"Walk where?"
"The fields. It's the best time of day. I used to—" I stop, suddenly self-conscious. "Grand-mère used to take me at this hour. She said the lavender was different in golden light."
The uncertainty in Iris's face melts into something softer, something curious.
"Okay," she says. "Let me get my shoes."
She comes back in trainers—actual trainers, bought from a shop in the village last week because her selection of heels and ballet flats was proving "unsuitable for agricultural life," as she put it. Proof that she's trying.
I've been seeing these small changes for weeks now. She's stopped straightening her hair every morning. She laughs more easily, her whole face going luminous and unguarded.
I need to stop cataloguing these changes. I need to stop noticing her at all.
I'm very bad at doing what I need to do.
We walk in silence at first, following the path between the lavender rows. The plants come up to our waists here, the purple blooms heavy with bees that drone lazily in the warm air. The smell is overwhelming—clean and sharp and sweet all at once, the scent of every summer I ever spent here, of every good memory I have.
"Tell me about when you were young," Iris says. "Here, I mean. What was it like?"
The question catches me off guard. We've talked around our childhoods—compared notes on our mothers' silences, swapped theories about what really happened—but we haven't done this. Haven't just shared memories for the sake of sharing them.
"It was magic," I say, and the word isn't an exaggeration. "My life in London was... complicated. My mum was having one of herbad periods, and everything felt heavy, and then I'd come here and it was like stepping into another world."
"What did you do? During the summers?"
"Everything." I run my hand along the top of the lavender, feeling the rough texture of the blooms against my palm. "Helped with the harvest. Learned to cook. Played in the barn until Grand-mère threatened to lock me in with the rats if I didn't stop making such a racket."
"There are rats in the barn?"
"No.She made that up to keep me in line. Didn't work—I went looking for them. I thought it would be like having pets."
Iris laughs, and the sound does something to my chest. I'm increasingly aware that I'm in trouble here, that every moment I spend with her makes it worse, but I can't seem to stop.
"She used to bring me out here at sunset," I continue. "We'd walk all the way to the edge of the property, where you can see the valley. She'd tell me stories about the land, about the family, about the women who worked this lavender before her."
"What happened to them? The other women?"
"Died, mostly. Or married and moved away. Grand-mère was the last one left—she inherited from her aunt. It's been passing through women in the family for generations. Not always the obvious ones." I glance at Iris. "She used to say the lavender chose its keepers. That the land would reject anyone who didn't belong."
"That's very..." Iris searches for a word. "Mystical. For a practical woman."
"She had levels." I smile at the memory. "She could skin a rabbit and balance the accounts and then tell you with complete sincerity that the old stones at the edge of the property were placed there by the goddess herself."
"What goddess?"
"She never said. I think she liked the mystery."
We've reached my favorite spot—a slight rise in the middle of the largest field, where the lavender stretches out in all directions like a purple sea. The sun is lower now, the light going thick and golden, and the mountains in the distance are turning the color of bruises.
"Here," I say, stopping. "This is it."
Iris turns in a slow circle, taking it in. Her hair is loose, catching the light, and there's an expression on her face I can't quite read. Wonder, maybe. Or grief for something she never had.
"She wanted you to know this," I say softly. "She wanted you to stand here and see this. That's why she made us stay. I’m sure of it."
"You think that's why?"
"I think she knew what this place could do to a person. How it gets under your skin." I swallow, suddenly aware of how close we're standing. "I think she hoped it would get under yours."
