Page 20 of Bridget & Gabe Are Not Okay

Gwen leveled the sword at Bridget’s chest, just close enough to imply a real threat.

Bridget swallowed. When she spoke, her voice was gravelly. “I swear an oath this day to the king and to England, to uphold the most noble values of chivalry…”

She was watching Gwen’s face as she spoke, and for a moment it seemed like this tactic might work: Her lips parted slightly as Bridget maintained perfect eye contact, her pupils blown wide like a hunting cat’s. The flat of the blade came to rest on Bridget’s left shoulder as she leaned closer, and Bridget thought, hopeful,Maybe this is one fight I’ll win.

“… to give my willing body and ready spirit…”

The weight of the sword shifted slightly, and Gwen frowned. “Willing body? You made that up.”

“That really is what you say,” Bridget said apologetically. She didn’t want to lose her momentum, so it was now or never—she rose up on to one knee, gently pushed the sword aside with the back of her hand, and then let that hand fall to Gwen’s hip, her thumb and forefinger splayed wide across the top of the princess’s thigh.

Gwen stopped breathing. When she seemed to remember it was necessary, her efforts were valiant but somewhat shaky. Bridget was watching her intently, checking her face for tells, but was still caught off guard when she leaned down, buried her fingers in the back of Bridget’s hair, and kissed her.

Bridget was forced very suddenly to reckon with all the things about Gwen she’d been trying not to think about outthere on the road: her unflinching purpose, her soft mouth and flighty hands; the fact that it was never enough to just kiss her without both of them feeling driven tomove, to find some horizontal or vertical surface to brace against so they didn’t keep going until they fell out of a window.

There was something that felt like alchemy when they touched. Bridget didn’t know if it was because of the way their bodies were put together, or the years they’d each spent acutely noticing the other from across courtyards and tourney stands, or if maybe it was something age-old and inevitable about knights and princesses doomed to want each other. It didn’t matter which it was, but Bridget was fond of that last one. She wasn’t romantic about many things, but she liked the idea of being Gwen’s cavalier; Gwen’s sword, forged to serve her.

Sort of ruled you out as devoted sentinel when you stopped replying to letters and avoided your princess entirely though.

Don’t think about it, Bridget told herself,if she’s not thinking about it. It was actually quite easy not to, because Gwen’s dress had these stupid slits in the ends of the sleeves that were probably just for show—fashion, maybe? Bridget had no idea what happened in the realms of fashion—but allowed access to long, smooth-skinned limbs, so that Bridget could run her hands up them with reverence. Gwen’s skin was cool to the touch but warming up fast, and Bridget was just thinking it was probably about time to get up off the floor when everything came to a sudden halt.

Gwen stopped kissing her. She pushed her away, and in a flash she was… furious. Shit.

“Where the hell have youbeen?” she said, the point of Bridget’s sword scraping along the ground as she took a half step backward. Her face was still red, but her eyes were brightwith angry tears now. Bridget had been right the first time.Doomed.

Bridget swallowed, her throat dry. “You know where I’ve been.”

“Obviously, Bridget, I mean—why did you stop replying to my letters? Why did you justvanish? I thought something might have happened to you, but I-I had someone check, and then when the results were published I knew you’d still been showing up to the tourneys.”

In the silence afterward, Bridget knew that what she said next would be very important. “I didn’t… know what to say.”

Gwen’s mouth fell open slightly, her lips pink with kissing, the rest of her now pinched and drawn. “What?”

“I still don’t know what to say.”

“Well, that’s… that’s just not good enough.” She was talking with her hands, the sword punctuating every other word. “We said you’d do the circuit again but that you’d write at least every week, and visit if you could when you were in the south. That was the agreement. You get your freedom, as much of it as you need, and then you come back to me when you’re done. You were there! You were the one whosuggestedit! I even started to question if we’d had that conversation at all, when you went silent. But I know that’s what we said, and God, Bridget, I’m so angry at you for making me doubt it. It wasn’t fair. So… I’m sorry, but I’ve been waiting for six weeks to hear what you have to say for yourself, and I need you to say it. Now.”

What could Bridget say?My hands aren’t connected to my brain anymore. Things that were once as easy to me as breathing are like another language. My horse seems to hate me. I can’t stand the sight of sunlight glinting off a helm. It distracts me. Everything distracts me; the world is made up of too manysounds, too many colors. I used to know exactly who I was and what I wasfor, but now that’s all gone.

“Sorry.”

It felt weird to still be kneeling. Like she was begging for forgiveness—except, of course, that she wasn’t doing a very good job. Talking about the things that mattered had never been her forte. Bridget wished they were still kissing. Kissing had always been the easiest and best thing about this. The rest was much more complicated.

Gwen shook her head, then placed the sword carefully on top of Bridget’s trunk with frightening formality and said, “I honestly thought you’d come back here and tell me right away that you just wanted to be friends. Not that you’ve been much of a friend either.”

Bridget frowned. “So then… why did you come to my room?”

“Because I decided today that if you’d changed your mind,Iwanted to be the one to end things withyoufirst!” Gwen said, exasperated. Bridget winced, but she knew she deserved it. “Because I was the one sending you letter after letter like an idiot, because I didn’t think anything had changed—yousaidnothing would change—and the longer you didn’t reply, the worse it felt, and eventually I realized that I didn’t deserve that. I have enough going on here without…”

She gestured to Bridget. The problem. Bridget didn’t like being the problem.

Life had been so much simpler before Gwen. The knowledge that there would be absolutely nothing easy about entangling herself with the thorny princess of Camelot had been one of the main reasons she’d been reluctant to interweave their lives, no matter how much she enjoyed watching Gwen bite her lip as she watched the lists, or wrap the ends of her braids absentmindedly around her finger. It should have just been asummer fling and a return to life as normal. That would have been cleaner. Almost painless.

Gwen was shaking her head again, backing away. She was going to leave the room, and then itwouldbe over. Bridget could just sit here and say nothing and let it happen.

“Hey,” she said, rising from her knees. “Wait. Sit down.” It wasn’t going to work, and Bridget knew it wasn’t, and in her sudden panic her walls crumbled just enough to allow one nakedly desperate, too-honest word to fly free.

“Please.”