The Mirror Side

The Sunroom always glowed at midday, a trick of the island’s glass and light and the rows of white-painted wicker that caught and amplified every bit of warmth. Myra lingered at the threshold, fingertips ghosting the edge of the cool glass door, uncertain if she was welcome or if she’d stumbled onto someone else’s private peace. She could sense the room’s emptiness—a soft, static hush—but also the bright, active energy of a single person inside, blue and green swirled together in a way that only belonged to Sam.

She didn’t want to intrude. Not now, not after last night, when it felt like every vulnerability in the Hotel had been dragged into the open and pinned there, wriggling, under a lens. Myra’s own emotional echo was oddly still, the usual chorus of regret and fear replaced by something she almost dared to call hope. It made her nervous; she didn’t trust quiet, not in her own head.

She was about to back out, to let Sam have the Sunroom to herself, when Sam’s voice rang out, steady as always:

“If you don’t come in, I’m going to have to talk to the world’s saddest plant.” She gestured towards a drooping fern-like plant that objectively looked fairly dejected.

Myra startled, then smiled. She stepped inside, cane brushing ahead. “Sorry. I wasn’t sure if you wanted company.”

Sam patted the seat next to her, and Myra navigated the three paces by color alone—Sam was an easy beacon, always larger and more vivid than the space she occupied. When Myra sat, the wicker creaked, and the hush of the room shifted to make space for her.

They sat for a while without speaking. Myra couldn’t see the garden beyond, but she could feel the warmth of the light and the fresh tickle of jasmine and wisteria that seeped through the walls. She could feel Sam, too, the restless way her foot jittered against the tile, the way her energy rippled out, not quite hiding the knot of anxiety she always carried.

Sam started first. “You look like you just dropped a backpack full of bricks. Good news, or are you finally just getting used to this place?”

Myra took a slow breath, letting the moment stretch. “Can I ask you something weird?”

Sam grinned. “If you don’t, it’ll break the pattern of our friendship.”

“What do I look like, right now?”

Sam considered. “Right this second? Relaxed, for the first time in… ever? Your tail’s actually still. And you’re smiling.”

“That’s what it feels like,” Myra said, a tiny, real smile playing at her mouth. “It’s weird. I took a nap before lunch, woke up and thought maybe I’d been replaced by a pod person.”

Sam elbowed her gently. “Want to tell me why, or should I guess?”

Myra hesitated, then shook her head. “I… I don’t know if I can explain. I feel… different. Not broken. Not hollow.” She let the words hang. “I think last night changed something for me.”

Sam nodded. “Performance like that will do it. You realize everyone’s just as scared as you are, and somehow it’s fine anyway.”

Myra’s hands fidgeted on her lap. “I met with Andy, Riley, Chloe, and Laura this morning. On the dock.”

Sam sat up, instantly attentive, her energy prickling. “That’s an ominous gathering, if ever there was one. Is everything okay?”

Myra nodded. “Better than okay. I apologized, finally, for everything I did. To Andy, to Laura. I thought… I really thought she’d never really forgive me. Yes, maybe her prank suggested it, but… I just couldn’t accept it. But she forgave me, Sam. Just—like that.” She snapped her fingers, a hollow click. “Said she wanted to let it go, so we both could.”

For a long moment, neither spoke. The only sound was the slow, rhythmic pulse of the ceiling fan, and the faint chirp of a hidden bird outside.

Sam, uncharacteristically, didn’t make a joke. She reached over and squeezed Myra’s hand, her grip strong and warm. “I’m really glad,” she said.

Myra breathed out, the relief a real, physical thing. “I spent sixteen years feeling shitty about myself, without even fully knowing why, but thinking I didn’t really deserve any happy ending. But now I think…” She fished for the right word. “Maybe I get to live, too.”

Sam’s laugh was a bark, delighted and surprised. “Look at you, being all ‘future tense’ and everything. I thought I’d have to drag you into a new life by your tail, but you’re actually—” She broke off, then grinned. “This is good, Myra. You deserve it.”

Myra shook her head. “I don’t know if I do. But it’s the first time I’ve ever wanted to try.”

Sam settled back in the chair, arms behind her head, letting the sunlight drape over her like a cat in a patch of warmth. “So what now? You have any plans for when we get out of here?”

