KAI

The sky is brilliantly blue, caressed by the rustling green tops of the rainforest.

Callie and I are at the small waterfall not far from Ayana. It’s tucked into the thick jungle with a blue lagoon that swallows the sunlight and almost blinds with its azure blue.

The water is deliciously cool as I dive from a thirty-foot rock. When I emerge from the water right below the waterfall, the lagoon is the rippling reflection of the sky. And I’m greeted with my favorite view—Callie’s tanned body perched on a flat rock. Her polka dot bikini top is back on. Dammit. She squints in the sunlight, then shimmies over to the edge and lowers her feet into the water, shielding her eyes from the sun as she smiles at me.

“How is it?” she shouts and dangles her feet in the water, splashing it around.

I swim up and, finding the rock bottom, walk up to her and nudge myself to stand between her legs, setting my wet hands on her sun-heated thighs.

“The water is great,” I say, leaning in to kiss her, then shake my head, splashing her with water droplets.

She squeals, then murmurs, “My nutcase,” when I kiss her again.

“Coming for a swim?” I close my eyes and lift my face to the sun.

I love this island, and I love it when it’s just the two of us. Ayana has been so loud and crowded lately, and Port Mrei even more so. Work never ends. Considering we work on social projects, we are surrounded by hundreds of people on a daily basis.

This—these moments in nature of just Callie and me and not a trace of any other humans—is rare.

I feel her warm hands as they palm my face. Her lips barely touch my cheek then disappear. Then touch my other one. Then my nose. My chin. She’s kissing me, but her kisses are like pecks. There’s deliberate order to them. I feel the tip of her tongue on my skin and her warm breath as she chuckles through her nose.

I open my eyes and narrow them on her, on her white smile and the blues of her pretty eyes, shining with the sparkly reflection of the water and happiness and mischief. Her blonde hair is tied into a messy bun on top of her head. Callie is sunshine, the girl who almost never stops smiling. At least not around me.

“What are you doing, petal? You sneaky little thing,” I murmur.

“Licking water droplets off your face,” she says, then licks the tip of my nose.

She bursts into laughter, her trill lacing with the sound of the falling water and the parrots screeching in the jungle.

“Love you,” she says and goes for another lick, but I pull back and grin, then bring my palm to her cheek, and she closes her eyes and leans into it.

“It’s so nice here,” she says dreamily.

With you, anywhere.

We’ve come here a number of times with the rest of the gang, but it’s the first time we are alone. We came so that Callie could suntan topless, and we could take a breather from the rest of the people. But most of all, so I could ask her an important question.

I wanted to wait until we set up the picnic stuff we brought with us, the fruits and sandwiches and fizzling cocktails. But this moment is perfect. There are years between betrayal and scars, survival and grief, and now her and smiles and forgiveness and blessing and a new family, the one who helped us get through our worst. Our family is the size of the island. And throughout those years, Callie was the cause but also the guiding star, the anchor. My everything.

"Will you marry me?" I ask her softly.

I should go fetch my shorts, get the ring out of the pocket, get down on my knees, do it properly and recite the speech that I made for this occasion.

But the words just burst out of me.

Her eyes fly open and widen in surprise, hope, and reassurance.

I smile, not taking my eyes off her. “Will you?”

"Kai! Yes! Yes!" Her arms fly around my neck, and we hug and laugh, and I don’t need more words than this to make her feel important and loved. We’ve said so much to each other to reconcile our pasts that all we need is to be close to each other to ensure our future.

Callie pulls back, grinning. But the longer I look at her without words, stroking her hair, the more her expression changes. She bites her lip. Tears well up in her pretty blue eyes.

At first, I think she is emotional, though this proposal didn’t come as a surprise, really. We’ve talked about it before. I just wanted to make it official.

But her eyes are filling up with tears fast.

Oh, man.

"Callie?” I tip her chin, trying to make her look at me, but she shakes her head and presses her forehead against my shoulder.

“I’m so happy,” she says in a broken voice.

“Yeah? Try again.” She might be happy, but there’s something else bothering her. “What's wrong, baby girl? What is it?"

"It's just…” She sighs. "I wish my mom got to meet you. I so wish… yeah…” She runs her palm over my chest.

This is the feeling I never stop relishing—her gentle touch, the constant casual brush of her fingers as if she’s always making sure I’m real.

"I told her about you back then, you know.” She finally lifts her face, a little smile on her puffy lips. I am an asshole because those lips already give me a wicked idea. Except my girl is upset now, while I thought we would be laughing and hugging and maybe getting naked to celebrate our engagement.

“She watched you on TV during your state finals. I told her so much about you. I just… Everything that happens to us, I constantly think… how I wish I could call her, tell her how happy I am, how amazing you are.”

