#10 Safety

Figures. We never did seem to get the timing right. That's something we really need to work on. So now I am here and You are off-world and they tell me that they won't be able to contact You before tomorrow and if I hadn't reached the peak of frustration quite some time ago already, this, here, would do the trick. I won't be here tomorrow and, come to think of it, maybe it is better that You aren't here to see me walk back through that gate again. (If I were You I wouldn't trust me out of Your sight again, either, but this time I will be back – I just have a debt to settle with those that helped me back home. So don't bite Carter's head off when You find out.)

I have been to so many planets in the past months that they are all a blur in my mind, have travelled in airships and submarines and I am not even sure how long I have been away because days, it turns out, are not really an objective way to measure time, but I know that it has been way too long. I have been dependent on the kindness of so many people, I have walked for days and had narrow escapes in the dead of the night, I have bargained and I have fought and I have told my story on countless home worlds in countless variations and our story, once or twice, to those most deserving of it. And, judging by their reactions, John, I think we are the stuff legends are made of. I think that the song, at that dawn, really was about us.

I found Your letters last night, in the breast pocket of my uniform jacket in one of those crates in my room, neatly tied up with a ribbon, and in all these desperate months it was the first time that I cried myself to sleep. There are so many things that I have realized now, running from place to place, trying to hang on to who I am and where I belong to. And most of these realizations have to do with You and I can't wait to share them with You, but I have waited too long, been through too much to waste on a letter what I could tell You myself. What are a few more days if I will then be able not only to see You, but also touch You, taste You…

Still, there are some things that I want to say now, and in the future, things that should be said often and that will not lose any value in repetition.

I am proud of You. Despite everything You have been the man I always knew You were, the man to whom I would trust everything dear to me in this life in a heartbeat. Nobody has ever made me feel so safe, so secure.

I want You. Your body and soul. Your strong hands and Your soft eyes and the defiant line of Your chin. Your heartbeats and Your dreams and Your love. I want You now, so much that it hurts, and I'll want Your tomorrow and in 40 years when we are both old and wrinkled. I want Your kisses and Your children, Your days and nights.

I love You. And I hope that one day I will find a way to show You just how much.

Now, John. Our time is now. And now.

And now.

Elizabeth