Epilogue Hayden One Week Later #2
“I love you,” he interrupts, startlingly serious now.
I want to throw my hand over his mouth to keep him from talking.
“But,” he continues, “I love being your friend. I think I might’ve confused that with being in love with you.
And I think that…for us, just friends is pretty great.
” He glances thoughtfully upward. “Perfect even.”
I stand, stunned for a moment before letting out a breath of relief. “Yeah,” I say, smiling back at him. “Me too.”
“Now, are you going to let me show you the surprise or not?”
“You never said anything about a surprise,” I say as he moves to the space behind the seats.
“It’s just a project I’ve been working on. An invention of sorts.” He retrieves a small white box with what looks like a lens on the top and takes it to the corner of the room. After plugging it into the electrical outlet, he says in a showman’s voice, “The lights, if you please.”
I flick them off, casting us in darkness again.
There’s a faint click, and then light bursts forth from the little box on the floor.
Overhead, bright yellow stars paint the theater ceiling before fading into glimmery silhouettes of trees.
A crescent moon peeks out from behind the leaves of a sycamore.
My heart hitches. It’s our view of the sky from the creek, replicated to the letter. The scene is hand drawn, each feathery leaf and twinkling star carefully sketched. But before I can get out a word, music starts up. A familiar piano tune.
“Shall we?” Henry asks, taking my hand and leading me to a reclining theater seat.
He takes the seat next to mine, and the moment I start to lean back, something unexpected happens. Instead of Davy Jones’s tenor, I hear my mother’s voice, soft and airy, singing the lyrics.
My throat tightens, and my eyes sting. “How did you do this?” I choke out.
“That night when you called me about your dad and how he deleted those home movies, I sort of hacked into your family’s cloud.
It took me ages, but I finally managed to recover some of them.
I saved them for you on a USB, including this part with your mom singing.
” He shrugs. “Then I decided to make something that would keep her with you forever.”
“It’s amazing,” I say, basking in the sound.
“I built the motor myself.” He turns a dial until the scene shifts from yellow to glittery green. “There’s a setting with creek sounds too,” he adds in an apologetic tone. “Obviously, I created it before you nearly died in that water. Probably too soon for that.”
“Probably,” I say, a smile on my lips as I watch the stars cycle through all the colors of the rainbow, listening to “Daydream Believer” resonating through that little box. Hearing my mother’s voice for the first time in three years, my closest friend at my side.
A knock at the door interrupts the moment. Probably Adam, finished showering.
“You should get that,” Henry says, turning off the music but leaving the glow of the stars to illuminate the room.
I side-eye him. “You picked a really inopportune time to lose your chivalrous habits. Don’t you want to save me the trouble? Not to mention, it is your house.”
“I think it’ll be worth the trouble,” he says.
I pretend to be annoyed as I get up. Then I pad to the door and pull it open to find Bram standing there.
“Hey,” he says, rubbing his hand over the back of his neck, a shy smile on his lips.
A flood of emotions hits me so hard and fast, I’m dizzy. “Hey,” I say, the word coming out choked. My feelings graze right past relief, landing on irritation. I glance back to dart a look at Henry.
“Oh, didn’t I say?” He grins coyly. “There was a second part to the surprise.”
I turn back to Bram. “When did this happen?”
“Early this morning.”
Behind me, Henry clears his throat. “I’m, uh, going to see if I can get the sound quality a little better on this. I’ll be in the garage.” He unplugs the star projector, tucks it beneath an arm, and tries to slip past us.
“Wait,” I say. “Can you come over tonight for dinner? My dad’s going to attempt to make my mom’s famous lasagna, and I don’t want to be the only guinea pig.”
He smiles. “Yeah, sounds good,” he says. “Or, you know, completely terrible.”
I laugh, bumping his arm as he skirts by. And then he’s out the door, and I’m alone with Bram.
My pulse thrums as he peers down at me, eyes flooded with concern. His skin is pale as always, a stark contrast against the black T-shirt. “I’m so relieved that you’re okay,” he says. “When I heard you—”
“Why the hell didn’t you call me the second you got out?
” I interrupt. Up close, I can see that his hair is still damp from a shower.
I inhale the herbal scent of his shampoo, the cedar and smoke of his cologne.
“It’s all I’ve been thinking about. You’re all I…
” I hesitate, not sure how to stop the words from pouring out.
“I’m all you what?” he asks, a soft smile on his lips.
But I don’t need words to tell him. I step closer, throwing my arms around his neck, digging my fingers through his hair. I tug him to me, pressing my lips to his.
He flinches, stunned at first. And then he’s kissing me back, urgently, his hands on the small of my back.
When we part, breathless, Bram blinks. His dark eyelashes flutter like he’s coming out of a daze. “Can’t say I was expecting that.” He pretends to look serious as he squints at me. “Should you be doing that in your condition? What with oxygen deprivation and all?”
“Sorry,” I say, my face heating.
“Phil,” he says, head titling as he smirks, “don’t apologize for something we both know you’re going to do again very soon.”
I start to protest, but he pushes open the door, reaching back for my hand. I want to refuse it, but my need to be close to him wins over and I take it, letting him lead me down the hall.
“What should we do today?” he asks as though it’s any other day. “You’re still recovering, so maybe you should just—oh!” He turns to give me a devious smile. “Have you been on a tour of our dungeon?”
I roll my eyes. “Let’s go out to the garden.”
Bram sighs dramatically. “Fine.” He pulls me closer, lips grazing the top of my head. “I guess we could both use a little vitamin D after our stints indoors.”
“I know how much you love the sun,” I tease as we step outside.
“It’s true that vitamin D and I have had our differences,” he says, pretending to be scorched by the slanting rays. We amble along on the pathway, our fingers interlocking. He glances over at me, and his gray-blue eyes catch mine. “But you, my dear, look awfully pretty in the sunshine.”