“Stop looking at me,” Evie said. “I like that you didn’t laugh, that’s all. It’s not a big deal.”
Natalie nodded. She didn’t know what else to say.
Natalie watched the film for a while. She thought about Evie, and how different Evie seemed to be at some times to others. She was having trouble working out which Evie was real, the one who smoked pot at work, or the one who cared enough about a career in tax law to take extra courses to impress potential employers.
“I like that you did the art and film courses,” Natalie said, after a moment.
“Just while we’re telling each other how great we both are?”
“Not that. Because it was organised, thinking that far ahead. It was clever and committed and I like that in people.”
Evie grinned, and ate another sweet. Natalie was starting to wonder if she was nibbling them because she couldn’t smoke.
“I have to,” Evie said. “Think that far ahead. I have to stand out from everyone else. Do you know how many graduates your firm hires each year?”
“I actually don’t.”
“I do. Not many.”
“So the art and music…?”
“Is meant to give me some kind of advantage. So I stand out and am all special and they pick me. Except how everyone else does the same thing, so I’m thinking I’m actually not that special. But if I hadn’t done it, then maybe it would work for someone else, and I don’t want to risk that, so I have to as well. It’s complicated.”
Natalie nodded. She remembered thinking like this. The second-guessing and worry. It sounded a little more competitive than it had been for her, but not very much.
“Except,” Evie said. “Apparently you’ve never heard of this. Which makes me think it isn’t going to work. So that’s a shame.”
Natalie wasn’t sure how serious Evie was. “I’m not on the hiring committee,” she said. “I wouldn’t necessarily…”
“Yeah, I still got a weird feeling they haven’t heard about it either.”
“I can ask? If they take that into account?”
“Honestly? I think I’d rather not know.”
“Tell me when you start applying for positions and I’ll see if I can help.”
“Nope,” Evie said. “And don’t suggest that again.”
“I could help.”
“Nope. You know why.”
Natalie looked at her, and was about to say she didn’t.
“You’re not paying me,” Evie said. “Not in any way, not ever.”
“Oh,” Natalie said. “I see.” She hadn’t realized Evie’s rule went quite that far.
Evie shrugged, and didn’t answer, and seemed to go quiet. They watched the film in silence for while, and Natalie began to wonder if Evie was offended.
Natalie leaned over and whispered, “I’m sorry. I forgot.”
“It’s fine,” Evie said.
Natalie nodded, but was still worried. Evie had been very firm about how upset she’d be if Natalie tired to pay her again. Natalie was about to apologise again, just to make sure, when Evie reached over and put her hand in Natalie’s.
Evie squeezed, and twisted their fingertips together, and held on gently. She looked over, and smiled.
“It’s really fine,” Evie said. “Don’t.”
“Thank you,” Natalie said.
Evie shrugged again, and then they sat side by side, holding hands, watching the film.
Natalie wondered why she was acting like this. Why she was so flustered by the idea of upsetting Evie. She thought she knew why, but it was unsettling to think about too much.
She concentrated on the film instead.
*
After the film ended, as Evie and Natalie left the theatre, Evie carefully stuffed their empty soft drink bottles down deep into the rubbish bin, so they were hidden beneath popcorn boxes and ice cream wrappers. Natalie watched. It took her a moment to work out what Evie was doing, but then she was impressed by Evie’s sneakiness.
They went outside, to the dark street, and stood in a cold, sharp wind looking at each other. Natalie wanted to ask Evie to do something else with her, but she also didn’t want to push too hard. She didn’t know how much time Evie had, or what Evie wanted to do next.
Natalie stood there, waiting to see if Evie started saying goodbyes, until it occurred to her that Evie might be waiting too. As the silence went on, Natalie began to suspect that perhaps Evie was.
“Did you like the film?” Evie said suddenly.
“I did,” Natalie said, relieved one of them was talking.
“You don’t have to just say that.”
“What?” Natalie said. “No, I really did.”
Evie’s self-doubt was a surprise. She had seemed very sure of herself in the darkness of the theatre. She had seemed confident, quite alarmingly so. Now they were outside, that confidence seemed to be fading, as if Evie had been pretending, a little. As if the darkness had helped her to be herself.
“It wasn’t too slow?” Evie said.
“It was fine. It was good. I liked it.”
Evie nodded, but didn’t seem convinced. Perhaps she hadn’t liked the film, and was worried Natalie hadn’t either. Natalie wondered if she should explain that Meredith liked arty films with subtitles, so anything that didn’t involve reading, no matter how slow, was something of a relief. She thought about explaining, but didn’t want to talk about Meredith, so instead, she said, “It’s early.”
“Yep. It is.”
“Would you like to do something? Maybe have a drink?”
Evie nodded. “Yeah, that would be nice.”
There were a few bars nearby. “There?” Natalie said, and pointed to one, mostly at random. Evie nodded, and they went there. Natalie bought their drinks, because Evie had paid for the movie. Natalie just held money out to the bartender, and ignored Evie when Evie said, “Hey.”
Evie objected, but she let Natalie pay.
