Evelyn (Cate Blancett x OC Story)

Chapter Four

           Chapter Four

           'I wouldn't mind an omelette, would you?' Evelyn asked in the kitchen, she was looking into the tall refrigerator. 'Do you like them?'

    Cate said she did, leaning both forearms on the kitchen aisle, peering at her kitchenette shelves while Evelyn lifted a carton of eggs and a plate of vegetables wrapped with wax paper.

    Evelyn looked over her shoulder. 'What would you like with it? Would you like another coffee?'

    'No, thank you. Are you a good cook?'

    'Not at all,' Evelyn said flatly, and Cate laughed.

    She came up behind Evelyn and touched her arm lightly. Evelyn could still see the delicate fingers in her memory; she could feel them moving up and toward her back. She felt as if her skin were awake now where Cate touched it, as if detached from the rest of her, and rather heating.

    'I feel—dreadful,' Cate said softly, glanced at her. 'Just earlier—I shouldn't have pried. Will you forgive me?' She stood closer. Evelyn could see all the freckles along the bridge of Cate's nose. Her faintly sweet perfume came to Evelyn again, that carried the scent that was in Cate's hair, that filled Evelyn's lungs, and a warm breath against her throat made her neck tingle. And it was the continued murmuring, the faint smile of apology, and the remorsefully tilted head still politely looking at her, that Evelyn could not make herself listen.

    She felt the hand leave her arm. 'Are we okay, Evelyn?'

    Though she wanted to tell Cate that they were more than fine, Evelyn could only nod her head with a large pan in her hand as she watched Cate slice a tomato. Through the rooms, there was no sound but those they made. Evelyn turned on the radiator underneath the window, and it made a hissing sound. The sizzling of the hot pan came louder now. Evelyn drowsily felt Cate glancing at her from time to time, heard her whistle a song as if she were happy to be there, happy to prepare a plate for herself with a stranger she had only just met. She asked Evelyn , over the boiling water and the rough chop of vegetables, 'Is that the way you like your eggs? Plain like that?'

    'Where do you keep your salt?'

    'Do you like Opera?'

    'How old are you?'

    Evelyn smiled as they sat down around the table alcove at the other side of the kitchen. 'Do you always want to know everything all at once?' she asked, pushed the sample folder Pippa had left and watched Cate take a fork full of eggs. And how old did she sound to Cate, Evelyn wondered. Only at thirty-one, she felt older than a century.

    Cate's eyebrows frowned, though she did not look offended. Her tranquil mouth curled up on one side as she chewed, and the wrinkles around her eyes widened.

    'Always,' she said without looking at her. She was searching through the catalogue. 'Tell me more of your work.'

    And before Evelyn knew it, she had told Cate all about dressmaking. But not in tedious detail. In only few sentences, as if it all mattered less to her than a story she had heard from someone else. And what did the facts matter after all? The women in Fulham wanted gowns for balls, and their husbands in tailcoats. Evelyn told her about the theatre, too, that she sometimes prepared costumes for plays. She saw Cate's eyes perking up at that. She didn't think to mention Anna's invitation to work at Bolshoi in Russia next year. She took a note of the fabrics she thought Cate looked at twice, three times.