60. Your Mistress
Your Mistress
Kiri
We spend the rest of the month pretending Seattle belongs to us.
She needs content, so I drive her through the city and stay out of frame.
Pike Place early enough that the crowds haven’t completely swallowed the market.
Gas Works Park with the lake behind her and wind pulling her hair across her mouth.
Kerry Park at sunset, where she complains that every influencer in Washington has taken the same picture and then takes it anyway because the skyline looks too good not to.
We go to the Fremont Troll, where she climbs onto its hand and orders me to make her look spontaneous. At the Olympic Sculpture Park, she walks backward while filming, almost collides with a cyclist, and blames me for not warning her even though I did three times.
She takes pictures of me too. Those are different.
I don't try to look polished; these aren't meant for anyone else.
She snaps me drinking terrible coffee beneath the Public Market sign.
Or squinting into the sun at Gas Works. One of both of us at Kerry Park, her cheek pressed against my shoulder and my mouth caught halfway to her temple. She looks at that one for a long time.
But she can’t post any of it. Not yet. That’s what I keep telling her.
One day, we’ll post everything. We’ll have a whole back catalogue waiting for the moment we’re finally allowed to exist in public.
For now, the best pictures of us stay buried in a private folder while the rest of her life goes online.
I know it bothers her. I know, because it bothers me too.
I keep telling myself it’s temporary, but temporary starts to sound like a lie with no end in sight.
Then, I take her to Canlis. We’re hidden away at a table by the glass, the lights of the city shimmering below.
Natalia wears a dark green dress that makes the entire dining room look at her the moment she walks into the room.
She photographs the plates, the view, the ridiculous little arrangements of food we both pretend to understand.
I reach across the table while she takes a picture without thinking about it.
Later, she posts it and I catch the story while she’s choosing another one.
My hand is visible at the edge of the frame. Only some of it. Two fingers and a part of my hand resting near her wineglass, but the tattoos on my hand are unmistakable.
“Delete that.”
The words come out too fast and Natalia looks up from her phone.
“What?”
“The story. Delete it.”
She glances down.
“People know the tattoos.”
Her face closes a little.
“Okay.”
She deletes it, just like that. Not even a joke or dramatic sigh. That should have set off every alarm in my head, but I chose the comfort of not looking too closely.
The rest of dinner slowly dies. She answers when I speak to her, but her attention drifts toward the windows.
She smiles at the server. Takes a few more pictures.
Eats less than half of what’s placed in front of her.
I ask if she’s okay, she says she’s just tired but I know better.
I also let her lie because I don’t want to ruin the night by forcing the thing beneath it into the open.
But the night's already ruined and I know it.
Back at my apartment, she barely kisses me before heading into the bedroom.
I take a shower alone, which should have been the loudest indication that a natural disaster was approaching.
When I come out wearing a towel around my waist, something flies past my head.
I jerk backward. A small potted plant hits the wall and explodes across the floor. Soil scatters over the carpet.
“What the fuck?”
Natalia stands near the bed with her arms folded. I look at the broken pot, then back at her. She picks up the little clock from my nightstand.
“Nat. Wait!”
It comes at me. I catch it against my chest.
“Jesus Christ.”
“You have good reflexes.”
“Why are you throwing shit at me?”
“Because I’m mad.”
“I figured that out when the cactus attempted to murder me.”
She grabs a decorative pillow and throws that too. It hits me in the face.
“Okay. Okay. I get it, can we stop this please?”
“I’m not done.”
She reaches for the lamp. I cross the room before she can weaponize electricity and potentially set the apartment on fire, catching her around the waist and hauling her back against my chest. Her feet leave the floor for half a second before I plant them again, one arm locked across her middle while the other traps both of hers against her.
“Nat. Kroppy, what the fuck is happening?”
“Let me go, you dumb bear.” She twists in my grip, getting absolutely nowhere. “Your muscles should be illegal. It’s not fair. Let me go!”
A laugh escapes me before I can stop it.
That was clearly the wrong reaction. I loosen my hold just enough to turn her in my arms, keeping one arm locked around her waist as I bring her around to face me.
Her glare is already waiting, poisonous enough to peel paint. It darkens when she sees my smile.
“This isn’t funny.”
