The Shape of Broken Mirrors, Part 2

By the time the Banquet Hall emptied, Andy had returned from the Annex and developed a plan. He adjusted the heavy duffel bag on his shoulder. Navy blue, Annex issue; Arabella had been surprisingly agreeable to his requests. “After all,” she had said, “you are the Master.” He had wondered for a moment if she had meant it as a compliment or not, but had chosen to take it as such.

Andy headed for the garden with the measured purpose of a man who had spent the entire morning scripting the next ten minutes of his life.

The duffel was heavier than it looked, the kind of industrial-issue nylon sack you might use to haul emergency gear, or maybe to ferry contraband through customs. It bulged with odd shapes, as if it contained a jumble of camping supplies or a shipment of small, angry animals. Andy tried to look casual, but the bag whacked his knees at every turn.

He found Erin in the farthest corner of the garden, sequestered on a mossy stone bench beneath a knot of ficus trees. She’d wedged herself behind a berm of greenery, nearly out of sight, but her long legs stuck out like a warning flag and her hair—sunlit auburn, always a little wild—refused to blend in. She’d dressed in a loose, black t-shirt and battered jeans, but even that concession to modesty could not disguise the way her breasts pressed forward: two impossible hemispheres that strained the fabric, each easily the size of his own head. Andy could see the outline of her bra beneath the shirt, taut and overmatched, the way a child’s kite is overmatched by a hurricane.

Andy paused at the very edge of the garden path, not quite stepping into Erin’s shadow-dappled enclave, as if he’d stumbled upon a sleeping animal and worried that a direct approach might startle her into flight. He weighed the duffel bag against his hip, then against the gravity of the moment, and wondered for a beat if he should say something, or simply go away and let her have another hour of peace before the storm. He recognized the set of her jaw, the way her arms folded—not in comfort, but as a fortress. Erin was the sort who needed to believe she was always a little bit in control, even in the moments when her world was actively cracking apart.

For a second, Andy considered turning back. There was no actual script for this part, and the duffel’s payload felt less like a peace offering and more like a poorly wrapped bomb. But then Erin’s gaze shot up from the tangle of her knees, brushed over him, then darted away sideways, as if she were making sure he was real before deciding whether to acknowledge him. Her lips tightened, not quite a scowl but something like a barricade, and Andy recognized the swirling undertow just behind her eyes: the urge to appear unfazed, set against the fatigue that threatened to drag her under.

He took a step forward, the duffel’s mass throwing off his balance. The bag, for all its cartoonish size, was expertly designed to fit into the crook of a grown man’s arm, but Andy had overstuffed it with deliberate excess. The base sagged, the zipper teeth gaped like the mouth of a hungry animal, and the entire contraption squeaked as he adjusted its weight. He made a show of swinging it forward, almost tripping himself in the process, then righted it with a comic grunt.

“Whoa there, Hulk,” Erin said, the faintest half-smile ghosting across her lips before she could reel it in.

He seized on the opening. “Is this seat taken?” Andy gestured, as if the patch of stone next to her required formal reservation.

Erin’s gaze flicked to the empty space, then to his feet, then back to her own hands, which had found a pebble somewhere among the flagstones and now fiddled with it as if it might be a talisman. “Not anymore,” she replied, voice quiet but not hostile.

Andy lowered himself onto the bench with a grateful sigh, setting the duffel between his boots. The stone was cold and slightly damp beneath him. For a while, neither spoke. The only movement was Erin’s deliberate rolling of the pebble between thumb and forefinger, over and over, like a magician’s coin trick.

Andy waited, letting the silence do the heavy lifting. He was always better at filling other people’s silences than his own. From time to time, he caught Erin’s eyes darting toward the duffel, sizing it up with a mix of suspicion and curiosity. Her lips pursed, as if repressing either a question or a snarl. Andy took a slow breath through his nose, then leaned forward, elbows to knees, doing his best to look approachable and nonjudgmental.

