When I lie down next to him, he blinks, groggy and mildly startled. And yet his first reaction is not to throw me in the sea but to push toward the bulkhead to make room for me.
He’s a way better person than I’ll ever be.
“Hannah?”
“I just . . .” My teeth are chattering. Again. “I can’t get warm.”
He doesn’t hesitate. Or maybe he does, but just a fraction of a second. He opens his arms and pulls me to his chest, and . . . I fit inside them so perfectly, it’s as though there was a spot ready for me all along. A five-year-old spot, familiar and cozy. A delicious, warm nook that smells of soap and sleep, freckles and pale, sweaty skin.
It makes me want to cry again. Or laugh. I cannot remember the last time I felt this fragile and confused.
“Ian?”
“Hm?” His voice is rough, all chest. This is what he sounds like when he wakes up. What he would have sounded like the morning after if I’d agreed to go to dinner with him.
“How long have you been in Svalbard?”
He sighs, a warm chuff on the crown of my hair. I must be catching him off guard, because this time he answers the question. “Six days.”
Six days. That’s one day before I arrived. “Why?”
“Vacation.” He nuzzles my head with his chin.
“Vacation,” I repeat. His thermal is soft under my lips.
“Yeah. I had”—he yawns against my scalp—“lots of time left over.”
“And you decided to spend it in Norway?”
“Why do you sound incredulous? Norway’s a good place. It has fjords and ski resorts and museums.”
Except that’s not where he is. Not at a ski resort, and most definitely not at a museum. “Ian.” It feels so intimate, to say his name so close to him. To press it into his chest as my fingers curve into his shirt. “How did you know?”
“Know what?”
“That my project was going to be such a shitshow. That I . . . That I wasn’t going to be able to finish my project.” I am going to start crying again. Possibly. Likely. “Was it—was it that obvious? Am I just this total, giant, incompetent asshole who decided to do whatever the fuck she wanted despite everyone else telling her that she was going to—”
“No, no, shh.” His arms tighten around me, and I realize that I am, in fact, crying. “You are not an asshole, Hannah. And you are the opposite of incompetent.”
“But you vetoed me because I—”
“Because of the intrinsic danger of a project like yours. For the past few months, I tried to get this project stopped in about ten different ways. Personal meetings, emails, appeals—I tried it all. And even the people who agreed with me that it was too dangerous would not step in to prevent it. So no, you’re not the asshole, Hannah. They are.”
“What?” I shift on my elbow to hold his eyes. The blue is pitch-black in the night. “Why?”
“Because it’s a great project. It’s absolutely brilliant, and it has the potential to revolutionize future space exploration missions. High risk, high reward.” His fingers push a strand behind my ear, then run down my hair. “Too high risk.”
“But Merel said that—”
“Merel is a fucking idiot.”
My eyes widen. Ian’s tone is exasperated and furious and not at all what I’d expect from his usually calm, aloof self. “Well, Dr. Merel has a doctorate from Oxford and I believe is a Mensa member, so—”
“He’s a moron.” I shouldn’t laugh, or burrow even closer to Ian, but I cannot help myself. “He was at AMASE when I was here, too. There were two serious injuries during my second expedition, and both of them happened because he pushed scientists to finish fieldwork when conditions weren’t optimal.”
“Wait, seriously?” He nods curtly. “Why is he still at NASA?”
“Because his negligence was hard to prove, and because AMASE members sign waivers. Like you did.” He takes a deep breath, trying to calm down. “Why were you out there alone?”
“I needed to drop off the equipment. The storm wasn’t forecasted. But then there was an avalanche nearby, I got scared that my mini-rover would get damaged, started running away without looking, and—”
“No—why were you alone, Hannah? You were supposed to have someone else with you. That’s what the proposal said.”
“Oh.” I swallow. “Merel was supposed to come for backup. But he wasn’t feeling well. I offered to wait for him, but he said we’d be losing valuable days of data and that I should just go alone, and I . . .” I squeeze my fingers around the material of Ian’s shirt. “I went. And then, when I called in for help, he told me that the weather was turning, and . . .”
“Fuck,” he mutters. His arms tighten around me, nearly painful. “Fuck.”
I wince. “I know you’re mad at me. And you have every right—”
“I’m not mad at you,” he says, sounding mad at me. “I’m mad at fucking—” I study him, skeptical, as he inhales deeply. Exhales. Inhales again. He seems to cycle through a few emotions that I’m not sure I understand, and ends with: “I’m sorry. I apologize. I usually don’t . . .”
“Get mad?”
He nods. “I’m usually better at . . .”
“Caring less?” I finish for him, and he closes his eyes and nods again.
Okay. This is starting to make sense.
“AMASE didn’t send you,” I say. It’s not a question. Ian won’t admit it to me, but in this bunk, next to him, it’s so obvious what happened. He came to Norway to keep me safe. Every step of the way, all he did was to keep me safe. “How did you know that I was going to need you?”
“I didn’t, Hannah.” His chest rises and falls in a deep sigh. Another man would be gloating by now. Ian . . . I think he just wishes he could have spared me this. “I was just afraid that something might happen to you. And I don’t trust Merel. Not with you.” He says it—you—like I am a remarkable and important thing. The most precious data point; his favorite town; the loveliest, starkest Martian landscape. Even though I pushed him away, over and over, he still came in a rocking boat in the middle of the coldest ocean on planet Earth, just to get me warm.
I try to lift my head and look up at him, but he presses on it gently and keeps stroking my hair. “You really should rest.”
He’s right. We both should. So I push a leg between his, and he lets me. Like his body is a thing of mine. “I am sorry. About what I said to you back in Houston.”
“Shh.”
“And that I’ve put you in danger—”
“Shh, it’s okay.” He kisses my temple. It’s wet from the slide of my tears. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not. You could be working with your team, or asleep in your own bed, but you’re here because of me, and—”
“Hannah, there is nowhere else I’d rather be.”
I laugh, watery. “Not even—not even literally anywhere else?”
I hear him chuckle just before I fall asleep.