Night curls itself around the house like an oversized black cat, pulling everything beyond a certain distance into darkness. It’s peaceful and still outside, and though the temperature has dropped, the ground is holding onto its heat. Fireflies appear at the edge of Ms. Callahan’s lawn and drift between the wide boles of the trees there. Aiden and I exerted a lot of energy today, and we keep sharing drowsy smiles across the table.

Ms. Callahan has boxes she needs taken to the attic, and a few for the basement. There’s a fallen branch in her yard too heavy for her shift. A curtain with a tear that she can’t reach to take down, and a replacement curtain she’d like put up. And, of course, there’s the matter of her ailing plant.

I check my car for the bottle of extremely gentle soap I know is still in the trunk, then bring it inside when all of the other tasks are complete. I dampen a washcloth, add a little soap, and begin carefully wiping down each leaf.

“Is this literally just soap?” Aiden asks. Ms. Callahan cut up a mango after dinner, and he’s nibbling on a piece of it. My eyes linger on the touch of brilliant orange against his lip.

“Yes.” I dip the cloth back under the sink, then begin a second pass at each leaf. “Using soap is not a great solution, honestly, it strips too much of the wax and oil from the leaves. But I don’t have anything else with me, and there are tiny little bugs eating this thing up.”

“You’re a tiny little bug,” Aiden tells me.

“You’re a tiny little bug!”

It doesn’t land so well when I say it: no one in their right mind would ever describe Aiden as either tiny or little. He smirks at me, one eyebrow lifted, and drops the mango peel into the bowl with the others. He sucks the remaining juice off of his fingers.

Ms. Callahan, still seated out on the porch, flips on the radio. Faint music reaches us in the kitchen.

“So what you’re saying is, you’re actually giving a plant a bath right now.”

I fix Aiden with a disapproving glare, but he’s smiling widely, his arms folded and resting on the counter, his chin resting on his forearms. It means he has to look up at me, for once, not the other way around. Cool to discover that he looks irritatingly cute from this angle, too. I poke his nose, being sure to get some bubbles on it.

“Just because you’re not familiar with the concept of a bath.”

“I know about baths. More of a shower guy, though.”

The image of Aiden in the shower flashes through my mind before I can stop myself. I squeeze the leaf I’m working on a little too hard and decide the plant is probably fine for the night. 

A stinging pain races up my back as I settle the plant on the windowsill. Aiden doesn’t miss the look on my face. He straightens up, watching me.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I think I might have gotten a sunburn today.”

“Your face looks fine." His blue eyes linger on my cheeks.

“Well, cause you made me wear the hat all day. But my back is probably fucked.”

“Are you being serious?”

“It takes a while to set in, I didn’t notice before!”

“Show me.”

I hesitate, then glance through the window to Ms. Callahan.

“I’m not taking off my shirt in your aunt’s kitchen to show you my hideous sunburn.”

“Then let’s go upstairs.”

“Okay,” I say immediately, before my brain catches up. “Wait, no, are you joking?” I tug my shirt closer to my body, as if he might try to take it off right here. “I don’t want you to see it, I probably look like a cherry tomato.”

“You are impossible, you know that? Just come on. I think I might be able to help.”

I follow him upstairs to the second floor of Ms. Callahan’s house. He pushes open a closed door at the end of the hall. I’ve never entered this room during the course of the many errands and favors I’ve done for Ms. Callahan: it’s always shut, and I assumed it was a closet or something. It actually opens up into a corner room with a twin bed against the far wall. A window is thrown open, offering a breezy view of the nighttime landscape outside. Cool air drifts through it, a mercy on my sunburn even through my shirt.

I stop, taking in the room. A large set of free weights is on the floor against the baseboards. A single dresser has an old-school CD player on top of it, and a weathered surfboard leans against the wall.

That’s pretty much it, so far as decorations go.

“My room,” Aiden says, but I’ve already figured that much out. So this is the place Aiden would return to every night after a full day of making my life hell. I try to imagine him as I knew him then, his face and chin less broad, no crinkles at the corners of his eyes, most definitely no smile. That vague, disinterested expression that always seemed to be searching for the sensitive spot where an insult would sting the worst.

The Aiden of right now, on the other hand, looks a little hesitant, like this is maybe a vulnerable moment for him. He’s waiting for me to say something.

I move over to the dresser and experimentally turn the CD player on. It actually lights up, casting a blue glow onto my hands. I can see that there’s a disc inside, so I press play. A soft guitar melody drifts up from the speakers, along with a relaxed drumbeat.

