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Caelon

Another Sunday of pack breakfast, something I don’t particularly enjoy. I know Nova means well, but watching her with Silas and now Warrick with Aspen, I can’t help but feel so alone. Everyone is laughing together as they fill their plates with food, while I stand in the corner waiting my turn.

I’ve never done well with the complexities of human interactions, especially in settings as large as this. There are far too many factors to take into consideration. I watch Xavior as he argues with Nellie again, something that is becoming another common occurrence around here.

The one light of my day is whenshecomes in, the one who fascinates me as my complete opposite.

“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?” Gail asks from beside me.

“Who?”

“You know exactly who I speak of, Caelon,” she says as she turns to look toward my obsession.

“Y-yes,” I stutter out.

“I’m glad you think so. You know she wants to open a photography business. I bet she could use the help of someone great with numbers.” She smirks as she taps my shoulder before walking to the buffet of food.

I watch her, with her peaceful smiles and camera dangling from her neck. She always picks the honeydew melon every single week, along with the apple juice and banana nut muffin. She doesn’t realize that I know her smile falters when people aren’t as excited about her photos as she is. How she lights up when someone asks to see the photos. I see her. One day, I hope she sees me.

Epilogue

Warrick

Three Months Later

“Welcome to Ireland, ladies and gentlemen. The current time is 9:53 A.M., with partly cloudy skies and a brisk 67 degrees outside. The flight attendants will come through the cabin to collect all your trash as we prepare for landing.”

Aspen squeezes my hand in excitement. The last three months have been a whirlwind of preparing for our month-long trip. I still have to pinch myself to make sure it’s real.

After landing and exiting the plane, we make our way to baggage claim. Aspen might have packed like she was moving here, but her argument is you never know what you are going to need. As we come down the escalator, we find a tall, bearded gentleman holding a sign with my last name on it. I give Aspen a questioning look before looking back at the man with his sharp nose and hair tightly curled against his head.

“Ms Stone.” He nods his head. “Mr. Merrit. If ye both can follow me, I’ll have someone collect your luggage.”

“How will they know which ones are ours?”

“Don’t worry, Ms. Stone, they will take care of it.” He turns to head out the sliding doors.

Aspen looks at me, she asks, “Did you know we were getting a car service?”

“Sure didn’t, but how cool is that?”

“I guess. Seems a bit excessive to me.”

As we prepare to walk through yet another doorway, I look at her and she asks, “You ready?”

I smile at her before saying, "As long as I have you, I’ll always be ready for anything.”

Later that evening, as we are unpacking our bags in the room the Conri na Sliabh pack offered us, I notice Aspen has been rather quiet since we came into the room.

Moving beside her as she tucks our clothes into the dresser, I rub my hand up and down her back in a soothing motion. “Everything okay? You’ve been rather quiet since we got here.”

She looks at me with a small smile. “Yeah, everything is fine. Just been feeling a little nauseous since we got off the plane. I thought it was from jet lag, but it hasn’t let up.”

The soothing circles I’m rubbing into her back seem to work as she leans into them. “You want me to see if they have some crackers or something to help with it?”

“No, that won’t…” Aspen is cut off when there is a knock at the door.

“Odd, I didn’t think we were expecting anyone yet,” I grumble as I walk over to the door. The door swings open to reveal a rather older-looking woman with a full head of gray hair and skin aged with the passing of time. Her milky eyes move across the room until they stop on Aspen, sitting on the edge of the bed.