He's been everywhere, and the stars are always cold, except in California. In California, when he's far enough from the cities to see them, they burn, flickering pin pricks of heat.
They're fire and danger and so is she, burning distant, burning for Red, now burning for him. She warms him now, cradles his heavy head, his weary bones against her all curves. She rocks him soft and slow in her heat, sings low and secret the stories of the stars, sings his troubles away.
They lay back beneath the sky, the blanket of stars, heady on fire like wine.