Fervent Preparations

Emily had never been much for sunbathing, but the poolside at The HH made a strong case for it. She lay on a lounger, naked as always, her body arranged in that unconscious way she’d perfected: one knee up, the opposite foot hooked over, a single hand tangled absently in the mane of hair that spilled down her side like a living sheet. Even on days when her mind ran a million directions, she could usually count on her hair to do the work of modest. She once joked to Dawn that she must have been a porn mermaid in a past life—cursed to be on land, but always mostly obscured by the aquatic tangle of her own mane. Dawn, blushing, had agreed that it was either that or a shampoo commercial gone terribly off-script.

The air was already heavy with the sweet perfume of the plumeria hedge, which ringed the pool in a tangled mass of pink and white blossoms. There were days when she could almost pretend The HH was a normal resort, a place where people went to forget the world instead of getting permanently rewritten by it. This morning, though, she could not forget the world at all. The Ereshkigal debt hung over everything, a black sun at the center of her thoughts; it wasn’t even her fate on the block, but the feeling had percolated into every conversation, every Mildred’s stiff smile, every glance from the other girls at breakfast. Laura was going to die again, and Emily was fresh out of ideas for how to save her, even though this did not mean she wouldn’t try to do so. Like the others, she was spending much of her time in the Sky Archive now.

She tried to focus on the warmth of the lounger, the precise tickle of the sun on her thighs, the little shivers as the ocean breeze set the short hairs on her arms on end. None of it took. The only thing that cut through was the weird, crackling pull under her skin—the side effect of Dream a Little Dream of Me. She never knew who would be the target, never knew what would actually happen, but every morning-after left her with a single person stuck in her head like an unfinished lyric. Today, that person was Riley, and the echo of the dream—hers or Riley’s, she could never tell—had rewired her whole body to tune for the sound of that voice.

She tried to push it out of her mind. Riley was a friend, but there was Andy, and there was the debt, and there was the growing suspicion that Emily’s own head was more like a rental property than something she actually owned. Still, even with her eyes closed, she could imagine the shape of Riley’s shadow when it finally came across the tiles.

It was easy to spot Riley. She never tiptoed, never did the slow slide up to a pool to test the water with a toe. She walked in the open, strides long and loose, black jeans and black tank top both clinging so tight they looked like a dare. Her hair was wet, slicked back in a glossy red-and-black fan that left her sharp olive face unmasked. She wore her body like a public service announcement: you could have this, but you’d better not waste her time.

Riley dropped onto the lounger beside Emily, one elbow cocked behind her head, legs stretched out like a crime scene chalk outline. She was still damp, and the sun set little pinpricks of steam working their way off her calves.

Emily opened one eye, then the other. “You always sneak up on people like that?”

“I didn’t sneak. And sunbathers are fair game,” Riley said. “It’s the price of naked loitering.” She let the words hang for a second, then grinned. “You’re lucky I’m not a towel thief.”

Emily made a show of glancing down her own body, the artful arrangement of hair, the perfect triangle of accidental modesty. “And you’re lucky I don’t own a towel. Wouldn’t want to give the impression I’m shy.”

Riley snorted, low and sharp, then tilted her chin toward the plumeria hedge. “It’s gonna rain, you know. Right after lunch. You can feel it in the petals—they’re wide open, like they’re waiting to get ruined.”

Emily lifted her face and inhaled. “Doesn’t rain in paradise.”

“Paradise is a fraud,” Riley said. “Every decent myth has a hurricane. And it already rained once, remember?” She stretched, the movement pulling her suit tight across her chest. “You don’t have to cover for them, you know. The rest of the harem. They’re terrified. They just don’t have your level of denial.”

Emily looked away, out at the still blue of the pool. The surface didn’t even ripple, but under it she could see the ghost of herself and Riley, like twin bodies floating face-up and motionless. “It’s not denial. We just haven’t found the answer yet.” A beat. “There’s a difference.”

“Maybe,” Riley said. She closed her eyes for a second, then turned her face back to Emily. “Can I ask you something?”

“Is it a trick question?”

