As I finally crossed the threshold onto the front porch, the stars emerged from their daytime slumber, casting a celestial glow upon the world. A crisp autumn breeze tenderly brushed against my cheeks, and I absentmindedly fiddled with the hem of the sweatshirt clasped in my hands. Its comforting warmth enveloped me as I slipped it over my head, each movement a gentle caress against my body. I treasured every thread, refusing to take even a single breath for granted, as his lingering scent permeated the fabric.
Amidst the symphony of chirping crickets, I ventured onto the stone path, leading to the sidewalk. Concealed among the vibrant flowers lining the yard, I felt sheltered from any lurking dangers. An indescribable eagerness to run consumed me and I wanted nothing more than to break free of the cast that held me captive in stagnant time. Time, akin to treacherous quicksand, threatened to engulf me, but I was determined to escape its grasp and outpace the hands of the clock, ensuring every precious minute was accounted for.
The night enveloped me with its dewy embrace as I trudged along the dimly lit road, bathed in the glow of streetlights. Although I had walked this path countless times, it was only in my search for light that I became acutely aware of the darkness. The silhouette of familiar trees loomed ahead, their intertwining branches seemingly reaching out to me, beckoning me closer to the park.
The gentle drizzle we received earlier had left behind a trail of abandoned puddles, serving as a poignant reminder that even the sky wept. The wet mud squelched beneath my tennis shoes and the tips of my crutches as I approached the clearing, my movements hindered by the dampness of the ground.
Resting upon the picnic table was a burgundy backpack, and my eyes eagerly scanned the surroundings in search of him. Disappointment settled in my shoulders when the only company I found was the incessant buzzing of gnats around the solitary light post in the middle of the park. The emptiness of the place felt haunting and unsettling in the absence of company.
"James?" I called out softly, mindful not to disturb the slumber of the neighbors who had long retired for the night.
I struggled to rotate and survey my surroundings. With a sigh, I placed my crutches on top of the picnic table, propping myself up to gain a vantage point that allowed me to swivel my head without the fear of losing my balance. As I settled down, the symphony of chirping crickets grew louder in the silence, but my thoughts competed with the cacophony, drowning out any solace I sought from their presence. There was no sign of James.
Suddenly, a rustling sound emanated from above my head. I expected it to be squirrels playfully frolicking among the maple trees, but when I raised my gaze, my eyes met a pair that bore no resemblance to those of any creature.
“What are you doing up there?”
His bright white teeth stretched as he pulled his lips back into a sly smile. His arms and legs were looped around a branch as he hung like a sloth, his nails like claws gripping into the bark.
He squinted his eyes at me and his chest heaved with exhaustion.
“Hanging around?” I puffed out a laugh and he twisted his body to the side of the branch before using his right arm to pull his weight to the topside. “It’s a better view up here,” he announced, his hand cupping over his eyes as he peered at the sky.
“I don’t see how a better view from up there is going to be much of a benefit for me if I can’t climb.” I gestured to my leg and he jokingly contorted his face into a pout.
“Need a boost?”
His grin stretched once more and I could have sworn I felt my body preparing to melt into the ground to join the mud that caked my shoe. A phantom wind rippled through my sweatshirt and the scent met my nose again. The sumptuous fabric coated my arms in its comfort and I momentarily wondered if this was a fraction of what it felt like to be touched by him.
I drew forward slightly and rolled my eyes. “Shut up and get down here.”
His eyes lit up and he scoffed. “So demanding.”
I watched carefully as he swung a leg over, his muscles protruding under the fabric of his own jean jacket. My jaw clenched, hoping he would not rip the jacket or his jeans on the bark. He was well dressed for the occasion. Not appareled in a suit and tie, but still contrasting to my billowing sweatpants and his casual sweatshirt.
His arms were hooked over the lower-hanging branch and he held himself like a gymnast, and I closed my eyes when he let go. His feet collided with the ground, but he did not falter as he simply bent his knees and then stood up straight, unfazed by the impact.
His smile returned to his face when his eyes locked back onto me and he straightened his jacket that had bunched up over his belt line.
“A clever invite, I must say,” I commented, my heading bobbing with each word as I mentally admired his forwardness. “Thank you for the flowers.”
He scratched his chin before reaching for his backpack on the picnic table. “What flowers?”
His expression was serious, and he had almost fooled me until he tried to hide his devious grin beyond the darkness that enshrouded his features as he turned away from me.
The corners of my lips turned upwards. “Funny.” Although it was meant sarcastically, the gesture as he hid truly was comical.
James peeked over the collar of his jacket. “It was no bother.”
I slumped my shoulders and watched him unzip his backpack with his long fingers. I sighed. “No one has ever bought me flowers before.”
He lifted a brow and cocked his head. “Never? Not even an ex-boyfriend?”
