may shatter on impact (tronnor)

76. Painted Stars & the Ghosts of Us

"Hey, Connor," I say, taking Dan's seat next to him - Dan's not here yet anyways. "How are you?"

He shrugs. "I've been better, but I'll be fine by the end of school. How are you?"

"I'm okay. And, well, you know how winter break starts after school today?"

"Yeah," he says, staring at me. "Why?"

"I'm going back to Clarke Lake for vacation."

He sits straight up. "What?"

"A friend invited us for some reason, and Tyde and Mum think it will be good for some reason, and I dunno. It'll be nice to see some of my friends."

"It's not going to be..." He pauses, searching for the right words. "Like...bad for your mental health?"

I shrug. "I guess we'll find out."

"Well call me if anything happens, yeah? And just to talk, if you want," he adds, seeming almost nervous.

"Time zones, though."

"Right." His sea colored eyes are downcast, his pencil tapping the desk in an absent minded fashion. "Text me, then."

"I will."

My cold hands grip the car door, opening it and letting the air rush inside. I shiver through the warmth of the car, Mum and Tyde following me. Dad sits in the front, telling the cab driver where to go: first and only stop Kayla's house.

The taxi pulls up to her house, the bright white paint seeming to glow in the darkness. The screen door bangs open and a girl rushes out, her parents right on her heels.

"Troye!"

Her arms are around mine, my fingers meeting around her neck, her head buried in my shoulder, her brown hair in front of my eyes but I don't care, Kayla, she's here, she's still here, it's really her. "Kayla, oh my God," I whisper and she just nods and doesn't pull away, holding on to me because oh my God she's real and she's still here and alive and we're safe and we're together.

"Troye. Kayla," Tyde coughs behind us, his hand pressed awkwardly against the taxi door, fingers clutching the handle of his suitcase.

Kayla looks up, brushing her hair back and stepping away from me. "Hey, Tyde. I can help with your bags, if you want."

"I think we're good," Tyde says, "if Troye takes his."

"Yeah. Got it." I grab my suitcase from the trunk of the car, joining Tyde and Kayla and Dad and Mum and Lila on the front porch. "Hello," I tell Lila.

She waves back at me, grinning. "It's great to see all of you! Come on, let's go inside. Troye, you can sleep with Kayla in her room if you'd like, Tyde, you and Laurelle will be in the guest room." We nod, stepping into the warmth of Kayla's house, breathing in the smell of baking cookies and chocolate and vanilla. I follow Kayla up to her room, dropping my bags next to the desk, the white a huge contrast against the dark brown of my suitcase.

Kayla sits on her bed, leaning against the pillows, leaving a space for me to join her. I do, my head on her shoulder, her hands next to mine, the two of us staring at the stars that we had painted on her ceiling so long ago.

"Do you remember when we painted those?" Kayla whispers, closing her eyes. "It was because my grandmother had just passed away and you guys were trying to cheer me up. It was the two of us, and Jason, and...and him."

She still can't say his name.

"And we stole your dad's paint, and Jason taught us all how to draw stars the way he did it - a triangle without the bottom, a diagonal line, one going across, then a line back to the beginning. He said that so many times, remember? A triangle without the bottom, a diagonal line, one going across, then a line back to the beginning."

I smile at the memory. "And we forgot that we were painting the ceiling and so the paint all dripped down onto the floor."

She laughs softly. "God, Mom was so mad at us."

"Are they still there?"

"What?"

"All the little blobs of paint that none of us wanted to clean up."

She smiles. "Yeah, yeah they are. Everyone who comes over always asks about them."

"What do you say?"

"I tell them about you. I tell them that I have these amazing friends named Troye and Jason who tried to paint all the stars in the sky for me."

"I still would. I just...can't do it from here. I'll have to paint the stars for you from a thousand miles away."

"I know. And I do get it, Troye. I wish that I could move away from the stars that you and Jason and...and Tyler tried to paint and then I'd paint new ones, ones without all the memories attached to them."

"Kayla? Troye?" Lila pokes her head into the room, her hair tucked back into the same bun that she always has when baking. "Dinner's ready."

"We'll be there in a minute," Kayla says, and Lila leaves the room. She stand up. "Come on. Let's go think about happy things now."

I smile. "I'll be down in a second." I get up, and stand at the door for a moment, just watching the little white stars stare back at me. The ghosts of ten year old Tyler and me and eleven year old Jason and Kayla dancing around the room, paintbrushes in our hands, the beginning of the night sky on the ceiling. We grow up in this room, the stars staring down on us when Kayla changes into her nicest black dress for her friends' funerals, taking my hand as we both sob into each other's shoulders and watch the stars and the memory of the four of us.

This is the storm that those stars hide.