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It’s been six months. Six months since Eve’s life was forever changed. Six months since Villanelle was swept out of her life by the current…and by Carolyn. Eve spent the better part of a month nearly catatonic in a dingy hotel room in London, with that stupid pink, princess teddy bear and Villanelle’s talking heart. She listened to Villanelle’s voice over and over until the battery died. On that day she spent the morning frantically searching her room for a replacement so she could hear her voice again. She wasn't ready for that to have been the last time she heard Villanelle's voice, deep and slowed by the dying battery. She cried when after checking every battery-operated item in her room she couldn’t find one to fit. She sobbed, curled around that bear on the stained, beige carpet of her hotel room. When she was finally able to pull herself together enough to stand and make herself presentable…ish, she walked to the corner store, with greasy hair and tear-streaked cheeks. And wouldn’t you know, they didn’t have the right size battery. She stood staring at the display with tears brimming in her eyes. And that’s when she broke. She broke out into laughter. Uncontrollable laughter. She stood there, laughing at the display. And when the clerk came over to check on her, she laughed right in his face before walking out of the shop. That same day she showered for the first time in who knows how long and went out and found herself a new apartment. It was a tiny one room thing. Nothing special. But it wasn’t the hotel room she’d been in for too long. She went to the restaurant and got her job back. The job was an easy distraction, and not at all challenging. She got herself a little tank and some fish to watch and feed. She went to work. She fed her fish. She found a new routine and reason to get up every day.
Today on her way to work, out of the corner of her eye, she sees a flash of blonde hair attached to a tall woman wearing some bright red and green pattern, that she thinks ridiculous, but Villanelle would have loved. She turns around and goes back home. She watches her fish. She imagines Villanelle’s face, with her smug, annoying smirk, looking back at her through the water. She cries. She drinks too much wine and passes out in the middle of the afternoon. She wakes up in darkness with a headache and an urgent need to pee. She hurries into the bathroom. It hurts to open her eyes. She decides to brush her teeth while she pees because her teeth feel fuzzy. She sits there with her elbows on her knees, her face in her hands, and her toothbrush hanging out of her mouth until her foot falls asleep. She finishes up and makes her way back out to the bed, limping on her tingly foot. She sits on the edge of the bed and grabs the glass of water from her side table. She doesn’t remember getting it. It must have been a semi-conscious drunken good decision. She thanks her former drunk self for the forethought. As she drinks, she looks over at the table spotting Villanelle’s heart on the corner. She curses her former drunk self for this. She sets the half-empty glass down on the table and sighs as she lets her fingers slide over Villanelle’s heart.
‘Admit it, Eve. You wish I was here.’ Villanelle’s voice, as clear as the first time she heard it, startles her. The flashing seems bright in the dim light of the room. How? She hadn’t changed the battery. She hadn’t even been able to find the right battery. She thinks maybe it’s a fluke. She presses it again. ‘Admit it, Eve. You wish I was here.’ She sobs and picks up the heart. She holds it to her ear and presses it again. ‘Admit it, Eve. You wish I was here.’
“I admit it.” Eve says out loud. “I wish you were here.” She sighs. She looks back at the table. There, where the heart had been, sits the notecard that had been in her once stolen and returned suitcase with ‘Sorry Baby’ written in Villanelle’s neat hand. She picks it up. She scoffs at her own drunken sentimentality. She traces her finger over the letters one at a time. S-O-R-R-Y - B-A-B-Y - V…Her brow furrows. “V?” She rubs her eyes. She must still be drunk. She looks again at the card. It’s very clearly a V, not the familiar X that she remembers finishing the note. “V?” That's not right. “V...V…” She feels a spark of warm hope flare in her chest. “Villanelle.” She looks around the small space. She reaches over and switches on the small lamp on the side table. “Villanelle!” She sobs. “Villanelle, are you here?” She looks off into the darkness of her kitchen area. There’s a shape. A shadow. “Villanelle…” She gasps when the shadow moves. “Vill…” Her voice breaks, trails off. Villanelle steps out of the shadow, brow furrowed, biting at her bottom lip.
“Hi, Eve.” She steps closer. “I’m so sorry.” But Eve is up off of the bed and lunging at her. Eve wraps her arms around Villanelle’s back pulling her into a hug. “I’m sorry.” Villanelle wraps her arms around Eve’s shoulders. “I had to be sure it was safe.”
“I don’t care. I mean, I care, but right now I just want to feel that you’re real.” Eve tightens her grip, spreading her fingers out across Villanelle’s back. “You’re real, right? This isn’t some sad, hopeful dream?”
“I’m real.” Villanelle turns her face into Eve’s neck and breathes her in. She runs her hand up into Eve’s sleep tousled hair.
