Chapter 16 It’s Getting Worse
The night ended with eight women, covered in a fine dust of pink glitter, lounging near the bonfire talking about their favorite childhood memories. There was something about pulling glitter out of each other's hair while feeling a new lightness that beckoned them all down memory lane.
And after a few croissants each, they hugged each other goodbye and left the pink glitter farm to go to their own homes. A walking cloud of pink confection, happy and exhausted.
Eloise and Ursula dropped Bess off. Eloise waited awkwardly on the front porch while her best friend said goodnight to Jenson, which was more action than words.
And then it was just the two of them, walking back to The Lost Souls House.
It was perfect out. Sixty-four degrees and the crickets were making their first appearance for the season as the stars twinkled above them.
"Do you think the stars are jealous of our glitter?" Eloise asked as she looped her arm through Ursula's.
"Absolutely. We outshine them gloriously," she said in a voice dripping in old money.
"I need to tell you something," Eloise blurted. She shook her head when the words came out like they were jumping frogs, shattering the dreamlike aura around them.
"Okay. I'm listening," Ursula said.
"I had something happen in Florida." She breathed in freesia and lily of the valley to calm her nerves. "No. Something happened to me. It happened to me."
And then she told her best friend of over twenty-five years her story.
The thing that happened to her. The thing she thought, and had been made to believe, she had manifested.
Because that was the thing about being hurt and assaulted so severely.
Our brains can hardly accept that the world, that an entire human, could be so cruel; that they could care so little about another's life. And so we do funny things.
For some, they bury the memories and feelings, pouring dirt and erecting a gravestone over it never to return. For others, they revisit that grave over and over and over trying to reimagine how they could have created a different outcome.
"I'm still not sure how to process it sometimes, and I'm working on that. You know me," she said with a tremulous smile that didn't echo her nonchalance.
They were on the front porch of the house now, a cozy embrace of comfort surrounding them, each sitting on a step. Jars of silver-white moonlight glowed for them.
"I wish I could kill him," Ursula's voice was low and calm. And it was honest. It was so honest that Eloise reached out a hand and laid it over hers.
"Hey, I'm the violent one," she said. "But yeah. Sometimes I do too. Mostly, I want to move on. Forget it all."
"It wasn't your fault. Those officers were shit at their jobs and monsters at being human. And I wish that I could kill them too."
She laughed and laid her head in Ursula's lap. "Alright, Sea Witch. But just being here with you is enough."
Ursula ran her fingers through Eloise's hair and looked up at the moon. It was waning, and beautiful as she slipped away slowly.
"Did you know that when the moon is in its waning phase, the part that glows decreases from almost fifty percent to less than a percent?"
"No, I didn't," she replied lifting her head to look up at the crescent in the sky. It was stark, that little thumbnail a juxtaposing force of light against the black backdrop.
"It's still quite beautiful when it disappears. Still there. Still a sliver of brightness," she murmured softly.
Eloise's heart filled. "Thank you."
Ursula tucked her hair behind her ear. "I hope you know," she paused and swallowed, the words not coming, but understood.
Eloise nodded. "I do." And Ursula nodded too. And then they sat there looking up at the moon, the smallest piece of her shining, but shining nonetheless.
No wonder the moon is often written or talked about as though she is a woman. A woman, even when she's being swallowed by darkness and slipping away to rest, shines a little. And still, when she goes completely dark, it's only for a spell until she's back again, serenading the world with her light.
The Lazy Snail was enchanting, the kind of place you wanted to make a regular stop in your breakfast and brunch routine.
But The Dancing Snail was dazzling. From the ceiling dropped thousands of glowing warm stars with a golden moon so large and bright that matched the phase it was in so that tonight there was the tiniest sliver dangling from the high, unseen ceiling.
Tonight, four women showed up with their dancing shoes in various heel heights and in beautiful outfits ready to release tension and worries.
Eloise was in a gold glittering dress that she wondered if she was too old for, then promptly put it on in defiance.
