Submitted by Sayer on Tue, 02/14/2017 - 23:46
She was radiant, standing at the edge of the surf with her arms outstretched and her head thrown back, as though she was trying to hug the whole sky. This had been his secret place as a child, separated from the rest of the beach and obscured by a mountain of rock. He'd never thought to bring anyone else here until he'd met her - and he was glad she liked it. It wasn't fair that everyone else got to enjoy the freedom she'd fought for, and she'd never even seen the ocean.
His sister had called her "unreasonably hot" when they'd met. She'd just been teasing him of course, since she and Kate got along just fine - but watching her play in the surf brought her words back to mind. She was right, it was "unreasonable". It was almost as if someone had sat down in that lab years ago and deliberately set about creating the prettiest girl he'd ever see.
It was hard sometimes to reconcile this girl, the one who'd kissed him that night, with the one he'd seen in the footage during training. And honestly, he wasn't sure if it mattered.
She was all sparkling gold in the sun. Her hair, her skin, the freckles darkening across her shoulders, the thin, almost invisible, thread of gold running down her back - tracing a pattern he sometimes had difficulty believing wasn't just aesthetic. In another life, it would have connected her to her hardsuit, but here on the beach, it was just something else that sparkled when the light hit it just right.
She tucked her hair behind her ear and grinned at him. He grinned back, caught up in her joy.
Unreasonable.