|| Victoria ||
He called when the sun had already gone down, and the sky was a deep, inky black. I picked up the phone with a furrowed brow, opening my mouth to say something sarcastic when his voice rang in my ear.
"Victoria," Luke said, sounding breathless.
"Yes?"
"I'm outside. Get out here, grab a blanket, and let's go."
"Luke?" I asked, through a laugh. "Are you crazy?"
"No, Hemmings, but I am freezing my ass off. The truck's heating is completely broken. So hurry up, if you will."
The truck? Luke still had his truck?
Without a second thought, I said goodbye, rushing down the hallway and writing a note to my father, who was having a late night at the office. I snatched a blanket off of the couch and headed out of the door, where I saw the driveway was illuminated with the warm, familiar headlights.
It was true. Luke's truck was restored to it's former glory, and he grinned at me from the driver's seat.
Laughing, I slung myself into the passenger's side, and he took the blanket from me, throwing it in the backseat.
"What's going on?" I asked him, and he smiled the same coy smile.
"Can't tell you that. It would ruin it."
"You're so frustrating."
"And you're so controlling."
"You're going to have to find a better insult soon, Luke, that one's wearing off."
"Dammit," he said, in a mock-disappointed voice as he pulled out, "What ever will I do?"
I shook my head.
"Shut up, Callaway."
"Only when you do, Hemmings."
It was funny, how easily we were able to slip back into our old ways, and it felt as though no time had passed at all. As if the four memorable weeks we'd spent together were being lived all over again, right there, in that moment.
I didn't ask any questions; I simply let my fingers run up and down the weathered leather of the seats, the familiar smell and static-filled radio flooding my senses and I watched him out of the corner of my eye, observing his taut features and steel-blue eyes that were set directly in front of him, unwavering, intense.
They were the eyes that looked like the depths of the sea, the eyes that I had grown to love and hate and trust and a million other things. They were the eyes that made me feel at home and in the middle of nowhere at the same time, the eyes that looked welcoming yet closed-off, open yet full of a thousand untold secrets.
His gaze was contradictory, opposing forces, a battle between two extremes.
But it was the gaze that I so often found myself lost in, and the gaze that I so often thought about, even after all those months apart.
And I fell into silence with that thought in mind, and somewhere in the midst of my rambling mind, his hand found my own and he lifted it to his lips, just like he had on the night of my mother's wedding, when he'd stayed by my side throughout the night-and then carried me to the clinic in the morning.
Dragged back into reality as the warmth of his lips pulled from my skin, and cold spread across the place where they had just lingered.
I tried to ignore the jittering in my veins as he continued to drive, and I continued to watch him, wondering how it was that-even after all of this time-I was still somehow able to fall for him with the same intensity that I had the first time around.
_________
We parked in the middle of a deserted area, where the trees opened up to a field, and above us, the stars shone brighter than I ever thought possible. Luke stopped the car and helped me out of my seat, grabbing our blankets and two Thermoses. Before I knew it, he was placing everything into the truck bed, popping it open and swinging himself up into it. I followed suit, and he handed me my blanket, and wrapped himself in his own.
He gestured for me to sit next to him, and I did. Together, we huddled against the back of the truck bed, sharing each other's warmth as our breaths mingled in the cold night air before us.
"Show me the stars, Victoria," he said, and his voice was a low rumble deep in his chest.
I turned to look at him from the corner of my eye, arching a brow.
"What?"
"You've always wanted to be an astronomer, haven't you? I brought you to the middle of nowhere so you could teach me a few things."
I laughed, pressing myself into his side.
"Okay."
My arm rose, and I pointed to the first constellation I saw.
"Orion," I told him, "is right up there. See the three stars next to each other? That's his belt."
He said nothing, just watching me as a smile slowly crept onto his features, and I felt myself flush, moving onto the next one.
"Virgo," I said, moving my hand slightly to the left, "Otherwise known as one of the zodiac signs."
"And that one?" he asked, his arm shifting around my shoulder and indicating to a different cluster of stars.
"Looks like Ursa Major."
"The Big Dipper."
"Yeah," I said, and after a pause, "It's a tragic story, you know. There was this huntress, Callisto, and she was apparently really beautiful. And the Roman god Jupiter fell in love with her. They had a child together, and when his wife Juno found out, she turned her into a bear so that she wouldn't be able to be beautiful. Anyways, the son grew up to be a hunter, and one day he found Callisto in the woods. And she forgot that she was a bear, and then rushed up to greet him, but he got scared and shot her."
"Oh, my God," he breathed. "That's-"
"Wait," I said, holding up a finger to silence him, "Jupiter stopped the arrow out of the love he had for Callisto, and he ended up turning both she and her son into constellations. He placed them in the sky so that they could be safe together, and that he would be able to see them without having to worry about their well-being. I mean, can you imagine? I know it's just a story, but-it's beautiful. Kind of proves that love can intervene in crazy ways, you know?"
