It is easy. All this. Their little alliance against all those other fuckers out there. He knows.

Stede had asked him tonight why he couldn’t just relax. Tightly wound of his own doing, Izzy had barked back some bullshit about always being ready. Always being hard to push out the weakness.

But that isn’t at all why he was upset. The weakness is already in. A slow drip of water against stone wearing a path clear through no matter how much that stone may try.

Lonely fuckers the pair of them. Isn’t that depressing.

Izzy pushes completely off the wall now and crosses the little cabin to lower himself onto the couch beside the other. He can’t even be bothered to fix his hair, wild from how he’d similarly thrown himself down on his bed the way Lucius has now.

Can’t look over. He keeps his face forward. He’s drunk, yeah, but he knows if he looks he’ll lose his nerve.

“I miss you, too.”