The silence stretched. He could sense Erin’s agitation by the way her foot jiggled, by the way her shoulders hunched subtly toward her ears. She wore her stress in compressed microexpressions, a Morse code of flickers and tics. Andy recognized some of them from the old days—her tell when she was about to admit something she didn’t want to, or when she was gearing up to deflect.

Eventually, she muttered, “You always did have a flair for the dramatic.” She nudged the duffel with the toe of her sneaker, just enough to make it wobble.

Andy allowed himself a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it grin. “Wouldn’t be a proper reunion without a little theater, right?”

Erin shrugged, but the movement was more at ease than before. “I figured you’d come find me.”

“I figured you’d try to hide,” Andy countered. “It’s what I’d do if I were you.”

“I wasn’t hiding,” she said, but then caught herself and shook her head. “Okay, maybe I was. It’s just—” She trailed off, staring at the pebble as if it had suddenly become radioactive.

He let her have the out, saying nothing, watching her as she worked through whatever calculus was happening behind her eyes. She looked tired. He suspected she hadn’t slept last night. Andy felt a razor pang of guilt, and then, as always, the impulse to fix it. He wondered, not for the first time, if the desire to repair people was a blessing or a curse.

Erin drew a deep breath. “So, what’s in the bag?”

“A surprise,” Andy said, but his delivery was lighter than the words suggested. “You know me. Could be smuggled tequila. Maybe a set of throwing knives. Could be a body part. You’ll have to take your chance.”

She rolled her eyes, but the scowl that followed was undercut by a smile threatening to break through. “You’re a terrible liar, Andy.”

“I prefer to think of myself as a chaotic neutral,” he quipped. He let his hand rest lightly on the duffel, as if anchoring the conversation to a physical object might stop it from floating away. “I promise it’s not a weapon. Or, well, not a conventional one.”

She huffed, the sound halfway between amusement and fatigue. “If it’s another one of those self-help kits, I’m putting it in the koi pond.”

“I would never,” Andy protested, hand to heart in mock affront. “This is strictly artisanal contraband.”

The banter, ritualistic and familiar, seemed to burn off some of the emotional static between them. Andy watched as Erin’s shoulders dropped a fraction, her spine uncurling from its coil. He knew she was still bracing for whatever reckoning was coming, but at least now she was in the room for it.

He let the moment hang, then offered, “You want to open it, or do you want to talk first?”

Erin didn’t answer, just stared at the duffel as if it contained the answer to every unasked question. Andy waited, knowing that patience worked better than any strategy.

She cleared her throat. “You know what’s stupid?”

He shook his head.

“I know how the math works. I’ve been in this since the beginning. But again, the day of the challenge, I still get convinced I’m going home.” She flicked the pebble into the bushes. “Even if the numbers don’t make sense, even if there’s no reason for it. It’s like the part of my brain that’s supposed to do logic just… combusts.”

Andy nodded. “I think it’s built in. You don’t ever get rid of it. Maybe you just get better at living with it.”

Erin huffed a short laugh, almost a snort. “If you say so, ‘Master’.” She said it with a mockery so gentle it was affectionate.

They sat in silence again, the comfortable kind, and Andy let himself take her in: the way her hands—so sure when cooking or tying knots—now fidgeted with invisible threads in her lap. The fine sheen of sweat on her brow, more from nerves than from the sun. The fact that, even in full panic mode, she still held herself like a field commander, back straight and eyes always scanning for threats.

Andy wondered if she was ready for the rest of it, so he waited. The silence of the garden did the work for him. A bee stumbled from flower to flower. In the distance, a lawn crew Mildred trimmed a row of ornamental grass, wearing giant headphones. Andy wanted to take a picture—Erin, with her long legs, her hair in a ponytail that made her look feral and scholarly at the same time—but he was pretty sure she would knee him in the groin if he tried.

So he went with words. “You know, if you want to talk about it, I’m here. Or if you want to pretend everything’s normal, I can do that, too.”

