Chapter 17: The Godmother's Blessing
The morning after the impossible resurrection, Riley woke to the unfamiliar sensation of warmth. Not just the residual heat of another body, but a deep, cellular warmth, like a stone left in the sun. Paul was pressed against his back, one arm a heavy, comforting weight over Riley’s ribs, his breath a soft, even rhythm against the nape of Riley’s neck. The old shirt Paul had borrowed—one of Riley’s, faded and soft from a hundred washes—had ridden up in the night. It draped loosely now, slipping off one of Paul’s smooth shoulders, the collar gaping.
Riley shifted, turning carefully within the circle of Paul’s arm. He found Paul already awake, those unnervingly warm brown eyes watching him, clear and lucid in the golden-gray light filtering through the lace curtains. There was no feverish intensity there now, no ancient sorrow. Just a quiet, deep-seated peace. A contentment so profound it made Riley’s chest ache.
“Hey,” Riley whispered, his voice sandpaper-rough from sleep and yesterday’s tears.
“Hey,” Paul echoed, a small smile touching his lips. The smile was a different kind of miracle.
They didn’t speak. They simply absorbed the quiet. Paul’s hand came up to cradle Riley’s jaw, his thumb stroking the stubble along his cheekbone. Riley leaned into the touch, eyes falling shut for a moment. He could hear the distant crash of waves, the cry of a gull, the absolute absence of anything else demanding their pain or attention. It was a breath caught and held, sweet and fragile, a reprieve from the world that waited outside—a world of ash, and judgment, and rebuilding. For now, Paul ignored it all. He leaned in and kissed Riley, a soft, languid exploration that tasted of sleep and salt and something indefinably right.
When they parted, breath mingling in the scant space between them, Paul’s gaze was earnest, almost shy. “What if you didn’t have to get old?”
Riley huffed a quiet laugh. “What, like you? You planning to turn me into a friendly neighborhood vampire? Pass. I’ve seen your diet. Unseasoned blood? Hard no.”
“No. Not like that.” Paul’s expression softened further. “No blood. No feeding. No hiding from the sun. Just… this.” He gestured between them, then at his own body. “Just time. A lot of it. Together.”
Riley’s smirk faded. He searched Paul’s face. “You’re serious.”
“I talked to Verna. In that granny-ass cottage outside of everything.” Paul’s voice was low, intimate, threading the memory into the cozy space between them. “When I died on the sand. She gave me a choice. To go with her, or to come back. She also said… if I found someone worth sharing the burden with, the gift could be different. No strings. No curse. Just us. Or,” he added quickly, his fingers tracing a pattern on Riley’s chest, “just me. Alone. But it’s your choice. I will never, ever force a decision on you again. You know that, right?”
Riley stared at him. He thought of his own guilt, a lodestone that had anchored him for years. He thought of gray hair and failing hands, of watching this beautiful, impossible man remain untouched by decades. He thought of more time. Not to atone—he was done with that illusion—but to live. To figure it out. With him.
The terror was there, a cold spike. But it was drowned by a rushing, overwhelming wave of want.
“Yeah,” Riley said, the word rough, final. “Okay. Yeah.”
A startled giggle burst from Paul, a sound of pure, unburdened joy. Riley found himself laughing too, a disbelieving chuckle that vibrated through both of them. They kissed again, giddy, noses bumping, their laughter muffled against each other’s mouths. They clung to each other, a knot of limbs and shared breath, as the morning sun climbed higher, painting the quilt in bright bars of gold.
Eventually, the rumble of Riley’s stomach broke the spell. They untangled themselves, moving with a slow, satiated laziness. Paul padded barefoot across the cool linoleum, the oversized shirt hanging ridiculously on his frame, covering him just enough. Riley pulled on a pair of sweats, scratching his chest.
They shuffled into the kitchen, drawn by the thought of coffee, of eggs, of normalcy.
Verna was already there.
She sat at Riley’s scarred kitchen table as if she’d been there for centuries, which, Riley supposed, she might have been. A pot of coffee steamed between her hands, and the rich, dark aroma filled the small room. She looked up as they entered, and her smile was kind, almost maternal, directed right at Riley’s stunned face.
“Good morning, sleepyheads,” she said, her voice like stones smoothing in a river. “Coffee’s fresh.”
Riley froze, one hand still on the doorjamb. Paul, however, just sighed softly, a smile touching his lips. “I had a feeling.”
“You said today was the day,” Verna shrugged, pouring coffee into three mismatched mugs that Riley didn’t remember owning. “I’m here to officiate.”
“Officiate what?” Riley managed, his brain struggling to catch up.
“Your union, silly boy.” Verna pushed a mug toward him. “The immortality rites. Think of it as a wedding, with slightly more cosmic paperwork. Officiated by a god,” she gestured to herself, “and a very confused former priest,” she nodded at Paul, who rolled his eyes but took a seat. “Sealed with a kiss. And, I hope, some breakfast. I’m peckish.”
It was absurd. It was terrifying. It was, against all logic, deeply serene. Riley sat down.
There were no grand pronouncements. Verna simply took their hands, placing Riley’s over Paul’s on the worn table. Her own hands were warm and dry. She spoke words that weren’t in any language Riley knew, yet he understood their meaning—a weaving of fates, a sharing of an unending thread, a choice made in full daylight. It felt less like a spell and more like a confirmation, a final, gentle knot tied on something that had already been true.
“Now kiss, you annoyingly adorable creatures,” Verna said, releasing their hands. “You’re made for each other, it’s frankly a little sickening.”
Paul leaned across the table. Riley met him halfway. The kiss was chaste, sweet, filled with the promise of coffee and a future that stretched beyond the edges of any map.
Then Riley made eggs and toast. They ate together, the three of them, while Verna told stories. She spoke of other couples she’d blessed, centuries, millennia ago. A pair of healers in a moss-covered valley who lived for eight hundred years, curing plagues and delivering babies. Two poets in a desert city who composed a single, endless epic together. “They all lived as saints, in their own ways,” Verna mused, sipping her coffee. “Not perfect. But kind. They died in peace, when they were finally ready, and they live on elsewhere in the cosmos now. It’s a nice retirement plan.”
It was the most normal, extraordinary breakfast of Riley’s life.
When the plates were cleared, Verna stood. She hugged Paul, whispering something in his ear that made him blush and nod. Then she turned to Riley, pulling him into an embrace that smelled of ozone and old parchment. “Be good to him,” she murmured. “And to yourself. I’ll check in now and then.” She gave Paul a last, pointed smile. “Don’t be a stranger, Johnny.”
With a soft sound like a sigh, she was gone. Not in a flash, but in a dissipating puff of something that might have been plumules from dandelion clocks, or tiny, iridescent feathers. The air shimmered for a second, then settled.
Paul looked at Riley, a slow grin spreading across his face. “See? She’s not so bad.”
Riley looked at the empty space where a goddess had been. He looked at the mundane mess of his kitchen—the dirty skillet, the crumbs on the table, the immortal man in an oversized t-shirt leaning against his counter. The foundation of his entire worldview, already cracked by resurrection, now completely crumbled into dust. He couldn’t look at that empty space, feel the new, strange hum in his own bones that hadn’t been there yesterday, and cling to atheism. It wasn’t a belief system anymore; it was just being stubbornly, stupidly wrong.
“No,” Riley said finally, his voice full of wonder. “I guess she’s not.”
He picked up the dirty coffee mugs, his fingers steady. The sunlight pooling on the floor was just sunlight. The ocean outside was just the ocean. But everything, absolutely everything, was different.