Archive of Our Own

Bérénice scrolls on her tablet as she approaches the doors- looking at her designs of the three desserts. Constance put a stop to her tweaking a word here or there last night after 22:00, but that hasn’t stopped her from tracing her work until now she sees it on her eyelids every time she blinks. She halts just before the glass. Everyone’s already there, waiting for her.

Carla’s there.

The anxiety-inducing radio silence since last Friday was another factor that drove Bérénice into her recipes. There was something humiliating about having to dump the sand out of her shoes while she replayed Carla, fleeing from her as soon as she stuttered through a thinly veiled excuse.

She didn’t get outright rejected, but only because Carla seemed entirely thrown off; she would have had to look at her to let her down. Bérénice couldn’t figure out if she regretted telling her or not. On the one hand, she doesn’t have to keep this secret from her best friend. On the other, she couldn’t tell how Carla felt about her. Sure, she was still friends with Souleymane after he told her he liked her, but would it be different with Bérénice? Would it be too much for Carla to handle? Would she even want to?

Bérénice shakes her head. They’d still be friends. It just might be different going forward. Carla would probably hesitate to touch or get close to her, but she’d still talk to her.

Trying to reassure herself, Bérénice hugs her tablet towards her stomach and opens the doors. She goes to say hi but stops when she hears her name.

“She’s a bit out of my league. I love Bérénice, but if I had to pick a girl, I’d never date someone so not sophisticated,” Carla says.

Bérénice freezes.

Not sophisticated enough. Out of my league.

“Sometimes I wonder why we’re friends.”

I can’t leave, she thinks. She had already promised to stop running from things that scared her.

There’s nothing left to do except swallow back the bile of orange juice rising to her mouth. Two days is all it took. Two days after confessing, Carla has gone from inventing a backstory for their fake relationship to jumping at the next chance to draw a line between them for everyone to see.

Bérénice clears her throat.

They all turn to look at her. She glances quickly from one to the next as she approaches, avoiding the sting of pity she senses. Her throat thickens with humiliation.

She’s not even good enough to be friends with.

How long has Carla felt like this? Forever? Was it all pity? Has she been embarrassing Carla this entire time? Bérénice must have been walking around like an idiot, thinking that Carla did anything more than put up with her.

“Bérénice-” Carla weakly says.

She cuts her off.“I have the recipes ready, and I want to finish everything today. Let’s get started so we’re not late.”

It takes a second, but she gets a chorus of “Yes, Chef,” and she wastes no time walking past Carla to collect her tools. Later, if she stands in the walk-in fridge for a minute too long, the cold always stops tears from cutting onions; maybe it’ll stop these tears from falling, too.

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Bérénice avoids everyone as much as she possibly can while still having to instruct them, and when it comes time to change and leave, she considers walking home in her uniform so she does not have to face Carla. But nobody does that, and the last thing she needs is to look even more weird.

She unlocks the changing room door, throws her uniform in her locker, puts on her coat, and grabs her bag.

She’s just twisting the key in her lock when she hears, “Bérénice?”

Her eyes close before she braces herself to turn around.

Carla stands still in her uniform, twiddling her fingers together.

“Can we talk?” she asks.

Bérénice looks around as another student walks down the hall. She feels a familiar panic rising in her. She blinks and tries to shove it down.

Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Not in front of her.

“Look, Carla, I get it. You don’t want to be friends anymore…” she trails off.

Carla shakes her head. “No, it’s not like that. Bérénice, I-”

It’s selfish, but she doesn’t want to hear her say it again. The last thing she needs is an explanation when she already understands enough.

Carla doesn’t want to be friends, let alone be in a relationship with her.

Bérénice doesn’t need to know exactly why. Not when Carla’s insistence on giving her a makeover and encouraging her to act differently is more than enough blanks filled in if everyone expects her to show up tomorrow. She just wishes it didn’t have to be so humiliating to realize it was both her appearance and her personality that Carla could never like.

