Chapter 4: Surrogate Brothers

I wake up on the morning after the party feeling as though I've been asleep for centuries instead of hours. For a moment, I have a sense of profound de-realization, as though I'm waking up in someone else's bed, in someone else's life. My nightgown seems to hang strangely as I sit up, and the hand that brushes my hair from my face is not mine. For a terrifying few moments, my memories are blank.

Once they return, I wish they had never come back.

I look at the bedside clock as I throw the covers off and rise: it's only six-thirty. Breakfast isn't for another hour, at least, but I can't stay in bed, as though I'm on the brink of the greatest change I've faced since I met Noir. I have to do something… to plan, to prepare for it. I have to be ready when it comes.

It might help if I had some idea of how to do that.

As I dress, I notice a folded slip of paper on the floor by the door, and recognize the Courland family crest pressed into the wax sealing it. My heart sinks, leaps, and sinks again at the thought that it might be from Noir, but in the time it takes me to bend down and collect it, I realize the idiocy of that assumption. Noir would never be so… pretentious. Of course, it must be from Michel. I smile as I recall the look on Noir's face when Michel invited himself to stay for a few days. I'm sure Noir might have put up more of a fight had Florian not, surprisingly tactfully, chosen that moment to introduce him to some wealthy dowager.

I break the seal of the letter, and unfold it. The handwriting is unfamiliar, but surprisingly polished, considering the haste in which the note was likely written. It reads:

My dear Laila,

I invite you to lunch with me at Les Deux Moulins. There are some practicalities we must discuss.

Faithfully yours,

Michel

I sigh, and fold the letter up once again. Now, in the glare of the morning light, it seems crazy that I ever considered leaving. Surely, I'm meant to be here, running the affairs of this house and taking care of Noir, until it's time to plan my own funeral? Leaving, especially to run off with Michel, seems like the highest form of lunacy.

I tuck the letter resolutely into one of my pockets. If it's lunacy, then I suppose I am a lunatic.

---

"I don't understand why he has to stay here," Noir grumbles as I approach the dining room. "Have all of Paris' hotels suddenly gone bankrupt?"

"Noir, for the third time, please be civil. He is family, after all, and it's not his fault that his plans were changed." Florian pauses, and I visualize his grin a second or two before I'm in a position to see it. "Besides, he helped us out before, and wasn't it you that said, 'A favour to the great house Courland will never be forgotten?'

Noir's hand pauses in the act of lifting his cigar to his mouth. "You were supposed to be catatonic then, as I recall."

Florian chuckles, and I circle the table to take my usual seat at Noir's right. Neither of them seems to have noticed me yet. "I picked up a bit here and there." He turns to me, and nods. "Good morning, Laila. Thank you very much for last night."

I bow my head shallowly, self-effacingly. "You're welcome, Florian, but you really should be thanking Noir. It was all his idea: I just did what he asked." As always.

"Don't sell yourself so short. I'm sure the evening wouldn't have been nearly as successful without your contribution." Florian smiles, and I'm reminded anew of just how impossible it is to feel anything negative towards him. He may have taken my life from me, but how can I hold it against him, when the whole thing happened so innocently?

Michel enters the dining room a few moments later, dressed in one of Noir's suits. "I hope you don't mind my borrowing your clothes for today, Ray," he says, despite the fact that Noir's scowl reveals exactly how he feels on the matter. "My own are all so travel-stained: completely unfit for polite society." He fingers the cuff of his borrowed jacket. "It's fortunate that we're about the same size."

"Isn't it?" Noir says through gritted teeth.

Florian smiles across the table at me, and I am about to return the gesture when Michel sits down next to me, and seizes my attention. "Did you find my note, Laila?" he asks, loudly enough for the others to hear.

"Note?" Florian asks politely. Noir is still glowering, and I'm unable to tell whether he's annoyed that Michel is communicating with me behind his back or simply still angry about the violation of his wardrobe.

"Oh, just an invitation to lunch." I smile, and turn to Michel. "I haven't decided whether I'll come yet. There's quite a bit of cleaning up to do from yesterday."

