Chapter 20 #2
‘Yeah?’ Briar asked, making a disbelieving sound in the back of her throat. She took a step forward, and Alice instinctively stepped back, her thighs hitting the desk they were meant to be repositioning. ‘Is this where I make a joke about mouth-to-mouth?’
‘Ha,’ Alice said, so close now she could count every freckle on Briar’s face. She hadn’t even realized she’d leaned in. ‘What are you—’
Briar cut her off with a kiss, and Alice let herself dissolve into it.
She savored the sensation of Briar’s body pressing against hers, trying to memorize each detail that had previously escaped her drunken mind.
She would never drink alcohol again if it meant that she would remember the exact feeling of Briar’s skin forever.
She ducked her head, sucking at the juncture of Briar’s jaw, moving across her exposed clavicle.
‘Think I might be too old for hickeys,’ Briar said, her voice breaking. ‘God, Alice, you make me…’
‘Me too,’ Alice whispered, grasping at Briar’s hips. They stumbled, crashing back into the desk. Briar lifted her onto it, pushing between Alice’s knees.
It would be easy for Alice to lose herself in this, to get swept up in the scent of Briar, the touch of her hands, and to think of nothing else. But she couldn’t, not after Briar had regretted it the last time.
Alice leaned away. ‘We should talk about this.’
Briar ran a hand over her face in frustration. ‘I was enjoying not talking.’
‘We need to be practical,’ Alice said.
‘I knew you were going to say something like that.’
‘I just think,’ Alice said, charging ahead, ‘we can’t fool ourselves that this isn’t going to happen again. It’s becoming a bit of a pattern with us. So why don’t we plan for the most likely outcome?’
‘The most likely outcome being that we have sex again?’ Briar asked wryly.
Alice was overcome by a wave of self-doubt. ‘Unless, um, you think that’s not the most likely outcome. And I’m just being stupid.’
Briar gave her a look. ‘You’re never stupid, Ally.’
She hadn’t called Alice by her old nickname the whole summer. That, and the glint in Briar’s eye, gave Alice the confidence to press on.
‘So, how do you want to handle this?’
Briar cocked her head, considering the question for far longer than Alice had anticipated. ‘I don’t want anyone to know.’
It wasn’t the first thing Alice had expected to hear from her, and it stung. ‘Oh. Yeah. Of course.’
‘It would complicate things with Noah. And we’re co-directors. It looks… messy.’
Alice knew that Briar wanted to be perceived as a competent camp director more than anything, so she tried not to take it personally. But it still left her with a familiar pain – of not being capable of earning the pride she was sure she should be worthy of from at least one person in the world.
‘But it’s not messy. Right?’
‘Right,’ Briar said. ‘I mean, it’s just friendship and sex. Neither of us wants anything else from this.’
‘And no one gets hurt,’ Alice said slowly.
Briar nodded slowly, holding her gaze. ‘No one gets hurt.’
It shouldn’t have been hard to agree to. Alice hadn’t given anyone the power to hurt her in a long time. Still, it took her a moment. ‘Are we shaking on it?’
‘I’d rather kiss on it,’ Briar said, her hands coming back up to rest on Alice’s waist.
‘That can be arranged,’ Alice said, and leaned in.
When Alice checked her inbox for the first time that session, she found fifty unread emails. She groaned, cradling her head in her hands. It was the longest she’d gone without checking her email since the beginning of the summer.
Feeling a pit in her stomach, she scrolled past a few from Jeremy pointing her to different grants and instead started with the ones from her flatmate.
Each was shorter and even more direct than the previous.
The final one just read: Alive??? Your plant isn’t.
–AHR. He had attached a picture of her fiddle leaf fig, dead.
Scrolling back to the top of her inbox, one of the emails from Jeremy caught her eye, this one titled: FW: something to think about…
He’d sent an email chain with one of his colleagues at the Royal Botanical Society.
Wouldn’t want to take her away from you… Ken from their research department had written, to which Jeremy had responded, Alice has been ready for a role like this since I met her.
Her eyes scanned the page in disbelief. She was up for a job – a fully funded job – starting in the fall.
She’d known it was something she’d have to think about soon, but school had seemed endless. This felt real, like a permanent decision. A commitment to her life in London.
Well, she had already committed. She’d committed ten years before, when she hadn’t come home for the holidays, telling her mom she’d see her the next time she was in Europe.
The interview was two days after camp ended, and Alice had no idea how she was going to be ready in time.