When I looked over at him, I saw that he was staring at me, and I gave a nervous laugh.
"What?"
"You're incredible."
I rolled my eyes.
"Save it, Callaway."
He chuckled, and I curled into him a bit more, a chill running through me. He looped his other arm around me, holding me to him, and I felt his lips just brush my ear.
"So love can intervene with us?" he asked, and I felt my lips kick upwards, just for a second.
"What do you mean?"
"Us. This. Do...do you think it can be fixed? That we can make things right again? Do you think we could have a chance to be real?"
I paused, contemplating this.
"To be honest with you," I said finally, "I don't think we were ever fake to begin with."
I felt a thrill in my chest as he replied,
"Neither do I, Hemmings."
I sighed, caving into him, and his lips met my neck, my breath catching a bit as I murmured,
"What are you thinking about? Right here, right now?"
"I'm thinking about the night in Florida." he said, quietly, "I'm thinking about the way you looked at me on the beach, and what I wanted to tell you. I'm thinking about the way you smile, and the way you laugh..."
He trailed off, and he recollected his thoughts, saying,
"And the way you drive me crazy. I'm thinking about the missed opportunities, and everything I could have done to avoid breaking your heart, and I'm thinking about everything I wasn't able to say."
He paused, and my breath hitched in my throat as he whispered,
"But most of all, Victoria Hemmings, I am thinking about the fact that I am totally and utterly in love with you, and I can only hope you still feel the same way."
I turned to him, unable to believe my ears, my mouth open in surprise as I whispered,
"Luke," I breathed. "I-I love you, too."
And then he smiled, and pulled me to him, and we kissed. And this time, there was no second-guessing. There was no doubt, no albeit, no perhaps. It was a confirmation, a promise, a shared moment between the both of us that swore to each other that we would always be this way, that I was Victoria and he was Luke, and no matter what happened, we belonged together.
I needed him more than I could ever express; I always had. I had no words for the way I felt, nothing I could possibly use to express the amount of love and joy and emotion that churned in my veins as I kissed him, really kissed him, for what seemed like the very first time.
Luke was my perfect storm, and I was his anchor, and we held each other in the midst of our chaotic lives. One was lost without the other, and now that we had found each other, we knew it would be for good.
"I love you," he said, as if unable to say it enough, "I love you, I love you, I love you."
And I repeated it back to him, my breathy voice an echo to the words, my heart leaping in my chest as I did so, again and again, and my arms wrapped around his waist and his chin rested atop my head, and we just kept breathing that whisper of a promise to one another, and the more we did, the truer it became.
"I was scared of commitment," he told me, his voice heavy with emotion, "and that's why I didn't know what to say. I'd spent so much of my life going from one girl to the next, but when I found you, that changed. And all I wanted to do was say it back, but I couldn't, because I wasn't sure what would happen if I did."
"Now you know," I said, and he smiled at me in the dark, fastening the blanket tighter around me.
"Now I know."
And I fell into his arms, lulled by the reassurance of his presence, of our shared feelings.
It was to the sound of his voice that I drifted to sleep.
_________
I woke when the sun was rose in the pink-tinged sky, and shifted against the fabric of Luke's shirt, freeing myself from his grasp. He was already awake, offering me a Thermos.
"It's kind of cold now," he told me, with an apologetic smile, "but it's something."
I took a sip from it, tasting lukewarm tea, and gulped a few times, wincing at the bitterness of it. I set it aside, and he grinned, pulling a blanket over the both of us.
"You cold?" he asked, and I shook my head.
"Surprisingly, no."
We sat in silence for a bit, the heat radiating from each other keeping me warm, and then I heard him release a breath, saying,
"So what happens now, Hemmings? What happens when we step back into the real world?"
I leaned into him, my heart pounding in my chest as I answered,
"I don't know. But that's kind of the beauty of it, isn't it? The idea of not knowing. You don't always have to have a plan."
A laugh, deep and sultry, resonated within his chest.
"Did you actually just utter that sentence?"
I elbowed him with a sarcastic, drawn-out sigh.
"Shut up, Callaway. Some of the best things come from wild, adrenaline-fueled improvisation-you should know."
"I suppose I should," he conceded, and I laughed, the sound ringing out into the empty trees before us as I brought my eyes up to the sky.
"I'm-a little scared," I told him, honestly, and he held me close to his side, planting the lightest of kisses on my lips.
"Don't be," he whispered, against my ear, "Because guess what?"
"What?" I asked, a slow grin spreading across my features, already predicting the answer.
"Everything's going to be okay," Luke Callaway told me, and for the first time in my life, I believed him.