Toward the sun that had not been a twilight sun at all, but one of dawn.

My mother and father. Both waved to me now.

As they did, Myriam ran to where they waited, Mother holding her hat.

Then the light that had brought me here took me into its embrace a second time.

A beautiful voice beckoned to me from within it, urging me to wake up.

But then that voice began to hum, and the risk of losing its beauty made me hesitant to heed its command.

Immediately, I recognized the ballad as my own—our own.

And the voice. I would know it anywhere.

I opened my eyes to find hers closed. Tears coursed from beneath her fringed lids, trailing down to fall upon my naked face. Though her pain destroyed me, I could not bear the thought of missing even one tear.

And so, I commanded my hand to move. My fingers merely twitched at first, and then . . . my arm found the capacity to lift.

She gasped at my touch, those brilliant blues bursting open with shock . . . and hope.

Stephanie. My heart.

The meaning behind Myriam’s words at last became clear.

Stephanie had become my heart. By bequeathing me hers.

Had not the bleeding stopped the night she had given me the rose? The night she, the rose, and I, the briar, had become as one?

The night her actions had done what I thought only her words could.

The night she had said “yes” without either of us truly knowing.

EIGHTY-FIVE

Lucas

“Woh-kie dokie,” said Sam as he arrived at our usual table. “Let’s ssssee here, burger special and ketchup with a side of fries.”

“Lycopene is my friend,” said Patrick, who now sat next to me, seeing as our seating arrangements had unofficially undergone an official change.

“Street tacos and nachos for the lovebirds. Safe to say that’s on one check, Darthemort?”

“Did you hear what he called you?” Wes asked Charlotte as he accepted the plate they’d ordered to share. Just like the booth seat, where they now were cuddled up to one another. It was a little absurd. What with Wes drenched in his usual ensemble of solid black and Charlotte in tones of honey and cream, her blonde hair secured in a high ponytail and accented with glittery heart-shaped barrettes.

“Because, between the two of us,” said Charlotte in her trademark monotone, “I make a way more passable dark lord.”

“Should I defend your honor?” asked Wes.

“Don’t you have to have your own first?”

Wes grinned. Like that retort was all he’d wanted. “One check’s good,” he told Sam, who fought off his own grin as he plucked up the final item on his tray: a huge soda-shop-style milkshake in a tall old-fashioned fountain glass.

Though I expected him to cart the shake off to one of the surrounding tables, he instead set the dessert in front of me.