Lost in Paradise

by Rachel Lacey

  “I think…I think he wanted to talk, but I couldn’t, not then. I shut him out, so in the end, he just said he was glad I was okay. Like I’ve ever been okay.” Fresh tears slid over her cheeks.

  “You’re more than okay,” Nicole said. “You’re a survivor. You’re smart and strong and successful and one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met.”

  “Don’t.” She buried her face against Nicole’s shoulder.

  “It’s the truth.”

  “I can’t believe you’re here.” In her life, in her bed, in her heart. Any or all of the above.

  “Believe it,” Nicole whispered. “And I’m not going anywhere.”

  16

  Nicole woke to an empty bed. Not a surprise. She’d woken alone every morning since coming to stay with Fiona, almost every morning since they’d met. But this morning, she hoped Fiona wasn’t regretting her middle-of-the-night confession. Nicole didn’t know how to adequately express how much she appreciated Fiona sharing it with her or how fucking sorry she was for everything she’d been through. She could only keep on loving her the best way she knew how and hope it was enough.

  To that end, she went into the bathroom to freshen up and then went in search of Fiona. She found her in the garden—on her head.

  “That’s just not humanly possible,” she said with an affectionate smile.

  “Amateur,” Fiona said without opening her eyes. She did these yoga poses on her mat in the garden…these really crazy yoga poses that involved contorting her body into positions that Nicole would never attempt in a million years.

  “Want me to make tea?”

  “Please.”

  Their morning tradition. Relief loosened in Nicole’s chest. Somewhere during the night, she’d become convinced Fiona would freak out and push her away, the defense mechanism of a woman accustomed to wrangling her demons alone.

  But it wasn’t happening. And now Nicole found herself wishing and hoping that this would bring them closer together, that Fiona would allow her to be the person who broke through her barriers, maybe the person who became a permanent part of her life.

  Because Nicole was helplessly in love with her, and she knew Fiona loved her too. Whether she’d ever admit it or act on it was a different question entirely.

  They had breakfast together on the back patio—toast and grapes with English breakfast tea. Nicole was starting to get used to the European way of life. Fiona looked like a goddess in her low-waisted yoga pants and sports bra, jewel glinting from her belly ring and matching glitter on her toes.

  “It’s unfair for anyone to look that good in workout clothes,” Nicole said.

  Fiona slid an amused look in her direction. “You should give it a try sometime.”

  “What—yoga? I have. I don’t look like you when I do it. I’m not graceful…like, at all.”

  “It takes practice.”

  “Well, maybe sooner or later, you’ll help me find my grace, then,” Nicole told her.

  Fiona looked away, and maybe Nicole was still worrying for nothing, but suddenly, it felt like the air between them had chilled.

  “We should paint something together,” Nicole blurted as they were cleaning up breakfast.

  “What?”

  “Teach me. It could be fun.” She was envisioning them in the studio together, paintbrushes in hand, laughing and splattering each other with splashes of color as they created some kind of messy masterpiece together.

  “Perhaps.”

  “Unless you had something else in mind for us to do today?” Nicole asked.

  Fiona shook her head, leading the way into the studio. “What do you want to paint?”

  “Anything. I don’t care. What do you suggest?”

  Fiona was silent a moment. “The ocean seems appropriate, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Nicole answered without hesitation. It was so obvious, she couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought of it herself.

  Fiona hauled out a blank canvas and placed it on the easel, her body distractingly lithe in her yoga clothes. “The first thing you want to do is sketch out your vision.”

  “Like, waves?”

  “The horizon, the shoreline, any landmarks you want to include,” Fiona said.

  “I think we should paint the middle of the sea, the way it looked when we were bobbing in the lifeboat, just waves everywhere.”

  Fiona planted her hands on her hips. “That’s actually harder. It’s difficult to make the ocean stand out without something to contrast it against.”

  “Well, I’m not trying to win any awards here, just have fun. But what if we include our lifeboat in it?”

  Fiona nodded, looking pleased. “I like that.”

