like it was a legal document.
“Why does everything have twelve consonants?” he muttered.
El leaned across the table and pointed.
“That one is eggs. I think.” she said jokingly.
“You think? You’ve lived here for years-you definitely know the language.”
“I’m ninety percent confident.”
She tilted her head, answering her own question.
“And the other ten?”
A beat.
“Maybe I forgot it. Just-suddenly.”
Mike looked at her, amused and vaguely horrified at the same time.
“Those are terrible odds for something I’m about to put in my mouth.” He shook his head.
She chuckled.
“You had breakfast here without me. How did you even order?” she said playful.
“I just got waffles. The first morning. And I had soup the night I arrived. I haven’t been involved in anything this complicated,” he said, studying the menu.
She laughed and flagged the waitress, ordering in Icelandic Mike didn’t even try to follow. He just watched her-how natural she looked here, like the city had shaped itself around her.
For a moment, everything felt almost ordinary.
They ate slowly, talking in the easy rhythm of people relearning each other.
“So,” El said, tearing off a piece of bread.
“Tell me more about her.”
Mike smiled without even realizing it.
“About Jane?”
“Mm-hmm, Jane” she smiled.
He launched into stories the way only a father could-messy, proud, slightly exaggerated. How Jane hated math but loved space. How she once tried to teach the neighbor’s cat to read. How she made up songs about dinosaurs while brushing her teeth.
And then the stories softened into something steadier, less funny and more real. He told her how Jane had learned to read at four, how easily she picked up new languages, and how the teachers kept using words like gifted and advanced programs-words that still made him nervous.
El listened like she was collecting treasures.
She’s scary smart,” Mike said, not hiding the pride at all.
“Sometimes I think she’s raising me, not the other way around.”
“She sounds… fearless,” she said.
“She is,” Mike answered, then softened.
“Stubborn, dramatic, too smart for her own good.”
El smiled.
“She gets that from you.”
Mike made a face.
“Hey-stubborn and dramatic, maybe. But the smart? I don’t know that guy.”
El rolled her eyes, not buying it for a second.
“Mike, please...”
They both smiled at each other then, the kind of smile that didn’t need explaining.
There was a pause. A real one this time.
Mike set his fork down.
“She loves you,” he said quietly.
El’s hand stilled.
“That’s a very big sentence.”
“I know. But El, it’s like she knows you. I mean really knows you. There’s no logical way to explain it, to put it into words. It’s not something you could ever believe without meeting her. You’re her hero, the name she chooses for herself when she plays. If she were your biological daughter, it couldn’t be any more real than this.”
With a strange flutter of excitement inside her, she smiled at Mike and squeezed his hand, as if to tell him everything was okay.
They looked at each other over cooling coffee and half-eaten bread-the future sitting uninvited at their table.
El swallowed.
“I want to meet her,” she said finally.
“But I’m also terrified.”
Mike nodded.
“That’s fair.”
“I don’t want to be… a storm in her life.”
He reached across the table and took her hand.
“You won’t be.”
El squeezed his fingers.
“Promise?”
Mike thought about all the promises he’d ever made-and the ones he’d broken without meaning to.
“Yeah,” he said softly.
“I promise.”
They were still sitting in that warm, fragile bubble when someone approached their table.
A middle-aged woman, scarf wrapped tight around her neck, hovering a little awkwardly. Her English was careful, rehearsed.
“Excuse me… you are Mike Wheeler, yes?”
Mike blinked.
“Uh-yeah. Hi.”
The woman’s face lit up like she’d just won a small lottery.
“I read your book,” she said, the words tumbling out with enthusiasm that ignored grammar.
“It was… how you say… very touching. I cry two times.”
Mike went completely red.
“Oh-wow. Thank you. That’s… really kind.”
He scratched the back of his neck, suddenly fascinated by the salt shaker.
El watched him with open curiosity, chin resting on her hand, trying not to smile too obviously.
He looked like a boy caught passing notes in class.
The woman fumbled in her bag and produced a well-loved copy of the book-spine creased, pages softened from use.
