Isla And The Happily Ever After Part 9

My smile turns into a full-blown grin. "Positive."

His discomfort eases, but only momentarily. His brow refurrows in confusion.

"Un nouveau record," I say. "Combien de temps ca t'a pris? Une heure?" A new record. How long did that take? An hour?

Josh's eyes narrow. He realizes that I caught him speaking in fluent French, even though he implied upstairs that he can't. "Au moins quatre-vingt-dix minutes," he admits grudgingly. At least ninety minutes. It only took this long for me to learn the truth.

I stare at him. I stare harder.

Finally, he shakes his head and laughs. I smile sweetly, this time to let him know that his secret is safe. Josh rubs the back of his neck. "I don't suppose you'd still want to show me that other place? That less pretentious, date-continuing place?"

"I don't know," I tease. "It's a secret place. Can I trust you?"

"I'm great at keeping secrets."

I nudge him gently. "I know you are."

The air outside is gusty and crisp, and it adds to my feeling of recklessness. I don't know if I'll be able to tell Kurt what I'm about to do, if this is breaking some sort of friendship code. It might be. But I don't care.

We're radiant, the thrill of the evening having been returned, as we hurry up the next four blocks. I take a left on rue Chapon and lead him to a building with white peeling paint and red wooden shutters. I stop at the keypad. Josh look surprised, maybe even shocked. "Don't tell me you have an apartment."

I punch in the code, and the door buzzes. I give him a mischievous smile. "Come in."

"I figured we were going to a bar or club or something. Colour me intrigued, Martin."

I wrinkle my nose.

Josh cringes. "Yeah. That doesn't work with a male surname, does it?"

I head upstairs, smiling to myself, and he follows quietly. After we've pa.s.sed several floors, he shoots me a curious look. "All the way up," I say. We spiral and spiral until we reach the top landing. Josh glances at the purple door with the leopard-print mat, expectantly. Nervously. "Not that one." I steer him around a hidden corner towards a second, smaller door. "This one."

He tugs on the k.n.o.b and discovers that it's locked. I fish out the skeleton key from the bottom of my bag. It's heavy and iron. "You know," he says, "if you weren't tiny, cute, and remarkably innocent looking, I'd be running away right now. This feels like the set-up to some torture p.o.r.n."

"Never trust a girl because she looks innocent." I wag the key at him, but my heart pounds faster. He said I'm cute. I turn the key, the lock thunks, and the door creaks open.

Josh squints into the darkness. "Ah. More stairs. Of course."

"Last set, I promise."

He follows me inside, and I gesture for him to shut the door. We're enveloped in pitch black. "Wait here," I whisper.

"Are you getting your axe?"

"Handcuffs."

"Kinky. But, okay, I'll try it."

I laugh as I climb the final set of stairs. They're narrow, rough, and steep, so I ascend with caution. I raise an arm above my head until my fingers. .h.i.t the trapdoor. One more turn of the key, a powerful shove with the heel of my hand, and it pops open. The stairwell illuminates. I look down. Josh looks up at me, bathed in starlight and wonder.

He steps onto the rooftop balcony with silent reverence. I close the trapdoor, and we're surrounded by a sparkling, winking cityscape.

"You can see everything from here," he says. It's the first time I've heard him speak with awe. The serpentine river and crumbling cathedrals and sprawling palaces and everything, yes, everything is visible from here. The view is even better than the Pompidou's. The City of Light pulses with life, Nuit Blanche celebrations in full swing.

"Welcome to the Treehouse." I shine with a buoyant pride. "I've never had a real one, but it makes for a good subst.i.tute. The only part that requires an imagination is the tree itself."

"I can't believe it. This is yours?"

"My aunt's. Tante Juliette lives in the apartment with the purple door. I used to play up here when I was a little girl, but then she gave me the key during my soph.o.m.ore year. Kurt and I need somewhere...to escape."

Josh is taking in the s.p.a.ce, lingering on and processing each item. The balcony is square, snug, and crammed with a variety of worn objects: a wooden ladder, two mismatched cane chairs, a mossy terracotta pot holding a miniature rosebush, stacked piles of round stones, a cracked mirror with a gilt frame, a collection of pale green soda bottles, a steamer trunk with a broken lock, and the head of a white carousel horse. A low concrete wall holds everything in.

"They're all found objects," I explain. "We pick them up off the street. We have a rule that none of our decor" I say this word somewhat jokingly, somewhat seriously "can be purchased."

Josh squats down and delicately touches the horse's mane. "People leave things like this on the street?"

"In front of their houses. They set them out for the garbage-men to take away."

"What about this?" He points to a chipped porcelain bowl that's filled to the top with fresh water.

"That's for Jacque. He's the stray cat who sometimes hangs out with us."

Josh shakes his head. "This...yeah. This is incredible. You must bring all of your paramours here."

It's a tease, but as he stands back up, I sense a real question underneath. "There's only been one. And, no, he didn't receive an invitation." I bend over to remove a thick, plaid blanket from the steamer trunk. "Okay. I lied."

