Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Vita hadn’t answered the messages.

Virginia thought to herself as she stood outside a small shop, a few streets down from Ducan's house. She was supposed to buy some dresses, she needed them for Nessa’s exhibition on Saturday, her sister insisted she finds herself in something other than the torn blue dress that Virginia bought about two years or so ago for Mrs Lucas’s wedding with her distant cousin. She checked her phone. Those little blue dots kept popping up as if Vita was reading. She didn’t reply though. The shop was right at that corner. Virginia reminded herself. Would Vita come?

The blonde woman stared at the shop’s window. There was a fine dress inside, hanging just nicely on a dead mannequin. A muted yellow and black dress. A bit short on her, Nessa would say that. She looked closely at the neck of the mannequin. Would she need a printed scarf? Those little flowers painted on it reminded her of dried dandelions pressed between Jane Austen's novels, young girls with dove eyes and a vague yearning to love. But Vita had that habit of describing them in such vivid details, she often talked of those flowers with rapture interest and tried to picture them with an intense focus almost too technical and biologically structured for a novelist. Dandelion to her was nothing more than the most vital nectar source for a wide host of pollinators in the early spring. What a strange relationship between the flower, bees, and us watchers. She wondered what Vita regarded herself as in that complex business of nature? 

Vita Sackville-West had been a peculiar force. Virginia smiled a little as she thought about her. This foolish longing though, it made her want to light a cigarette. The blonde woman was waiting for Vita. She insisted on coming to her shopping trip at their meeting last week. Virginia convinced herself that Vita would keep her promise. She hated standing here alone in the silent corner of this busy street. 

Virginia let the smoke blur her eyesight. She bored herself staring at people who passed by. The hurry one, the young one, the student, and the elder man in the suit, all randomly stumbled here, in Berwick street, at 5 o’clock in the afternoon, Thursday, March 9. She glanced at them and thought of what if. Virginia let endless scenarios appear in her mind. Both the worst tragedy and the happiest moment, a son dying in his father’s hands and drunken men chasing gooses. She wondered what kind of past they had and whether they were interlinked. 

Yet how did one count the seconds, the minutes, the hours just to sink into the depth of time and desperately grasp for a reminder of the reality that was already placed upon its own eyes? Virginia knew she was asking herself a nonsense question. It’s clear that Vita wasn’t here now and would not be here any time soon. She never did. 

It angered her. Virginia knew she would keep looking for the silhouette of Vita in the crowd of solemn passengers walking past her. She thought of such hope and excitement as the undying habit of new love. Perhaps that was what was happening between her and Vita. She didn’t really know. 

A woman laid her gloved hand on her shoulder, breaking Virginia of her thought. The mischievous brown eyes stared at her. “Hi.” Vita said and leaned forward, a smirk appeared on her velvet lips, showing her perfect white teeth and implying a question Virginia had grown tired of answering. Virginia turned her head, avoiding the kiss. “You’re extremely late.” She gave Vita a condemned look, but the short woman only shrugged. 

“And you missed my birthday.” Vita put her lips on her cheek and glanced at her as if challenging. It was March 9 and two hours before Vita’s birthday party. Virginia had refused to attend such an event despite the shorter woman's multiple attempts at convincing her otherwise. 

“Would you come? For my sake, if there is no other reason?” Vita asked again. “Please?” Her rich brown eyes sparked with childish excitement and expectation. She gave her a charming smile and a great long look of forbidden promise, almost like a dare she often sends to her lovers. Virginia couldn’t really pinpoint whether she was curious at that offer or whether she already knew what that implied. She shook her head at Vita’s tactic. 

“I could barely stay in the crowd of hundred aristocrats emptying their souls with expensive champagne and dancing until their laughter became ghost sounds and white noises,” Virginia told her. “And I could barely stand your constant nursing toward me.” She tilted her head and stared down at Vita as a habit. 

“You should know it’s just because I care for you, Virginia. A fabulous lot.” Vita leaned forward and held her face in her soft hands, its warmth reached a place deeper inside her. Virginia stared at her own reflection in Vita’s brown eyes and mocked herself for the genuineness and honesty she found in those orbs. Such pure adoration and admiration made her want to forget the dreadful feeling of being abandoned each time their dance went further than it should be. For this moment, at least, Virginia convinced herself to believe in those sweet words. And believing as she was doing, this raw feeling scared her. 

