Cherry on Top by Elise Noble

Author:Elise Noble
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Undercover Publishing Limited

CHAPTER 6

“DO YOU WANT a drink?” Lachlan asked.

“Something non-alcoholic?”

“That’s probably for the best. Tea? Coffee? Juice? Hot chocolate?”

“You have hot chocolate?”

His cheeks coloured a little. “Guilty secret. My mum used to make it for me every evening when I was a kid.”

“I’d love a cup.”

He pushed the door wide enough for me to fit past him and followed me into the kitchen. I reached for the kettle automatically, then stopped myself.

“Sorry. Keep forgetting I don’t live here anymore.”

“Why don’t you find a plate for the cakes? They’re in the cupboard under the microwave.”

Ten minutes later, we were sitting cross-legged up on the deck. Lachlan had laid out a thick blanket, and we leaned back against the house wall with the cakes and drinks between us as we looked up at the sky.

He motioned at the fancy-looking telescope beside us. “Let’s eat these first, and then I’ll show you how to use that. You’ll be able to see a lot more with it.”

“Hey, look! Another meteor.” The white dot streaked across the sky right ahead. “They’re so pretty.” I took out my phone and snapped a photo. “Aw, it’s all blurry.”

Lachlan stepped into his bedroom and came back with a camera to rival the telescope. “Here, try this. I can email you the pictures.”

“I don’t even know how to turn it on.”

He leaned over to show me, and each time his fingers brushed mine, a zing of electricity surged through my veins. My hands were shaking by the time I raised the viewfinder to my eye. Did he realise the effect he had on me? I took a few photos of the sky, then snuck a glance at the man next to me. His gaze was fixed on the stars, both hands clasped around his mug of hot chocolate.

“Did you always want to be an astronomer?”

“Astrophysicist, but I won’t bore you with the differences. Yes, since I was little. My father bought me my first telescope for my seventh birthday. We lived in Northumberland, and the skies were so much darker up there, but he had to move down south to work when I was a teenager.”

“I’ve never really looked at the sky, but it’s so beautiful.”

“Give your eyes half an hour to adjust to the dark, and it’ll be even more spectacular.”

“Do you know the names of all the stars?”

“Just the main ones.” He pointed out a cluster of stars up ahead. “The Perseid meteor shower is named after the constellation Perseus because it radiates out from there.”

“They’ve come all that way?”

“No, they just look like they have. They’ve actually come from the comet Swift-Tuttle. See that bright dot over there?”

I followed his finger. “Mmm.”

“That’s Alpha Persei, and Beta Persei is that one just across from it.”

Another meteor lit up, and I grabbed the camera. “Got it!” Then another flash of light, and another. “Hang on, why is that one going in a different direction?”

“It’s a late meteor from the Delta Aquarid shower that started in July. There’ll be more of those in the early hours.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.