The Stars Are Brightly Shining
They were putting up the Arbor family's ratty old tree when the Luke's power was knocked out. Tala fiddled with a loose ribbon on the sad, little, home-made angel that she found in the bottom of the ornament box. Holding it up to Luke had only elicited a blush and the shy admission that he'd made it sometime around his preschool days and his mom had kept it ever since--despite his efforts to make it disappear.
Tala had laughed quietly at his dismayed look after she's set it near the top of the tree and Luke had just stretched out a long arm to reach for the angel when, with a small beep from the Carbon Monoxide detector, the house had been plunged into darkness. The beginnings of "O Holy Night" playing from Luke's iPod speaker had been cut short to: "The stars are brigh…" followed by a sharp squeak of surprise from Tala and a "Seriously?" from Luke.
The power company's automatic assurances that the problem would be fixed by noon on the following day had proven false and the couple found themselves without heat or water for two days before they stopped checking the power company's automatic messages and instead curled up under mounds of blankets to escape the cold.
They spent Christmas Eve like that, talking to each other in low voices with the covers pulled over their heads all save for a small opening so they could breathe. Luke told Tala stories of his childhood Christmases and Tala pressed her cold feet against Luke's shins just to hear him yelp indignantly.
She was still laughing childishly when he gathered her closer to him and buried his face in her hair. She settled against him although she poked him in the ribs once and complained that neither of them had showered since the storm had knocked out the power. He had shrugged dispassionately in reply and reluctantly pulled back albeit just enough that he could see her face.
"Do you…?" he fiddled with a frayed thread on one of the blankets
"Do you think you could keep doing this?" A blush crept across his features "No, that came out wrong! I mean, would you...I dunno, would you very much mind spending forever stuck with me?" Luke's eyes squeezed shut as though the question had sounded better in his brain and come out wrong yet again.
Tala laughed softly and inserted her head under his chin again with her ear pressed against a heartbeat that had grown suspiciously fast. "I wouldn't think of it as being 'stuck with' you, Luke...But yes, I do think forever sounds good…" She tilted her head up in time to catch the quickening of his breath. "Why do you ask?" she couldn't help being curious, he'd been wanting to ask her this for a while now, since before the power cut even, she'd seen him open his mouth a couple times to ask her a question and then close it again as though the time wasn't right.
Luke shrugged but a smile was tugging at his lips "No reason…"
Tala poked him in the ribs again and he yelped "You tell me, Lucas Robert Arbor!" she poked him again "'No reason' my foot!" She was beginning to guess at his reasoning but she wasn't sure, after all-some things happened more quickly in Tenides than Vancouver.
Luke laughed softly and held his ribs where she had poked him "Fiiiiiiiiiiiinnnneeeeee….But I blame this on you, I was gonna make this much nicer… And we were supposed to be somewhere with heat... and proper lighting…" He was sliding out from under the covers now, sitting up and shivering as his bare feet hit the cold hardwood of his basement bedroom floor. "Wait here." And he was off the light of the flashlight in his hand flickering on in the dark as his coltish legs carried him away.
Tala sat up pulling the covers around her shoulders to stave of the chill of the room a little longer. "Luuke?" she called out uncertainly hearing a crash and a small curse. He returned an assurance and a moment later was back in the room carrying something in his palm. Unfortunately for Tala, his flashlight was angled in such a way that she couldn't make out what it was. Then he was kneeling and at first Tala though he'd dropped whatever he'd been carrying but she found she couldn't breathe when she looked at him and his eyes were focused on hers, his palm open to reveal a shiny silver ring caught between his thumb and first two fingers.
She could barely hear the words he was saying past the trembling that had taken hold of her but his expression was open and earnest and so very *Luke* that she thought she might cry. And then he was giving her an expectant look, eyes begging for an answer and Tala found she was holding the blankets in a death grip, knuckles white and unrelenting as she tried to pry her hands free…
"Yes!" The word was barely a whisper but the effect it had on young man's face was instantaneous. The hazel of his eyes suddenly seemed brighter and a slow smile spread across his face, first a flash of white teeth and the dimples that deepened at the corners of his mouth before the corners of his eyes crinkled ever so slightly and a happy laugh bubbled from his chest.
He was kissing her before she knew what was happening. Faintly she was aware of the ring sliding onto her finger, but more than that she was focused on the warmth that spread through her as she responded to the kiss, the quick heartbeat under her hand as she slid it to rest against his chest, the air they savored together as they broke the kiss to lean forehead to forehead as he grinned at her and her own features warred over which of the many emotions she was experiencing to display. They stayed that way for a time, eyes sliding closed just letting their heartbeats settle into the same rhythm.
Tala let her eyes flutter open as she pushed her arm out, palm down to admire the ring on her finger, it glinted in the beam of the flashlight which had dropped to the side table when Luke got to his knees. A circle of light surrounded the couple, the only light in the house as darkness settled early that night. It was so chilled in the little room that she could see their breath, faint silver tendrils to curl though the air and dissolve into the cold. Luke chuckled slightly and he pulled her ring hand into his.
"I was hoping you'd say that…"
He was blushing. Not the deep red that indicated he'd been sorely mortified either by his own clumsiness or Tala's quick tongue, but the faint tinge of pink accompanied by the still deepened dimples that made him look boyish and shy.
Tala tilted her head slightly only then realizing that her own smile matched his in wattage. "I'll say it again." she threatened and he looked vaguely confused before he grinned again.
She leaned in and kissed his jawline... "Yes."
...and finally his lips, which moved beneath hers as he returned the kiss. "Yes!" A small laugh and she settled against him, feeling his arms snake around her to pull her close….she never wanted to move again.
