by Rachel Lacey
Her gaze sharpened. There, next to her pillow, finger painted in vivid turquoise, were the words, I love you.
And then she started to cry. She curled in the middle of her paint-soaked bed and cried until she was a miserable, shuddering mess. Why was she like this? Sometimes she thought she must be irrevocably broken inside, rendered incapable of love after too many years spent without it.
Here she was alone…again. Nicole’s words echoed endlessly inside her head.
You’re still lost, and you’re too afraid to admit it.
The first part of Nicole’s statement was definitely true. She was lost. So fucking lost. And okay, fine, she’d been too scared last night to admit it. The problem was, she couldn’t be found, not nearly as easily as Nicole had gone home and gotten herself together.
Fiona was just…like this. And people like her weren’t suited to relationships. She’d always known it. She’d been happy alone, preferred it that way, even. When Nicole first came into her life, she’d thought it might turn out to be a good thing. They could be friends, see each other occasionally, screw each other’s brains out when the opportunity presented.
But love her? Fiona didn’t know how to do that, was certain she’d fuck it up. So she’d taken the easy way out. Or at least it had felt like the easy way a few hours ago. Now, instead of standing at the airport kissing Nicole goodbye, she was alone in a bed full of paint.
With a heavy sigh, she sat up, annoyed with herself for getting it all over her clothes and in her hair, annoyed with Nicole for pouring paint in her bed. By now, it had probably soaked into the mattress, and that was a hell of an expensive thing to replace. She climbed to her feet and slid the top sheet off the bed, but instead of crumpling it up, she folded it so the words I love you faced up and set it in the corner of her room.
She’d throw it away…later.
She stripped away the rest of her bedding, confused when she found one of the drop cloths from the studio in the mix. And then she held back a laugh, because even furious and jilted and heartbroken, Nicole had put a tarp under Fiona’s sheet before she poured paint on it. She’d protected the mattress.
Fiona slid the whole mess into the hamper to deal with later. She stripped out of her paint-stained clothes and took a shower. And then she attempted to get on with her day, her week, her life.
She created a halfway decent graphic for one of her clients and sat for a long time in her studio, staring at a blank canvas. In her early morning fit, Nicole had also taken their painting—the one of the lifeboat bobbing in the ocean—and thrown it facedown on the floor. Fiona couldn’t bring herself to pick it up. So it lay there, an echo of every failure that had befallen her since she’d set foot on the Cyprus Star.
She’d been a fool to think a man would buy her voyage on a vessel like that without expecting something in return. She’d been a fool to let herself fall so deeply for Nicole. She’d been a fool to invite her here, to give them both a taste of how it could have been when she’d always known she would never be able to make it work.
Enough foolishness. She gathered her bag and headed to the market to find something for supper. At least that was something she could do like a normal person. She didn’t have the heart or the energy to cook today, though, so she selected a container of premade soup and brought it to the counter.
The employee there—a woman named Manon who rang up Fiona’s purchases almost every day—gave her a shrewd look, a smile curling the corners of her mouth. “I almost didn’t recognize you in those clothes,” she said in French.
Fiona looked down at herself. She had on black trousers and a gray top, nothing outlandish. “Why is that?”
“I’m used to seeing you in something much more…” She paused for a moment as if searching for the right word. “Colorful.”
“Oh.” Well then.
Fiona tucked her chin, paid for her soup, and headed home.
The next few days passed in painful monotony. She did her morning yoga. She meditated—even if she still felt slightly off-balance without Nicole as her focal point. She met her deadlines and even painted something new. Unfortunately, it turned out as gray and depressing as her mood. It would appear that Nicole had sucked all the color right out of her house when she walked out the door.
I love you.
The finger-painted message taunted her from the corner of her bedroom, but she couldn’t bring herself to throw the ruined sheet away. Not yet.
