𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐆

𝟵. 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗸

"Keep your eyes open, sweetheart."

Jake's guttural drawl fills your ears, his breath rolling over your skin and making you struggle to keep your composure. His firmly protective arms encased yours and his solid chest brushed against your back, making it impossible to focus on little else.

The wooden bow in your hands was heavy and you would have lowered it almost immediately after it was thrust into your hands if Jake wasn't supporting most of it's weight. Adhering to his command, you opened the eye that had previously been screwed shut and struggled to aim the nocked arrowhead near the base of the closest tree. If it weren't for Jake's constant assurance that you were doing 'just fine', you would be completely humiliated by your childlike lack of knowledge.

Spearthrowing, trap-making, diving, weaving. You could pick up any skill under the sun and master it in a number of hours. The one exception was archery.

"Ease up," he whispered. "You're choking the bow. You wanna be more like—" Jake wove his fingers around yours, coaxing you to loosen your grip while his opposite hand came up behind you and slid down your forearm until his long, slender fingers curled over the taut string that you were pulling back at an awkward angle. "—this."

When he finally coaxed you into the position he wanted, he let out a triumphant exhale. "There we go. Send it."

You hesitated, not wanting his closeness to be ripped from you so soon. But the ache in your fingers was beginning to strengthen and it wouldn't be long before you lost all feeling in your arms. To your pleasant surprise, releasing the arrow wasn't enough to persuade Jake to move an inch—the soft black tresses of his tail still brushing against your outer thigh. With his chin ducked low beside your ear, you could feel the smile growing over his face long before you even saw it. "Look at that, sweetheart."

You tilted your chin back and there it was—that boyish, arrogant smile that carved dark violet dimples into the crests of his cheeks. You would have forgotten about the weapon in your hand entirely until he curled an eyebrow toward the tree at the end of the small trail that he dragged you down.

There it was, your feathered arrow sticking straight out of the splintered target he carved for himself while you foraged boredly through the short bushes. It hadn't made it into the small, whittled circle in the center of the bark, but it was relatively close. You puckered your lips, trying to call upon the English phrase you heard him shout not even a few minutes prior. "Bools'aye?"

Jake chuckled and lowered the bow for you, taking it from your hands and relieving you of the weight. "Bullseye, yeah." His head stooped as a solid laugh crashed over him. "That's great."

He smiled—the kind that met his eyes and made your skin tingle as if every inch of your body was dripping in seafoam. You were once again ensnared by his closeness, using his blissful expression as an incentive to chart the map of glowing constellations scattered across his face in intricate patterns. Subtle creases formed in the corners of his eyes from decades of avid laughter and shallow grooves made themselves known in the space between his brows, which only became more prominent when he frowned—an expression he wore almost exclusively over the course of the last day.

You remember catching it distinctly as you helped Norm return his things to the gunship at the end of his short visit. It didn't bother you in the slightest that your father had assigned Ao'nung to the task or that your brother simply failed to show up. Norm's stories filled your day with high sprits, making the time pass excruciatingly fast.

From what you could coax him into telling you of his past, you were able to paint the vaguest portrait of the planet that he hailed from and the strange life that he left behind for Pandora.