“I” Virginia answered with struggle. “...” She felt lost for words again as if she was suddenly pulled back in the process of reaching for the flow of language and becoming incapable of coming up with a sentence, an agreement, or a compromise to Vita’s insistence of sort. “I don’t…” She repeated, trying harder “in that place of all else.” Virginia looked directed at Vita. She thought of Knole, its hundred rooms and dozens of staircases, more like a town than a house where King James’s silver lay untouched for centuries. She remembered the past that followed her every step, not dead at all. Knole held the fragments of memory, of Vita standing in the Chapel as a married woman, holding her hand out for the lover, for her. An unsuitable heir and her mistress. Neither belongs. 

“You liked it the first time I took you, Virginia.” Vita said, her voice holding a truth that expected no argument. She looked her in the eyes. It was difficult to explain. “...” She said nothing in reply. She simply wished she could call Leonard, go home and escape this intense question of Vita. It had become unbearable for her. 

But then Vita just shrugged as if she understood. “Okay.” The smaller woman said and let go of their close promiscuity. The ghostly smile on her powdered face brought out some unpleasant feelings in Virginia’s body, she wondered what Vita’s puzzling look meant. She felt the subtle anger radiating from the smaller woman. Virginia wanted to lay a silent question onto the air, asking which one of them would give in and what would come after. What was the point anyway? 

Vita reached for her hand and she let the woman lead them both into the shop. Her hand felt small in hers. The tall woman looked blankly at the wooden shelves of vintage clothing and accessories with hats and purses that Vita would like to own. She thought of what this spacious room had once been, it smelled like medicine, cheap perfume, and dust. Her eyes fixed on the printed photograph on the wall, a woman showing her shoulder and wrapping herself in only satin and pearl. Her facial structure reminded her of the ancient English race. 

She let go of Vita’s hand as something caught her interest. Virginia picked up a silver ring and placed it on her own finger. The cold metal sent a rush through her skin. She reached for the hand of the mannequin, feeling its plastic touch and admiring the piece it wore. A muted yellow and black dress. The one she found from outside the shop’s window. “Not that yellow one, Virginia.” Vita pulled her hand again as she realised Virginia had abruptly stopped. Virginia nodded her head and followed Vita inside. 

They walked past the clotheslines. She held her hand out to touch the fabric and felt the roughness of the denim and glossiness of the silk. Vita turned her head to look at her, gentle and unreadable this time. She asked Virginia for colour preference. “Blue.” She said, like her old dress. “Or that yellow one.” She pointed at the mannequin. Vita gave her an unapproved look. Virginia nodded again, saying nothing. 

She walked behind Vita and stopped as she seemed to suddenly take an interest in headpieces. “How about this brown hat?” Vita asked as she tried to put the hat onto her head. Virginia bent down to help her. “It makes you look like a scarecrow.” The woman acclaimed. Vita once said how she dressed quite atrocious, perhaps it implied how Virginia had no taste. She never seemed to mind though, sometimes Virginia thought Vita enjoyed her odd sense of fashion. 

“Do you like it?” Vita asked again, joking this time. Virginia stared down at her, unamused. “Maybe.” She told her upon seeing her reflection in the mirror. She looked like herself that time they went to the theatre together to be drunk on old comedies and bad jokes. Virginia had looked all tall and skinny with that ridiculous hat. Vita had cried her eyes out in laughter that day but she had mustered sweetly how much she loved her outfit. “This one then.” Vita told her with a happy tone, she laid another kiss on her cheek and started to walk her through some dress preferences and inquired about Nessa’s exhibition. 

Vita continued to ask whether they would have dinner together after the exhibition and if they allowed, she could catch up with them before dessert. She had to take the kids to her mother that afternoon and could not join them on time. Vita said she wouldn’t mind staying the night. Virginia raised her eyebrows. “If you spare me a spot on your bed?” Vita gave her a cheeky smile this time. Virginia decided to give her no reply. 