“You called me a bear while trying to kill me with a plant and an alarm clock.”
I set the lamp out of reach, then catch her wrists as she goes for something else. I hold them gently against her chest.
“Stop.”
“Let me go.”
“Are you going to keep throwing things?”
“No.”
“Promise?”
“No.”
“Natalia.”
Her eyes are bright now but not with anger alone. That wipes the last of the amusement out of me. I release her immediately. She drops onto the bed and folds her arms again, lower lip pushed out in a furious pout. I kneel in front of her, still wearing nothing but the towel.
“What’s going on?”
“I’m sick of this.”
“Sick of what?”
“All of it.”
She waves one hand between us and my stomach turns cold.
“Us?”
“The way this feels.”
I brace my hands on my thighs.
“What does that mean?”
“It means I’m tired of hiding.” Her voice cracks, and she looks away. “I’m tired of checking every picture for pieces of you. I’m tired of lying to Kasia. I’m tired of leaving your apartment before anyone sees me and sneaking out of my own house like I’m doing something disgusting.”
“Nat—”
“I feel like your fucking mistress.”
The word hits me square in the chest.
“You’re not.”
“Then why can’t we tell Rafe and Kasia?”
“Because it’s complicated.”
“Everything with you is complicated.”
I flinch. She sees it and keeps going anyway.
“You snapped at me over two fingers in a picture.”
“I didn’t snap.”
“You did.”
“I panicked.”
She stands, forcing me to rise with her.
“For one second, I forgot I had to erase you. I posted a picture from dinner with my boyfriend, and you reacted like I’d exposed something shameful.”
Rithy’s voice comes back so clearly he might as well be standing in the room.
Don’t keep her hidden so long she starts feeling like something you’re ashamed of.
Fuck.
I'd been so lost in this thing with her that I convinced myself everything was fine.
We were together. We talked every day. I touched her every chance I had.
I knew I loved her with a certainty that should have frightened me more than anything ever has.
I hadn't said it yet, but I would. I just needed the right time.
That's all. I thought that was enough. I thought if I made her feel wanted when we were alone, it canceled out every time I asked her to disappear outside these walls. Natalia wipes angrily beneath one eye.
“I don’t need some huge announcement. I’m not asking you to put me onstage and dedicate an album to me. I just don’t want to feel like the second someone might find out, you regret being with me.”
“I have never regretted you. Not once.”
“Every time you panic, I’m back there waiting for the call where you tell me this was fun but there’s no future.”
That one hurts. She turns away and I catch her hand, but I don’t pull her back.
“I’m scared, Nat.”
She stops. The admission feels worse than taking a fist to the mouth.
“I’m not ashamed of you,” I say. “I’m terrified of how much I have to lose.”
She looks over her shoulder. Her fingers soften slightly between mine. She resists for one breath, then folds into my chest. My arms lock around her, and hers circle my waist above the towel.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper into her hair. “I made you feel hidden but I'm the one that's hiding.”
“It was shitty.”
“It was.”
“You ruined dinner and you made me kill a plant.”
I kiss the top of her head.
“I’ll buy another one.”
She sniffles as I draw back enough to see her face.
“Anything else you need to throw? Will that make you feel better?”
Her eyes move toward the lamp.
"That isn't flammable?"
“I’m done.”
“Thank fuck.”
I wipe beneath her eyes with both thumbs.
“I’ll tell Rafe when we’re back in L.A. next month. I promise. Okay?” I tighten my arms around her. “I just want a little more time with you before it all goes to hell with their judgmental bullshit. I want to relax and spend some actual quality time with my girlfriend. Is that so wrong?”
She gives me a damp, skeptical look.
“Very official. Wow. Girlfriend managed to come out of your mouth once. How dare I complain?”
“I’m rusty with all the labels and shit.” I brush a strand of hair away from her face. “How about the woman who holds my heart in her sexy, perfectly manicured hands?”
That reaches her. I see it in the way her anger finally gives. She hooks her fingers into the edge of my towel and pulls me closer. I glance at the shattered planter across the room.
“You're cleaning that up,” I tease.
She shoves me. I catch her around the waist before she gets far and pull her against me, her laugh breaking free as I kiss her.
The secrecy isn’t over yet but at least it has an expiration date.