A Scarlet Kiss

by Heidi Lowe

  "Uh, hi," I said," praying I'd averted my gaze before she caught me perving on her legs. They really were great legs. Enviable.

  "Hi," she said stiffly.

  "Are you making tea? Could I have one too?"

  She narrowed her eyes at me. "Isn't coffee more your thing?"

  And aren't women more your thing? I wanted to say, but didn't.

  "When in Rome, right? Or in my case the UK." I did a little laugh at my lame joke, and was surprised when I saw the faintest smile creep to her lips.

  She got another cup down from the cupboard, put a teabag in it. "What are you still doing up?"

  I shrugged, sat around the table, and didn't meet her gaze for fear she would see I was about to lie. "Couldn't sleep. I can never sleep when I'm traveling the next day."

  She didn't speak until our teas were brewed and she'd set them down. Across the table, she leaned back in her seat and studied me, making me feel super self-conscious.

  "So we didn't wake you?"

  "No, what do you mean?" I was so caught up in my lie and trying not to make it obvious that I knew exactly what she was talking about, that I took a mouthful of my tea, forgetting it was still piping hot.

  "Fuck!" I said. My tongue and lips felt like they were on fire.

  She laughed in her smooth, sexy way. "You must be really thirsty."

  I poured myself a glass of water and gulped it down. She was still wearing her smirk when I returned to my seat.

  "I hate when that happens. Now my tongue's numb and I won't be able to enjoy the tea."

  "Your tongue will heal."

  "So, is your friend gone?" I said a little while later, already fully aware that he was.

  "My friend? You mean Eric? Yes, he's gone. Why?"

  "No reason." And because I simply couldn't help myself, I added, "He seems nice."

  "He's fine."

  "You guys seemed to get on well."

  "We do..." She looked at me suspiciously. If I were in her shoes, I would have been equally as suspicious of my comments. We hardly knew each other, yet here I was delving into her private life. Why did I care?

  "Look, I wanted to apologize for implying that you...well, you know."

  "That I like women?"

  "Yeah," I said, embarrassed. Susan may have been someone she'd slept with, but she clearly wasn't exclusively into women. There was such a thing as bi-curious.

  "Does that disappoint you?"

  "Why would it disappoint me?" The question dumbfounded me. Not just because it was random, but because it had an element of truth to it, and it frightened me that she'd been able to see that. I was disappointed, though I didn't know why.

  "Maybe you wanted a juicy story to tell my brother. Who knows?"

  "You have a worrying impression of me. Believe me, no one wants you married with children more than I do. Then your parents might stop trying to get me to have their first grandchild."

  She laughed like someone who had been where I was and knew the feeling well.

  "That sounds about right. They did such a bad job with their own children, they think grandchildren will be their second chance."

  Though this had been my thought, it wasn't my place to say it, so I just smiled.

  "I keep telling them it's far too early for me and Marcus to talk about starting a family–"

  "That, and you don't love him..."

  I gawked at her, something that had become somewhat of a habit. "I...I..."

  "What? Do I lie?"

  "Well, I care about Marcus–"

  "Right, but you don't love him. You're having your fun until someone more serious comes along. We've all done the toyboy thing, I get it, it's flattering. But you won't be heading to the altar."

  "How can you say that?"

  "Because it's true."

  The joy she got from watching me squirm was written all over her face. How easily she wound me up. I pitied the man who married her.

  "We've been together for six months! That's too soon to be madly in love and planning our future together."

  She shook her head. "That's not true. You would have already fallen in love with him if you were ever going to. You would already know that he was the one."

  It sounded outlandish coming from her – this concept of The One.

  "Some people take longer than others to get there."

  "Sure, but Marcus is the complete package, he's loveable. You just don't love him."

  I wanted to argue with her, to prove that she was wrong, but I couldn't. I'd decided a long time ago that I would never lie to myself or anyone else about my feelings. That was why whenever Marcus told me he loved me, I never said it back. It hadn't affected our relationship; maybe he believed I would eventually feel the same. He didn't know what I did, however; what Scarlett seemed to know just by looking at me. I would never work up to loving him; caring was as far as my feelings would go.

  I drank my tea miserably, pissed at my scorched tongue and my perceptive sister-in-law.

  "So what about Eric? Did you get butterflies with him?" I asked bitterly.

  "We're not talking about me."

  "Why not? You're the one who's thirty-four, unmarried, and still living at home with your parents."

  Okay, so I hadn't planned for it to come out so malicious, and I instantly regretted it when her face contorted with anger.

  She opened her mouth to give a retort, a scathing one, no doubt, but snapped it shut, got up, poured the rest of her tea down the sink, and started to leave.

  I was suddenly overcome with guilt at hurting her feelings. As she was about to storm past me, not thinking, I stood up, put my hand out to stop her.

  "I'm sorry, I didn't mean that the way it sounded."

  There we were once more, staring at each other, the sounds all around us – the buzzing of the refrigerator, the humming of the boiler – fading away until I could only hear her gentle breathing.

  I was terrified at that moment. Terrified because I couldn't explain what was happening, what this feeling was when I got lost in her gaze, lost in eyes the color of rich soil. My stomach knotted.

