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Your wrist remembered her pulse. It raced just the same as before, only now you had time to savor it. Her thumbnail dug into the back of your hand, and you moved to interlace your fingers with hers.
Tabitha’s mysterious cousin had turned out about as reliable as you’d expect from a Scarlet. The group call shattered to muffled syllables, then to static, and after a while, it was cut off completely. You were certain they’d gone ratting to Tabitha, while Stella insisted that it was just technical problems, the notoriously poor phone data in this town. No matter. The cousin and your earbuds were gone, leaving the two of you to deliberate if it’d be worse for the general store owner or the banned girl to go in. Stella was way too enthusiastic about getting a lungful of coal dust, though, so you decided to go yourself.
Through the gates and across the camp, you walked straight ahead, not glancing to your sides, keeping your back straight. It might have been a little too straight, though. Should you hold your arms still, or let them swing? If only you had pockets.
“Hey, general store lady!”
You turned to face the balding miner who definitely knew your name. He was leaning against the fence with a much littler man of approximately the same age.
“Hey.” You kicked at the sand and gravel with your heel. There was hardly any shade in the camp, and your choice of clothing wasn’t exactly ideal for the weather. The air was dry and gritty, the sweat-smell distinguishable even under the overwhelming stench of rock dust. “Have you seen Tabitha’s cousin around?”
“Can’t say I have, no ma’am.”
You let out an exasperated sigh. You were never getting your earbuds back. What were you doing, giving a virtual stranger the expensive pair? Though, now that you were here, you might as well finish their job, get a bit of intel. They had all seen you come in, already, the damage had been done.
You hadn’t realized what kinds of opinions you’d be exposing yourself to. It started well enough, with them telling you things you already knew, of how Tabitha exploited her workers, how unpleasant she was to be around. Then, who Tabitha had been sleeping with, how they wouldn’t sleep with her but actually they totally would. You hadn’t signed up to hear old man sexual preferences. They babbled on and on, as though they were oblivious to the deepening of your glare. And someone else might have let it slide, but you felt your blood pressure steadily rising, until you couldn’t stay quiet anymore. The heist was off.
“What the hell are you saying?” you snapped. “Did I ask? What gives you the right to talk about-“ A woman. Their boss. “-to talk about someone else that way?!”
Their eyes widened, the taller one taking a step back, and a momentary sense of justice washed over you before you remembered to worry about the reputation of the general store.
“What are you doing here,” a nasal voice came from behind you. Your shoulders stiffened on their own accord. And there she was, Tabitha Scarlet, shooting a look at her workers which sent them scurrying off, wishing their boss a good day. You were happy to see them go and unhappy to see them so afraid of their employer.
“I’m-“
Tabitha groaned. “Whatever, not out here. We’ve had enough commotion for one day, you can explain in my office.”
Tabitha’s “office” turned out to be a trailer parked on top of a hill on the outskirts of the camp, its walls lined with cabinets and dust and loose sheets of paper. A mounted rifle loomed over the small space, officiating her status as someone not only hopelessly old-fashioned, but following in the footsteps of the worst type of people. A faint smell of cigarettes lingered in the air. On a corkboard there was an uncharacteristically cute calendar and posters upon posters of Stella, bright red letters announcing her bannedness on most of them. The sheer amount of posters was definitely over the top. Your sweet friend had done nothing to deserve this much hate from Tabitha.
“I’ll ask you again. What are you doing here.”
You mirrored her irritated expression. “Your cousin ran off with my stuff. I’m just looking for them.”
“What? Why would they be here?” She sighed. “I told them to stay at the estate, I told them…”
You rolled your eyes. Unreliable as they had proven themselves to be, Tabitha couldn’t expect to ground a grown adult.
“And what exactly were you doing, talking to my men?”
“I was asking them about your cousin- it’s not important. You know, you should really keep a better eye on them, listen to the things they say, Jesus, Tabitha.”
She squinted. “What are you talking about.”
“They talk about you and your mother like you’re just pieces of meat. It’s fucking gross.”
Her face twitched for just a moment, but maybe you’d imagined it. She arched an eyebrow. “Why do you care, exactly?” Because she had to make things as difficult as humanly possible.
“Don’t get me wrong. I don’t like you, or your mother-“
“Noted.”
You took a deep breath. “Just… You shouldn’t tolerate that type of talk. It normalizes it.”
