The Dreamers Read Online Free PDF Page B

her life but she does not care. She just wants to drink in every detail about her, in case she never sees her again.
    She has shoulder-length, slightly curly black hair. Her skin is darker than Arianwen’s, almost tanned . It does not mar her beauty. Her face is pretty but she has a strong jaw and a determined look to her. There is paint under her short fingernails and the smudge of pencil lead on her fingertips. Her body is slim and she is actually wearing trousers. Arianwen rubs her hand along the woman’s thighs. The material of the trousers is rough and course. They are a faded blue colour and look well-worn. She is not a rich person then.
    Arianwen cannot take her eyes from her companion. She has whispered soft words to her, sung to her like they had sung together at the piano. The woman heard her voice, responded to her.
     
    ‘Am I your sweetheart?’
     
    ‘Yes!’ Arianwen had wanted to shout, to fill the whole cottage, the whole village, the whole world with her proclamation. But her insides had filled with fear and she had shown herself to be a coward. Blodwyn did not want her, why should this woman, this stranger?
    Then, in the silence, she had reached out and whispered her confession. Fy nghariad . This woman is her sweetheart. She feels a pull to her, some strange connection.
    But there is a distance between them. It is like these times alone with this woman are a world apart from her ordinary life. Arianwen is pulled between these two worlds and she does not know which way to go. Arianwen does not know what it means, only that she knows of no way to cross the distance. She is trapped.
     

Chapter Six

    J ENNIFER WAS AVOIDING CERIS . She hadn’t seen her since that day in the coffee shop, nearly a week ago now. It was at times like this that she wished her old dad was still around. He always knew how to deal with people. Jennifer knew that was one of her failings. She could make friends easily but she found it far too easy to say the wrong thing, before she’d even thought about it. And she never knew how to put it right.
    Could she have broken it off with Ceris in a better way? Maybe. Could she have thought it through before she’d started dancing with her like that, before she’d started kissing her, before she’d started rubbing against her. She’d had far too much to drink.
    Jennifer sat in front of her easel at the back door, which opened onto her little garden. Beyond the garden, she could see the beach. The cove, for which the village was named, was blue and sparkling. There was a curved beach, golden sand stretching out between the high cliffs. The sea moved gently. There was almost no wind down there. Jennifer adored the colours; the blues and greens all mixing in together fluidly.
    She began to paint. She wanted to capture the peace of that quiet little beach. She longed to feel that peace inside her. She began to mix up her colours. The sea was so many shades of blue and green, she knew she could never capture all of them. She would be satisfied with capturing just an impression of it.
    ‘What do you think?’ she asked the empty room as she considered the blue green mix she’d created to use as a base. ‘Is that about right?’
    The answer she got wasn’t with words. Instead, she was rewarded with a skipping refrain on the piano.
    She smiled. ‘I guess you approve then.’
    Jennifer began to paint: slow, careful strokes across the canvass. She wanted to recreate the pleasure she felt whenever she looked at that view. She wanted to make herself feel at peace again.
    As she painted, she wondered about her companion. She wanted to know more about her. She felt sure she was a real person, no matter what her logical mind said. She was learning about her, learning her soul or her spirit.
    Her companion’s music filled the cottage: soft and lilting but tinged with sadness. They were communicating in a way deeper than words.
    Jennifer smiled, painting and listening to that music. She felt at