I could hold you, in my arms, I could hold you, forever…

“Ray LaMontagne?” I ask, twisting to look at Aiden. He shrugs.

“That’s been in there since high school.”

“This is what you listened to in high school?” I can’t help but be surprised. “Wow. I would have pegged you as a Slipknot guy.”

Aiden snorts.

“I’ve always had all this noise in my head, so quieter stuff is better.”

There’s a single candle next to the CD player, the wick never burned. The sticker on the front says: Happy graduation, Aiden! Love, Aunt Sarah.

I trail my fingers along the surfboard, then try to pick up one of the free weights and fail so dramatically that Aiden laughs. I stop at the window and look out at his view, the swaying tree boughs that line Ms. Callahan’s yard, their tops silvered with early moonlight. His closet is the kind with a mirror for a door. There’s a fracture at the top, a split in the glass like someone punched it. I slide the mirror aside and look in at his stuff. His old jersey from the school soccer team is here. The rest of the hangers are empty. I have a strange urge to reach out and touch the fabric. Aiden is watching me, but I do it anyway. Memories I’d forgotten I ever had swirl into my mind: Aiden on the field with his teammates, kicking his toes in the grass to stay warm between plays. His chestnut hair damp with sweat, curling at the temple and falling into his eyes.

Ray LaMontagne sings on in the background: When you kissed my lips, with my mouth so full of questions, it's my worried mind that you quiet…

I want to make a joke: ask him where the hell the rest of his stuff is, inform him that no sane human being has absolutely nothing on their walls - in fact, this is a prime opportunity for a one backpack tease. But I don’t do it. Where Aiden has been silly and warm all day, I can sense that he’s grown serious now, feel it off of him without even turning around.

Tell me what you’re feeling, I want to say. I imagine him sitting in this room, plotting his escape from Ketterbridge. Something he’d planned to do for years, according to Melanie. What must it feel like to be back? And not only back, but back with me?

I guess we both know that it’s weird, because when I turn to look at him, we break into quiet laughter.

“This is the fucking strangest thing, right now,” he tells me. “Seeing you in here.”

I move to sit on his bed. The old springs groan softly under my weight, but the comforter is soft. Simple and unpatterned, just navy blue. Aiden waits a moment, then joins me, settling down a foot or so away.

“So,” he says. “Are you going to tell me how you actually got that bruise?”

“What?” I twist to stare at him. “I told you, I walked into a wall.”

“No, you didn’t,” he says firmly.

“Maybe I did.”

“You’re a terrible liar, Jamie. And I heard the jump in your energy. I told you, range isn’t a problem for me.”

“Maybe my energy jumped because I walked into a fucking wall!”

“Not like that, it didn’t. I was about to come and find you, but then it went back to normal.”

“How do you even know it was me?” I ask, as Aiden pulls up his feet to sit cross-legged on the bedspread. “I thought it was like picking out one note in a song.”

He shrugs.

“Yours is easy.”

I don’t know what to say to that, and Aiden is still looking at me, waiting for an explanation.

“Look,” I manage. “I’ll tell you how I got the bruise, but can it wait until tomorrow? I’m having like, a perfect day, and I don’t want to ruin it.”

Aiden looks like he’s prepared to argue, but instead he pins his lip between his teeth, smiles, and shakes his head.

“Fine. But at least let me help you with the sunburn.”

“It’s not even that bad,” I insist, though it’s currently eating my back alive.

“Let me see it, then.”

I make a pained face at him, then pull off my shirt and turn on the bed so that he’s facing my back. There’s a moment of silence.

“Holy fucking shit, Jamie.”

“It’s not my fault!” I protest, twisting to look at him over my shoulder. He has both hands clasped over his mouth, his eyes wide like he can’t decide whether to laugh. “I’m Irish, it just happens! You don’t even want to hear about what Kasey and I refer to as the ‘Infamous Miami Spring Break Debacle’, okay?”

“How did you sit still all dinner? I can literally feel the heat coming off of you.”

“I’ve had burns before, I know what to do, alright?” I protest. Aiden is clearly suppressing a laugh now, his blue eyes crinkled. “Do you have aloe vera, or, um, a new back I could have?”

“A new back?”

“I thought you said you could help!”

“I probably can.” He glances down at his hands, like he’s considering their capabilities. “A sunburn is mostly trapped heat. I think I can just pull it out.”

I stare at him in silent confusion before it dawns on me what he means.

“You mean - use your magic? To take the heat out of my sunburn?”

“Yeah, I mean. I think I can?”

