Under the Same Stars by Libba Bray(136)

“Seriously. It’s like my nose is having weird fetish sex. Oh god.” Chloe pounds her forehead with her fists. “Why did I say all of that? That was so creepy. I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

Miles laughs harder because, yes, it’s weird. And funny. But also because he’s relieved; Chloe doesn’t know what she’s doing any more than he does.

“How’s your new gig with Chi’s voting rights group working out?” she asks. “Are the Moms Squared still upset that you deferred college for a year to do activism?”

“Nah, they got over it. Honestly, I think they’re proud. But I like doing the work, you know? It feels … meaningful. Sometimes people slam doors in our faces. But we’ve also registered over a thousand new voters. Last week in Woodside, I registered a lot of new Filipinx voters. In one day, I signed up an eighteen-year-old and a seventy-five-year-old.”

“That’s awesome!”

“Yeah. It is. Now we’re working on protecting voting rights, fighting redistricting, stuff like that. Democracy is … a lot of work, it turns out.” Miles laughs. “But I remain hopeful.”

It’s thirty-one degrees outside. Bracing wind sloughs the loft’s manufactured warmth from their bodies, makes their cells dance awake. Streetlamps gooseneck above the narrow street, spreading a warm amber glow across the centuries-old cobblestones. Miles never used to notice the streetlamps before. The sidewalks were always so congested with humanity that getting from one place to the next was a bit of a video game. Emptied of all of that, the city is so very still. It’s nice in its way, but he misses the annoyance of people. Even the clueless tourists.

In the hollow spaces, their footsteps echo.

“Your Mormor seemed really happy.”

“She did, didn’t she? Your mom’s pictures are really incredible. I loved the ones of all the punks. And of Lena.”

“We should go to Berlin someday,” Miles says. He hopes it wasn’t too much.

Chloe’s eyes crinkle with a smile. “Totally. And Edinburgh! I really want to see Edinburgh.”

“Imma buy a kilt.”

“Yeah?”

“Gonna wear the sheep out of it. I’m ‘kilt-ing it’ in this thing!”

Chloe groans. “That was terrible! Really ‘off-kilt-er.’”

The air feels electric. Snow coming on.

“Where else should we go?” he asks.

“Mmm, Paris, for sure.”

“Hells yeah. Gotta see Paris. And Morocco. And Manila!”

“That would be amazing! Ooh, Iceland! I wanna see the northern lights.”

“Cooool.”

“Right? I mean, there’s a whole world still out there. Eventually.”

There is a world inside Miles, too. He is both nervous and at home, occupying two states at once. Maybe they will see all of those places. Maybe not. They are here now. On this street. In this city. On this night. And it is snowing. He does not want to be anywhere but right here with the people he loves. He does not want to be anyone but who he is with all that he has.

Delicate flakes dance in the beam of a streetlamp, turning the ghostly, dirty streets of New York into this new wonderland.

“Snow!” Miles says.

Chloe puts a hand to her chest in mock surprise. “Wait, hold on—they have the same word for it here in Tribeca that we do in Brooklyn? That’s amaaaazinggg!”

Miles laughs. “Yeahhh, okay.”

Chloe takes a deep breath and lets loose with a wolf howl. “Snoooooowwwww!”

“Snoooooowwww!” Miles howls back.

They howl separately and in unison until an old man raises his window and shouts, “Shut the fuck up!”

“Now it feels like New York,” Miles says.

Miles remembers his dream about the deer and snow being the souls of the departed saying hello. He wants to tell Chloe about it. He might someday. Miles wonders if Chloe is smiling behind her mask like he is. He wonders if seeing people’s lips will be the new erotica, like in Victorian times when a glimpse of ankle was supposed to drive people wild with desire. He wants to kiss her. But it can wait. He wonders if they will be in each other’s lives forever. He wants to tell her how much he loves her, but his heart is full of an awe so immense that no satellite currently floating above their hurting planet could ever connect to his mouth to relay it.

“What are you thinking about?” he says.

“I was thinking, What if snow actually tasted like dog shit?” Chloe says.

“Oh my god! Saaaame!” Miles says.

They double over, laughing so hard it’s nearly violent.

“Wish we could see the stars. Too much neon haze,” Chloe says.

“They’re still there, though.”

He looks down the street toward the soft warm glow of the loft and the defiant pictures hanging inside. He gets brave and laces his fingers in hers. She returns the gesture, glancing shyly at him from above her mask. It’s a start. Miles and Chloe lift their chins toward the night sky of New York City. Snowflakes wiggle down and settle gently on the two of them, testing out their human warmth for a second before dissolving into their skin. Hundreds of old souls, joining them.

“Snoooowwwww!” Miles howls, and it echoes off the concrete canyon of the weary city.