Erin flicked an amused glance at him. “Is that the official statement from the Master’s office?”

“It’s more of a provisional statement,” Andy said. “Pending approval from the council of extremely smart and intimidating women.”

She laughed briefly. “That’s not what’s intimidating,” she muttered.

Andy let that hang. “Is it weird,” he asked after a while, “that the closer we get to the end, the less I care about the outcome?”

Erin stopped rolling her pebble, considered. “I think you’re lying.”

He shook his head. “No, really. The first week, all I could think about was how to game the system. Get everyone through, break the show. Now? It’s just—” He struggled for the word, and found it, with a little surprise: “I want everyone to make it. I want you to make it.”

She looked down, fiddled with her jeans. “That’s not possible, statistically.”

“Doesn’t mean I’m not rooting for it.” He smiled. “You know, you’ve changed. Since the beginning.”

Erin made a face, elbowing him fondly. “I think it’s the boobs, Andy. Or have you not noticed?”

He decided to go with it. “They’re, uh. Impressive. But that’s not what I meant.” He waited until she looked up again, then said, “You’re not the same person who left me in Chicago. I’m really glad about that.”

She bristled, half-joking and half-serious. “Is that your way of saying you didn’t like the old me?”

“I loved the old you,” Andy said. “I just didn’t love the way I left things.”

A long pause. Erin’s jaw twitched. “I didn’t, either.” Her voice was low. “But that’s what you do, right? Leave before you get left.”

Andy looked at the ground. The bench, the bag, the years in between. “That’s what I used to do,” he said. “But I decided I don’t do that anymore.”

She snorted. “Since when?”

He didn’t answer directly. “Yesterday. After the, uh, situation with you and Claire.”

“Situation,” she said, arching a brow, amused.

Andy felt heat on his ears. “Look, you know I’m bad at naming things.”

Erin’s eyes softened a fraction, and she smiled. “You told me you loved me, Andy. While you were literally inside my body and holding Claire’s hand. Are you sure that wasn’t just the endorphins?”

He took a slow breath. “It wasn’t.”

She nodded, then: “I’m still not sure if you mean it.”

He shrugged. “I am. I don’t want to lose you again, Erin.”

This time the silence was different. Erin wiped her palms on her jeans, then looked at the duffel. “I thought about you for a long time, after we broke up. Sometimes I wanted to see you again, sometimes I wanted to throw a brick through your window. Depended on the day.”

Andy tried to picture that: Erin, showing up to his apartment with a brick and that look on her face. He kind of liked the visual. “Which is it today?” he asked.

She gave him a side-eye that was equal parts threat and promise, but her eyes were full of mischief. “Ask me again in an hour.”

He grinned, then patted the duffel. “Maybe this will improve your mood.”

Erin took the bait. She reached for the zipper, paused, and then gave him a look: permission?

He nodded.

She yanked the zipper and peered inside. Her brow furrowed. “A cactus?”

Andy nodded, a little sheepish. “He’s an old friend. I had to pull a lot of strings to get him out of customs.”

Erin gently lifted the plant from the duffel. It was a cactus, all right: a miniature saguaro, about a foot tall, two stubby arms reaching upward in a gesture of permanent surrender. It was potted in a battered ceramic mug, painted with a fading “Go Tigers” logo.

She stared at it for a long time. “Is this… Sir Spikes?”

Andy felt something catch in his throat. “Yeah. I thought you might want to say hello.”

Erin blinked, then traced the cactus’s ridges with her fingertip, careful not to touch the thorns. “I thought he’d be dead by now.”

Andy shrugged. “He almost died, twice. But I kept bringing him back. Couldn’t let him go.” He smiled, putting all his love for her in that smile. “It was the only thing I had left of us.”

Erin’s hands trembled just a little. She set the cactus down on the bench, then turned to Andy, her eyes shining. “You kept him alive all this time?”

