“No, but it’s a job of which many disapprove. And I don’t know you well enough to be sure you’ll be kind.”
“Well, I’m still unsure of what this has to do with swimming, but as someone who has been ruthlessly mocked by you for my own occupation, I can assure you that I would never do the same to you.”
Lottie takes a breath to respond, but she lets it go. She is silent for a few moments, before she finally says, “You’re right.”
“What?” Marigold and August both say in time with each other. Marigold did not expect Lottie to abandon the fight so quickly.
“I’m sorry, I must have misheard. Did Lottie Burke almost admit to being wrong in her behavior?” August says, and Lottie shoves him nearly into the pool. He catches his balance in time and says, “This is unheard of. Tell me, Lots, what has prompted such an admittance?”
Lottie chews on her lip, the way she always does when she’s nervous, and she looks back at Marigold. “I think I trust you,” Lottie says, and she begins to undo her heavy dress.
Marigold can barely contain her heart. It throbs in her chest like a new wound. Lottie does not speak. She pulls her arms out of the long sleeves and drops her dress, then her stay, so that she is only in a thin chemise that stops just above her ankles. She stretches her arms out to her side, revealing areas of pinkish skin covered in random black shapes that Marigold cannot quite make out. Immediately, though, she knows that the marks on Lottie’s skin are the result of burns. It looks like the wound on her own mother’s hand that is always hidden underneath a lacy glove.
“My parents died in a fire when I was young,” Lottie starts. Marigold opens her mouth to offer sympathies, but Lottie cuts her off. “Don’t cry for me, for I have no memory of it, and I don’t know how I made it out alive. I only have scars to prove that it was real.”
As she comes closer, she can clearly see the pink and white scars all over Lottie’s upper arms. She can also see that the black shapes over them form an elegant, swirling design. They are tattoos, all over her body. Birds, flora, anchors, snakes. Ribbons, Latin, gods, and monsters. Marigold stares in awe. Tattoos are scandalous, even in Bardshire, where people are supposedly more open-minded to any form of art. Even there, they are only for men. For women, tattoos are illegal, punishable by massive fines and possible jail time. She heard a story once abouta rebellious daughter of a novelist in Bardshire who fell in love with a sailor boy. The boy had lots of tattoos, as most sailors do, and she asked for one—a letter or a heart or something else perfectly harmless and easy to hide—but her handmaiden saw it one morning while she was helping the daughter dress. When her father heard of this, he took his daughter to a doctor who scrubbed her skin down to the bone with salt and gauze until the tattoo was gone.
“No tattoo artists would provide their services to a girl,” Lottie continues, “much less a girl of my age, and the scar tissue is nearly impossible to cover. But I wanted to do it. I had to. I had to reclaim my body and mark it the way I wanted to, not the way that the burns left me.” Marigold reaches for Lottie’s hand and holds it lightly, lifting her arm toward the moon for a better view. She admires both the tattoos and the scars, as they both tell the story of this impossible girl.
“I’m grateful for the scars. They led me to my purpose, which is art,” Lottie says proudly.
“You’re so extraordinary, Lottie.” The words fall from her mouth before she can catch them, before she realizes what she has confessed. She could not help herself. She thought Lottie was beautiful before, but now she is so much more than beautiful. She is marked with bravery, with artistry, with so many stories. Marigold wants to know them all.
Lottie starts making that pinched, sour face again, the one she makes every time she receives a compliment. She palms her forehead like she has a headache and shakes her head.
“Are you all right?” Marigold asks.
Before Lottie responds, there is a splash behind them as August jumps into the water.
“This is exhilarating!” August screams as he comes up and shakes the water from his hair.
The oasis looks like a pit of glass with jagged edges reaching up toward the moon. When Marigold jumps in, her movement blurs the sharp shards into soft ripples that welcome her inside.Her hair hovers upon the surface of the water, its bright golden tones piercing through the black of night. It spills down her back as she turns back to regard Lottie, who still stands at the edge with her arms crossed.
“Jump in!” she says, motioning Lottie forward.
“You’re both mad,” Lottie says, and Marigold splashes her with icy water.
“And you are missing out,” Marigold says, pulling herself out of the water to stand by Lottie’s side. “Come on!”
She shivers as the cold night air breathes against her body, pebbling her soft skin beneath its touch. Lottie looks down to regard her already wet chemise and giggles under her breath.
“Okay. We fall together?” she asks, offering her hand.
“We fall together,” Marigold echoes, taking her waiting hand.
They leap into the air, and Marigold witnesses the moment that Lottie lets go of herself and everything holding her back, and for a moment, the woman is nothing but air and sound. She screams joyously as her body meets the water and she is submerged. Marigold swims down to meet her. Moonlight streams through the inky black water until it is blocked by Lottie’s silhouette. A halo of moonlight surrounds her, hugging the sharp contours of her body.
They touch—softly at first, until Lottie pulls her closer. Marigold’s fingers fit perfectly around the curves of Lottie’s waist. Lottie’s hands drift to Marigold’s face, and whether she means to or not, she drags her thumb across Marigold’s bottom lip. Underwater, they can pretend that this is not intentional, that every touch is by chance alone. Their noses brush, and if they were not close to running out of air, Marigold wonders how much further they could go.
When they come back up, they are both gasping, and not just for want of air. Tension crackles between them.
“Have fun down there?” August jokes. Marigold blushes and Lottie’s only response is the sudden shiver that vibrates between her teeth.
“It’s summer. How is the water so cold?” Lottie says.
Marigold squeezes her hand, unable to let it go just yet. “We don’t have to stay. Whenever you’re ready, we’ll go inside.”
The three of them splash and laugh until exhaustion creeps in. They pull themselves out of the water and grab their piles of clothes before heading back toward the cottage. Marigold leads the way with the dimming lantern in her grip.
