MUSE had officially moved into Adrien's apartment. (Not the slut hut.)
Adrien should have felt it―the strangeness, the vague unfamiliarity of a new presence in her home. Fuzzy green towels added to the bathroom counters and painted flower magnets on the fridge and a vintage radio on the guest room's nightstand. She'd come home this past week and things were just different. A bag of silver macarons left on the table, one half-eaten. A blanket on the reclining chair instead of the L-shaped couch. The curtains drawn, letting in sunlight, when Adrien knew she'd left them shut.
None of it bothered Adrien. If anything, it unnerved her how much she didn't mind. Muse's presence didn't feel off―it felt like she'd always been there, warm and bright and soft, like candlelight.
"And you guys haven't fucked?" Ezra said, raising doubtful eyes above his glass of champagne.
Adrien winced. "No. We're just . . . friends. Glorified roommates, really. She sleeps in my guest room, and I . . ."
"Please. Finish that." Ezra's full lips twisted into a sultry half-smile. "You what, Adrien? She's your friend? Your roommate? And you're happy with that?"
The two of them, tucked onto the balcony of Ezra's apartment, were hiding. Music from the party inside, muted, flowed out into the night beyond them. Ezra and his wife had decided to throw a baby shower. New York's elite had naturally shown up. Adrien had mingled for a while, but it was three a.m. now, and her ability to make small talk had run out. She hated the fawning, the endless flirtation, and the not-so-subtle changes in topic towards stock investments and business deals and―worst of all―her father's diagnosis. It'd all gotten worse now that they knew he'd be dead soon. The public thought she'd inherit everything, because how could they know her father had threatened to hand it all over to Grey?
Still, Adrien probably would have tolerated the petty socialites―at least a little longer―if Muse were here. Something about Muse eased her anxiety. But Muse had work at the Moth Cafe until seven a.m.
It had been a week, and Adrien had memorized her schedule. Which wasn't even the worst part. No, the worst part was that if Adrien knew Muse had a night shift, then it didn't matter when she got home, and if she was exhausted right down to her bones. She always waited for Muse to come home.
Hopefully Muse thought it was a coincidence.
"Yes, I'm happy," said Adrien, with a swallow.
It would have to be enough for her―these fragments of Muse, random and domestic and sweet. To come home early on the weekend and find Muse napping on the couch, a slant of golden afternoon sunlight on her cheek. And to catch her at midnight, sitting on the kitchen counter, with a spoon and an entire tub of strawberry Greek yogurt, with Cher Lloyd's Want U Back radiating from her phone in a cereal bowl.
Adrien would make that enough.
Risking all of it . . . risking Muse's smile, and the bubble of her laughter, and the morning frizzy of her curls . . . just to fuck once?
No, it was better to have Muse as a friend, a wife in contract only.
"Well," said Ezra. He rolled his eyes heavenward. "I guess some things you just have to figure out for yourself."
"Hey!" Adrien playfully flicked at him. "Tell me about you, now."
"Nothing's new. Besides this baby shower, I guess."
"I'm not buying."
"Okay, I'm scared." Ezra set down the glass of champagne and leaned over the railing, bowing his head. "Like, I've always wanted kids. And Jodie's always wanted kids. It's not just about it being conventional, you know? Happiness to me is a family, screaming kids and soccer games and a messy kitchen."
Adrien, personally, could not think of anything worse. But she said, softly, "Then what's the problem?"
"What if I'm not a good dad? What if I get impatient, and annoyed, and I snap? What if I yell at my kids or―or teach them something wrong―or they turn out horrible people?"
"Ezra. You're human. You'll get impatient and annoyed. But I know you. And if anyone's going to be a wonderful father, it'd be you." Adrien smirked. In her pocket, her phone buzzed. Who's calling in the middle of the night? she wondered, as she continued, "Plus, they'll have me as their cool aunt. They'll turn out alright."
Ezra let out a breath. The city lights glittered on his dark skin. "Thanks, Adrien."
Adrien pulled her phone out of her pocket. The screen was lit up with No Caller ID. She didn't usually receive calls this late unless it was a business emergency.
