The earth trembled as you passed by

Turning everything sacred as you walked

And you set your eyes upon me for the first time

Speaking at me with the depth of the night

Like a nightingale who doesn't need its wings to fly

What a blessing it is to be worthy of your look

I have seen rain on the desert

And all impossible things coming true

All of my prayers carry your name

I wish to be pure so that I can desire you

( ancient egyptian love poem )

The next few years of Luna's life are some of the most beautiful. Immediately after their return from London, she sets about the task of acclimating Ahkmenrah to 21st-century life. Shopping trips to J. Crew, Old Navy, and Banana Republic; using Dr. McPhee's connections to establish an alias and backstory (and citizenship, which is surprisingly difficult); and teaching him to use things like a microwave.

Luna and Nicky spend several hours one weekend establishing Ahkmenrah's 21st-century life and this is what they finally come up with: Ahkmen Rahim, a first-century Egyptian immigrant to England with his parents. He lived in England for several years (explaining the accent), before moving to the United States to pursue a career in ancient history, and while at the Natural History museum, he met Luna one evening and asked her out for coffee. The rest, Luna will always say, is history.

This way, Ahkmenrah can talk freely about his parents who live in England, his estranged brother who never visits, his extensive knowledge of Egypt circa the Middle Kingdom, and never raise any eyebrows. And anyone who knows him can call him Ahkmenrah without thinking, and no one will be any the wiser. In Luna's opinion, it's fairly genius.

It's the Thursday after that Luna brings him with her to family dinner and introduces him to her parents. It's nerve-wracking at first, especially since Sterling's predisposed to be extremely harsh on guys Luna's interested in. But Ahkmenrah brings flowers for Eliana, beautiful white lilies, and compliments her paintings of the night sky, and she's instantly in love.

It takes a few dinners before Sterling's used to Ahkmenrah, and it's only when Ahkmenrah mentions that he boxed and wrestled in school (which is true, reader, although he's taken a four-thousand year break) that Sterling really opens up. Luna knows he just wants what's best for her, and she always knew he'd like Ahkmenrah. It just took him a little longer.

Once Ahkmenrah can use the oven without help, Luna decides it's time to teach him how to drive. It's a little shaky at first, considering he's never been in a car, but he's a very good listener and a fast learner. Although he dents her bumper in the first twenty minutes, it only takes him a week to get fully comfortable behind the wheel, and then he insists on driving everywhere, despite the horrendous traffic in Manhattan.

Nicky only DJs one summer in Ibiza before deciding he'd rather not, and instead goes to college in upstate New York to study architecture, something that's always interested him. He was always better at math than his grades would tell you, and Luna's very proud that he finally decided on a career he really loves.

Larry spends most of the next few years as the head of the Night Program, and Luna goes from an intern to a full-time employee, and when Larry tells her he plans to quit and go back to school, that he wants to teach instead, Luna's sad at first--and then he tells her that she'll be the new head of the program.

Of course, Luna'll need an assistant, so she hires Ahkmenrah as her "assistant director", which basically means a few nights a week, they get to have fun with their friends and both get paid for it. It's a perfect situation and Luna could never have imagined anything more perfect.

All their friends are just the same: Teddy and Sacagawea together, as always, and perfectly in love; Jed and Octavius, partners in crime; Rexy, Columbus, Attila, Laaa, all of them back to normal. Well, all except Dexter, who's enjoying his life as a reincarnated monkey at the New York Zoo, where Larry, Nicky, Ahkmenrah, and Luna visit him every weekend and bring him banana chips, his favorites.

Ahkmenrah's enthralled with living. He's missed simple things like eating, drinking water, and waking up to see the sunrise (which he does every day now), and he never knew how much until now. It's his favorite thing in the world to wake up just before dawn, to lay there next to Luna and watch the sun rise slowly over the horizon, and then get up and make her coffee before she wakes up, so that he can bring a steaming mug to her in bed and see her sleepy smile and the way she whispers, "I love you," in her gorgeous morning voice.

(Ahkmenrah's much more of a tea fan, reader, ever since he tried it for the first time. He likes earl grey with honey and a splash of cream.)