I can see a sob coming and a possible breakdown. I won’t have it. Not now.

“Callie, hey, hey, hey, shhh.” I wrap my arms around her, pulling her tighter against my chest.

Memories about our families spill out of us at random times, and though it’s been several years since the Change that stole our loved ones, the memories still hurt so bad sometimes. We deal with the bad moments on our own. It’s the happy ones we wish we could share with the ones who are not here, still feeling guilty for being the ones who made it to the sunny side.

"She’d so love you, Kai,” Callie whispers in a broken voice, “and it's unfair and…”

"Baby girl, come here…”

I move to sit on the edge of the stone slab and hoist her into my lap. Right away, she folds her legs under her, wraps her arms around my neck, and buries her face in the crook of my neck.

It’s okay. I’ve learned how to fight these bursts of grief. We all have them. I slip into depression once in a while. It’s easier when a bunch of us are together, and we reminisce about the old times. The collective trauma is somehow faster to combat. As if it’s divided between us all.

"My dad would've loved you too,” I say as I stroke her hair. “And Lilly would. But they are not here. We are. And we are lucky. So lucky. I'm so fucking lucky to have you, Callie. Many people are not as lucky as us. You realize this, right? Many still have to deal with the past on their own.”

“Yeah, I know.” She pulls back to look at me and nods, trying to smile through tears.

“There's a solution."

“Sorry,” she whispers, wiping her cheeks with a little sniffle, and looks at me. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. We have our own kids."

A laugh escapes her, mixed with a little sob and a sniffle. "Trickster,” she murmurs, running her fingers through my hair.

"It's true. I want to have a family with you. We’ll have a whole new world that we’ll see through our kids. I'd love mini-Callie running around."

The smile on her lips is growing. "What about little Kai?"

"What about both?"

"Both works."

“See?” We learned to fix things fast in this fucked up world.

She traces the tattoo on my bicep with her forefinger, making my skin break out in goosebumps. I’ve long stopped cringing at people’s touch. And I started loving hers. It’s amazing what the approval of the person you love can do to your self-esteem. I used to hate taking showers and running my hands down my scarred body, feeling every ridge and sickly smooth patch of my burned skin. It stopped bothering me.

"What if they ask why their dad's skin is different from theirs?" She means excessive tattoos.

“It’s not different. Just colorful.” I grin. "We’ll tell them it's war paint. Their dad earned it when he had to fight for their mom.”

Callie sucks in her bottom lip and bites on it, casting her eyes down.

"Baby girl? Callie?"

I lift her chin, and her eyes are pools of tears again.

Oh, shit. I thought we got over it. I got over it. I’ve made peace with the memories, made peace with Crone. He is truly my brother. We both talked it over many times and decided we were the closest family to each other.

“No, no, no, baby girl,” I calm her. It’s that time before her period, and her hormones are through the roof. “We are not doing more tears today.”

She sniffles and nods in rapid succession. “Yeah. Sorry. I just… Got carried away.” She smiles. “I just love you so much."

She wiggles on my lap until her legs are wrapped around my hips and her arms around my neck, and she sniffles and kisses my face, sniffles again, and kisses me.

“I just had a little meltdown. You proposing and everything. I just wish I could share this?—”

“Shhh, we have the whole island to share this with. All right, no tears anymore, okay? It was supposed to be planning our future, then sex."

She bursts out in laughter. “My tears just totally cock-blocked you.”

I grin and pull back to inspect her face. “Yeah, look at you.” I tap the tip of her nose with my forefinger. “Your nose is red, all stuffy. How am I supposed to work with this talented mouth when you can't breathe through your nose?"

She gapes at me. "Kai! You are awful!" She bursts into laughter again.

“So, it’s a yes? We are engaged?”

Her mouth drops open as she gapes at me. “Of course, it’s a yes! You kidding me? Yes!” She kisses me on the mouth. “Yes.” She kisses my cheek. “Yes.” She bites my neck right underneath my ear where it tickles the most, and I start tickling her and she laughs and thrashes in my arms

"Petal, we just got engaged and we should be celebrating. "

She playfully scorns at me. "With my mouth."

"That's a thought."

We both grin like fools and just gaze at each other for some time.

"You know,” she says, “The world lockdown is being lifted in many places. We should travel. You and I.”

“Yes. You and I. And maybe others.”

“You mean your precious Crone.”

“Crone and Kat, yeah. Maybe Ty and Dani.”

“Whatever you want.”

“But I come first,” I repeat her words from long ago.

She laughs, then twists her fingers into my hair, her expression softening as my favorite blue eyes full of love are on me. “Of course you do,” she whispers, lowering her forehead to mine. “It’s you and I.”

“You and I always,” I say, kissing my favorite person in the world.