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Vi didn’t rememberhow she’d gotten up the stairs from the cafe. Her hands trembled as she held on tight to the steel rails of the narrow stepladder, the camera still dangling heavy around her neck. Once there, she refused to be distracted by the magnificence of Paris spreading like wings in front of her. She kept her head down and tried not to think about her fear of heights as she jumped from one roof to the next. When she was two buildings away from Lilien Haus, she finally saw her.
Chiara was standing across from Vi, on the very edge of the roofline. It didn’t have a railing, and Vi’s heart was suddenly in her throat. She didn’t know if she should shout, since she might startle Chiara. And with every breath she took, Vi prayed that Chiara’s being so close to the edge was by accident. That it meant nothing. That none of this was happening.
Spurned on by the need to do something, Vi took several careful steps. Then more and more, until she was only a few feet away. Still, her own fear made the lump in her throat insurmountable, choking the life out of her.
Her tears were blinding her. However, none of them were for herself. They were all for the woman who trembled in the wind and seemed a million miles away.
Chiara couldn’t jump, Chiara couldn’t fall, because Vi would not be able to save her. Vi was too far away,too far away…
“I won’t, Vi. I’m just… uncentered… Unsteady, I guess.”
Had she once again spoken her thoughts out loud? Had Chiara heard her? The low voice, laden with sorrow, was so quiet, Vi could barely hear in spite of being as close as she was now. When she raised her eyes—fear swallowing her whole and tears streaming down her cheeks—and looked at Chiara, she was still near the edge, still motionless, still staring into the distance.
“I heard you cry, darling. Or try not to sob too loudly. I’m sorry they sent you after me. You can go back now. I know you’re scared. I knew you were scared the very first time I took you up. But you were so brave, soldiering on.”
Vi jerked her head, then realized that Chiara was still not looking at her, but into the beautiful expanse of Paris. She needed to speak, to ask, to deny that she was here on someone else’s orders, to find her voice. Yet she felt like everything around her was steeped in molasses. She herself was sluggish, weary, unable to act. Like in one of those dreams where someone is chasing you and you can’t move quite fast enough. A dream where her closed-up throat precluded her from uttering a word, from salvation.
Except she didn’t need to be saved right now, Chiara did.So Vi gritted her teeth and finally managed to force her mouth to cooperate.
“Nobody sent… Came by myself… Well, not really, Zizou…” She stopped when she heard Chiara’s quiet chuckle.
“Rambling again, Ms. Courtenay?”
The laughter and the words, so familiar, so quintessentially Chiara, so unlike the cavernous, lifeless ‘I won’t,’ that Vi was ready to sprint the rest of the way on the warm, gray zinc of the roof. She chose to temper her zeal and instead take careful steps towards Chiara.
“You know I ramble when I’m nervous. And no, I didn’t believe you would jump. She doesn’t deserve—”
“God, you are so naïve, still!” Chiara finally turned, skewering Vi with a direct look as she stepped away from the edge, her arm gestures—so rarely employed by her now, yet oh-so-Italian—underscoring her frustration.
The rare glimpse of temper, so uncharacteristic compared to her overall calm and collected disposition, was a surprise. A pleasant one. Anything was better than the prior lifelessness.
Vi knew Chiara’s anger and pain over the situation must have finally taken over, and she didn’t mind if it was directed at her. She didn’t care. The ice that had been encasing her chest ever since she’d seen Chiara teetering on the edge had begun to thaw. That was all that mattered.
Chiara stalked towards her and grabbed her upper arm, not so gently taking her farther away from the edge of the roof.
“Naïve and so damn brave I can’t even be angry with you. And I have so much anger now, Vi… So much…” Chiara trailed off, despite the obvious dark mood, seemingly satisfied now that Vi couldn’t see the street beneath them anymore from where they stood. She closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, then sat down, pulling on Vi to join her.
Before she knew what was happening, Vi found herself shoulder to shoulder with Chiara, engulfed in the remnants of crackling aggravation still radiating from her companion, who continued to take deliberate deep breaths to calm herself down.
“I am not sure that strategy has ever helped me.” Vi’s words took both of them by surprise.
“Are you really criticizing how I cope with my frustration?” Chiara’s eyebrow rose indignantly and Vi had to smile.
“I know you want to bite my head off… You could, you know, it’s fine. Or you could hold on to me. Because I’m here. Because I’m safe.”
And it was Vi’s turn to look into the distance, to pretend that the skyline was all she saw when, in fact, she saw nothing at all, her eyes again filling with tears that she couldn’t explain or understand.
A gentle touch on her chin made her turn back, then amber eyes perused her face at leisure. And suddenly the air was no longer filled with crackling anger.
The temperature rose each time Chiara lowered her eyes to Vi’s mouth. On the last pass, Chiara spoke, and her voice had that low note to it, the one that Vi recognized, because she had been hearing it for months now. And she had never heard it directed at others. She thought she finally knew what it was.
“Whoever is writing my life is perverse.” The words were a soft whisper. Chiara’s eyes twinkled with gentleness, then she bit her lip, and Vi wanted to whimper.
In the distance, a single bird trilled, flying high in the purpling sky, and Vi’s heart wanted to chase it, to fly along.
“You are not safe, darling. Not even close. But youaretoo naïve and too kind, Vi. A gentle soul. Too beautiful. Too…everythingreally, for your own good. You would have tried to save me, wouldn’t you?” When Vi tried to shake her head ‘no,’ she knew what Chiara would say next, because she understood her own eyes had betrayed her.
“Don’t lie to me, Vi. You can’t pull that off to save your life, anyway. Your face, your eyes will always show me the truth. So don’t even try. You never have before. Obviously hidden some things, judging by your lack of surprise at Frankie’s choice of mid-afternoon snack…” And now the tone held no warmth, just mocking.
