“Great.”
He keeps staring and smiling and then I’m smiling as well and we must look like two lovesick teens who don’t know how to act around each other.
“Yeah, great,” I say. “Shouldn’t you…?”
It’s like he realizes he’s holding an actual child at that moment.
“Oh, right! Yes. Okay, see you in a bit.”
“See you in a bit.”
He turns to head back into the school tent but spins around super quick to add one more thing.
“You look different,” he says, “good still, but different.”
For another beat he smiles at me like he’s lost his goddamn mind.
“Go!” I say and finally he nods and returns to his adoring fans.
As Jasper launches into a new story, all the energy I have left in me seems to flood out the bottoms of my feet and I know I need to find somewhere to lie down immediately.
I wake from a long nap to find Jasper’s arms wrapped around me.
“Hey,” he says as I hum and roll over to face him.
“Hey,” I say, noticing just how groggy I sound. “Have you been here long?”
“Just a few minutes.”
“How was the rest of the show?”
“The kids had a few notes, but they liked my Big Bad Wolf impression.”
“Mmm, I always thought the Big Bad Wolf was misunderstood. Wait, you read them that human propaganda?”
“We did the alternate version where Little Red and Big Bad team up to defeat the evil woodsman.”
“Ah! I see.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Sleepy but good.”
“How was the moonwalk? You didn’t tell me much before.”
“Well, you were busy giving the performance of a lifetime.”
He punches my arm softly.
“Stop. Tell me about your experience.”
“It was…I saw a lot of things. You were there.”
“I was?”
“Uh-huh. Actually you were kind of everywhere. Except the lunar plane, that was just me and…I think I met Selene.”
He pulls back, sitting up just a little.