It's a year to the day that they came back from London that Ahkmenrah and Luna are married in the lobby of the museum at midnight. Luna's parents, Ahkmenrah's parents (on loan from the British museum, and thank God Luna and Ahk convinced them to wear normal clothes), and all of their friends are there to celebrate them.

Teddy performs the ceremony (what special effects, whispers Eliana to Sterling, and Luna just smiles to herself) and Ahkmenrah says his vows under his breath in Egyptian, ending finally with a poem Luna knows well: the one he whispered to her as they watched Teddy and Sacagawea on their first date, what feels like a thousand years ago.

And then he kisses her in front of everyone, two simple gold bands on their fingers, and it's official. Luna knows in that moment that they will be together forever and nothing will ever separate them.

After the wedding, Ahkmenrah takes Luna to the airport, refusing to tell her where they're going on their honeymoon--until the plane touches down in Scotland and he promises her that they're going to see the world, the way she told him that first night under the stars.

It's the best three weeks of her life. They spend days in Scotland, walking through tiny villages, sipping tea in hole-in-the-wall cafes; warm afternoons in Italy, shopping in little bookstores, eating pasta and watching boats on the canals; and chilly sunrises in Nepal, hiking through the mountains and shopping in the markets. It's everything Luna's ever dreamed of, and the best thing about it is that Ahkmenrah's there with her.

They are wonderfully, gloriously normal. They have a gym membership and a Netflix subscription and pizza night every Saturday. Ahkmenrah's favorite movie is still Casablanca, and one afternoon at a coffee shop, he discovers a sweet fascination with classic rock, especially Queen and ABBA. It's customary to dance around the kitchen on pizza night, singing "Dancing Queen" into wooden spoons together and laughing. And when they finally decide to get a dog, a beautiful Australian shepherd puppy, her name is, of course, Mia, after Ahk's other favorite ABBA song.

They go to concerts and plays and see movies in the theater, and every summer, they take a trip somewhere. Spain, Thailand, Mexico, and one summer, Egypt, which is particularly moving for both of them. Luna's favorite photo of the two of them comes from that trip: a selfie, in which Ahkmenrah's kissing her cheek goofily and she's smiling at the camera, holding his face with her free hand. 

It's in their fifth year that Ahkmenrah wakes one morning to Luna vomiting into the toilet. And the next morning. And the next after that. And the next after that. It's on the fifth morning that a woman in a white coat smiles sweetly and tells them that it's not food poisoning; they're going to have a baby.

So Ahkmenrah runs hastily to the library and checks out as many parenting books as he can, because he has no idea what to do, he's never been a father before, and then it comes to him: He does have a father. So he flies to London on a one-night basis and sits at his father's side for hours, listening to him talk about being a good parent.

But when he talks to Larry, Larry tells him that all the advice means nothing in the world if you don't focus first on loving your kid. You could be the greatest parent on paper, but your child's life depends fully on your love.

Love, however, is not anything Ahkmenrah has to worry about, because when he stares down at the beautiful little girl in his arms, yawning widely, her beautiful dark curls just like his own, and her big green eyes just like her mother's, he knows without a doubt that he loves her more than she could ever imagine and he will do anything and everything to keep her safe.

And many, many years later, when Ahkmenrah has, for the first time in his life, grown old, and he's sitting in his living room, watching Luna and their daughter Zahra laughing in the kitchen, and holding his grandchildren on his lap, he reflects back on the beautiful wonder of life and the true depth and breadth of love.

He tells the smiling children sitting on his knees all about how he and Luna saved the museum time after time from evil night guards, from his crazy brother, and from a selfish night, and as they grow older, Aya and Salem laugh and say, "Jeddo, that's just a story! None of that really happened!"

And every time they say this, Luna always looks up and winks at them, a twinkle in her beautiful eyes, lined with years of smiles and laughter. "It's as real as you want to be," she always says, and Ahkmenrah knows without a doubt that it will always be real to him, as long as Luna's beside him.

So when death comes, this time as naturally and as swiftly as it left him, so many thousands of years ago, Ahkmenrah is at peace. He has lived and lived well, and that is enough. Enough to have loved, laughed, and truly lived, and then to die and make room for someone else, to move on to what is to come, what is after this life.

But they'll always remember the night they met.

✦✧✦

THE END