“Can we sit outside?” Evie said. So she could smoke, Natalie assumed.
“Of course,” Natalie said, and they went and sat on an outdoor terrace, which also meant they were alone. It was dim, and a little cold. They both had their coats on now, and Natalie had her hands in her pockets. Natalie wanted to talk, to say something clever, but it was getting late, and she was a little tired, and she couldn’t think of a thing to say. She thought about mentioning the film, but that seemed a little predictable.
She sat there quietly instead, watching Evie smoke.
Evie was breathing onto Natalie’s face, probably without realizing. Natalie could smell the tarry sootiness of the smoke, and could feel it in her eyes. Natalie sat there, though, without complaining. For the first time since she’d quit herself, she didn’t actually mind being around a smoker. She wasn’t irritated, and didn’t want to move away, and that probably meant something terribly important.
She sat there quietly, letting Evie breathe smoke all over her and wondered whether she should try to kiss Evie.
She wasn’t entirely sure.
“Sorry,” Evie said, after a moment. “Making you sit out here. It’s colder than I thought.”
“It’s fine.”
“And for that too,” Evie said, and waved her hand at the smoke, even though only a little of it moved.
“Don’t worry,” Natalie said. “I don’t mind.”
Evie nodded.
“I want to kiss you,” Natalie said. “But I’m not sure if I should.”
Evie thought about that for a moment. “Why not?”
“I don’t know. I’m just not.”
“You can if you like.”
“I thought I probably could.”
“Are you going to?”
“Yes,” Natalie said, and then sat there without moving.
Evie smiled, and leaned over, and kissed Natalie with a smoky mouth. She kissed for a moment, closing her eyes, and then suddenly moved away. “Fuck,” she said. “Sorry. About my breath. I forgot.”
“I
really don’t mind.”
“Yeah, of course you don’t. But all the same, we can not right now if you’d rather not?”
“No,” Natalie said, surprised. “I want to.”
“You do?”
“I very much want to.”
“But all smoky? Really?”
Natalie leaned forward and kissed Evie again, and tried to remember if it was the first time she had. “I like your taste like that,” she said.
“No you don’t,” Evie said into her mouth.
“I do. I like the taste.”
“Liar.”
“I promise, I do.”
“Why, because you used to smoke?”
Natalie didn’t answer.
Evie leaned back, and looked at her. “Did you used to smoke?”
Natalie shrugged. “Everyone did.”
“So you did?”
“Yep.”
“Oh,” Evie said. “I see. You miss it, that’s all. You don’t really want to kiss, you’re sucking smoky out of my mouth.”
Natalie looked at her for a moment. “You’re not as funny as you think.”
“Yeah I am,” Evie said, and grinned, and Natalie grinned too.
Evie leaned forward and kissed again, and Natalie kissed her back, and this time Evie closed her eyes and left her mouth against Natalie’s, and seemed lost for several moments. Lost and kissing, until she remembered the cigarette burning in her hand, and pulled away to glance at it.
“You kiss well,” Evie said.
Natalie wasn’t sure what to say. “Thank you.”
“Except I shouldn’t assume you don’t,” Evie said. “Should I?”
“I have no idea. I’m trying not to assume anything. It seems safer.”
“Yeah,” Evie said. “It probably is.”
“This doesn’t make much sense if I have too many assumptions.”
Evie grinned. “Which kind of does make sense.”
Natalie smiled.
“Me too,” Evie said. “By the way. I’m not assuming.”
Natalie nodded, because it seemed like that was good, and then there was another silence. Evie was watching Natalie, and seemed to be thinking again.
“So this thing,” Evie said. “Seeing you and all.”
“Yes.”
“I like you. I want to do this again, if you do. Just in case you were wondering.”
“I think I was about to start wondering.”
“Yeah, I thought you might be. So. I want to again.”
“I do too.”
“But not tonight. We should be a little bit slow, yeah? And stop for tonight?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“Don’t you?”
Natalie thought she understood. “Yes,” she said. “All right.”
Evie smiled and put down her glass and reached forward to touch Natalie’s hand. She took it in hers, and sat there for a while, smoking, holding hands. It was cold and dark and quite peaceful sitting there, watching Evie smoke.
Evie finished her cigarette. “Come on,” she said, and squashed it out. “It’s too cold. We should go.”
“Do you need a ride?”
Evie shook her head. “I’ll call a taxi,” she said, and took out her phone, and did.
They stood out the front of the bar, waiting in silence, looking up and down the street. It was a nice enough silence, Natalie thought, and didn’t try to talk. After a few minutes, a taxi turned the corner nearest them. Evie waved, and it slowed down and stopped beside her. Evie opened the door, and said, “Just a sec,” and then closed it again and looked at Natalie. She stood there for a moment, and seemed to be thinking, then kissed Natalie quite quickly.
“This was fun,” she said.
“It was.”
“And I organised it.”
“You did.”
“No, I mean, I organized it, so the next time it’s your turn.”
“Oh,” Natalie said. “All right.”
“Pick something for us to do. I mean, if you still want to.”
“Of course I do.”
