Chapter Text
Phoebe flutters around the party; she is all laughter and sparkle. She knows she is, because she put on the sparkle along with her dress.
She air-kisses people she can’t remember and exclaims at the right times and drinks the cocktails someone hands her and wonders if there is anyone she can actually count on. Does she truly know anyone or is she too empty-headed to be able to tell who people are inside? There’s probably a reason she is such good friends with Adela and Bubby and the rest, who are delightful but…well, weren’t brought up to think much.
She mixes and mingles and sparkles, and despairs.
Then the shifting crowd moves just so and Maisie is there across the room, laughing up at Gloria and Binkie, making them laugh as well. Maisie, who is all sparkle but substance too. Of this Phoebe is sure, and she is unable to look away from the sheer luminance of her.
Maisie turns and looks at her, looks straight at her and smiles, and Phoebe’s heart lurches.
There is a terrible knot of emotions inside her that make it hard to breathe sometimes. Her affection for Maisie has become something different, irrevocably different, and she is terrified of what will happen if she says something, because she can’t lose Maisie, she just can’t, she wouldn’t survive it, not now. All the other feelings tangled up in her chest—anger, sadness, pride in Maisie’s talent, anticipation of all Paris will bring—fight for space with her hopeless longing, but the worst is knowledge that she is so blasted useless and silly that she can’t cope with any of them.
Bubby has said something funny, she realises, and she laughs heartily along.
There is a hand on her elbow then—how can just a hand be so familiar? But it is, and she turns to Maisie, who is looking at her with a society smile and serious eyes.
“Darling,” Maisie says, “I have simply got to get some air. Will you come with me? We shan’t be long,” she adds to Bubby and the rest, who hardly notice as Maisie pulls her gently away.
In a quiet corridor Maisie turns to her. “Phoebe, my dear, what’s wrong? Oh wait, of course I know.” Maisie’s arms go around her, a consoling hug like so many before.
Phoebe holds on tight, pulling Maisie close. Half of her is simply grateful for the comfort, though the selfish half can’t help noticing Maisie’s soft breasts pressed just below her own.
Maisie pulls back and searches Phoebe's face. Phoebe is mesmerised, transfixed, caught in the fairy spell of Maisie’s eyes. Maisie hasn’t spoken, and Phoebe finds herself closer than she was before. She is leaning slowly, slowly down towards Maisie. There is no noise, there is no party, there is just Maisie, whom Phoebe loves.
Maisie is still looking up at her; she hasn’t moved away. There is a little flash of pink against the red of Maisie’s lipcolour as her tongue reaches out to touch her lip.
Phoebe is helpless against this. It is only fear holding her back, and fear should be enough to stop her but it isn’t this time. She is still leaning, so slowly, towards those lips, the bottom one now glistening a bit.
Maisie moves abruptly and her soft mouth is against Phoebe’s, her hands on Phoebe’s head, pulling her down, and Maisie is kissing her and she is kissing Maisie back, lips slanting and tongues tangling, warm and close and Maisie, and it’s better than Phoebe imagined, ten times better, because Maisie is making little noises of pleasure that echo Phoebe’s own. She wants to kiss Maisie forever, here in this perfect moment with just the two of them, arms around that soft waist and Maisie holding her close and sharing each other’s breath.
The sound of approaching partygoers shatters the quiet, and they startle apart. Phoebe doesn’t know what to do with her hands, which feel empty and bereft of Maisie’s form. Maisie, bless her, solves this by grasping one of Phoebe’s hands in both of her own, fingers entwining. “Let’s go home,” she says, her eyes dark with desire.
“That sounds perfect.” But Phoebe thinks of the endless leave-taking and can’t gather the strength to move.
Maisie sees this for what it is and has the answer, as she so often does. “We’ve seen everyone we needed to. Adela won’t notice if we make a French exit.”
This is the best idea—the second best idea—of the evening. She smiles into Maisie’s eyes.
They slip out through the servants’ entrance and towards the night ahead.