“Please don’t, okay?”

Unfortunately, Carla either doesn’t notice that Bérénice is barely holding on, or she doesn’t care, and it’s becoming clear that Bérénice has never been able to tell the difference.

“I shouldn’t have said all that. I didn’t mean it like-”

“Stop. You said you wonder why we’re friends… so just let it go and stop wondering.”

“Bérénice,” Carla’s tone is lower, deeper, as if she means it.

Bérénice starts to become annoyed by her insistence. Why does she even care? Bérénice isn’t that fragile. She can handle having her heart broken and ripped apart without the one who did it trying to patch it up like they were surprised it happened. Carla has no obligation to her anymore. She never did.

“Let’s just limit our conversations to the brigade. It’s what I want,” Bérénice says as she yanks her shoulder bag further up her shoulder.

She takes that as an opportunity to leave, just faintly hearing the “okay” that Carla murmurs in response.

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As soon as Carla hits the pavement outside, she looks up at the sky and screams as loud as possible. A few birds scatter from the trees, and at least half a dozen people jump to stare at her, but she crosses her arms over her chest like it never happened and glares til they look away.

How did she fuck up so badly so quickly? Two sentences she can’t take back that she didn’t even fucking mean. Would Bérénice even look at her again? She can’t blame her if she never does. If she had heard Bérénice say that about her, she might just have burnt the entire school down.

Let’s just limit our conversations to the brigade. It’s what I want.

God, Carla was fucked.

“Hey, Carla. How’s it going? Nice weather, huh?”

She turns her head to scowl as Souleymane approaches. She readjusts her purse on her shoulder. At least she could pretend like she still had her dignity.

“What do you want?” she demands.

“Nothing,” he raises his hands, “Want to talk about what’s got you upset?”

Where would she even begin?

“No.”

“Well, I’m heading this way if you want to walk with-”

Carla rolls her eyes and storms off in that direction. Her heels click clack with each heavy step before there’s an added scuffle of Souleymane jogging to catch up with her.

“A bad day in class?” he asks, breathless.

That would be an understatement.

4 tortuous hours in the kitchen where Bérénice didn’t say one word to her outside of what was necessary. Even then, she stood a few feet away from her and fled as soon as Carla indicated she understood.

At one point, she pretended not to know how to do something to see if Bérénice could physically get closer to her, but all she did was send her the instructions from her tablet. Any other time, she would have stepped closer, maybe nudged her with her shoulder as she teased her before she would explain it in quiet steps before anyone else could notice Carla Furiani didn’t know something.

“You could say that.”

“Is this about Bérénice?”

She whirls around. “Why would you say that?”

Is it already all over the school? Does he know something?

Souleyman scratches his head. “You kissed last week in front of everyone. It’s a lover’s quarrel, right?”

Carla cringes to herself; how could she forget her fake public declaration? She turns around and continues walking. “We’re not dating. Never were.”

“What? Carla. Wait up.”

She doesn’t stop. Now that she remembers it, she can’t stop. The look of Bérénice, the touch of her hands, her lips. Did Bérénice think it was real? Was she disappointed? Carla felt so satisfied in the moment that she didn’t even notice how Bérénice was feeling. Guilt weighs on her chest at the realization she unwittingly played with her feelings.

“It was just a stupid ploy to stop people from making fun of her.”

“Ouch,” Souleyman says. He puts his hand over his chest and mimics falling.

“What?” She snaps at the dramatics.

“You moved on so quickly from our fake relationship.”

“Shut up. I’m not in the mood.”

Souleymane shrugs. “How is your solution to your problems always fake dating?”

“It didn’t solve anything. It just caused more problems.”

She huffs and breaks from the walkway to sit down at the weird art wall booth. Why is this even here? It's just stupid art in stupid places. Leaning up against the wall, she raises her eyebrows until Souleymane abandons whatever plans he has and sits down with her.

“Like what?”

