Charlie's POV:
Ten days.
That’s how long it takes for something to become a habit without anyone agreeing to it.
I’m downstairs at 7:52 without my alarm going off twice, without Mom shouting up the stairs, without checking my phone once.
The kitchen smells like coffee and the particular lemon soap Vivi uses on her hands, and there’s a mug waiting on the counter—cream, no sugar, the way I take it—and another beside it that I don’t touch because it’s hers.
She comes down at 7:58 in a cream sweater and dark jeans, hair wet from the shower, and doesn’t say good morning.
She says, “You put your feet on my dashboard again yesterday.”
“I did.”
“There’s a footprint.”
“There’s a whole shoe, technically.”
She picks up her coffee. Drinks. Looks at me over the rim the way she looks at everything—like she’s already decided something and is waiting for me to catch up.
“Get in the car, Charlie.”
And that’s it.
That’s the whole negotiation.
It’s been happening for over a week now, and neither of us has said a word about whether she’s driving me or I’m riding with her, whether this is a favor or a thing we do.
It just is.
I’m in the passenger seat before she’s even started the engine.
The playlist is the same low instrumental thing, a woman’s voice in a language I still can’t place, and I’ve stopped asking what it is because the last time I did, Vivi said Portuguese in a tone that made me feel like I’d asked her to explain her own name.
The road to campus is wet from last night’s rain, the trees dripping, the light gray and flat.
She drives with both hands at nine and three, because apparently even her hands obey regulations.
I’ve spent the last three days staring at them without meaning to.
That’s the problem.
That’s been the problem since the pasta.
I date women too.
Four words.
That’s all she said.
Four completely ordinary words that have been sitting in the back of my head ever since, apparently waiting for opportunities to ruin perfectly normal things.
Like hands.
Vivi’s hands, specifically.
None of this should have changed anything.
It’s information. One fact about a person I’ve known for ten days.
But it did change something.
It changed the way I notice her.
The hands on the steering wheel.
The perfume that’s probably bergamot but smells like the inside of a nice hotel.
The way she says my name when she’s annoyed, which is a specific thing—a two-syllable exhale, like she’s already tired of whatever I’m about to do.
None of those things are new.
That’s the part I keep coming back to.
She’s been driving me all week. She’s been saying my name like that since the first morning.
The knowledge that she could, theoretically, look at a woman and want her—
That’s the only new thing.
And I keep telling myself that distinction means nothing.
“You’re quiet,” Vivi says.
“I’m always quiet in the mornings.”
“No, you’re not. You’re usually narrating something.”
She changes lanes.
“You didn’t comment on my turn signal.”
“It was fine.”
“You always comment on my turn signal.”
“It was a beautiful turn signal, Vivi. Textbook. I’m going to write a paper about it.”
She almost smiles.
It’s there for half a second and then it’s gone, and I look out the window at the wet quad and the students with umbrellas and think, very clearly, that I would like to make her do that again.
I don’t know what to do with that.
So I put my foot on the dashboard.
“Charlie.”
“Yes?”
“Take your foot off my dashboard.”
“Make me.”
She pulls into the lot, parks, turns off the engine, and looks at me with the full weight of her blue eyes.
I take my foot off the dashboard because it’s the polite thing to do.
Not because she told me to.
That’s what I tell myself, anyway.
Priya finds me at lunch under the big oak by the library, where we always sit, and she has a container of something that smells like her mom’s kitchen and a look on her face like she’s been waiting to ambush me.
“So,” she says.
“So?”
“How’s the blended family?”
“It’s fine.”
“Fine.”
She opens the container. Rice and something yellow and a smell that makes me immediately jealous.
“You’ve been living there for what, two weeks?”
“Ten days.”
“Ten days and it’s already fine.”
“It’s a house, Priya. I sleep in it. I eat in it. It’s fine.”
She chews.
She watches me.
She has this way of watching me that’s worse than Vivi’s, because Vivi’s watching feels like being read and Priya’s watching feels like being caught.
“Did you know,” I say, and then stop, because I don’t actually know how to ask this.
“Did I know what?”
“About Vivi.”
Priya waits.
“That she dates women.”
Her eyebrows do something.
“Why are you asking me that?”
“No reason. Just—I didn’t know. And I was wondering if it was, like, common knowledge.”
“Pretty much.”
“Oh.”
“She’s never exactly hidden it.”
“I didn’t say she did.”
“You’re being weird.”
“I’m not being weird.”
“You brought it up.”
“Because she told me.”
Priya sets down her fork.
“She told you.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“The other night.”
“At the house?”
“Yes.”
“What were you doing?”
“Making pasta.”
Priya blinks.
“Together?”
“She was watching. I was making pasta.”
“You made Vivienne Ashford pasta.”
“I made myself pasta. She happened to be there.”
“And ate it.”
“Yes.”
“So you made Vivienne Ashford pasta.”
“That is not how causation works.”
Priya’s grinning now, and I hate her.
“And now you know she dates women.”
“She told me because I asked if Nadia was her girlfriend.”
Priya’s grin disappears.
Not because she’s concerned.
Because it gets bigger.
