Jeremy Paxton almost whistled as he walked back home but what he felt was too deep and solemn for whistling.

Nobody had asked him how he defeated those three vampires while Walter knelt useless at Jesse’s side. He had fought like a gumball machine, spitting out punch after punch but he knew he would soon give up and die. The hate that had fired him for five years was gone, spent in the senseless murder of the red-haired man.

When the bright light flared, he was sure it meant his skull had smashed.

But the three vampires blinked, tilted their heads and listened as a quiet voice said, “I’m still your Queen, sweeties. Go outside, sit in the garden, huh?”

Peace flooded their faces. Just by chance, they all happened to be male Caucasians (but two were nerdy geeks with pimples while the third was an old grump in a fedora). They climbed through the window, muttering “Jeez, ouch” at the broken glass.

Jeremy ignored them and lifted longing eyes to the first woman he had loved. “Can I touch you?” he whispered.

KerriAnne held out glimmering hands. “I don’t know how it works. Try?”

His hands went through hers though they tingled when they did. Her pixie mouth made a moue of disappointment. “That’s kinda what I thought.”

Jeremy felt small and crushed by grief. “I’ll never love anyone but you. Can’t you come back to me? I’ll love a ghost.”

Her sweet hands stroked his face like a wisp of wind. “I’ve never loved anyone but you, dear dear you,” she said. “But I’m going soon. I feel myself coming apart…” She shook her head. “I won’t be KerriAnne much longer. I think I might be….” She shook her head but looked radiantly happy.

Walter sobbed brokenly over his husband and Jeremy started miserably.

“Was it worth it?” she asked. “Are you better cause you got revenge at last?”

“No.” Jeremy’s voice was like a crow’s.

“That’s so what I thought.” KerriAnne’s face filled with gentle grief. They both looked at Walter.

Jeremy stepped into his adult wisdom for the very first time. “Tell me something. Sally, your sister? Has she ever lied to you?”

She understood instantly what he was intending. “No,” she said, joy replacing the grief. “No, not in all the years, not with everything I put her through, she never lied to me. Never.”

“Then I know what I have to do.”

And he stepped forward, out of her magic circle into the dim bedroom with the weeping man.

You can save him, he told Walter, and he had been right. Perhaps sunlight had killed KerriAnne because she had chosen to be a vampire. But he had been there in the plaza when Sally Yan swore it had healed Lavinia and she didn’t lie, KerriAnne said so.

He had seen her again as they carried Jesse out and she’d looked at him with hope. Are you certain? And he’d told her yes. It was right. He was a better man because of her love and trust.

When the sunlight healed Jesse, he felt as if Sister Amanda had blessed him.

And now he climbed the steep San Francisco street to his home. In a minute he would walk inside. But he couldn’t yet face his parents, bustling around with efficient cheer. He stood under the pepper tree that the previous owners of the house had planted before he’d been born.

In one night, he’d healed himself and become a man. All that was true but he felt something more.

He wasn’t afraid to be alone now. He wasn’t afraid of the moment when his friends had left, the vampires were all hunted, the smart phone was turned off and he was in the dark.

He longed to tell this to Sister Amanda. She would be happy for him, and she wouldn’t force a Christian interpretation down his throat either.

“I get to choose,” said a beloved voice with wonder. He looked up with sweet hope.

KerriAnne floated in the tree above him, stroking its branches. “A piece of me will stay in whatever tree I chose. I can choose this one. I will if you promise me you’ll love again. Mmm?”

Everything seemed possible in this fresh morning sun. He could love again. He could ask a normal girl on a normal date. “I promise,” he cried.

He never saw her again. He never actually heard her final I love you if she said it.

But when he put his arms around the graceful tree’s trunk and nestled his head in the V of its branches, he felt her and let the sweet tears fall.