Letters to the Star Whisperer

-53-

Aspen invited Alien Baby and Kitty along with them. They tagged along, even though Ethan was secretly hoping they wouldn't. It was around eleven, but there was a 24/7 hour restaurant that was opened just down the road. It was empty, but still going. When they entered, they got a few looks, but not too many.

Ethan did feel embarrassed being with the two other people with their eye catching costumes, but who was he to these girls. Maybe they were embarrassed to be with him. Luckily, the restaurant still served waffles at this hour.

"Hey, I know you. You gave me that fifty dollar tip just about a month ago," the older waitress said to Aspen. "You know what, it's on the house."

Ethan dropped his head and started shaking it as the waitress took the menus and walked away. He faced Aspen, and she smiled, "What?"

"How do you know all these people?"he asked.

She just shrugged. "I don't know. Sometimes I forget my random act of kindness," she said taking a sip of her water.

"We are still happy that you knocked the living day lights out of him," Alien Baby said. Ethan just shrugged. "Oh, my real name is Karen, by the way."

The cat girl said, "Oh, and my read name is actually Skyler." She took off her cat ears and placed them in her bag. Karen gave her goggles to her and she placed it along with her ears. They looked semi normal, expect for their outfits, but it wasn't as eye snatching as their head gear.

"Well, thank you for telling me your name," Ethan said. "I am just happy I don't have to scream Alien Baby across the street if I ever see you again."

The group gave a laugh, and he started to look less red. When they got their waffles, they all started talking like they were all long life pals. Turned out Skyler worked as an RN and Karen was a preschool teacher. Ethan didn't ask any more questions on that, even though he was now worried for his future kid and what teacher they really had. He wondered how many teachers growing up was into stuff like that and he had no idea about.

Aspen had texted Jane before they started to walk to the restaurant, telling her about the date. Jane had called back in a heartbeat, and told her, "I'll be there in twenty minutes." She arrived when the waffles did. Aspen gave her a weak and tired smile, holding out a fork for Jane to share their giant waffle with.

"I am so sorry," Jane said hugging Aspen.

Aspen accepted the hug. "It's ok, it's really okay, don't worry about it."

When Jane let go, she pointed to Ethan, "You! You get a pass from me. Ethan, I now fully accept you."

"For some reason, that scares me," he half mumbled. "It's no big deal."

Jane scooted next to Aspen. She said hello to the two new people and the conversion went on. They were laughing, exchanging stories. Karen and Skyler were actually nice to talk to. Ethan started to think about a month and a half ago, and he started to think of what he was like.

He started to think what he thought life would be like for him and how wrong he was. Ethan thought that maybe he would be doing the same thing as always. He would go to a club, not the other club, just the one with normal drunks.

He thought maybe he would be doing the same work that he hated, still wouldn't have known Tom's past and that he had a kid. He wouldn't have known about Super-Duper-Awesome-eggs. He wouldn't have met Joy.

He wouldn't have met Jane. He wouldn't have known how Boulder really was. He wouldn't have known that he could do whatever he wanted that made him happy. He wouldn't have had the guts to stand up to people he would have simply turn his back on. Most importantly, he wouldn't have had met Aspen, the one that showed him the beauty in the stars.