She doesn’t move for like a while, tilting her head and sizing me. Then steps aside, holding the door open with a lazy wave.
“Seriously?”
She shrugs. “I like having you wait on me.”
I walk in, shaking my head. “You don’t make it easy for people, do you?”
The apartment’s warm and quiet. Smells like vanilla and incense. I glance around at the scattered sketch pads and the infamous table still sitting in the middle of the room like a dying animal.
Then I look back at Frankie.
No makeup. Just bare skin and sleepy green eyes. And for the first time I notice the tiny tattoo below her temple, stretched just slightly by her full cheeks.
I gesture toward it. “You kill somebody?”
She blinks, confused. “What?”
I nod toward her face. “The tattoo. You in a gang now?”
Her lips twitch, and she puts a hand to her cheek, pretending to be horrified. “Is that what it means?”
I roll my eyes. “You’re a real comedian.”
“It was a crescent moon,” she says, rubbing it lightly. “When I gained weight, it stretched a bit.”
I smirk. “Well. At least nobody will fuck with you.”
That earns me a half-smile.
I set the toolbox down near the couch, glancing up at her again. “How’d you end up all tattooed up anyway? You used to hate needles.”
She tilts her head, eyes narrowing. “You remember that?”
“‘Course I do.”
For a second, her expression softens as I catch her off guard. Then she shrugs, hiding it.
“Guess I just… got tired of feeling plain.” She eyes me carefully. “You don’t like it, then?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“So you do?”
I nod, slower this time. “I love it, actually. I could never mark my skin like that, but it looks good on you.”
Her lips part, like she’s about to say something, but she doesn’t. She just looks at me eyes half-lidded.
Then she mutters, “You’re full of shit.”
I tilt my head, a slow smirk tugging at the corner of my mouth. “No, you’re full of shit. Acting like you don’t know me.”
Her brow lifts, calm and unbothered. “Am I? Or is it just not possible for you to comprehend that I don’t remember you?”
I lean in a little, voice low, steady. “You remember me, Francine. I know you do.”
She stares at me. “Really?”
Then she turns and walks off like the conversation’s over.