She changed as Vita picked up some of the long dresses. Vita’s light-headed laugh rang in her ears, she could hear her talk with the girls from outside. She caught the dry phrases of compliments and imagined how Vita would look with a smile so wide that it became empty. Virginia knew of the woman’s aristocratic manner, something like an actress’s - no false shyness or modesty - the one that made her and any other girls feel virgin, shy and schoolgirlish. Those girls would giggle with Vita's charm and let the woman take her fill of youth just so she could leave them to rot with the promise of her affection later. It was cruel and intoxicating. Virginia wondered why she slept with them and came back to her. 

Virginia heard they exchanged phone numbers. She thought of herself doing the exact same when Vita asked her a few months ago. She was never spontaneous and Vita had made her. And that woman, she was never monogamous. She didn’t know why it felt different between them.  

Virginia came out of the changing room, wearing a silk slip-dress that hung on her body like a skeleton in its burial clothes. “I want this.” She said, Vita’s left hand was playing with her pearl neckline as she saw her, the woman bit her lips as if trying to hold her chuckle. “I know you would adore it.” Vita said sweetly. “Just this one?” She asked again. “Yes.” Virginia answered her question. 

xxx

Virginia came back to her shared flat with Leonard with a few bags of clothes. She opened the door and came across a white box with a note tucked on its ribbon. “Dear Virginia,” it said, “not that yellow one I’ve already bought for you.” She opened the box to see the muted yellow and black dress carefully folded inside. 

“What is that Ginia?” Leonard called out from the kitchen. “It was delivered for you a couple of hours ago.” He told her. “A gift from Vita.” She raised her voice so he could hear. Virginia chuckled to herself, wondering when Vita had had the time to visit the shop. “Is that for Nessa’s exhibition?” He continued to ask. “No, for me.” She said.

Chapter Text

Vita hadn’t answered the messages.

Virginia stared out of her broken window and saw Mr Wilson in his living room, watching cartoons and drinking his third bottle of beer. Leonard insisted that she didn’t need to accompany him on his trip to visit his grandparent in the countryside. She reached for her cup of hot milk, sipping with tiredness and boredom. She was supposed to write the Author's note for her latest novel, her editor was nagging her to finish it within this weekend. She checked her phone. Those little blue dots kept popping up as if Vita was reading. She didn’t reply though. 

She should light the fireplace. Virginia stood up from her writing table and walked around the house to gather her useless drafts and manuscripts. Or newspapers, she had them tucked somewhere in the study. Vita had told her a few hours ago that she might stop by, just because Leonard was away and would not fuss her about keeping Virginia stay up late. She found flawed pages of her Mrs Dalloway in the trash near their printer, it was no use to them anyway. She liked her book, everything that she wrote and challenged the common notion in it, she knew it didn’t matter if Vita understood it - she said she loved Dalloway - Virginia wanted to smile at the effort, perhaps it was enough. 

Virginia took the pages back with her. She sat on the floor and started crumpling the paper with her hands. She saw dark ink on her fingertips but couldn’t get the risk of them. It must be from her writing earlier. Virginia stared at her hands and let the burning voice of her brain lead her out of the present tense. She thought of the past and its tintly purple shade, the unnamed garden she found on her usual walk toward Fernham after the luncheon with Mary Seton and her fellow colleagues. She remembered the charismatic orchestra on the side of the river and found herself distracted again by its organic music. The melody lingered on her mind, stubborn as if reminding her of things that cannot go away. 

The woman threw the paper in the back of the fireplace. She stacked the kindling with her dirty hands. Then the logs, on top of the crumpled papers, she told herself. She should go looking for her matchstick. Now her hands were covered in dust and ink. Nessa was a neat painter but she would never manage herself the way her sister could. In their summer home, Talland House in St Ives, what was her childhood then, and how did it shape their present, Virginia asked herself about the meaning of those summers. Had any wishes of hers come true? 

But what about Vita, she thought again, what happened at Knole then? At that exact moment? She imagined the young versions of themselves knowing each other. Vita, with her proud features and boyish clothes posing as a prince to take her out for an adventure. Though the only thing Virginia wished to do with that bright version of Vita was to take her over the water meadows in the summer of ‘02 on foot, the one that now laid in ruin in Sussex Downs. There would be a million things she wanted to tell her. 

