Her closet is full of dresses, ball gowns and office wear alike, and her fingers slip between the hangers to push them aside one by one, seeking something elegant. Not too flashy but formal enough for the stuffy socialites of Sanctuary Hills. She chooses a black dress, off-the-shoulder with a knee length skirt, and decides she can relieve its plainness with pearls. When she's slipped it on and stepped up to the mirror, she rifles through her jewelry box.

"I like that one." Nate smiles without looking away from his reflection as he buttons his shirt. "Haven't seen it in a while."

She collects a pair of diamond studs in her hand and bites her lip playfully. "You like any dress so long as the skirt is over your head."

He smiles wider. He's no doubt remembering all of her dresses that his hands have slid into, that his mouth has ducked under, and there have been a lot. They have not outgrown each other yet and by the way his eyes are darkening now, they won't soon. "I do. But I really like this one."

He steps closer and there's no doubt what he wants. She's inclined to give it to him, feels the pulse of desire between her legs. Nate is handsome on the best of days but when he looks at her like this, ravenous and heated, he's fully irresistible.

"Don't you mess up my makeup, Nathaniel Davis," she whispers as he lifts her onto the countertop.

"Never, my dear."

His mouth roams her neck, plants barely-there kisses along her skin that turn her inside out while the hand on her knee creeps up her thigh. This is not half of what they'll do tonight but it will tide them over until the party has fizzled and he can fuck her properly.

There are always upwards of a dozen parties to attend at any given time because this neighborhood is the sort of pretentious middle-class housing development whose lifeblood is the illusion of importance. Nora hates it. This house had been Nate's idea for all of their would-be children but Nora is less and less sure they'll ever conceive and she takes it out on the house, this damned neighborhood of pretty plastic people that she will socialize with tonight.

At least she has this.

Tension and intimacy and then oh so sweet release.

Nate's fingers slide over her and inside of her, having mapped out her body long ago and he's a certifiable expert on turning her into a moaning mess. She drops her hand to his but it's not to guide him. He needs no assistance. She just wants to feel the flex of his fingers as they work her, play her like an instrument he is well-practiced at.

She wants him to draw it out and make them late, wants to not go to Susan Powell's at all. Snooty Susan at the end of the cul-de-sac. If they never show up, it might well be that their absence would go unnoticed. But Nate is breathing just as hard as she is and he unzips his pants to finish the both of them far too soon. She shoos his hand away from his fly and it's her own that wraps around his cock and makes him drop his jaw, makes him twist wickedly inside her in revenge.

She knows she's close when her languages blur together and Nate can only understand half of the praises she offers. And then, feeling her contract around him, he spills himself over her hand and they both take a moment to appreciate that lighter-than-air feeling and bask in the afterglow.

He stays the gentleman in everything, helps her down and kisses her temple before he cleans himself up and attends to the tie that has been draped loosely around his shoulders. There's no place like home, she thinks, but even as she does, she knows why it's not quite true.

She wants to cry. This had always been enough; always until it wasn't because she hadn't known anything was missing until Danse. She craves him in ways unexplainable. It isn't his character or the way he treats her so much as it's some undefinable spiritual phenomenon that leads her to believe in a Great Something Else. She still thinks of him: how it might be feel to have him dressing in her bathroom, watching him knot ties and fold collars and just belong in the same space as her.

There are no more holidays, no more excuses to see him and she has to know. "How's Danse been?"

Nate is oblivious to the whys behind her question. The boys had gone out the night before so it isn't random, not strange enough that he should see through the ruse.

"Good," he reaches for his shoes and slips them on. "Actually... well, it's too soon to say much. He's been out with that Camila girl a few times."

She fiddles with the strand of pearls she's placed around her neck and pretends the stabbing pain in her stomach isn't there. She doesn't care what he does or who or how often and she will lie to herself as much as she has to. "A few..."

"I know. I haven't seen him with anyone in a while."

He's listened to her, then. He's done what she's asked and what's best for the both of them. There's no reason to scowl at her reflection except that she knows Camila is everything she cannot be. Friend, lover, domestic goddess rolled into one. The whole package, and probably with a working womb to boot.

There's no competition. Nora should not compete even if there was.

Nate is willing to give her anything she needs. But some things, she thinks, cannot be achieved through time and effort. The difference between earning something and being given it is vast. The latter only happens once in a blue moon and that's precisely why it's so valuable, so frustratingly difficult to refuse.

But she does. And for all she knows, she may never see him again. He will fall in love with Camila and forget Nora and it will be that much easier to keep to herself.

But the thoughts are harder to quell. Everything reminds her of him, like some schoolgirl crush.

She hardly knows Snooty Susan or her husband, Mr. Powell, but she realizes as she listens to them talk that he is also military. Like Nate. Like Danse. Everyone and their mother is in the goddamn United States military and she digs her nails into her palm.

While Nate is engaged with someone he hasn't seen since basic, she excuses herself to a table in the corner of the room with more half-full wine bottles than she thinks she's ever seen and as she refills her glass past the mark of propriety, she leans against the counter and allows herself to be swept away by fatigue.

Too many people. There are too many people here and she doesn't like any of them and she's tired of the charade. She is drained by her work and again when she goes home to too many empty rooms that may never be filled. She hears her mother's voice telling her to pray and she has and she does and she's scared the answer is no.

She tilts her head up to save her makeup from the destruction of tears. It's a crime to fall apart in so public a space, one she's never committed yet. If she can wait, she knows Nate will let her fall apart on his chest tonight.

He does. He isn't blind sees to her struggling and the fake smile she props up with a few drinks and he has them home and reclining on the sofa by nine. Her arms are locked around him, refuse to let him up but he won't complain, he says because there's nowhere he'd rather be. She falls into a quiet calm with his fingers combing through her hair but it's disturbed by her curiosity, her wondering if Danse is doing the same for Camila. There's no room for thoughts like that and peaceful dreams so she buries it and tells herself not to rob that grave. She won't see him for months or longer if she can avoid Nate's gettogethers. For all she knows, he'll put a ring on Camila's finger before she will ever lay eyes on him again.

All is as it should be, she insists as she falls into unconsciousness. The world is right even as it slips from its axis.