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Lyra sat on the bench and evened out the folds on her skirt. She took a look around and watched Pantalaimon get comfortable in his favourite spot under a tree. She smiled as she remembered all the previous times.
She closed her eyes. It had been a few years since she first tried to do that, but she was used to it by now. She made sure she was sitting in the right side of the bench and held her hand out in her left. There, somewhere in the middle of the air, was a tiny, microscopic crack in her universe. It felt as if the air was numb around it. She wiggled her fingers around the tiny crack. Yes, it was still small enough; no specter would pass through.
She concentrated, as if she was trying to read her alethiometer. And then she felt it: a tiny pressure in her hand and a small brush against her consciousness.
Hello, Lyra.
Lyra smiled, biting her lip. She had missed his voice so, so much. She wished she could get her ears to hear it too, but for now, her mind was enough.
Will, my love. Right on time.
Let me see you.
Lyra concentrated on her idea of what she must have looked like, sitting on the bench, dressed in her best skirt and coat, with even her shoes polished and shining. Her knees weren’t hurt like they used to, but her skirt covered them anyway; maybe Will would like having to guess if she was still the child she used to be. Her hair was loose on her shoulders, falling on her chest, as if she wanted to cover the fact that her body was changing; as if Will wouldn’t like what she was becoming, what she couldn’t stop. She created the image and sent it through the tiny electric current in her fingers, and off to the universe on the other side.
Will didn’t answer for a while, and Lyra’s heart beat faster. It had been a year since they’d last talked; she was sixteen now, and much different than Will remembered. What was taking him so long?
A few moments later, Lyra’s mind got a new image. Yes, she could see him as clearly as if it was with her eyes. He was there on the bench, his hair as dark and messy as she remembered, as it always was, matching Kirjava’s fur on his lap. There was a line between his eyebrows as he was trying to concentrate, and there was a shadow on his face. For a moment, Lyra was worried, until she realized that, oh, that was one of the shadows you had to shave off. His jacket was tight on his broad shoulders, and made from the same blue canvas as his trousers, and Lyra didn’t know if that was casual or formal in his world; she liked it, though. She focused on his left hand, as always. The stumps on his fingers were perfectly healed, as they were last year, and the year before that, but she couldn’t help worrying; the constant bleeding and Will’s pale face still haunted her dreams, and she was guessing they were haunting his, too. Nowadays, the only remnant of those times was the fact that he was always sitting on the left side of the bench so that he could feel Lyra with his good hand.
Lyra’s smile widened affectionately. You look good, she said simply, as they got up, their hands entwined through the universes, leaving the tiny crack on the bench and just focusing on each other’s minds. Lyra couldn’t wait to tell Will what she had achieved, how sure she was that their little tiny crack was larger than last time, than maybe in a few years they could actually see each other.
Instead, she remained silent as she walked with Will by her side, so vividly there, as if he was actually next to her. She preferred to feel, really. There wasn’t much to tell. Whatever was in her heart, Will would feel it before she could name it.