She’d never felt less like the person she’d left in London, who would have ruthlessly carved out time in her diary to prepare.
Instead, the Alice at camp wanted to savor her final moments in her favorite place in the world.
‘Yo, you good?’
Alice’s head snapped to where Sierra was leaning against the door jamb. ‘Yes, fine. What’s up?’
Sierra squinted at her, then shrugged. ‘Kylie had a family emergency. Think you can cover art?’
Alice nodded, relieved for the distraction. She could put off replying to Jeremy until tomorrow.
Her turn subbing in for the art counselor went considerably better than her stint teaching theater.
As her class on flower pressing drew to a close and the campers filed out of the cabin, Robin beckoned her over to the table he was sharing with his new friend, Sam.
They had bonded in her decomposition lab and had taken to foraging in the woods together in their free time.
Alice’s heart swelled whenever they asked her to come look at an interesting mushroom.
‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘My flower pressing is for you, Violet,’ he said solemnly. ‘It’s like our own friendship bracelet.’
‘Friends forever?’ she asked, holding out her finger.
He took it in his own. ‘Yes.’ He and Sam filed out of the classroom with the rest of the campers, leaving Alice to arrange the flower pressing kits off to the side of the room to reveal to the campers at the end of the session.
‘Hey,’ a familiar voice came from behind her, ‘I’m here for a lesson? I heard there’s a hot art counselor?’
Alice turned to Briar. ‘Who told you that?’
‘Oh shit,’ Briar said, ‘I thought you were someone else. My bad.’ She leaned against the table closest to the door, lips tilted in a smug half-smile that Alice found painfully sexy.
Alice checked her watch. ‘The next group will be here in… twenty minutes.’
‘That’s plenty of time.’ Briar strode over to Alice. ‘Don’t you think?’
‘I don’t know—’ Alice said, but was cut off by Briar kissing her, quick and hard. When they pulled apart, they were both flushed. ‘I love the mural,’ Briar said, as though it was an explanation for what had come over her. ‘Am I your muse?’
‘I forgot about that,’ Alice admitted. Something like uncertainty flashed across Briar’s face, and Alice explained, ‘It feels like forever ago when I painted it, pestering Freddie with questions about your life. But I guess my best work has always been a bit inspired by you.’ She touched the tattoo on Briar’s forearm.
‘That’s my favorite drawing I’ve ever done. ’
It almost hurt to admit to Briar that she had meant so much to Alice, even after everything. She didn’t know if Briar had figured out what had taken her so long to accept: that years of their friendship hadn’t been platonic at all. At least, not on her end.
‘You should start drawing again,’ Briar said. ‘It’s a waste of talent not to.’ The words sounded so much like something Susan would have said that Alice couldn’t argue.
‘Okay,’ she said, leaning in to kiss Briar again so she wouldn’t have to think about what she was agreeing to. It wasn’t exactly like she had any time to spare for art.
‘No, I’m serious,’ Briar said, stepping back to avoid Alice’s distraction. She was reminded of why it was nice to not have someone who could read your mind around – they could be pesky about wanting the best for you. ‘You can’t sideline this forever.’
‘I’ll have more time eventually,’ Alice allowed. ‘Assuming I don’t get a job or anything.’ She forced the email from Jeremy out of her mind, leaning in for another kiss.
‘Why wouldn’t you get a job?’ Briar demanded, taking another step backward. Alice was starting to feel rejected, which was unfair because Briar was the one who had put ideas of kissing into her head. ‘As far as I can tell, you’re publishing some of the most original research in the field.’
‘What do you know about mycological research?’ Alice asked, taken aback.
‘Oh…’ Briar’s cheeks went pink and she ducked her head. ‘You know, I’ve read some of your stuff here and there…’
Alice frowned. ‘But I’ve only been published in some niche journals, and my undergrad thesis through St Andrews Press.’
‘All of which is available online, for the casual mushroom fan…’ Briar said, looking at her again, her gaze soft and a little bit shy.
Alice kissed Briar again. Looking at her now, her lips slightly parted and her bangs sweaty against her forehead, Alice was acutely reminded of being a teenager with a crush.
‘You’re a mushroom fan?’ she teased.
‘Shut up,’ Briar mumbled. ‘I guess if I was an incredible artist and one of the foremost experts responsible for the reclassification of the Basidiomycota division, I would also have trouble making time for both. Thank god I’m a fuckup and don’t have that problem.