“Why did you ask if Nadia was her girlfriend?”
“I saw them together.”
“Okay.”
“Nadia was touching her arm.”
“Okay.”
“And I was curious.”
“Okay.”
“Stop saying okay like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you’re building a case.”
“I’m not building anything. You’re doing all the work for me.”
I throw a napkin at her.
She catches it.
“Anyway,” I say, “it doesn’t matter.”
“Clearly.”
“Priya.”
She laughs and hands the napkin back.
“I’m just saying, you hated this. When your mom told you, you called me from the car and said—what was it?”
“Don’t.”
“‘I’m going to live in a mausoleum with a stranger.’”
“I did say that.”
“And now you know her coffee order.”
“That’s what happens when you live with someone.”
“You know her schedule.”
“Because she drives me.”
“Her best friend.”
“She told me.”
“What music she listens to.”
“I’m trapped in a car with it every morning.”
“You know she plays tennis on Sundays.”
“She mentioned it.”
Priya stares at me.
I realize, slightly too late, that this has not helped my case.
“Whatever.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“That’s less than two weeks, Charlie. I’ve had roommates for a year and couldn’t tell you what they eat for breakfast.”
“That’s because you never talk to your roommates.”
“I talk to my roommates.”
“You call them ‘the girls.’”
She throws the napkin at me again.
I catch it.
The yellow rice smells amazing, so I steal a bite.
She lets me, which is how I know she’s not actually mad.
“I’m just saying,” she says, quieter now, “you seem less miserable.”
I look at her.
That’s different from what I expected.
“I’m not miserable.”
“I know.”
She takes her rice back.
And because Priya knows when to stop, she does.
That’s why she’s my friend instead of just somebody I talk at.
“Okay,” she says. “Literary thing tonight. You’re going?”
“I have to. Professor Ellery’s making us.”
“Is Vivi going?”
“I don’t know.”
I do know.
She mentioned it on Monday—something about a donor reception before the reading—and I’ve been carrying that information around like a ticket I didn’t buy.
“Maybe.”
Priya makes a sound.
“Mmm.”
“Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You keep doing that.”
“Learned it from Vivi.”
I steal another bite of her rice.
I spend forty minutes in front of the mirror.
This is not something I do.
I try on the black dress first.
Too much.
Too obviously a decision.
The green silk—the one that makes my eyes look like something you’d find in a forest, my mother’s words—is too polished.
I end up in a dark burgundy wrap dress that rides a little high on the thigh and pulls across the chest in a way that’s honest about my body without apologizing for it.
Heels I can actually walk in.
Hair down, because it won’t behave anyway and I’ve stopped fighting it.
One earring.
Then the other, because I’m not insane.
I am not dressing for Vivi.
I want to be very clear about that.
I’m dressing for the reception.
For Professor Ellery.
For the possibility that there will be someone there worth talking to—a visiting poet, an editor, someone who might actually read the essay I’ve been working on about grief and geography.
I’m dressing because I want to be taken seriously in a room full of people who take themselves very seriously.
I’m not dressing for Vivi.
I come down the stairs.
She’s in the foyer, keys in hand, wearing a black sheath dress and pearls that are probably real.
She looks up when she hears me.
And—
It’s a fraction of a second.
Less.
Her eyes move down me once.
Quick.
Collarbone.
Dress.
Shoes.
Back to my face.
Then she’s looking at the door like she’s been looking at the door the whole time.
I catch it.
I catch it the way you catch a coin someone flips at you—reflex, no thought.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You looked at me.”
“I looked at your shoes.”
She opens the front door.
“You’re going to be standing for three hours in those.”
“They’re comfortable.”
“They’re not.”
“You like them.”
She doesn’t answer.
Just walks outside.
And I stand in the doorway for one second longer than I should because my heart is doing something stupid and I don’t know what to call it.
Then I realize—with a clarity that feels like stepping into cold water—that I wanted her to look at me.
I wanted her to find me attractive.
And the worst part is that some small, treacherous part of me might have dressed for exactly that.
Oh.
Fuck.
I follow her outside.
The reception is in the atrium of the humanities building, all glass and string lights and wine that’s better than it needs to be.
Professor Ellery’s novel came out in the spring and the department is pretending it’s a bigger deal than it is, which means free champagne and a lot of people in blazers talking about the state of the essay.
I’m good at this.
That’s the thing I don’t say out loud.
I’m good at rooms.
I can find the one interesting person in any crowd and make them laugh and leave before they get bored.
It’s a skill, like parallel parking.
I’ve had a lot of practice.
Tonight I’m using it like a shield.
There’s a woman from my seminar—Tess, dark hair, sharp laugh, the kind of person who reads the assigned pages twice—and she’s standing by the window with a glass of white wine.
She lights up when she sees me.
“Charlie. You came.”
“Professor Ellery would’ve hunted me down.”
“She would. She’s terrifying in a very small way.”
Tess leans in.
She’s close enough that I can smell her shampoo, and she’s looking at me in a way I recognize.
Normally, I’d flirt back.
Maybe let her buy me another drink.
Maybe see where the night went.
Instead, I’m scanning the room.