“It’s about the Hollow Garden,” Riley said, voice softer now. “You worked down there, right? For almost two years?”

Emily nodded. “I did.” She thought of the rooms, the women who struggled, and those who were well and truly lost. She thought of the way the day started there: the communal breakfast, the stillness, the way every conversation was a little too polite, as if the walls themselves might tattle. But she also thought of the peace, the quiet that helped those who could be saved.

“Did you ever meet Sandra?” Riley asked.

Emily nodded again, a slower motion this time. “She lived in the cottage at the very end of the west path. Never came to the Gentle Hearth with the others, not after the first few weeks. Staff always told us to leave her be, unless she called for something. But I saw her almost every morning when I went to check the birdfeeders.” She realized, hearing herself, that this made it sound more clinical than it was. “She was… not a case. She was just a person you could have a real conversation with. When she felt like it.”

Riley didn’t move. “What is she like?”

Emily thought about that. There were a thousand answers, none quite right. “She was sad, but she never let it be the only thing about her. When I brought the milk, she’d have a joke ready—sometimes good, sometimes garbage—but she’d always wait for me to laugh, just to check if I actually thought it was funny. Some days she wouldn’t say a word, just let you sit with her in the sun, like that was enough.”

Riley picked at a loose thread on her own suit, her fingers moving restless. “Did she ever say if she remembered her kid?”

Emily nodded. “She did.” She looked at the line of the hedge, the way the flowers seemed to swallow the sun. “She would say her whole body hurt for you. But she also remembered every detail of you. Said she hoped you were happy, or at least not as angry as she was. And she would say her greatest regret was that she would never get to see you.”

Riley blinked. Once, twice. “You knew?”

Emily nodded. “Not until yesterday. Myra mentioned you went down to the Hollow Garden with her and Laura, to see your mothers, and I knew Sandra's daughter was called Riley. It wasn't a big logical leap. I'm sorry.”

“I did go,” she said. “A couple of days ago. She let me come to the cottage. There was a screen,” Riley continued. “One of those old folding ones, fabric panels. She had it set up right in the middle of the room.” Her jaw moved. “She said she didn’t want me to see her like this. That it was her choice to make.” She looked down at her own hand, the fingers loose in her lap. “I almost—” She stopped. Started again. “I almost had my hand on it. The edge of the frame. I could have just—” She exhaled through her nose. “I let go.”

Emily didn’t say anything.

“I could hear her breathing,” Riley said. “The whole time. That was all I got.” She looked out at the pool. “I don’t know which is worse. That she’s ashamed, or that I understand it.”

Emily didn’t answer. There wasn’t anything to answer with. She looked at the still water, the plumeria hedge, the way the light sat heavy and gold on everything like it was trying too hard.

After a while, Riley made a small sound—not quite a laugh, not quite a sigh—and turned her face back to the sun. The line of her jaw softened by a fraction. She reached down and picked up a loose petal from the tile, turned it over once between her fingers, and let it go.

“Okay,” she said quietly. Then, with the deliberate ease of someone changing the channel, she slid her eyes sideways to Emily, with a look that was all mischief and no apology. “I have to ask. Is the no-clothes thing a permanent lifestyle choice, or are you just waiting for someone to dare you?”

Emily laughed, but it came out as a little involuntary hiccup. “Why, is it too much for you?” She gestured at herself with both hands, a game show model presenting a prize, then ran a finger down the fall of hair, tucking a strand behind her ear.

Riley eyed her with a clinical detachment that was somehow hotter than any actual hunger could have been. “I’m just surprised you’re not lobster-red by now,” she said. “If I were that pale, I’d be SPF’d into oblivion.”

Emily looked at her own arms, which had the unblemished cream color of someone who, if anything, only got whiter with sun exposure. “Maybe it’s another transformation. Maybe I’m immune to sunburn.”

Riley grinned. “What’s your least favorite one?”

Emily said, “Transformation?”

Riley nodded. “Yeah. Or, I guess, what do you miss most? From before.”