“I missed you…” Eve leans back to look up into Villanelle’s eyes. “…so much.” She places her hand on Villanelle’s cheek, her thumb drifting over the corner of Villanelle’s lips. Villanelle leans in, unsure. Eve slides her hand around the back of Villanelle’s head and pulls her down into a kiss. It’s deep. It’s slow. It’s hungry. It’s passionate. It’s full of promise. Eve’s head swims with her hangover and the rush of blood in her ears. She pulls away from the kiss to rest her head against Villanelle’s chest. “I'm sorry…my head.”
“Too much wine?”
“I had a bad day.”
“I know.” Villanelle rubs her hand over Eve's back. “Why don't you lie down.”
“Yeah.” Eve reluctantly backs away but stops to grab Villanelle’s hand. “You too?”
“Of course.” Villanelle smiles softly. “But first I'm going to go get you some painkillers.”
“Ok.” Eve releases Villanelle’s hand and sits on the edge of the bed but doesn't take her eyes off of Villanelle as she walks into the bathroom and opens the medicine cabinet. She comes back a moment later with two pills in the palm of her hand. Eve takes them and swallows them with the last of the water from the glass before placing it back on the table. It’s then that she notices the pair of boots sitting neatly by her front door. She looks up at Villanelle and watches as she takes off her bright red and green patterned jacket, tossing it over the back of a nearby chair. Villanelle holds the blankets open for Eve to slide into the bed, following closely behind. Eve pushes the pink bear further into the sheets as she slides under the covers. She knows Villanelle will tease her for it. Villanelle pillows her arm under her head and looks at Eve with a soft smile on her lips, her brow still furrowed. They lie there staring at each other for a long while.
“I’m sorry.” Eventually it’s Villanelle who breaks the silence. Eve closes her eyes and shakes her head. “I couldn’t come sooner.”
“No.” Eve opens her eyes.
“I had to be sure…”
“It’s ok.” She sighs.
“…it was safe.”
“Stop.”
“But I…”
“Stop. I understand.” Eve reaches out, resting her hand against Villanelle’s cheek. “I understand. I missed you and it was awful, but I understand why.”
“Ok.” Villanelle closes her eyes and releases a deep sigh. “Really?” She opens her eyes again, hopeful.
“Yes.” Eve leans forward and brushes her lips against Villanelle’s. “You’re real and you’re here and you’re safe…wait…” Eve leans back. “Are you safe? Is it safe for you to be here?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Everybody who wanted me dead is dead. The rest of the world thinks I’m dead.” She shrugs. “It’s safe.”
“Everybody who wanted you dead?” Eve pauses. Her brow furrows and then raises. “Carolyn?”
“Yes. Dead.”
“Dead?”
“Yes. It wasn’t me.”
“I wish it had been you…or me.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do. I spent many days thinking about how I would kill her.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.” Eve shrugs. “Then you’d still be dead, or so I thought, and I’d either be dead or in prison. I could handle dead, and sometimes wished for it, but not prison.”
“I’m glad you’re not in prison…or dead.” She smirks. “That would make this reunion very difficult.”
“How are you…” Eve pauses. “…not dead? You were shot. Right? Many times?”
“Three times.”
“And you survived?”
“Yes. Clearly.”
“How?” Eve asks, exasperated.
“I’m very strong.” There’s the smugness that Eve’s missed so much.
“Oh my god!” Eve laughs, flopping over onto her back. “You are so annoying.”
“Yes.” Villanelle chuckles. She props herself up on her elbow looking down at Eve. “One through my shoulder. Hit nothing. One punctured my spleen and broke a rib.” She chuckles. “One in my ass.”
“Your ass?” Eve laughs.
“Yes. I passed out from the pain and washed up downriver. A good Samaritan pulled me out of the water and took me to hospital. They took my spleen and stitched up my…other wounds.”
“Your ass.” Eve laughs.
“Yes.” Villanelle rolls her eyes. “My ass.”
“Can I see?”
“My ass?” Villanelle smirks. “Yes.”
“Your scars. Not your ass.” Eve pauses thoughtfully. “Maybe your ass.” Villanelle leans down to kiss Eve. She smiles against Eve’s lips.
“Yes. You can see my scars.” Villanelle sits up, tossing the blankets aside, and swings her legs over the side of the bed. She pulls her shirt off over her head, her golden hair spilling out of it onto her shoulders. Eve sits upright behind her. The first thing she notices is that Villanelle is thinner than she had been. Then she sees them, pink against pale skin. One on the back of her right shoulder. One in the middle of her left side. The familiar scar from Gunn’s arrow. Eve runs her finger gently over each of them.
“Does it hurt?”
“No. Not anymore.” Villanelle turns to face Eve. Eve looks up into her eyes and then down at the exit wound scar on her right shoulder. She remembers the confusion and then the horror when she realized that Villanelle had been shot. She touches the scar tenderly with her fingertip. Her eyes shift lower to the scar that she had given to Villanelle. Eve runs her thumb over the raised pink flesh there. She flattens her palm against Villanelle’s warm skin and looks up into Villanelle's eyes.
“I can’t believe you’re here.” The tears are back in Eve’s eyes, but these aren’t the same tears she’s been crying for months. These are tears of joy and of hope and of love.