“Can you sign?”
“Of course,” Mike said automatically.
Then he patted his pockets and froze.
“I… don’t actually have a pen.”
The woman looked mildly devastated.
Mike turned toward the counter, half rising from his chair.
“Excuse me-sorry-do you have a pen I could borrow?”
The waitress blinked, recognized the situation instantly, and hurried over with one.
“Of course.”
“Lifesaver,” Mike muttered, taking it like it was a rescue rope.
The woman wasn’t sure how to say what she wanted to say.
El noticed immediately and jumped in, turning to her and switching into smooth, confident Icelandic.
The relief on the woman’s face was immediate.
She answered El first, fast and emotional, hands moving as much as her words. Then she turned back to Mike with an apologetic smile.
“Thank you! My English is… small.”
Mike shook his head quickly.
“No, no-it’s great. Way better than my Icelandic.”
El translated, and the woman laughed, visibly more comfortable now.
Mike stared at El, slightly in awe.
The woman kept talking, and El leaned closer to Mike to translate softly.
“She says the story reminded her of her husband.
That she read it during a hard time. She read the last chapter twice.
And that the ending felt like someone wrote her own heart.”
Mike blinked, suddenly unsure what to do with his hands again.
“I’m… really glad it meant something to you,” he managed, his voice a little rough.
El turned to the woman and translated softly.
He bent over the title page.
“To…?” he asked.
“Margrét.”
He wrote carefully, tongue pressed to the corner of his mouth like a nervous kid:
To Margrét-
with all my love and thanks,
Mike Wheeler.
He handed the book back as if it were something fragile.
“Thank you for reading it,” Mike added. “Seriously.”
The woman hesitated, then held up her camera.
“Photo… maybe?”
“Yeah, sure.”
She turned to El then, saying something quick in Icelandic, a polite question wrapped in unfamiliar sounds.
El smiled and nodded.
She reached across the table and took the small camera from Margrét’s hands, turning it over in her palm while Mike was still sitting there, suddenly aware he was about to become a public object.
Mike stood-and immediately forgot what to do with his body.
He straightened his shirt, then un-straightened it.
Tried to put a hand in his pocket, changed his mind, let it dangle awkwardly instead.
El bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing.
He glanced at her for help.
She gave him a tiny, encouraging nod.
The woman slipped an arm around his waist for the picture.
Mike went rigid like a cardboard cutout, then forced a polite smile that looked suspiciously like pain.
El lifted the camera-and for a second, she didn’t press the button.
She just looked.
At him standing there, embarrassed and decent and alive.
At the man the world had somehow found while she was gone..
Not just the boy she’d loved.
Not just the man she’d lost.
Someone people thanked for saving them with words.
Something warm and fierce bloomed in her chest.
Pride.
She snapped the photo.
“Perfect,” she said.
Margrét thanked them both, squeezed El’s hands, and floated back to her table like she’d met a movie star.
Mike collapsed into his chair.
“Oh my God.”
El laughed.
“You’re famous.”
“Well. Okay.. Maybe little...”
“You made a woman cry two times.”
“That’s not a statistic I’m comfortable with.”
He shook his head, still half embarrassed.
“I can’t believe that happened in front of you.”
El tilted her head.
“Why?”
“Because I’m supposed to be… I don’t know. Cool. Mysterious. Not ‘forgets how arms work’ guy. I’m usually fine with readers, honestly. I just got nervous with you watching.”
She smiled softly.
“I liked ‘forgets how arms work’ guy.”
She nudged his hand.
“You’re a writer, Mike. A good one. You deserve the attention you get-and I’m more than willing to be the one taking your photos with readers.”
He looked at her, a little stunned.
“Really?”
“Really,” she said, with a warm, easy smile.
Mike let out a breath and glanced down at the table.
“Don’t encourage me.”
El reached across and nudged his hand once more.
“That was nice,” she said quietly.
He shrugged, suddenly shy again.
“Just a book.”
She leaned in a little, voice gentle but certain.
“No. I read them, Mike. That’s not just a book.”
He swallowed, looking everywhere except at her.
