Chapter 9
Eris
They slipped briskly into an intimacy
from which they never recovered.
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise
A dull soreness radiated from her spine.
She came to in an unfamiliar position, in an unfamiliar place.
Screwing her eyes at the harsh light, she tried to stretch and realised she couldn’t move half of her body.
A solid weight was draped along her side, gluing her on the spot.
A weight that was warm and soft and breathing.
She broke into an unwitting smile: Denny was snoring peacefully on her shoulder, a hand tucked in a curl under her chin.
Eris couldn’t remember how they had ended up pillowed on each other on the uncomfortable sofa of the lab.
Rocco was nowhere in sight. The entirety of the room was covered in white and pink roses, beautifully arranged, with loose bunches here and there still awaiting a purpose.
Eris tried to straighten up a bit to give her back some relief.
Denny stirred. Eris’ hand splayed on the small of her back to rub soothing circles as the other hand went up.
She ran it through Denny’s hair, smoothing the long waves back and out of her face.
Denny hummed softly, nuzzling into Eris’ hoodie.
The instinct to nuzzle back was hard to fight.
Beautiful, precious Denny, with her freckles and the twin moles at the sides of her nose and that absurdly perfect Cupid’s bow.
The most adorable annoying person Eris had ever met.
The longer she was with Denny, the more convinced she was that nothing good could come out of it. Not for Denny, anyway.
Eris had nothing to offer to her, and Denny kept giving and giving her, just happy to have her around.
Eris couldn’t pretend for much longer that the imbalance in this relationship was healthy.
Anyone looking at them from the outside would have assumed she was just taking advantage of the situation, and with reason.
It’d been so easy at first, when she didn’t give a fuck. She was so used to not caring about anything and anyone that it hadn’t even crossed her mind to keep a safe distance. A pure soul like Denny should guard herself from people like Eris, not the other way around.
Get away from me, Eris wanted to snarl all the time. I’ll pollute you. Don’t let me touch you.
But Denny sought her like a sunflower seeking the sun, quietly and unassumingly, always there when Eris needed her and never ever expecting anything in return. She had no idea how much Eris had hogged already.
Eris was the opposite of the sun. She lived in fear that her darkness would end up poisoning Denny’s light, one way or another. They were growing close—too easily, too fast.
When Denny’s lips had touched her cheek, Eris’ world had tilted on its axis.
The shift had opened a crack in a shell which had been growing thinner since the day the two of them had met.
Eris’ thick, invincible armour, built to withstand the hardest blows life sent her way, had been useless against a gentle caress.
She closed her eyes again. She let her cheek rest upon Denny’s head, just for a moment, breathing in and out with a serenity she was just borrowing. She didn’t know what time it was. Didn’t care. It was dark enough to assume it was early. All she was asking for was a few more minutes of this peace.
She fought not to fall back asleep, lulled by the slow rise and fall of Denny’s chest. She could’ve stayed like this for hours, sore back and all.
An experimental deep breath allowed her to assess that her ribs didn’t feel any worse than usual.
She was healing, the bruises were fading, but Eris would never be the same person she’d been before those bruises again.
A faint moan rose from Denny’s throat, followed by an idle stretch of long, slender limbs. Eris held her breath until drowsy green eyes fluttered open on her.
“Hey.” Denny smiled with a half-hearted attempt to straighten up, unfairly beautiful even sleep-mussed like that. A print of hoodie wrinkles ran across one side of her face.
Eris peeled a blond curl away from her eye. Hey, Sunshine.
“What time is it?” Denny murmured, snuggling back against her. She went still for a second, then abruptly backed away. “Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t— Did we sleep here?” Eris curled her arm around her and tugged her back. Albeit surprised, Denny let her. “I don’t remember doing any of that.”
‘That’ being the over two dozen flower arrangements scattered around the lab.
No shit, Sherlock. Eris grabbed Denny’s chin and tipped her head back to show her a stern scowl. You were a zombie. I was afraid you’d collapse on the table.
The breath caught in Denny’s throat, a gleam of dismay in her widening eyes.
Eris’ lungs failed her. She could feel Denny’s beauty with her entire soul.
It was something that shone from within, warm and radiant like the sun.
Like only Denny could be. And that warm, radiant sun had kissed her cheek, a touch so light and fleeting that a part of her feared it’d been just a figment of her imagination.
Denny had kissed her, and something had changed.
The tip of Eris’ thumb traced the plump curve of Denny’s bottom lip.