Myra smiled, slow and a little shy. “Honestly? I want to go back to medicine, if I can. Even blind, I think there’s a way. Maybe—maybe not as a doctor, but as a counselor, or a mentor. I thought about teaching, too.” She let the words tumble, surprised by how easy they came. “I might… I might also try to find my birth parents. I never cared before, but now I wonder.”

Sam blinked, then laughed again. “Shit, you really are going for all the side quests.”

“Why not?” Myra said, the old caution gone. “It’s not like anyone expects anything of me, now.”

Sam turned, serious for once. “I do,” she said. “I expect you to do whatever the hell you want. That’s what friends are for, right?”

“Right,” Myra agreed, the word bright and unburdened.

They let the hush rebuild. Myra was the first to break it this time. “What about you? You always play therapist, but you never say what you want. What’s your big dream?”

Sam grinned, a little lopsided. “It’s boring. I want to run a coffee shop, like the Blue Bean, only… with a music night. And a game night. And maybe a microbrewery, if I could ever convince Andy to fund it.” She laughed. “Or maybe I’ll just keep working with kids, like in the support group. I like helping people find their way, you know?”

Myra nodded. “You’re good at that. Even for stubborn idiots like me.”

Sam shrugged, but there was a blush in her cheeks. “I think that’s what makes it fun. I don’t know if I want to settle down, or travel, or both, but I know I don’t want to go back to how things were before. I want to make it count.”

Myra leaned in, sensing the soft vulnerability under Sam’s usual armor. “Is there anyone you’d want to… you know… make a life with?” She teased, quietly.

Sam went still, the air in the Sunroom suddenly delicate. “Yeah,” she said, after a long beat. “I think so.”

Myra cocked her head. “Anyone I know?” She prodded, fully knowing the answer.

Sam snorted, embarrassed. “You’re going to make me say it, aren’t you?”

Myra just smiled, waiting.

“Fine, of course it’s Liesa,” Sam said, barely above a whisper. “But I haven’t really asked her. Not formally, I mean.”

Myra considered, then said, “Why not ask her?”

Sam groaned, hiding her face. “Because I’m a coward, and because I don’t want to jinx it. I told Andy I’ll do it tomorrow, but I’m freaking out. What if she says no?”

“Then you’ll survive. And if she says yes?”

Sam was quiet. “Then I guess… I’ll be the luckiest idiot on two continents.”

Myra squeezed Sam’s arm, a familiar comfort. “You should tell her, tomorrow. Life’s too short to wait around for happy accidents.”

Sam exhaled, then nodded. “You’re right. I’ll do it. After tomorrow’s game.” She grinned.

“That’s adorable,” Myra said, and laughed—a real, ringing sound, all her own.

They sat together, two women neither fragile nor broken, letting the Sunroom’s warmth fill up the empty spaces. Just a perfect, small moment. Myra found she wanted it to last.

“So what do you think?” Sam said, after a long time. “Should we do it? Should we make it out of here and turn the world upside down?”

Myra smiled, her fox ears quivering with delight. “I think we already started.”

And they stayed like that, basking in the golden hush, not as competitors or as lost causes, but as friends.

The terrace was the only place on the island where the wind could be counted on to do its job: sweeping the heat out of the air and bringing in the clean, briny tang of the sea. It was late enough in the afternoon that the sun slanted low over the water, turning every ripple into a gold-flecked invitation to escape. Sam and Liesa sat at the end of a driftwood table, mugs in hand, bare ankles propped on a bench and sneakers kicked off beneath.

Sam’s leg bounced a little harder than usual. Liesa noticed but didn’t comment right away. Instead, she sipped her coffee, watching the surface of the lagoon, where a school of neon-blue fish flashed beneath the waves like a living party favor. She wore a faded men’s shirt, open at the throat, and cutoff shorts that belonged to someone else last week—her “I’m not performing for anyone” look, but on Liesa it still managed to be theater.

Sam waited until she thought Liesa was distracted before blurting, “Can I ask you something?”

Liesa arched an eyebrow, then set her mug down. “You can ask me anything, schat. Even if it’s about my tragic addiction to Belgian mayonnaise on fries.”

Sam grinned, then groaned and made a face, “Never again.” She took a breath, then went for it. “Do you want to marry Andy?”

Liesa’s head snapped around, the gold hair almost luminous in the sun. “Is this a trick question?” Her voice was soft, but there was a smile at the corner of her lips.