“You’re exaggerating.”
“I’m not and that's not just a book,” she repeated, softer this time.
Mike met her eyes-and realized she was seeing him in a way she never had before.
And for once, he didn’t want to hide from it.
They finished their food in comfortable silence, the kind that didn’t need to be filled. When the plates were cleared, Mike caught the waitress’s eye and asked for the check.
El reached for her bag immediately.
“I’ve got it.”
Mike shook his head.
“No, you don’t.”
El’s hand shot out and covered his.
“You paid for dinner, Mr. Wheeler. Equality rules."
Mike gave her an offended look.
“I invited you. You can get dessert-so I’ll have an excuse to take you out on another date” he said and reached for his wallet.
El tilted her head, eyes mischievous.
“That is emotional manipulation.”
Mike stared at her for a second, then laughed.
“It’s strategy.”
“Cruel, unfair strategy.”
He grinned, victorious.
Mike opened his wallet to pay.
The motion was ordinary-automatic.
And then his eyes caught on the photo.
He didn’t mean to stop.
He just… did.
Fourteen-year-old El.
The girl he’d carried across states, across oceans, across ten impossible years.
He looked at the picture.
Then he looked at her.
The real one-older, sharper, alive in a way the photo could never learn.
His thumb hovered over the worn corner.
El noticed the shift in his face before she understood it.
“What?” she asked.
Mike swallowed.
“Nothing.”
She followed his eyes.
"Mike.."
Mike hesitated, then gave up pretending.
“It’s just… you,” he said quietly.
“The version of you I used to talk to when I didn’t have the right to talk to the real one.”
El’s chest tightened.
He pulled the photo free at last and held it between two fingers like something fragile.
She watched the way he handled the picture-careful, almost reverent.
“Show me,” El said.
Mike turned it toward her.
A worn photo.
Corners soft from years of being touched.
A fourteen-year-old version of her stared back-just a smiling, normal girl.
“You kept it in your wallet?” she asked softly.
“Yeah.”
“For ten years?”
“Yeah.”
She looked up at him.
“You said it was on your nightstand.”
And on my desk, and in the car, and in other places too” he admitted quietly.
Her throat tightened.
El looked at the picture again.
At the girl who didn’t yet know she would run, survive, lose, live.
“You carried me everywhere.”
Mike shrugged, suddenly shy.
“Seemed rude not to.”
A laugh escaped her-soft, broken at the edges.
“You’re ridiculous.”
“Guilty.”
For a moment neither of them spoke.
The café noise felt far away, like they were sitting inside a bubble shaped exactly like ten years.
He finally took her photo from her hand, leaned in, and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead.
“She was braver than she thought,” Mike said.
El closed her eyes for a second.
Mike looked at her, really looked.
“And stronger than she ever believed.”
She opened her eyes to him then, something bright and unguarded there, and reached for his hand.
Their fingers found each other the easy way-like muscle memory remembering a language it hadn’t spoken in years.
Outside, Reykjavík greeted them with pale morning light and the kind of wind that pretended to be gentle but absolutely wasn’t. El zipped her jacket and inhaled like she was greeting an old friend.
“So,” Mike said, rocking on his heels. “What’s the official Iceland experience checklist?”
She pretended to think.
“First, coffee that’s way too strong. Then we buy something knitted we don’t actually need. And at some point you have to try something fermented and regret it.”
“I feel threatened.”
“You should.”
They started walking toward the row of small souvenir shops near the harbor. El pointed at a window full of wool sweaters and tiny wooden puffins.
“We’re getting Jane something,” she decided.
“Something very Icelandic.”
“Preferably non-fermented,” Mike added.
“No promises.”
He glanced at her, smiling.
“After that?”
El shrugged, slipping her hand into his without really thinking about it.
“We act like tourists. Walk until our legs hate us. Maybe see the sea. Maybe pretend we have a normal life for a few hours.”
Mike squeezed her hand.
“Sounds traditional enough.”
