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I could write a thesis on the Attractiveness of Paul Donnelly, but it suddenly hits me.
On the contrary, Donnelly is the most mesmerizing earthling I’ve met thus far. I doubt anyone could trump him.
“No guy you’re dating should feel at ease while they’re here. They need to know with one wrong move, I will have them sobbing in their ugly little pickup trucks with their testicles rolling halfway down the street and into the sewer where they belong.”
I prepare myself for another round of the Loren Hale Petty Special, which he seems to reserve solely for the guys looking to fuck his oldest daughter.
“It’s the ways of the stars: burn too bright and a supernova will explode.”
“I was afraid of the unsure thing because I didn’t want to lose, but there’s never been a moment where I haven’t believed in you, Luna.”
“You ready, space babe? Your universe awaits.” “Ours,” she corrects, opening the door. Our universe. My ruptured heart feels full.
I could gorge myself on love and be satiated for all-time just being in his presence.
“It could be your true gift,” I whisper. “You have a way of making the darkness emerge into light.” I shrug. “It’s Star Wars stuff.”
I could dance and kiss and love him for longer than a lifetime.
Confetti cannons, stadiums of applause, champagne spewing in the air, I hear and see it all in my head, and my grin widens. I have the girl.
“When I’m with Donnelly, I’m no longer scared. I’m not afraid of the world. I’m not afraid of the past. Of any darkness. All the fears I have about myself are gone because I’m my most beautiful self in his eyes, and he sees her before even I do.” I wipe at an escaped tear. “He loves every version of me, and I love being with him, Dad. I love how he loves me completely. I love how uninhibited and mighty I feel when I’m with him. I could be a broken mess, and he’d still pick me up and try to love me back together. And he’s already done it. He’s already tried.”
“I’ve loved your mom at her weakest, at her strongest, at her most broken. And she’s loved me at mine. There’s never been a day where I haven’t loved her.”
Love like this feels inevitable. Like it has always existed and will always exist.”
“But the kitchen,” Dad says gently. “We eat there.” I wince and try not to visualize Donnelly eating me out there, but the clear connection seems to hit my dad because he grimaces. “Jesus Christ,” he mutters. “Never in a billion years…”
On the outside looking in, we might appear like a weird mess, but inside looking out, we’re the rulers of our own universe.
“You make it seem like ‘living is just as easy as breathing, and sometimes I do wonder how it can feel that easy. Because in my head it’s not easy at all.’”
Girl rocks the Spider-Man suit better than Tom Holland.
Just stand here. Do nothing. Study the walls. Picture Luna naked. Yeah, don’t fucking do that.
“Girl, you keep doing this to me,” I say in one breath. “What?” “Making me fall in love with you.” I’m still choked. Don’t know how I managed to say it at all, but I clear the ball out of my throat. “Don’t stop.” Very softly, she says, “I never will.”
“I was so angry.” I’m glad we can both smile about it now. “I know. You stormed out of the suit fitting like I ate all your McDonald’s french fries.”
“Girl, you already have my heart. Stop trying to steal it again.”
“We didn’t know you were dating the goddamn Hulk.”
“Do you think about your future with Luna?” Do I think about our future? “No,” I tell him. “I don’t need to think about it. She is my future.” It’s so clear. It’s so bright. “It’s all I know.”
“More bubbles. Less troubles.”
the year my Lord and Savior Jon Bon Jovi released the album Slippery When Wet.
“It’ll only get worse,” he warns. “Yeah, I don’t care,” I say and brush a hand through my hair. “Life is worse without her.”
“Now…” She picks up her coffee mug and takes a tiny sip. “What’s your ship name? Because I keep seeing ‘dirty duo’ and that doesn’t sound magical enough for a ‘Luna and Donnelly’ pairing.” I laugh into a grin. “Been thinking the same thing.”
“New anti-anxiety meds. I’m almost positive the ones I’m on stopped working three months ago. But the idea of having to go through a bunch of different prescriptions and all the side effects just to find another one that works makes me want to kill myself.”
I love us.” Us. There is an official us now. A Donnelly and a Luna bound together. It’s not a sad us. It’s a vibrant, grinning, buoyant us, ascending higher and higher. I haven’t thought much about where we’ll land. Staying on this voyage with Donnelly matters more to me.
“You call him Lo?” He’s irritated now. Jealous, really. He glares at the grimy, band-stickered wall. “Well, aren’t you two best friends.” I laugh hard. “Yeah, he wrote me in his will and everything,” I joke. “He’s leaving me a single buck. Can you believe that?”
His ability to make me feel extraordinarily beautiful and irreplaceable and supremely powerful
She chomps them, and fuck me, I’m in love. Drop everything, I’ll die for her kind of love. She’s the last name I’ll whisper on my death bed kind of love. The universe makes no sense without her kind of love. It will be just her and me until the end of time kind of love.
I can’t cry in Wawa! It’s a hallowed space.
“Guys who are embarrassed by me,” I add. “You mean my enemies?”
I’ll always love all of you exactly as you’ve loved all of me—that’s the secret of our universe.”
I’m scrolling on my phone for websites that sell body pillows with printable photos.
“If you don’t let me publish this,” Dad says, clearing his choked voice, “that would be the problem. Because this, what you two created—your love, your lives, through space and time—it’s the best goddamn submission I’ve had in decades.”
“Once upon a galaxy—” “Somewhere in the cosmos,” I add, coming closer. His hands settle on my hips. “There was a human and an alien princess…who’ll one day be queen.” His love fills me to the brim.
