Edges and Echoes, Part 1

VP and BP Standings
Emi - 36 VP - 4750 BP - 1 Achiev
Erin - 33 VP - 3300 BP - 1 Achiev
Claire - 32 VP - 6200 BP - 1 Achiev
Marissa - 27 VP - 4800 BP
Sam - 18 VP - 3250 BP - 1 Achiev
Norah - 17 VP - 2500 BP - 1 Achiev
Dawn - 11 VP - 4000 BP
Liesa - 10 VP - 3500 BP
Chloe - 4 VP - 3475 BP

Andy spent half an hour studying Emi’s painting in the den before he dared to move it. He touched the dry, slightly toothy surface of the canvas and wondered how something so unassuming—a riverbank, three kids in the grass—could knock the wind out of him so completely. He hadn’t really believed in ghosts until now.

The memory was there, of course. That day by the river had been one of the last real afternoons before everything started to come undone. He remembered Laura’s laugh, a high, careless thing, and how Emi, even at fourteen, had sat a careful pace away, always just at the edge of the scene. He remembered his own unease as his body was starting to change, the way he’d slouched and hid his face, never able to quite meet the world head-on. The painting told it all back to him in strokes that hurt.

He carried the piece up to the lounge, thinking it would look best where the light could hit it. The main room of the Master’s Suite was almost empty; only the day’s first draft of sunlight and the distant sound of the hotel’s world waking up came through the tall windows. He set Emi’s painting on the wide ledge beneath the other painting in the room—the painting that had dominated the last week of his life in a way he’d never anticipated.

Katherine was, as always, already there.

She stood in her painted meadow, forever caught in some moment between serenity and shyness, shoulder leaning against the edge of the frame, her black hair spilling down her back like an oil slick, her body displayed and yet never quite yielding. When Andy entered, her gaze snapped to his. He knew it was projection, knew that there were no actual muscles or nerves behind those brushstrokes, but the effect was so uncanny that he sometimes found himself apologizing to her aloud.

He did so now, out of reflex. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

Katherine cocked her head—not in accusation, but with the subtle interest of someone who’d just been waiting for an excuse to be noticed.

Andy sat on the couch across from the fireplace and just let himself exist in the moment. For a while, he listened to the soft sound of air moving through the vents and the even softer song of the birds outside. He’d become weirdly accustomed to talking to the painting, and even more to the way Katherine “listened”—with full attention, never judgment, just a kind of patient, waiting energy. It was better than most of his conversations with the living.

He put his elbows on his knees, staring at the rug. “I talked to Emi last night,” he said. “Well, more than talked.”

Katherine’s lips turned up just slightly, and she gave a theatrical roll of her green eyes. Andy chuckled, feeling himself relax. He wondered if Katherine had been privy to every awkward tryst in this suite. Probably. That had to be a special kind of hell.

“Don’t judge,” he said, grinning. “Or do. Maybe it’ll keep me honest.”

She shrugged, an elegant, almost feline movement. Her hair drifted as if stirred by a wind inside the painting.

Andy reached for the right words, and as usual, failed. “I don’t know what to say to you most days,” he admitted. “It’s stupid. I talk all day to everyone else, but with you, I… I don’t want to say the wrong thing. You have enough time on your hands to think about every word I ever say.”

At this, Katherine’s expression went thoughtful. She wrapped her arms around her torso, beneath her absurd breasts, still never obscuring herself, because the rules wouldn’t allow it.

Andy steeled himself. He’d practiced this talk in his head a few times, but it always came out wrong.

“I keep thinking about that letter,” he said finally. “The one from the fan mail round, the one that said, maybe someday you could be freed. That I could… win you. That you could be part of my harem.”

He waited for her to recoil, or at least roll her eyes again. She didn’t. She just waited.

Andy **** himself to continue. “It’s a crazy idea, I know. You’re trapped here, and Arabella made it clear even she can’t free you. And I have no business… wanting more. I already have, what, seven women in this house who would put up with me if I just asked? Hell, some will do it even if I don’t ask. It’s greedy. It’s—” He stopped, running a hand over his face.

Katherine’s brows furrowed. She leaned forward, her gaze suddenly sharp. It was a look he recognized from his own mother, the “you’re being stupid, but I’m going to let you finish” look.

He swallowed. “I don’t know what I want from you,” he said, voice low. “I like talking to you. I like seeing you. It’s… it’s more than that, sometimes. But I feel like an asshole even admitting it.”

