Stargazer

The next-to-last night in April offered one small treat, though—a blue moon.

It’s not like a blue moon is some incredible astronomical event. All it means is that it’s the second full moon in a single month. But I always sort of liked to make a celebration of them, to be sure and look up at the sky and remember that nights like that didn’t come along very often.

I waited until late at night before I slipped outside in my jeans and Tshirt. I wanted to be alone. The sky was too over-cast for real stargazing, but the moon shone brightly, tinting the clouds nearest it pale with light.

Quickly I walked across the grounds to the gazebo, so I could sit down and watch the moon through the cast-iron lattices. I had other memories of the gazebo—memories of Lucas. This was the first place we’d ever kissed.

“You still love a blue moon.”

I whirled around to see Lucas standing on the grounds behind me.

At first I honestly thought I had to be imagining things. But he stepped into the gazebo, his battered boots making the floor creak, and I realized he had to be real.

“Lucas? What—what are you doing here?” I cast a hurried glance around us. “It’s dangerous. If they find you—”

“They’re not going to find me.”

“They will if you just stand here!” Now that I had finally accepted that Lucas had come back to Evernight, I was even more astonished than I’d been before; this was reckless to the point of being suicidal. “Anybody could walk out here at any second!”

“I won’t stay much longer.” Lucas put his hands in the pockets of his corduroys. He wore an old flannel shirt over a T, and his body was hunched and tense, ready to fight at a moment’s notice. But none of that wild energy was directed at me. When Lucas looked at me, his eyes were only sad. “I thought I’d have a good chance of catching you outside tonight, what with the blue moon and all.”

“Yeah. You caught me.” I couldn’t think what to say. My longing for him wouldn’t come out in words, and I was too startled to know what to do. “How long have you been waiting out here?”

“Since sundown.”

It was almost midnight. He’d been on the Evernight grounds for hours, and anyone could’ve seen him. If somebody had reported Lucas to Mrs. Bethany, by now he could’ve been a prisoner, even dead. He was as reckless as ever, but this time I couldn’t be angry. “Why did you come?”

“Because I couldn’t leave things between us like that.”

“I was ugly to you,” I whispered. “Lucas, I’m so sorry.”

“You were angry, and you had a right to be angry.”

“We ended up cremating Courtney after all.”

“Okay, you didn’t have a right to be angry about that.” The hint of a smile played upon his face, but only briefly. His hair had grown out, scruffy again. I thought he’d lost some weight. Wasn’t he taking care of himself anymore? “You said I didn’t accept you being a vampire, Bianca. I guess—maybe you were right.”

Even though I had realized that for myself, it stung to hear him say it.

“You said once you loved me no matter what I was.”

“I do,” Lucas said, taking a ragged breath. “But when I said that—it was as if, what I felt for you, it was in spite of you being a vampire. Inside, it was like—like I was forgiving you just for being what you are.

That’s probably the crappiest thing I ever did to anybody, not figuring out what a jackass I was being. If I’d figured it out faster, I could’ve been to you—what I should’ve been to you. What I wanted to be.”

“Lucas—”

“Let me finish, all right? You know I suck at the emotional stuff. So I just—” His foot scuffed the gazebo floor. “Whatever it is that makes you the person you are—that’s what I love. All of it. Including you being a vampire. You shouldn’t ever have had to defend that; I should’ve accepted it a long time ago. If I had, maybe I wouldn’t have lost you.

That’s on me, and I know it.”

He was staring down at his boots. I thought if he’d been looking at my face in that instant, Lucas could never have fooled himself that he’d lost me.

More quietly, he continued, “I saw the thing with Balthazar coming.

It made me pretty crazy. But—you know, for a—for anybody, he’s a decent guy, and I guess he never asked you to pretend you weren’t the person you really are. So maybe you made the right call. I just wanted to say—Bianca, if you’re happy, I’m glad. You ought to be happy. You deserve that.”

“I’m not with Balthazar.”

Lucas lifted his head, his expression disbelieving. “You aren’t?”

“No. We were never together, not really.”

“Oh. Okay.” Lucas shifted from foot to foot, obviously torn between hope and uncertainty. “Listen, I—I know I screwed up, but if I could—” I jumped from my seat and flung my arms around him. Lucas hugged me tightly as I buried my face in the curve of his neck. At first neither of us said anything; I don’t think we could speak. It felt so incredibly good to hold him again, to feel him next to me, when I thought I’d lost him forever. Hadn’t I told him to believe that we’d always find each other again? I should have listened to my own advice.

“I love you so much,” I finally whispered.