The bell over the shop door gave a shy little jingle as they stepped inside. The place smelled like wool and cedar and something faintly sweet-like every grandmother in Iceland had secretly agreed on the same air freshener.
“Okay,” El announced, clapping her hands once. “Operation: Gift for Jane.”
Mike wandered between shelves of knitted hats and wooden figurines, already overwhelmed.
"You know she’s into dinosaurs and space. What you don’t know is she also loves anything that makes noise at 6 a.m.,” he said. “Preferably all at once.”
El picked up a tiny puffin plush, squeezed it, and it made a tragically loud squeak.
“This feels dangerous.”
“She’d love it,” Mike admitted, then winced. “Which is exactly the problem.”
They moved to a table covered in small, brightly painted boxes. El opened one and found a delicate silver necklace with a little star charm.
“This is more… her,” she said quietly.
Mike leaned over her shoulder to look.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “She’d wear that like it was armor.”
El glanced at him.
“You know her really well.”
He gave a small shrug.
I’ve had practice,” he said, then hesitated, searching for the right words.
“At first, I worked really hard just to know her. I tried to read her like a book. She was only three, but she was always more than she looked-she always has been. I didn’t just trust my instincts about how to treat her. I read, asked people who actually knew what they were doing, tried to understand her instead of making her fit me. I fit myself to her.”
He gave a small, uncertain shrug.
“Somehow I managed it, I guess. I don’t know. I hope I did.”
A beat passed-soft, comfortable.
El looked at him for a long moment before speaking.
“You didn’t just manage it, Mike,” she said quietly. “You showed up. You learned her language instead of forcing her to learn yours. That’s not luck. That’s love doing its homework.”
She traced the edge of the little box in her hands.
“Kids don’t need perfect. They need someone who keeps trying. And from what I can see… she has that.”
Mike swallowed, pretending to study the shelf.
“What about both?” El suggested then, lightening the air on purpose. “Serious gift and silly gift. Balanced childhood.”
“You’re dangerously good at this,” Mike said.
They ended up at the counter with the star necklace, the squeaky puffin, and-after Mike’s weak resistance-a ridiculous wool hat with tiny ears.
“She’s going to think you’re the coolest person alive,” he warned.
El smiled at the thought.
“Good. I have a reputation to build.”
Mike watched her for a second, something warm and grateful settling in his chest.
“Thanks,” he said, softer now. “For doing this with me.”
El nudged his shoulder.
“Always.”
Outside, the harbor wind was still pretending to be polite. Mike tucked the bag under his arm like it was important cargo.
“Next stop,” he said, “traditional Icelandic experiences that don’t involve fermented nightmares.”
“No promises,” El repeated and took his hand.
They walked for a while without a plan, letting the streets decide for them. Boats rocked lazily against the docks, metal ropes singing their thin, lonely song. A street musician somewhere near the square was murdering a perfectly innocent guitar.
El pointed at a café with steamed windows.
“Coffee first. Serious decisions require caffeine.”
“I thought serious decisions required maturity.”
“We don’t have that.”
“Coffee it is.”
They bought two paper cups that were too hot to hold and stood by the railing watching the water. Mike kept brushing his thumb over her knuckles like he was making sure she was still there.
“We should talk,” El said finally.
“About… everything.”
Mike nodded, suddenly serious.
“Yeah. We should.”
They ended up on a bench near the harbor, the souvenir bag between them like a silent third person.
The sea looked calm in a way El didn’t trust.
Mike stretched his legs out, hands folded together.
“Okay,” he said. “Options meeting. No yelling. No dramatic exits.”
El let out a small breath.
“I don’t yell.”
“You drove seven hours fueled entirely by spite,” Mike said, “and kept telling me not to turn around like you were running some kind of psychological operation on me.”
El gave him a look.
“Psychological operation? You didn’t let me talk, Mike.”
He opened his mouth, then closed it again, studying her face for a moment.
“Okay, okay... El? I asked you last night too,” he went on. “You never answered. How did you even find me?”
Her voice softened but it carried the same warmth it had held the night before.
“You’re a book, Mike Wheeler. And I’m the only person who knows how to read you properly.”
