Tilly held her gaze for a long moment before she extended the novel to Kate, opened to the passage.

Tilly tapped a paragraph with her fingernail and Kate made a disgruntled sound of acknowledgment as she began speed-reading. A young woman learning herself while her trusted friend advised her from behind a closed door—so what? The passage was beautifully written and integral to character development. Kate could feel Tilly’s sharp eyes scanning her face. She could only imagine the immature giggles the passage had received from the girls. But what had gotten Tilly so riled up?

She returned the book to Tilly’s hands. “Whatever the girls said, they’re just stirring you up.”

“Yeah?” Tilly pressed. “Just stirring me up? Then why, when I explained the metaphor of Shug’s button,” she air quoted the word, her cheeks tinging pink, “did Grace say, ‘The button she’s touching isn’t a metaphor, Tilly.’ In fact, I believe Grace’s words were, ‘The button is pretty f-ing literal.’ So if they’re just stirring me up as you claim they are, then why did they find that so hilarious?”

Kate chuckled. Wow, Tilly, pulling out the big guns…

“Don’t be arrogant, Kate. Why?”

Kate’s gaze shot up. “What?” she asked, confused.

“Why did the girls laugh at that?” Tilly repeated, completely serious.

Kate blinked twice. Hold up. Was Tilly not being sarcastic? Was she genuinely asking Kate what Grace had meant? Did she really not understand? “Seriously?”

Tilly arched a brow, waiting.

“Til…in the book…she’s talking about her clitoris.”

“Excuse me?”

She wet her lips. “Her button…it’s her clitoris.”

Tilly’s brow furrowed as she stared at Kate. Lowering her gaze, she reopened the novel and began flicking for the passage.

Kate watched, gobsmacked, as confusion crossed Tilly’s face. Hail Mary Full of Grace…had Tilly really not known? She was thirty…how was that possible? The passage was so clear, it seemed almost impossible that the meaning could escape her.

Tilly stopped on the page, her long lashes fluttering against her cheek as she placed what Kate had told her into context. As understanding dawned, something turned behind Tilly’s eyes. “Oh. I supposed I overlooked that,” she muttered.

Overlooked that? How the hell could she overlook something like that? Had she tried to read a copy in braille?

Tilly looked up. “This is filth.”

“It’s a classic. It’s…” Kate paused. She shook her head and averted her gaze.

“What was that look for?” Tilly demanded.

The sixth period bell was shrill as it rang out through Kate’s office. Down the hall in the language classroom, there was the loud scrape of chair legs against the hardwood floors as girls shot from their seats.

Kate shifted the file of essays beneath her arm. “No reason. I’m just surprised that something like this warrants such a reaction.”

“Why wouldn’t it?”

Kate cleared her throat. “It’s just that, well, you didn’t seem to be so scandalised by The Joy of Lesbian Sex.”

She could summon the memory in a heartbeat—returning to their room one night after a shower and finding seventeen-year-old Tilly at their shared bureau, The Joy of Lesbian Sex spread open in her palms like a hymnal. Kate had made the purchase in Melbourne that winter, hidden it at the bottom of her underwear drawer upon her return to St. Joan’s. It was a vivid recollection, the way Tilly’s eyes had widened when she’d realised she was caught, Kate mumbling something about forgetting something in the west wing bathroom and retreating. When she’d returned, the drawer had been closed and, like the subject of Kate’s sexuality, the book had gone undiscussed for all of eternity.