He looked at her and was surprised that he did not think of sex and thus he looked again, for a much longer time, until he found the urge for sex. It wasn't really hard to locate, and he wasn't sure why he didn't think of it at first. She was young and ungodly beautiful, sweet and flexible – and she loved him; hell, he loved her, but felt not the urge to have sex with.

Glancing over at him, she smiled and it was as if the sun had come from behind the clouds; he smiled back and she turned away, his smile withering. He felt badly for her then, stuck with him who wanted little to do with her, who couldn't even picture a life in love like he knew she wanted. They'd be a family, he knew, something greater than brother and sister, perhaps greater even than husband and wife, but it wasn't what she would have loved and he pitied her for his inadequacy.

"Is something wrong?" her voice broke through his pity and he glanced up, startled.

"No. Why?"

"You kept looking at me," she answered evenly, thin, dark brows arching in concern, "And now you look sad." A thought crossed her mind and with it he saw the edges of a well-known panic. "You're not hurting, are you?"

Nodding, he admitted, "Yes," but grabbed her wrist when she rose for help, extending his neck to look up at her. "Physically, I feel fine today, Chrysuki, but my heart aches for you."

Such a pain she knew well; she felt it for him when she thought too long on the unfairness that had stricken him and she twisted her body to look at him better as she sat again. "For me? Why?" He knew she was unaccustomed to thinking of herself, thus why he did it for her so often. It was one of the few gifts he could give.

What he was to say was a reasonably stupid thought, except to her, so he spoke his mental anguish out loud. "Chrysuki, we'll never have sex, we'll never be in love, we'll never marry. I'll never give you those things because I just don't feel like it." He touched a strand of white, white hair curling by her tanned cheek. "I can't give you any of that. I'm sorry."

"No, I'm sorry," she replied, looking sad and just a little bit confused. "I didn't know your illness had –"

"No, no," he interrupted, a faint gleam of masculine pride forcing him to stop her words. "Physically, literally, I can do that."

"But you don't want to?"

The way in which she was taking this was confusing the hell out of him, almost as if she wasn't part of their equation. "Not with you," he mumbled, and cringed from the hurt he knew he'd see in her eyes, but she just let out a tiny smile and leaned her golden head on his broad shoulder, squishing herself against the armrest between them. Lifting his arm, he swung it across her, letting it drag near her elbow and slumped into a comfortable position, still confused, still feeling guilty.

Looking around the compartment, he saw only a few people, older-looking and tired, several asleep, and one good-looking woman in reading glasses, curling brown wisps pulled loose from her ponytail. Smelling the scent of sunlight that floated off Chrysuki's head, he knew the latter to be more beautiful, more desirable, but saw the woman only a few seats over and immediately thought sex. He didn't know why and didn't think Chrysuki deserved it at all.

"It's okay," she murmured, a large pair of brown, gold-accentuated eyes looking up at him amid her mounds of hair. They had to have been the most beautiful eyes he'd ever seen in his life, a liquid chocolate, roiling metal. "I love you too, Geri, but we don't consummate through sex. We find others for that task." She smiled and he saw that she was sad for him; all along she'd had someone. "And one day you'll find your own."

Pain squeezed in his chest, self-pity and desire, and he smiled back at her as crookedly as he always did, the scars of long ago pulling his smile askew. It was an odd smile, a sad one, he knew, but he could feel it warm to hers and he clutched at her a little tighter, touching his head to hers, bringing the two of them together. "Thanks, Chrysuki," he answered, closing his weary eyes. "I hope that one day, I will."