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“Wait, you’re saying… you’re saying Earth isn’t round?” Lincoln asked incredulously, glancing sideways at Emmet, who was pushing his hair out of his eyes as he excitedly explained.
“Not perfectly round. I mean, it’s round, but it does the same thing as Saturn… just not as extreme.”
“Wow,” Lincoln breathed, genuinely fascinated. Emmet’s hair had fallen back in his face. The dark strands were catching the moonlight.
“Let me look through again; I’m gonna show you something else.”
Lincoln certainly didn’t mind — he wasn’t even looking through the telescope anymore, too distracted by the moonlight dancing across Emmet’s features. He leaned back to slide over and the sand shifted in an unexpected direction beneath him, throwing him off balance. His hands flew out to catch himself, one landing on Emmet’s lower back.
Lincoln could feel the curve of Emmet’s hip beneath his thin sweater and suddenly his heart was in his throat. He stammered, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—“
Emmet didn’t move away. He didn’t move at all. “No, it’s nice - I mean, it’s okay. I mean… you’re okay.”
Lincoln barely processed what he’d said, finally remembering to move his hand, rushing to explain himself. “I just needed to steady myself. I didn’t mean to like, put my hand on your back or anything. I’m s- sorry.”
Wait, did he say it was nice?
“No, it’s okay,” Emmet said, shrugging one shoulder. “I grabbed your hand the other night.”
“Yeah. Right,” Lincoln said, confused. Did Emmet say it was nice?!
“It isn’t any different,” Emmet said, starting to move closer to the telescope.
Oh. So maybe it didn’t mean anything? But then why did Lincoln’s fingertips feel like they were buzzing? “Yeah, totally,” Lincoln said, sliding over to make space at the scope. “Sorry.” He laughed nervously. Shit, could Emmet tell he was nervous? That would probably seem weird to Emmet, right? He’d be wondering why Lincoln was nervous and think that was pretty weird, right? “Weird,” he added without meaning to. He begged himself to stop talking. He hesitantly looked over at Emmet, who was smirking and quite close to him. His heart skipped a beat.
“I’m going to look through the eye-piece now,” he said, a glint in his eye.
“Yeah, uh, sure,” Lincoln said, grateful to have something else they could both focus on. “So, uh, what are you looking for?”
Emmet was already engrossed in the telescope, his nose adorably scrunched up in concentration while his fingers nimbly adjusted the settings.
He truly didn’t seem to mind. He even said it was nice. Somehow, Lincoln didn’t feel comforted by that. He was certainly glad he hadn't made Emmet uncomfortable — and he was pretty sure at this point that he could trust Emmet to tell him if he had — but this possibility that Emmet didn’t mind Lincoln’s hand on his back and in fact thought it was nice was… well, more complicated. It made it a lot harder to ignore the persistent and slightly overwhelming fact that Lincoln thought it was nice too.
“There it is, okay,” Emmet said, pleased. “Look through now. Do you see that bright object right near Saturn?”
Listening to Emmet and talking about the moons of Saturn with him calmed Lincoln. He often felt like he could barely comprehend the size of Earth, nevermind the scale of the solar system and the universe beyond. He used to make him nauseous just thinking about how far away Mars was; he began avoiding the thought altogether, avoiding all thoughts of space, really. But with Emmet… it didn’t seem as scary. Instead, Lincoln felt like he was getting a glimpse of a secret world and it was beautiful. There was something magical about the way Emmet so effortlessly illuminated these inscrutable phenomena, making plain how exquisite they were.
When Emmet spoke about his favorite of Saturn’s moons, he absolutely shone. The moonlight had nothing on him. Lincoln found himself hanging on to every word, as well as every hand gesture, every smile, every time Emmet’s eyes widened with excitement or his brow furrowed with focus. Lincoln’s fingertips were still tingling, and while his heart had returned to his chest it was apparently trying to escape through his rib cage instead.
Maybe Emmet didn’t mind the touch because he was comfortable with Lincoln as a friend. Or maybe he felt the tingling too. Lincoln wasn’t sure, but he found he didn’t have time to worry about it anymore as they cast themselves as Saturn’s moons, painting possibilities into the night sky.