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Luisa finds her in the night.
The submarine is cramped at best and claustrophobic at worst, but Rose knows every corner perfect for hiding inside, when her chest is tight and her hands are shaking and the future is an uncertain headache at the forefront of her mind, blurring her vision with every pulsating throb. She’s tucked into an area meant for working – there is a desk and a chair that she folds her legs up on, her chin on top of her knees, thinking. A solitary lamp lights her face and the porthole that she’s been staring out into, expecting to see shadows.
The hairs at the back of her neck stand on end before she hears a noise at the door, and turns to find that she’s being watched – had expected it, too.
Luisa leans against the doorframe like she isn’t sure whether or not she can enter, or perhaps she’s not sure if she wants to. Rose tries to make her face into something unassuming, but her smiles no longer come easily, and she fears her expression is more resigned than it is inviting. Luisa watches her, wary.
“It’s about three in the morning,” Rose guesses, although she knows her estimate is accurate. She does not say, back home, because Miami had never felt like it, not really, and even less so now that Luisa is standing here before her. Still, she catches the perceptible shifting of Luisa’s throat as she swallows. Her eyes flicker toward the porthole that had previously arrested Rose’s attention, and Rose smiles and asks, “Can’t sleep?”
“No,” Luisa says, and she is not smiling. She meets Rose’s gaze and frowns. “I feel like the walls are going to be torn apart at any moment, and water’s going to rush in and we’ll drown down here. I jump every time I hear a noise, I don’t know how you can stand it.” She folds her arms with obvious discomfort. “What are you doing?”
Rose shakes her head. “I was just sitting. Thinking.”
“About what?”
“You know you’re safe with me here, don’t you?”
Luisa looks away. Her gaze settles on the porthole, on the empty desk, on an anonymous metal wall that curves in at the ceiling like some great, monstrous hand has dented a permanent grip-hold into the submarine’s side, then disappeared back into the depths of the ocean. When her gaze returns to Rose, the question is already half-forgotten.
“What were you thinking about?” she prompts, again, and Rose sighs and adjusts herself in the chair until her feet are on the ground again.
“You,” she answers. “Me. What I did— what you said, earlier.”
Luisa frowns at that.
“I’m sorry for shouting,” she says, and Rose thinks she means it, too, even when there’s steel still in her eyes. “I’m not taking back what I said, though, I meant every word of it, and you’ve got to understand how messed up this all is, because— God, I don’t think I can talk about it anymore, not now.” She brings her hands to her face and rubs her eyes, and the breath that she takes once she’s lowered them again is almost calming. “None of this feels real.”
“It is,” Rose assures her, and she looks sorry for it, too.
Luisa only holds her gaze.
Rose has prided herself on her ability to read people. It’s a skill that has saved her life more times than she can count, for if she can understand what a person is thinking, then she can anticipate their next course of action— or reaction, as it may be. She had learned early in her life how to hold a finger to the wind and predict the changing of her current situation; it’s this skill, this constant paranoia, that allowed her to escape the Marbella just prior to her detection.
Right now, looking back into Luisa’s face, Rose thinks she knows nothing at all of their outcome.
She searches Luisa’s face for hints, for tells, for anything that she might find purchase in. “What are you thinking?” she asks, frowning, and would plead for an answer if she thought she really wanted to hear it. Truth be told, Luisa’s always had the ability to escape her predictions. She’s wild like the ocean and just as untouchable – it has always been other people who Rose has had to target, in order to invalidate Luisa’s power within their minds. She’s the only person to see through Rose’s deception (and still love her).
“You don’t want to know,” Luisa says, now, and Rose feels the air like it’s been taken from her lungs.
“Tell me, anyway,” she pleads, and Luisa’s expression falls.
Rose can’t tell if she’s feeling sorry for her, or for herself.
“I miss Susanna,” Luisa whispers, finally. Her chin trembles until she looks away and makes it stop. She has cried enough in front of Rose, already. “I thought I was over you, when I was with her. I thought I’d actually found something real, with someone who would respect me, and love me, and not put me through the shit that you put me through. I thought that I was finally in a stable, healthy adult relationship for the first time in my life, maybe.”
She leans her head against the doorframe and shakes it.
“You gave me everything I wanted,” she says, and then she smiles, like she’s just now seeing the humour in it. “Of course, you did – you knew exactly what I wanted, didn’t you? I only told you every time we were together.”
