Daniel led her toward a part of the cemetery Luce had never seen before, a clear, flat space where two peach trees had grown together. Their trunks bowed toward each other, forming the outline of a heart in the air below them.
He led her under the strange, gnarled coupling of the branches and took her hands, tracing her fingers with his.
The evening was quiet except for the song of crickets. Luce imagined all the other students in the dining hall. Spooning mashed potatoes onto their trays, slurping thick room-temperature milk through a straw. It was as if, all of a sudden, she and Daniel were on a different plane of being from the rest of the school. Everything but his hand around hers, his hair shining in the light of the setting sun, his warm gray eyes—everything else felt so far away.
“I don’t know where to start,” he said, pressing harder as he massaged her fingers, like he could rub the answer out. “There’s so much to tell you, and I have to get it right.”
As much as she wanted Daniel’s words to be a simple confession of love, Luce knew better. Daniel had something difficult to say, something that might explain a lot about him, but might also be hard for Luce to hear.
“Maybe do one of those I-have-good-news-and-bad-news kind of things?” she suggested.
“Good idea. Which do you want first?”
“Most people want the good news first.”
“Maybe so,” he said. “But you are worlds away from most people.”
“Okay, I’ll take the bad news first.”
He bit his lip. “Then promise me you won’t leave before I get to the good news?”
She had no plans to leave. Not now, now that he was no longer pushing her away. Not when he might be about to offer up some answers to the long list of questions she’d been obsessing over for the past few weeks.
He brought her hands to his chest and held them against his heart. “I’m going to tell you the truth,” he said. “You won’t believe me, but you deserve to know. Even if it kills you.”
“Okay.” A raw knot of pain took hold of Luce’s in-sides, and she could feel her knees start to shake. She was glad when Daniel made her sit down.
He paced back and forth, then took a deep breath. “In the Bible …”
Luce groaned. She couldn’t help it; she had a knee-jerk reaction to Sunday school talk. Besides, she wanted to discuss the two of them, not some moralistic parable. The Bible wasn’t going to hold the answers to any of the questions she had about Daniel.
“Just listen,” he said, shooting her a look. “In the Bible, you know how God makes a big deal about how everyone should love him with all their soul? How it has to be unconditional, and unrivaled?”
Luce shrugged. “I guess so.”
“Well—” Daniel seemed to be searching for the right words. “That request doesn’t only apply to people.”
“What do you mean? Who else? Animals?”
“Sometimes, sure,” Daniel said. “Like the serpent. He was damned after he tempted Eve. Cursed to slither on the ground forever.”
Luce shivered, thinking back to Cam. The snake. Their picnic. That necklace. She rubbed at her clean, bare neck, glad to be rid of it.
He ran his fingers down her hair, along her jawline, and into the hollow of her neck. She sighed, in a state of bliss.
“I’m trying to say … I guess you could say I’m damned, too, Luce. I’ve been damned for a long, long time.” He spoke as if the words tasted bitter. “I made a choice once, a choice that I believed in—that I still believe in, even though—”
“I don’t understand,” she said, shaking her head.
“Of course you don’t,” he said, dropping down onto the ground next to her. “And I don’t have the best track record at explaining it to you.” He scratched his head and lowered his voice, like he was speaking to himself. “But all I can do is try. Here goes nothing.”
“Okay,” she said. He was confusing her, and he’d barely even said anything yet. But she tried to act less lost than she felt.
“I fall in love,” he explained, taking her hands and holding them tightly. “Over and over again. And each time, it ends catastrophically.”
“Over and over again.” The words made her ill. Luce closed her eyes and withdrew her hands. He’d already told her this. That day at the lake. He’d had breakups. He’d been burned. Why bring up those other girls now? It had hurt then and it hurt even more now, like a sharp pain in her ribs. He squeezed her fingers.
“Look at me,” he pleaded. “Here’s where it gets hard.”
She opened her eyes.
“The person I fall in love with each time is you.”
She’d been holding her breath, and meant to exhale, but it came out as a sharp, cutting laugh.
“Right, Daniel,” she said, starting to stand up. “Wow, you really are damned. That sounds horrible.”
“Listen.” He pulled her back down with a force that made her shoulder throb. His eyes flashed violet and she could tell he was getting angry. Well, so was she.
Daniel looked up into the peach tree canopy, as if for help. “I’m begging you, let me explain.” His voice quaked. “The problem isn’t loving you.”
She took a deep breath. “What is it?” She willed herself to listen, to be stronger and not to feel hurt. Daniel looked like he was broken up enough for both of them.
“I get to live forever,” he said.
The trees rustled around them, and Luce noticed the faintest trickle of a shadow out of the corner of her eye. Not the sick, all-consuming swirl of blackness from the bar last night, but a warning. The shadow was keeping its distance, seething coldly around the corner, but it was waiting. For her. Luce felt a deep chill, down in her bones. She couldn’t shake the sensation that something colossal, black as night, something final was on its way.
“I’m sorry,” she said, dragging her eyes back to Daniel. “Could you, um, say that again?”
“I get to live forever,” he repeated. Luce was still lost, but he kept talking, a stream of words pouring out of his mouth. “I get to live, and to watch babies being born, and grow up, and fall in love. I watch them have babies of their own and grow old. I watch them die. I am condemned, Luce, to watch it all over again and again. Everyone but you.” His eyes were glassy. His voice dropped to a whisper. “You don’t get to fall in love—”
“But …,” she whispered back. “I’ve … fallen in love.”
“You don’t get to have babies and grow old, Luce.”
“Why not?”
“You come along every seventeen years.”
“Please—”
“We meet. We always meet, somehow we’re always thrown together, no matter where I go, no matter how I try to distance myself from you. It never matters. You always find me.”
He was staring down at his clenched fists now, looking like he wanted to hit something, unable to raise his eyes.
“And every time we meet, you fall for me—”
“Daniel—”
“I can resist you or flee from you or try my hardest not to respond to you, but it makes no difference. You fall in love with me, and I with you.”