She shook her head, gentle but emphatic. With one hand, she gestured—first, a sort of “stop,” then a point at herself, then at him, then back at herself again.

Andy stared at the gesture, trying to parse it.

“I know you don’t blame me for wanting company,” he said. “Or for being lonely. I know you like the company, too. But it’s more than that. I think I… I care about you. I like you. And not just as a picture in that painting, either. Not even just as a person.”

Katherine’s eyes widened. For a moment, she looked so human that it hurt. Her mouth parted, her painted hands flexing as if she might reach through the canvas.

He felt like a fool, but he pressed on. “I know it’s impossible. I know that. But I think about you all the time. When I’m walking on the beach, sometimes I feel sad that you can’t experience it. Or when I’m with the others, sometimes I catch myself wondering what you’d say if you could be with us too. Or how you’d react. And I feel ridiculous, because you’re—” He waved at the painting, feeling the color rise in his cheeks.

“You’re here,” he said, voice rough. “And I want to be with the other women, but I want to be here with you, too.”

For a long minute, there was only silence. Then, Katherine straightened up. She planted both feet on the painted grass, and straightened her back as if composing herself for a portrait. She looked him straight in the eye, her green gaze as bright and sharp as fresh-cut grass.

She didn’t gesture this time. Instead, she pressed her hand towards the glass, palm forward, fingers splayed wide. There was only the faintest difference in the oil—no glass to actually press against, but the intent was clear.

Andy rose from the couch and walked to the fireplace. He stood in front of the painting, so close he could see the individual bristles in the brushwork, the ghost of a thumbprint at the edge of the canvas.

He raised his own hand and pressed it to the glass that protected the painting. Katherine’s palm was smaller than his own, the size of the painting meaning she was just over three feet tall, but in that moment, it felt like they were touching for real.

Her expression softened. She smiled—a real, shy, **** smile that looked like it hurt to make.

Andy smiled back, feeling tears prick his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said. “If this is weird, or selfish.”

Katherine shook her head, slowly, once. Then she leaned forward, almost as if she were trying to push through the canvas. Her hair spilled over her shoulders and down, her chest heaving with the illusion of breath. She pressed both hands against the glass, then, with a slow, deliberate motion, traced a path up her own arm, over her collarbone, and to the place where her heart would be.

Andy felt the ache so deep it bordered on physical pain. He rested his forehead against the glass. “I like you, Katherine. I think I more than like you.”

She laughed, silently. The movement was small but electric—her whole body trembling with the **** of it. For a split second, Andy thought she might break the painting just by sheer **** of will.

Katherine gestured at herself, then at him, then made a gesture he didn’t recognize at first—a closed fist, thumb pressed to the chest, then drawn outward in a flourish. He stared, confused, and she made a frustrated face, then brought a hand to her mouth and blew him a kiss.

He laughed, breath hitching. “You know, if I didn’t know better, I’d say you’re telling me you feel the same.”

She shrugged, then offered him the smallest of winks.

He let his hand slide down the glass. “I wish I could help you. I wish I could do something.”

Katherine, for her part, shrugged again, then pointed at the painting. She indicated herself, then mimed a handshake, then placed both hands flat to the grass and spread her fingers wide, as if to say: this is enough. This is all there is, and it’s not nothing.

Andy felt the words stick in his throat, but he said them anyway. “If there’s ever a way to set you free, I’ll do it. No matter what.”

Katherine shook her head, gently, then pointed at him. At first, Andy didn’t get it. Then, with careful precision, she placed one hand on her cheek, then mimed a tear, then traced a smile across her mouth.

Andy tried to process it. “You don’t want me to feel bad?”

She nodded, emphatic.

He wiped his eyes, feeling foolish. “You’re kind of amazing, you know that?”

Katherine’s smile was pure radiance. She straightened up and, with the barest hint of a flourish, ran her hands down her hair, then over her shoulders, as if to say: yeah, I know.

Andy laughed, then caught himself. “You don’t mind that I… that I want to be here? With you?”

Katherine paused, then shook her head, slow and sure. She touched her cheek, then her lips, then splayed her hands against her own body—every inch of her, every bit of herself laid bare. The message was clear: she had nothing to hide from him, nothing to offer but this, and that would have to be enough.

