Lucy looked at Erica, trying to decide whether Erica actually meant her offer. She wondered, because Erica didn’t seem as absolutely delighted to see Lucy as Lucy had imagined she would be. Sometimes, as they’d talked, Erica had seemed a little distant, or distracted, but Lucy supposed that might just be her imagination. Erica might simply be tired or thoughtful, rather than upset.
Lucy wondered if that was so. The idea that Erica’s detachment was in her imagination made her feel a little better, but all the same, it seemed wrong to impose on Erica, so she didn’t know quite what to do.
She sat there for a moment, thinking, and while she thought, she reached up, and pulled her fingers through her ponytail, taking Erica’s hair-tie out of her hair.
She held the hair-tie out to Erica. “Sorry,” she said. “This is yours. I saw it in the bathroom and just took it without asking, and I’m sorry.”
Erica seemed surprised. “Don’t worry. It’s fine. I have more.”
Lucy put the hair tie down on the counter. “Well, thank you anyway. And there you go.”
Erica kept looking at her. “Keep the hair tie.”
“No, it’s yours.”
“Lucy, fuck. Keep the hair tie. Put it back in. And then just go and lie down and sleep. Please.”
“No, I should be going. I shouldn’t interrupt you any more.”
“Stay,” Erica said. “You’re high as fuck and need to be somewhere safe. And you probably need to sleep, too, if you’ve been up all night.”
Lucy considered that for a moment, and decided she probably did.
“So go and sleep,” Erica said. “I’ll do some work while you are. You really won’t be in the way.”
“I don’t know. Maybe I should leave. I probably shouldn’t have come here in the first place.”
“You should have, and I want you here, so stop being difficult.”
“I’ll be a distraction. I’ll interrupt you.”
“No you won’t.”
“I will. I am right now.”
“Yeah, and making me talk about this over and over is interrupting me far more than if you just went and lay down and slept.”
Lucy thought about that.
“It is,” Erica said. “Please. So just go and lie down.”
“I suppose. For you. If that’s best for you.”
“It is. And keep the hair-tie too. You kind of need it. You’ve gone a bit…” Erica waved her hand around her own head, meaning wild or tangled or messy, Lucy assumed.
Lucy looked at Erica, undecided, wondering whether she should feel self-conscious about whatever Erica’s gesture meant. And also wondering what to do. She was grateful Erica wanted her there, and very glad of it too. Glad that someone in the world still cared about her. She couldn’t quite decide whether to stay, though. She almost felt like any decision was too hard, and beyond her.
Erica seemed to understand. She pushed the hair-tie back towards Lucy. “Keep it. Put it back in. Then go and sleep.”
“Are you sure?”
“It’s a hair-tie. Yeah I’m sure.”
“Not about the hair-tie.”
“About staying? Yep, that too. Just stay.”
“I shouldn’t…”
“Just fucking stay. Please.”
Lucy hesitated. Erica seemed to mean it. She was arguing forcefully enough, anyway. She seemed to mean it, and the earlier distance between them was gone again, too, so perhaps Erica did want Lucy here, and was just unsure about what it meant, the way Lucy was unsure.
Or perhaps Erica just wanted to work.
YOU ARE READING
Losing Everything
RomanceLucy loses everything that matters to her, her partner and job and business and all her money. She loses everything, and in doing so she reconnects with an old friend, Erica, and begins to fall for her instead. And as she does, she realizes that e...