“She…” Carla trails off, not knowing how to phrase it.

She’s in love with me.

Understanding dawns on Souleymane’s face, and Carla hates how quickly it happens. He could have at least pretended to have to think about it for a minute.

“She likes you?” Souleymane guesses.

Carla reluctantly nods.

“And you don’t feel the same?”

“No.”

They sit in silence. Carla doesn’t know what else to say. She pretends not to see the side glances Souleymane sends her way. She gets the itching feeling that he doesn’t quite believe her.

Among the breeze of the trees, her ears turn towards the sound of something familiar. It almost sounds like…like Bérénice’s voice. She goes deadly still until the voice gets closer, and undeniably, she knows it belongs to the woman in question. Through the gap in the wall, she sees a glimpse of a green wool jacket and the brown strap of a bag. Carla gives a half-shriek and ducks out of the view. Her elbow bangs on the table, and she bites her lip through the pain. Then she glares at Souleyman, who has been staring at her dumbfounded until he follows her frantic gestures to crouch beside her. He tries to speak, but she shushes him.

There’s a faint sound of coffee cups tapping the table on the other side, and she imagines Bérénice sitting down.

“Wait. Tell me again, what happened?”

Carla recognizes Constance’s voice.

“I don’t want to go over it again. It doesn’t matter. It’s over,” Bérénice sighs, “I know I didn’t have control over half of it, but even before, I thought she’d be a safe person to tell. A friend, at least,” there’s a pause, “I feel so stupid.”

“You’re not stupid for believing you were friends. You were a good friend to her. I saw it myself. She doesn’t deserve you if she treats you like that in return. As a friend and as something more.”

Carla chokes a little at the finality of their use of past tense. At the suggestion that she misled Bérénice into thinking they were friends, that everything they went through together was nothing to Carla. Like Bérénice wasn’t the one thing holding her together last semester.

No, we are friends.

She knew it. Bérénice has just forgotten. And she was a good friend. A safe person. For Bérénice, at least. She just hasn’t had the best week, and she said something dumb, and she made Bérénice pay for it. Just sitting here listening to her insult herself made Carla want to jump up and shake her til she stopped. She’s the bitch here, not Bérénice. Never Bérénice.

“I don’t even know if it was my feelings that freaked her out or if it was just me,” Bérénice pauses, “Or both.”

Carla opens her mouth. To defend herself, to defend Bérénice, she doesn’t know because Souleymane pinches her arm and tugs her up from her seat. She’s too preoccupied with I don’t even know if it was my feelings that freaked her out or if it was just me that she lets him drag her away.

Far away enough, she rips her arm out of his hand.

He rolls his eyes and keeps walking. “You’re welcome.”

“For what?”

“Not letting you get caught spying on her?”

“I wasn’t spying. It’s a public place.”

“You think Bérénice would agree with that?”

“No,” Carla grumbles. Of course, she wouldn’t. She has a stupid moral compass.

“Right. So, tell me why she thinks you aren’t friends anymore?”

Carla looks back over at the wall. She can’t see her, but she knows she’s there. She finally understands the stupid metaphor of being worlds away from someone.

“Not here.”

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“Now, she doesn’t want to talk to me. I think she thinks her feelings make me uncomfortable.”

Carla paces back and forth on the pavement. Souleymane traces her movements from his seat at the table they found. A spot Carla made sure had a vantage point so she wouldn’t get eavesdropped on like Bérénice.

“Do they?”

Carla pauses and gives a little shrug. “Yes.”

“Carla.”

“I know,” Carla throws her hands up, “I can’t explain it. I’m not homophobic. And I didn’t even mean it like ‘why are we friends’; I meant more like ‘how.’ Like we’re so different, it works. I’m a bitch, and she’s not. I’m too loud, and she’s too quiet.”

“Like opposites attract.”

“Exactly!” Carla exclaims and then pauses at the romantic insinuation, “Not like that.”

