Page 11 of Our Secret Summer

Dylan tilted her glass to Raffo’s and they clinked rims. From what Raffo had told her, it wasn’t so much the lake’s water that had sparked something in her.

“I’m almost emotional because… I don’t know what was worse, losing Mia or losing my mojo.” Raffo cleared her throat. “I could learn to live without Mia.” She shrugged. “I’ll have to, regardless. But I could never live without painting.” Her next breath was a little unsteady—a little ragged with emotion.

Raffo took a sip of her champagne and fell silent. Dylan studied her face. No matter what mood she was in, there was always something regal about Raffo’s features. She carried herself with a gravitas that Dylan hadn’t encountered in many people.

“I hope you’ll stick around for a while longer, even though you’ve already got what you came for.” Dylan wasn’t sure how she would cope with Raffo leaving.

“I’ve only just started my first painting.” Raffo shook her head. “I’m not going anywhere.” She found Dylan’s gaze. “As long as you’ll have me.”

Dylan just nodded. It didn’t need repeating that Raffo was welcome to stay.

“But enough about me.” Raffo grinned at her. “I feel like it’s been about me all day.”

You have no idea. Dylan remembered her ‘nap’—although she hadn’t slept a wink.

“I’ve been here all this time and apart from your financial mishap, I don’t know all that much about you.” Raffo peered at Dylan over the rim of her glass. “I’d like to know more. I know you’re Connor’s lovely mother; you’re an excellent hostess; you are exceedingly kind and welcoming and, well—” She chuckled. “You have an extremely inspiring pair of…” She gestured at Dylan’s chest.

“I’ll drink to that.” Dylan laughed, not just because the situation was funny, but because, in that moment, as she lifted the champagne flute to her lips, and looked into Raffo’s dark eyes, she was genuinely happy. For the first time since she’d lost half a million dollars, she didn’t feel like a complete loser. Raffo was saying all these beautiful things about her—and she was working on a topless painting of her. Although, admittedly, Raffo had also just claimed to know very little about Dylan.

“Well,” Dylan said. “To start at the very beginning, when I was born, my parents gave me the name Diane. I changed it to Dylan as soon I was legally able to.”

“No way?” Raffo widened her eyes in exaggerated fashion. “You’re a Diane? That totally changes my perception of you.”

“I’ve never felt like a Diane. Dylan is so much cooler.”

“You’re right. You’re much more of a Dylan than a Diane.” Raffo tipped her glass. “Thanks for sharing.”

Dylan tried to think of another innocuous confession she could make, something frivolous, befitting of this lovely evening.

But Dylan had a bit of an issue with impulse control, especially after a few sips of delicious champagne.

“I’m one of those lazy bisexual women who only dates men because it’s just so much easier.”

Raffo nearly spit out the sip of champagne she’d just taken. She swallowed hard, then said, “I’m sorry. What was that?”

“I’m a bad bisexual because I give my kind a bad name.” Dylan took too much glee in these things—she knew this about herself. It didn’t feel dissimilar to buying more cryptocurrency, followed by even more. Just because she could. Because she liked to believe—wrongly—that she was much smarter than anyone else.

“Please explain further.” If Dylan admitting she was bi had any effect on Raffo, she didn’t show it—which was a real bummer, because that’s why she’d said it.

Dylan drank more champagne—so much for staying in control.

Raffo was Connor’s age, a full generation younger than herself, and while Dylan considered herself plenty woke, she had to tread carefully because she knew from experience with Connor this was gaffe-prone territory. Because she was almost sixty, and had a different life experience, and enjoyed a whole other host of privileges than the generation that came after her.

“Even though I’m attracted to both men and women, I’ve primarily dated men because there are simply many more single straight men available than there are women who are attracted to women. It’s a numbers game more than anything else, really.”

“What’s so bad about that?”

“Nothing. I just—I’d hate to be one of those seemingly straight women saying I’m bi while enjoying all the privileges of being perceived as heterosexual, all the while complaining my sexual preference is so invisible.”

“It’s complicated,” Raffo just said in that typical understated way that Dylan had already gotten to know so well. “That doesn’t make you less bi.”

Dylan had struggled on and off with this all her life, but she hadn’t spent a lot of time discussing it. She’d married a man—Connor’s father—whom she’d been perfectly happy with until the marriage crumbled, like so many did, under the crushing weight of everyday life, of growing apart while being together, of failing to communicate what was bothering you because, one day, you simply ran out of words to say it, and all that followed was a painfully slow disintegration called divorce.

“I’ll be sixty next year and I’ve only been with two women in my life.” So much for innocuous conversation.

“You wish there had been more?” Raffo asked. Was that a hint of a blush on her cheeks? It was hard to tell—and it could be the effect of the champagne.

“I don’t know. I haven’t really given it that much thought.” That much, at least, was true.

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