Fireworks go off in my chest. I think I might faint if he doesn’t touch me.
Just when I can’t take it anymore, his arms are around me, and my arms are around him, and he’s warm and solid, and he smells good, like freshly laundered clothes hanging in the sun. I’m overwhelmed with relief. Gratitude. Joy.
I know right at that moment that it wasn’t just the twinkling stars. I don’t want to be Just Friends. But what about him?
“Hi,” he murmurs into my hair.
“I missed you,” I say, tightening my arms around his back until I can hear his heart thudding inside his chest.
I want to tell him, I missed you so much, it felt like I was dying.
I want him to say that to me.
But we’re both silent, and I feel his arms stiffen. He pulls back, looking over my shoulder. My mom is standing behind us, arms crossed.
“Hi, Lennon,” she says. “It’s good to see you.”
“You too.”
She hands him a bag with something in it. “Here you go.”
“Thanks,” he says, smiling.
I glance back and forth between them. “What’s going on? Is this some sort of drug ring?”
Lennon’s brows waggle. “You’ll see.”
My mom and Lennon in cahoots? That’s definitely interesting.
He gives her a shy look. “Are you . . . ? I mean, is it okay that we leave?”
“It’s fine. I’m fine.” She makes a shooing gesture. “You guys go on out. I’m actually looking forward to some peace and quiet. Just come back at a semireasonable hour.”
“We will,” he tells her, lifting the bag she gave him in thanks.
As we head down the steps, she calls out, “And, Lennon? Keep her safe.”
“Don’t worry,” he calls back. “I always do.”
He leads me toward his car, which I haven’t been inside since he got it last summer. The heavy door creaks—loudly—and the inside of the car smells like old leather and engine oil. It’s not entirely unpleasant.
“No dead bodies in the back, right?” I ask when he slides into driver’s seat next to me.
“Not this week.” He smiles at me, and I feel like I’m melting into the seat.
For the love of God, get ahold of yourself, Everhart.
“Now, strap in,” he instructs me, “so I can make good on my responsibility for your safety.”
“Where are we going?”
“That’s a secret, Medusa.”
A tiny, electric thrill shoots through me when he uses my nickname. “I don’t like secrets,” I remind him.
“You’ll like this one. I think. I hope. Let’s find out.”
He drives down Mission Street and won’t give me any hints as we speed across town. I try to figure it out—a movie? A restaurant? Coffee at the Jitterbug?—but he just says, “Nope,” after each guess. Honestly, I’m so happy just to be close enough to reach out and touch him that I genuinely don’t care where we go. But when we pass familiar landmarks and the car’s engine strains climbing a hill at the edge of town, I think I realize where we’re headed.
The observatory.
He pulls into the parking lot, and we’re the only car here. Not surprising, because it closed half an hour ago. But Lennon parks, and he pulls me across the parking lot toward a zigzagging cement pathway on the left side of the building, which heads to the public rooftop area. We head up inclines bordered with painted metal railings until we get to a locked gate. Lennon punches in a key code.
“How did you know that?” I ask.
“Guess I got lucky.”
“Lennon,” I say, serious.
“Zorie,” he says, not serious. “I did not come by the code illegally, nor did I promise to do anything illegal in exchange for it. Now, please, if you would, Miss Everhart . . .” He holds the gate open and gestures.
I squint at him and step through.
Red lights border the low wall around the dark viewing platform. Below us, at the base of the mountain, the city unfurls to the Bay, a grid of white and yellow lights, sparkling like fallen stars on black ground. San Francisco’s skyline glitters in the distance, and we can see both the Golden Gate and Bay bridges stretching over dark water. The wind blows, and I smell eucalyptus trees.
It’s a beautiful view. A breathtaking view.
And it’s our view; we are alone.
When the observatory is operational, a connecting oxidized green dome opens up to allow a large, high-powered professional telescope to scan the skies. That’s closed right now, but the two smaller public telescopes that normally are rolled into a small metal shed every night are still sitting out.
“What is this?” I ask.
“I’m not positive,” he says, scratching his chin, “but I think it’s an observatory.”
I slant a hard look at him.
He flashes me a smile. “Avani helped me arrange it with Dr. Viramontes. We talked a lot after you left the meteor shower. I thought he’d hate me after the big scene with your dad—”
I groan. It’s still humiliating.
“But Dr. Viramontes was surprisingly cool about everything.”
“He’s a cool guy,” I say.
“He likes you an awful lot,” Lennon says. “Which makes two of us. Here. You’ll need this.”
I accept the bag that my mom gave him and look inside. It’s my good camera. “My mom’s in on this?”
“I wanted to make sure she was okay about where we were going. Things were weird between us in the past, and I didn’t want her to hate me like your dad does.”
I shake my head. “She always stood up for you.”
“Are you okay? I mean, about your father moving out. I know it’s not easy—for you or you mom.”
“It’s weird,” I admit. “I’m not sure it’s hit me fully yet.”
“I wish things had been different. As much as I’ve fantasized about horrible things happening to him, I never wanted to see you or Joy hurting.”
“I know,” I tell him, crinkling the paper bag that holds my camera. “At least something good came out of it.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m not banned from seeing you,” I say, feeling inexplicably shy.
“Not yet,” Lennon says, eyes merry. “The night is young.”
I set the bag with my camera