Her phone gave a ting sound. A message. She stood up immediately. Virginia held her head with the upper side of her hand as a sudden headache came to her. She felt her vision darken. Virginia closed her eyes to regain her balance but she could hardly stand on her two feet. She held onto the decorative wooden chair in front of her for balance but unfortunately missed and pushed the chair to the floor instead. Virginia let go of her slippers and went barefoot toward the kitchenette. 

She walked slowly to prevent herself from falling. Virginia washed her hands with urgency and uncontrollably let the soap slip from her hold and fall to the sink. She dried her hand with a towel and rushed to find the pills Leonard left on the dining table for her. Virginia swallowed it with difficulty. She caught her breath and realised she had forgotten to eat dinner. Leonard left something in the fridge, she should have checked them earlier tonight. The doctor would be furious about her lack of caution. 

Then Virginia heard a small sound from outside her glass window. Followed by repeated knocks. The woman thought of ignoring it but the knock became urgent. She drank a full cup of water and felt the effect of the medicine reach her brain. It relaxed her and forcefully smoothed the ache. Virginia decided to go check the noise. She didn’t think she could stand it in this condition. 

The knocks became angry. Virginia found her way toward the source of the noise. She saw a shadow of a familiar silhouette with a straight posture. The dimly lit street light painted the figure in ashed colour. As she walked closer, she realised it was Vita standing outside her glass window with the cutest smile. The smaller woman must have climbed the fire escape staircase. Virginia chuckled at her silly notion of romance. It thrilled Vita, any forbidden act out of the ordinary. 

“Surprise!” Vita said in her chirping voice as Virginia opened her window wider so she could step inside. The taller woman questioned how she always allowed Vita's spontaneous ideas. “I bring dinner,” Vita told her and handed her a large bag of Chinese takeout. Virginia shook her head at this thoughtful habit. She knew how Vita could come out of her way to make big gestures but never hesitate to ignore a message. It confused her. “No chance missed this time?” She asked Vita and gave her a mocking look. The woman only replied with a cheeky smile. 

“Any vengeance you want to take for that one event will lie ready to your hand.” She said with a wink as if daring Virginia to do something to her even when she knew full well the taller woman was incapable of such an action. “Would I?” She asked. Vita seemed to ignore her question. Virginia thought about what she would do if the day of Vita's complete betrayal came sooner than she anticipated. She asked herself what kind of fool she was posing as to open with someone who keeps strands of themselves hidden from her. Virginia wanted to compare herself with all the foolish ones before her, she wished for the ability to display such anger and rage toward a betrayed lover. Yet she would forever stand here as this fragile woman. Damned by the person in front of her. 

“Do you need help lighting the fire?” Vita asked in her thick accent. Virginia nodded at first but then shook her head. “I just need to find the matches.” Virginia opened some of the drawers, searching for her spare matches. She went to Leonard’s room down the hall looking for his lighter instead, he would not bring it with him on the trip. “Virginia! Where do you keep your wine glass?” Vita called out her name. “Nevermind!” Vita found them before Virginia could answer the question, she was never good when it came to keeping her things. It took her a full five-minute to locate the lighter and went outside to finish what she started with the fireplace. Virginia ignored the falling chair as she walked past it. 

Lighting the fireplace wasn’t as easy as she thought it would be. She burned her fingers getting the lighter to work. “Let me do it.” Vita said as she took Leonard’s lighter from her hand. She folded the paper, burned it and ruthlessly threw it onto the open fireplace. Virginia stared blankly at the dancing fire as Vita finished. She liked the ghostly shape of those red lights as they painted their skin colour in such warm shades that Vita became less distant and foreign. 

Virginia held her hand out to tuck a stray of hair from Vita’s face. It caught her attention. Vita’s dove eyes looked straight at her, silently questioning her intention. Virginia didn’t say anything, she enjoyed their familiar closeness. Millions thoughts rushed through her mind but Virginia found them all together meaningless, she simply liked the soft look on Vita’s face as the small woman relaxed on her touch. 

When Vita made that old smile of hers, Virginia felt herself falling again. “Dinner?” Vita asked in that beautiful voice which made everything she said sound like a caress. Virginia nodded, knowing she was still vulnerable after the headache earlier. 