“It does what?”
“It-“
Tabitha didn’t let you explain, scoffing. “You have got to grow a thicker skin, Kaneeka. Really? Did they not have that type of talk in the big city?”
You did, but that was hardly the point. “You have women working here, for God’s sake! What do you think it’s like for them, listening to that? If you won’t think of yourself, then at least think of them!” She was so indescribably frustrating to try to reason with. She was a Scarlet, a stubborn Scarlet, the closets in her home filled to the brim with skeletons, no doubt. You should have just gone.
“And what the hell are you after with all this?!”
You should have left.
“I’m not after anything, I just-“ Out of words, your frustration caught up to you. You slammed your hand on her desk, so hard that it hurt. Tabitha jumped. Her mother’s eternally grinning portrait rattled against the wall, settling slightly askew.
Tabitha stood up from the chair, and you’d forgotten she was taller than you, with the way she’d slouch as she sat. Her voice dribbled with venom as she spoke: “If you came here to snoop around and lecture me on what I should or should not tolerate, you can leave. The door’s right there.”
You tossed your hands in the air with resignation, or attempted to. Her eyes widened, and in an act of pointless defense, she caught your right wrist in her hand. You froze in place, and so did she, her fingertips brushing against the neatly trimmed nails on your pointer and middle fingers, before releasing you and whipping her hand down like she’d been burned. Her pale face reddened. You hadn’t known it was possible for her to look more furious.
Your wrist would remember her pulse.
It turned out that the cousin had found the teens while the call cut out, and followed them to the abandoned Shaw mine all by themselves (to Stella’s despair), re-emerging with all but two of them. Miles was alright, stomping off as you tried to give him a piece of your mind. As the police arrived, you spotted Tabitha talking with them, and her eyes met yours, the now-exhausted glare lingering a little longer than usual.
Your mother served you your evening tea, for your cold, a cold which you didn’t remember having. But she had a knack for these things, knowing your incoming ailments long before you noticed them yourself. From the way she looked at you, you could tell she wanted to talk about what had happened today, but now wasn’t the time. You could rest, first, get a good night’s sleep.
You wouldn’t.
You considered Tabitha’s words, and the words of the miners, about Tabitha, about Pearlanne. Had Tabitha’s mother been the same as she was now, ignoring them, teaching Tabitha to ignore? You didn’t want to think about her. But no matter how hard you clutched your pillow, pressing it against your ears, sleep wouldn’t come.
She was the coal baron. The exploiter. She was the boss who slept with her employees, remember? It didn’t matter that she was a woman. That was still definitely fucked up. But that information, which you had in the moment considered another tally in the long list of the terrible things Tabitha Scarlet had done, now tasted rancid, like bile burning in your throat.
You’d had your spats with college lovers. They weren’t always pretty, either, messages left on wooden doors in water-soluble marker. Never would you have badmouthed them so publicly. Never would you have spoken of any of them in the way those miners spoke of Tabitha.
The events of the day played on repeat in your head, grainy like a black-and-white movie. You imagined the Ditchlings with their anguished faces and mangled bodies, the collapsed mineshaft, the children who wouldn’t be returning to their parents tonight, your brother who had. You imagined how Tabitha’s forehead creased as her eyebrows shot up in surprise. You imagined the calloused, murky hands of the old miners, reaching for Tabitha. How they’d fish for gossip and go blabbering to their coworkers and near-strangers. Your tired mind became a jumble of images you did not want there, solidifying into a single clear thought: You wouldn’t have treated her like that. No matter how much you hated the woman, you wouldn’t have.
And you wouldn’t.
On the lightly used couch of one of the more tolerable properties she owned, you caressed her cheeks as she kissed you, the initial roughness melting into something more real, more vulnerable. You traced the age lines on her face, her neck, the marks on her skin which made her look away in embarrassment. You thought you understood why. You had seen this face before, or a strikingly similar one, on another woman, one who wore it with more confidence. (To her detriment, in your opinion.)
And you held back the words you’d wanted to say to Tabitha, the countless arguments you’d practiced winning in the shower. Those words still struggled to resurface whenever she was right in front of you, right underneath. And you still believed them, you thought. No matter the reason, no matter her recent actions to the contrary, she was still terrible, and antisocial, and abusive. But she didn’t need to hear these things right now. You settled for another truth:
“God, you’re beautiful.”