“Yeah. I mean, I’m not saying I did a great job. There were some lean years. But he’s here.” Andy coughed. “He’s persistent. Like someone I know.”

Erin let out a sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “God, you’re still a dork.”

“I know.”

She shook her head, but there was no anger in it. “You know, that’s the most romantic thing anyone’s ever done for me.”

Andy shrugged. “Low bar, I guess.”

She punched him in the arm, not hard. “Shut up. You kept our cactus alive for six years.”

He looked at her, then at Sir Spikes, then back. “I didn’t want to lose you, Erin. And I’m not going to do so again.”

She stared at him for a long time, her mouth working as if she were arguing with herself. Then, all at once, she lunged forward and hugged him. The movement was awkward, as both of them had tried to stand at the same time, and the cactus almost went flying. Andy caught her, then her arms were around his neck, and for a second everything felt the way it used to, only better.

He could feel her shaking. Her breath was warm on his cheek. “You idiot,” she whispered, but the words had no bite. “I love you, you absolute idiot.”

Andy hugged her back, so hard his ribs hurt. “Love you, too.”

They stood that way for a long time, ignoring the world, until the breeze off the ocean made them both shiver. Erin drew back, wiped her eyes, and said, “God, you made me cry, you bastard.”

Andy wiped his own eyes, not caring that he’d probably leave a streak of snot across his cheek. “Worth it.”

Erin smiled, the real one, the one he remembered from way back. “You’re such a dork.”

“Yup.”

They sat together on the bench, silent again, but this time it was the kind of silence that didn’t need filling. Erin cradled the cactus in her lap, running her finger around the edge of the mug.

“I don’t care what happens,” she said, very softly. “I just want to keep this. And you.”

Andy decided not to say anything, just rested his hand over hers, both of them careful not to touch the spines.

Erin let out a long, shaky breath. “You know, I kept thinking about the Cabana,” she said. “The memory one. I remembered what it felt like to belong somewhere, to have a home. I always thought that was just nostalgia, but—”

She stopped, and he squeezed her hand.

“It’s not nostalgia,” Andy said. “It’s us.”

They looked at each other. For once, neither of them blinked.

When the time came, Andy helped her stand. She tucked the cactus under her arm, then punched his arm again, but softer. “If you ever bring me a second cactus, I’m throwing it in the koi pond.”

Andy grinned. “Fair warning.”

Erin started to walk away, then turned, eyes fierce and wet. “Promise you won’t lose me again.”

He held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

She gave him a crooked smile, then disappeared through the hedge, leaving Andy alone with the bench, the duffel, and the sound of the ocean.

He looked at his watch, realized he’d lost track of time, and for once didn’t care.

For the first time in a long while, Andy didn’t feel like he was running away from anything. He felt like he was home.

Andy let the garden bench keep his shape for another minute, then stood and swung the duffel over his shoulder. He let himself wander—not aimlessly, but not quite with intent—until his feet crunched gravel, and the shade of the south wall pressed a hush over his thoughts. He could sense Claire nearby, a gentle aura of curiosity and warmth that seemed to draw him in. The library’s heavy oak door resisted at first, then sighed open, as if the room inside disapproved of surprises.

The place was empty, save for Claire.

She sat at the long table by the main window, legs neatly crossed at the ankle, her hair still mussed from bed. In front of her lay a precise arrangement: four open books, three stacks of closed ones, and a battered black notebook which Andy recognized as the third one she had been using since the first week here. Even now, she kept it always within arm’s reach, like a safety blanket.

Claire didn’t look up as he entered, but the tip of her cat-ear twitched in his direction. Andy sensed her quiet delight at his presence, a soft ripple of contentment that mirrored the faintest curl of a smile on her lips, which then vanished behind the concentration she fixed on the page. Her tail swished faster. Andy realized with a start that she was not just reading—she was annotating, a thin trail of penciled margin notes spidering from paragraph to paragraph, forming a kind of whispering counter-narrative.

He approached quietly, as if afraid to break the spell.

