“They reminded me of you,” I say softly.
“Who?”
“The stars.”
Her brows pull together tightly. “How?”
I can’t help but grin. “What can I say? You’re a shooting star. Every time I see you, a wish comes true.”
Vivienne swats my side in disbelief, but I catch the flush creeping up her cheeks.
Flirty words aside, the comparison was much deeper than that.
In the daylight, when the sun shone bright, you couldn’t tell that something else was shining in the sky. It’s only when everything dimmed down and the world quieted that you could see it.
Vivienne is a little like the stars—glimmering with an extraordinary brightness whenever she sets aside her uncertainties.
She broke down so many self-limiting barriers to get to where she is now. Compound synthesized. Invited to a huge chemistry conference. She’s always shone. She just never realized it when she got caught up in her mind.
Owls howl in the night, the sound mingling with the soft whooshing of the wind passing through the trees. A silence settles between us as we listen to nature, but it grows heavier. Her shoulders tense. Her eyes fall shut. And her hand draws circles on the wool of her jacket.
She doesn’t need to say anything for me to know what’s on her mind. I heard the crack in her voice when she mentioned it over the phone.
“I don’t know if I can do it, Nate,” Vivienne admits on a heavy sigh.
I wrap a hand around her waist, squeezing tightly as I pull her body closer. Her chest presses into mine, and I hook one of her legs around my hip so I can look her in the eyes.
“This is the biggest opportunity of my academic career, and I’m thinking of turning it down because I’m still hung up on the past.” She lets out a sigh.
But honestly, she isn’t giving herself enough credit.
A mere three months ago, she couldn’t stand the sight of a plane without running away, and look at her now. She made it through the Aviation Global Forum, let me explain my project to her, and even sat in on a few talks. That’s a vast improvement by itself.
“You can do anything you set your mind to,” I assure her.
The small breath she releases—forming a faint mist in the cold November air—tells me she doesn’t truly believe it herself. And I hate that. I just wish she’d see herself the way her loved ones do.
“You did it once, and you can do it again. Baby steps. I’ll be there with you the whole way.” Her glassy doe eyes meet mine with pursed lips. “I’ll help you get over your fears. We’ll start small, then work our way up.”
“You would really do that for me?” Vivienne asks in surprise.
The question sends a squeeze through my chest. I can't fathom how anyone could have hurt this girl so bad that even the simplest things leave her shocked.
“I would do anything for you,” I confess.
Vivienne’s breath stills, and mine does too, as if all the air has been pulled into a vacuum. That’s one loaded confession to tell your fake fiancé, but it’s the truth.
We’re supposedly going with the flow, but I’d be lying if I said the flow isn’t nudging me toward real commitment.
I sleep better when she’s next to me. I’m my happiest when she's around. The tumultuous, crazy world we live in feels calm with her.
Vivienne has her fears, but it seems I have my own as well.
This girl has been sleeping in my bed every night for almost a month, nuzzled next to me for heat, yet I’ve been too scared to come clean about my feelings.
I don’t want to see this fall apart before it even has the chance to take off. Some things work out, and others don’t, and I would hate for this to fall into the latter.
“You know what I was thinking about today?” She lifts her head off my chest, meeting my eyes. “Where would we be if no one cared about us?”