Souleymane puts his hands up in defence. Carla decides to let it go, not wanting to say the words to accuse him of it.

“I just don’t know what to do.”

“Did you apologize?”

“Of course, I apologized. It was the first thing I-”

Carla thinks back. So maybe she didn’t, but it’s only because Bérénice didn’t want to listen to her. She was ready to apologize.

“No, I didn’t.”

“Okay, so you could apologize. Tell her you do want to be friends.”

Maybe if she could get Bérénice to listen, she could explain that she just…

She just what? Can’t stop thinking about what Bérénice thinks when she sees her. Can’t stop wondering what she feels when Carla smiles at her. Or when she talks to her. Or touches her.

“Yeah,” Carla says as she looks at the ground.

“Unless you don’t want that…”

“Of course, I want that. Were you even listening to me?”

“You don’t seem too happy about it. Are her feelings for you such a big deal?”

The problem has never been Bérénice’s feelings. It’s what they mean.

Carla runs a hand through her hair. “No. No, It’s just that everything is changing. I used to be able to count on certain things.”

“You can still count on Bérénice.”

“She hates me now.”

“She loves you. If you had a problem right now, she’d be there for you.”

Carla deflates. It’s true. Bérénice would always show up for her. She was genuine. It would be so much easier if she only wanted to sleep with her this whole time. Carla would write the whole thing off as betrayal, but then, at least, she wouldn’t have to be so confused.

“Carla, what do you want from Bérénice?”

Carla stops and stares at him. Her chest rises in anxiety, and she tries to swallow it back.

“I don’t know,” she whispers.

“Do you like her?”

“No!”

She runs a hand over her face and lowers her voice. “I don’t know.”

“Let’s figure it out.”

“Like it’s that easy.”

“It can be if you let it.” Souleymane straightens up, “Look, answer these questions for me. Do you want Bérénice in your life?”

“Yes, it’s like the one thing I want,”

“Do you care how?”

“What?”

“Do you care if she’s your friend or something more?”

Carla scoffs. “That’s your question? Of course, I care which one it is.”

“Why?” he says so nonchalantly Carla considers hitting him on the head.

“Why, what?” she asks.

“Why do you care so much about the question if you only want to be friends? If you don’t have feelings for her, why are you thinking about it so hard?”

Carla opens her mouth to respond. Why was she thinking about it so hard? Bérénice. It always comes back to Bérénice. What makes her so different-

Carla knocks her teeth shut and narrows her eyes at him.

“I know you didn’t agonize over my feelings like this,”

It seems so stupid when he puts it like that. She took a day, maybe. Half to realize she didn’t like him, half to figure out how to tell him. Here, she’s been agonizing over Bérénice’s feelings for at least three days and is no closer to a resolution.

“I don’t like this comparison.”

He rolls his eyes at her. “Carla, what’s stopping you?”

She sighs and sits beside him on the bench. Her mind goes back to Bérénice in the changing room. How Carla witnessed the most efficient way she’s ever gotten ready to leave before. The way she avoided eye contact until Carla forced her to turn around, and then when she did look at her…

“She got blinky,” she blurts out.

“What?”

“She did that thing where she blinks a whole bunch. I’ve seen her do it all the time, just never toward me.”

“Like flirting?” Souleyman bats his eyelashes at her.

“No, like she was stressed out! Like I was stressing her out. She’s my best friend. I don’t want to hurt her. Or lose her.”

“Aren’t you already losing her? Haven’t you already hurt her?”

It’s probably the shittest Carla has felt. But friendships can be mended.

“Love doesn’t last, Souleymane.”

“Sometimes. But it’s always worth it to try. Why not be happy? Why not spend as much time with Bérénice as you can? Nobody comes with a guaranteed forever label. You can’t tell me you would regret spending time with her?”

“No…” Carla admits.

“They say the best relationships evolve from being best friends.”