Emily thought. “If I could have one thing back, it would be the feeling of putting on a big old sweater after a bath. Or the way a T-shirt fits when you just get it out of the dryer.” She smiled, a little wistful. “Or maybe just the feeling of not being aware of my own body every second of the day. I didn’t know how much of my brain was spent on hiding until there was nothing left to hide with.”

Riley propped herself up on one elbow. “I can see that.” She studied Emily, the gaze analytical but not unkind. “Roll over. Let’s see the back.”

Emily opened her mouth to make a joke, but the words didn’t get out. The command landed on her nervous system like a direct wire; her breath stuttered, her skin prickling with a sudden, sharp electricity. Her body moved on its own, and she rolled over, cheeks hot, heart jackhammering as she presented her ass, legs together, arms folded under her chin.

Riley’s eyebrow arched. “Whoa. What was that?”

Emily closed her eyes. “That’s… a thing,” she said. “Any direct instruction, even if it’s a joke, feels—” She hesitated, then told the truth. “It feels really good. Not just normal good. It’s, like, impossible to resist. If you told me to jump in the pool right now, I’d do it, and probably thank you for it on the way down.”

Riley let that hang, then said, “Jump in the pool.”

Emily’s body was already moving before her mind could talk it down. She hopped off the lounger, hair streaming behind her like a flag of surrender, and dove cleanly into the deep end. The water was so cold it should have shocked her out of it, but instead it felt like every molecule of her skin lit up at once. She surfaced with a gasp, laughing despite herself, and wiped the hair out of her face.

Riley was at the edge, crouched with both hands on her knees, looking down. “You weren’t kidding.”

Emily paddled closer, her smile wide and bright and real. “I literally can’t say no to a command. But only if someone else gives it.” She treaded water, abs tight from the cold, and added, “I can tell myself to stop, but it doesn’t do anything. Has to be from someone else.”

Riley considered this, then grinned again. “Come up here.”

Emily climbed the pool ladder, water sluicing down her body in runnels. She shook herself off, then padded back to the lounger, hair flattening to a sheet across her breasts. She looked at Riley, cheeks still pink from the heat, and said, “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”

Riley shrugged, but her smile was sharp. “Little bit.” She tilted her head. “You ever regret it?”

Emily thought. “Sometimes. But it wasn’t my choice, and it’s easier, now. I don’t have to decide how to be. I just am.” She looked away, down at her own feet. “It’s weird, though. There are days I wake up and I want to be with Andy, like it’s the only thing that makes sense. But once in a while, when something like this happens—” she trailed off, the heat in her cheeks coming back.

Riley’s voice was softer now. “Mornings like this, what?”

Emily looked up. “I just want someone to tell me what to do.”

Riley reached out, her hand warm on Emily’s wrist, and pulled her closer. It was a simple move, but it took the rest of the distance out of the air; Emily knelt between the two loungers, their faces only a hand’s width apart. Riley brushed a wet strand of hair off Emily’s cheek, then kissed her—soft, then with a firmness that left no confusion about who was in control. Emily let herself melt into it, the click of Riley’s teeth, the taste of salt and sunscreen, the sense that she could live in that moment forever and never need to think a single thought again.

The kiss deepened, and Emily felt the hunger under it, the want that had nothing to do with transformations or games. She let herself want, too, for once, and the permission of it made her dizzy. Riley’s hand traced down her spine, nails light, and Emily shivered, the sensation ricocheting through her in a wave that made her knees go weak.

They stayed like that until the narrow lounger gave up and pitched them both sideways onto the hot pool tiles in a heap of limbs and surprised laughter. Emily ended up on her back, staring up at the sky, catching her breath.

Riley leaned over her, hair dripping. “Okay,” she said, a little unsteady. “Okay. I did not expect that. Sorry, I...”

Emily looked up at her and felt the warmth of it, and then felt something else—the obligation of it. “No, it's my fault,” she said. “I need you to know something. This thing you’re feeling right now.” She touched Riley’s wrist, lightly. “It’s the transformation. Dream a Little Dream of Me. It makes people want to be close to me. One person in the harem every night dreams of me, and the next morning they're attracted to me, and I'm attracted to them. It resets the next morning.”