I find Vivi before I mean to.
She’s across the atrium, standing with two professors and a man in a gray suit, and she’s laughing at something.
Not the polite laugh.
The real one.
The one that changes her whole face.
She’s holding a glass of champagne like it’s an accessory she was born with.
She looks like she belongs here.
Like the building was constructed around her.
“Charlie?”
“Sorry.”
I turn back to Tess.
“What were you saying?”
I flirt with Tess for twenty minutes.
I’m funny.
I’m charming.
I tell her about the essay and she asks smart questions and I laugh at her jokes.
And I check—without meaning to, without deciding to—whether Vivi is watching.
She isn’t.
She’s talking to the man in the gray suit.
Drinking her champagne.
Being Vivi.
Composed and untouchable.
And I hate how much I want her to look over.
So I make her look.
I don’t plan it.
I just do it.
I laugh at something Tess says, louder than the joke deserves, and turn my head as I do.
My eyes find Vivi across the room.
She’s looking.
She’s already looking.
Neither of us looks away.
Three seconds.
Maybe four.
Nobody else in the room would notice.
There are two hundred people here. Everyone is looking at everyone.
But I feel it in my chest.
That same strange drop I felt when our fingers touched over the place cards.
Vivi’s face doesn’t change.
Mine probably doesn’t either.
Then she turns back to the man in the gray suit and takes a sip of champagne.
And I’m left standing in the middle of a conversation I’ve completely stopped hearing.
“You okay?” Tess asks.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m—”
I look at my empty glass.
“I need another drink.”
I don’t get another drink.
I find Priya by the door and tell her I’m ready to go.
She looks at me for a second too long.
Then she says, “Sure.”
And we leave.
I don’t look for Vivi on the way out.
I don’t need to.
I know exactly where she is.
Priya drops me at the end of the drive because the gate is a whole thing and I don’t feel like making her deal with it.
I walk up the long wet path to the house with my heels in one hand and my feet in the grass.
Cold.
Wet.
Good.
My room is dark when I get upstairs.
I drop the shoes beside the bed and lie down without changing, burgundy dress and all.
Then I stare at the ceiling.
I think about Vivi looking at me in the foyer.
I think about Vivi looking at me across the atrium.
I think about how pleased I was both times.
That’s the part I don’t like.
I pick up my phone.
Me: your shoes were ugly tonight
I stare at it.
Delete.
Try again.
Me: you didn’t even tell me my shoes were ugly. you’re losing your touch
Send.
Three dots appear almost immediately.
Of course she’s awake.
Vivi: They were ugly.
Me: you didn’t say it though
Vivi: I was exercising restraint.
I smile.
Me: terrifying. don’t do it again
Vivi: Noted.
I stare at the screen.
Then type:
maybe i wasn’t looking at your shoes
I read it.
Once.
Twice.
My thumb hovers over send.
It would mean something.
Not a lot.
But something.
And that’s the problem.
Because if I send it, I have to admit I know what it means.
Worse, I have to wonder what she’ll think it means.
I delete it.
Me: still ugly
The three dots appear.
Disappear.
Appear again.
Vivi: Eight tomorrow.
That’s it.
No goodnight.
No emoji.
Nothing.
And I’m lying on my bed in a dress some small, treacherous part of me may have worn for her, smiling at my phone like an idiot.
I don’t even try to stop.
The next morning, I’m awake before my alarm.
I lie there for a while listening to the house.
Pipes.
Birds outside the window.
The distant sound of a car on the road.
Then I get up.
Jeans.
Sweater.
Hair into something resembling a knot.
Downstairs.
7:40.
Earlier than I’ve ever been down here.
The kitchen is empty.
Quiet.
The coffee hasn’t been made yet.
So I make it.
Two mugs.
Hers first.
Black.
Mine with cream, no sugar.
I set hers in the place it always sits.
Mine beside it.
Then I stand there with both hands wrapped around my mug and wait.
Which is ridiculous.
I could go upstairs.
I could sit down.
I could do literally anything other than stand in the kitchen waiting for Vivienne Ashford to appear at the exact time I know she will.
At 7:58, she does.
Gray sweater.
Dark trousers.
Hair down today.
She gets three steps into the kitchen before she sees the mugs.
Stops.
Looks at them.
Then at me.
“Is one of those mine?”
“It was going to be poured out.”
Her eyes narrow.
She knows exactly what I’m doing.
The corner of her mouth moves anyway.
She picks up the mug.
Drinks.
I watch her swallow.
Which is apparently a thing I do now.
Great.
She lowers the cup.
“Charlie.”
“Vivi.”
“You know you could take the bus.”
“I know.”
“You could sleep another hour.”
“I know that too.”
She waits.
I look at her.
There it is.
An out.
The bus route.
The extra hour of sleep.
The ability to get myself to campus like I did before any of this became a thing.
I could take it.
Maybe I should.
Instead, I pick up my coffee and walk toward the mudroom.
“You coming, or what?”
For half a second, there’s nothing behind me.
Then—
Ceramic against stone.
Keys.
Footsteps.
I smile before I can stop myself.
I don’t turn around.