When he puts it like that…it sounds like everything Carla already wanted to do and everything she didn’t know she wanted to do. She can imagine it. Almost too easily for her liking. Holding hands, going on dates, kissing, being the hottest couple at this school. But if it ends… Then Carla would have nothing—no best friend. No girlfriend. No Bérénice.

“Besides, just imagine her being with someone else.”

She whips her head towards him. “Excuse me?”

Someone else? Does Bérénice have another crush? How the hell did she not notice?

“If you let her go, she will find someone else. Someone ready to do something about it.”

After glaring at him for giving her a heart attack, Carla begins to think.

She imagines herself having to smile at Bérénice as she tells her all about the wonderful date she went on. Hearing her gush about the hot sex she had. Being forced to meet the girl and play nice so she doesn’t upset Bérénice because no matter who she pictures- Carla hates her. Then, when she inevitably is rude, forcing Bérénice to choose between her girlfriend and her best friend and then having her best friend title revoked when Souleymane’s best friend-relationship theory turns out to be true, and Bérénice starts wanting to hang out with her girlfriend instead of her. Then they start to see each other only at school, and Carla’s left to stare at her across the classroom because Bérénice forgot to save her a space. Or maybe her girlfriend would be in the program, and Bérénice would like her more and would tell Carla to move- because she only sees her as a friend now, nothing more—no best friend. No girlfriend. No Bérénice.

Both are theoretical endings, one for sure and one not so sure.

“Carla? Are you alright?” Souleymane asks.

Carla stands up. She grabs her purse and shoves it on her shoulder.

“Tonight. I’m going to talk to her tonight.”

“Tonight? You just were…”

“Plans change, Souleymane,” Carla says as she walks away.

She’s got a space to claim before some skank steals it.

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Teyssier stares at her in the doorway. Of all the people to answer the door, why him?

She swallows and gathers her courage. “Hi. Is Bérénice here-”

Teyssier shushes her. Affronted, she can do nothing but stare back. If only he wasn’t the director. She endures his looking her up and down. She bites her tongue til it stings to keep the I’m not Anaïs from slipping out.

Finally, he looks her straight in the eyes before turning his head slightly to the side to yell, “Bérénice, your girlfriend’s here!”

Her cheeks heat up, but she doesn’t give him the satisfaction of looking away. How does he even know something is going on between them?

There’s a small crash, and she sighs in relief, but it’s just Constance who rushes in from the area right of the doorway.

She crosses her arms when she sees Carla, which tells her right away that while this already wasn’t going well, it was going to get worse.

“Bérénice’s not here,” she says.

Teyssier looks at his wife like she’s stupid. “She was just down here moping.”

Constance gives him a look while Carla fixates on the word ‘moping.’ That could mean anything in Teyssier-speak. Bérénice could’ve just been breathing, and he could have been annoyed. Or she could have been sobbing, and he would’ve been annoyed.

“She just left,” Constance says, her voice flat.

It’s clear she’s not welcome here. Carla awkwardly shifts her weight about to excuse herself when a thump from upstairs draws all their attention upwards to the ceiling. Well, there goes Constance’s obvious lie.

“Must be ghosts. Or really big rats,” Teyssier smirks.

Constance rolls her eyes at him.

Carla stares at the staircase. Bérénice is definitely here. Will she come down? Or will Carla be forced to do the walk of shame away?

Constance looks at her and concedes, “She’ll be down in a minute.”

“I guess we wait,” Teyssier says sarcastically.

Why is he even still here? Doesn’t he have better things to do than humiliate students? Then again, Carla thinks Constance looks very angry, so it’s not like he’s getting any.

After a minute of awkward silence, Bérénice appears at the top of the stairs. She halts with everyone’s attention.

Teyssier rolls his eyes and starts to walk away. “Don’t start thinking you can have guests around here. This is my house.”

That’s what he stayed for?

“It’s my house, too,” Constance scolds before saying to Bérénice, “You can have guests over anytime. Maybe someone I haven’t met yet would be nice.”