They didn't use the dining table, feeling it was too formal for a late meal. Vita turned on the television for some talk shows that neither of them was paying attention to. They sat on the sofa and chatted while eating. She asked Vita about Harold and their trip on the train to Tehran. “What do you want to know?” Vita asked her back. “Tell me what you have been seeing as I have never been to Egypt.” Virginia told her. 

“Couldn’t you wait until I sent you the draft of  the travel log I promised to write for your blog?” She said sweetly, almost like teasing Virginia about the job she asked her for some months ago. “No.” Virginia shortly replied. “It’s for personal purposes.” She said, unshaken by her usual tactic. 

“Well, the only way I can deal with them is like Molly MacCarthy did with Christmas. Alphabetically.” Vita said the master of factly and didn’t hesitate to actually entertain her by listing them all out in order. 

She didn’t let Vita finish as she started to come to the letter V and decided to repeat her name instead. “You are a crafty fox to tell a story like that” Virginia told her between laughs. “I need to be handy enough so that you can let me steal you away.” Vita slowly said as she took a sip of her red wine with a satisfied smile. Virginia blushed at her statement. Every sentence she told her had never been untinted with desire. Vita had always been asking that question. The taller woman asked herself whether she would say yes to her again or whether it had never been something to think about as she already knew the answer long before Vita came. 

Virginia wanted to down herself. In what, she couldn’t pinpoint in her disoriented state of mind.  They were all drunk and content after some ridiculous stories of trains on fire and swearing in new languages. Virginia couldn’t keep her eyes off the other woman’s lips as the rich red liquid painted them in a darker shade. Vita was everything feminine, curved and stunning. Virginia loved how her smile was less mischievous and painfully real now. Her rich brown eyes sparkled with kindness and her passion wasn’t as brutal, Virginia wanted this version of Vita. 

She let Vita sit on her lap. The smaller woman loosely wrapped her arms around her neck. Her freckles, her foggy eyes, and her heavy breathing became closer to her. Virginia felt the familiar nervousness invading her body, she thought of the ghost of their passion that haunted her at night and the burning sensation it caused to her flesh as she lay alone in her bed. Vita leaned in, she held her breath as if anticipating. Her perfect mouth curved to form a smile again, much more gentle and nurturing this time. “Would you be very kind to me?” She asked her in a whisper. And Vita nodded, surely, she silently said with her darkening eyes. Virginia would hide herself in them like every lover before her. This act of affection clouded her mind, she could forget for a while that there was always something wrong with herself, something disconnected. 

But did it matter? Her soft lips were on hers. She savoured almost hungrily the taste of her tongue as Vita lavished her with hot wet kisses. Bitter and sweet like cigarettes and expensive wine. Virginia felt the passion that radiated almost blindly from her, she let it consume her, take her, and covered her in something utterly and perfectly physical. Her sure hands gently stroked Virginia’s short hair, the feathery touch on her bare neck challenging the taller woman’s fragile mind. She yearned for Vita to come closer, kiss her deeper, and constantly call out her name. 

Virginia. Virginia. Virginia. She opened her mouth and tilted her head back. Her moan was being pulled out of her dry throat as Vita and her tongue travelled down her neck. It burned her. The overwhelming sensation woke her up and brought her back to the surface. She guided Vita’s hands to her heart, wanting them to feel the evidence of her devotion. In her crazed mind, she badly wanted to offer it to Vita, the full heart of a woman who had never experienced this kind of emotion. Not before Vita. Never to anyone. 

xxx

They made love on the floor. Next to the fireplace. Red yellow light covered her naked body. She became bare, vulnerable, and happy. She didn’t know Vita any better than she was before, she wasn’t sure another act of passion would help them, but they were happy, she was happy. 

Vita told her in the drunken voice of fantasy how she loved her. But Virginia could only hear the last part of her sentence. “I would stay with you all night, ” she said. And Virginia believed her.  

xxx

A week after that she came to her sister's house for a visit. “She would definitely ghost you,” Nessa told her in a sister tone. She meant Vita and Virginia only gave her a tight smile in return. She knew it too.