“You are blinking your eyelids,” he replies.
It is a simple declaration, and yet I realize it conveys more than what it states. Nobody declares the obvious with so much conviction unless they’re hinting at an underlying complexity.
Unnerved, I nevertheless reply coolly, “Well, yes, I tend to do that with regular frequency during my waking hours. I do it less frequently while sleeping.”
Sebastian acknowledges the accuracy of the response. “Forgive me. I should have said that you are blinking your eyelids rapidly. You always do when you are lying.”
I gasp. “I do not!”
“You did it every time you talked about Mr. Davies,” he continues, ignoring my denial to explain that he can see it clearly in retrospect. “If you wish to make a habit of lying to me, then you must learn to regulate your eyelids. In the meantime, however, I will ask you again why you are really in Eleanor’s room.”
Outraged by the implication that Iwantto lie to him, that lying to him does not cut me to the quick, I say, “Yes, well, you palmed me off with lie after lie for weeks, hiding the truth from me and allowing me to suffer the torment of believing you no longer cared for me.”
The comment elicits a fierce frown and he asks with an air of frustration if I am going to bring up the Altick episode every time we argue. “Will you hold it against me forever?”
Maybe.
The answer is maybe.
I do not say it because it is unsatisfying and indecisive. I would rather respond definitively even if it is in the affirmative, but I truly do not know if I will ever stop smarting at the cruel subterfuge. My resentment feels heightened now, at this moment, because I have been caught in an indiscretion and because I am already tense from the treatment I have endured at the hands of his family.
But perhaps my bitterness would pop like a bubble if he would just say, “I love you, Flora.”
Evading a direct reply, I say, “If you did not want me to remind you of your deceit, then you should not have deceived me. It is a simple concept that a man of your intelligence should grasp.”
He does not take offense at my censure and instead seeks to assure me that he is neither angry nor dismayed by my dishonesty. “I trust you have a good reason for being here, and I am anxious to hear it before one of the upstairs maids discovers us alone together in a bedchamber, irreparably harming your reputation and sending your mother into transports. Logically, I can only conclude that you are looking for something. Did you lose a valuable item to Eleanor? She does enjoy making minor bets.”
A lost wager is an excellent fiction, and it is on the tip of my tongue to chastise him for not warning me about his sister’s gambling habit. But then I remember I cannot lie to him without revealing the truth with my rapidly blinking eyelids.
What if I hold them open so wide I cease blinking altogether?
Yes, Flora dear, he would not notice that at all!
Earnestly, I reply that I cannot tell him. “I have a very good reason to withhold the information from you, and youmusttrust me when I say it is better for you not to know. I swear, you do notwantto know. Ididcome here to look for something but have since realized the foolishness of that decision and was onthe verge of leaving when I spotted you on the threshold. Now, come, let us go before that housemaid or a footman finds us,” I add, with an imperious gesture toward the door, a high-handed display made convincing by my impatience to depart. “You know that everything I have said is true because I am not blinking rapidly. My blinking is entirely normal.”
Is it actually normal?
I have no idea.
Now that I have been made aware of the abnormality of my fluttering lashes, it is likely that I will never blink normally again.
But itfeelslike my blinking is normal.
That has to count for something.
In fact, it counts for nothing.
Sebastian clasps his hands together behind his back and widens his stance slightly—an immovable object fortifying itself against an irresistible force—but does not otherwise speak, allowing the heft of his silence to compel me to respond.
We are at an impasse.
“Very well, fine,” I snap angrily.
All I want to do is to protect him from the horrible ugliness of the world.
But he cannot extend even that grace to me.
For whatever reason he is incapable of permitting himself to remain in the dark, and so I am forced to destroy his illusions about his younger sister.
