The First Steps (A Hunter Hayes Fanfiction, Book 1 of the Hardships Saga)

Chapter Twenty-Four

❝night (pronounced nʌɪt or nahyt), noun
the period of darkness between sunset and sunrise.❞

May came about quicker than the two expected, with their attempt at being intimate long forgotten. Lilly got ready for her date with Hunter. He had told her to get dressed in a dark hoodie and dark jeans, so after applying a little makeup, she was ready. She heard a knock on the door, and went to answer it.

Hunter stood there, today holding a bunch of pink tulips, his eyes sparkling. "Hey, baby. Bought these for you."

"Thank you, Hunt."

"You look beautiful," he said.

"Yeah, I've been exercising, I lost some weight."

"That's not what I meant, but I'm happy for you. If that makes you happy-"

"It does."

"-then that's a good thing," he finished, smiling.

"C'mon," she said, taking his hand, and they walked to Hunter's car together.

"So, what are we doing?" she said after about fifteen minutes of driving.

"Let's just drive. We don't need to go anywhere or do anything. Let's just forget everything for a little while. I know how stressed you've been lately."

She looked down, chuckling slightly awkwardly, and Hunter reached over and let his hand sit on her thigh. "You're beautiful," he said gently. "Just let go for a little while, okay? You're with me now. We don't need to worry about anything right now."

"I know," she said quietly, looking up at him from beneath her long lashes, and he kept his eyes focused on the road ahead of them.

After two hours or so worth of driving, Hunter parked his car in a vacant field and helped Lilly out of the car. "What are we doing?" she asked him.

"You promised we would go stargazing one day," said Hunter, pointing up. She gazed up in awe, amazed by the beauty of the Milky Way now that the lights of Nashville weren't in the way. Hunter set up the back of his semitrailer with some pillows and blankets, then invited her to lie down next to him. They were both staring up, and Lilly felt a warm spring breeze blow over her face.

"Where are we?"

"Somewhere in Tennessee," said Hunter. "Now, tell me about the stars. I love listening to your voice."

She laughed a little. "Well, would you believe that there are things so much bigger than we are?"

"Well, duh," said Hunter, sounding uncannily like Mimi. "There's the sun."

"Yeah, but think about it this way. The Sun is 1.4 million kilometers, but the whole galaxy, that streak up there-" (she pointed up at the white splash which was just above them) "-is 120,000 light years across. The Earth, our whole planet that we call home, is a hundred times smaller than the Sun."

Hunter stared up in awe. "Wow."

"And Pluto's biggest moon is only as big as California. In fact, Pluto would fit in Russia. Isn't that amazing?"

"Yeah..."

"The Great Barrier Reef- you know, in Australia- is bigger than the biggest dwarf planet."

"I thought Pluto was a dwarf planet?"

"Doesn't make it the biggest. The Great Barrier Reef is bigger than that, too. Also, Asia is bigger than Mars."

"All of Asia?"

"All of Asia," confirmed Lilly.

"Wow," he breathed again.