Chapter 38 Elijah
Elijah
It takes one eleven-hour flight to get to Utah from London, and then an hour’s cab drive to get to the home address I convinced Devi to get for me when I explained that I was impulsively travelling across the world to see Molly on Christmas Day.
‘How very romance novel of you,’ she said, and I had to agree.
Only, in the novels and movies, do the characters doing the grand gesturing feel this sickly nervous?
Maybe they do, but the parts where their stomachs are somersaulting and their knees bouncing are cut in favour of getting to the big event.
I wish I could do the same.
I’ve been walking a path into the snow outside of the lovely home of Molly’s parents for the better part of fifteen minutes, mentally going over again and again what I plan to say first to Molly.
Nothing I can come up with feels right, or feels like the thing I need to say to convince her to want to be with me.
The half-day on the plane should have been enough, but I was taken into a heavy sleep for most of it, waking with a start as the pilot announced the plane’s final descent into Salt Lake City.
The sound of the front door opening startles me and I freeze, half-hoping the person exiting the house won’t see me if I don’t move. Then I can have another twenty minutes to fret about my words.
No such luck, though, as the person staring from the doorway of the home, eyebrows knitted in confusion, is Molly. Even as nervous as I am, she’s a sight to me. She wears a matching set of flannel pyjamas I’ve never seen, and her hair is wild like I love it most.
‘Happy Christmas,’ I call from the bottom of the garden.
‘I…’ Molly peers up at the sky, the sun bright even though it’s below freezing outside. It’ll start snowing again soon, I bet. Her confusion morphs into concern. ‘Come inside.’
I can’t help the wide smile that pulls over my face and I shake my head. ‘Can we talk out here? Please, it feels great!’
Molly’s concern and apprehension only grow, but I watch her pull on boots and a coat. Gemma circles her ankles, meowing at Molly probably not to go into the cold.
‘Don’t forget a hat and scarf!’ someone calls from inside the house, and Molly sighs but does as they say, retrieving a knitted hat and the scarf I gave her from a hook.
She meets me at the bottom of the driveway and searches my face like she’s trying to get to the bottom of something she can’t quite pinpoint.
‘You look different,’ she says. ‘Why do you look different?’
I laugh without meaning to, my joy at seeing her and the whole of the situation spilling out of me.
My breath steams in front my mouth and her eyes catch the puff of white air.
I’ve never seen her so perplexed, detangling the things she knows are impossible.
Molly reaches a hand to my cheek and swipes the cold skin with her thumb.
‘Are you wearing makeup?’ she asks, but no makeup comes off on her hand. She reaches for my face again and I catch her wrist and hold her palm against my jaw.
‘I was wrong to leave you,’ I tell her. ‘I was stupid to do it, because I love you and I would take any life with you that I could get. I would try to make it work because you’re my very favourite person.’
‘Why is your neck so warm?’ she asks instead of acknowledging my words. Maybe she didn’t even hear them. ‘Is it the sun?’
I laugh again and she looks at me like I might be insane, or a doppelg?nger of her Elijah, because the one she knows certainly wouldn’t be laughing at nothing, cheeks rosy, standing in the sun in the middle of Utah.
‘I took a plane here from London, and I was so afraid that it would go down. I was so relieved when it landed and then I was so nervous in the car from the airport because I thought it might crash before I could see you. I feared catastrophe because I knew you were on the other side.’
‘What are you saying right now?’
‘I’m human, Molly. I’m real and alive and–here, feel.’ I pull her hand down to the top of my chest, and press her fingertips to the base of my neck where after a few silent moments, both of us holding our breath, she feels it.
A heartbeat.
Molly gasps and seals her ear to my chest–my warm chest with a fucking beating heart inside.
‘How is this possible?’ she whispers.
‘Evangeline, she’s brilliant. She and a witch named Samara figured out a way to unmake vampires and I was–well, it worked.’ I decide to leave out the part where we had no clue if it would work or not until, syringe still plunged into my heart, it started to beat.
Molly’s too sharp, though. She recoils and looks up at me. ‘Was there a chance it wouldn’t?’
‘Well, it wasn’t exactly tested,’ I admit.
‘Elijah! You could have died!’ She pushes my shoulder, not hard, and she’s very serious, but I can’t help laughing again, holding her hand to my chest, to the organ working beneath. ‘I could throttle you.’
‘Please don’t try to kill me, Molly. I’m especially fragile today and you just might succeed.’
‘Is it… forever?’ Molly asks. There’s a thread of hope in her voice, and it makes me feel like I just might have a chance here. ‘Tell me what it means.’
‘It means I’m alive until I’m not, same as you. And for as long as I can live, I’ll live by your side. If you’ll have me.’
Please, please, please have me.
Molly’s eyes well with tears, and I know that mine match.
My tears aren’t tinged with blood any more, just salt water. ‘If I’ll have you?’ she asks, voice wobbling. I nod, and Molly surprises me, jumping into my arms, her legs wrapped around my waist, forcing a soft huff from me as I catch her. ‘I’ll have you. Of course I’ll have you.’
She kisses me, long and deep, still in my arms as fresh snow begins to fall from the bright white sky above us.
‘I love you,’ she says against my lips. ‘You crazy, reckless man, I love you.’
‘Does this mean we’ve graduated from friends with benefits?’ I ask. ‘Because I’ll be anything you want so long as it’s yours.’
She scoffs and kisses me again. ‘How about my boyfriend, to start?’
I hum, the pleased smile perhaps permanently affixed to my face. ‘Deal.’
Molly gasps, realising something with a start. ‘You can eat now,’ she says. ‘You can try cinnamon rolls.’
‘I would love nothing more than to share a meal with you,’ I tell her, and let her down from wrapped around me. I put one more kiss to her mouth, then lower my voice to ask, ‘Now, is it normal for four adults and a small child to be watching us like a film from the front window?’
Molly recoils and turns to the window, the people I can only assume to be her family dispersing immediately, all except for the little girl who is still jumping and pointing at us, our cat on the windowsill next to her.
Molly sighs, an amused smile remaining, and shrugs. ‘Welcome to the family.’