Even the calendar had begun to taunt her. As August rolled into September, she was forced to face the date looming ahead. On the tenth, she would turn forty. It was no big deal. Age was just a number. She hadn’t felt much about it one way or another as the date approached, but now that it was nearly here, she couldn’t help wondering—what did she have to show for the first forty years of her life?
And the answer was: not a hell of a lot. She lived alone, had few friends, was estranged from her only living family member, and had pushed away the only person in recent years brave enough to love her.
The only person in recent years Fiona had been brave enough to love back.
She didn’t want to turn forty alone. She didn’t want to be alone for another fucking second. Her cottage was so empty these days, it was about to swallow her whole.
She picked up her phone and scrolled backward through her texts from Nicole, all the way back to the night they’d exchanged selfies in bed. The night Fiona had agreed to let her visit. She looked at the photo of Nicole in her ridiculously adorable pajamas, hazel eyes crinkled in one of her irresistible smiles, the kind of smile that made Fiona feel worthy of being looked at that way. When she was with Nicole, the world felt lighter and brighter. The plain truth was, Fiona didn’t want a life without her. And maybe their love was worth the risk of her fucking it up.
Because maybe, if she got out of her own head and just let Nicole love her, she wouldn’t fuck it up. Maybe it was that easy. No, it wouldn’t be easy. It would be one of the hardest things she had ever done, but it might also be the best, certainly the most important. Nicole had gone home and sorted herself out when Fiona asked her to. Now it was time for Fiona to do the same thing.
I have so many regrets, her father had said.
God knew Fiona had regrets, a lifetime of them, but right now, not letting him explain himself that day in the hospital ranked near the top. What would he have said?
She remembered the cards he’d sent over the years, the times he’d called—calls she’d never returned. He’d closed himself off from her as a child when he felt like he’d failed her, pushed her away out of fear, the same way she’d done to Nicole. The same way she’d been pushing him away throughout her adulthood.
Maybe he’d come to her hospital room to make things right. Maybe it was time to let him. And maybe it was time for her to do the same.
Choking on the terror clogging her throat, she closed out of her messaging app and booked herself a flight to London. She packed a bag. And she made the long flight home.
The following morning, she stepped out of a taxi in front of the granite-fronted row house where her father lived now. Sucking in the biggest breath she’d ever taken in her life, she walked up the front steps and lifted the knocker.
Her whole life seemed to flash before her eyes as she waited, listening for the sound of his footsteps. The creak of her bedroom door when Uncle Timothy pushed it open. The horror and revulsion in her father’s eyes when she’d told him the truth. The bitterly cold rain that fell on her shoulders as she stood over her mother’s grave.
The door swung open, and her father stood there, looking impossibly old and gray. His eyes widened, his fingertips white where he gripped the edge of the door.
“Dad,” she managed, clinging desperately to her composure.
“Fiona.”
For a moment that seemed to last an eternity, they just stared at each other. Her heart beat so fast, her ears buzzed, her stomach a hard knot lodged somewhere beneath her rib cage. And then her ri
gid, impassive father pulled her against his chest, arms shaking as they encircled her, tears streaming down his face.
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. So very sorry.”
18
When Nicole first got back to New York, she’d checked her phone about a million times, hoping against hope that Fiona might call or text. Apologize. Explain. Ply her with some pathetic attempt to stay friends that Nicole would have to decide if she was strong enough to accept because the thought of losing her entirely was unbearable.
But the days passed, and nothing came. No call. No text. Nothing. And Nicole was forced to accept that their relationship was irrevocably, completely over.
It was the loneliest week of her life, even though she was surrounded by people for the majority of it. She got up and went to work every day. She went out with her friends for girls’ night. She went to her parents’ house for a home-cooked meal and some much-needed affection, courtesy of her mom, a game of chess, courtesy of her dad, and a much-needed smile, courtesy of her younger brother, Michael, who came to dinner with his brand-new fiancée.
