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I take his hand and lay it on my chest. Say his name, but I shorten it, because I’ve noticed it makes him smile when I do.

His lips twitch. “Again?”

“Po.”

Finally, he grins. “Oscar.”

And look, I hear him just fine. But I feel him even more and I want that grin to stay.

For how long?

That’s an answer I do know, I think. Or at least, I’m beginning to. But now isn’t the time for what little introspection I can control.

My gaze strays beyond Poet.

I shift a little and rise, leaving him on the couch. Briefly. I return with the būgnas that belonged to my grandfather. It produces deep and resonant sounds—sounds Poet might feel when I place his hand on the drum head or the wooden frame.

Reading me, he sits up from where I left him. “Are you going to sing for me?”

“Would you like me to?”

“Yes.”

“All right then. Tell me when I reach you.”

The first beat of the drum is quiet. The second hums through the wood and into Poet’s palm and his eyes grow lighter.

Only then do I sing, and I pitch the old Lithuanian folk song lower than my grandfather, and his father before him, used to sing it. In truth, it is a lament about grief, and not much built for romance—if that is what we are doing here, but as Poet tracks every word that shapes my mouth, I don’t think it matters.

The song ends on a low note and rumbling rhythm on the būgnas. Poet drops his hand to my knee and the smile I was so desperate to hang on to expands to something I’ve never seen in him before. “Thank you.”

I don’t ask him what for. I just nod and set the drum aside, grateful I have the privilege of being able to give him back what he lost in the Joker tonight. “I should be thanking you. The drinkers in the Joker don’t care for Lithuanian war songs.”

“That was a war song?”

“For the most part.”

“What’s it called?”

I tell him.

Once.

Twice.

As many times as he needs to learn the unfamiliar words.

I tell him something else too. “You are very beautiful. I think about you all the time.”

Poet frowns. “What did you say?”

Lucky for me, or maybe for him, my watch beeps, sparing us whatever my confession might’ve brought us.

I check it. Note the downward arrow and reach for the juice Poet brought from the kitchen, and the moment passes. Or at least, becomes something else.

Poet’s gaze flicks to the watch.

I show him. It feels right.