Sam shook her head, suddenly embarrassed. “No, I mean… really. Because you said before that you weren’t sure, and now I’m just… I don’t know. I guess I want to know where I stand, if I’m honest.”

Liesa’s posture shifted, her hands folding in her lap. “I do love him, Sam. I always did. But marry? I think it’s not for me. I think he will marry Claire, Erin, maybe Marissa, certainly Laura… but I don’t need that. I want him in my life, yes. But I also want—” She hesitated, eyes searching Sam’s face. “I want you, too.”

Sam tried to play it cool, but the words hit her like a punch. “So, what? You’re going to go back to Belgium, and I’ll just—Zoom you once a month?”

Liesa smiled, wide now. “No, gek. I want to see the world with you. I want to bring you to Antwerp, show you the river at night. Maybe even teach you Dutch, though that could break us.” She laughed. “But yes. I want you to be my home, even inside the bigger home that we all will build.”

Sam let the silence build, her foot tapping a complicated rhythm. “So if I asked you to be, you know, official—would you say yes?”

Liesa didn’t answer at first. Instead, she leaned forward, her green eyes steady, and covered Sam’s hand with her own. “Sam. If you ask me to be your wife, I’ll say yes. But you should know: I’m not very good at being normal.” There was no drama in the statement, just a kind of joy, like she was confessing to a lifelong habit of stealing flowers from other people’s yards.

Sam’s face broke into a real, wide-open smile. “I don’t want normal.” She coughed, embarrassed, then shook her head. “Honestly, I was scared you’d just laugh at me.”

“Never,” Liesa said, and squeezed Sam’s hand.

Sam grinned like an idiot. “Uh, I may, uh, have a formal question for you after tomorrow’s game, I think?”

Liesa laughed, patting Sam’s hand fondly. “That is okay, schat. I will pretend to be surprised.” She tilted her head, studying Sam for a moment longer, the smile softening into something warmer. “After the game, though,” she added lightly. “Not during dinner, not in the middle of everyone shouting. Some moments deserve a little space.”

Sam blinked, then nodded quickly. “Yeah. Yeah, that was the idea.” Liesa squeezed her fingers once, approval clear in the gesture.

They sat for a moment, the air light, the world improbably large and full of possibilities. Then Liesa said, “You know, anyone who marries Andy, it would be a legally binding polycule. I don’t think the world is ready.”

Sam cackled. “Yeah, but with the stuff we’ve seen? I’d bet a week’s pay that Arabella has a loophole ready for when we get home.”

Liesa shrugged. “Then let’s just see what happens. Maybe we invent a new word for it.”

Before Sam could reply, she heard the familiar footfall of someone approaching. She turned to find Erin, walking and a determined stride that said she had somewhere to be and dared anyone to comment on it. Her skin was bright mint, the color deeper than ever, and her J-cup breasts bounced with every step, somehow defiant and inviting at the same time. Claire walked at her side, clutching her leather notebook, her feet silent on the tile.

Claire was dressed in a sensible linen shift, cat ears angled forward and tail flicking in little pulses. She reached the table first, hesitated, then sat beside Liesa, tucking her legs under the bench and arranging her dress so as to maximize coverage.

Erin flopped down on Sam’s other side, grinning. “Interrupting something, or are we just in time for another round of the seemingly endless ‘who’s marrying Andy’ debate?”

Liesa laughed. “You are the topic, Erin, as always. We were just planning your wedding menu.”

Erin’s cheeks (and ears, and even the tips of her breasts) blushed a soft, almost edible green. “Well, you better start ordering food now, because he promised to marry me and Catgirl both. At this rate, I’ll need a cake the size of the fuckin’ island.” She snorted, then elbowed Claire, who smirked in response.

Liesa smiled, then turned serious. “Are you happy?”

Erin’s answer was a soft, unguarded: “Yeah. I thought I’d be terrified, or embarrassed, or that I’d mess it up. But I’m just… happy.” She shrugged, then added, “It’s weird, right?”

Claire nodded, then realized she could be misunderstood and quickly scrawled, I’m happy, too.

Sam squeezed her arm. “No. Not weird at all. I’m happy for you. And you, Claire. I always thought you’d make the cutest wives.” She grinned.

Claire’s tail swished, which was her version of a smile.

Then Erin said, “You know, it’s not just that, either. We have something to tell you. Both of you.”