None of them could ease the emptiness in her heart. How must it feel to be Fiona, all alone in that cottage in the French countryside? Was she missing Nicole even half as much as Nicole missed her? The most heartbreaking part of the whole scenario was that Nicole suspected the answer was yes.
When September tenth rolled around, Nicole holed up in her apartment, wondering what Fiona was doing to celebrate the milestone. Was she at home with a glass of wine? Out with friends? A man? A woman?
The thought turned Nicole’s stomach, but no, she didn’t think Fiona would have moved on yet. Probably, she was home alone with a glass of wine. That was how she’d told Nicole she wanted to spend her birthday, after all. Alone. Eternally alone.
Oh, Fi…
Idly, Nicole picked up the sketch Fiona had left in their hotel room in Greece. She’d drawn them in bed together, bodies entwined, hair a mixture of light and dark across the pillows.
But the table beside the bed…
Nicole shrugged up on her elbows and turned on the lamp to get a better look. She’d seen that table, and not in their hotel room. It was the table beside Fiona’s bed in her cottage in France. Those were the sheets Nicole had poured paint on. She recognized the zigzagged stitching along the seam. This was Fiona’s bedroom. And, now that she was really looking, the thin line below Fiona’s knee wasn’t a wound but a scar.
She’d drawn a future version of them, at her home, healthy and healed and cuddled in bed together. What did that mean? Was it an apology or a promise?
And the question that had been lingering in the back of Nicole’s mind all day suddenly loomed to the front—should she call Fiona on her birthday? Maybe send her a text?
What time was it in France right now? Late. Probably too late to call. She looked at the clock. It was past eight here, which meant it was already well past midnight in France. Her birthday was over. Fiona was forty, and they were both still alone.
Nicole rolled facedown in bed, fighting back tears.
Someone knocked on her door, and she lurched upright. Aw, dammit, here she was in her pajamas with red-rimmed eyes, and she was going to have to face down a neighbor or well-meaning friend who’d decided to drop by unannounced.
The thought briefly crossed her mind to ignore the knock, roll over in bed, and pretend to already be asleep. At eight fifteen and with all her lights on? Yeah, right.
With a sigh, she climbed to her feet, checked her appearance in the mirror to make sure she was at least basically presentable, and shuffled to the door. Without bothering to check the peephole, she pulled it open, and then she reeled backward in surprise.
“Hi,” Fiona said, staring at her out of eyes even more tired and red rimmed than Nicole’s. She wore black pants and a formfitting black top, her hair pulled back in a messy ponytail so that her dark roots all but hid the golden depths of her curls, a duffel bag slung over her shoulders, and she couldn’t have looked any less like herself if she’d shown up in a ball gown and glass slippers.
Nicole just gaped at her for a long minute, unable to believe Fiona was actually on her doorstep, looking like this dim, glum version of herself.
“I, um, I hope you hadn’t rescinded my invitation to visit?” Fiona said, going for a joke, but her voice cracked about halfway through. Her eyes welled with tears, and…dammit.
Nicole wrapped her arms around her, squeezing her tight. “I’m still furious with you,” she whispered through her own tears. “Don’t forget that just because I’m also ridiculously glad to see you.”
“May I come in?” Fiona asked with a tight smile, swiping a palm over her cheeks.
Nicole gestured her inside, closing the door behind her. “Did you really fly all the way to your least favorite city in the world on your birthday?”
“I did.” Fiona twisted her fingers, her eyes darting around the apartment before landing on Nicole’s.
“Why?” she asked, because her heart was swelling with all kinds of possibilities, and they were almost all good. She couldn’t take it if Fiona was here for any other reason.
Fiona blew out a breath. “I did what you told me to do,” she said finally, her voice small.
“What was that?” She hardly dared hope…
“I went home,” Fiona said, and okay, that wasn’t what Nicole had expected.
“Home?”
“To see my father,” she said quietly. “I’ve been in London most of the week.”
