“Thanks for planning the day.” She beams up at James as he splays open the journal, scribbles, and her locked bones release. She trails him up the steps, holding his hand. “I also want to buy some art supplies.”
“Sure,” James says. “You gonna paint while we’re here?”
“No, I want to sketch.”
James stops an old man and his dog to ask where they can find paper and pens for sale. The man furrows his shaggy gray brows and gesticulates angrily, snapping in French.
“I think he said that way.” James points. “Also, not to kill the mood, but the pen is running low on ink.”
Nelle touches the spot on her palm where she draws from, tired of breaking her flesh with the fountain pen’s dull tip. Quill may be a monster, but he only cut her with the sharpest of blades. She knows better ways to get this done.
The first papeterie they find, a shop with wood-paneled walls and books and knickknacks, has a letter opener for sale beside the counter. And a small pad and art pencils. Two birds, one stone. The uniformed crone at the register glares up through a pair of magnifying spectacles.
While James counts out a handful of euros, Nelle slips off to the toilet with her new knife. She winces at the touch of the tip to her palm. The blade isn’t as sharp as a usual knife, so it takes some force to break skin. Still, it works better than the pen nib. Her blood drips to the tiled floor.I’ll get more precise, she thinks, shuffling to the sink.
Once the pen is refilled, Nelle sticks it in her back pocket and catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Her skin has a honeyed touch. Untamed sandy-blond hair frizzling down to her waist. Maybe it’s the white blouse James bought her from a boutique called La Maison du Fil, or the thin silver chain hanging daintily on her collarbones, but for the first time in her life, she is happy with her appearance. Or maybe, for the first time in her life, she is just happy.
She ducks out of the bathroom and scans the empty papeterie for James before her feet carry her out the front door. Narrow Rue Raynouard is framed by gorgeous Parisian architecture, balconies and windows covering stone facades down the street. Cars slink along the sidewalk, bumper to bumper, until they curve out of sight.
James appears like a mirage, leaning on a lamppost, holding a bouquet of flowers wrapped in a green ribbon. He flourishes the bouquet with a balanced bow.
“For you, my lady.”
Nelle runs the scarlet petals under her fingers. “I’ve never seen flowers up close. Quill didn’t have them in the house. Other than the roses on my wallpaper. What are these called?”
“Dahlias,” James says.
Struck by their smell, she brings them closer. Not perfumy, but wet dirt, still morning air, and a mystery note, distinctly plantlike. Both repulsive and wonderful.
“It’s what I want to name my daughter one day,” he says. “Dahlia.”
She looks up from the flowers, taking him in. “Really?”
“Yeah.” He clears his throat. “Since I was sixteen.”
Nelle lifts on her toes to press her lips to James’s cheek, her heart swollen with feeling. He will make such a better father than Quill, but it will never be with her. She can’t get pregnant, has never even had a period. Quill taught her about them when she was eleven but told her she wouldn’t be affected. Created as she was, she can’t reproduce.
James turns around to write in the journal.
She peers over his shoulder. “What is it?”
“Do you trust me?” His pen hesitates. “I thought our next destination could be a surprise.”
Nelle softens. Shedoestrust him. “Lead the way.”
James takes her down the lamppost-lined street as evening burns.
Eyes closed, Nelle feels a magical string tug from her chest, reminding her of her lack of autonomy. Despite her dependence on James, she doesn’t feel like she did with Quill. Not constricted, even if her movements are predetermined. Even if,still, she has no true free will.
She spends the next half hour tripping over the back of James’s feet.
“Okay,” he says, “some stairs coming up here.”
After a few minutes ascending, Nelle’s calves are burning.
“Just a few more,” James assures her. “Okay, stand here.”
Balmy air caresses her cheeks as he steadies her shoulders.