He leaned in, pressing his palm once more to the glass, wishing for just one second that magic was real in a way that could undo her curse. He wanted to hug her, or hold her, or even just brush the hair from her face.

Instead, he let himself feel the ache and the gratitude, the way both seemed to coil together in his chest.

After a time, Andy drifted back to the couch and sprawled out, letting the tension bleed from his shoulders. He stared at the ceiling, replaying the conversation in his head, wondering if he’d ever get used to how strange and perfect this place was.

He glanced at Katherine. She was back in her default pose, leaning against the side of the frame, hair a velvet waterfall behind her. But this time, she looked almost smug. Content, even.

He shook his head, smiling. “You’re something else, Katherine.”

She winked, barely perceptible, but there.

He wondered if she’d always been this funny, or if it was something that happened after the painting. He wondered a lot of things.

He spent the rest of the morning alternating between aimless busywork—organizing the kitchen, tidying the den—and short, silent check-ins with Katherine.

Each time, she watched him with the same patient, amused expression.

Each time, he felt a little less alone.

The Inner Gardens were at their best just after sunrise. It wasn’t just the color of the light, which made every dew-speckled leaf glisten as if the plants were **** for attention, but the way the air had cooled overnight, holding the ghost of salt from the distant surf and the sweetness of so many half-opened flowers. There was always a new sound: the whistle of a bird that shouldn’t exist outside of cartoons, or the faint clack of bamboo canes settling in the morning breeze.

Dawn and Emi had started a morning yoga session in the big clearing behind the library, but word had spread and now half the harem was arrayed in neat rows on borrowed yoga mats, all moving through downward dogs and warrior poses with varying degrees of grace. Liesa and Sam were up front, locked in a contest to see who could hold a plank longer. Norah had staked out a mat at the edge, pretending to stretch while actually scanning the horizon for threats. Erin moved with unexpected precision, her balance impeccable even when her long limbs trembled and her newly enlarged breasts threw her off.

But it was Emi who stole the show, not by being good at yoga—she was flexible, but distracted—but by the sheer spectacle of her six arms, which gave every movement a flourish no one else could imitate. Dawn, spotting the gathering crowd, had reorganized the session so that Emi’s poses became the “challenge” for the rest of the group.

“You have to do all the arms,” Dawn announced with a giggle, demonstrating a two-handed side stretch and then looking to Emi, who flowed gracefully into the same stretch, but with four extra hands fanning out in various expressions of serenity.

Sam, never one to pass up a dare, flopped sideways and attempted to mimic the pose, toppling over and knocking into Liesa. “It’s not even fair,” Sam complained, face in the grass. “She’s got the hardware advantage.”

Dawn grinned, then giggled. “You’ll get bonus points for effort.”

Emi blushed, retreating a little into herself, but then she caught Dawn’s eye and smiled back, genuinely. The two had become fast friends—both shy in their own way, but with a streak of gentle mischief that drew them together.

Between stretches, Dawn whispered, “Congrats on the big VP bump last night.”

Emi’s cheeks pinked. “I don’t even know how it happened. One second I’m just… there, and the next it’s like everything is different.”

Dawn nodded. “Was it weird? With the arms, I mean?”

Emi shook her head, then amended, “Maybe a little at first. But Andy was…” She searched for a word. “Kind. Patient.” She paused, then gave a shy smile. “Hungry.”

“He always is,” Dawn said, voice dreamy. “I think that’s why he gets in so much trouble. He wants to please everyone and ends up confused.”

Emi considered this, then gave a tiny nod. “I like him. I’ve liked him since we were kids. I thought I’d be jealous, you know, with all the competition? But it’s not like that.” She hesitated, then lowered her voice. “Is it weird that I want him to be happy, even if it’s not just with me?”

Dawn’s smile turned soft. “That’s why you’re my favorite, you know. You make it easy for everyone to love you.” She paused, stretching an arm up and over her head. “I’m nervous about my turn. What if I mess up, or say something dumb?”

Emi laughed, a quiet, silver sound. “You could never mess up, Dawn. You’re… radiant.”

Dawn’s face lit up at the compliment, and she reached over to squeeze Emi’s hand—one of the middle pair. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I hope I can do as well as you.”

From a little further down the mat row, Chloe watched the exchange, her body perfectly still in child’s pose. Her hair had come loose from its bun, and she kept her face pressed to the mat, like she wanted to disappear into the soft green. She watched the others through her lashes, cataloging every interaction, but made no move to join in.

