A strangled laugh came out. “How can I do that?”
He stretched his legs out before him. “I do it every year.”
It took me a moment to process what he meant. “But that’s different.”
“No, it’s not. I know exactly how it feels to want something so badly, and to fail and have to start over again. And again. To keep going even when you’re losing.”
I turned, slightly worried for him. “But it’s not your fault if you lose.”
“Sometimes it is. And it’s my career on the line. My reputation. And I have thousands of people watching. Counting on me. Hoping I’ll fail.”
“You shouldn’t carry that whole weight on your shoulders. It should be the whole team.”
“Natalie.” He shifted to face me. The moon brightened his hair to cold fire. “You shouldn’t be taking this completely on yourself, either.”
“I don’t know what I’ll do if there’s
nothing.” To my embarrassment, my voice cracked and I started to sniff. “I’m sorry.” I pressed my hand to my nose and mouth, and then when that wasn’t enough, I pulled up my knees as though that would pull in my emotions. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“You’re stressed out.” He placed an arm around my shoulders and pulled me against him. His warmth seeped into me and edged out the damp air. “It’s okay.”
Was it? It didn’t get things done. Oh, it was useful enough as a way to release stress, but indulging in long crying jags always seemed pointless, when I could instead be working on how to solve the problem. “I don’t cry.”
He sounded wry. “So you’re not human?”
I laughed, and then pressed my hand to my head. “I have such a headache.”
“That’s what happens when you spend so much time trying not to cry.”
I flicked my eyes toward him. “And what would you know about that? Spend a lot of time bottling down tears?”
He leaned his head back, offering me a clear, strong profile.
I breathed out a long sigh. “No, but it’s the same when you’re bottling any emotion, isn’t it? And you keep your anger wrapped up in a charming smile.”
“No more than your anxieties are bow-tied with laughter.”
He had me. I shrugged. “Why cry when you can laugh?”
“Why yell when you can grin?”
We both stared up. “You think we’re kind of fucked up?”
“Utterly.”
I started laughing, and he started laughing, and then we were kissing in the cold night air. He twisted his upper body over mine, and I fell down into the grass, pricks of moisture chilling my arms until Mike’s hands swept over them.
We lay there, me curled into him. We watched the stars brighten. “I’ve spent my entire life thinking I knew what I wanted to do. I’m beginning to think I was wrong, and that scares me. It scares me to think that I might have to go to the conference and admit that there is no Ivernis, and Dr. Ceile was right and I’m just a dreamer.”
“Natalie. None of us are perfect. And you shouldn’t be scared at the conference. If there’s no site here, and you’re able to admit that without clinging to Ivernis—that’s brave. And I’ll come. So you can just pretend you’re telling me, and I’m not going to judge or care, I’ll just want to hear what you know.”
“Really?”
“I promise.”
I wanted Ivernis to be real so badly. I wanted it for so many reasons and so many people, and I’d wanted it for so many years. I wanted to find Ivernis even more when the world or Ceile or my parents told me it was impossible.
But it was nice—it was wonderful—to have someone whose focus wasn’t tied up in the site, but that simply wanted me to be happy