When I’d found her drifting beneath the surface—her body limp and cold, her white hair floating eerily around her—I’d feared the worst. I’d seized her. Shaken her. Kicked to the surface and shouted her name. Nothing had worked. In a fit of rage, I’d even dived back down to find the white dog, but it’d vanished.

As we’d risen the second time, however, something had changed: her legs had started to move. Slowly at first, then swifter. Stronger. They’d worked in synchrony with mine, and I’d watched, amazed, as her hair had grown longer with each kick, as the color had returned to each strand. To her skin.

She’d healed before my very eyes.

Crushing her to me now, I spun us in the water. It didn’t ripple with the movement. I didn’t care.

“Lou.” I said her name desperately, pushing the long locks from her face. “Lou.” I kissed her mouth, her cheeks, her throat. I kissed every inch of her I could reach. Still laughing. Hardly able to breathe. She laughed with me, and the sound sparked in my bones. Light. Bright. If I stopped swimming now, I would’ve floated. I would’ve flown. I kissed her again. I’d never stop kissing her. “Lou, are you—?”

“I’m all right. I’m me.” Her arms wove around my neck, and she tugged me closer. I buried my nose in the crook of her shoulder. “I feel—I feel better than I have in ages, honestly. Like I could fly or wield an axe or—or erect a statue in my honor.” She wrenched my head up to kiss me once more. When we broke apart, gasping for breath, she added, “It’d be made of sticky buns, of course, because I’m starving.”

My cheeks hurt from smiling. My head pounded in rhythm with my heart. I never wanted it to stop. “I have one in my—”

Coco’s shout at the shore caught us both unaware, and we turned as the world rushed back into focus. She’d sunk to her knees, staring into the waters like she’d seen a ghost. “Ansel,” Lou whispered, loosening her grip to better tread water.

I frowned. “What?”

“He wanted to say goodbye.” Smiling softer now, she kissed me again. “I love you, Reid. I don’t say it often enough.”

I blinked at her. Warmth cracked open in my chest at her words, spreading to the tips of my fingers and toes. “I love you too, Lou. I’ve always loved you.”

She scoffed playfully. “No, you haven’t.”

“I have.”

“You didn’t love me when I plowed into you at Pan’s—”

“I absolutely did,” I protested, brows shooting upward. “I loved your god-awful suit and your ugly mustache and—”

“Excuse you.” She leaned back in mock outrage. “My mustache was magnificent.”

“I agree. You should wear it more often.”