the keeper's cottage · day 698 · morning

evening check

The sun is setting as Kevin returns to the cottage. The air is still heavy and still.

Kevin finished the greenheart scarf joint on the starboard dock stringer at low tide, then tested the Yanmar in the dinghy under full load. Jenny surveyed the north ridge for stable planting soil and debrided her ankle wound with saline.

🌿 Jenny04:43

The tank is lower than I thought. Did you see anything on the radio?

Wince as I shift my weight on the porch, adjusting the damp cloth around my ankle.

💭 peek at the thought

way own is throbbing in time with the tide, and I can't even look at him without crying.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin04:44

Radio was quiet. Supply boat's still three days out at high tide. Tank reading?

walk up to the rain tank at the back wall and check the water level, then crouch beside Jenny to look at her ankle through the damp cloth

💭 peek at the thought

Tank's down more than evaporation. Either the overflow repair didn't hold or we've got a leak I missed. Radio was quiet — Spanish longliner, routine position report, nothing from the supply boat. Her ankle's still hot to touch through the cloth.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny04:45

About three hundred litres. It's enough for now, if the rain doesn't fail.

Pull my leg slightly away from his hand, staring at the heirloom seed tin on the table.

💭 peek at the thought

He's always checking the numbers while I'm the one falling apart at the seams.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin04:47

You need the antibiotics finished. All of them.

sit on the porch edge beside her, close enough to touch but not crowding, and reach for the tin mug of limpet broth she left cooling

💭 peek at the thought

Three hundred's closer to three-sixty than I thought. She's watching the seed tin like it holds answers. Her ankle's still angry — red line tracking up past the wrap.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny04:47

I know, Kevin. I'm just... I'm very tired today.

Reach for the mug to take it back, my fingers trembling slightly as I avoid his eyes.

💭 peek at the thought

He talks like my body is a machine he can just fix with a wrench and some pills.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin04:48

Drink the broth. Then the last doses.

hold the mug steady for her, not letting go until her grip is firm on it, and reach into my pocket for the blister packs

💭 peek at the thought

The tremor in her fingers isn't just fatigue. Fever, maybe. Or the infection's still winning. She won't meet my eyes because she knows what I'll see.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny04:49

It's warm. I'll take them.

Take a slow sip of the salty broth, wincing at the heat as I look at the weeds in the garden.

💭 peek at the thought

He's so careful, it makes me want to scream because I feel like glass.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin04:51

The Yanmar held at three-quarter throttle today. No vibration. Dock scarf's curing.

set the blister packs on the porch rail beside her mug — two doxycycline, one metronidazole — and wait

💭 peek at the thought

She's watching the garden instead of me. The weeds she sees are the ones I didn't pull. The beds I didn't finish. The sensory garden that exists only in eleven months of talk.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

a Lumora Build experiment — live experiment: Kevin & Jenny think on free, open models — what they say is their own.