My Butterfly

up the bluffs opposite us in the distance.
    Julia giggled and pressed her hips against mine. I pulled her closer and watched the next firework race to the sky and then explode into tiny, little pieces of light. Jules squealed, and I felt her arm squeeze tighter around my side as she nestled her head deeper into the muscles in my chest. My eyes fell onto her face, and I smiled and noticed a piece of her long hair resting on her cheek. I picked up the strand and then gently laid it back down onto her bare shoulder. It was hard to just simply watch the fireworks because I couldn’t stop thinking about what I wanted to tell her—what I had wanted to tell her for a long time now. Suddenly, there was another loud shriek, followed by a big thud and a colorful burst of light in the sky again. Jules looked up at me with wide eyes and a happy smile, and I just couldn’t hold it in anymore.
    “I love you, Jules,” I said, in almost a whisper.
    She was quiet, and her smile was starting to fade, but her eyes were still on me, still locked in mine.
    My heart sped up. Say something, anything. I watched her eyes trace a path in mine. I wondered if she had even heard me. But then, I saw her lips fall slightly open.
    “I love you too,” she whispered.
    Her eyes smiled before her lips did. Then, she returned her head to my chest and her attention to the lights still dancing in the night’s sky.
    My heart was pounding. I bet she could feel its thuds. I wanted to shout something, but I didn’t want to scare her or cause her to move from the exact place she was resting on my chest. So this was what I love you felt like. I started to replay all the days and all the moments and all the memories I had of Julia Lang. My grin widened as I realized that each moment involved me being in complete awe of her and her not even knowing it. God, I loved this girl, and I bet she still didn’t even know how much.
    “Will,” I heard her soft voice say then.
    “Hmm?” I asked.
    “Will you sing me another song?”
    “What about?” I asked.
    “About us,” she said.
    I could hear the smile in her voice.
    “Okay,” I said, taking a second to think.
    I gathered the words and then whispered into her ear another melody, but this time, it was soft and low:

“Little girl, little boy
If love has a way
Fill their fields with laughter
And scatter the sun on their day
And if it should happen to rain
Make their raindrops kisses
Straight from heaven above
That touch their hands and faces
And that fill them with love
And make the moon reflect their smiles
And their stars plenty
And, above all, keep them together
And hold them as you may
Forever and ever
Until their last days.”
 
    She squeezed her arms tighter around my side when my lips stopped singing her song.
    “It’s perfect,” she said.
    I watched for a second as her eyelashes followed the path the fireworks made from the barge in the river to the heavens. Then, I kissed the top of her head, pulled her hips closer to mine and smiled.

Chapter Eight
    Senior Year
     
     
    I heard a knock at the door just as I was signing my name to the last page of paperwork.
    “Come on in,” I said.
    I heard the door push open, and I took a quick glance back.
    “Hey, babe,” I said, setting down the pen and flipping through the healthy stack of pages.
    “Hey,” I heard her say, making her way over to me.
    And within seconds, I felt her arms wrap around my neck and her weight press down onto my shoulders.
    “Whatcha’ workin’ on?” she asked.
    My hands left the pages and found a spot to rest on her arms, and I reached up and kissed her.
    “Oh, just filling out forms for the fire department,” I said. “Even if you’re a volunteer, it requires an autobiography, evidently.”
    I heard her take a deep breath as she pushed off of my shoulders.
    “Can I have some water?” she asked.
    I turned in my chair and watched her make her way into the kitchen and pull out a glass from the cabinet. She filled the glass with water from the faucet and took a drink. I smiled at her when her eyes finally met mine again, but her lips only slightly turned up.
    “What’s wrong, Jules?” I asked.
    She took another deep breath, then set the glass down onto the counter and walked back over to me. My eyes followed her as she fell into the chair next to mine and began to study my face.
    “You really want to be a firefighter?” she asked.
    Her question made me pause. Yesterday, when I had told her