"Who's calling you now?"
Adrien shrugged, thinking there must have been a sharp decline in the net worth of her enterprise on the stock market, and answered: "Hello?"
"Is this Adrien Vitale speaking?"
"Yes―"
"Your father is in the hospital. He suffered a heart attack an hour ago."
ADRIEN, after thanking Ezra and Jodie for their lovely baby shower party, found herself restless in the hospital waiting room an hour later. Her first thought, upon hearing the words heart attack and your father was: He's dead already?
Then: He's dead. And she hadn't felt . . . devastated. But she hadn't been relieved either. There had been nothing there―a kind of disconnect, detachment.
He was her father, and she felt nothing?
Maybe she was the problem. Maybe she had always been the problem.
But, as the nurse had explained, her father wasn't dead. The heart attack had been minor, but with his tumour, it had been exacerbated. He was in critical condition. He might not survive till morning.
A newborn baby wailed from a distant corridor. A middle-aged woman sitting opposite Adrien sobbed almost silently, head in her hands. The old woman beside her, probably one of her mothers, patted her shoulder gently.
"I know she's getting older, but I'm not ready for Mama to die. I didn't think . . . so soon . . . there's just no way . . ."
Adrien felt paralyzed. Rooted to the plastic seat. The fluorescent lights felt hotter, brighter, all-encompassing like the sun.
That was how she should feel about her father's possible death. Terrified and panicked and unwilling to believe it.
Was she a bad daughter? A bad person?
She felt suddenly eight again, with muddied knees and a hot trickle of blood on her upper lip. She could smell the wet grass of the soccer field. Her heart raced like she'd just run all the way home.
Daddy, my nose is bleeding.
You are a disappointment, Adrien.
Adrien knew he had only five months to live. The diagnosis was terminal. Five months felt like forever; five months felt like not soon enough. Still, though―it had always been months away. Not now. Where would this leave her?
And if Julien really did die today, where did this leave her and Muse together?
A fake contract wouldn't be necessary, because a fake marriage wouldn't be necessary. Adrien would, of course, give Muse the million dollars anyway. But after that, they'd have no reason to stay in each other's lives.
Adrien leaped to her feet. The middle-aged woman and her mother stared at her like she'd been possessed.
If Julien died today, it was a fifty-fifty chance on whether she'd get the Vitale Enterprises. Wholly dependent on if he'd changed the terms of his will and made Grey the heir.
That felt less urgent at this very moment, though, than Muse.
The idea of losing her made Adrien's stomach clench. She felt nauseous, swallowing back white-hot fire. She had never felt like this in her life.
And the pieces of it all.
The pieces of it all made sense at last.
Who would place their palm on a burning stove top for a girl? Who would buy an art museum for her? Who would stock the fridge with strawberry flavoured Greek yogurt for her, and eat the other half of a macaron for her, and drape an extra blanket on her when she napped in the afternoons?
A hand on Adrien's shoulder made her turn. She stood face to face with a nurse.
"I love her," Adrien breathed.
"What? I didn't catch―"
"Sorry, um, I―is there news on my father?"
"He's still in critical condition. But we should know a little after seven a.m. if he'll make it."
"Okay. Thank you."
As soon as the nurse was gone, Adrien began pacing from corner to corner in the near-empty waiting room. What did she do now that she knew? Keep pretending? Suppress it? Get rid of it? There was no way Muse felt the same way, not with the way she kept emphasizing their relationship as purely professional.
Two simple options. Two simple outcomes.
Adrien sent a quick text to Muse, asking her if she would mind coming to the hospital straight after her shift, with Adrien's chauffeur picking her up.
Muse typed back an agreement.
Around that time, they'd know the final answer on Julien. The choice would be clear.
If Julien lived, Adrien would hide her feelings. She'd continue on with the wedding and the four-month-long marriage. She'd keep it purely professional.
And if Julien died?
Adrien stared at Muse's contact on her phone until the little letters blurred and swam. Her heart thundered. She couldn't breathe.
If Julien died, Adrien would tell Muse she had fallen in love with her.
***
Late chapter but it's here at last.
From the moon and back,
Sarai