Page 89 of A Season in the Snow
Chapter 38
‘Good morning,’ Alice rasped with the croaky voice that comes from singing too loudly and hydrating too little. She turned and handed a coffee to the sleepy head who had just walked into the kitchen.
‘Guete Morge,’ replied Vanessa, taking a seat at the table, and holding the coffee cup as if it was keeping her upright.
‘Happy New Year!’
‘Indeed. Where is your man?’
‘At home,’ Alice answered. ‘There’s only one man allowed to sleep in my bed, whether I like it or not, eh, mister?’ she said to Bear, and his tail wagged in agreement. ‘Where’s yours?’
Vanessa collapsed onto her hands and chuckled. ‘Ohh, I am a wicked witch when I have champagne in me. Alice, where were you to keep me sensible?’
‘I could never keep you sensible. Don’t you remember the night of a thousand caipirinhas?’
‘“Just two drinks then home to bed”,’ Vanessa quoted.
‘“We have an early bus in the morning.” Did we even go to bed in the end?’
‘No, we went straight from dancing on the tables to the hotel lobby at six a.m. It was Jill’s fault, I think.’ Vanessa winked.
‘Yep, all Jill’s fault.’
Vanessa slurped her coffee. ‘I did tell him, though, I said I don’t know what I want yet, so we could only kiss if he understood that. I said, I don’t want to lead you on.’
‘What did David say?’
‘Mmm, something about, how about we get a kiss in before you decide you might not want me. I shouldn’t have let it happen, but the stars and the drink, and the blahblahblah.’
‘It was New Year, don’t beat yourself up. I’m sure he’ll understand if you don’t want to take things any further.’
Vanessa leant across the table and whispered, ‘He is upstairs, though.’
‘What?!’
‘I’m kidding, relax. What are you doing today?’
‘Walking the grizzly bear, then going back to sleep. You?’
‘I should talk to David. He heads home for a week today. You want to do something with me later?’
‘I want to donothingwith you later.’ Alice yawned.
‘Let’s lie under blankets and watch bad movies all day.’
‘Now that’s a good start to the year.’
When Alice and Bear returned from their walk, Vanessa was already lying on the sofa under two faux-fur blankets. Bear bounded straight over and rested his chin on her, his nose centimetres from her face, sniffing.
Vanessa reached a hand out and stroked his head. ‘I just talked to David,’ she said.
‘What happened?’ Alice pulled off her gloves, scarf, coat, salopettes, boots and down to her soft PJs that she was still wearing underneath, and joined Vanessa on the other side of the sofa.
‘I said I was sorry for letting it happen, it wasn’t an intention to lead him on, I just got caught in the moment. He said he was sorry if I’d felt in any way pressured. I said no I wasn’t, and actually I quite liked it, but our lives are quite far from each other. He said I was right. I said, fight for me, man. Then we kissed some more. Then I realised I still had some alcohol in me, so I said goodbye, let’s talk when you get home, and I came back here and threw up.’
‘You threw up? Are you okay?’
‘Yeah it was from all the champagne, not from him.’
