and it's hard to dance with a devil on your back

For a brief moment, Loren slumped forward, eyes distant. ”Loneliness is preferable to letting people in and just losing them again, for one reason or another.” The words were soft and pained. Then he sat up straight again, all signs of distress gone. "No. Not really. You just get used to it being there." He looked down for a moment. "But it hurts just as much." At that Astra gave an unhappy bleat, so he lifted his gaze back at Samuel. "Does it help you to talk to people?" However, the summoner found himself tapping his fingers against the table before he stilled them. "His name was Abasi. He was an Outlander, from a world very different from my own, and from this one. He was an undertaker." Pausing, he searched the redhead's features for some sign of a reaction. "And I never got to tell him I loved him." The admission hurt, and his expression grew sad for just an instant before fading back into impassiveness. ”I never said he was acting.” The Launceleyn shrugged, the motion having little energy behind it. ”But people change. He became much freer and more confident in Caido than he ever was in our old world. So this might be another change for him.” Perhaps unsurprisingly, he wasn't bothered by the thought. Perhaps because grief had similarly changed him, more times than he could count. LOREN Not quite an open book