A/N: Named after the song 'Stardust' by Nat King Cole.

Another little addition to the Tinder 'verse.

Two nights before his twenty-seventh birthday, the Perseids at their best, supposed to be, between midnight and five am.

It is bitterly cold for August, a chill that attempts to seep deep into his bones, through his shirt and jumper and the waxed jacket he took from Uncle Al's kitchen that is just slightly too small for him, curse of being unnaturally tall.

Christine is wrapped up warm with her hoodie and a white scarf patterned with small blue birds, her hair a fluffy mess of blonde curls.

(He loves that fluffy mess of blonde curls.)

He's not certain who proposed it. It might have been John Henry, who has been unusually melancholy lately even for him. Too much time spent in archives, Kate says, researching things not relevant to his thesis but always relevant to his interests, and some of the documents he has found have given him emotions about a couple who loved each other more than eighty years ago.

(Neither participant was gay, but that has, apparently, not dampened John Henry's agonies over them. Erik supposes there had to be a first time for everything.)

It doesn't much matter who suggested it really. What matters is that someone who might have been John Henry or might have been Nadir suggested they should all decamp to Sligo to watch the Perseids in one of Uncle Al's fields, and celebrate Erik's birthday "in the place where his blood sprung from" (that bit was definitely John Henry, melancholy poetic git.)

And so they find themselves in Sligo, in a field, with two tents and a jeep because if you're going to go out into a field to look at the stars you might as well do it right. Erik commandeers one of the tents for himself and Christine, on the grounds that he needs space for the sake of his long limbs, while John Henry and Kate and Morgan take the other tent, all quite happy to jam in together. Nadir is more than content with the arrangement, and decides to curl up in the back of the jeep, beside the wind-up record player they liberated from Al's attic, and the small collection of records they brought.

They have hot chocolate in flasks. Erik has his violin. Morgan has his accordion. John Henry was charged with bringing the alcohol and on the assumption that he would solely stick to varieties of whiskey, Nadir took it upon himself to buy cheap wine. In the event there is whiskey, but there is also a bottle of expensive green chartreuse which causes a number of raised eyebrows on the grounds of strangeness and John Henry defends himself with the statement, "It was in something I read."

Christine alone does not seem perturbed by the bottle of chartreuse, but her lips are pursed and she cocks one brow knowingly. "I suspect I know what it was and I'm going to need analysis."

Kate is the one who brings the records, and Erik looks at them longingly in their sleeves. Mumford & Sons, Delta. Hozier, Wasteland, Baby, and also his self-titled one. Florence's Ceremonials. One which Kate insists is an ancient one of Nat King Cole singing 'Stardust'.

Erik refuses to admit that for all he is a connoisseur of music he has never heard of 'Stardust' and Nat King Cole is little more than a name for him, so he nods knowingly and makes agreeable noises.

Christine sees through him, and he suspects Nadir does too, but neither of them call attention to his effort at a lie by denial.

Christine, for her own part, reveals hitherto unknown fire-lighting skills. As they stare in awe at the flames coming to life beneath her hands, she simply grins one of those grins that goes straight to his heart and says, "There was a camping trip after the Leaving Cert."

He looks at her there, her face lit with the glow of the fire, her hair falling around her shoulders, and thinks he has never been more in love.

Al's cows are in a paddock a few fields away, but if they are quiet they can hear the snuffling of them, distant bawling of a cow off on the hillside belonging to someone else. Sound carries on cold nights like this, there is no telling where she may be, but it is a little after eleven, the sky deep navy, a scattering of stars shining against it like a tapestry, and there is a dog baying off in the distance, the rustling of rabbits and little things in the undergrowth of the wood behind them.

They are ringed around the fire, Christine leaning into him, and he tightens his arm around her, brushes his lips against her hair and feels her smile against him. John Henry has that old melancholy written across his face as he sips the whiskey, Nadir tinkering at the record player.

"As I leave behind Néidín," Christine's voice is soft as she starts the song, the undercurrent of sadness rising high, pulling at his heart, "it's like purple splashed on green…"

He releases her gently and reaches for his violin, already tuned, and raises it to his shoulder, the notes coming easy, ready. They've been listening to that song a lot lately, thinking of how she is soon to leave, to go to Portugal for her research, and the thought of being parted from her, of four years of only seeing her occasionally, on odd weekends when she flies home and on holidays, and not every day, almost every hour, the way they have become accustomed, the way his heart cries out to…

It is only temporary. It is not a real leaving. But it is more than he can stand to think about though it grows closer every day.

The first notes ring out soft and sad.

