"Sorry, I took longer than I said," Janius smiled and put his arms around Kaleeth's waist. "We need...to have a talk," Janius' smile faded as he spoke. A part of him was tempted to just take the night to be happy with Kaleeth, but he needed to get this out of the way now. "Come," Janius took Kaleeth's hand and lead her to the beach.

Janius began talking as they walked, starting as soon as he believed they were talking in private. "I've done a lot of thinking, and I've decided to be honest with you completely. Although I didn't show it as much, these past few months have been rough for me as well as you, Kaleeth. I love you, and I always loved you, but seeing you struggle through the melancholy made me resent myself and...it really wasn't your fault, but I started to resent you as well. But then there were times where things were better, and I came to love you just as much again. It has been very painful, so much so that even the good times made my chest ache because I thought it would just spiral down again."

They reached the edge of the beach and Janius turned to take both of Kaleeth's hands in his. "Once you started to accept who you were, though, everything started getting better. You smiled again, you were lively. Now here we are, at a high point, and I have to be honest with you. This pressure to have a child has made be afraid that our relationship would fall further than ever. I could argue with you angrily, but the truth is, I just don't think I would make a good father. My own father is someone I'm afraid to become, so I just don't think I'm ready yet. I'm young, you're young. We don't have to rush into this. I promise that if you want a child, we could try in a couple of years, but right now, I'm not ready. I understand if you're upset about it."

Janius continued while looking down, wanting all his feelings to be expressed. "In deciding what to do, I thought about ending the pain by separating from you, but I couldn't do that. I would never meet anyone like you again in all my life. I thought about keeping on going, and keeping this all bottled up, but then I would just end up shouting at you, or running away in desperation. That would have been even worse." Janius glanced out to sea, "But, today, out in the water, I felt that I'd fallen further in love with you than ever before." Janius looked into Kaleeth's eyes and felt a burning behind his own, "I decided that even through the times where you or I struggle, I wanted to be with you for the rest of my life." Janius looked down again, guiltily, "I'm sorry to keep this all back for so long, but I didn't know what else to do. Now, everything is here, I just want to know if you can still love me. I understand if you can't."

---

Having misjudged when Rukeewei's shift started, Ariel had been worriedly tapping on the counter for what felt like a while. Sabine was keeping an eye out, though, and spotted Rukeewei starting at them from across the room. Sabine nudged her sister and pointed him out to her.

Ariel turned and looked back at Rukeewei. She didn't quite have the courage to stand up and talk to him yet, but she managed a nervous smile.

Sabine looked between the two of them and displayed a little impatience. Didn't Ariel work out what she wanted to say beforehand? She proceeded to grab Ariel's hand and pull her towards Rukeewei.

"Ah!" Ariel was startled by Sabine's pull. Just like Ahnasha had mentioned, Sabine's strength was deceptive for her size. She staggered off her stool as she followed Sabine, it would be rather embarrassing to fall flat on her face in front of everyone. Before she could take a full breath in, she was face to face with Rukeewei and still out of words. "Hello! I mean- Rukee, it's good to see you, I, well-I-thought-it-might-be-nice-to..." Ariel raised a hand and bowed her head, before taking a deep breath through her nose and looking up at Rukeewei again, "Ah...I'm sorry for calling your inn a smelly cesspit. I didn't mean it, and it was a stupid, immature thing to say, so I am sorry." Ariel glanced diagonally to the floor, then up at Rukeewei's eyes again, "Are you still cross with me?"