+ OMER ( @omer-nacar )
EVENING, TUESDAY 2ND MARCH. OMER’S HOME, HAMPSTEAD. It’s been over a week since they last spoke. Over a week since his beard tickled the soft skin of her inner thighs. Over a week since she condemned them to this uncertain silence that has her staring at her texts, cursor blinking against a blank message bar. I need you, she wants to say in the wake of Saint’s confession and the literal bombshell that had been dropped on Famine, her only close friend who doesn’t belong to the Femenias name typically valued for his ability to offer sturdy reassurance and outside perspective; a grounding rod to the electrical storm that life is brewing. But she doesn’t, because Kitty knows anything she sends will be pale in comparison to how she feels, far better when it comes to actions than words.
Which is how she ends up here on the way back from the house she grew up in, stood in Omer’s back garden while he’s working, eying up the clean glass angles of his home. Hidden under the cover of darkness, it takes fifteen minutes for her to remember how to pick a lock, jamming the thin steel rods aggressively before there’s a satisfying click. The door swings open, Omer’s cleaner looking at her with a frown with the key in their hand. “Shit, hello,” Kitty says, pleading her case of innocence ( “I know what it looks like but I’m a friend, not a burglar” ) with multiple photos of Omer on her phone before she’s let inside. Making a beeline for the kitchen, she finds his fridge ( as always ) well-stocked, helping herself to a daintily decorated slice of cheesecake.
She’s perched on a stool at his island counter when the familiar hum of a car pulling up outside catches her attention, pushing a strawberry slice around the plate. Something anxious lurches through her stomach, listening to him enter the house. Footsteps grow closer and Kitty braces herself to meet his gaze, an explanation slipping from her mouth before she can trap it behind her teeth. “I was in the neighbourhood visiting my parents. My mum says hi.”