Marissa noticed. She always noticed. She finished her own stretch, then knelt beside Chloe, careful not to crowd her.

“Hi,” Marissa said, voice gentle.

Chloe peeked up, startled, then ducked back down.

“Would you like to move your mat over with the others?” Marissa asked. “You’d be welcome. Emi’s teaching us all how to do the arms thing.”

Chloe shook her head, then sat up, hugging her knees to her chest. “I’m okay here. I don’t want to ruin it.”

Marissa smiled, recognizing the habit of self-effacement. “You’re not ruining anything. You’re part of the team now.”

Chloe tried to return the smile, but it looked more like a grimace. “I’m not really… good at teams.”

“That’s okay,” Marissa said. “I’m not either, sometimes.”

They sat together in silence, listening to the background of laughter and Dawn’s steady encouragement. Marissa let the quiet settle, then said, “Is it hard? Being here?”

Chloe picked at the edge of her mat. “It’s just… not what I expected. Andy never even looks at me.”

Marissa weighed this. “Do you want him to look at you?”

Chloe’s shoulders lifted, fell. “I don’t know. I guess I wanted a chance. But he’s not like the boy I remember.”

Marissa tried to be subtle: “You two were close, in school?”

Chloe shook her head. “Not really. I mean, I liked him. But he never noticed me. Not until…” She trailed off.

“Until what?”

Chloe’s voice dropped. “The kiss. It was stupid. He didn’t even want it.”

Marissa watched her, careful to hide her own curiosity. “Was it a dare, or did you mean it?”

Chloe turned her head away. “I meant it. But I think I was the only one who did.”

“Did you tell anyone afterward?”

Chloe frowned, confused by the question. “Why would I? I was embarrassed.”

Marissa studied her. The girl’s micro-expressions—small flicks of the eyes, the twitch at the corner of her mouth—betrayed nothing but awkward honesty.

“Do you regret it?” Marissa asked.

A long pause. “No,” Chloe said. “I regret what happened after. But not the kiss.”

Marissa nodded, filing this away. “Thank you for telling me.”

Chloe looked back at her, a question in her eyes. “Is it bad, to want him? When there’s so many others?”

Marissa shook her head. “It’s not bad. It’s brave. Most of us have had time to wrestle with this idea. Andy… he is an easy man to love.”

Chloe blinked, not expecting that answer.

“Would you like to join us for breakfast after yoga?” Marissa asked.

Chloe hesitated, then nodded. “Yes. I’d like that.”

Marissa smiled. “Me too.”

A few rows away, the yoga session was winding down. Dawn had the group in a circle now, everyone cross-legged and facing each other, their mats forming a flower on the grass.

Erin groaned, but Sam nudged her. “Play along. It’s for the team.”

Erin muttered something about “cults,” but when her turn came, she said, “I’m grateful for caffeine and for not breaking my wrist in crow pose.”

Norah, deadpan: “I’m grateful that I have all my original limbs.”

Liesa, more seriously: “Am grateful for company. And for beautiful mornings.”

Emi’s turn. She hesitated, then said, “I’m grateful for friends. And for Andy.”

There was a brief hush, not awkward but sincere.

Dawn beamed. “I’m grateful for all of you. And for being here, together, even if it’s just for today.”

Marissa nodded. “I'm grateful for harmony. It's good to have the chance to get to know you all.”

Sam, who’d been quiet, piped up last. “I’m grateful for carbs. And for not having to deal with shitty customers for a while longer.”

The group broke up in laughter.

At the edge, Marissa leaned in to Chloe. “Your turn.”

Chloe looked at the others, then at Marissa. “I’m grateful for new beginnings,” she said, and meant it.

As the group rolled up mats and headed for breakfast, the mood was light, unburdened. Dawn and Emi walked arm-in-arm, giggling over something private. Liesa and Norah bickered in friendly, rapid-fire bursts. Sam and Erin, sweating but satisfied, compared muscle aches. Even Chloe, lingering at the back, found herself swept along by the tide of people who, for once, didn’t mind if she trailed behind.

Marissa hung back, watching Chloe. There was something about the girl that made Marissa both protective and uneasy—an innocence that felt genuine, but also fragile, as if it might crack under the wrong kind of attention.

Marissa resolved to keep an eye on her, just in case.