I shook my head. “Nope, I’ve never even had a boyfriend.” I corrected myself. “Well, I ‘dated’,” I motioned my hands to form air quotes, “a boy in freshman year, but it wasn’t true dating. Never even kissed him. If you count my dad dropping me off at a movie theater when I lied to say I was meeting up with my best friend, then saw a movie with him, I guess you could call that dating. We weren’t official. It was petty. He tried to kiss me, but I turned my head away because I was too scared that I would be horrible at it and he would spread it around school like wildfire. It was very awkward.”
He huffed a laugh and propped a knee onto the picnic bench. “No one knows what they’re doing for the first time. It’s awkward for everyone involved.”
“Even for you?”
He chuckled again and dropped his bag onto the picnic table. His eyes gleamed a beautiful ocean blue. “Have you ever seen the movie, My Girl?”
I was shocked to know that he had seen that movie. “Yeah, why?” I drawled.
He lifted his hands with his palms facing me. “Okay. Picture the scene where Vada kisses Thomas for the first time, but I was thirteen years old and it lasted longer. She was older than me. Fifteen, to be exact. She convinced me that it is a necessity to know how to kiss before high school. She was instructing me how to kiss, but she was a horrible resource of information because I had no idea where to put my hands, or what to do with my lips or my tongue. I just sat there and kept still as a board as she did all of the work. Very humiliating.”
I laughed. It was not a judgmental laugh, but a laugh that one can share with another when they can make fun of a situation without feeling judged. A laugh that expresses our embarrassment, joint and similar, as a single entity.
His laugh matched mine and he blushed. Coloring bloomed on his cheeks and he was not vulnerable, for once. There was an affable trait inhabiting this body that stood before me. A confident, yet genuine spirit about him.
“Are you making fun of me?” he asked as he pressed an elbow onto the wood of the table, his head propped into his palm.
I held my hand up with my index finger and thumb pointed outward from my knuckles, parted slightly. I squinted my eyes and scrunched my nose. “Just a little bit.”
In an instant, his hand snatched a cotton object from his opened backpack at his side and he thrust a blanket at me, the material lightly smacking me in the face. It didn’t hurt one bit and I heaved it back at him.
James chuckled and caught it before it could make contact with his head. My stomach hurt from laughing as I leaned over and tried to compose myself.
“Why do you have a blanket?” I gasped in between breaths.
His hands found the corners of the black cotton blanket and he stretched his arms out. “Well, I’m not trying to get your clothes all muddy, of course.”
He backed away from the table and walked around it with the blanket raised high above the ground. The blanket flapped as he whisked it into the air before laying it down at his feet on the grass of the clearing. He returned to the table and shoved his hands into his backpack before revealing another navy blue blanket from the bag. His hands mimicked the same actions as he tossed the blanket onto the other one for more cushioning and protection from the damp, muddy floor.
I grinned and he beckoned me over to him. “Unless you would rather get a better view from up in the tree,” he shrugged. I rolled my eyes and my mouth stretched wider across my face.
The light post hummed the closer I approached him and he remained standing as I gently laid one crutch onto the grass next to the blanket. I balanced on one foot and contemplated the easiest way to lower down to the ground without falling. As if reading my mind while I weighed my options, his hand raised toward me and he waited.
I remembered the other day when I shook his hand during our introductions and eyed him like a feral cat. The simple gesture of skin-to-skin contact that made me wary.
My pupils drifted from his hand to his face and he smiled sweetly, so I drew in a breath and connected my skin to his.
His hand was cold but gentle. I dropped my other crutch onto the grass and balanced, but my body became sturdier when he stepped towards me and he laced his arm under mine. He was much stronger than I was and I swore I felt his muscle ripple when I bent my knee, and he carefully lowered me down onto the blanket. My bottom pressed into the soft blanket lightly and he unraveled his arm from mine when I was finally seated.
I fixed my sweatshirt that was bunched up around my waist and watched him lower himself next to me. He was two feet from me, respecting any invisible wall between us, and half of me wanted to scoot closer.
My eyes momentarily danced down his body as he laid back onto the blanket, noting each curve of his slim frame. Indeed, he was noticeably much taller than I was even when lying down. Slim, but strongly built.
“Are you hungry?” he asked, blowing me from my thoughts like a grenade. “I have snacks in my backpack if you are.”
I shook my head and looked towards the sky to pretend I wasn’t watching. “No,” I replied. “I went out to eat with my friend and her mom for dinner.”
“Where did you go?”
I shrugged. “Just some little Italian restaurant off of Guilded Avenue.”
“Take It Cheesy? I love that place.” He smiled when my eyes found him.
“I love Italian food. I just wish we were closer to home so that we could have gone to one of my favorite restaurants there.” My gut lurched at the thought of home. The thought that Miranda was able to return there tonight.
There was a deafening silence when I twisted my head to the stars above us and sighed. The stars twinkled and I grew jealous that stars could see my house from their position, but I couldn’t.
“Do you miss it?”
