Light travels at 700 miles a second, 300,000 kilometers a second. It takes longer to get to us though, I think. Defies the laws of science. Simon wouldn't believe. All facts and logic. Slower though, I think, still. It filters though our shadow. We're cold. Engines hot like lava and burning, but still cold. Distance. Space between things that are close together. Negative space, like negative numbers. Existing without really being there. Theoretical. I am a walking theory. I hypothesize that Rivers cannot be divided equally without the halves turning against one another. Cold blades and blue fingers left me blue. Blue Moon. Old song. Older than me. Older than Serenity.

He misses the sun. I see him, wilting like a flower in the black. Houseplants die when they're not kept, and the cat bats at them like living toys. Kittens all around him, even when he doesn't know. He smiles at me, a needle in his hand, dripping venom like snake's fangs. Make me better. Make me right. Sew together River scraps and make it whole. Needle and poison-thread. Won't work. But I like that he tries. I like that someone remembers the whole. Remembers River.

I remember moments. Sunlight. Dancing. Arms. Books. Remember things and places and how many steps it was to reach the back room where they kept the things that broke too easily to be out where the children go. Don't remember how I felt though, what it meant to be a girl. Wish I did. Maybe if I knew what to work for, the venom and sewing and brother-doctor would work.

He gravitates toward the sun in our cold. She is warm and shining. The root of us, square and shiny and bubbling like champagne. She keeps him from wilting. Keeps him from the black. Keeps us all from ricocheting out into the nothing, held in by metal and air instead of ties and bonds and love-words. Tie that binds, Kaylee is. D