Claire scribbled a quick line in the notebook, then, after a pause, wrote more. She tore the page out and handed it to Liesa, who read silently, then covered her mouth.

“What is it?” Sam asked, a spike of adrenaline in her voice.

Liesa slid the note over. Sam read: We’re both pregnant. Arabella confirmed it last night. Erin’s having twins, I am having one. We don’t know the genders yet, but Arabella says the babies will be healthy, and normal. We wanted to tell you before anyone else.

At first, Sam just stared. For a second it didn’t register at all—a weird feeling, as if the words were written in a language she half-remembered from childhood. Then the meaning clicked, and Sam barked a single sharp laugh. Immediately, she worried that was the wrong response, that she’d just said something truly offensive to two people she loved. She tried to walk it back: “Wait. That’s—are you serious? Like, for real?”

Erin grinned, but her hands shook a little as she laid both palms flat against her stomach. “Very serious. And very scared, if I’m honest.” For the first time since Sam had met her, Erin’s voice had no bravado at all. It was raw, unguarded, as if the confession had peeled something vital free.

Sam was the first to break the stillness with words, as usual. “Congratulations. I mean it. That’s… just wild.” She looked to Claire, searching her face for any sign of panic or doubt. “Are you okay? Are you freaking out?”

Claire shook her head with a quiet determination, then wrote: Not freaking out. Just… amazed. And a little proud. Her statement was only slightly undermined by her underlining of the word Not.

Liesa’s eyes went soft—softer than Sam had ever seen—and she reached across to squeeze Claire’s hand. “You’ll be a wonderful mother,” she said, and for once there was no hint of playfulness underneath.

Erin nodded, then added, “We’re not telling Andy until tomorrow. We don’t want to put him in a weird spot with Laura, and besides, today’s her day.” She shot a look at Sam, as if to say please don’t make it about us.

Sam nodded, understanding. “I think that’s a good plan. She’s been in a dark place since the argument with Marissa. Let her have the day, then blow his mind.” Sam hesitated, her grin lingering a second too long before it faded into something thoughtful. “Hey,” she said softly, nudging Erin with her elbow. “When you do tell him tomorrow… you thinking private, or like a big group thing?”

Erin blinked, as if surprised by the detail. “Uh. Didn’t really plan it. Why?”

Sam scratched the back of her neck, suddenly sheepish. “No reason, really. Just… tomorrow might be kind of a big day in general. Could be nice to give it some room.”

Liesa’s lips twitched in amusement, but she kept her thoughts to herself.

Erin studied Sam’s face for a moment, then her grin widened. “Ah! Got it,” she said. She didn’t press, which Sam was grateful for.

Claire’s ears perked. She scribbled something quickly and slid the notebook over: Secret?

Sam pointed a warning finger at both of them. “Extremely hypothetical secret. Like, don’t even breathe it.”

Erin smirked. “Relax. We’ll tell him somewhere quiet. Maybe drag him down the beach after the game. No big fuss. We’ll talk with him about when to tell everyone else.”

Claire nodded and wrote beneath her note: Catgirl = discretion.

Sam let out a long, slow exhale. “Thanks. Really. It’s just—” She trailed off, not sure how to finish the sentence. But in the space between, the conversation shifted, the weight of the news transforming the mood from nervous to electric, like the air right after a thunderstorm.

Liesa started to ask something, but Sam interrupted herself with a sudden, almost giddy giggle. “Can I tell you what’s hilarious? I never thought I’d be the one to say this, but… you two and Andy are going to be the best parents in history. And you’re going to have, what, three babies running around at the same time?” She laughed, shaking her head in disbelief at the mental image. “I’ll get to be the cool aunt.”

Erin snorted, picking up the thread. “You already are. And if you want, you can be their godmother, too. Right, Claire?”

Claire nodded, then scrawled: Only if you’re willing to teach them the art of mischief.

Sam snorted at that, a real laugh this time, and leaned back on the bench, feeling suddenly lighter. For a moment she could actually see it—Chloe’s house, a year from now. Toddlers wobbling across the terrace, Erin chasing one with grass in its mouth, Claire trying to write in her notebook with a baby clinging to her tail. The other women there, too, perhaps with other children, perhaps pregnant. Andy somewhere in the middle of the chaos, looking overwhelmed but happy.

And herself there too. Not visiting. Not orbiting. Just… there.