  "Are you going to let me pass?" she said eventually, breaking the spell as she had done in the changing room. That was when I looked down and noticed that my palm was pressed to her stomach, to the silky fabric of her chemise.

  I snatched my hand back, feeling the blood rush to my face and neck. I'd never been so humiliated in all my life. Hurriedly I stepped aside and let her leave, which she did, but looked back over her shoulder to give me one final, bemused look before disappearing into her room and closing the door.

  I let out the breath I'd been holding, and shuddered. Shuddered because, had she not broken the spell, I didn't know what would have happened between us.

  EIGHT

  "If you keep trying to kiss me, I'll never get this done," I said, giggling as I did Marcus's tie. "I'm starting to think your wrist isn't really sprained."

  He grinned down at me cheekily, then held up the hand that he'd supposedly sprained while helping his father move some things from the cellar the day before. "Would I lie to you? See."

  I wasn't buying it. He'd obviously used trickery to get me close so he could steal kisses from me.

  When I'd finished with his tie, I spun round in order for him to help me with my dress, which he seemed more than capable of doing.

  My reflection stared back at me in the mirror. Here I was again, in the expensive dress, a Rutherford-Manning sibling doing me up.

  "You look amazing, you know that," Marcus said, but his voice was distant, as though he was speaking from another room.

  I wasn't really listening. In my mind I was right back in the changing room, and the figure standing behind me, now sweeping my hair out of the way, was Scarlett. When Marcus did it, goosebumps didn't spread over my flesh. He didn't look at me with the same intensity in his eyes.

  "Jenna, are you listening?"

  I snapped out of my reverie. "Sorry, what did you say?"


  "I said you spent three-hundred and fifty pounds on a dress?" He'd just seen the tag, which I'd neglected to remove.

  "No, I didn't. Actually your sister paid..."

  Should I have said that? Was it wrong of me to accept such an expensive gift from her?

  His eyes grew wide. "She did? Wow, and there I was worrying that you two weren't hitting it off."

  "I insisted I could pay for it myself, but she wouldn't let me."

  "That sounds like Scarlett. She's great, isn't she?"

  "Yeah," I said, forcing a smile. I told him whatever he wanted to hear. Anything other than complete and utter agreement, any opposing opinion about her would have started a war!

  "Well, I think we've left it long enough to be fashionably late." He held out his arm for me to take. "Shall we?"

  It all seemed so formal, so over the top. But as we went to step out of the room, we burst out laughing because, when we tried to walk out together, we couldn't fit. Instantly I felt less nervous about the party, a little more relaxed.

  "I feel I should warn you about some of the crowd," he said as we made our way down the stairs. Vivaldi was playing. "Once you open your mouth and they hear that you're American, there are going to be a lot of very stupid questions and misconceptions thrown at you. You'll be poked and prodded like you're not from this planet, and they'll proceed to bore you with details of the one or two American friends they have, and ask you if you know them."

  I gawked at him, mortified. "You're not serious?"

  "I wish I wasn't."

  "...and my daughter married an American man. Very intelligent young man indeed. Mind you, the marriage didn't last. As it turned out, he'd been carrying on with his assistant for the duration of their relationship. Is that a common thing for American men to do?"

  "I went to Los Angeles in '78. I didn't like it then, and I haven't been back to the US since. You're not from there, are you, love?"

  "I don't much like the Americans! They're just English people with funny accents!"

  I'm going to kill Marcus! my inner voice screamed, as my eyes landed on him way across the garden, talking to a couple of his friends, having left me surrounded by a pack of old people who fit into one of three categories: grumpy, nosy, and drunk. One of them fit into all three!

  No, first he has to suffer. So I'm going to skin him alive. While trying to wear a convincing smile I was thinking about all the torturous ways I would kill my boyfriend.

  I needed another drink, or the whole bottle of wine. My glass was empty and none of the caterers had bothered to pass my way. I wouldn't have made it through another twenty minutes listening to these people.

  It was at the point when some guy, the husband of one of Fiona's closest friends, began a diatribe about all the things he didn't like about America's last ten presidents, that I saw Emily arrive with her parents. Her hair seemed more blonde and shiny today, her skin paler. The white summer dress she wore emphasized her paleness.

  I watched her greet a few people, smile warmly, and receive hugs from Marcus's parents as she handed over her gift to Norman. She fit right in among this crowd; seemed to already have a place here. I found that mildly annoying. Even more so when she made a beeline for Marcus, and suddenly the four friends were laughing and joking together, probably catching up on old times. It wouldn't have surprised me to learn that Marcus had forgotten I was there.

  "How do you know Norman?" a new arrival to the conversation said, a woman with the biggest and most imposing hat I'd ever seen. It looked like she had a spaceship on her head.

  "I'm dating his son, Marcus."

  "You must be the new girlfriend then. The one I met was English, blonde, I think. Very stunning girl."

  "Gee, thanks," I mumbled under my breath. "And I guess I look like Quasimodo."

  "Oh look, there she is. The one he's talking to now. Are you sure that's not his girlfriend?" She turned to look at me, genuinely confused, as she pointed to Emily.