“Good,” Evie said, and smiled. “Then pick something good. Really good. Something to impress me.”
Natalie stood there, startled, while Evie opened the taxi’s door and got in. She couldn’t work out how or why, but suddenly the certainty she’d felt a moment ago was gone.
Evie spoke to the driver, and then waved to Natalie, as the taxi began to drive off. Natalie waved back, quickly, and tried to work out what on earth she could organize that would impress Evie as much as she wanted to.
*
Natalie had lost most of her friends when she and Meredith separated, and it hadn’t really surprised her that she did. She and Meredith had the same friends, and worked with the same people, and Meredith had always played rough. Meredith had developed a cruel habit of talking Natalie down to everyone they knew, and of playing games with double-bookings to exclude Natalie from social events. In the end, for Natalie, it was easier just to lose touch with people, and most of the time she didn’t even really mind. She understood why Meredith was like this. Meredith felt better about herself and her cheating by blaming Natalie for what had happened, and the more Meredith told her stories, the more she ended up believing them, and not feeling as bad.
Natalie understood, but it sometimes left her lonely. It left her without a close circle of friends, they way she’d used to have, and no-one to talk to about difficult decisions. Which meant, right now, trying to plan an evening with Evie, she had no-one she trusted enough to ask advice from.
That made her a little sad.
She thought about Evie, and the best plan she could come up with was for them to go out for dinner. She had an awful feeling that might not be a very good idea. Evie was young, and restaurants might not be what people her age did, and Evie might not feel like she fitted in somewhere Natalie would usually go. Worse, a restaurant might be too much like work for Evie, too, and it would probably cause problems about who would pay, and it might even remind Evie how much older Natalie was, in the wrong kind of way.
Natalie wasn’t sure dinner was sensible, but she couldn’t think of anything else. She didn’t really have hobbies, and didn’t do very much other than work, and she knew nothing about what Evie liked anyway, so in the end she decided that dinner was best. At least she had a fairly good idea which were the better restaurants, and she had her assistant check for her to make sure.
Then she phoned Evie, feeling oddly nervous, and said, “Would you like to have dinner with me? Somewhere nice?”
“So not the food court?”
Natalie sat there for a moment. “No.”
“So not a burger?”
“Not that either, no.”
“Wow, so somewhere really nice, then.”
“Could you stop that,” Natalie said. “Please?”
“I’m sorry,” Evie said, but didn’t sound it. She sounded more like she was smiling.
“Well then,” Natalie said. “Is dinner going to be enough to impress you?”
“I have a funny feeling that it might.”
“You’re talking strangely.”
“I’m trying to be formal. Like you. Because you phoned to ask me out.”
“You’re teasing aren’t you.”
Evie laughed. “Yep.”
Evie hadn’t actually said yes yet, Natalie noticed. “So would you like to?” Natalie said.
“As it happens,” Evie said. “I would very much like to have dinner with you somewhere nice. When would you like to do this?”
Evie was still teasing, but Natalie decided not to care because Evie had said yes. Natalie thought about when. She wanted to say tonight, but she also didn’t want to look too desperate. “Thursday?” she said, a compromise. Three days to wait.
“Yep,” Evie said. “Thursday would be good.”
Natalie hesitated. “Evie, I’d like to go somewhere nice.”
“We can go somewhere nice.”
“The
n I’d like to pay.”
“Nope.”
“Somewhere nice might be expensive.”
“I assumed. But still no.”
Natalie thought. “How about if we don’t sleep together.”
A silence, then Evie said, sounding amused, “Who says we’re going to…”
“If we agree not to beforehand, can I pay? I’m worried how expensive a nice restaurant might be.”
Evie seemed to be thinking.
“Please?” Natalie said. “It would mean a lot to me.”
“Yeah, okay,” Evie said. “And thank you.”
“No, just… the same. For letting me.”
There was a short silence.
“Okay,” Evie said. “Well, I’d better go. And I’m just saying so to warn you, in case you’re all weirdly nervous right now, so I don’t suddenly disappear and make you think something’s up.”
Natalie smiled. “All right. Goodbye.”
“Bye,” Evie said, and was gone.
Natalie thought that was that. She made reservations, and put Evie out her mind and got on with her life. Then, two nights later, the evening before they were supposed to have dinner, Evie rung Natalie at home and said, “You’re taking too long to impress me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I should think so. It’s terrible.”
Natalie had no idea what to say. “I’m looking forward to tomorrow,” she managed.
“Yeah, about that. So I was thinking. That all seems like a lot of pressure. Like we have to be witty and perfect and beautiful and interesting for each other, and keep it up for hours, and we won’t even get laid at the end of it.”
“It’s not…”
“It’s pressure. Doing everything all properly, all formal. Dinner and wine and then probably we fuck. It’s like some awful wedding kind of thing.”
Natalie understood exactly what Evie meant, but she didn’t want to admit that she did. She was also a little confused by Evie assuming they’d have sex. “I thought we weren’t going to…” Natalie felt awkward. “I thought we weren’t going to have sex tomorrow.”
“Of course we are,” Evie said.
“Oh,” Natalie said.
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