“Three babies,” Sam murmured, half to herself. “Jesus. This place is going to sound like a daycare.”

Erin grinned, tilting her head and crossing her arms in a way that made her look, for the first time in Sam’s experience, almost bashful. “Yeah. But, like… a cool daycare. With cake.”

Sam’s reply was automatic, dry—she was Sam, after all—but the words stuck to her tongue and something else shone through instead. “Yeah,” she said softly, meeting Erin’s gaze. “Yeah, it will.” The words hung between them, refracted in the honeyed air, and Sam couldn’t stop replaying it—three babies, the whole wild, impossible mess of a family, everyone surviving and, God, maybe even happy.

The possibilities unspooled: first birthdays and scraped knees; Claire teaching a toddler to count by stacking notebooks; Liesa painting faces for Halloween, unable to resist adding a streak of color to every cheek; Chloe making scones and cakes every day, and helping Dawn make dinner for the growing army of a family. Norah showing toddlers how to use Excel, warning them that the early bird gets the worm. Riley sulking in a corner but secretly mushy whenever a child would climb in her lap to let them play with her hair. Myra sitting with them on a bench in the backyard, telling them stories. Marissa soothing an upset toddler after a tantrum, sneaking them a cookie. Emi teaching them to paint, or tickling a baby with all six arms. Erin—already terrifying as a bouncer—somehow even more formidable with a diaper bag slung over her shoulder; and Andy himself, the center holding the whole circus together, possibly wearing a burp cloth like a tie because no one else would.

Sam had never thought anything like this could be hers. It felt so alien, so fundamentally not her story. She’d always been the aunt, the backup, the secondary plotline in other people’s happy endings. Even in her old life, nothing about family had been safe or easy: her parents’ cold self-preservation, the unspoken agreement that love was something you rationed out in emergencies, not a source of warmth or fuel. The day they had disowned her and her brother, purely for being what she was.

She’d gotten good at being proud of how little she needed, how long she could go without anyone noticing she was gone. But now—now she was here, in a mad sunlit miracle, with people who not only noticed but immediately started sketching her in as a vital, permanent part of the picture.

Sam stole a glance around the terrace, as if to anchor herself in the moment, and found every color brighter than before: Liesa’s wild dandelion hair, Erin’s minty blush, Claire’s velvet ears twitching in anticipation. The sunlight on the water was almost too much to look at. She did anyway.

Liesa put a hand on Sam’s arm, gentle. “Are you okay?”

Sam opened her mouth—yeah, of course, always, what else would she be—but the newness in her chest, the unfamiliar gravity of it, made the words catch. For a moment, she just blinked, almost confused at the sensation of being truly seen, truly safe. She let out a breath. “I’m… I’m good. Just…” She made a vague, wobbly gesture that was supposed to mean everything at once.

But then the rest of the thought hit her—really hit her. Not a hypothetical family, not “found family” the way she’d always said it, with the distance and irony and the implicit assurance that it was just a phrase and nothing more. But a whole, living, growing thing: babies and birthdays, school forms and terminally embarrassing group emails, fights over what to have for dinner, the harem’s annual “what the fuck are we doing for Christmas this year” debate. Andy in the thick of it, trying to give all of them what they needed, probably failing half the time and apologizing twice as much. Herself, not watching from the outside, but in the story, in the thick of it, loved, cherished, not just tolerated but embraced exactly for who she was.

It was too much, and not enough, and exactly what she’d always wanted without ever daring to admit it.

Her eyes stung.

Her smile wavered, collapsed, and rebuilt itself on new foundations. “Oh,” she said, and the tears came before she could finish. She tried to swallow it, tried to laugh, but it turned into a hiccupy little gasp. “Sorry,” she muttered, mortified, using her sleeve to mop her face before anyone could make a big deal of it. “I just… My parents never really wanted me, after they found out, you know? My brother does, but—” She fought for control, but it was already gone, the secret old wound on full display. “This is the first time I ever thought I’d get to be part of a real one. Even if it’s weird as hell.”

Erin, expert in her own way, swept Sam into a one-armed hug, pinning her head against a wall of soft, scented hair. “You’re family, Sammy. Get used to it.”

Liesa’s arm joined, a quiet anchor at Sam’s back. “You are,” she said, voice gentle. “It’s not only the babies. It’s all of us, together.”