She wasn’t familiar with the tenderness that was creeping into her.
She was a biter. A scratcher. A puller. What she felt now bore no trace of that violence.
She craved something sweet and soft—as sweet and soft as the way Denny was looking at her.
Her mouth opened, but whatever had been about to come out was smothered by Rocco’s flamboyant arrival.
“Buongiorno, bimbe, è arrivato papino!”
Eris fell back against the sofa with a disgruntled groan that was tainted by a hint of laughter. One day she’d confess she understood Italian.
Rocco turned the lights on and swept the waste off a corner of the table to make room for what he had brought: two bags, from which he extracted pastries and take-away cups.
“Latte for Denny, black coffee for the Shadow Mommy—” Rocco hunched at the deadly glare Denny shot him. “Pumpkin spice for me, because I love it when things get spicy…”
“Oh my god, seriously!” Denny fell back into the couch with her face buried in her hands. “If I didn’t need you, I’d let Eris dismember you.”
When Rocco worriedly glanced her way, Eris provided a vicious grin, tongue swiping at a canine’s pointy tip.
They were still tangled together: Eris’ arm wrapped around Denny, Denny’s head on Eris’ shoulder. Relaxed. Perfectly at ease. Getting up to eat required an unbearable effort that had nothing to do with Eris’ sore back.
Denny took off her glasses. “I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable yesterday. I don’t know what came over me.” She rubbed her eyes, puffy and reddened from sleep. “It’s just… I’m used to being very physical with my affection and I try to hold myself back with you, but yesterday—”
Eris took her face between her hands, relishing the sudden silence.
It’s alright, Sunshine. Don’t ruffle your pretty feathers.
And before Denny had a chance to babble anything else, she pulled her in to press a kiss to her cheek—a cheek that was so soft and silky that just one kiss could never be enough.
When she drew back, Denny stilled, bemused, touching the spot as if expecting to find anything there other than a vague lingering warmth.
Eris’ lungs were full of her scent, that sweet, lemony fragrance that was in all of her hair and body products.
Lily of the valley: light and pure, wild and graceful. Just like Denny.
“So we’re okay?”
Eris got her phone out to make sure Denny stopped stressing over such a triviality. After so many days, she still wasn’t speaking and Denny still didn’t seem troubled by it.
OMG you mug
It was just a stupid kiss
Denny’s relieved smile seemed to slip a little.
* * *
The following days, Eris chalked up Denny’s unusually sulky mood to PMS blues.
The morning she got her period, it was so bad that she stayed clutched to the toilet bowl for almost half an hour, throwing up bile because she hadn’t been able to get anywhere near breakfast.
All Eris could do was kneel at her side and do her best to be helpful.
“Go away, it’s gross!” Denny whined in between nausea waves.
Yeah, whatever. Eris settled more comfortably behind her. She gathered the wavy mass of Denny’s hair into a clip to hold a wet towel to the back of her neck. Denny tried to thank her, but another wave of nausea gagged her. Eris rubbed her back until the painkillers kicked in.
It took a while before Denny was finally granted some respite.
She let out a weak moan of protest when Eris hoisted her up and led her to the couch.
“I have to go to work.”
Over my dead body.
She laid Denny down and put the kitschy pink plush hot-water bottle on her lower belly, rewarded by a sigh of relief.
“I can’t,” Denny whimpered, eyes shut. After a few seconds of stillness, she tried to push herself up. “I really need to—”
Eris clasped a hand over her mouth and urged her back down. She knew Denny was seriously out of it because she didn’t fight back. She had no choice but to text Rocco and explain the situation.
Sunshine’s Minion
Don’t worry, I’ve got this
Stay with Denny and make sure she’s okay
I’ll get backup for the shop
The statement sounded ominous. Eris wasn’t sure she trusted that boy enough to let him handle Denny’s beloved shop, nor could she imagine what kind of backup he could possibly summon with zero notice, but there was no other option.
Her questions were answered an hour later, when an elderly lady with flawless silver curls and lively green eyes knocked on the flat’s door.
“You must be Eris,” said the woman, a net of wrinkles surfacing across the lovely face. “Denny can’t shut up about you.”
Eris smirked. Denny can’t shut up in general.
“My, my, look at those eyes… Such stunners! Forgive me, love, where are my manners? I’m Tansy, Denny’s grandma.”
She smelled like the imaginary grandma Eris had fantasised about as a child: like soap and talc and something flowery.