She glanced up, eyes impossibly blue behind her glasses, and offered a tight, two-fingered wave. Her notebook slid across the table, page already prepared: If this is a reference retrieval, your odds are not good. The catalog system here is criminal. Andy sensed a playful exasperation in her words, knowing she reveled in the challenge.

Andy stifled a laugh, and sat down beside her, the duffel bag thunking onto the parquet.

"Not here for research," he said. "Just the company."

Claire’s head tilted a few silent degrees, her expression so carefully smoothed it might have been mistaken for indifference by anyone less attuned than Andy. But he felt it—just beneath the surface—a gentle, warming surge of affection, like an electric blanket slowly cycling on. Her posture, precisely calculated for maximum comfort and minimum vulnerability, relaxed the tiniest fraction at his words, as though she’d been waiting for a cue to let her guard down.

The library felt like a cathedral of dust. Even now, the only sound was a far-off shuffling, a sort of spectral presence moving through the stacks. Andy guessed it was probably a Mildred, tidying up the wake of some arcane researcher, but he supposed it could just as easily have been an echo of the hotel itself.

Claire gestured at the scatter of books on the table with a quick, dismissive sweep of her hand, then reached for her notebook with a motion as practiced and thoughtless as breathing. She wrote for a few seconds; her pencil made a soft, urgent scratching, like a mouse gnawing inside the walls. Without looking up, she angled the notebook toward Andy: You are interrupting a comparative analysis of magical realism’s treatment of the word ‘home’. Also, there’s a shocking amount of smut in the ‘Philosophy’ section. Andy sensed her amusement, a shared joke between them, and felt the connection deepen.

Andy grinned. “Maybe that’s the whole point of philosophy.”

Claire’s eyes flicked to him, a pale blue made even sharper by the wire-rimmed glasses perched on her nose. She rolled her eyes, but her tail betrayed her, giving a small, approving flick. Andy sensed a warm ripple of amusement from her, like sunshine breaking through clouds. She jotted another note, this time faster, and spun the notebook to him once more: In your case, I’d call that confirmation bias.

Andy grinned wider, leaning into the banter, feeling her quiet delight wash over him. “Hey, I don’t see you skipping the Philosophy section, either.”

She hesitated for a beat, and he caught a flash of playful defensiveness radiating from her, then she wrote: It’s called pattern recognition, Andy. Try it sometime.

He laughed, and for a moment the library felt less like a cathedral and more like a living room. The two of them, side by side at the long table, surrounded by towers of books and the faint perfume of old glue and leather, seemed to exist in a kind of private time zone, one where the only relevant events were the micro-expressions and Morse code tail flicks that passed between them.

It was Claire who broke the easy silence next. Andy felt her curiosity tickle at the edges of his awareness, gentle but insistent. She tapped her pencil against the margin of a thick volume, then scribbled a quick message: You seem lighter today. Did you have a good morning?

Andy felt a blush heat his cheeks, sensing her interest sharpen like a cat spotting movement. “You could say that.” Claire’s gaze didn’t waver, and he hesitated, feeling her attention focus with laser precision. “Did you… sense anything?”

She nodded, matter-of-fact, and wrote, You were aroused at approximately 8:25, then again at 8:40. High amplitude the second time. I was worried, but then the curve resolved. Andy felt no embarrassment from her, only clinical fascination tinged with genuine concern.

He laughed, a little louder than he meant to. He shook his head in disbelief, sensing Claire’s calm confidence. “You’re unbelievable, Claire. Aren’t you supposed to be embarrassed by stuff like that?”

She held up a finger, then flipped a few pages back in her notebook. Quoted, with a timestamp: ‘Embarrassment is just a social shortcut for uncertainty about shared boundaries. If you already know the boundaries, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about.’—C.F., 8:07 a.m. yesterday.

Andy laughed aloud this time. “Fair enough. Okay, I’ll bite. What do you want to know?”