Claire, who never needed words for the big things, scooted close and offered her hand, palm out flat. Sam took it, squeezing tight, and for a moment everything else—every single thing—dropped away. It was just four women in the fading sunlight, a little ridiculous, a little beautiful, holding each other together.

They sat like that until Sam got herself under control, then she took in a long, shaky breath and tried to reconstruct her armor. “Okay,” she said, “but if you make me babysit, I swear to God I’m teaching them all the bad words before they can walk.” This got the laugh she needed—an explosion, not a trickle. Erin snorted, Liesa went high and bright, and Claire’s tail swished so hard it knocked a cup onto the floor.

Erin was the first to recover, grinning with all her teeth. “I think you’d be a great role model, actually. Someone’s gotta show them how to survive in the wild.”

Sam rolled her eyes, but she was still grinning. “Yeah, well, somebody else can handle the birds and bees talk. I don’t want to be responsible for explaining why Catgirl has a tail and why you’re mint green and why Andy is… Andy.”

Liesa giggled. “We will make him do it. He is the father. It’s his job, yes?”

Claire, pen poised, wrote: I will supervise and correct as needed.

That was enough to set them all off again. After a while, Sam wiped her face and tried to make a joke. “Just promise me you don’t name them after plants. I can’t handle a Sprout or a Fern Cooper.”

Erin’s face split in a mischievous grin. “No promises. I might go with Leif. Or maybe Moss.”

By the time the sun dipped below the edge of the sea, Sam’s ribs hurt from laughing. The joke about naming the babies after plants became a running bit—Liesa suggested “Dandelion” for the most stubborn, Erin countered with “Venus” for a daughter (“you know, like the flytrap, because she’ll bite”), and Claire, after much solemn consideration, wrote: Ficus, because it is low maintenance and hard to kill.

At one point, Sam excused herself to get a drink and, standing alone in the little alcove off the terrace, looked back at the table. She watched the three of them—Liesa’s head thrown back in laughter, Erin arguing a point with her hands, Claire already scribbling down the exchange for posterity—and she felt it again, the way a lock must feel when it’s finally met its matching key.

She squared her shoulders, took the glass, and returned to the table. She didn’t say anything more about it, but from then on she sat a little closer, laughed a little louder, and let herself be held a little longer when the next round of hugs came.

Sam thought about her brother, about how she might finally explain all this to him. She thought about Andy, who still didn’t know he was about to be a father, and how he’d probably faint or throw up or both. She thought about herself, and realized she wasn’t scared anymore—not of being left behind, not of being forgotten, not even of loving and losing all of it at the end.

She just wanted to be there for as long as she could.

The four of them walked back to the main building together, arms linked. Sam gave herself permission to believe in tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that. She didn’t know what to call it yet, only that it felt like home.

Norah stalked the hall at the far end of the Hotel with the focus of a woman who had learned, young, that the best way to survive was to always walk three steps ahead of your own fear. She had discovered she liked the isolation of the far wing: the old floors scuffed from centuries of maybe-real, maybe-invented footsteps; the corridors lined with glass-fronted cabinets that suggested museums but smelled faintly of fresh lacquer, as if someone in the present still cared for them.

This place wasn’t indicated by anything. She had found it by accident, today, and had immediately dubbed it the Hall of Curiosities. In a resort where every view was crafted to seduce or comfort, the Hall of Curiosities gave her only what she asked for—no more, no less. In a building full of constructed fantasy, this was the closest thing Norah had found to actual reality.

She paced slowly, letting her gaze scan the ranks of oddities: a tea set that looked like it had been hand-thrown by a child, but was in fact Royal Doulton with a chip in the rim; a chessboard with pieces in mid-game, as if waiting for a lost opponent to return; a set of embroidered napkins with stains that hinted at stories she would never know. The whole room was a monument to things left unfinished, and it suited her.

Near the far end of the room, something new caught her attention—a display case, locked and lined with velvet. Inside was a dog collar, oversized and heavy, with a lock mechanism so intricate that Norah spent a full minute just tracing the maze of exposed gears and tumblers with her eyes. The collar itself was black leather, inlaid with mother-of-pearl and a single tag, brass, engraved with a name: "Sandra."

Beside the collar was a photograph. At first Norah assumed it was a posed shot of a pet and owner, the usual trope, but her stomach tightened when she realized what she was actually seeing. The woman in the photograph—Sandra, presumably—was on all fours, naked but for the collar, floppy red-furred dog ears, the muscles of her shoulders and haunches built for movement on hands and knees. Her body was impossibly lean, every line accentuating the shift from human to animal, but the real horror was not in the body. It was in the eyes.

