Chapter 10
"Delphine?"
The knock that came was softer than it needed to be, unnecessarily gentle as her mother's head peeked in. She was no doubt surprised to see her daughter sitting up on the bed, hugging her knees with her one good arm, dark circles around her eyes.
"Ma chère fille." Mrs. Cormier moved to the side of her bed, pushing blonde curls to the side. "What's wrong?"
Delphine sniffled. She'd been up all night trying to sort through memories. It was strange, how she remembered so many things, but certain things were starting to blur around the edges, things just on the outside of her grasp. The worst thing, she decided, about losing memories was that she didn't actually know what she was losing. "I'm just tired, maman. I could not sleep last night."
Holding her knuckles to her daughter's forehead, she frowned. "Maybe you should stay home today? Get some sleep? It makes no sense going to school if you are just going to fall asleep in class. Is your arm hurting?"
Delphine shook her head. It hurt, but the pain was keeping her motivated, keeping her awake. She was so exhausted but she was afraid to sleep. What if when she woke, she returned to her old self, so desperate to fit in and keep her ignorant quarterback boyfriend that she'd do anything he asked.
"Stay home today." Her mother spoke with finality. "There is some soup in the pantry, but I will leave some money in case you want to order something after you've had some sleep." Leaning forward, she brushed a quick kiss to her daughter's temple. "Maybe taking a bath will help? Just don't submerge the cast."
Delphine watched as the woman left. She really needed to stop missing school, but she was in no condition to go to class.
How much was she going to lose?
What was she going to lose?
With a frustrated growl, she slipped from her bed and grabbed a notebook from her bag. She couldn't forget. She needed to remember. She sighed heavily as she sat on the bed again and started a list.
Save Cosima.
Save herself from years of her miserable marriage.
She remembered all the important things she needed to do. At least she thought she did. She tried to trace her timeline, get it down on paper in case she forgot.
Paul taking her to the Prom. Pregnancy. Marriage. Paul's acting career. She thought she remembered most of it, but the problem was she was no longer sure. She doubted almost everything.
She was sure she was married, but she was no longer sure on how long. She wasn't sure of the details, of how many times exactly Paul had cheated on her.
Oddly enough she was sure Cosima was going to Berkeley. She was sure she herself got accepted into the same college before things around Paul started to blur. She was sure Cosima got sick.
Cosima was still dying. Or at least she thought she was? Even that was bluring around edges, the details of when and how slipping from her mind even as she tried to chase them down.
She was certain that if she wrote it enough, repeated it enough, there would be no chance she could forget, so she wrote until her hand ached, until she had pages of facts and memories, "Save Cosima" written in more than one place.
She didn't know how long she was at it, hadn't noticed the time going by but the sun was shining brightly through her window when the doorbell rung. She ignored it as she let her eyes skim over the details of her life. There was so much she was uncertain about, memories she wrote down and crossed out and wrote down again.
The doorbell rang again in a more insistant way, the chime sounding over and over again and she sighed heavily, closing her notepad. Had she been a little more coherent, and thought back on everything that had happened the past week, she wouldn't have been so surprised to find the teen on the doorstep. "Cosima!?"
"Whoa, Delphine. Are you ok? You look a little… out of it." Cosima shifted the guitar on her back, her sleeveless black Joan Jett shirt wrinkling beneath the strap.
Delphine ran a shaky hand through her curls, trying to make some semblance of what was no doubt a mess. "Yes. I'm sorry I just… didn't sleep well last night." She tugged nervously at the old t-shirt she wore over a pair of boxers. "I'm sorry I must look like a wreck. I wasn't expecting you."
"No you don't. You're beautiful." Cosima spoke softly before her cheeks darkened to a bright crimson, realizing she spoke out loud. "You do look a little tired though. Did you get any sleep?" Cosima gave her a worried look as she stepped inside, the door closing behind her.
"Not really." Delphine shook her head, turning to head towards the kitchen, expecting the brunette would follow her. The complement wasn't lost on her, even in her state of disarray. She found the coffee pot still on, no doubt burning the coffee that was in the pot. She didn't care, pouring herself a cup only to have it taken away from her. "Cosima!"
