“Penny for your thoughts, Tina?,” Bette was saying.  Tina had woken ahead of Bette the morning after they had spent a long night talking in a café in the Left Bank.  She had gone out to get them breakfast.  She remembered Bette commenting that she wasn’t particularly fond of the coffee that she had tried, on her arrival at this hotel.  Thus Tina made a few calls, and found out there was a boulangerie nearby that the owner of the café they had gone to last night recommended.  Fortunately, it also carried butter and cheese.  And it brewed a good cup of coffee.

Tina was setting up their breakfast, when Bette peeked out from the bedroom.  She smiled upon seeing the breakfast spread Tina was putting final touches on.

She pulled on the robe Tina had laid out over the corner of the bed, for her, tightening its straps as she sat at the table.  Bette picked up the steaming cup of coffee gratefully, inhaling its aroma.

Tina had been quietly sipping her coffee, in the meantime, seemingly lost in thought.

“I’m sorry, Bette. I just zoned out for a bit.  Did you say something?,” she refocused quickly on Bette, when she heard Bette say her name.

Bette just smiled, and repeated, “I was just wondering about what you were thinking, that’s all.”

She picked up the half baggette that Tina had broken up for her, and broke off a smaller piece, to butter it. Bette bit into the bread, approvingly.  “This is good bread, Tina.”

Tina nodded, “Recommended by our friend, the café owner last night.”

They fell silent. After Bette swallowed, she asked Tina, “What’s on your mind, T?”

Tina smiled a half-smile, “Just something Logan and I were talking about one evening, early in the spring. In some ways, the conversation was inspired by the Jay DeFeo hanging in our wall.”

She swallowed quickly, “I’m sorry, Bette, I didn’t mean to say “our””

Bette waved it off, “T, let’s not be that way.  We shared a place for the better part of 12 months, we had a life.  During that time we lived in a world that we shared so much of ourselves in. In every respect, yes… it is “our” wall.”

“So… the painting.  Did it inspire Logan?"

Tina smiled, “Actually, it did in a way.  But everything about the apartment inspired him, he seemed to say.  The pictures of us, the way we decorated it, and all the personal things around it.”

It was Bette’s turn to smile a half-smile.

“And did it inspire you?,” she asked softly.

Tina put down her coffee. As with Logan, she chose her words carefully, “Yes it did Bette.  I couldn’t have survived without it.  I saw the tension; I saw the darkness; but also the beauty….”

“Hmmm…,” Bette looked back at her, reflectively, “Not a perfect world, fragile even?”

Tina teared up, “Yes, not a perfect world. And Logan says, a rare one.  He used the word love.”

Bette smiled a half-smile, again, “Not love because of…but love in a world that lovers build… and share, rather.”

Tina said nothing, but her tears began to fall, again.

Bette was tearing up, also, “I’m guessing your words, not his.”

Tina nodded.

Bette drew a breath, put down her coffee, and clutched the robe closer around her.

“Tell me about Scott, T.”