I didn’t want to ask her that, but at the same time I was curious about whether she was thinking about him.
“I think he can figure that much out for himself.”
Her nonchalance made me relax, and my fingers traced lazy lines around her ankles until she leaned back into the cushions and closed her eyes. Soft shadows danced across her face in the firelight, and I’d never felt happier than in that moment.
I woketo Francesca peeling back the duvet and climbing out of bed. I nestled into the warm space she’d left behind, watching as she stripped off my T-shirt and dressed in the thin light.
“Where are you going?” I said through a stretchy yawn.
“Oh, you’re awake!” She spun around. “I need to get back; Jeremy has a trip planned for today.”
The casual way she mentioned his name jolted me. I propped myself on my elbows, squinting without my glasses. “What, just the two of you?”
“I’d have thought so, yes.” Francesca pulled off the cotton knickers I’d given her last night and glanced around as if she were trying to figure out where to put them. Ireached my arm out from under the duvet, and she dropped them into my open hand.
“Don’t you think that’s going to give him the wrong idea?”
She tilted her head. “What idea?”
“That he has a chance with you.”
“That’s the wrong idea, is it?”
A heavy weight dropped in my gut. “But we… you and I. We…”
Her lips stretched into a disapproving grimace. “You’re not going to get all jealous and make me feel guilty, are you?”
“I don’t understand.” I flopped back and covered my face with my hands to hide my threatening tears.
Francesca moved over to the bedside and pulled at my wrists, but my hands remained clamped firmly over my eyes, where those tears were making good on their threat.
Francesca’s weight shifted onto the bed as she hitched up her dress and straddled me. With more force and greater leverage, she tugged at my forearms until I released. She stared down at me in bemusement, as if she were having to patiently deal with a massive overreaction.
“You do understand, Catherine.” She cupped a hand around my cheek. “You and I have something precious and rare. But if we’re to keep on doing this, sharing this special thing, it needs to remain just between us.” She spoke in a slow, syrupy voice, pouring out words that should have sounded sweet to me —precious, rare, special— but they didn’t.
I clenched my jaw until my teeth ached.
“So, what you’re saying is, you want to keep us a secret. And you’re going to date Jeremy too?”
Francesca rolled her eyes. “Let’s not do this. Let’s not ruin what was a magical night.” She bent down to kiss me, and despite my better judgement, I let her. If I kissed her for long enough, if I could make her feel what I was feeling through this kiss, then she might not pop this perfect bubble.
When she pulled away, I tried to hold on to her even though it felt desperate and needy. She peeled back my fingers and climbed off me before tucking me in under the duvet.
“Why don’t you get some rest? It was a big night.”
“I don’t want to share you with Jeremy,” I blurted.
The muscle in Francesca’s jaw twitched, and I knew I was pushing too hard.
She sharply inhaled. “Now you’re making me feel bad. Come on, I don’t want to think of you like this.” She curled her lip as if repulsed by a bitter aftertaste.
I nodded, scared to say anything else because I didn’t trust my brain to come up with the right combination of words, and even if it did, my voice would only say them all wrong. I wanted to rewind the tape of this morning, because now that it had unravelled, I wasn’t sure I could fix it.
Her features softened, and she bent and kissed my forehead. “Stop worrying. I’ll see you later, maybe?”
Then she was gone, leaving me alone in bed to sort through my tangled thoughts, like an impossible pile of laundry, separating light from dark.
15