The tear that slips from Kate's eye matches the ones rising inside him, and he swallows hard against them, steadies his fingers on the strings.

Won't you remember? Won't you remember? Won't you remember me?

She sings, softly, on to the end of the song, and as she finishes her final plea a flash of movement above catches his eye and he looks up, looks up in time to see the first white arrow racing across the sky.

If wishing on stars worked, if magic could be woven from the heavens…

His heart is too full, his fingers finding different notes, softer notes, and Christine leans back into him as he plays, and closes his eyes, and lets the music come as it will.

The wheezy notes of an accordion join him, but he does not open his eyes. It is Morgan, finding the thread of a common melody, and as the violin goes high the accordion goes low, each weeping tears of grief, of longing, of love, and as he plays there are tears damp and cold on his cheeks, both cheeks because he has forgone makeup for tonight when he is amongst friends, and Christine's tears warm against his shoulder, and as the notes swoop and dive his hands cry out how much he loves her, how much he will miss her, how much being parted feels like torture though it is all for a good reason, all for her doctorate and the research that calls her away and he would never try to hold her back, never try to keep her here where she cannot be all that she deserves to be, never try to keep her from following where her thirst for knowledge leads her but God how he wishes she could stay, could just be here, always.

He finishes, faintly breathless, the accordion fading after the violin, and the silence is broken only by the crackling of the fire, and their ragged breathing.

He blinks his eyes open, the fire blurred, the sky above a scattering of white dots, and swallows.

"Well that was unexpected." Nadir's voice is hoarse and when Erik looks to him his face is splotched from crying, and a hysterical laugh rises up inside of him that he can't stop.

It's like a signal for the celebration such as it is to start. Shots of the chartreuse are passed around, the liqueur sweet on his tongue only to leave a hint of spice as he kisses Christine and she laughs breathless into his mouth. Another star shoots overhead, bright and shining, and Morgan laughs as he kisses the two of them on the cheek.

"I declare this union blessed."

He has not asked her to marry him, not yet, but someday he will, he knows it deep inside, and it is only their second summer but there is no doubt in his heart that this, here in his arms, is the girl he will marry.

Nadir cranks up the record player, and the first unmistakable notes of 'Take Me to Church' ring out and where there has been grief tonight and longing and love, so much love, there is blooming laughter and he reaches for John Henry and kisses him smack on the mouth because this was their song once when they were briefly a thing, long before he knew of Christine and John Henry knew of Kate, and the memory of it makes something cry out within him and John Henry's laugh is breathless in his mouth before they break away and Christine reclaims his mouth for his own.

Another sweet arcing star.

They dance, there with the fires and the heavens their only witnesses, Christine in his arms and Kate in John Henry's and Morgan with Nadir though sometimes Morgan and Kate switch as they are wont to do when it comes to the man they share and Nadir is as straight as they come but he drift-dances with Morgan to 'Shrike' and a deep affection for these dear friends of his throbs deep within Erik, something inexplicable that he can never put into words only that it is love too of a different sort to what he feels for Christine, love pure and simple and uncomplicated.

The stars fall overhead. The birds and the beasts in the woods make branches crack and grass sigh. Kate's laugh is high and beautiful. Nadir dances with the empty bottle of chartreuse. John Henry looks happier than he has been in weeks and Christine smiles up at Erik as they sway, her head against his chest and he wonders what she is thinking. Is she, too, thinking of love? Is she thinking of how they will be parted? Is she thinking of all that they are and all that they have?

Is she, like, him, wishing they could spin this night out forever and keep it, keep each other, always as they are in this moment? Healthy and happy, no aching joints, no pains in his chest, no breathlessness from a collapsed lung. Just the two of them as they are, whole and well and safe and in each other's arms until the end of time.

He aches for it fiercely, desperately, and the stars twinkle as their comrades fall around them and if he believed in magic he might believe it is bestowed upon them here tonight, that there is stardust like fairydust shining in her hair and he kisses that hair and kisses her forehead and and her arms tighten around him, keep him close.

Oh, to have her, just like this always.

Oh to be well enough to have her like this always.

Nat King Cole's 'Stardust' soft and sweet on the record player. The faint lightening of grey in the distance. Nadir lying in the grass, arms folded behind his head, watching the stars above as Morgan leans into Kate and John Henry into the two of them, Erik and Christine still swaying slowly in each other's arms, a little away, eyes closed, wrapped in their own world. The stars their silent watchers, and them just as they are, safe and close, and dreaming of always.

A/N: The song Christine is 'As I Leave Behind Néidín' by Mary Black, a gorgeous melancholy song about emigration and leaving Kenmare.

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