Carla uses all her energy not to roll her eyes.

“Right,” Bérénice says as she walks down the stairs.

“I’ll leave you two to it,” Constance reluctantly walks away into the adjacent room.

“Hey,”

“What are you doing here?”

Carla locks eye contact with Constance, whose pitter-pattering is obviously an excuse to spy on them, before flickering back to Bérénice.

“Can we talk somewhere private? Outside, maybe?”

“Let me grab my coat.”

Bérénice takes it off the rack and joins her, closing the door behind her. She tugs it on and then stares at Carla without saying anything. Carla swallows and looks around.

“Should we?” She gestures towards the sidewalk down the road.

Bérénice shakes her head. “This won’t take long, right? There’s a bench around the side of the house.”

The rejection stings, but Carla’s not going to go against what Bérénice is comfortable with. Especially when cold-calling her.

“Uh- sure, if that’s what you want. Lead the way.”

Bérénice takes off towards a back gate, cutting through the grass.

Carla wobbles after her in her heels, trying to keep pace. Her mind whirls, trying to find something to say to fill the ugly silence.

“How was your day?”

Fuck.

Bérénice shoots her a weird look over her shoulder.

“You really want to know?”

“Yeah? Yes.”

“It was fine. Probably could’ve been better.”

Carla winces. “Right.”

They arrive at the saddest bench Carla has ever seen. She’s convinced it’s actually a storage box, but she doesn’t comment on it. Neither of them sit down anyway.

Bérénice turns to face her, her hands shoved in her pockets. She looks like she’d rather be anywhere else.

“What did you want?”

“I wanted to apologize to you. And clear some things up.”

“Carla, you don’t have to. I understand-”

“No, you don’t.”

Bérénice nods, and her shoulders slump as if she is resigning herself to her fate. Carla hates that she’s done this to her. She never realized she took advantage of being the one person Bérénice always confided in. Seeing the dread on Bérénice’s face at the sight of her is almost as impossible to reconcile with her memories as it is to swallow.

“Alright. Let’s get it over with then.”

Carla hesitates. One last chance. That’s all she’s got before Bérénice walks away from her.

“I’m sorry. For everything I said. Not just today. I’ve been horrible to you lately. It’s not okay.”

Carla watches for any changes in Bérénice’s face. Nothing. Does Bérénice think she doesn’t mean this? Panic rises in her, and more words spew from her mouth than she was prepared for.

“I’ve never had a best friend before. People have found me…difficult in the past. When we met in September, you were the only person I wanted to be around. You were weird, and I liked it. I wanted to be your friend probably before you even considered being mine. Then I got to know you more, and I didn’t regret it at all because you are one of the best people I’ve met. I’ve just been so confused lately because I never considered that we, well, you know…”

Bérénice winces and looks away.

“But it shouldn’t have been that surprising,” Carla shakes her head, “I don’t think I was surprised. I think I knew. I just didn’t want to…”

Bérénice tilts her head as she tries to follow along.

“Want to…?”

“Admit it.”

There. The truth’s out.

Carla knew what she was doing on the beach when she brought up Livio’s comments. But she didn’t expect Bérénice to say yes. She wanted her to say no, that he was wrong. She wanted Bérénice to lie so she could put it back in her mind and never have to think about it again. She never expected her to be so brave to say yes.

“Listen. Carla, I understand what you’re saying.” Bérénice sighs, “I’m sorry my feelings have made things so weird and confusing for you. If you mean what you say, and you can look past my feelings for you, maybe with a little time and space, we can try to be friends again.”

Carla almost gets whiplash from her words. They are having two entirely different conversations.

“No, that’s not at all what I’m saying.”

She sees Bérénice begin to get frustrated with her, and she can’t blame her. She’s been going about this all wrong. She’s never been one for words.

“Okay, so you don’t want to be friends. Carla, I really don’t understand what you’re doing here-”

Carla steps forward. She grabs Bérénice by the cheeks and kisses her. The words halt from Bérénice’s lips, and her hands come up to graze hers.

