Instantly, her eyes flew open. She let out a cry—of anger or surprise, he couldn’t tell. He pulled away. He felt like an idiot.
“Hang in there,” he said. He was glad, at least, that it was dark enough to conceal his blushing. “I’m going to get a fire started.”
He stacked a dozen smaller branches into a neat tepee shape, just like his father taught him so many years ago, then reached into his pocket. The bright pink lighter belonged to Jas. He’d taken it from the wobbly kitchen table the morning after their talk, hoping she’d stop smoking if she couldn’t find it. It was a stupid thing to do, totally irrational. She would have just bought a new one at the corner deli. It had been an impulse—powerful, deeper than words—like the time when Charlie Halley had called Jasmine a freak in fifth grade and Luc had punched him.
Love was irrational. Luc knew that. His dad knew that, too.
He wouldn’t think of Jas ensnared in that horrible growth; he wouldn’t think of Blood Nymphs or blood forests or blood anything. He would only think of finding her.
It took him a while to get the lighter to work. Finally, tiny flames licked at the dry sticks, catching and spreading quickly. He fed the fire more branches, watched the light grow gradually higher, felt the heat ever so subtly begin to emanate. Slow and steady. If he piled too many branches at once, he’d smother the flames and the fire would go out. Though he’d been too young on their old camping trips to actually build a fire himself, he’d helped his dad do it several times—had studied him closely. As a kid, he’d always been like that: an observer. He watched people. He noticed the little things.
How’s it look, Dad? I did it myself this time.
I’ve never seen a better fire, Luc.
He stood up. The fire was good now, strong and hot. He stared at the flames for a while, allowed the warmth to flow through his chest, burn up his memories, turn them to ash. No point in hanging on.
Corinthe had fallen asleep again, curled up against the stone. He eased down next to her.
“Corinthe,” he said. “You have to stay awake until you’re warm.” He tried to ignore the strange desire to touch her, to run his fingers through her hair. When she didn’t respond, he took off his jacket and draped it over her like a blanket. “Corinthe.”
She moaned softly when he shook her. Still she didn’t wake up. Fear began to gnaw at him. If she was too sick, if she didn’t wake up …
Would he be able to save Jas without her help?
Gently, he reached out and eased her up and into his arms, pulling her onto his lap, keeping her wrapped in his jacket, rubbing her arms and shoulders. For a second, her head lolled heavily against his, and he could smell her breath. Flowers.
She smelled like flowers.
Then she stirred and shifted in his arms. He knew the moment she became aware of him. Her body tensed and she let out a startled cry, half turning in his lap. Her hands found his chest. Her eyes were huge and silvery in the moonlight.
Luc couldn’t breathe.
“I—I was trying to keep you warm.” His voice sounded distant, unfamiliar, as if someone else were speaking.
For one long second—time enough for him to think about kissing her, about bringing her closer to his chest, running his hands down her back and through the wild tangle of her hair—they stared at each other.
Then Corinthe pulled away, shifting off his lap. “What happened?” she asked.
He felt dizzy and—since he had given her his jacket—cold. And yet, weirdly, there was a wild heat racing through his veins. He stood up and moved toward the fire.
“You fell asleep. You were freezing.” He squatted and stoked the fire, trying to avoid looking at her.
But she came and sat next to him. The color was returning to her skin, and her lips weren’t blue anymore. “You did this?”
“Yeah.” Luc leaned back on his heels, watching the flames twist up toward the sky.
“How?” Corinthe asked.
He glanced at her quickly to see whether she was making fun of him; but she actually looked interested. “My dad used to take me camping,” he said. He didn’t like to talk about his family—had never talked about them with Karen, if he could avoid it—but here, in this crazy world, with two moons hanging above them, it didn’t seem so bad.
“Dad,” Corinthe repeated, as though she’d never heard the word. Then, abruptly: “Did you like it?”
Her question took him off guard.
“I did,” he said slowly. “I loved it.” He tossed a couple more pieces of wood on the fire, and for a while, he and Corinthe sat in silence. Luc didn’t know why, but he felt oddly comfortable sitting with her in the cold and the dark.
“This one time, we hiked ten miles to these hot springs Dad wanted to see,” Luc said suddenly. The memory had only just returned to him. “It took all day to get there because I was just a little kid and had to keep stopping for breaks. I was really pissed at him because he made me carry my own pack. He kept saying, ‘Trust me. It’s worth it.’ ”
Luc paused. He could practically smell that forest; the creeper moss and loamy earth, the smell of animals and growth, and that thick lemon sports drink he always chugged when they went camping.
“Was it?” Corinthe asked.
“What?” He had almost forgotten she was there.
“Was the hike worth it?”
He smiled. It felt like forever since he’d smiled. “Yeah, it was.”
Corinthe moved a little closer. Luc was suddenly hyperaware of the space between them: barely an inch separated their arms. “Do you still go camping together?”
“Nah, it’s been forever. Since my mom left.” The words came out before he could stop them. He’d never told anyone about his mother. Only he, Jas, and their dad knew the truth.
“What happened?” Corinthe hugged her knees to her chest, brushing his arm accidentally with one hand. Her fingers were so small, so delicate, her unpolished nails like little seashells. He wanted to curl his fingers around hers until this stupid burning in his chest stopped. Corinthe said, “You don’t want to tell me. That’s okay.”
Luc sucked in a deep breath. That was the problem. He did want to. “We thought she would come back,” he blurted out, and immediately felt like screaming. No, his voice felt raw, burnt, as though he had been screaming the entire time—the full ten years since she’d left. That was the sad, pathetic truth. That for years after she walked out, Luc, his dad, even Jas—they’d all believed she would come home. For four years Luc had worn the sweater she’d given him for Christmas to school every year on picture day, even after it was far too small, in case she came home suddenly and wanted to frame his photos.
Luc had been only seven when she left, but he remembered the day perfectly.
“Be right back,” she had said, looping her ratty leather bag onto her arm, sparking up a cigarette. The cloying scent of clove lingered in the air for days after she was gone.
He’d watched her walk down the porch steps; her yellow cotton dress looked dingy in the sun. Her dark hair, streaked with old highlights, was pulled into a messy ponytail.
She glanced over her shoulder one last time, but she didn’t wave.
He and Jas had waited hours for her to come back.
Eventually, Jas had gotten hungry. She sat in the middle of the playroom crying. Luc went to the cupboard—he knew Jasmine loved graham crackers, but they were too high up to reach. Climbing on the counter was not allowed, so he used the broom handle to knock the box from the shelf. When the box hit the floor, crackers scattered, broken, across the kitchen tiles.
Little fuzzy-haired Jasmine sat down in her footie pj’s and started eating the graham crackers straight off the floor. After a moment, Luc joined her and started to reassemble the pieces, like a puzzle. She laughed at the new game and together they spent the afternoon right there on the linoleum.