“You deserved it,” Rose says, and her voice comes out as barely a whisper. It’s not her turn to cry, and so she won’t, not right now, not with Luisa standing there to see. She feels a knot the size of a cherry pit in her throat. “I wanted to give you everything. I wish I’d just said yes, the last time you asked me to run away with you. I’d go back to that moment in a heartbeat, if I could.”
At the door, Luisa turns so that it’s her forehead against the frame, and closes her eyes.
“I don’t want to hear that,” she whines, but it’s an unconvincing lie. “It’s not true, is it?”
“Of course, it’s—”
“If it were,” Luisa cuts in, opening her eyes again, turning to Rose, “if it were, you would have just revealed yourself to me to begin with. It was never about us, though, was it? It was about you. It was about you getting your chip back, and keeping tabs on the Sin Rostro investigation. You just wanted to be two steps ahead of the police. We could have avoided all of this, if you’d have just come to me first, but you just can’t help yourself, can you?”
“I’m always going to need to be two steps ahead of the police, Luisa,” Rose says. “And, as for the rest—” She cuts herself off, and it is with clear reluctance that she makes herself continue. “As for the rest, I tried to let you go. It wasn’t my plan to get involved with you as Susanna. Without me in the picture, your chances of having a normal life increase exponentially. I’d already said goodbye to you, I was meant to stick around just long enough to throw the police off my tracks, and then get out. I never planned on hurting you— again.”
Luisa stares at her, frowning.
“It was a lousy goodbye,” she says, finally, and a muscle in her jaw strains from the pressure of her clenching teeth. “Lousy plan, too,” she mutters. “What changed, then?”
“You,” Rose sighs, lifting a hand a letting it slap back down against her leg. “Obviously, it was you. It’s always you. I’ve never been able to stay away from you, even if it’s for the best. And, then we had something, didn’t we? I could help you, as Susanna, I could treat you better. I could give you what you wanted, and I wanted to. As soon as it got serious, I prepared to tell you what was happening.”
“And then you shot Michael,” Luisa deadpans.
“Yes, that… was regretful.”
Luisa scoffs, shaking her head. “You almost killed a man.” She seems to catch herself, then, and her face pales. “Though, it wouldn’t be the first time, would it?”
“I had no other choice,” Rose says, rubbing her temple. “He’d figured it out. I needed to buy us time to get out.”
“You always have choices, Rose, and risking the life of another human being should always be the last one, not your go-to.”
“Yes, you’re right.” Rose sinks back against the chair and makes herself take a deep breath in. They’re going in circles, again, and she has no idea how to keep them from spiralling like they had earlier in the day. “You’re right, of course. I should have come to you sooner. I regret that I didn’t. But, Lu,” and she stops, looks to Luisa, and looks again fearful of the answer she will receive to this next question, “would you have actually left with me if I had come to you straight away, at the beginning?”
Across the room, Luisa shifts uncomfortably on the spot.
Her hesitation speaks volumes, although Rose doesn’t think that it’s immediate disagreement. Luisa falls into introspection the way that most people fall into daydreams, and Rose waits patiently for her to come to the conclusions that she needs to find, before she speaks again.
“I don’t know how I’d have reacted,” Luisa says, finally. “When I thought you were— when I saw you die, that was the worst moment of my life. As soon as you pulled that gun out, I wanted you gone. I wanted them to arrest you and take you away, where you could never hurt me or Susanna, or anyone, again.”
She wets her lips and looks at Rose, searches her face, like she’s checking to make sure that this one is real.
“I was so afraid. You were cold and terrifying, and the way you spoke about that family, about that little boy… I bet he’s not even real, is he? And, it wasn’t you who said those things, but I think you would. That’s what scares me the most. I think you’re really capable of being that person, even if it was all just for show.”
“Not anymore,” Rose tells her, like she means for it to be a promise.
“I don’t know if I believe you,” Luisa says. “I don’t know that it’s enough, even if I did.”
The submarine creaks around them, and for a second Rose imagines that the walls really will tear apart and let the water in.
She feels like she’s drowning.
“Okay,” she says, but her voice is weak and half-lost already. “Then, I can take you back. We don’t have to do this.”
Luisa frowns at her, shakes her head. “I can’t leave.”
Rose blows out a breath. “Then, I’ll take us to the island, like I planned. That’s the safest place for us. Our lives would almost be normal.”
