note: just for the fun of it! also because history notes are being boring this afternoon. I may have to write more because i actually really enjoyed doing this. please tell me if you like it! or if you don't... =D ~x~

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From the darkness of her bunk Zoë heard the clunk of Mal’s hatch. It was morning. Her heart sank. She determinedly closed her eyes, her body entwined with Wash’s her head resting on his chest.

“I don’t want to wake up.” Her voice was quiet, but it resonated around the darkness of their bunk. “I want to stay like this forever. Why should I go on? Why should I go on without you?”

Wash’s worn fingers played with her curls. “I guess this is where I persuade you against the whole suicide thing. Oh what the hell. Do it. I miss you too.”

“Husband.”

“What? I do!”

Zoë sighed. It was beating. Her ear pressed against his body and she could feel his heart beating.

“Though,” Wash added, “I wouldn’t want to be the one to tell Kaylee… and Mal would seriously kick my ass when he got here.”

“I don’t want to sleep alone.”

“Well…” Wash tried to sound reassuring. “There’s always Jayne’s bunk.”

Zoë glanced up to meet his eyes. “Husband, if you weren’t already dead I’d kill you right now.”

Wash grinned and kissed her. “You won’t sleep alone ever. I’ll always be here, even when you don’t know it.”

They smiled at each other for a moment.

“Actually that sounded a bit creepifying.”

“Uhu,” Zoë agreed.

The comm. buzzed. “Zoë? You getting the hell up any time soon?”

“Go to hell, Captain,” Wash yelled back. “Zoë’ll be up when she gorram wants to be. Dong ma?” Mal couldn't hear him. He grinned at Zoë who had peeled herself away. “I love being dead.”

“Clearly it has its perks.”

Wash leaned back in the bed, lazily watching Zoë dress. “Well the invisibility thing has its uses. I get to see you when you don’t realise. Like the other day when you were bathing…”

“Honey, you could watch me bath when you were alive.”

“Yeah, but it’s more exciting when you don’t know I’m there…” Wash objected.

“Not for me.”

A silence stretched between them, a silence spanning the worlds of the living and of the dead.

“I’m sorry.”

Zoë perched on the bed, her fingers brushing over his body. “For what?”

“I’m sorry for dying. I’m sorry I made you love me and then left you. I’m sorry I don’t get to live with you until you're old and wrinkly. I’m sorry I don't get to hold our child.”

A pause.

“Our… child?”

“Our – oh, gos-se.”

“Husband, you mean to tell me-?”

“Sorry, Sweetie, got to go. Got Budda on the other line…”

“Don’t you dare-” He had already gone. “Wash!”

Mal had opened the hatch to chastise, but hearing Zoë’s exclamation, his heart fell. “Zo? You alright?”

“Yes, Sir. I’m coming.”

“If you need time, that’s alright. Jayne’s virtually got it covered.”

Zoë came to the foot of the ladder and Mal was half surprised to see no signs of tears.

“I’m ready, Sir.” Why did he have that dreadful sympathetic look in his eyes?