She frowned, confused by her sudden agreement with feedback that, when she’d first heard it, had been hard to take.
“Precisely.You have the meat of the thing—I’ll leave you to trim the fat.”Vronsky waved a hand dismissively.
He was using Oliver’s metaphors, which made Aurelia think how much more efficient it would be if only Oliver and Vronsky could sit down to talk about the manuscript without her.
“Alright, I’ll work on cutting it down tomorrow,” she said.
“What other notes did this publisher have to offer?”Vronsky asked as he settled deeper into his chair.
“He thinks your stay in Italy is too boring,” Aurelia said, deciding to take the gloves off now.
“Well, I am not visiting casinos or bordellos, but those are hardly palatable pastimes for our readership.”
Aurelia couldn’t help letting off a snort at the word ‘bordellos’ and he narrowed his eyes in mock disapproval.
“If you are trimming the fat to get me to France, perhaps that will cure some of his boredom, eh?”
“Sure, I’ll try to keep only the most exciting bits of your time in Italy.”
She couldn’t hide her sarcasm but at least resisted the urge to mention that wouldn’t leave them with much since painting and visiting stables wasn’t exactly the stuff of high drama.
“We’ve made quick work of his notes, haven’t we?”
Vronsky sat up, looking satisfied with himself.Now was the moment to raise the prospect of writing a love interest for him, but Aurelia felt her throat tighten.She didn’t want to hurt Vronsky and knew it would upset him, but she had to admit that her own feelings were at play too.
As a reader, she felt invested in his relationship with Anna.It was one thing to want him to move on and build a new life for himself, but another to imagine him running off with a new woman after losing her.Her mother’s words came back to her once again:a love that powerful is written in indelible ink.For Aurelia, her mother’s death felt just like that.It was a loss that would stay with her forever, written in indelible ink across the pages of her own life.If Aurelia was still dealing with her own loss, could Vronsky really be ready to move on from his?
“Alexei, he did have some other notes,” she said after a moment.
“Yes?”
Aurelia pulled the manuscript out from a desk drawer, deciding that she might be able to build up to the major edit that hung in the air between them if they started with some of the minor ones.She pushed aside the scattered papers and books on her desk to make room for the manuscript, and Vronsky watched as she ran her thumb along an edge and flipped through it.His eyes widened as he took in the red marks that crisscrossed the pages.
“He has a lot to say, this Oliver fellow,” Vronsky observed.
“Oh, yes.He does indeed,” Aurelia said ruefully.
They spent the rest of the evening working their way through the manuscript, debating over which edits to make and which to reject.By the time dawn arrived, they’d spent so much time working on minor changes that Aurelia had completely forgotten to raise that lingering, most significant one.
40
Laterthatmorning,Aureliapulled out her laptop and started typing up a clean, new draft.With the amount of edits she was likely to get from Oliver in future, she couldn’t be bothered retyping entire pages on the typewriter, so she’d just have to hide her laptop away before the characters arrived each night.She smiled thinking that Oliver wouldn’t be able to make fun of her about typewritten pages the next time they saw each other.
A publication contract arrived in her inbox that afternoon, just as Oliver had promised, so Aurelia called Kali and asked if she’d be willing to dust off her solicitor’s skills and review it for her.Kali stopped by to look at it after one of her art tours, giving the two friends an excuse to catch up over tea.Before she left, Kali spent a few minutes going over the contract and said it had her stamp of approval.Aurelia was exhilarated to be one step closer to making Oliver’s commitment to publish the book official, but that feeling was matched by worry over having to ask Vronsky whether he’d let her add a romantic storyline.
Back at her desk after her visit with Kali, Aurelia called Antonia.She still hadn’t told her what she was writing about and thought—as she had a contract to publish it—now was the time.Aurelia dialed and barely registered a single ring before Antonia answered.
“Usually I beat you to it, but this time you did,” Antonia began.
“What wereyoucalling about?”
“Owen’s finally told us what he wants for his birthday next week and I need help figuring out how not to break his heart when we don’t get it for him.”
“What is it—a life-sized robot or something?”
“Worse.A dog.”
“Oh dear.I’ll start thinking of excuses for you.”
