Page 46 of Once Upon a Star

“Don’t you have goals and ambitions?” She gave me a knowing look as she took a sip of her wine.

I smiled and took a sip of wine. “I hadn’t thought of what would happen next. The only thing I cared about was getting you back. I figured everything else would fall into place.”

Ara gave me a look like she didn’t know how to comprehend that information. I reached over and took her hand in mine. She let me but I could see the uncertainty in her eyes. I squeezed her hand and said, “This, what we have, is the most important thing to me. No matter what happens next, all I know is that I want to be with you.”

“I want to be with you, too,” Ara said.

“Good.” There was so much more that we needed to discuss but the biggest hurdle was out of the way. We wanted each other, we loved each other. Everything would work out, it had to.

I looked outside and saw that it had stopped raining. I squeezed Ara’s hand again and said, “The rain has stopped. What do you say to taking a night hike with me?”

Chapter 26

Aracely

Of all the activities I did at camp, night hiking had to be one of my favorites. It wasn’t one that we got to do very often, and like the pizza on the last night, that made it special. I remember being younger and taking a hike with Bash. Ella and Layla had wanted to watch a movie under the stars so it had just been the two of us. It had been the first time he had taken my hand and when we had gotten back from the hike, he had kissed me.

I wondered if Bash was remembering too as we bundled up and headed out to the lake. We had found some flashlights but after the rain, the clouds had cleared and the moon was high overhead. We almost didn’t need them but I was glad we did.

It was strange to think that I had taken the same hike with Bash less than two days ago. So much had changed since then. I felt like my whole life had changed. Bash loved me, he wanted to be with me, he was implying that he was going to stay in New York so he could. He hadn’t said it in so many words but it was what I was hoping for. Though I was considering what it would mean if he needed me to be in California with him.

While they were all concerns that I had, I was going to enjoy the night, the moment with Bash. Tomorrow was soon enough to discuss everything else. For now, I wanted to live in the fairy tale world we had created. I liked thinking it was just the two of us. As if the rest of the world didn’t exist. It would all change when we got back to the city but that was hours away.

Bash took my hand as we walked out to the lake. It felt different doing it as an adult and I felt a little bit more apprehensive. When I was younger, I had been excited about the dark, about the possibility of something lurking in the shadows. Now I wasn’t as confident. It helped having Bash’s hand in mine and I tried to enjoy how beautiful it was and reminded myself there wasn’t anything out there that could hurt me.

When we got to the edge of the lake, Bash pulled me to him and I went into his arms. There was a slight chill in the air and feeling his body next to mine warmed me up, in more ways than one. I pressed my cheek to his chest and inhaled his scent. Bash ran his arms slowly up and down my back.

“Do you remember the first time we took this hike?” he asked.

“Yes. Of course. We were, what, fourteen at the time. Layla and Ella were butthurt with me for taking the hike instead of watching a movie with them. But I didn’t care. You mentioned you wanted to do the hike so I signed up for it.”

Bash laughed and said, “Really? I waited to see what you had signed up for and did the same thing.”

I tilted my head and looked at him. “Are you saying if I had done the movie, you would have too?”

“If it would have allowed me to be with you, yes,”

“Well, that’s great to know now as I only went on the hike to be with you.”

“I would say it worked out pretty well for us,” Bash said and brought his mouth down. I wrapped my arms around him and held him close. His tongue moved around mine and I melted into his arms.

“That it did,” I said when we broke away from each other.

Bash’s mouth was still close to mine and he whispered. “I never thought I would get the chance to recreate our first kiss.”

“Do you want to?” I asked.

“We just did,” he said.

“This isn’t where we had our first kiss,” I said and moved away from him.

“No. It was here. We went on the night hike and I pulled you back so that we were behind everyone. You got all worried that Amy was going to find out and get mad at us. You wanted to go into town the next day and didn’t want to lose that privilege. I told you it was going to be fine, I just wanted to ask you something and I kissed you.”

“That was our second kiss. The first one was after another night hike. When we got near the arts and crafts building, you told me you wanted to show me something and then you kissed me.”

“That was our second kiss. And that was after the camp scavenger hunt.”

“It was our first,” I countered but I wasn’t sure.