breathless at the loss. Henry spits out lake water and sends a splash in his direction, and Alex forces a laugh. “Christ,” Henry says, slapping at a bug that’s landed on him, “what are these infernal creatures?” “Mosquitos,” Alex supplies. “They’re awful,” Henry says loftily. “I’m going to catch an exotic plague.” “Tm... sorry?” “T just mean to say, you know, Philip is the heir and I’m the spare, and if that nervy bastard has a heart attack at thirty-five and I’ve got malaria, whither the spare?” Alex laughs weakly again, but he’s got a distinct feeling of something being pulled out of his hands right before he could grasp it. Henry’s tone has gone light, clipped, superficial. His press voice. “At any rate, I’m knackered,” Henry is saying now. And Alex watches helplessly as he turns and starts hauling himself out of the water and onto the dock, pulling his shorts back up shivering legs. “If it’s all the same to you, I think I'll go to bed.” Alex doesn’t know what to say, so he watches Henry walk the long line of the dock, disappearing into the darkness. A ringing, scooped-out sensation starts behind his molars and rolls down his throat, into his chest, down to the pit of his stomach. Something’s wrong, and he knows it, but he’s too afraid to push back or ask. That, he realizes suddenly, is the danger of allowing love into this—the acknowledgment that if something went wrong, he doesn’t know how he would stand it. For the first time since Henry grabbed him and kissed him with so much certainty in the garden, the thought enters Alex’s mind: What if it was never his decision to make? What if he got so wrapped up in everything Henry is—the words he writes, the earnest, heartsickness of him—he forgot to take into account that it’s just how he is, all the time, with everyone? What if he’s done the thing he swore he would never do, the thing he hates, and fallen in love with a prince because it was a fantasy? When he gets back to their room, Henry’s already in his bunk and silent, his back turned. In the morning, Henry is gone. Alex wakes up to find his bunk empty and made up, the pillow tucked neatly beneath the blanket. He practically throws the door off its hinges running out onto the patio, only to find it empty as well. The yard is empty, the pier is empty. It’s like he was never even there. He finds the note in the kitchen: Alex, Had to go early for a family matter. Left with the PPOs. Didn’t want to wake you. Thank you for everything. xX It’s the last message Henry sends him.