Buses.
Trucks.
Fucking tractors.
Everwyld has gone all-out, and when the fire brigade finally appears, even the engines have been decked out with lights and tinsel.
The first truck passes, firefighters chucking sweets and small teddy bears from the open windows, calm and serene, a stark contrast to the absolute riot unfolding on the second engine bopping along behind them, and of course, that’s where I find him. Galen. Hanging off the side rail by his good arm, jacket open, glitter on his face catching the light as he moves,dancing, loose and free, like the music pumping from the engine’s cab belongs to him.
He’s laughing too, as his crew eggs him on. I can’t hear him over Wizzard, but I know it all the same. Feel it in the air as the warm rumble I’ve found myself dreaming about unclenches the fraught knot in my stomach.
There you are.
And here I am. But whether it’s luck or mercy, Galen doesn’t spot us, and I’m as relieved as I am deflated when the truck rolls past without the contact I’ve come to crave.
Esme, though. She doesn’t care that we’re half hidden by a lamppost. She finds Galen almost as fast as I do, and sheshrieks, planting both mittened hands on my head to climb higher on my shoulders. “Papa! Galen! Look.”
I’m trying, but with her hands smooshed against my face, it’s hard to see anything that isn’t the thick wool of the fancy coat my parents sent her from France. Or her beaming smile when I manage to shift her enough to see her face lit up as bright as the string bulbs wrapped around the ladders on Galen’s truck.
I swear, she glows with it, and it’s enough to have me carrying her through the crowd to a better spot, closer to the road—closer tohim—as we catch the engines on the corner.
Esme finds Galen again and bounces in my arms, and she doesn’t seem to mind that he hasn’t seen us. That he keeps dancing, oblivious and beautiful while she vibrates with excitement, and me?
I fucking love it, and I feel hollow when he’s gone. I take Esme back to Tam’s stall and help him out for an hour or so while Esme sits on a chair between us, eating enough sugar to keep her awake for a week, even though it’s way past her bedtime.
The night winds down. Stalls and stands pack up, and superstar that my brother is, he’s sold out, so there isn’t much to carry back to his van as the town returns to its usual quiet.
Esme iswired. I take her hand, thankful we’ve moved past the days when social workers knocked on our door first thing in the morning, my mind on the bedtime battle I’ll face when we get home?—
Lyrical Irish brogue cuts through the biting cold. “Sab?”
I turn and Galen’s right there. Fresh from wherever the parade took him, the glitter on his cheeks catches under the street decorations, limning his easy grin, and he’s so fucking good to look at, for a hot second, I just stare.
Esme has less gormless chill.
She squeals his name, wrenches her hand free of mine, and barrels away from me. Barrels toGalen, as he crouches and opens his arms as if he’s been waiting for her all night.
Esme skips to him with zero hesitation, slapping her mittened hands to his face.
Galen laughs and taps the end of her nose. “There you are, little lady. I was hoping I’d see you and your dad again tonight.”
“You’ve seen us already?”
“Course I have. You can’t hide the moon behind a lamppost.”
Merde.
Heat creeps up my neck.
Galen grins and stands with Esme in his arms, bringing her back to me. And he comesclose, right into my personal space, the way he did at the fête, so he can whisper in my ear, “You made my parade. I’d have eaten myself into a coma otherwise.”
“Oh yeah? What were you eating?”
“French Fancies, and let me say this, boy, as far as French things go, I’d rather eatyou.”
He murmurs the words so low I barely hear them. Or have time to react before Esme has his full attention again. “Did you like the parade?”
Pickled by sugar, Esme laughs and tugs on Galen’s uniform. “Galen!”