“Oh, well, thanks for the offer, but I saw what happened the last time you tried to do something with heat. You nearly gave us both a heat stroke, and came one step away from melting the Ghost Office.”

“That’s because I was trying to make the glasses work. I know how to just move heat, it’s very similar to light.” He tilts his head to the side. “I won’t do it if it’s going to make you uncomfortable.”

I mean. If he feels like he knows how to do it, I trust him. It’s not exactly like he’s ever over-sold his abilities before. I don’t think he’d do anything to hurt me, not on purpose.

“Ummm… okay. Let’s try. But if you melt my skin off, I swear…”

“Just hold still,” he says. I turn and face forward again. He shifts closer on the bed behind me. "Stop me if you need to, alright?"

Ten sudden points of contact on my back, cool against my burning skin. His fingertips, more gentle than I would have thought them capable of being. 

I didn’t expect him to touch me. I hold completely still as his fingers move up my spine and along my shoulders, apparently mapping out what they’ll be doing. He stops, one thumb brushing over the scar on my right shoulder.

“What’s this?” he murmurs.

“Oh-” I try to sound as casual as possible. “No big deal. Got in a bar fight.” I glance over my shoulder and find a skeptical look on his face. “Fine. I hugged Nugget too hard when he was a puppy and he scratched me trying to get away. There. Are you happy now?”

He's close enough that I feel his huffing laugh on the bare skin of my back. He settles his fingertips just below my ribs, like he’s about to slide his arms around my waist.

“Ready?” he asks, very softly. An answering blush crawls up my cheeks before I can do anything to stop it. I hope he didn't see that. Doesn’t he normally close his eyes when he does magic? Why are they open right now?

“Ready.”

“Are you sure? Your energy is jumping all over the place. Feels a bit like you’re freaking out.”

I fucking forgot that he can hear energy, for a minute. His hands on me have annihilated every other thought that could hope to cross my mind.

“Show me you can do it and I’ll stop freaking out!”

He chuckles and falls silent. There's a breath of silence, and then I’m aware of something happening. A gathering of heat around the places where he touches me. It doesn’t hurt, but it is a curious sensation: coolness breaking over my back, spreading down my shoulders, chasing the heat towards his hands. I can’t help but shiver a little. This is an entirely new experience for me.

Both the heat and his fingers withdraw from my back all at once. My eyes blink open; I turn to look at him. His irises are that frosty blue again. He has his palms cupped like he’s holding something.

“Wh - is that it?” I ask, pointing at his hands. “Seriously? That’s heat, from me?”

“A little from both of us, I think, but yep.”

“What the fuck!” I stare at it, amazed, then back up at him. “Is that burning your hands?”

“Nah.” He shrugs. “I can barely feel it.”

“But your cheeks are all pink,” I answer, leaning for a better look. “What do we do with it?”

Aiden glances around the room. His eyes land on his dresser. He lifts his cupped palms to his mouth and blows on them.

There’s a moment of silence, and then the wick of the candle on the dresser bursts into flame, flickering merrily. I stare at it, then swivel to look at him. Something in my face must be funny, because he starts laughing the moment he sees it, and I can’t help but join in. The strange moment breaks. He tosses me my shirt. I press my fingers against my back, testing the results. My skin feels normal and cool.

“Do I look back to normal?”

Aiden’s eyes skate over me.

“Yes, except - there are a lot more freckles.”

“That always happens after I burn.” I pull the shirt back on without even one squeal of pain. “Wow. Where were you doing the Infamous Miami Spring Break Debacle? You could have saved me so much money on Benadryl alone.”

He laughs again. I love the sound of it, the way it's rough around the edges but sweet like the feeling of his hands on me.

“Aiden? James?” Ms. Callahan’s voice finds us through the open door, though it sounds like she’s calling from downstairs. “I have one or two more things for you to move, and then I’m afraid we’re going to have to call it a night! I’m an old woman with an early bedtime!”

When it comes time to leave, Aiden walks me to the door.

“Well,” he says. “Try not to burn yourself again before we get to the Ghost Office tomorrow. Or walk into any more walls. Or hug any puppies too hard. Or-”

“I get it!” I push a finger over his lips. “That’s enough.”

I feel him smile under my fingertip.

Kasey must know that I need her, because she’s already waiting in the passenger’s seat when I climb into my car. We make the short drive back to my apartment in silence. I park out front and flip the car off, then sit still for a long time, staring through the windshield, my mind racing.

“What happened?” Kasey folds her hand around my fingers. “Jamie?”

“I decided.”

“Decided what?”

“I’m going to do it. I’m going to tell him.”