Work Text:
Kai's Perspective:
He’d been waiting for her. Surprisingly, that’s all he seems to be doing with Selene lately—and the realisation makes him qualm. The thought couldn’t be given much thought, as he sees Mr Lee approach him, moving across the crowd swiftly, maintaining eye contact with Konn Torin, his own advisor.
A polite nod as he stands before the said guy, and whispers without any facial change in his expression. But if the sinking feeling in Kai’s gut is any indication, he already knows what the message is about. It becomes evident with the way Torin shakes his head slightly, eyes full of understanding.
It looks awfully like pity.
“Good Evening, Journalists. Unfortunately, Her Majesty won’t be joining us today. If you have any questions for the Lunar Queen, they’d be taken care of by the Lunar Ambassador, Mr Karahan. We may now begin,” the Commonwealth’s Head of PR announces, commencing the press conference.
Kai can feel the warm glow on his face as he enters the room, the loud chorus of questions being hurled at him. He only wishes this ends sooner than expected, as he takes the seat meant for him. Selene’s chair is briefly empty before Mr Karahan joins them.
"Greetings. It is a distinct honour to announce that the Lunar-Commonwealth Mining Corridor will be officially operational as of April 1st. Comprehensive details will be circulated to all delegates at the conclusion of this conference. This initiative stands to significantly bolster economic synergy and expand employment opportunities for both parties."
With this said, multiple hands go up in the air, most of them for the Lunar Ambassador and Head of Mineral Resources, which was ideal, for Kai was too shaken by his earlier realisation to work out on diplomacy.
“-My question was for His Majesty,” a woman in a pale green button-down asks, eyes sharp, and in all the years Kai has given to being royalty, he knows she was going to have a personal attack incoming, “-Does Miss Blackburn’s absence hint at her disagreement with the Mining Corridor? or worse, should she feel the matter is too trivial for her presence to be required?”
“Miss-”
“-Delalieu,” the lady provides.
“-It is presumptuous to suggest that Her Majesty, the Lunar Queen, views this conference or the corridor as trivial. She has worked exhaustively to bring this vision to fruition, prioritising the stabilisation of Earth-Lunar relations. Mr Karahan stated that Miss Selene was unable to attend due to ill health. Any further scrutiny into this personal matter is entirely misplaced, Miss Delalieu."
“Your Majesty, on that note, don’t you think Her Majesty’s presence in the Commonwealth’s activities is dwindling, like this ‘unit’ thing you affectionately mentioned in the early years of marriage, isn’t very obvious anymore—” before the reporter could make any more accusations, Kai silences him off, “- I appreciate your concern for my marriage, Sir. I’d take delight in expressing that my wife, Selene and I are in a very blissful marriage, and love each other dearly. We’re both Inter-Planetary leaders with quite busy schedules; the absence of both isn’t intentional. We’re trying our best to lead our nations to a better future, but we’re human at the end of the day, and cannot be present everywhere at once.”
Kai signals a curt nod, giving his cue to end this conference. No sooner do the words for closing leave Torin’s mouth, Kai’s already out of the back door, his frustration at the question evident.
Mr Lee is already waiting at the turn. The sight of Selene’s PA makes Kai lose whatever control he’s trying to keep hold of.
“Why wasn’t she there?” Kai asks, his voice on a higher note than usual.
“Your Majesty, Miss Selene had taken ill-”
“Please elaborate on this sudden ‘illness’ Her Majesty caught, that wasn’t reported to my staff or me on her arrival, 30 minutes before the conference?” He asks, all sense of calm lost, as the way Lee fidgets makes a lie incoming evident; hesitant, for he’s not sure how much of a cover-up he’s allowed to make.
“Please leave us alone, Lee,” Selene says, and her PA is quick on his heels. Kai doesn’t turn, but he feels her approaching, as her heels click against the black marble.
“Kai,” Selene whispers when she’s standing before him, and it takes everything in him not to wrap his arms around her, “I’m sorry, I had corn soup on the way here, and ended up throwing up as soon as I reached here. I was adamant about joining the conference, but my state didn’t allow it.”
Given that explanation, Kai meets her eyes, his anger pushed back, replaced by care for his wife. She was wearing his sky-blue hoodie, faded from long years of wear, her hair tied in a messy bun, as if she hadn't combed through it in weeks. I
“Are you feeling better now?” He asks, concern evident, finger pushing the short strands of hair covering her face, and feels how she leans into the touch.
“Somewhat, I’d love to crash out though,” and that was enough cue for Kai to pull her in a sideways hug, “-c’mon then, do you want to have a protein bar before that?”
“I don’t think I’d be able to handle it, but I’d like some cold milk with kesar. Did you eat dinner?”
“I had crackers before the conference, so I’d eat something light.”
Selene hums in approval. It had been 47 days since he’d last seen her, the longest in years. Kai recalls how his last visit to Lunar had ended on a sour note, something about not seeing each other enough. They’d thrown words they didn’t mean to, said things out of anger and circumstance. In the heat of the moment, Kai had left 2 days earlier than he’d intended. Nobody had apologised; they’d just overlooked the fight and gone about it.
That’s one of the reasons why Kai was so riled up about the question earlier. It had hit a sore nerve; both of them were avoiding it. Something inevitable.