“No.” Luisa pushes away from the doorframe, now, and steps foot properly into the room. She hugs her arms around her middle, like she’s the only thing holding herself together. “We need to process this, first—I need to process this, first. There’s no normal life waiting for us. I’m not stupid, Rose, I know exactly what it’ll be like if I run away with you. I’m not ready for that.”
Rose looks at her, helpless.
“Then, what?” she asks, but there’s little strength behind the words. “Tell me what to do, Luisa, and I’ll do it. Tell me what you want.”
She would get on her knees and beg, if it would make any difference.
In place of answering, Luisa looks to the porthole and the darkness that looms on the outside. It doesn’t look like water, this far down. There are no fish to see, no coral reefs, no sign that life still exists outside of the submarine. They could just as easily be drifting through shadow or dark space. It feels a lot like limbo – like purgatory – like some awful journey in which the outcome is just as likely to be heaven as it is to be hell, and Luisa can’t say for sure which one ends with her and Rose together.
Maybe that’s what they need, right now. A literal time-out, a pause button, time to figure out where they are and where they’re going.
Rather, time to not think about the outcome.
To the porthole, Luisa says, “I never got to grieve you, when you died. I didn’t feel like I was allowed to be sorry that you were gone, after everything you’d done. The only people I could talk to you about were in rehab, and they didn’t understand. Probably didn’t care, either. They’re paid to listen to sob stories and excuses for a living.” She sniffs and wipes at tears that haven’t yet fallen. “But, it felt like something in me had changed, forever. Even with everything going on, even with Susanna, it felt like so much more had just been lost.”
“Luisa,” Rose whispers, and Luisa turns to her with a watery smile.
“I guess, even up until the end, I always just thought that we’d end up together eventually, you know?”
“I’m not dead, Luisa. We can have that, if you want. I’m still here.”
“Are you?”
Rose blinks at the question. She sinks that much further into the chair at the look on Luisa’s face, a searching look, like she’s trying to find something in Rose’s face that will give away the illusion. Rose, for her part, has never felt less like she’s wearing a mask, than in this moment.
“What can I do to prove it?” she asks Luisa, who seems to think on this for a moment, before she decides.
“Come to bed with me? I can’t sleep in this place on my own.”
Something inside of Rose’s chest softens – the fist around her heart relents, if only slightly. She nods her head and stands, and when she brushes past Luisa and out of the room, Luisa’s hand threads smoothly into her own, and she lets herself be lead. Rose takes them through the quickest route to the bedroom. Once there, she moves to turn around, but hands at her hips stop her.
Gentle fingers run down her back, until they reach the hem of her shirt and begin drawing it out from the waistband of her jeans. Rose allows herself to be undressed. She feels Luisa’s hands, usually so steady, shaking as they draw the shirt up and over her head, and Rose lifts her arms to allow her to take it completely off.
Her bra follows, next, and once she is topless Luisa’s hands move her hair aside, exposing her back. She runs her hands along Rose’s spine. She moves so close that Rose can feel her breath against her skin, followed closely by her lips, and a litter of scattered kisses against the knots of bone that protrude from the very base of her neck.
Satisfied, Luisa releases Rose and undresses herself.
They crawl into bed when they’re both bare and their clothes are in scattered piles still on the floor. Rose doesn’t expect that they’ll have sex, so soon, or that Luisa will even want to sleep beside her, how she usually does. As soon as she turns off the bedside lamp, plunging the bedroom into dark, however, Luisa swarms her.
She is hot skin and snaking limbs, wrapping herself around Rose like if she knots herself here, she’ll never have to leave. When her arms are squeezing too tight around her middle, Rose wriggles herself free enough that she can roll over and face her. She cannot see Luisa in the new dark of the room, but she reaches for her, and her fingers find wet tracks down her cheeks when they brush over them.
“Lu,” she whispers, an invitation, and Luisa sinks into her chest.
Her body does not shake with tears. Truly, Rose thinks they’re both exhausted from crying, they have nothing left to give for tonight. She presses every inch of skin that she can against Rose’s, just short of lying on top of her, and Rose holds her back just as tight. They won’t be able to sleep like this, but that doesn’t matter, yet.
In the dark of the room, her head tucked into Rose’s chest, Luisa whispers, “I know, by the way.”
Rose combs her fingers through Luisa’s hair and hums, “What’s that?”
“When we’re like this,” Luisa says, “I know that I’m safe with you.”
Rose closes her eyes and hopes that that trust is not misplaced.