Riley was quiet for a moment. Something moved behind her eyes—not hurt, exactly, but a recalibration. She sat back on her heels, looked out at the pool. “So this was—”

“I don’t know,” Emily said. “Maybe. I can’t tell where it starts and where you stop.”

Riley looked away. Her thumb found a groove in the tile and stayed there. “I need to think about Chloe,” she said. “That’s all I’m saying.”

“Okay.”

“But—” She stopped. Started again. “I clocked you on day one. Before any of this. You were just standing there in the doorway with your hair wet and I thought—” She laughed, a short, private sound. “I thought, that’s going to be a problem.”

Emily felt the warmth of it move through her. “And now?”

Riley glanced over, mouth pulling sideways. “Now I don’t know what’s mine and what’s your whole—” she waved a hand “—thing. Which is annoying.” She looked back at the pool. “Chloe and I aren't really official. And we never talked about exclusivity. But I was right about the problem part.”

Emily stayed on her back, eyes closed, hair a wild halo. “I won't tempt you if you don't.”

Riley snorted. “No promises.” She offered a hand, and when Emily took it, Riley yanked her up with surprising strength. “Next time, though, you’re coming with me and Chloe to the beach. You’d look good in the waves.” She paused, then smirked. “Or out of them.”

Emily gave her a look, but it was all teeth. “You’re terrible.”

Riley had her hair arrange itself behind her, then turned and walked away, leaving wet footprints behind her on the stone. “I know,” she called over her shoulder. “But I’m never boring.”

Emily stood there, naked and beaming, and for the first time all morning, the debt and the drama and the threat of rain felt very far away. She hugged herself, just for a second, then looked out at the plumeria hedge and the pale blue of the sky.

The elevator was always cold, the air a distilled hush that felt like a held breath before a plunge. Laura had learned, by now, to use the descent as a place to do the things that required not being watched. She was getting good at the merge: the way she could sense the line of her bodies pulling tight, then winding together, memory and muscle and hunger and hope all stacking in a single, clean continuity. By the time the doors slid open on the Hollow Garden, she was one person again, undivided and whole.

Light spilled in from above, filtered by nothing in particular yet shaped by everything—by the will of the room, by the habits of the earth, maybe by the simple desire for a world that was neither too bright nor too blue. There was a stillness to the Garden, but it was not empty. There were women here, in ones and in pairs, drifting in the glass-bright shade or moving along the stone-edged paths. There were no children. There never were. This was not a place you brought a future; it was a place you put down the past.

Laura stepped out, her shoes whispering in the grass. She wore the clothing she always wore for these visits: jeans, white T-shirt, nothing you could lose in the memory of a hospital or a living room or a small brick house on a cul-de-sac. Her hair was down, not styled. She had stopped trying to look like a version of herself from before.

The walk to her mother’s cottage was a straight shot across the Amber Pastures, a stretch of meadows and low, slow trees with bark like weathered hands. Along the way she passed a few of the long-term residents, but she only nodded at the ones she recognized; she didn’t stop. That was the trick, here. You could get caught in endless reruns if you let yourself get caught.

There was a woman by the fountain, in the distance, feeding something that might have been a rabbit or a squirrel or just a very slow bird. She looked up and smiled, the kind of smile you gave to a child who was going somewhere important. Laura recognized her in the way you sometimes recognize a street you used to live on, not by name but by the sense of it. Aunt Marie. Laura waved, and Marie smiled wider, but neither said anything.

The cottage was set away from the others. Its windows were always open, and there was the low, uneven sound of a rocking chair running in the main room, never stopping. Laura let herself in.

The walls were the same color as the inside of an eggshell, and the whole place was tidy in a way that suggested it never needed to be cleaned. On the left, next to the window, was the chair, and in the chair, Sarah. Her mother, hands pale on the armrests. She was rocking, but not fast; each forward and back took the full measure of a breath.

Laura stood in the door for a moment. Her mother’s eyes stayed on the window.

“My baby girl, my baby girl, I’m sorry, sweet girl,” her mother whispered, the words tucked into the rhythm of the chair. She didn’t look at Laura.

Laura stepped closer, set her backpack down on the table, and walked over to kneel by the chair. She took her mother’s hands—smaller than they’d ever seemed. She held them together, a bridge between.