"The last thing you need is caffeine." Cosima poured the dark sludge down the drain before turning back to Delphine, arms crossing over her chest. "So, can you not sleep or are you avoiding sleep?"
Delphine sighed heavily. "Oui?" She didn't really want to get in an argument, least of all with Cosima. "A little of both. I'm…" She wasn't sure how to explain anything. She vaguely remembered running her mouth way too much when she'd been high, but Cosima had laughed it off. She wasn't going to bring the subject back up. "I had a bad dream."
"Ugh, I hate those. Did you…" Cosima pursed her lips, not sure of what to say. "Did you want to talk about it?"
With a shake of her head, Delphine but her bottom lip. She held her hand out until Cosima took it and moved closer. "Thank you for asking… and for checking up on me." She pulled her closer, close enough to smell the marijuana on her shirt. "You're missing class again."
Cosima shrugged a shoulder. "Totally self-serving. You know...I don't have to go to class and I get to see a hot blonde?"
Delphine rolled her eyes. "Come here." She wasn't satisfied until her lips pressed against Cosima's. There was a little less awkwardness from the both of them than their previous kisses and Delphine wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing. She was beginning to feel comfortable, something a nearly-40 year old woman shouldn't feel when making out with a 17 year old. After a moment, she broke off the kiss, feeling the exhaustion in her bones. "Sorry. I'm not being a good host. Did you want something to drink?"
After a moment of hesitation, Cosima reached up to push a blond curl back behind Delphine's ear. "You're barely standing straight, Delphine. You need to stop fighting it." Cosima slipped her hand back into Delphine's, tugging her out of the kitchen and up the stairs. "Come on. Let's get you back in bed."
Delphine didn't fight her, but allowed herself to be tugged along. She could only hope that the memories she wrote down would be enough to carry her through. Her eyes fell on the bed and she froze when she saw her notebook sitting there. Cosima didn't seem to notice anything was wrong as she grabbed the book and set it on the nearby desk without a second thought.
"Alright. Get in bed." Cosima turned, a smile on her lips.
She wanted to hide the book, to tuck it away somewhere no one could find it, but there was no way to do that without drawing suspicion. "Lay down with me?" Delphine eyed the brunette as she slipped into the bed, moving all the way over to one side in invitation. "Nothing dirty, just… lay down with me?"
"Erm…" Cosima seemed to debate the offer before kicking off her shoes. She set her guitar against the nightstand before slipping under the comforter. Her body was rigid with nervousness as she kept space between her and Delphine, obviously very conscious of where they each laid.
Delphine couldn't help smiling. She rolled onto her side, her cast tucked between them as she draped her good arm over Cosima's abdomen. "Relax. I'm not going to take advantage of you." She moved even closer, trying to extinguish the chill between them. "Why aren't you in school?"
Cosima turned on her side towards Delphine, her colorful dreads fanned out on the pillow. "You weren't in class…" She gave a small shrug. "I was worried after yesterday."
"That's sweet." Exhaustion tugged at her senses. Now that she was laying down and her mind was no longer focusing so intently on her memories, she could feel herself growing weary. "Thank you, Cosima."
Another small shrug. "Close your eyes, Delphine."
Delphine just nodded, doing as she was commanded.
She knew she was dreaming right away, but she found herself going along, caught in a trance of some sort. There was a foggy sensation over everything, a muted reality of things that had already passed. She wasn't watching from a distance or anything to that effect, but she had no control over her body. She wasn't a teenager, not stuck with her broken arm and falling grades. She was older again… not 38 but strangely in her 20s, the later half. She was in her loft, not the apartment she resided in alone once she split from Paul, but the one they shared together overlooking LA.
She remembered the dress she was wearing, the premier of some stupid movie Paul had played a role in that was just enough to get him access to the red carpet. She could feel the champagne loosening her inhibitions, mingling with the Xanax that still tasted bitter on her tongue even in her dream, knowing he would want to celebrate in his own way. She really wasn't in the mood, but she forced herself to think of her husband, merely closing her eyes as she felt the heat of him suddenly pressing against her back. His lips appeared at her throat, the stubble scraping across her delicate skin as she felt the long zipper of her dress being dragged down, the material being pushed off her shoulder by large hands that caressed her skin without a second thought. She prepared herself, knowing it was coming but still wincing as he bit down on her shoulder, harder than she liked.