Noir stubs his cigar out in the ashtray that sits between us. "The cleanup can wait, Laila. If you want to go, don't let it stop you." His eyes flick in Florian's direction, and I feel like an outsider, as though I've been looking at their world through an open window, and someone has just closed the curtains on me.

"Besides, I'm only in town for a few days." Michel's tone is soft, and I wonder if I should interpret it as an indication of sympathy. "If we don't seize this opportunity, who knows when we may see each other again?" A flirtatious note creeps into his voice, but I have only to look into his eyes to doubt its sincerity.

"Alright, then." I say. "I'll meet you there at noon…" I turn to Noir. "If you're sure it's okay."

"I already said it was," he replies, more than a little curtly.

"I can hardly wait," Michel says, and when I glance back at him, he's grinning, as though he knows something that we don't.

Maybe he does.

---

"I believe I understand why your present circumstances have become so uncomfortable," Michel says, breaking the silence that's hung over our table since we were seated here by the hostess.

I set down the utensils I've been toying with absent-mindedly, and look up at him. "Really?"

He nods. "Certainly. And I don't blame you in the slightest. It can't be easy, watching those two together, day after day…" His fingertips settle on the freshly-laundered tablecloth. "Not when you want Ray for yourself."

I swallow, and feel my cheeks heat up. "It's not… exactly like that."

"Oh, really?" Michel tilts his head to one side, and I am momentarily stunned by his attentiveness. "I apologize. Would you be so kind as to explain it to me?"

I twist my napkin in my lap. "It's not that I want Ray for myself… at least, not in a romantic context. I mean, I've thought about it, but… I gave up on it long before I gave up on staying. It's not the fact that he and Florian are together that makes me want to leave." I look away. "It's the fact that Ray doesn't seem to have any time at all for me anymore, not even as a friend."

"Have you spoken with him about this?"

I laugh. "You don't know very much about Ray. He'd hate that kind of weakness… he'd think I was being too high maintenance."

"Do you really think so?" Michel shrugs. "Of course, you know him better than I do, but I don't believe that he would interpret it that way. At least, not if the words were coming from you." He smiles. "Ray is the kind of man who won't realize these things unless you tell him what he's doing wrong. He tends to get caught up, to focus his entirety on a few select elements of his life, at the potential expense of everything else."

I look back at him. "You might be right."

He smirks. "Of course I am. Ray and I have more in common than our appearances, you know."

I feel strange as he speaks these words, as though I've just tripped over Pandora's box and the lid is beginning to fall open. "I'm beginning to see that."

"Just beginning, hmm?" Michel leans across the table slightly. "Laila… why do you want to come with me?"

I glare at him. "I told you, don't ask me that."

He holds up his hands. "No, no. You misunderstand me." He inhales deeply. "Why do you want to run off with me, as opposed to running somewhere else? Let's be honest: you barely know me, and you've never seemed very impressed with what you've experienced of my personality." He leans back. "So, why?"

"I don't know," I answer honestly.

"Is it because we're so much alike?" he replies immediately.

I blink quickly, fighting the instinct to deny this theory without even considering it. Once I've managed to win that battle, I focus on Michel. In this moment, I can only see how he differs from Noir: his infinitely lighter hair, his infinitely softer hands. I recall his ostentation, and the comfort level at which he moves through high society. All of these things and more distinguish him from Noir, and it seems ludicrous that I could be looking for a surrogate Noir in him. After all, they're nothing alike.

But then I begin to see him a bit differently, perhaps a bit more clearly. I note the structure of his face, and recall the expressions that I've witnessed on it. I acknowledge his stubbornness, his equal capacity for manipulative charm and cruelty. I realize the simple wisdom with which he's just managed to see right through me, though I've barely been able to get beneath my own surface, and remember all the times I've watched Noir do the same thing.

"I do believe you have your answer, Miss Laila," Michel says as he raises his water glass to me.

"Maybe." My voice is quiet, and I wonder if he can hear me. "What am I supposed to do now?"

"You still have two days to decide," he replies, and sips from his glass.

I don't want to admit that even two years might not be enough time to decide not only what I want to do, but whether I'm doing it for the right reasons.