  “You sketch it. I’ll help paint,” Nicole said, both because she sucked at drawing and because she wanted an excuse to observe Fiona at work. She leaned against a stool and watched as Fiona took a pencil to the canvas. “Wait, you’re a leftie?”

  Fiona’s eyebrows rose. “You’re just noticing?”

  “I haven’t watched you work before, and yes, I’m just noticing. Never mind. Carry on.”

  Fiona lifted her left hand and sketched an outline of their lifeboat toward the right-hand side of the canvas. Then she added a faint line Nicole presumed would be the horizon about a third of the way down the canvas. She turned to Nicole. “Next, we need paint…and smocks. And even so, I’d recommend changing if you’re particularly attached to those clothes.”

  Yeah, Nicole had noticed that most of Fiona’s casual things had paint spots on them. She looked down at her jean shorts and tank top. “I don’t mind if these get messy.”

  Fiona took two paint-spattered smocks from a rack in the corner. She tossed one to Nicole and tied the other around her own waist. Nicole watched as she took out a white plastic tray and began to pour small dollops of paint onto it. She added several different shades of blue, purple, green, black, and finally white.

  “Those are a lot more colors than I thought we would use,” Nicole said, coming to stand beside her.

  “There’s a lot more color that goes into painting than you realize,” Fiona said. She dabbed a brush into one of the lighter blue paints and demonstrated a few strokes for Nicole. “We start like this, and we’ll layer in more depth of color as we go.”

  Nicole selected a medium-sized brush and dabbed it into the same light blue paint Fiona had started with. A wide smile broke on her face as she swiped her brush against the canvas, creating a rich band of color. This was fun. Painting together had been a good idea. They worked side by side, leaning over each other, occasionally swapping brushes and paints.

  Fiona demonstrated various techniques to add depth and texture to the waves. She squirted yellow and orange onto their palette and added the sun shining in the sky above. She outlined their lifeboat in vivid orange and showed Nicole how to reflect the color in the waves around it. They spent most of the day in the studio together, taking periodic breaks for food and rest.

  Fiona seemed relaxed and at ease as they worked, occasionally pausing to kiss Nicole or touch her, shoulders and hips bumping as they smeared oil onto canvas.

  “It’s a masterpiece,” Nicole announced when the painting was finished. In truth, it had turned out much better than she’d expected, and that fact was due in large to Fiona’s ability to shape Nicole’s hapless brush strokes into something beautiful. Their orange lifeboat floated on a rolling sea, waves stretching across the canvas as the sun beat down from above.

  “I love it,” Fiona agreed, her fingers squeezing Nicole’s. She turned toward her, untying the smock from behind her back. Nicole lifted it over her head as Fiona untied her own smock. She hung them both on the rack in the corner.

  “You’ve got a little something.” Nicole swiped at a dot of blue paint on Fiona’s nose, smearing it.

  “You do too.” Fiona touched a spot on Nicole’s cheek.

  “Made it worse,” Nicole said with a grin, rubbing at the paint smear on Fiona’s nose.

>   They stared at each other for a moment. Fiona’s eyes sparkled mischievously, and then they moved almost as one, reaching for the palette still sitting by the easel, paints blended here and there from the colors they’d mixed for their painting.

  Fiona dipped a finger into the sea of blue and smeared it across Nicole’s cheek, grinning wickedly. Nicole swiped her finger through the orange and traced a line of it down Fiona’s chest, swirling it around her belly ring like the sun peeping over the horizon of her blue pants.

  It was all downhill from there. They painted each other, kissing and touching, hips moving, seeking contact, colors mixing, blending, their desire illustrated in vivid hues.

  Fiona tugged at the button of Nicole’s shorts, looking at her paint-colored hands. “Shower,” she whispered.

  Following her train of thought, Nicole nodded eagerly. They tumbled into the shower together, shedding clothes against the white tiles. Fiona soaped up her hands, scrubbing away paint. Nicole followed her lead. They kissed as the shower beat down on them, washing each other and teasing by equal turns. Fiona pressed Nicole against the tiles, sending rivulets of blue-tinged suds down her chest and over her nipples.