’ She rolled her head forward, resting it in the crook of Alice’s neck.
‘You’re not a fuckup,’ Alice said, running a hand through Briar’s short hair, admiring its silkiness. Then she brought up something she didn’t expect to go over well, ‘Do you know what you’re going to do when the summer ends?’
She needed to hear the answer, to know what Briar would be doing when she wasn’t around to see it for herself. If she felt confident Briar had things sorted out here, maybe she could start thinking about her own future.
Briar blew a breath of frustration onto Alice’s collarbone. ‘None,’ she admitted. ‘Back to the bar, I guess.’
‘Do you like it?’ Alice asked, twirling the hair at the nape of Briar’s neck.
‘Sure,’ Briar said, tilting her head to look at Alice. ‘I like my coworkers, and the regulars too. I learn a lot every shift, just talking to people about their lives.’
‘Then why aren’t you sure you’ll go back?’ Alice asked.
Briar sighed. ‘I just haven’t been thinking about it. Trying to get through the summer at the moment.’ She paused. ‘Why?’
‘When I’m back in London, I want to be able to picture your life in DC,’ Alice said.
Briar frowned. ‘Why would you want to do that?’
Alice felt embarrassed by the admission, but ploughed on anyway. ‘For years, I had an idea in my head of what your life here looked like. And it was true in a lot of ways, but also not. Understanding things better now, it’s… nice.’
Briar straightened, looking at her like she had grown a second head. Alice wasn’t sure if her reaction would have been better or worse if she’d shared the whole truth: not just that she wanted to know what Briar’s day-to-day looked like, but also that Briar was okay.
‘I can send you some Snapchats if it makes you feel better,’ Briar joked.
Alice didn’t smile back. She imagined herself poring over books late at night, her stomach rumbling and her body shaking with too much caffeine, getting a Snapchat from Briar and questioning every decision she’d ever made.
It was certainly a distraction her research-addled mind wouldn’t be able to resist, which made it dangerous.
Being miles away from Briar, studying her life through social media, had been one type of pain.
She didn’t know if she could handle having a sliver of her and not the whole thing.
So she cleared her throat, steering the conversation in another direction. ‘What do you like about your coworkers?’
‘I dunno… they sort of remind me of the counselors. Just good kids who are eager to learn. I’ve been there the longest, so they always come to me when they have issues. It makes me feel capable.’ She snorted. ‘Capable as a bartender. I can add it to my resume.’
Alice raised her eyebrows. ‘From the bar to camp, you’re always surrounded by adoring fans. You inspire that in people.’
Briar shook her head. ‘Like I said, I’ve been at the bar a long time, so people trust me. And here people trust me just because I’m the daughter of the camp’s founder. Not exactly anything I accomplished myself.’
‘Oh, please,’ Alice said, frustrated by having to explain to Briar just how special she was, by the idea that people didn’t constantly remind her. ‘You must notice the way you captivate a room when you walk in. I don’t see any of your siblings having the same effect around here.’
‘No,’ Briar said, ‘but that’s because I encouraged them to pursue their own passions.’
Alice wanted to argue that Briar had other passions as well, that she had a life outside of her mother’s camp. But maybe that was the difference between the Briar she had known and the one in front of her. That Briar had been full of potential, and this one couldn’t see that she still was.
‘What about going back to college?’
Briar scrunched her nose. ‘I couldn’t.’
‘Why?’ Alice asked.
‘It’s embarrassing, isn’t it? I’m too old to be finishing my bachelor’s degree, let alone the master’s I would need to become a teacher. I mean, you almost have a terminal degree.’
‘And I didn’t have a dying parent at any point during that process,’ Alice said gently. ‘I couldn’t have gotten through school if I’d had a family to look after, or even a functioning social life.’
‘Self-deprecating isn’t a good look on you,’ was all Briar had to say to that. ‘You’re a genius. You would have gotten through school no matter what. We’re not the same.’
‘But—’
‘Look,’ Briar said, putting a hand on her hip, ‘I came in here to make out a little. Do you realize how absolutely annoying it is that you insist on trying to improve my already perfect life? Look around’ – she gestured to the dusty classroom sarcastically – ‘we’re in paradise.’
Alice giggled. ‘Is it sad that I honestly agree with that?’
Briar smiled again, drawing her closer. ‘You think this is paradise?’
‘Well,’ Alice said, ‘you’re here, aren’t you?’
‘That’s such a line,’ Briar scoffed, but pulled her in for a kiss anyway.