Claire hesitated, the tip of her tongue just visible between her lips as she considered the question. Andy could feel her focus spiral inward, a gathering of all the threads of feeling—his and hers—into a neat little ball she could turn over and examine from every angle. It was a look he’d come to recognize, equal parts concern and academia, and it always made him want to squirm and sit up straighter at the same time. After a moment, she set her pencil down and wrote in her precise, looping script: I’m only curious because you felt sad at breakfast, then not-sad after. Did something happen?

Andy fidgeted with the zipper of the duffel, unsure if he should just say it. “I, uh. Kind of jerked off in the shower. Is that what you meant?”

Claire’s eyes went wide for a microsecond before narrowing in consideration, her academic mode springing to the forefront. She scanned his face, then flicked her gaze down to her notes, as if re-reading his emotional graph in her mind’s eye. After a few heartbeats, she wrote: That would explain the physiological indicators, but not the emotional ones. I assumed you’d had a run-in with Erin. If you haven’t, you should. She is a bit unhappy today.

Andy’s brain briefly short-circuited, sensing her earnest concern. “You want me to… what?”

Claire set down her pencil and steepled her fingers, the gesture precise and oddly delicate. Her tail curled around the leg of her chair and began a slow, hypnotic sway, as if she were lulling herself into patience. For a long moment, she just looked at him, her eyes the sharp, impossible blue of winter sky. She didn’t write this time—just nodded, slow and patient, as if explaining to a child that yes, the stove really was hot, and yes, it really would burn if you touched it. Then she pointed at herself, then at Andy, then mimed dialing a phone with her thumb and pinky.

Andy stared, then laughed, the tension draining out of him in a rush. “I should just call you next time?” he asked, only half-joking.

Claire’s face broke into a radiant smile, her lips parting in a way that made her seem, for a moment, much younger than she was. She gave him a massive thumbs-up, as if the simple clarity of the solution delighted her beyond words.

Andy grinned back, caught in the warm undertow of her sincerity. There was something so innocent, so utterly sweet about her encouragement that it made his heart squeeze. He reached across the table, careful to move slowly, and covered her hand with his own. He noticed, for the first time, the faint tremor in her fingers—the way they hovered just above the surface of the tablecloth, never quite landing unless she deliberately willed them to. He remembered her telling him once that she hated the feeling of being trapped, that even the weight of a heavy blanket could sometimes make her panic.

He let his hand rest gently atop hers, but didn’t press down.

“Promise me you’ll never change, Claire,” he said, the words coming out softer than he’d planned.

She frowned at him, her brow furrowing in confusion. He could sense her mind spinning out the possible implications of his statement, searching for hidden context or implied criticism. Then, almost grudgingly, she wrote: Why would I want to? The question was so pure, so undiluted by performative humility, that Andy almost hugged her on the spot.

Instead, he unzipped the duffel and pulled out the small, olive-green box he’d been saving. He placed it on the table between them. Claire eyed the box like it was a live grenade. She looked at Andy, then at the box, then back at Andy. “Open it,” he said gently.

She reached for it with both hands, but paused just before her fingers made contact. She inhaled deeply, steadying herself, then lifted the lid.

Inside was a notebook—but not just any notebook. The cover was soft, hand-tooled leather, a rich brown flecked with gold, the sort of thing you might find in a Parisian stationery boutique, not a chain store in a half-abandoned mall. The pages were creamy and featherlight, edged in a pale gold leaf that shimmered in the sunlight streaming through the library window. Andy had spent nearly an hour in the Annex picking it out, running his thumb along the spines of endless volumes before settling on this one. He’d asked the Mildred behind the counter—Salamander, she’d called herself—if it came in other colors.

“Brown’s best for you,” Salamander had said. “It’s honest. And it won’t show the blood if you make any big mistakes.” She’d said it with a wink, but Andy had a feeling she wasn’t entirely joking.