He’d noticed the tone in her voice, and it did things to him he wasn’t prepared for. Something in his chest actually melted. He took a breath, swallowed.
“Jesus… woman, you’re gonna be the death of me.”
He let out a shaky laugh.
“And you still didn’t answer. You did this last night too-how do why does my brain shut down every time?”
El’s face did the universal translation for boy, please.
“Please, Mike…”
The question hung in the air anyway.
“I just wondered if you used your powers to find me.”
“I told you,” El said softly. “I haven’t been able to for years.”
“Does that upset you?”
“Not seeing you all was hard,” she admitted, “but in a way… it was necessary.”
“Did they just disappear? All at once?”
“I don’t really know. Maybe because I never used them outside the Void. Or maybe I pushed myself too hard in there.”
She paused.
“It doesn’t matter anymore. I don’t want to need them.”
A gull screamed somewhere above them.
Mike nodded and turned serious.
“Okay. Let's think.
First option: You come back with me. America isn’t what it was. The Soviets are gone. The Cold War’s over. The world moved on while we were busy being miserable.”
El stared at the water.
“The world maybe. Not me.”
“El-”
“I was hunted there, Mike. Experimented on. Locked in rooms with numbers instead of names. You can’t just put a new flag on the calendar and call it safe.”
He swallowed.
“I know. But it’s not the same place.”
“It still feels like the same nightmare.”
A pause settled between them.
Mike tried again.
“Second option,” he said. “I move here.”
El turned so fast he almost smiled.
“No.”
“You didn’t even let me finish.”
“You have Jane. You have a life. Family, friends-”
“She’s six. Kids adapt.”
“Not to losing everything at once.”
Her voice softened. “Different language. Different culture. Different father because he’s trying to rebuild himself in a country he doesn’t know.”
Mike looked down at his hands.
“She’d learn Icelandic quickly. She learns everything quickly.”
“She shouldn’t have to.”
The wind tugged at El’s hair. She wrapped her jacket tighter.
“Third option,” she said quietly. “You there. Me here. Visits. Calls."
Mike made a face.
“That’s not a plan. That’s emotional long-distance torture.”
“It keeps us alive.”
“No, El. Please don’t put us through that kind of pain.
Last night… it was indescribably beautiful.
And yeah.. what happened between us was incredible, I won’t pretend otherwise. I still feel like I’m walking a few inches off the ground.
But that wasn’t even the best part.
Waking up in the middle of the night and finding you curled around me…
Opening my eyes to your warmth in the morning…
That’s the part that got under my skin.
I don’t want to be without you anymore.
After last night... I can’t.”
El was quiet for a long moment, listened without interrupting, her thumb tracing the line of his knuckles.
“Yeah… it was beautiful. All the things you said.”
She bit her lip, tense.
“I don’t want this either. But we have to find an option without danger.
After resisting for so many years, we can’t just fall into the arms of risk.
We can’t do that to Jane.”
Mike let out a slow breath, trying to gather his thoughts.
“Okay… so we keep thinking.”
Another gull, another scream.
Mike leaned forward, elbows on his knees.
“Okay... Fourth option,” he said slowly. “We build something new. Not America. Not Iceland. Somewhere neutral. Somewhere without ghosts. Maybe Canada.”
El nodded at that, at least.
"Maybe."
“Fifth option,” she added, surprising him.
“I try. Not America forever. Just… visiting. Short. Controlled. With escape routes.”
Mike looked at her like she’d just invented oxygen.
“You’d do that?”
“I said 'I try',” she warned. “Not promise.”
He reached for her hand.
“Try is huge.”
El squeezed back.
“We don’t need to decide today.”
“Good,” Mike said. “Because I had a sixth option involving buying a boat and disappearing like polite pirates.”
She laughed despite herself.
“Terrible option.”
“Excellent option.”
The harbor bell rang in the distance.
El rested her head briefly against his shoulder.
“We’ll figure it out,” she said, not entirely sure but wanting to believe it.
Mike kissed the top of her hair.
“Yeah,” he said. “We will."