Beauty
"Stop the car," Eric grunted at me. He'd been staring out the window for an hour, letting the breeze roll through his hair. Sometimes I just prefer to drive, to let him stew in the passenger seat like a chump. I mean, that's how I feel, like I'm being chauffeured around town. It's ridiculous.
"What do you mean? We're not even close to there yet!" I gestured at the lights on the horizon where the Morro Bay Pier was calling my name. It was a quaint and adorable town on the California coastline. I'd seen it on the map and I was just dying to take a glance at it, up close. Besides, I'd heard that the chocolate chip pancakes at the boathouse were simply divine. And you rarely hear that about pancakes.
"Stop the car, Sookie." He rumbled in that hard to resist sex-on-a-stick voice that makes me go all weak in the knees. I looked around for a place to pull off to the side of the road. I mean, we were driving down the interstate. It's not like there are a lot of turn-offs just sitting around. I found an emergency pull off and hoped no one would mind if we casually borrowed it for a little bit. I shut off the engine and raised an eyebrow at my Viking vampire boyfriend-guy. I don't know if you can actually call a thousand year old man your "boyfriend" but "man-friend" sounds odd and "vampire friend" just sounds weirdly platonic.
I guarantee you--we're about as non-Platonic as they come.
"Grab your jacket," Eric pointed into the backseat. Then he got out of the car and stood in the center of the road, floating slightly above it like the big old show-off he often appears to be. I slipped my arms into the black coat he'd bought me for the trip out to California. We were on vacation, which is a rare thing for a vampire with a whole lot of ground under his wing and a fair amount of political uprising to boot. Personally, I'd saved up far too many vacation days at the bar. Some might call me a workaholic. Others, like Sam, would refer to me as "reliable."
I got out of the car and zipped up my coat. It was definitely nippy for a late April evening in Northern California. I looked both ways at the empty twists and turns of Highway 1 and joined Eric in the middle of the road. He was looking up at the sky as though mesmerized. As soon as I was beside him, he pulled me into his arms and we floated out across the road and down a perilously steep embankment to the beach below. It was unbelievably dark. On the highway, there were no streetlamps at all. Heck, out here in the middle of nowhere, there was nothing to power them. Besides, I heard they interfered with certain migrating species. Whatever. The point is, it was very dark. Really dark. The only light for miles around was the half-moon, spreading light out on the crests of the waves that crashed against the beach.
"So…" I started. Eric had set me down on the sand. I could feel it, cool and soft, between my toes thanks to the thong sandals I'd worn at more populated (and warmer) beaches during the day. Eric reached over and pressed a finger against my lips. He sat down on the sand and grabbed my hand so I would join him. I sat down reluctantly, having no desire to get sand bits in my underwear. I've heard about sex on the beach you know. They say it's fairly unpleasant, what with the sand in all your areas. Eric laid back, dipping his long hair onto the ground. I raised an eyebrow at him but he patted his chest and I curled against him, my cheek resting on his shoulder. His arm wrapped around me like a blanket.
And that's when I finally saw what Eric had been seeing for the past hour, driving down the highway. He was seeing heaven, in all its glory. Out here, without the lights of the city, you could see every single pinpoint of reflection in the sky. To say that it was breathtaking would be inconsiderate of the drama of it. It was more than breathtaking. It was more than blissful or dramatic or awesome. It was the absolute picture of Heaven. If you've ever seen phosphorescence, which I have only seen in the movies, it was almost like the sky version of that. The stars actually twinkled, just like the nursery rhyme said they should, and each one seemed to have a life all its own.
"That one is Andromeda," Eric said thoughtfully. "Do you know the story?"
"No, I don't think so," I murmured in reply. Perhaps if he hummed a few bars, I would remember the tune, but I wanted to listen to the rumble of his voice echoing against my cheek. I loved the feel of him beneath my skin.
"Andromeda was considered, particularly by her mother, Queen Cassiopeia, to be one of the most beautiful women in Greece. Cassiopeia said she was more beautiful than the nereids, which were the daughters of Nereus, a god of the sea. To punish the queen, Poseidon sent a sea monster, Cetus, to the coast of the queen's kingdom to terrorize it, causing economic hardship and general terror. The queen consulted the Oracles for help, and they told her that the only way to get rid of Cetus and restore peace to the kingdom would be to sacrifice Andromeda to the sea monster."
Here, Eric stopped and pointed out the constellations of Cetus and Cassiopeia, tracing the lines of their grouping with his finger. I leaned closer to him and murmured contentedly. I wondered when he had learned these stories, if he ever navigated by the stars.
"The queen agreed and Andromeda was chained to the rocks at Jaffa on the coast. The hero, Perseus, was coming back after slaying the Gorgon, Medusa, and he defeated Cetus and rescued Andromeda from the rocks. Perseus married Andromeda and killed her first husband, Phineus, by showing him the head of Medusa, which turned him to stone. Upon Andromeda's death, Athena placed her in the sky where she could live in myth for eternity."
"A myth with a happy ending," I said thoughtfully, leaning on my elbow to look at Eric.
"I agree, it is fairly unusual," he replied.
"Is this why you wanted to stop? You wanted to tell me stories?"
"No," Eric said quietly. "I wanted to show you the stars. The gods live in those stars, Sookie, no matter what type of gods you believe in. All of the questions of the world, all of the truths and the fantasies, every single dream you ever had lives in those stars. Think of it this way, lover. A thousand years ago, I was lying under these same stars, telling these same stories. A thousand years before that, some other couple was lying under these stars, making up those myths and using them to explain why we see what we're seeing now."
He paused and stroked my hair, lost deep in thought. I didn't dare close my eyes should I happen to miss a meteor or a twinkling light.
"These stars have been with me for all of my unnaturally long life. And they will continue to be with us until we die. When our souls rise into the Heavens, we will be among them forever."
"I've never heard you talk like this before," I mused.
"We cannot see them in Shreveport, my lover. In most cities, they cannot be seen. But out here, in the darkness, there is nothing between us and the Heavens but life."
"Do you ever miss the sun?" I asked only because he was already lost in thought.
"Sometimes, my lover. But if the tables were turned and I saw only the sun and not the stars, I would miss them more. I would miss them constantly. The sun is an aggressive thing, a thing that beats down upon the earth. The stars are more like eyes watching us from above. They are the warriors of Valhalla if you believe such things. They are your ancestors and mine. I appreciate their guidance, even if I do not always heed it."
I listened to the crashing of the waves upon the beach and I watched the glory of the sky, watching us and guiding us through life. I don't usually think about such things too much. After all, I have a life to lead. I never did have much schooling and I figure that only people with a lot of schooling have time to stare up at the night sky and think about the mysteries of the world. But that night on the beach, I was one of those people with time. I stared up into the eyes of my ancestors, Eric's ancestors, the very eyes of God, and I smiled. Because what other kind of response could you have to sheer and uncomplicated beauty?