"You did bring him here?"

I hold up the blanket and laugh. "No. I bought this. I didn't find it on the street."

Josh emits a barely discernible but clearly relieved breath of held air. It makes me smile. I lay the blanket down. We sit, facing each other with crossed legs. "So tell me about him," he says. "Tell me who I should be jealous of."

"Well. His name is Jacque, he's about yea-high, and he has the most delightful little paws."

"Come on."

"The guy isn't important. It's not like I dated him for two years," I add pointedly.

"Ugh, don't remind me." But after a few seconds, he nudges my knee. "Go on."

I sigh. "His name was Sebastien. He's French. He attends a school ten minutes away from ours. And my aunt set us up."

"Oy." Josh winces. "The same aunt who lives below?"

"The very one. Tante Juliette is friends with his maman, and they invited us both to brunch last winter, not telling us that the other one would also be there. It was humiliating. But, oddly enough...we clicked. We dated quietly for a few months."

"Dated quietly?"

"We didn't want to tell our nosy families that their plan worked." I pause for a well-timed grin. "So we didn't."

"Did anyone know?"

"Of course. Kurt knew. And Sebastien's friends."

"So...what happened?"

My gaze lowers. "Turns out, he wasn't a nice guy. He didn't really like Kurt."

"I'm sorry." Josh winces again. "How serious were you guys? Before that?"

"You mean did we have s.e.x."

He's taken aback by my bluntness. He ducks his head, abashed.

"Yes," I say.

He tries to cover his surprise. Again. I suppose everyone at school a.s.sumes that I'm a virgin that is, if they don't already think I'm banging my best friend.

"But we were never serious-serious," I explain. "I mean, when you grow up half French, it's not like s.e.x is this big taboo. And, yeah, you have to be careful and you need protection and blah blah blah, but it's not that American Puritanical be-all, end-all. You know? Sebastien was the only one, though. I don't want you to get the wrong-"

"No." He shakes his head rapidly. "I know."

A long pause. "How about you?"

"The same. Just the one."

The wind picks up, and I rub my bare arms. "But you loved her."

"I thought I did." Josh stares out over the city. "And then I knew I didn't, and she knew she didn't, but we stayed together, because...I don't know why. Maybe because we thought we should be in love. At least I did. I wanted to be in love." He looks back at me. "Have you ever been in love?"

"No." Yes. With you.

A motorcycle pa.s.ses on the road below. We listen until its guttural roar fades away. Josh glances at me, and then he double-takes. "You're shivering."

"Oh, I'm fine. I like the chill."

But he's already on his knees, removing his coat. He swings it up and around my shoulders, and the weight of it stuns me in more ways than one. My body weakens with l.u.s.t. The coat smells like citrus and ink and him.

"I saw you that next night," he says.

"Huh?" My eyes open. "What night?"

"Last summer. I went back to the cafe at midnight the next night, and I saw you there. I knew it was a long shot, but...I had this feeling you might be there. And you were."

I know that feeling. I had that feeling. "Why didn't I see you?"

"I never went inside. I saw you through the window, and you..."

"I was with Kurt," I finish.

"So I kept walking. I felt like such an idiot. If only I'd known, I wish I'd known. You'd been so funny and flirty, and-"

"Flirty?"

"Yeah." He grins. "I could kinda tell you liked me."

"OhmyG.o.d." I'm mortified.

"No! It was cute. Trust me, it was really, really cute."

"Yeah, nope. I want to die now, thanks."

"No. I'm serious. I always liked you, but I thought you didn't like me. You would never talk to me. So I didn't think you were even an option, and then I got together with Rashmi, and that was that. But I realized last summer that you're just shy."

Back up, back up, back up. "You always liked me?"

"A supersmart hot girl who reads comics? Are you kidding? You were definitely on my radar."

Hot. I've been upgraded to hot. No one has ever called me hot. Cute? Yes. Adorable? Yes, often, and it makes me want to punch them. I didn't know short girls could even be hot. I thought I'd been permanently relegated to elfin-pixie-child status.

"Well, b.l.o.o.d.y noses." I hug his coat tighter. "Those are definitely hot."

Josh buries his head in his hands. He moans. "I can't believe I did that."

"I believe the laws of physics did that."

"And my chin."

I laugh. "But until that last part, it was pretty great, right? I mean, we had actual fireworks. Talk about a credits-rolling, happily-ever-after kind of a kiss."

"If only I could take credit for those."

"You know...you can always try again."

He raises his head. "Setting off fireworks?"

"A second first kiss."

"I think that's just called a second kiss."

I b.u.mp my knees against his. "Are you seriously going to make me ask again?"

"Um. No." Josh quickly leans forward.

"Unless." I put a hand on his chest. "Are you sure? Because. If you don't want?"

He smiles. "You're ruining our second first kiss."

"I just...wanted to make sure," I say.