The roughness excited him, she could feel the evidence of it pressed against her through his tailored slacks. Hands roughly cupped her breasts, seeming to fondle her with no interest in exciting her, twisting her nipples hard enough to make her whimper in pain before he roughly pushed her forward, her palms splayed across the surface of the table. She felt his hand dip between her legs from behind and she wondered if he could feel that she wasn't aroused, wondered if he even cared.
As she heard his belt unbuckling, all she could think was that she had to remember to tell the maid to wax the table again. Her eyes settled on the wall, expecting to see a shelf of photos eerily watching her about to be taken by her husband, but strangely the faces were nothing but blurred rectangles, photos of memories she couldn't pin down. What had been in the photos? Were they pictures of when they were once happy? Were they ever happy? She tried to remember as she waited for Paul.
She waited, but nothing came. She could still feel the heat of him behind her, but this memory wasn't playing out the way it was supposed to. Turning around, she was suddenly face to face with a much more welcome sight.
Cosima pushed herself to her toes, brushing the lightest of kisses against Delphine's lips, her hands settling on her hips that were no longer bare, but covered in soft pajama pants to match the tank top she wore. The table behind her had changed from a polished mahogany to a light oak, the apartment fading away to one that felt warmer, more inviting.
Breaking off the kiss, Delphine let her eyes travel over Cosima's face, seeing she was slightly slimmer, the bright colors of her dreads exchanged for an earthier tone that seemed more mature. She wasn't a teen anymore. She was the same age, in her 20s, and somehow had gotten even more beautiful and definitely more confident in her own skin.
"You're not going to make me beg again are you, Captain?" Cosima asked with a mischievous grin, the bridge of her nose wrinkling behind her thick framed glasses as she inched Delphine's pajama bottoms and boyshorts down over her hips.
Delphine bit her bottom lip, feeling the searing heat that accompanied the light touches of Cosima's fingertips around the edge of her pants. There was the desire that had been missing, before… "Maybe…" She responded, but her body was already responding, stripping off her own tank top as the rest of her clothes fell to the floor in a heap of material. She was pushed back until she relented and sat on the edge of the table, the woman positioned between her thighs, fingertips drawing a slow path up.
"You are so beautiful." Cosima whispered in awe, as if they hadn't been together for a decade, as if it were the first time she were catching a glimpse of the long legth of pale skin. "How did I get so lucky?" Her words were muffled by the kisses she placed along Delphine's jaw.
"I'm the lucky one." Delphine responded. Her patience grew way too thin and she quickly covered the woman's hand, pressing it firmly against her arousal. Her soft whimper was captured by Cosima's devious smile and playful tongue, teasing her own lips with abandon. Delphine cupped the woman's cheeks, returning the kiss with an urgent desperation that surprised her as fingers pressed into her.
She felt the fogginess of her dream slip away as the kiss grew tangible. She could feel the softness of Cosima's cheek in her hand and the tentative response as if the girl was unsure about Delphine's tongue moving against her own. This wasn't the confident 20-something year old she'd just been kissing; the 20-something year old that had shamelessly taken her on the kitchen table like it was something they did on a regular basis. Blinking her eyes open, Delphine broke the kiss off in surprise. "Merde… Desolèe… Sorry, Cosima."
"No no…" Cosima, missing her glasses, blinked her eyes that were still wide with surprise. "I… um…" She licked her lips before clearing her throat. "That was a little more intense than…" She took a calming breath. "There are worse ways to be woken up, though I'm really curious what you were dreaming about…"
Delphine felt her cheeks redden with embarassment. "I don't remember." She lied, looking over Cosima at the clock on her night stand. She'd been asleep for two hours. It had seemed to go by so much quicker in her dream.
"Well if you remember, let me know, cause it's probably better than dreaming about the crappy concert I was dreaming about…"
As she burried her face against Cosima's shoulder, trying to ignore the thrum of arousal that coursed through her body, she tried to focus on the dream. It had been a memory… or at least it felt like it had been, but even as she tried to remember the details, they escaped her grasp. As she tried to remember the rough feel of stubble against her skin, all she felt was the soft brush of lips and the tender caress of knowing fingertips.