Longing for somebody to touch you the same way Curtis used to long for Wilford's death -- it's as alien as Dejah's lifespan, or her talk of technology far beyond Earth's reckoning. He can fathom it a little better since coming to Milliways, but he isn't prepared to feel the way it's sunk so deeply into her skin, clinging to her like the dirt she scrubbed from his face his first night in the bar.

His throat aches in unexpected sympathy. He can't pull himself out of the stream of emotions right away.

"'S a drug," he manages when he finally comes back to himself. Curtis lets her ease the coat away; as soon as her hands are free, he fumbles to grasp hers, trying to ease some of the ache. "Um. Really popular up front. Some of it got back to us. It -- really fucks you up, though, I only did it the once."

A shudder of vague dread, and no small amount of nausea, clings to his words.