One (One Universe)

parents had done that. They just paced in front of my room a lot and talked about me when they thought I couldn’t hear.”
    One of the chaperones calls, “We’re expecting things to start in the next few minutes, so gather around a telescope. We only have a dozen or so, and we’ll need to take turns.”
    “I think we could see them closer without a telescope if we need to, huh?” A nervous laugh rolls up from my belly and out my nose, and he laughs, too.
    He cocks his head toward a cluster of trees silhouetted against the horizon behind us and says, “Come on.”
    The air cools by the minute with the setting sun, and I zip up my hoodie a little higher. Elias reaches out his hand, folding it around mine.
    He glances at me, wondering if it’s okay, I think. I smile and nod, squeeze his hand, and he beams. He’s so brilliant, I might die.
    I fall in step with him, and we don’t speak. As we walk, he shifts his hand to intertwine his fingers with mine, and my heart jumps, flits around in the upper regions of my chest, and it’s almost painful how good it feels. His fingertips, which stretch out across the back of my hand almost all the way to my wrist, brush lightly against the knob of bone there.
    This is almost as incredible as flying. Almost.

ELEVEN
    T he sky has darkened to a dusky charcoal gray, and it’s the clearest I’ve seen in a while. I can already count dozens of bright stars. The chatter of the crowd fades into the background, and when I look back to where half of the school has gathered, I realize we’re a quarter of a mile away at least. With the light fading by the minute, I’m sure no one will even notice that there’s someone moving around beyond the tree line.
    I still feel weak, but I can’t tell if it’s leftover sickness or from being with Elias or from wondering if he’ll agree to fly with me again. And then it hits me — he might not feel the same way. He might be freaked out.
    Or worst, it might all have been a dream.
    But the way he looks at me is so intense, even through the thickening dark, that I know he’s thinking the same thing.
    He takes a deep breath in, then out again. “Are you okay?”
    “Um, besides being knocked on my ass for the last few days? Yeah.”
    He doesn’t laugh at my joke. Probably because it wasn’t funny. “No, I mean…the way you left and all.”
    “Oh. Oh.” It all comes back to me in a rush now — my shock, my panic, my indecision. I’ve been so focused on flying and so focused on kissing him that I’ve almost forgotten that the two of them are linked. And it was that link that terrified me.
    He looks at me, waiting for me to respond. Then he looks down at our hands, still woven together. I smile at them and then back up at him. Even though I don’t know what to say, I hope he gets it.
    “Yeah.” I say. “Um…thanks for bringing the car back.”
    He swallows hard. “Of course.”
    “If you don’t want to, we don’t have to…you know…anymore,” I blurt out.
    I actually don’t know exactly which thing I meant — the flying or the kissing. I’m dying to do both but terrified of both at the same time. I look at Elias, and my cheeks flush again. Then, thank God, he raises his eyebrows questioningly and makes that same swooping motion with his hand in the air. My heart wants to burst with excitement. It’s going to happen again.
    We’re going to fly.
     
    The slightest breeze rustles the trees’ leaves, pushing their sibilant whisper through the air. It’s like they’re acknowledging that we have this secret and that they’ll keep it safe for us. Between the tree trunks separating us and the growing darkness, I can barely see the crowd.
    He turns to face me, and drops my hand. “How should we do this?” His voice wavers, and I’m lost in wanting my face to be closer to his for just a moment.
    “Um. The way we did it before, I guess?” I giggle. Again. This giggling is getting ridiculous.
    “I mean,” he stammers, “did you want to turn around or something? So you can look down?”
    Something like defiance rises up in me. I shake my head, automatically. The image of Elias’s arms around my waist with him behind me is not okay. I don’t want to be carried.
    “Or do you want to go behind me?” He shifts his balance, looking everywhere but at me.
    I wrinkle my nose more at that image. I’d be…riding on his back? I can tell he’s picturing the same thing because we both laugh, then say at the same time,