He flinched and recovered. “My true concerns, however, are in regards to the delicate sentiments of our good hostess.”
“And if we propose the recreation to Aunt Saffronia and she approves, will you participate?”
“Yes, I suppose I must.” He tightened his lips, in annoyance or against a smile, she wasn’t sure. “You are infuriatingly persistent, Miss Erstwhile.”
“And you, Mr. Nobley, are annoyingly stubborn. Together we must be . . . Impertinence and Inflexibility.”
“That was clever.”
“Was it? Thanks, it just came to me.”
“No forethought?”
“Not a lick.”
“Hm, impressive.”
Jane poked him with her elbow.
When they reached the front steps, the rest of the party was just arriving from the other side of the house. Miss Charming was engaging Colonel Andrews in a discussion on the “relative ickiness of tea.” Amelia appeared calm and content, melting into her conversation with Captain East as though into his arms.
“We’re going to do the theatrical,” Jane announced to the others. “Mr. Nobley is clay in my hands.”
That night she snuggled into her sheets, giggling as she remembered all the delicious moments from the day. She was pleased with herself for deciding to go for broke. It was easier because she wasn’t really Jane here—not obsessive, crazy Jane. Fairy-tale land was a safe place to roll around in, get into trouble, figure yourself out, and come out unscathed.
Hopefully unscathed. As she sank into a dream, her heart murmured a sleepy warning, but Jane was too far gone to notice.
Boyfriend #12
Peter Sosa, age twenty-nine
They met in the elevator. He worked on an upper floor, an ad exec, young for the position, so obviously a genius. Smartness had always attracted Jane, that and hands and jawline and butt. And eyes. Also, integrity of character—she wasn’t shallow. Peter fell for her at once, he said, because she was stunning. That’s the word he’d used—stunning.It’s a difficult word to dismiss. She longed to be that word to someone.
They texted daily for weeks, and she felt her heart plummeting a long way. Boyfriend #11 was still raw, a sore that wouldn’t heal because she kept picking at it, but wouldn’t Peter besucha way to come back from that catastrophe! She fantasized of the day she would casually bump into nasty ex-boyfriends with Peter on her arm. And then, when Peter finally took her to dinner on their first real date . . .
“What’s wrong? You’re married, aren’t you?”
“No, no, nothing like that.” He paused, leaving Jane to imagine. “I have a girlfriend. I’m sorry. I’m not cheating, she’s right over there, at the table by the window. She made me a bet that I couldn’t make the first girl I asked out fall in love with me. She got the idea from some book she read, thought it would be romantic, then it went too far . . .”
Jane’s language would have made Britney the longshoreman blush down to her boots.
Day 9
Jane woke early to paint. The neglected artist had begun to yawn again inside her, and she yearned to feed it. With a brush in her hand, all the clunky, scattered thoughts drained out of her, sparing her from awareness of her sharp, pointy bits or the assaults of anxious memories, and she entered the artistic meditative state she hadn’t realized she’d been missing.
When she finally took a step back from her canvas, hours had somehow passed. It seemed like a small miracle. Never before had she noticed that her fear of being alone dissolved while she was creating. The process brought up an ability to be present with herself, the art reflecting her heart back, making her feel surrounded and supported.
“I am all astonishment,” whispered Jane.
Noticing her stomach rumble, she rang a maid to help her dress for the day and hurried down to the morning room,hoping to catch the last of breakfast. Waiting for her in an otherwise empty room was a cup of cold tea, some eggs and toast, and Mr. Nobley, holding two scripts. He had the look of a long-suffering man.
Jane laughed. “I knew Aunt Saffronia would not mind.”
“As did I. And that is why I had preferred not to ask her.”
They sat in silence on the sofa, reading through the scripts side by side. It was a fairy-dusted romance of star-crossed lovers that was too sentimental for Jane even in her present state of extreme openheartedness. She snorted a laugh.
“It is not supposed to be a comedy,” he said.