Sandra looked out from the photograph with a hollow, exhausted smile, the kind people used when they were trying to keep a child from being scared. And beside her, on a pallet of blankets, was a baby. The child looked happy, reaching a chubby fist toward the camera, but what undid Norah was the distance between mother and child. Sandra posed next to the baby, but her hands—her paws—never touched. They hovered, always a few inches from the little body, as if she’d been forbidden the basic instinct to cradle or comfort.

Norah stared at the picture for a long, long time. Then she noticed a second tag in the case, smaller, almost lost in the velvet. It was a little plaque, faded by years but still legible:

Sandra Guerrero, Eliminated Contestant. Harem Hotel: The HH, Season 169. Master: Greg.

There was a pause in Norah’s brain as the word Greg echoed, hollow and heavy. She didn’t know the name, not really, but there was something in the cadence that scraped against her memory. She scanned the case again, then pressed her fingertips to the glass, reading the details like she was cramming for an exam she never wanted to take.

She should have just walked away. She could have rationalized it: another HH oddity, a sick Host's joke, a past so remote it didn’t matter anymore. But the picture—mother and child—wouldn’t let her. She imagined, with perfect clarity, what it must have been like to have your only connection to your baby filtered through fur and humiliation and the constant ache of being less than yourself.

Norah **** herself to inventory the details. The lock was not a toy: it required a key, or a code, or maybe a trick. The photo was old, but the paper had held up. There was a faint watermark in the corner—nothing she recognized. The plaque was real brass, worn at the edges.

She memorized every piece, then let her hand drop.

The room pressed in, thick and electric, as if she’d just stumbled onto a **** weapon. She scanned the hallway—still alone. For the first time since arriving on the island, Norah felt something like actual fear, not for herself, but for all the invisible threads that led from one season of this "game" to the next. How many Sandras had there been? How many children? Where was the baby now, and what kind of life did it get with a mother who couldn’t even hold it? The thought was too ugly, so Norah locked it away, the way she did with anything she couldn’t fix.

She looked around and found another case. This contained a picture of four women. The central figure was an older woman, in her late forties, with brown hair streaked with gray. She had breasts bigger than Chloe’s, cartoonishly wide hips, wearing what could only be charitably described as a “porn MILF” outfit, her eyes vacant and glassy. Her legs, barely covered by the microskirt, appeared shiny and plastic-like, while the upper body seemed normal. Norah suspected she could see a little drool on the side of her mouth. A younger woman who resembled her (maybe her daughter) held her hand tenderly. The younger woman, dirty blonde hair and wide, horrified hazel eyes, wore only ribbons of colored fabric, and a steel collar with a padlock. She was crying. A third woman, perhaps the youngest of the four, wrung her hands nearby, clearly unsure how to help. She wore a skintight cocktail dress, her nails were long and black, and she was weeping. The fourth woman, hugging the older one from behind, could only barely be seen by the arm wrapped around the older woman’s waist, and the mane of black hair falling over the older woman’s shoulder, obscuring most of her face.

Horrified, Norah looked at the bronze plaque.

Carol Wilson’s Elimination. Harem Hotel: The HH, Season 169. Master: Greg.

She walked out of the Hall of Curiosities with her hands clenched and her teeth set hard. She didn’t look back, but she carried the image with her—Sandra, **** to smile, **** to watch her own child from a distance she could never close. Carol, turned into a parody of herself and without a mind of her own, the other women (the other Contestants, Norah corrected herself grimly) only able to weep. The memory gnawed at her, and she realized, with a cold certainty, that she wasn’t going to be able to let it go.

Someone on this island had answers. Arabella, certainly. Perhaps Anna, or that doctor from the Hollow Garden. But Norah wouldn’t rest until she figured out who Greg was, and why his harem’s ghosts seemed to bleed through into this one. The game was older than any of them. It was older than the structure of the Hotel. And Norah understood that she was playing for more than just herself.

She walked the rest of the way to the Main Lobby with her chin up, shoulders set, and the outline of Sandra’s story etched hard behind her eyes. If there was a way to break the cycle, Norah would find it. Even if she had to lock herself inside the Hall and burn the whole contest to the ground.