I nodded, my voice barely a whisper. "Yeah," I breathed. "It's tough to be abruptly uprooted from something so familiar against your will. Sherry and Mark have been kind, accommodating, but it's just not the same. The houses, the school, the sounds, the smells — they're all different now." I gnawed on my lip, furrowing my eyebrows, my mind drifting back to the glimpses of the funeral home's oppressive cream walls. "Seeing that casket today... I don't know. It shattered me. It felt like being trapped in a room, suffocating from claustrophobia, with no other exit. I felt like I was drowning, all while watching Sherry's face lit up with laughter and smiles among the other people..."
"So she lacks empathy?" he interjected, his voice tinged with curiosity.
I ran a hand through my dark hair, contemplating his question. "No, she does have empathy," I replied, my voice laced with uncertainty. I pursed my lips, biting the inside of my cheek, lost in my thoughts. "They seem to believe that my dad may have caused the accident that killed him. They think he was like my mom, but I know he wasn't." Shaking off those disturbing thoughts, I exhaled heavily, allowing my gaze to settle on one of the brightest stars above us. The cool wind nipped at my arms, and I wrapped myself tighter in James' sweatshirt that he had lent me, seeking solace in its warmth.
James rose from the blanket, sitting up and scooting a little closer, reducing the distance between us by a few inches. An electric charge surged through my body as if I had touched a live wire. When the wind carried his cologne towards me, I caught its scent, heightening my senses.
He let out a sigh. "I believe you."
At that moment, my eyes snapped toward him, and the ice in his gaze shattered every wall I had vowed to construct around myself. It opened a door within that locked room of my heart.
I exhaled, releasing the tension that had held me captive, and the only response I could muster was a small, grateful smile. My hands lowered to the blanket behind me as I laid down on my back, my eyes fixated on the stars once again. As if in perfect harmony, James followed suit, falling back beside me, our bodies aligned under the vast expanse of the night sky.
I located the brightest star once more and envisioned myself capturing its radiance, holding it close, a secret meant only for my eyes. Sensing James beside me, I turned my head, and our eyes locked in an unspoken connection. His gaze remained fixed on mine, refusing to stray.
Returning my attention to the stars, I posed a question, my voice barely a whisper. "Do you ever wonder... when we pass away and enter Heaven, do we become stars?"
He raised his arm, propping his head up as he contemplated my inquiry. Shaking his head gently, he replied, "No, I'm not entirely sure. I don't know what awaits us — whether it's Heaven, limbo, or nothingness. I know it's not the answer you were hoping for, but all we can do is hope."
I smiled softly, expressing my thoughts. "I'd like to believe that when we depart from this world, we transform into stars. See that brilliant one?" My finger traced the path of the star that pierced through the darkness, pointing toward it. "I like to think that's my dad. If only I could capture it in a jar and keep it, my very own personal star."
James followed the trajectory of my finger, his face lighting up with a gentle smile. "I think it is him," he affirmed.
A warmth spread through me, reaching my heart, as I dropped my hand to my chest. The star stood unwavering, watching over me, proud and radiant. I became convinced that it was indeed my father.
James took a deep breath, his chest rising and falling, releasing a sigh as he continued to gaze at the stars. Nestled beside him, I felt a comforting warmth despite the biting cold. It was as if we could lie there all night, never questioning the need to return home.
A sudden motion in my peripheral vision captured both of our attention. We shifted our gaze beyond the line of trees, witnessing a shooting star gracefully traverse the heavens like a flickering flame. As it rapidly faded, I gasped, urging James beside me, "Quick, make a wish."
My mind raced, searching for desires that I longed for, anything within the realm of possibility. Thoughts of my father tugged at my heart, evoking a bittersweet sensation as I knew I couldn't wish for his return. With a determined resolve, I settled on the next thing that came to mind.
The star dissolved into the expanse of the open sky, melding with the blanket of shimmering stars that seemed motionless. Yet, my gaze stretched beyond them, imagining those celestial bodies as the luminous spirits of those who had departed this earth, either long ago or in the near future.
Curiosity sparked in James's voice as he asked, "What did you wish for?" His words carried an everlasting smoothness, and I turned to face him, mesmerized by the glistening of his eyes beneath the moonlit sky.
A giggle escaped my lips. "I can't tell you. If I do, then it won't come true."
"I'll tell you mine, but only if you promise to share yours," he proposed, his smile radiant like the stars that adorned the night sky.
I pondered his request for a brief moment, considering the implications. "Deal," I agreed.
He averted his gaze, and I wondered why he suddenly seemed bashful. Taking a deep breath, he exhaled softly. "Kristen," his voice caressed the air like velvet, "will you go on a date with me? A real one?"
My heart skipped a beat, and my eyebrows shot up in surprise. "That was your wish?" I asked, unable to conceal my astonishment.
He shrugged, a nervous smile tugging at his lips. Biting his lower lip, he attempted to hide his jitters.
A blush crept across my cheeks, and I nodded, my voice filled with warmth. "I was also secretly wishing that you would ask me that."
At that moment, beneath the luminous night sky, our wishes intertwined, and a newfound excitement enveloped us both.
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