“I heard the question,” Selene says, as the elevator door closes.
“- It was nothing,” Kai answers, hand on her back, as he unintentionally draws circles, “- I don’t think it was nothing,” she repeats.
“Please, Sele, we have fought on this before,” Kai sighed, hands withdrawn now, as the earlier feeling of resentment resurfaces. He doesn’t want to talk about this, as it leads to more fights, and overlooking it isn’t working in their favour anymore.
“I don’t want to either, but people are talking, you know this would be all over the media by tomorrow afternoon,” she points out, which is worse, for it’s the truth. They have a great list of sad edits from fangirl that don’t make sense. How could strangers know what utmost failure his marriage has become?
“We just met, I don’t want to talk about it,” He tells, voice leaving no room for argument, and for once, Selene agrees, and he’s grateful, but now there’s silence, which is daunting. Somewhere in between, a man enters the elevator, and Kai doesn’t know him, but he can trace the anxious energy he is holding inside him, hesitant to enter before Selene gives him the final nod. Kai isn’t fine, but he’s not not fine either. This way, their silence can be blamed on the stranger’s presence, and not on how they don’t know what to say to each other.
“I was thinking of getting something from the kitchen,” he mentions, looking at Selene, question evident, without being framed in that order.
She nods, “Could you bring me some pudding as well?”
There it is, the missing touch. Kai had hoped she’d accompany him, but instead she’d lost the hint. Tight-lipped smile, as he gazes down, feet shuffling.
“Sure.”
And he’s walked out, no glance back, as he exhales loudly. Walks inside his chamber, only to find Torin already waiting there.
“- I didn’t expect you here,” he remarks.
“To be fair, neither did I,” Kai states, peeling out of the blazer, as he throws himself on the leather sofa.
“You should talk to her—”
“I don’t know what to talk about, it’s like all the words vanish when I’m alone with her. I have never felt so much of a fool before,” he grunts, fingers tugging at his hair, as if removing the polished layer of the Emperor, one by one. The tie had already come off, one of Selene’s gifts from their courtship days, he recalls.
“Then you should tell Miss Selene that,” Torin points out, and his ever-welcome wisdom is stupid. He doesn’t have a partner, whom he doesn’t see for weeks. If Kai knows anything, it’s that Saho shares 10 pictures of his activity while Torin’s away at work.
“I don’t know how to,” Kai rants, eyes searching for something, ultimately in vain; there’s no miracle Torin can provide him. Communication isn’t one. “— it’s like walking around eggshells, and I’m tired, and I know she is too, but it’s honestly, I don’t know, Torin. I don’t know how to save my marriage, and I’m trying my best to do it.”
“You don’t have to overthink about the questions, Kai. You need to tell her that you love her and how you’re tired of downplaying it. She’d walk half the distance from there,” Torin says, patting his back, as he leaves. The door shut in his wake. He doesn’t like this suffocation, and this hiding from his wife.
Doesn’t know how to end this at all, how to make all these things fall back into place. He has a holograph of them on his desk. Her 19th birthday, from before they were dating. He’s giving her a pigtail ride after her leg had sprained, and someone at the competition had clicked them together. That photo was trending for months, ultimately forcing them to confess that they liked each other romantically.
He smiles. Wiping off the non-existent dust with his palm, he decides to act upon Torin’s advice. He’s gonna tell her that he hates whatever this is, and hug her until their bones hurt, and they have talked everything in the world, and then he would kiss her forehead, and ramble how much he’s missed her, and tell her how much she means to him.
Kai has a plan. He makes his way to the kitchen, packs some dinner for himself and 2 puddings, as she’d requested. He ends up getting a bowl of khichdi too, in case she’s hungry again.
“Sorry, I had to stop by the office,” Kai says, pushing the door open, “- don’t tell me you’re—” He stops, she’s asleep.
Head tilted at an angle that would give her a sprain, as she is unaware of the world, her body crouched to fit into the small space of the sofa.
He had a plan.
He stares, stuck in the moment. It didn’t matter what he had to say; she was tired. All Kai can think about is whether she was waiting for him, staring at the door, hoping he’d be there with pudding, like she’d wanted.
Scoffing at himself, he keeps the food he’d brought aside and walks towards her. Her sketchbook, hidden between her legs and torso, falls as Kai lifts her.
“Shush, it’s ok,” he whispers, lulling her back to sleep, as he drops her on the bed. His fingers moved the hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear.
“Good night, Sele”, he whispers, covering her body with the duvet. A soft smile enriches his face as he kisses her forehead.
As he unpacks the dinner, he notices the fallen sketchbook, and knowing how she hates the way the graphite spills on the page when unkept, he picks it up, eyes scanning her work, only to find a half-done drawing of his at the recent press conference, and it’s in the way his eyes look lost, that he knows, she watched him.
Kai doesn’t know what to think anymore, but the ache in his heart is too loud for him to overlook anymore. He glances at Selene, takes in her calm face, the way her chest rises and falls, and feels the weight of everything he’s been trying to hold.
A tear ends up on the paper, smudging the layers of graphite she’s crushed against the white, “Fuck Kai,” he mutters under his breath, desperately trying not to have a breakdown.
Wiping the snot by the back of his hand, covers the book, dinner all forgotten, as he promises himself to get them through this.
fin