“Hi, Mom,” she said. “I came early today. I wanted to tell you something.”

“My baby girl, my baby girl, I’m sorry, sweet girl,” her mother said again, but Laura squeezed her hands just a little, and the rocking paused for half a second.

Laura started talking. It was the only thing that ever worked, the only thing that sometimes made her mother hear her through the drift and the broken connections. She talked in the rhythm of the old stories: the long, rolling sentences, the updates, the things that could get in under the skin and take root.

“Do you remember Andy’s parents?” she said. “Andy and I, we had a date in Warrenville, at his parents’ house. It was just for a day, but it felt like the old days.” Laura kept her voice steady, didn’t let the emotion rise into it. “His mom was there, and she hugged me. She said she was glad I made it.” She let herself smile, a small thing.

“My baby girl, my baby girl, I’m sorry, sweet girl,” Sarah said, but it was softer now, the “sorry” trailing into a breath.

Laura kept going. “I wanted you to know, Mom. I wanted you to hear me say it: I made it, too. I’m okay. I’m better than okay.” She closed her eyes for a second, not to cry, but to get the words right. “Arabella gave me memories. All the years I lost. The college, and the training, and the time in the hospitals. I got to be a doctor, Mom. A real doctor, a paediatrician. The thing I said I’d be when I was nine, and you told me if I worked hard enough I could fix anything, even the stuff that couldn’t be fixed.” She let the words out, slow and clean.

At the word “doctor,” her mother’s rocking slowed, then stopped. The room went very quiet.

Sarah’s mouth opened, closed. Her hands clamped down on Laura’s, hard enough to hurt.

“My baby girl, my baby girl—” She stopped, drew in a shaky breath, and for a moment the rhythm stuttered.

Laura bowed her head and pressed her forehead to the backs of her mother’s hands. She stayed there, holding the hands tight, not saying anything else. If she stayed long enough, sometimes her mother would find her way to a new loop, or a better one.

When Sarah spoke again, the loop was different. “My baby girl, my baby girl, I love you, sweet girl.” The “I love you” came out in a single breath, no “sorry” in it at all.

Laura’s own breath caught, just a little. She kept her head bowed, still holding the hands, and let her voice find its way back. “I love you, too, Mom. I always have.”

She stayed there for a long time, telling her mother the little things: about the garden, about the wedding coming up, about the other women in the harem, about how Andy was the same and not the same, and about how there were ordinary days now, full of nothing and full of everything, the way they used to be before the accident. She talked about the future as if it was already here, as if the wedding was just a few days off and everything after that was already real. She never mentioned the debt, or Ereshkigal, or the possibility that in a few days, Laura might no longer be there to visit her mother.

Her mother’s hands never let go. The rocking didn’t start again, not right away, and when it did it was slower, almost like breathing.

When Laura was done, she stood up and folded her mother’s hands back into her lap, smoothing them flat. She looked at her mother’s face for a long moment, memorizing the way the light caught the edges of her hair, the way her lips kept moving even after the words had run out.

“I’ll come back soon, Mom,” Laura said. “I promise.”

Her mother didn’t look up. The rocking continued, even and slow. But both hands closed around Laura’s, pressing down hard for just a moment—the way you’d hold something you were afraid of dropping—before going soft again. “My baby girl, my baby girl, I love you, sweet girl.”

Laura stood, smoothed her mother’s hands flat against the armrests, and picked up her backpack.

She let herself out. The door clicked behind her, and she stood in the grass for a moment with her eyes shut, face tilted up. The sun was warm and direct. It was a good day. Even if it was only a day.

She started back across the meadow, her shadow long at her heels, and she didn’t look back.

Katherine took the long way down the bluff, bare feet slow on the dew-wet path. She stopped at every bend, letting her fingers trace the low branches, the spines of pinecones, the seam of a quartz vein running through old volcanic rock. Every touch was a checkpoint, a little insurance against the possibility of not making it all the way to the sea. She had twelve hours a day in her body, and she wasn’t going to waste a second of it.