“Oh my God.” Nicole couldn’t help herself, she was hugging Fiona again, dragging her toward the couch. She set her bag on the floor, and they sat, side by side. “How did it go?”
“Okay,” Fiona said with a quick nod. “We talked quite a bit. He apologized…so did I.”
“Fi, that’s so good. Oh, I’m so glad.”
“Yeah, me too.” She took Nicole’s hand in hers, her grip surprisingly strong. “I think I found the thing I was hiding from. We faced our demons, my father and I.”
“That’s really great.” Her words felt painfully inadequate, but she didn’t know how to tell Fiona just how glad she was that she’d finally been able to make peace with her past.
“We still have a lot of healing to do. I have a lot of healing to do. But I’m willing to do it.” Fiona turned toward her, eyes wide and vivid, swimming like the Mediterranean, an emotional hurricane churning in their depths. “I don’t want to be alone anymore.”
“Oh, Fi…” Tears splashed over Nicole’s cheeks, and her heart felt like it was wringing itself inside out.
“So I came here to this awful city on my fucking birthday to tell you I love you,” Fiona said, the words tumbling out of her, chest heaving, fingers clutching Nicole’s. “I’m sorry for running out on you like I did. I was scared and stupid, and I promise…” She drew in a ragged breath. “I’ll try to do better next time if you’ll give me the chance.”
And then they were kissing, tears mingling on their faces, arms wrapped so tightly around each other Nicole could hardly breathe.
“Of course,” she gasped. “Of course, I’ll give you the chance. I love you, Fi, so much.”
“I’ve been miserable without you,” Fiona said, kissing the tears from Nicole’s cheeks. “It’s been fucking awful.”
“Same,” Nicole said, laughing through her tears. “Let’s not do that again, okay?”
“Never.” A smile broke over Fiona’s face, her lips red from their kisses, cheeks flushed a happy pink, eyes impossibly blue, color coming out from behind the storm clouds that had obscured her when she first came to the door.
“I have the craziest urge to get on my knees right now and propose to you,” Nicole whispered.
“Oh God.” Fiona slapped a hand over her mouth.
“I’m not going to, at least not today. You’re not ready. Hell, I’m not ready. But just know that I plan to love and cherish you for as long as we both shall live, regardless, okay?”
F
iona nodded, crying in earnest now.
Nicole leaned in, pressing her nose against Fiona’s cheek. “You crossed an ocean for me today.”
Fiona turned her head, bringing their lips together. “And I’d do it again.”
They kissed, deep and drunk and desperate, weeks of pent-up longing bursting into flames between them.
“You’re the first person I’ve ever felt this way about,” Fiona whispered into their kiss. “I’ve thought about you every moment since we left Greece, even when I thought I’d never see you again. It took me forty years to fall in love, to find someone I could imagine spending the rest of my life with. It’s safe to say you’re it for me.”
Nicole grinned at her, wiping the tears from Fiona’s cheeks. “I knew you were a romantic at heart.”
“Only for you,” she whispered, pulling Nicole in for another kiss.
“Oh, and Fi?”
“Yes?”
“Happy birthday.”
EPILOGUE
ONE YEAR LATER
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.”
Fiona glanced over her shoulder at Nicole. “You love me.”
“You’re insane.” Nicole huffed as she picked her way over the scrubby ground toward the crumbled marble pavilion ahead.
“In a good way, I hope?”
“That remains to be seen.” But she was smiling, and Fiona took that as a yes.
“This time, there’s a boat just offshore waiting to whisk us back to the mainland the moment we’re ready to leave.” Fiona stepped into the pavilion, spinning to take it in. Nothing had changed since they’d raced into the darkness that fateful night, chasing after a distant Greek fishing boat. Their dresses—one red and one gray—fluttered from the pillar where Nicole had hung them after their last washing, tattered and faded now like ancient artifacts.
“I can’t believe they’re still here,” Nicole said, tracing her fingers over the ragged edge of Fiona’s red dress.
