Sarah resurfaced from the dream, gasping for breath. Someone had carried her upstairs from the sofa and tucked her into her bed. It was dark; she must have been asleep for at least three hours, and her hair was a tangled mess around her head. Her cheeks and forehead were burning, and an exhilarating sense of freedom filled her every atom. She smiled contentedly and took a book from beneath her bed. As if she could concentrate on it. Jareth was surprisingly handsome even without makeup. His eyes sparkled and gleamed like a sapphire and an emerald. And his skin… smooth and soft and cold like silk. He was so beautiful, it was inconceivable that he should love someone like Sarah. She laughed, a genuine laugh that resounded around the room. She didn't know how perfect she looked in that moment, with hair sticking out at odd angles, flushed cheeks and starry eyes...
Her father noticed a real change in his daughter that night. Sarah curled up on his lap and watched Eastenders with the family, looking as content as a cat by the fire. The step-mother smiled nervously at the two of them because they looked more like a couple than she and him ever could. Toby rolled gleefully round on the floor in his red striped clothes. The stars twinkled outside, and it was a happy scene that Jareth saw as he looked through the window in the form of an owl. Even as a bird, he was very expressive, and the features were clearly contorted into a scowl. The bird flew away, snatching a mouse up in its beak as it went.