The wind was up this morning, setting the whole island talking: the grass hissing, the palm fronds clapping, the first curve of ocean already creased with white. The light was early, blue and brand new, and for a minute Katherine just stood above the cove, looking down at the sweep of it. The beach was empty, as it always was at this hour, and the tide was out, the sand marked only by the feather-light treads of birds.

She made her way down the old path, skipping the last few stairs to land on the soft grit. She crouched at the line where the night tide had left its offerings: a scatter of shells, some sharp and some worn down to nubs, a litter of tiny crab parts, and a field of stones pale as bones in the morning sun.

She knelt, then sat, then leaned in, letting her hands hover above the best of the stones. The first one she picked up was smooth and dark, with a thin stripe of white running through it; she rolled it in her palm, then set it aside. The next was bigger, heavier, so cold it made the blood in her fingertips contract. She held it, then pressed it to her cheek, then set it on the growing stack of “keepers.”

She didn’t notice Emi until the shadows crossed.

“Good morning,” Emi said, and her voice had the floaty, gentle sound of someone who’d been awake for a long time already. She wore a soft gray shirt that let her six arms move free, and all six were folded, crossed, or holding something—a sketchbook, a pencil, a mug.

Katherine looked up, then nodded with a smile, not bothering with the sign for hello. She watched as Emi sat cross-legged beside her, the sketchbook balanced on one set of knees and the other four hands busy: two picking at the stones, two more setting them in little rows on the sand.

“What are you hunting for?” Emi asked. She watched Katherine’s hands, waiting for an answer.

Katherine considered this, then held up a smooth, teardrop-shaped pebble between her fingers. She turned it back and forth, showing both sides. Then she shrugged, the universal sign for “nothing in particular.” She mimed tossing it, then put it back on her own growing pile.

Emi grinned. “Just for the feeling?”

Katherine nodded. She grinned back.

“Me too,” Emi said, and for a while, the only sound was the soft click of stones, the scratch of Emi’s pencil as two hands kept working the sketchbook even while the others searched. Emi kept up a gentle commentary, talking to herself or to Katherine, or maybe to the world at large. “I used to do this all the time when I was little. My mother said it was a nervous habit, but my father thought it was good luck. Every smooth stone was a wish.” She glanced over. “Do you think they remember the wish, after you put them down?”

Katherine cocked an eyebrow, then shrugged again, but this time she pointed at the tide, as if to say “maybe the ocean does.” Emi laughed.

They worked in silence for a while. When Emi found a stone she liked, she held it up for Katherine to inspect, and Katherine would give it a thumbs up or a sideways shake, or, if it was really bad, an eye-roll. Once Emi found a piece of broken shell that looked like a tiny, perfect smile, and Katherine grinned so wide her eyes crinkled. Emi put it on the top of her pile as the new mascot.

Eventually, Emi asked, “Is it strange, getting to be yourself for only half the day?” She asked it quietly, not as a challenge or a probe, just because it was the kind of thing you could only ask someone while sorting pebbles on an empty beach.

Katherine didn’t answer right away. She sifted through the wrack for a moment, then picked up a piece of sea glass—blue, thick, the color of a perfect bruise. She set it flat on her palm, weighed it, then pressed it to her own cheek. She closed her eyes, holding it there.

After a minute, she opened them, handed the sea glass to Emi. Emi took it, turned it over, and pressed it to her own cheek, mimicking the gesture.

Katherine smiled at her, then shrugged again, but this time it meant: “it’s more than enough.”

Emi nodded. “I get it.” She set down the glass, then turned her sketchbook around. The page was a fast, sure drawing: not the stones, but Katherine herself, crouched at the waterline, hair wild in the wind, one hand extended for a pebble and the other braced in the sand. In the foreground, Emi’s own hands held a pencil and the blue glass.

Katherine looked at the drawing for a long minute, then grinned, wide and open. She picked up the piece of glass and set it down in the center of the page, a gift for the sketch. She leaned forward and gave Emi a peck on the cheek.

They sat for a little while longer, sorting the good from the just-okay, not in a hurry for the day to start. The tide would come in eventually, and sweep the rest away.