THESE CELESTIAL BODIES (Demetre)

Chapter fourteen

"That was so sick!" Rose beamed as they stumbled off the ride, half disorientated, half drunk on the thrill. Before them, the carnival was a lattice work of purple and yellow and flashing red. Teeming with bodies and children with candy floss. They happened upon the carnival after coming out of the theatre and Dean was eager to see it, he'd heard about human carnivals but to see it first hand was something different. Rose found herself watching the way his eyes caught on every movement, lingered for a second, and searched for something else. The look in them was all feline and animal and child rolled into one. She was not the only one living, she realised. "What do you want to do now?"
     Dean scoured the carnival, chewing on the question. They'd practically been on every ride, seen most of the stalls, there wasn't much left now that they had exhausted everything.
     "Food?" he nodded towards a massive gazebo with stalls and a mini bar.
     Her stomach growled in response. Food it was. Dean interlaced their hands without thinking and started walking, to any normal person it looked like they were a couple. To any normal person, no one paid them any heed because they looked like half the people there: a young couple spending their night in a carnival. For a moment, Rose let herself believe it. That they were normal, a normal guy and a normal girl. With lives so careless and free, who would go home to a warm house and a puppy to greet them, who would wake up the next day and face world. But they weren't normal, their lives aren't careless or free, they would go home to a castle beneath the earth, they wouldn't wake up and face the world. They wouldn't do anything together. And that, perhaps, was the most terrifying thought.

They sat down at a table but didn't touch the menu.
     "Here," Dean fished in his pocket and pulled out a photo strip.
     Rose frowned at the strip of pictures. "I thought Vampyrs don't show up in pictures."
     He chuckled. "That's a myth, a very stupid one too. I'm too handsome not to be seen in the mirror."
She reached out and tousled his hair, grinning when he swatted her hand away. She had dragged him to a photo booth, he called it a magic box. Eight photos, one strip. First, a photo of Rose smiling and Dean frowning because he couldn't see where the camera was. The second was Rose roaring with laughter and Dean looking at her and smiling after he asked her if the camera was operated by miniature humans. The third was Dean with his arm around her, fingers tangled in her hair as she laid her head on his shoulder. Then one of him using a lock of her hair as moustache, her sticking her tongue out and making a rock sign with her fingers. Another of them smiling.

Then one of her smiling and Dean turning to face her.
     Another, with his head fully turned to her and her still facing the camera.
     Then her head turned and their eyes locked.
In the last one her smile vanished as if she had become hyper aware that his gaze was solely on her. Like she was the only person he needed, the only person that mattered. And he the only person who saw her for what she was. A galaxy with no end, a storm, a mirage, a painting. A temple and an alter he would fall to his knees at. Two people who seemed to belong in a different world.

She handed it back to him with a rattling heart. "Keep it. I want you can remember this."

Gods the way he was looking at her, it made her breathless and hot and flustered.

He drew a breath, cleared his throat. Right, Rose remembered, he was practically engaged. "Food?"

"The cheesiest burger you can find."

"The cheesiest burger for the cheesiest woman."

"Fuck off."

Rose watched him stalk off and realised she needed to pee. Really badly. She politely asked a neighbouring couple to watch their table for her before snaking her way through the crowd to find some kind of bathroom. It was as she was manoeuvring that she slammed into a man so hard it almost winded her. "I'm so sorry, I didn't see you—"
     The man wore a hood and barely even turned to her, but she had the strangest tingle at the bottom of her spine that he had seen her. Whoever he was. He pulled his hood tighter, pushing massive hands into his jumper pockets and storming off. Out of the gazebo and into the crowd. Yes he had seen her, and he had shoved something into her hand too.
     Rose unfurled the tiny, crumbled piece of paper, trying to figure out how he had time to even touch her let alone put something in her hand. The black ink was smudged but legible.