"I'm glad I kissed you."
Her smile could light up the whole village. "I'm glad you did too."
She tugs me gently away from the wall, and we walk back toward the fête, hand in hand. When we round the corner and rejoin the crowd, I half expect everyone to stare at us—to know, somehow, what just happened.
But no one looks twice. We're just two women holding hands at a party, which apparently isn't remarkable enough to merit attention. Monique catches my eye and winks, but that's all.
I could get used to this. Being unremarkable. Being just another couple at the fête.
"Dance with me again?" Cat asks.
"Always."
She leads me back into the crowd, and when she pulls me close this time, there's no pretense, no hesitation. I rest my head onher shoulder and let the music carry us, and I feel something inside me unclench—a knot I've been carrying for so long I forgot it was there.
This is what it feels like, I think. To want something and reach for it. To take a risk and have it pay off.
This is what it feels like to choose.
The song ends. Cat lifts my hand to her lips and kisses my knuckles, a gesture so tender it makes my eyes sting.
"Ready to go home?" she asks.
Home. The farmhouse. Our farmhouse.
"Yes," I say. "Let's go home."
She takes my hand and leads me away from the fête, into the darkness, toward whatever comes next. The stars are bright overhead, the air is warm and fragrant with lavender, and I'm holding the hand of a woman I just kissed for the first time.
I don't know what happens now. I don't have a plan, a spreadsheet, a carefully organized list of next steps.
For once in my life, I don't need one.
I have Cat. I have tonight. And for right now, that's enough.
18
CAT
I wake up alone, which is not how I expected to wake up.
For a moment I lie there, confused, the memory of last night filtering back in fragments. The fête. The dancing. Iris kissing me like the world was ending and she wanted to spend her last moments doing exactly that.
And then the walk home, hand in hand, neither of us quite able to speak. Standing in the hallway outside our bedrooms, the air thick with possibility. Her eyes dark and uncertain, wanting and afraid.
"We should probably..." she'd started.
"Yeah. Probably."
And then she'd kissed me one more time—soft, sweet, a promise rather than a demand—and disappeared into her room.
So here I am. Alone. Staring at the ceiling and trying to figure out if last night was real or if I dreamed the whole thing.
The smell of coffee drifts in, which suggests it was real. Iris doesn't know how to use the French press. Or she didn't, anyway, before I taught her.
I drag myself out of bed, pull on a worn t-shirt and shorts, and make my way to the kitchen with all the grace of someone who drank too much rosé and kissed a woman she's been fantasizing about for weeks.
She's standing at the counter with a mug in her hands, staring out the window at the lavender fields. Her hair is loose, still messy from sleep, and she's wearing the same shirt she wore to bed—an oversized thing that falls to mid-thigh and makes her look soft in a way I've never seen before.