Jen was glorious in a red satin fitted cocktail dress that showed off her full figure and her long legs.
Kelsea was in a backless black halter top and a pleather skirt with high heels that put her nearly at Jen's height and Tilly's lavender chiffon dress was made of fairytales fitting her sweetness and the tips of her hair.
"I cannot believe Ursula picked Jenson over this," Jen said as they took a picture together.
"I can," Eloise said with a snort. "Have you seen him?"
"You are not lying," Tilly replied with a wide smile. Tonight she had left the cute cateye glasses off and her eyes were large and made her sweetness tenfold.
"Alright," Jen announced to the group. "We are here to celebrate new business deals, even though Ursula isn't here, the little witch, and new relationships." Her eyes turned up at the corners as she smirked with held secrets.
"Wait wait, new relationships? What did I miss?" Kelsea asked.
"The redhead and I have made it official."
They moved to the bar together with appropriately loud congratulations and the sounds that women make for each other in celebration. After drinks were ordered they demanded answers.
"Is her name Redhead or..." Eloise teased.
"Isla," Jen grinned.
"Pretty," Tilly and Kelsea said.
"She is very pretty. And she's smart. And she's into healthy lifestyles and building her business around it."
"Oooh, Jen found her twin flame," Tilly cooed.
"I don't know about that, but so far it's fun and the sex is good and I'm glad we're calling whatever we were doing something official.
And, she was the one who wanted to go official.
" Her eyebrows were arched high as she shimmied a little dance.
Drinks were served and as Eloise sipped on her old fashioned she smiled widely as they talked, voices in competition with the loud music until their voices lost the battle and they found themselves on the dance floor.
They danced together and with arm-raised strangers who asked. The freedom and laughter was a tonic running through each woman's veins as they moved and swayed to the medicinal beat.
Eloise was languishing in the feeling when she caught sight of someone familiar dancing with a beautiful woman, and the pang that hit her heart was so sudden and so intense that she nearly buckled from it before she righted herself on Tilly's outstretched arm.
"You alright?" Tilly called over the beating music.
She nodded, about to move her eyes from the couple when blue eyes lifted to hers, then caught.
Detective Taylor White stared at her, across from a packed dance club, as a golden-haired woman who looked like she could be cast in any movie of her choice moved easily like she was made of water.
They looked perfect together. And even though she knew that he could not and would not choose a relationship, seeing them together was the kind of painful that made standing still impossible.
"I need water, and to sit for a minute," she said into Tilly's ear, who nodded and continued dancing with a laughing Kelsea and Jen.
Eloise found an open leather stool to sit on and catch her breath.
She flagged the bartender for water and closed her eyes against the cool slide of it down her throat.
She could not allow herself to be sucked into the kind of sadness she was not owed.
Taylor was not meant for her. He wasn't meant for anyone.
And to borrow sorrow would not do; not for her heart and not for her new life.
She could shake this off and though she hoped he hadn't looked at her and seen her hurt across the dance floor, she knew that she would have to pretend it didn't cut her. And she could do that.
Jen spotted her and came over looking alive and glowing. Here was a true happiness that she could settle on and celebrate. What a beautiful thing to find your friend experiencing joy and the excitement of a new relationship.
"I'm so happy for you. Are you happy?"
Jen's white smile, whiter in the flashing lights, was brilliant.
"I am." A look of concern crossed her dark eyes and Eloise watched them shift to something behind her over her shoulder.
The way Jen's face froze and her eyes flickered to where Eloise sat with uncertainty, she knew she'd seen the same thing that brought her here for respite.
But then her brilliant white smile flashed and she said, "And I want this for you! Let me try to set you up again."
Eloise groaned and slumped a little on the stool. "I was wrong. I don't feel like I need to date. If someone comes along who intrigues me, then fine. But I'm not going to force it. And frankly, the set ups so far have made me want to declare myself single forever."
Jen frowned, the disbelief strong on her face. Eloise tilted her head. "Admit it: I'd make a great cat lady," she smirked and Jen laughed.