Chapter 24
If hearts could take wing and fly the way they did in cartoons, Pete was pretty sure his just had.
He'd dreamed of fate striking for his whole life, but he hadn't realized how joyful it would be.
He whispered, "I love you too," and then with a glance at his family, added, "They're a bunch of goofs. But they're my goofs."
"They're great. And I'm going to go help your mom set the table, because it's freezing out here!"
"Oh, you don't have to do that. I—"
"I know," Shanti said firmly and with a very sweet smile. "But if I do, I bet I'll be able to steal a couple of those pieces of halibut, or some of the fries."
"Oh! Oh, I see! You're cunning, that's what it is!"
"Honestly, Peter, I think I'm about the least cunning person in the world," Shanti said wryly as they went inside. "I'm quiet and straight-forward and not at all sneaky."
"Except in the case of halibut and home fries."
She laughed. "Right. Except in the case of halibut and home fries. Can I help set the table?" she asked his mom, who waved metal tongs in the air.
"No, you don't know where anything is. Pete can do it while you taste-test the fries for me. Are they salty enough?"
Shanti beamed as Pete made a sound of protest and snaked a hand past his mother to grab some fries.
She smacked the back of his hand with the tongs and he yanked it back, clutching it to his chest and giving her his best big-eyed mournful puppy dog look.
As the mother of four, she was completely unmoved, even though he had vague memories of that kind of thing working when he'd been very small and his younger siblings hadn't been around yet.
Shanti, in the meanwhile, said, "Oh, they're so good," and was rewarded with a piece of halibut straight out of the fryer.
His mom even broke it in half so it would cool down faster, but Shanti still hissed and gasped and burned her mouth on the hot fish, mumbling, "Oh, oh wow, okay, now I understand why you said it's the best whitefish, wow… "
Pete said, "Moooom!" plaintively and his mother laughed at him.
"Go set the table and you can have some."
He scurried to do as he was told, as if he wasn't thirty-two entire years old, and was back at the fryer as the rest of the family tramped in, shaking snow off their shoulders and feet.
Everybody tried crowding into the kitchen to steal fish and chips themselves, and his mom shouted good-naturedly again, sending them to the table to eat like civilized people.
By the time they all got settled, the food was done, and Pete carried a couple of heaping platters of shrimp and halibut to the table while his mom carried bowls of fries.
It looked like an impossible amount of food, but experience told Pete that there would be little-to-no leftovers.
He noticed that Shanti listened more than spoke during the meal, although to be fair, everybody was eager to tell her stories about his childhood misadventures, so she didn't necessarily need to talk all that much.
She did look increasingly dismayed as his siblings cheerfully recounted the several-year period in his life where he'd run his face into a variety of objects much harder than his face on a bi-annual basis: the grocery store floor, after he'd specifically been told to stop spinning himself around the grocery cart-holding frame, then the frozen concrete playground, then running under the bleachers, then a mailbox—
"A mailbox?" Shanti interrupted incredulously.
"He was riding his bike," Aaron announced gleefully. "He looked over his shoulder to say something and looked back and wham!"
Shanti winced from her bones out, which made Pete's embarrassment a little less than it might otherwise have been. "And then I tried to split a boat prow with my face," he said with a sigh. "Strangely enough it worked the other way around."
"Why don't you have a bunch of scars?" Shanti asked, her tone caught between horrified and fascinated.
His sister waved an unconcerned hand. "Shifting heals most injuries with one or two shifts. Otherwise my brother would be like Freddie Krueger."
"I don't know why you even know who Freddie Krueger is," his mom said. "That was my time, not yours."
Lynn rolled her eyes. "Ugh, time is flat now, Mom. Streaming services changed all that 'my era, your era' thing."
"Yeah? So tell me who Rudolph Valentino was."
Aaron and Lynn eyed each other, then both reached for their phones as all the parents and grandparents laughed. Dinner went on, the mounds of fish and chips slowly disappearing, and eventually his mom offered to whip up a batch of chocolate chip cookies.
Shanti shook her head. "That sounds so good, but I've eaten so much, and also I'm so tired," she said apologetically. "I'm already afraid I'm about to fall asleep in my plate."
"We'll come over for cookies tomorrow," Pete offered, and his mom made a face at him.
"Oh, so now you want me to go to the effort tomorrow?"
Shanti sat up, blinking in dismay. "What? No! Of course not!"
"I'm teasing," Pete's mom promised. "I make cookies about twice a week anyway, and my children come over and eat them all."
"We wouldn't if you didn't text us and say 'Cookies!'" Lynn pointed out, and their mom shrugged.
"I've got to see my children somehow, don't I? Anyway, take that girl home, Peter," she said to him firmly. "She really is falling asleep in her plate."
Shanti wailed, "I'm sorry!" and Pete's mom shook her head.
"Don't be. It's a tiring flight. But we're glad you're here, and even gladder to meet you."
"I am too," Shanti said, her eyes suddenly soft and damp. "You're all wonderful. Thank you for welcoming me so warmly."
A round of awwws met that, and as Shanti got up from the table, most of Pete's family got up with her, offering hugs that she shyly accepted.