  “Now this is a masterpiece,” she said as she used her hands to sluice hot water over Nicole’s skin, chasing it with her mouth. She dragged her teeth along the underside of Nicole’s breast before swirling her tongue over her nipple, and Nicole let her head clunk against the tile.

  “Your mouth…” she managed, hands sinking into the wet depths of Fiona’s hair.

  “You like it?” she asked, peering up at Nicole through a wayward curl.

  “I love it.”

  “More than just my accent?” she asked, batting her eyelashes as her tongue continued to explore Nicole’s breasts.

  “I love that too.” Nicole gasped as Fiona slid a hand between her legs, stroking her as she continued to use her deliciously talented mouth on Nicole’s breasts.

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, sounding so overbearingly British that Nicole almost called her on it, but it turned into a moan as Fiona dropped to her knees, bringing her beautifully British mouth against the most intimate parts of Nicole and rendering her unable to speak.

  She braced herself against the tile, straining to hold herself upright as Fiona worked her magic, shattering Nicole into a million blissful pieces as easily as she’d created beauty on the canvas in her studio. They rinsed off, dried off, and tumbled into her bed, where Nicole returned the favor.

  “This has been the most amazing day,” Fiona said as they lay together afterward, sounding relaxed and at peace with the world. Their toes bumped beneath the sheets, foreheads pressed together, hands clasped between their bodies.

  Nicole wanted to hold onto this moment, bottle it up, and keep it with her forever.

  OVER THE NEXT FEW DAYS, they made even more perfect moments. They toured an art museum, a winery, and a castle. They bought food and flowers at the market and spent a quiet evening at home, sipping wine and sharing stories. They made another painting together, this time of the flower arrangement they’d gotten at the market, but the lifeboat remained Nicole’s favorite. Fiona even attempted to show her a few yoga moves in the garden.

  There were glimpses—little moments tucked between bigger ones—when Nicole thought she saw Fiona pulling back, distancing herself, perhaps preparing for an ending much bigger than Nicole’s upcoming return to New York. It was there in the way she paused, paintbrush in hand, her eyes a million miles away when Nicole mentioned a phone call from her parents, the way she turned her back when Nicole lamented having to be at work on Monday.

  Maybe she was just being paranoid. But there was no way she was going to let Fiona shut her out, not after everything they’d shared this week. On Saturday night, Nicole’s last night in France, they went out to dinner at a local brasserie and spent the rest of the evening in bed, making the most of their final hours together.

  Nicole rolled over, resting an arm over Fiona’s waist. “I don’t want to go home tomorrow.”

  “Don’t think about it yet,” Fiona whispered.

  “Will you come?” Nicole asked.

  Fiona gave her a coy look, purposely misunderstanding her. “I’m capable of doing that by myself, you know.”

  “To New York, you pervert.” Nicole shifted her hand, toying with Fiona’s belly ring. “Will you visit me?”

  “I hate cities,” Fiona said, turning her face toward the ceiling.

  “I’ll take you to the countryside, to the mountains, anywhere you want to go.”

  Fiona was silent, staring up at the ceiling fan that slowly swirled the air around them, spreading the scent of the fields outside, grass and wildflowers and livestock mixed with a lingering scent of paint from the studio behind them.

  “Don’t do this,” Nicole said as tears stung her eyes. “Don’t push me away, not now.”

  “I’m not,” Fiona said, her voice as faint as the birds chattering outside.

  “Then tell me we’ll see each other again. Let’s plan it. Right now. Get your laptop, and let’s book our next trip.”

  A tear slipped from Fiona’s eye, disappearing into her hair.

  “Come on, Fi. All I’m asking for is the chance to see you again.”

  “We’ll see.”

  And everything Nicole had feared hung plainly in Fiona’s words, in her voice, in the vacant stare in her eyes. “‘We’ll see’ is a cop-out. It’s an excuse to send me home so you can shut yourself away from the inconvenient fact that I’ve come along and made you care about me despite your best effort not to.”

