18. In a Faraway Land of Loaned Pleasure #2
“Is there a difference?” The voice was remarkably steady. Vi lowered her head and came closer again, taking Chiara in her arms with soul shattering gentleness. Like she was broken. Like Vi was the one who broke her.
“I was rough with you. I apologize.”
Chiara shook her head, but Vi simply laid a finger on her lips and she quieted.
Yes, Vi was very much aware of her own power these days.
“Shhh…” The sound, the same one Vi had uttered when her fingers were inside her, caused a Pavlovian reflex in Chiara.
Her throat worked, and Vi’s lips curved into a smirk.
Arrogant. This was new, too. And it was sexy.
Chiara opened her mouth and licked at the finger still resting against her lips, finally tasting herself.
The smirk widened, and Vi’s voice took on that low tone.
“You have such an aversion to apologies. It’s an unhealthy habit.”
“I seem to have many of them. And most of them where you are concerned.” Chiara’s hands reached up and tucked a lock behind Vi’s ear, letting her fingers trail over the delicate shell, delighting in the shiver her gesture caused.
Vi caught her hand, bringing it to her chest, keeping it there, perhaps thinking Chiara couldn’t do much damage that way.
Instead, she could feel Vi’s heart beating a steady tattoo and Chiara took solace in the rhythm and strength from it.
It beat too rapidly, giving Vi away in a way her eyes and her smile did not.
“I was under the impression that you lived a healthy lifestyle, Chiara.” Vi squeezed her fingers, and she wondered at the choice of words. Was Vi asking about what she had been up to these past years? Because she’d been so insistent on being totally disinterested only days before.
“I think five years of dieting makes it imperative that I fall off the wagon every once in a while. At least till I get my fill before my next fast. Plus, I can’t abstain now. I need to… to you…”
She stumbled over the words, feeling foolish once again. Needy, still aching, and already ready for more. And had she mentioned foolish? She wanted to bolt. She couldn’t yet.
They watched each other then. Combatants behind drawn lines, a short armistice to discuss terms. Terms Chiara wished she understood, since she had no idea where her words were coming from or what Vi was really thinking.
The heart under her fingertips kept its elevated beat, and Chiara felt like it was the only honest thing about them, limbs intertwined, mouths inches apart, Vi’s fingers still holding the scent and the essence of Chiara.
Vi’s heart was the only true thing? Chiara wanted to laugh at herself. Wasn’t this how she had gotten hers broken the last time?
Some of her thoughts must have shown on her face, because Vi let go of her hand and gravity did its job, both of them watching it fall limply into her lap.
“You don’t need to do anything. And I already apologized for being rough with you earlier. But I won’t be your ‘cheat meal,’ Chiara. I’ve had the dubious honor of settling for that role once before.”
Well, what the girl hadn’t been capable of—that cruelty—the woman had become masterful at.
Chiara pushed her away and, with whatever strength her shaking knees could muster, slid off the desk, righting her bodice, tucking away both naked skin and whatever dignity she had left.
“Remember how during that night you said you were afraid that I’d break you?” She straightened her shoulders, pleased when Vi’s eyes followed her every move. After a second, the gray orbs lowered, and the nod Chiara received was jerky. “Well, you broke me first.”
She heard the exhalation of air Vi let out before she turned away from the hurt expression in those eyes.
With that, she gave into that overwhelming wish to get away and swept out of the office and out of the studio and kept walking, the crowds of Mercer Street swallowing her in their soothing bustle.
* * *
She didn’t return that afternoon, choosing to walk away rather than face the scrutiny of a makeup artist and a sharp-eyed interviewer while marked by hands and teeth in quite a few visible places.
Instead, she spent the rest of the day on the streets of Manhattan losing herself in the crowds and the movement of the city that never stopped and didn’t care. It felt good to be a speck of lint on the miles of the urban canvas.
Despite the pleasure of being unknown and lost in the crowd, she was aware she would pay for her willfulness and her irresponsible decision to waste the afternoon in light of their restrictive timeframe.
Her predicament became evident as soon as she returned to Chiaroscuro once the dusk was settling behind her on the now much emptier Mercer Street.
“At some point in the last five years you might’ve mentioned that you and Courtenay did more than solely stare at each other in a haze of longing and unrealized lust, Chiara.”
Aoife was on the stairs leading up to the atelier, her voice muffled by what looked like a churro she was chewing.
“There wasn’t any point in that.” Suddenly, hit by a tiredness that permeated her bones, Chiara sat down, hugging her knees and letting her chin rest on them.
“ Point …” Aoife repeated the word as if it was foreign to her. Chiara reached over into her friend’s flannel shirt’s front pocket, trusting she’d find what she needed most in this moment. Faster than Aoife could swat at her, she pulled out the pack.
Aoife still batted her hands away, but offered her the lighter regardless, as Chiara wrapped her lips around a cigarette. The first drag was like a lover’s caress. She relished the sensation, the familiar movements, the taste of the smoke on her tongue.
“You quit.” Renate’s voice, in all its accusatory glory, sounded from behind them, and both of them jumped at the interruption.
But Renate just waved them off and opened one of the massive windows overlooking the interior garden, letting in the sounds of the evening city.
In the distance, a cacophony of sirens and screeching tires could be heard. Chiara closed her eyes.
“Did I screw up today?”
“If you mean the overall schedule, then no. Courtenay used the afternoon to get some pictures of the atelier itself. Hounded Aoife to pose for some action shots of ‘her process.’ As if Aoife has a method to her madness—”
“Hey, hey!” Aoife’s protest was ignored as Renate went on.
“But if you mean the whole thing about fucking the chief photographer instrumental to the success of your first Poise issue as a designer… A photographer who also fucked you over five years ago… One who just happens to be a Courtenay? Well, it seems you crossed that line already, Chiara. Please don’t tell me you did it simply because she was there. Then or now.”
“I don’t know why I did it now.” She still remembered the confusion, the anger, the guilt that were all eating her alive, and Vi provided such an outlet to all those emotions she herself was causing.
“And back then?” Aoife’s voice was quiet, even as she snatched the cigarette from between Chiara’s fingers, took a long drag, and handed it back to her.
Before she was able to react, Renate reached for it, and they proceeded to sit in silence as her former sister-in-law polished it off and masterfully flicked it out of the open window.
“Isn’t that the million dollar question, Aoife? Because some things make so much sense now, Chiara.” Renate’s smile was sad. “All that guilt I couldn’t understand. With the divorce and with every reference to Courtenay herself. Must have choked you for all those years, didn’t it?”
“There was nothing I could do about it anyway.” Chiara pushed her guilt aside.
She had told the truth. What good was wallowing when she did what she did, using Vi as a catalyst for her new life?
Chiara shook her head before slowly unfolding herself from the stairs and took several steps towards the studio.
At Aoife’s call for her to stop, she looked back down at her friends.
“Although I wasn’t able to do anything whatsoever about it then, maybe there is something I can do now.
I certainly wasn’t expecting her. In fact, if you had told me I’d see her again, I would have been convinced I wouldn’t even have recognized her.
And yet, it’s been years and I still knew those eyes, and they knew me.
Not a stranger at all.” She ran her hand through her hair, decision made.
“I’m sure you could wheedle her address out of Arabella, Renate. ”
She deliberately did not phrase her request as a question, and the look on both Aoife and Renate’s faces told her they disapproved.
As she turned away, Chiara had to smile. If she had been thinking clearly, she too would disapprove. But she didn’t have the strength to stay away in those days either.
Five years was a long time to be numb. Vi had awakened her before. And Chiara wanted to be alive again. Plus, she had a debt to pay, and she was never one to renege on her debts.