Page 36 of Saint

“You mean we have to finish sorting,” I grinned.

Victoria

Summer was coming to its end, but not without endeavoring to burn us all alive. As brutal as winter could be, late summer was always hellish. The hot and muggy weather caused the stickiness of my limbs and the vexation mounting in my being. I hated the excess of any season. Excessive cold, excessive heat, excessive rain, it all grated me. A middle ground was required for me to enjoy the weather. My luck was depleted today. A typical air-conditioned day at the office seemed to have diminished in favor of disproportionate heat.

Lowering the sound of Lauryn Hill crooning about being killed softly, I called out to my assistant, seeking to rectify whatever had gone wrong with the thermostat.

“Cora?”

“Yes, Tori?” She made her presence known, appearing in my doorway. Her entrance was exasperated by golden locs sticking to her face, which also held evidence of dampness. The light makeup she wore was removed, likely from constant wiping of her face.

“Can you check the thermostat? It seems like we don’t have any air running through here.”

“Whew. I thought it was just me. I’ve been dealing with menopausal stuff, but girl…”

“No, it’s definitely hot in here. This is getting ridiculous.”

Cora disappeared only to return a few minutes later.

“The air conditioning is certainly down, and it’s a building-wide problem. A few seamstresses have left for the day because of it.”

“Okay. Let’s shut down for the day and get someone out here to look at it.”

Cora nodded and disappeared to contact an HVAC technician while I powered down my computer and gathered up all my belongings.

Eight weeks had passed since I’d married my fake husband, but Saint and I had slipped into a comfortable routine with one another. The revelation that he had autism drew us closer. It was like a light flourishing into a dark room, which I was aimlessly fumbling around in. Despite what I knew, our relationship didn’t feel counterfeit. It felt genuine, with real feelings beginning to develop between us. Unsure of how to feel about that, I tried not to spend too much time thinking about it.

I’d noticed the changes in Saint first. He was much more relaxed and not as uptight as he’d been over our first week together. Comfortability was to blame. Being vulnerable in the presence of someone who both accepted and didn’t judge him had to have been freeing. As he relaxed, I followed his lead.

The room I was initially given when I arrived at the house was turned into my office. I’d spent a week transforming the space to my liking, silencing the internal reproach that it was all temporary. Collection boards were brought in, allowing me to set up a satellite space for days when I didn’t want to head to Demure’s headquarters, and soundproofing was added –my idea– to ensure I could blare my music without disrupting Saint’s sensory processing disorder.

Every night, I slept next to him, relishing the clean notes of coconut and sandalwood as the smell of his skin invaded my olfactory system. He made me feel secure, and that alone was worth its weight in gold. Even today, as I left the office early, I looked forward to seeing him when I got home. A lover of old-school R&B, I played Faith Evan’s Soon As I Get Home. The soulful lyrics punctuated my mood.

Detouring from the usual route I took to get to the beach house, I stopped at a garden store. When we first got married, Saint told me I could make changes to the house to suit myself. Returning to work hadn’t permitted me much time to do so, however. Now, with the office shut down, it seemed a perfect time to get a few things I envisioned to liven up the house.

As I browsed the aisles of the indoor portion of the store, my eyes locked on a gorgeous fiddle leaf fig. The height was perfect for the tall walls in the home. The rich, deep green would give a quintessential pop of color to the monotony of the interior. It wasn’t my intent to erase the style of the house. It was extremely relaxing and airy, like the beach behind it. For both my and Saint’s sake, I sought to maintain that. It was what he’d settled on to suit his needs before I entered the picture, and I loved the style of the home. The plants would simply add more, like a cherry topping a cake.

Standing in front of the fiddle leaf fig for several minutes, I compared it to the others beside it, imprisoning myself in a loop of indecision. Much like the potted greenery, my hesitation would keep me planted in place if I allowed it. When suffering such uncertainty, I typically went with both, buyer’s remorse be damned.

“Tori?”

The endless loop of wavering was broken by the curious inflection of my name. My head snapped in the direction of the summoner seeking an identity. She presented in the form of the curvy, dark-as-night vixen who dared to call herself my friend.

“Dream? Oh, hey, girl. What are you doing here?”

“Ain’t no, oh hey girl, heaux,” she reprimanded. “Where the hell have you been, and better yet, what are you doing here?”

She swayed up to me, placing a hand on her hip with her brows dipping into a scowl.

Dream had every right to be snappish. I’d been ignoring the girlfriend group chat amidst them trying to plan our next brunch date. Up to now, Robyn was the only one who knew a fraction of what I’d been up to. As far as the marriage went, everyone had been uninformed. I wasn’t ready to share that information. Hell, I didn’t know how I’d share that information.

“I’m getting plants, girl. Come here and hug me. Stop playing,” I grinned, reaching for my friend.

Dodging my grasp, she crossed her arms. “I ain’t giving you no hug, heaux. You done abandoned the group, Farrah. Gone on. Destiny’s Child will be okay without you.”

That tickled me, causing me to double over in laughter.

“Dream.”

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