As she climbs into the truck, she glances at the folded blanket beside her. “What’s that for?”
“Temperature drops fast at the ridge.”
Her smile is small but bright. “Thoughtful.”
“It was Gran’s idea.”
“Still thoughtful.”
I look straight ahead so I don’t stare longer than necessary. “Let’s go.”
The trail is quiet tonight, the kind of quiet that settles deep in your bones. Our boots crunch softly over the dirt and frost, our breaths fogging in the air. The sky above us is darkening fast.
Emma walks close but not touching. Every few minutes, she lifts her camera and takes a test shot of the sky or the trees. Each time, the soft beep of her shutter draws my attention.
I’m not trying to watch her. I just keep… noticing.
“How long have you lived here?” she asks softly.
“All my life.”
“That must be nice. Being from somewhere.”
Her tone is light, but something behind it pulls at me. I slow my steps a little.
“You’re from New York?”
“Sort of,” she says. “I lived there. Worked there. Ate too many bagels there. But being from someplace and being in it aren’t always the same thing.”
There’s something in her voice—loneliness maybe, or a gap inside her she hasn’t figured out how to fill. I recognize the sound of it because I’ve had it, too.
“You got out,” I say. “Even if it’s temporary.”
“Temporary,” she repeats quietly, like she’s testing how the word feels in her mouth.
The trail opens just enough for us to walk side by side. Our arms brush once, lightly, and the contact zips through me before I can pretend it didn’t happen.
We reach the last rise, and she inhales sharply as the sky shifts—greens and faint purples beginning to unfurl like ink dropped into water.
“Oh my God,” she whispers.
I guide her up the final step onto the ridge. “Wait until it strengthens.”
She walks forward, mesmerized, and lifts her camera, breath catching as the aurora sharpens—curving, folding, shimmering against the stars.
“This is…” She shakes her head. “I don’t even have the right word.”
“Don’t need one.”
Her shutter clicks. And again. And again. But the camera isn’t what I’m watching.
It’s her—how she moves with the light, how her expression opens, how something unguarded flickers across her face like she’s seeing hope for the first time in a long time.
I don’t mean to step closer. It just happens.
She lowers the camera slowly, turning toward me as the sky glows green above her. The light catches her cheekbones, the bridge of her nose, the corner of her mouth.
“Kendrick,” she says softly.
