In the faint light of a distant streetlamp, Katya looked exhausted. But after a month of seeing his face on Facetime only, Brian was struck—stricken—by how good he looked, how interesting his face was, how sharp and dimensional and handsome. Brian could stand there and look at him for the rest of the night, easily, not even blinking. He was aware of his own mouth hanging softly open again. It was like he was in a state of shock. He felt hypovolemic; he felt starved. How could he have forgotten, how electric this was, the air between them, the pinpoint focus in Katya’s eyes?

Unbidden, his own eyes began to water. Katya dropped the shit he’d been carrying to the dock and grabbed onto Brian’s forearms, his elbows, the curve of his biceps. “Don’t,” he said, “come on, don’t, you said good news, you promised me good news.”

“I just—” Brian wiped at his face. “I just missed you. You bitch.”

Violet at Prada spring’19 show,