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The post-it note on her bedroom mirror isn’t the first thing Sarah sees. She’s a professional, trained to observe and assess a situation. The first thing she notices is everything – the unfamiliar angle of the door handle, the flattened carpet, the slight shift in the books on her shelf. All the tiny details that say someone’s been in her apartment.
Sarah already has a pretty good idea who. Even so – or perhaps because of it – her gun is out and loaded the moment she walks through the door. She doubts anyone is still here, but not enough to stake her life on it.
She checks every room, making sure the place is secure, cataloguing disturbances in the back of her mind. A drawer slammed shut where someone had checked for weapons. A wrinkle in her bed sheets, like someone had been… trying to make her notice.
Sarah pulls the note off the mirror. And yeah, maybe she shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions. Conclusions can get her killed. But sometimes it pays to trust her instincts.
Carina’s handwriting is unmistakable - confident and careless. Or maybe Sarah just knows her too well.
Stop leaving the front door unlocked, it says.
Sarah crumples the piece of paper in her hand. Her fingers stay curled around it, clenched in a fist she can’t release.
Sarah thinks, I didn’t.
*
Each time, it starts somewhere different. It always ends the same way.
*
“He’s looking at you,” Carina said, draping herself across Sarah’s shoulder.
She flashed the man in question her brightest smile, and as much leg as she could get away with. Sarah rolled her eyes.
“He’s not,” she said.
She pushed one of the drinks she was holding into Carina’s hand, and used the distraction to pull away from her. Carina clearly wasn’t fooled, but she just laughed.
“Not anymore,” she said, batting her eyelashes at the man. He blushed, looking hopeful and a little scared. Just the way Carina liked them.
Sarah looked down at the drink in her hand. She thought about handing that one to Carina too, telling her she was going home.
“Oh, none of that,” Carina said.
She did take the drink off Sarah though. She placed it on the bar, along with her own.
“We don’t need those.”
Sarah frowned, but Carina already had hold of her wrist, pulling her towards the dance floor. She could have tugged her arm out of Carina’s grasp. But the music was thrumming around them, and then Carina was pressed up against her, and Sarah let herself forget why this was such a bad idea.
*
Carina slid an arm around Sarah’s waist. It left Sarah torn between wanting to step away from her, and to pull her in close. She compromised by standing her ground.
“Just the one bed?” she asked, nodding at it over Carina’s shoulder.
“Hotel’s booked out,” Carina said. “It was all I could get.”
It might have been more convincing if she didn’t follow it up by nuzzling Sarah’s neck.
“I’ll bet,” Sarah murmured.
Carina licked her way along Sarah’s jaw line.
“I’ll bet you bet,” she said.
Sarah laughed. Carina being silly for her was a rare occurrence; she couldn’t help but laugh. No more than she could help the gasp that escaped when Carina’s teeth grazed her throat.
*
Sarah watched Carina bring her hand up to her lips. It came away covered in blood. Carina had thrown the first punch, but it was Sarah’s that landed.
They both knew better than to hold anything back when it came to this.
Sarah hit out again before Carina could react. This time Carina blocked it. Her face hardened, and it occurred to Sarah that maybe Carina hadn’t meant her punch to connect. She dismissed the idea, but the feeling lingered. Not that it mattered. She didn’t have time to wonder, and either way, it wouldn’t happen again.
Carina lunged forward, and Sarah read her strategy in the familiar lines of her body. She twisted to avoid her, but Carina pulled up at the last moment.
The kick came out of nowhere. It caught Sarah off balance, tossing her into a wall. She landed badly on her shoulder, but it was a distant kind of pain, dulled by adrenaline. She pushed off the wall, using the momentum to throw herself back at Carina. Carina’s elbow hit her in the ribs, but she got Carina in the stomach, making her double over.
*
Sarah’s breath caught in her throat as Carina swayed against her. Though they’d abandoned their drinks untouched, she felt giddy and light headed. Carina spun around so that her back was to Sarah, leaning into her. She was so warm and close, sliding against Sarah as they danced. Sarah didn’t remember moving them, but she found her hands on Carina’s hips, fingers curled tight.
Carina tipped her head back onto Sarah’s shoulder, face flushed and warm. Sarah tilted her head until their cheeks were pressed together.
*
The blow to Carina’s stomach must have been hard. She was up again in a moment, but something about it was wrong. She was too slow, too halting. Her lip was still bleeding. It wasn’t something Sarah should even notice. But for just the slightest moment, she didn’t move.
And then Sarah felt a gun pressing into her jaw.
Carina laughed, dark and breathless. “You know I don’t fight fair.”
*
With their bodies locked so close together, it was hard to move. They weren’t really dancing any more, weren’t even pretending. They just stood there, crowd and music roaring around them, breathing each other in.
*
Carina’s teeth dug deeper, and Sarah shuddered.
“Tell me you don’t want this,” Carina said, words vibrating across Sarah’s skin.
Sarah didn’t say anything. They both knew she’d be lying if she did.
Admitting that to herself was all it took. She clutched at Carina’s hips, dragging her closer. And then they were falling, landing tangled together on the bed.
*
Those were always the moment she remembered most clearly. The words and the reasons faded away. Everything was lost to the movement of their bodies, fitting together with impossible perfection, pushing apart with practiced precision. Muscle memory that couldn’t be erased.
Carina always left with a kiss. Sometimes casually, a peck on the cheek and a laughing promise to do this again soon. Sometimes blown to Sarah from a distance, as she disappeared into the night.
The important part was that she left. Or maybe the important part was that she always came back.
Sarah was never sure which was worse.
*
Each time, it starts somewhere different. It always ends the same way.
*
Sarah’s hand relaxes, very slowly. She unfolds the piece of paper, smoothing its creases against the dresser.
Stop leaving the front door unlocked.
Sarah gropes around for a pen. Of course Carina moved those too, for no other reason than that she could.
Then stop stealing my keys when you leave, Sarah thinks wryly, but that’s not what she writes. She answers Carina with a single word, then drops the note on the dresser and leaves it there. She has no doubt Carina will find it.
*
Stop leaving the front door unlocked.
--No.
cdybedahl
Posted Tue 16 Aug 2011 03:18PM EDT
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