  Fiona sucked in a harsh breath, jaw set, eyes fixed on the ceiling.

  Nicole curled herself around her, unwilling to be shut out, not this time. “And I care about you too. The best part of my day—every day since we got home from Greece—has been you. Whether it’s a text or a phone call or just staring at the sketch you made for me, you make me happy, Fi. I want to be with you. I love you.”

  Fiona tensed beneath her, more tears sliding over her cheeks, disappearing into her hairline. She closed her eyes. “You don’t mean that.”

  “I do. I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone. I love watching you do ridiculous yoga poses on your head. I love lying next to you in bed…and all the other things we do in it. I even love eating food cubes with you. Do you realize how happy we were on that island? It should have sucked, and a lot of it did, but honestly, there isn’t another person on earth I’d rather have been stranded with.”

  “Stop it.” Fiona finally softened, rolling toward her. Her eyes blinked open, staring into Nicole’s, the color in them as vivid as the paint they’d used to create the ocean in her studio.

  “I love your eyes,” Nicole whispered. “They’re like our beach…turquoise and gold where the water meets the sand.”

  “It’s hereditary,” Fiona said softly. “The gold ring. My mother had it too.”

  “I love you, Fi. And I know you’re not ready to say it back yet. Just say we’ll see each other again after I fly home tomorrow.”

  “You’re barely out of your marriage,” Fiona said, her voice gone deep and husky the way it was when she was emotional. “You’ve never even been with another woman.”

  Nicole sighed, running her fingers through the honeyed depths of Fiona’s hair. “I know how I feel.”

  “I don’t know how—” Fiona pressed her lips together, eyes glossy.

  I don’t know how to love you back.

  Nicole was almost certain that was what Fiona had been about to say, and the knowledge ripped her apart even as it broke her heart. “This isn’t about me or my divorce, not anymore. You know that, right?”

  Fiona was silent, her bottom lip quivering slightly.

  “Dammit, Fi, you told me to go home and find myself, and I did, but you didn’t do the same. You’re still lost, and you’re too afraid to admit it.”

  Fiona squeezed her eyes shut, hands clenched into the sheet between the
m.

  Not knowing what else to say, Nicole rolled away, facing the door. She sucked in breath after breath, trying to keep her emotions in check, until finally, she surrendered and let the tears flow.

  “I’m sorry,” Fiona whispered from behind her.

  “Yeah, me too.”

  They lay like that for what felt like hours, backs to each other, lost in their own misery. The tension between them festered like an open wound, and this one couldn’t be so easily healed with a round of IV antibiotics. This one required words and actions that Fiona might not ever be ready to say or take.

  Eventually, Nicole drifted into a troubled sleep. Sometime during the night, instinct took over, and she woke to find herself wrapped in Fiona’s arms, her chest wet with Fiona’s tears.

  She’ll come around. She will.

  But when Nicole woke the next morning, the bed was empty. Even though this was a totally normal part of their routine, Nicole’s stomach turned to lead. This felt different somehow, after the way they’d left things last night. She slid out of bed and walked to the back door. The garden was empty. The driveway was empty.

  Fiona was gone.

  Nicole’s throat closed up. Her vision went hazy, and she bent over to stem the buzzing in her ears. Furious, she marched back into the house and picked up her phone. Sure enough, Fiona’s name glinted on the screen.

  I called a car to take you to the airport. I still hate goodbyes.

  And then…

  I’m sorry.

  With shaking fingers, Nicole typed back, Fuck you.

  No dots bounced. No reply came.

  This time, Fiona wasn’t coming back.

  17

  Fiona stared at the mess in her bed, unsure whether to laugh or cry. Nicole had dumped the entire pot of turquoise paint on her sheets. Fiona knew she was an unforgiveable bitch for leaving this morning, but she hadn’t been able to face the reality of letting Nicole go, and now she had to own the consequence.

  She sat on the edge of her bed, swirling her fingers through the paint, trying to fight the sinking sensation inside her, like she was a black hole being sucked cell by cell into the gaping void in her chest.