Page 51 of Gifted & Talented

Meredith squinted at him. “Is this you being funny?”

“Not successfully, it seems.” Arthur became aware of a cottony feeling in his mouth and pondered whether Meredith might procure him some water if he asked nicely or flatteringly enough. (For purposes of theoretical exercise: “Sister Murderous, you have never looked so righteously vengeful, might you grant me a libation, please?”)

Meredith looked thoughtful.

“It’s funny,” she mused, “I don’t really want to kill him, but at the same time I feel like he’ll respect me less if I don’t at least try.” She glanced down at her hand, where apparently her phone was buzzing. “It’s Ward again, the little weasel. He’s going to have a meltdown and call the Feds himself at any moment, I swear to god. Anyway, forget about the assassin, it was really just a whim. What now?” she barked into her phone, and thankfully was gone.

She had pulled a suit out of the wardrobe, which did bear markers of Gillian’s handiwork. Arthur had forgotten to ask why he’d be needing a suit for whatever occasion Meredith seemed to know was on their agenda for today, though he supposed it didn’t matter. Meredith had set it out for him, and so he put it on.

At this very moment, since I’m sure you’re dying of curiosity, Gillian Wren was in the woods, woolgathering. By then it was nearly three, a solid eight hours since Yves had offered her a bit of medicinal chocolate, theoretically long enough for Gillian to regain some sense of her usual executive mastery, though it was well into the hike before she realized she wasn’t wearing the proper shoes for such an outing. They were a pair of black ballet flats, which of course were filthy now, all soiled around the toes. She had also been thinking in silence for almost forty minutes before Yves said something to her.

“Hm?” Gillian said, blinking to cognizance. Something was wrong with her, she deduced. And not just the drugs, although yes, drugs.

“We will have to go back soon, I’m afraid,” Yves repeated. “There is a gathering this evening in honor of your father-in-law.”

Gillian faintly remembered that Meredith, upon returning to the house at some point midday, had spoken to exactly one grieving pilgrim (a friend of Thayer’s from primary school) before throwing her hands in the air and saying there would no longer be any allowances for coming and going—anyonewho wanted to grieve would do so at one time, conclusively. “Where the balls is Eilidh?” Meredith had added, before stomping off muttering something about Daddy’s little princess.

At which point Yves had turned to Gillian and suggested they go for a walk. “You know, I sense I could teach you something,” he said, “if you were interested in the matter of sensuality we discussed earlier.”

Gillian hadn’t the faintest idea what Yves was talking about. She was discovering that there were some holes in her memory of the day, not unlike the time she’d torn her calf playing lacrosse in high school and had been forced to take a muscle relaxant. She had spent the day with her high school boyfriend, and had later received a message online that he was sad she felt that way and hoped they’d be friends even though she’d apparently made it clear to him that she didn’t want to be. She didn’t have any idea what she’d said or why she’d said it, though mixed into her distress was some tiny, glowing ball of relief. Her father had always liked that boyfriend. Gillian thought he could be a bit of a bore.

“Okay, a walk sounds nice,” said Gillian. Some of the lethargy was beginning to fade by then, and so the menstrual pain that she’d forgotten about for a while had returned. Still, she felt a kinship with Yves that hadn’t been there before, as if whatever he’d said that didn’t make any sense actually did make sense if she really thought about it, though when she thought about it, she just found a sort of big empty space, so a lot of this was really just a feeling. “But I don’t want Arthur to worry.”

“Oh, Arthur is fine, we will not be gone long,” Yves assured her, shutting the front door behind him in a way that Gillian realized meant they had already begun to walk, descending the long staircase from the house’s front door to the private drive below. “Chocolate?” Yves offered again as they wound their way downward, withdrawing some from the small pouch he’d been wearing earlier.

Gillian glanced at the unfamiliarly marked bar of chocolate with the feminine sense of danger she’d been unwisely lacking earlier, when Yves had first offered it. “What’s in that?”

“Only a little recreational marijuana,” said Yves, “as well as some mild intoxicants. You needn’t worry, I have a very good mixologist. He has almost all the licenses.”

“Am I on drugs?” asked Gillian then, wondering why she wasn’t more bothered by having to ask such a question.

“Oh, no!” Yves laughed. “Or yes, depending. They are really more like herbs. Would you like more?”

“I’m okay, thanks,” said Gillian. Then she became curious what Yves had meant by the “matter of sensuality” they had apparently earlier discussed, noting privately the irony of descending literally into temptation as they disembarked the house’s stairs. “When you say, um,teach mesomething, did you by chance mean—?”

“Oh, you would like to start now? Well, let’s see, I suppose as a baseline we will need to establish your comfort level. How is this?” asked Yves, coming to a sudden halt to face her, placing both hands firmly on her waist.

“Oh. Uh.” Gillian looked at his hands, which were objectively very attractive hands. They were big and masculine but artful, as if he could do many magnificent things with them. She imagined them hunting a very large animal or gathering vast amounts of wheat. She tried to picture them painting or sculpting and found that she could do that as well. Then she tried to imagine him undressing her with them and she suddenly felt very cold. “I don’t think I like that.”

“Wonderful. How is this?” Yves shifted one hand to her face, stroking her jaw with his artful thumb. It was very intimate. Gillian was forced to look him in the eyes, which despite the heavy precision of his brow were lovely, very lovely. His eyes were a very interesting shape, and they were an extremely dark brown, almost black, set back within the shape of his eye so that she could see the entire circle of his iris. They were very unlike Arthur’s. Arthur’s eyes were a cool, grainy amber he had gotten from his father, and they had the effect of appearing larger, softer. Less penetrating, but more unearthing.

“I don’t really like this,” said Gillian, squirming. It was strange, as she was sure she felt some kind of philosophical attraction to Yves, and certainly she liked him a great deal. She also did not feel any sort of moral guilt, since she knew Yves had done all of these things to Arthur and therefore there was nothing inherently wrong with being touched. It was more of a fundamental wrongness, like oil and water—like her feelings of attraction sat on top of the feeling of discomfort, instead of relieving or dissipating it.

“Yes, okay,” said Yves cheerfully, and leaned in.

Gillian immediately withdrew, turning her head so sharply that she was sure it had to read as repulsion. “I’m so sorry,” she said, though she didn’t turn toward Yves again until he had fully retracted his sudden closeness. “I don’t mean to act like… like you disgust me or anything, it’s notthat—”

“Oh, Gillian, I am only finding your edges,” said Yves, his mood undiminished. “I have to learn before I can teach. Although in this case, I do not think there is any teaching to do.”

“Oh,” said Gillian, who was hearing that she was a hopeless case, which was what she had already sort of understood about herself. “Right, okay.”

“Would you like to keep walking?” said Yves. “We don’t have to touch. I can stay this far away from you,” he said, leaving a space of about two or three Arthurs between them, “or perhaps this far,” he attempted, squeezing in an additional Arthur.

“I think here would be fine,” said Gillian, excising the fourth Arthur, which seemed excessive. Arthur had very broad shoulders, broader than Yves’s.

“Excellent,” said Yves, popping a bit of chocolate in his mouth. “And now, we walk.”

It was about four by the time Arthur later regained the motion with which to partially dress, unaware that his wife had been out with his boyfriend in an attempt to explore the constraints of her sensuality. His girlfriend, however, had reentered the room in time to join him at the mirror.

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