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My head swings toward Phoenix, and I see the shocked truth of it on her face. Her gaze drops to the floor as if guilty at being caught out, especially by my father. And Vlad, if he’s the one who knew it too.
My chest clenches for her. I reach out for her hand and squeeze. Of course she wanted a normal life. She couldn’t even tell me the truth about herself for years. She was embarrassed… or guilty, it suddenly dawns on me. She feels guilty about what she did, back when she was a spirit who didn’t fully understand what she was asking for when she made bargains with a human from this world.
She’s kind-hearted in nature but didn’t understand humanity until she was born as a baby to loving parents. Then she’s had to live with the decisions she made before she was even born, only a shapeless spirit in some other place…
Of course, all she wants is to be normal.
“You,” my father says, his cold eyes coming back to me. “Yes, you’ve wanted your wings back since the day I sliced them off and poured hell-metal down your back to keep them from regrowing. But more than that, you are a pitiful little being that craves love. Each of you hopeless creatures wants what they can never have, doomed to live out stories without a happy ending.” My father tut, tut, tuts.
“Fuck you,” I bark at him, my face flaming with anger for taunting us like this.
“Don’t you see?” My father laughs. “Today is your lucky day. Today,” he says, his voice lulling, “both of you little desperate beasts can have everything you want. Just look.”
He points behind us. Golden runes light up beneath our feet, and Phoenix gasps.
“Layden, look!” Her voice sounds full of wonder.
I don’t want to look. I know the moment I do, my father gets what he wants. She grabs my hand, and I want to yank her away. To warn her of the danger.
But her voice is so insistent and delighted when she cries, “Layden!”
In spite of myself, I turn.
The little house at the end of the cul-de-sac is perfect. It couldn’t be more perfect.
It’s sea-foam green with white shutters and a white picket fence. The grass is so, so green, and the sky so, so blue.
“Oh, Layden, I couldn’t be happier,” Phoenix says from beside me. I look over, and she’s in her wedding dress, beaming up at me. “This is all I’ve ever wanted. Come inside.”
I clench her hand to mine like a lifeline. Because she is all I’ve ever, ever wanted. I finally have all I’ve ever craved. I finally feel full.
I lift her into my arms, and she giggles with joy as she throws her arms around my neck. I’ve never heard her so light and happy and free.
Life starts here, at this moment, with her.
I carry my bride over the threshold of our new life.
The house inside is just as perfect, and not because it’s some mansion. It’s not. It’s small. Cramped even, some might say.
“I love it,” Phoenix says, looking around, then smiling back at me so big. “And I love you.”
My chest expands at her words. Why does it feel like I’ve been waiting forever to hear them? “You do?”
“Of course I do, silly,” she laughs, then nuzzles her forehead to mine. “I have since that first day I ran into you on that hiking trail and gave you first aid.”
I nuzzle her back, so full of love even as my memory blanks a little, but then, piece by piece, the blanks are filled in. Oh yes, the day we met. I’d gotten into an… accident of some kind on the hiking trail deep in the woods. I frown as I try to make out the details, then forget as soon as Phoenix kisses me.
The details don’t matter. I remember Phoenix coming to my rescue. She took me back to her cabin while I recovered. Tended to me. Brought me back to life, it felt like.
I nuzzle my face against hers, whispering into her hair, “I couldn’t admit to myself how long I’ve loved you.”
She shakes her head. “We were so stupid for so long. We never should have let anything come between us and keep us apart.”
I nod, and like magnets, we turn toward each other, kissing as hungrily as I’ve always dreamed. I pour all of my love into the kiss, and our tongues dance as she presses her mouth eagerly back against mine.
She tugs hers away only long enough to say, “Show me the bedroom?”
I carry her down the short hall to one of the two bedrooms of the small house. The carpet’s a little worn, and it could use some new trim, but Phoenix just looks around as I carry her and sighs happily. “I love this house. It’s so normal.”