Peter hung back a moment as she went to start bundling up, and murmured to his dad, "Have you guys heard anything about the shifter exposure down in Colorado? "
His dad's eyebrows drew down. "A little. Carol Torben's family was involved in it and she's been keeping us posted, but so far nothing seems to have come of it. Why, do you know more?"
"No, I just wanted Shkalnik's shifters to be prepared if…" Pete shook his head. "I don't even know what the 'if' is, honestly. I don't know what we'd do."
"I don't think any of us do," his father replied. "We can't fight back and there are too many of us to hide. I think we just have to hope it all fades away."
Pete nodded. "I'm going to talk to Carol in the next day or two, to see if she's got any more information or a plan if things go sideways."
His dad nodded, too, then lifted his chin toward where Shanti had gone. "She's great. I'm happy for you, son."
"Me too," Pete said with a stupid smile. "Thanks."
"Drive carefully getting home. The roads aren't too bad, but you're tired."
"I really am." Pete fought off a yawn as he went down to the foyer to put his shoes on, and to collect hugs from the entire family, who were jammed into the seven-by-seven-foot-square space.
It took a few minutes to get out the door, but he and Shanti were both smiling as they left, and she said, "I really like them," as soon as the door closed behind her.
"They really liked you too. And I can't wait to show you Shkalnik in the daytime."
She laughed, leaning against him on the short walk to the truck. "So in, like, March?"
"Ooh! Harsh but fair," he admitted. "Although I did mean tomorrow."
Shanti giggled and stood on her toes to kiss him before going around the truck to get into the passenger seat.
Neither of them said much on the drive back, but every time Pete glanced at Shanti, she was smiling, and he knew that he was, too.
At home, she unpacked enough to find her pyjamas and toothbrush, and came out of the bathroom looking both adorable in soft flannel, and incredibly sleepy.
"Is it okay if I sleep with you tonight? "
"It's always okay," he promised. "No pressure."
"Because you're perfect," she mumbled sleepily, and went to crawl into his bed.
Pete was surprised at the level of possessive pride that awakened in him. He wasn't entirely sure why, just that it felt…
Like home, his bear said contentedly. Our mate is in our den where she's happy and safe, and we can take care of her and be happy with her.
Sometimes his bear was a little simplistic, Pete thought.
Not this time. This time, it had gotten it exactly right.
He murmured, Yeah, I think so, and after changing into his own PJs, crawled into bed beside an already-sleeping Shanti.
He was every bit as tired as she was, and only woke up some hours later because his bear whispered, Wake up, at him.
It also added, Nothing's wrong, just as softly. But you should take our mate outside. The sky is dancing.
Pete heard himself make a bleary sound even as he sat up to snuggle Shanti, blankets and all, into a bride's carry in his arms. She woke up with a soft, startled breath, and he murmured, "I've got something to show you," into her hair, even though he was only half awake himself.
She made a bleary little sound herself, a blurt of confusion as she turned her head to smoosh it against his chest as if rejecting anything that had to do with wakefulness.
Pete couldn't help chuckling with sympathy even as he carried her out of the bedroom and down the stairs.
Shanti made another sound of pure protest as he opened the front door, but unsurprisingly, curiosity got the better of her even if she was barely awake. "What are you doing?"
"Look up," Peter breathed, and Shanti glanced upward as she yawned.
"Clouds. What. Funny clouds. They're…" She caught her breath and came all the way awake, staring at the sky.
"They're green? And red and oh my god, this is the aurora?
The…oh. Oh, wow." She choked on the last words, and Peter sat down on the stoop, Shanti still cuddled in his arms as they both gazed upward at the dancing sky.
The lights really were almost like clouds, in their way.
Thin and constantly moving, but in the northern darkness, stars shone through the soft colorful curtains as they hissed through the upper atmosphere.
The bulk of the lights were green, ranging from a faint, barely-there color to a surprisingly vibrant shade that shivered, at the uppermost edges, into a soft, shifting red.
The lower edges spun lines across the sky, twisting and tracing above the treetops, singing and whispering until Shanti, incredulously, breathed, "I can hear them. Can I hear them?"
Pete murmured, "Yeah," into her hair, smiling. "Yeah, you can. Not always, but tonight they're singing for you."
Shanti threw her arms around his neck and he could feel hot, joyful tears against his skin as she whispered, "Okay, well, I guess I live here now. I live here, where the sky sings."
He laughed, a combination of hope and delight and adoration washing through him. "I'm all for it, but maybe that's not a decision to make in the middle of the night?"
"It's the best time to make it," Shanti disagreed, still in a whisper, before her mouth found his and captured it in a sweet, increasingly hungry kiss. When it ended, both of them breathless, she whispered, "There's another decision I want to make now too."
Heat and hope crashed through him, seizing his heart. "Are you sure?"
"I've never been more sure of anything in my life," Shanti murmured. "I want you to take me back to bed and show me everything. I love you, Peter. I love this place. I love whatever life we're going to build together. I want it all to start right now."
"I want everything you want," he whispered in return.
"I love you too, Shanti. I can't wait to see how everything goes for us.
" He lifted her easily and carried her back into the house and up to his—to their—bedroom, and in the small hours of the night made love for the first time, carried away by joy and the brilliance of the dancing aurora above them, shining like a benediction on their union.