"But he was back on earth, and this was a test like any other. Love, like soft fragile ice, spun across to fill the breach."
I don't know if you've read Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye, but she has a gorgeous discussion of love doing things like that in the house of Claudia, the main character.
I like the suddenly hokey -- or, let's say, surprisingly moving -- and that was it, right there.