Lost Among the Living(24)

I left the door open behind me—that Alex would succeed with the landlady was never really in question—and walked immediately to the bedroom, dropping my coat, my hat, and my gloves as I went. “There,” I said when I heard him come in. “You’ve accompanied me home. Well done, Sir Galahad.”

I heard him close the door and settle on the single chair in my sitting room, and I imagined him looking around my flat. Taking in its mere two rooms—the kitchen was downstairs and the bathroom was down the hall—and their dim corners, the smell of cabbage cooking from downstairs. I began to unbutton my lavender wool dress, not caring that the door to the bedroom stood half open.

“What is this?” Alex asked. I glanced through the doorway to see him holding a framed photo, one of the few mementos I kept in the flat.

“That is me,” I replied, ducking back into the bedroom and continuing to undress. “Mother had work for a time as an artist’s model, and she convinced the studio to hire me as well. I didn’t last.” I had been unable to sit still, or still enough. I had wanted to sketch instead.

He was silent for a moment. The photo showed me in nothing but a simple Greek toga, cut to midthigh, sitting chin in hand on a stool with leaves woven into my hair, the fabric of the toga falling artfully off my shoulder almost to the level of my small breast. “How old were you?” he asked.

“Thirteen.” I folded the lavender dress carefully and put it away.

I heard a click as he put down the sketch in its small frame. “Dear God, Jo.”

“We had to make a living,” I snapped, pulling the pins from my hair.

“I know what you’re worried about,” Alex said. “I’m not a fool, you know. I’m worried about the same thing.”

“It’s none of your concern.”

“I disagree.”

Here we were, then, two people who had had a night of passion, facing each other in the light of day. It was sordid and sad, and it made me angry. I came out of the bedroom, wearing only my chemise, and stood before him. He had removed his hat and gloves, but he still wore the black coat, and he was slouched a little in my uncomfortable chair, his hands in his lap. I ignored the wince of unhappiness on his face.

“Money doesn’t make you better than me,” I said. “Money doesn’t make anyone better than anyone.”

He looked at me, and there was nothing predatory in it. His gaze did not travel my chemise, my bare arms, my hair tumbling over my shoulders. But his features smoothed as he looked at my face, the unhappiness draining away, for all the world as if he were looking at something he liked. I admitted to myself in that moment that I was horribly, hopelessly in love with him, and that the pain of it would be something that could be overcome but would never entirely go away.

“I know it,” he replied, and he stood and shrugged off his coat.

I took a step back as I watched him remove his charcoal suit jacket as well, leaving him in his waistcoat and shirtsleeves. “What are you doing?” I asked.

He did not reply but strode to my bedroom, and for a moment I wondered if I had read him wrong, if he expected something of me after all. But he only reemerged a moment later, my bathrobe in his hands. “Here,” he said, sliding it over my shoulders.

I put my arms in the sleeves and pulled the robe tight, still watching him. He stood close to me now, and I could smell the scent of his skin that I had come to know so well. I could not speak.

“Where is the bathroom?” he asked.

I pointed vaguely. “Down the hall.”

He nodded and took my hand in his. He pulled me gently toward the door.

I resisted. “What are you doing?” I asked again.

He did not let go of my hand. “You are exhausted,” he explained. “And you are worried. A hot bath will help. Let’s go.”

“We can’t,” I protested, thinking of my neighbor down the hall, a middle-aged lady with a pimply neck and pouchy eyes, who watched everything I did with sour disapproval. “I already can’t have a man here. We can’t go—the both of us—everyone will know.”

He raised my hand to his lips and kissed it, for the first time giving me a flirtatious look that melted my knees. “I promise not to get in with you,” he said solemnly. “Come with me.”

He led me down the hall, and when my neighbor popped out of her doorway to stare at us, as she inevitably did, he only nodded politely at her and bade her good evening.

“She cannot have a man here!” the woman shouted at our retreating backs.

Alex only ushered me into the bathroom and turned back to address her briefly. “My good lady, she already does.” Then he closed the door with a soft click.

He let the bathtub fill as I stood frozen in place, unable to move. The bathroom was not large, and he seemed to fill the space, even in his shirtsleeves. He tested the water, then untied the bathrobe and slid it from my shoulders, rearranging my long hair. “You will not be evicted,” he said softly. “I promise.”

I said nothing. I had no words left; I had nothing to say. I stood like a tailor’s mannequin as he raised the hem of my chemise and drew it up my body. I lifted my arms as he pulled it over my head. I had nothing to say even as I stood naked before him. All of my anger had drained away, and all of my worry, and all of my terror, and I was left an empty shell. Alex took my shoulders, turned me, and helped me into the bathtub.