  "I'm pretty sure. That's his best friend. They never dated."

  "Oh, that's a shame. They make a lovely couple," she said, to the nods and grunts of agreement from the rest of the crowd, who seemingly decided they had had enough of me, and all dispersed.

  I was about ready to stomp away in a fit of rage, hide away upstairs and wait until the whole thing was over, when I heard behind me, "It's true, they make the perfect couple."

  Scarlett was standing there wearing her signature smirk when I spun around. Her dress was simple – a strapless pastel-colored summer number. She wore it elegantly; perfectly. I almost didn't recognize her with freshly straightened hair. This woman could pull off any style, mixing sex and class together to give the ultimate look. She came so close to perfection it was scary, and also made me feel insecure. All other women needn't have existed.

  She stood beside me, smelling of expensive perfume and clutching a wine glass in her hand. This was the third time we'd seen each other since we got back from Edinburgh a few days ago.

  "It would make the perfect love story: best friends finally giving in to their feelings and coming together after fifteen years of friendship."

  She wasn't going to get to me, I decided then. I wouldn't let her. So I played along.

  "It would make a good love story, I agree. Would you like her better as a sister-in-law, or would you give her a hard time as well?"

  "Emily would make a wonderful addition to the family. There would be no need to give her a hard time. She's the right age for him, she loves him – anyone can see that."

  I laughed out of sheer shock. It was all right for her to say crap like this to me, but judging by how pissed off she got that night back in Edinburgh when I'd merely made an observation about her life, she couldn't take criticism herself.

  "Look, if they were meant to be together, it would have happened by now."

  "Not necessarily. Don't you know their story? Every time one of them was single, the other was in a relationship. It's been that way since school."

  I didn't know, and it made my stomach turn. I'd known there was more to them than friendship that day when we bumped into Emily in London. And watching them now, how easily they spoke to each other, how flirty Emily was in his company, the attraction was blatant.

  Through the corner of my eye I saw Scarlett watching me watch them.

  "Maybe that's what true love looks like. Fifteen years in the making, two people who just get each other and don't have to work at it."

  Fed up with her stupid comments, I said, "Oh how the hell would you know? Look, do me a favor and focus on your own love life. Maybe if you weren't so cold you'd actually find someone." I stormed off to join Marcus and Emily, to claim what was mine, and once again mark territory I'd already marked.

  The problem with people who had over a decade worth of history, a decade that had passed before you entered the picture, was that you couldn't share in their in-jokes. Thus, listening to Marcus, Emily and their buddies from school chatter and reminisce about their chemistry teacher, or that one assembly when the headmaster lost his temper and swore at one of the pupils, was nowhere near as fun for me as it was for them. I was starting to wish for the crazy old people from earlier.

  Seeing him in his natural habitat, with people his own age, made him seem so young, and me, well, just some cradle snatcher going through something. Never before had the age difference been so apparent.

  "Excuse me, I need to use the little girls' room," I said, and wasn't surprised when they ignored me.

  I opted to use the toilet in our en suite just so I wouldn't have to wait in line for the one downstairs. It did occur to me that if I stayed up there, no one would miss me or notice I was gone.

  No, that wouldn't have been very proper, I decided, and reluctantly headed back downstairs, but not before sneaking out a cigarette and my lighter, both of which I hid between my breasts, like someone sneaking drugs into a prison.

  Luckily the party goers were all contained in the backyard, so I could smoke in pe
ace. The peace lasted only three drags, which I took as though they were my last. Smoking was bad, sure, but those first drags after a week-long hiatus were the most glorious. Any smoker would tell you that.

  The guy manning the gates opened them, and a blue sports car convertible with the roof down came rolling onto the grounds, and parked among the dozens of other cars. Curious to see who was bold enough to turn up this late to a Rutherford-Manning party, I watched eagerly until the driver stepped out of the car.

  She wasn't dressed for a party, but instead donned gym clothes – jogging pants and a tight-fitting sports bra that made her already ample bosom stand out even more. Only when she removed her shades did I recognize her. I also recognized that look in her eye: fury. I'd seen it at the park as she ordered Scarlett never to contact her again.

  Things were about to get ugly.

  "C–can I help you?" I said, stepping forward like it was my duty to be keeper of the house.

  With scorn in her eyes she looked me up and down, as she sat her sunglasses on her forehead. "Who the hell are you?"

  "You're Susan, right?" What business was it of hers who I was? I had every right to be here; judging from her attire and that murderous look in her eye, it was obvious she didn't.

  She squinted her eyes at me. "How do you know me?"

  "I, uh, Scarlett–"

  "She's told you about me? Where the hell is she?" Before I knew it, she was making a beeline for the back of the house, where the music and chatter was coming from.

  Without thinking, I dropped my cigarette and went after her. "I don't think you should be here. It's a private party."

  "Oh, is it? Well I'm in the right place. It's about time everyone learned about that lying piece of crap and her fucking mind games."

  "Look, this really isn't the time or place. I think you should leave."

  That made her stop, but when she turned to face me, I wished she hadn't. She looked like she was about to scratch my eyes out.