Carla pulls back when Bérénice doesn’t kiss her back. Her hands fall to her side.

Bérénice eyelids flutter as her eyes dart over Carla’s face as if she could find answers written on her skin. But Carla doesn’t have answers. All she has is itchy palms and an internal monologue saying, She didn’t kiss me back. Why didn’t she kiss me back?

“You kissed me,” Bérénice whispers with the slightest of wonder in her voice.

“Yeah,” Carla says. Her voice is breathy enough to sound stupid to her own ears.

Bérénice looks her straight in the eyes. “Will you do it again?”

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They walk back to the front with swollen lips. Carla discreetly wipes the back of her hand against her mouth, convinced she looks like a clown with a mixture of their lipstick on her. The glimpses she casts Bérénice’s way tell her that Bérénice’s lips are overlined, but all it does is compliment the red flush on her cheeks that’s been there for the last few minutes. The sight makes Carla want to do everything she can to keep it there.

A slight hole in the grass makes her heel digs into the dirt, and her ankle gives a slight roll. Feeling like an idiot, she recovers swiftly, but Bérénice still reaches out to stabilize her. Her hand feels a solid pressure even through her coat.

“Thanks,” Carla says, and her hand lightly covers her.

“Sorry to make you go through the grass,” Bérénice apologizes.

A warm, tingly feeling floods Carla’s stomach as she realizes Bérénice intends to keep her hand on her arm to escort her to the pavement. Any other person, and she’d be yanking her arm away, but with Bérénice, she leans into it.

“No need to apologize. I deserved it,”

It was actually a little impressive how Bérénice got the high ground so quickly. Not that Carla would ever admit that she admired her for it.

Bérénice gives a little laugh and agrees. Then she goes silent and Carla starts to worry about what’s going on in her head. Does she regret it?

“You didn’t kiss me because you felt pressured, right?” Bérénice blurts out.

“No, I wanted to,” Carla automatically denies the accusation. She would never kiss Bérénice unless she were sure it was what she wanted.

“Even though I’m not…”

“Not?”

“Not sophisticated enough for you?”

Carla stops in her tracks. She won’t stand for anyone making Bérénice insecure, especially if it’s because of her. She grabs Bérénice’s hands and brings them together in hers.

“I didn’t mean that. You are plenty sophisticated for me.”

Bérénice just stares back at her. She almost looks shocked.

Oh, god. Was she being too intense right now?

Carla awkwardly drops their hands and clears her throat.

Bérénice lips slowly spread into a smile. “Do you want to stay for dinner?”

The thought of asking Teyssier to pass the dinner rolls while Constance interrogates her vanishes any hunger Carla has, but if Bérénice wants her to… she could stick it out for one evening.

“Oh, yeah,” she stutters.

Bérénice laughs; her eyes are bright with mirth. “I’m just messing with you. Want to go out somewhere?”

Carla breathes a sigh of relief.

“Yes. Yes, I’d really like that.”

“Let me grab my purse. You can wait here,” she teases her.

Carla smiles back at her, not even mad about it. She’s just glad they’re back to a place where Bérénice can laugh and joke with her again.

“Thank god. I’m never knocking at your door again. Next time, I’ll be throwing rocks at your window.” she kicks at the pebbles on the ground with the toe of her heels.

Bérénice pauses in the doorway. “Next time?”

For a second, Carla panics. Was she being too presumptuous? But then she sees the hint of a smile on Bérénice’s face and makes a decision to commit to it.

“Naturally,” she shrugs, hoping she looks nonchalant instead of as bashful as she feels.

Bérénice beams at her, so she doesn’t think she’s so successful, but then again, she doesn’t really care, not when she’s looking at her like that.

When the door is softly closed, Carla allows herself to smile til her cheeks sting. She tucks her hair behind both of her ears.

She nailed it. Take that skank.