Page 122 of Carousel

“You know what I’m talking about. We’re telling each other we love each other. We rushed to have sex. I’m an officer. You’re a prisoner.” He strains. “This… You⁠—”

“You said it yourself,” I say, talking over him. “I’ll be FI’d soon. Then it won’t matter.”

“Yes,” he agrees. “Then it won’t matter, but I don’t know, your magic connection with the other guy just might⁠—”

“Shut up! I never should have told you about it. I knew you were going to be like this. Riss knew, too⁠—”

“Riss knew? What, I’m the last person to know about my girlfriend’s bond with another man?”

I stare at him. I’m furious at what he’s saying.

But also…

“I’m your girlfriend?”

He looks at me. “I thought you would be. When we don’t have to sneak around anymore.”

“I want to be,” I say.

Eyes forwards again, he says, “I’m not going to argue with you. If you really want to know what I was going to tell you, I’ll just tell you. You already know part of it.” His voice wavers. “When I came up here⁠—”

He winces, like it’s physically hurting him to talk.

“It’s okay,” I say, letting my knee touch his.

“I didn’t know any of the things I know now, like where there are food stashes, or how I could sign up for missions on the ground.” He pauses. “Back then, I thought my only option to eat was, well. To trade.”

“Trade what?”

“Hooch. Or…” he trails off, glancing up briefly at the valve above us.

A memory surfaces in my mind. How giddy he’d been last night. The words Drake had spoken, so smugly.

I think high is the correct term.

And I understand.

“Is osimidite something you can smoke?” I ask, carefully.

“You inhale it. It relaxes you. Makes you happy. Really happy.” He clarifies, “It’s strictly against The Accords for anyone to be using it like that. Only engineers are even allowed in the Osimidite Chamber – the big one on The Emperor, that is.”

I blink at him, seeing where this is going.

My body feels taut. Like it knows that whatever he says next will alter my whole world.

“You didn’t start stealing it.”

He faces me. “I had to. I had to eat.” One hand still on the wheel, he ticks the steps off the fingers of his other. “Hooch to bribe engineers. Osimidite to bribe soldiers. Food, so I could eat – and make more hooch.”

He shudders.

It breaks my heart.

“For a while,” he continues, voice shaky, “I was doing good. Doing great. I was sixteen, remember. I thought I was invincible, and super smart for finding a way to, I guess, break their system – a way I could get me and you and my mother fed. But every time you go in the Chamber, you’re breathing in tiny particles that come off it when cannisters are filled. I couldn’t risk wasting oxygen and being found out, so I didn’t wear a mask, like the engineers. And, over time…”

“You got addicted,” I finish for him.

“Yes.” His hands tighten on the wheel. “And, the worst part is, I knew I was getting addicted. And I didn’t mind. I was seeing awful things up here. I was scared. And worried about the people back home. And miserable. And hungry, all the time. The gas would take all of that away.” He exhales. “But it always wore off. And then I’d just want more.”