Claire opened the cover, running her finger along the edge of the first page. Her touch was reverent, almost ceremonial. She looked up at Andy, then back down at the notebook, as if she couldn’t quite believe it was for her. “Salamander—she was the Mildred in the store—swore it’s got endless pages,” Andy said, trying to fill the silence. “Not sure if that’s literal, or just good marketing. And I had her throw in a leather strap so you can carry it over your shoulder.”

Claire’s eyes widened, pupils dilating in what Andy recognized as the closest thing to awe she ever displayed. She closed the notebook, then hugged it to her chest, the gesture so spontaneous and heartfelt it made Andy’s chest hurt a little. For a long moment, she just held it there, breathing slow and steady, as if memorizing the feel of it.

She scribbled, Thank you. Then, softer: No one ever brings me things.

Andy felt a pang—of guilt, of tenderness, of something he couldn’t quite name. He thought of all the little kindnesses that had been denied her, all the times people had overlooked her or mistaken her quiet for aloofness or indifference. He reached out, more gently this time, and ruffled her hair, careful to avoid the soft velvet of her cat ears. “Well, I consider this an investment in our collective future,” he said, and meant it.

Claire didn’t smile this time. Instead, she rose from her chair, the movement so sudden and decisive it startled him. She leaned over the table, hands trembling slightly, and kissed him. It was a soft, silent kiss, her lips dry and warm against his, her breath a faint tremor between them. Andy felt her hands on his cheeks, the pressure uncertain at first, then growing more confident. There was no artifice, no calculation—just the honest, awkward devotion of someone who had decided, after much deliberation, that this was the correct move.

When she pulled away, her cheeks were bright pink, and she wouldn’t meet his eyes. Andy felt the ghost of her affection settle into his bones, a low, humming warmth that lingered long after her lips left his.

They sat in silence for a while, the air between them thick with unspoken things, and Andy could feel Claire’s hesitation pulsing beneath her calm exterior. He found himself tracing the grain of the table with his finger, suddenly self-conscious in a way he hadn’t been since he was a teenager. It was Claire who broke the silence, tapping her pencil against her new notebook with a sense of purpose.

She wrote, I will need a new pen soon. This one is inferior and will not do justice to the paper.

Andy laughed, the tension broken. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said, catching the uptick in her lips that betrayed relief. He could almost taste her gratitude.

Claire nodded, once, as if confirming a scheduled appointment. Then she did something unexpected: she slid her chair closer to Andy’s, close enough that their shoulders were almost touching. He felt the warmth radiating from her, and he sensed both eagerness and a tiny flicker of nervousness in her posture. She opened the notebook to the first page and wrote, in deliberate, ceremonial script: Today is a good day.

Andy watched her, feeling an unexpected pride. He sensed her satisfaction—this small ritual of words carried weight for her.

She didn’t smile this time; instead, she rose from her chair, leaned over, and kissed him full on the lips. It was a soft, silent kiss, but her hands trembled a little where they touched his cheek. When she pulled away, Andy felt the ghost of her affection settle into his bones.

He sat there, not wanting the moment to end, but knowing it would. Nothing lasted, not even the best days, but he was learning that sometimes it was enough just to witness them.

As he watched, Claire sat back down and, with exaggerated care, wrote the first entry in her new notebook:

1. New notebook. Feels like possibility.
2. Next time: join him in the shower. Or invite him to join me.
3. Remember: do not change, unless it’s for the better.

She slid the page across to Andy, and as he read it, he sensed her hope in every carefully chosen word. He nodded, his heart pounding in a weird, embarrassed way that he’d thought he’d outgrown years ago.

He glanced at her, saw her watching him, not with the cold, clinical curiosity of before, but with something approaching wonder. He felt her anticipation, the gentle tremor of expectation in her gaze.

For a long moment, neither of them needed words. The hush of the library pressed in, thick as velvet. Andy realized he’d never felt so safe, or so utterly himself, with anyone—and he could feel that Claire felt the same.

Finally, Claire stood, gathered her books and her new notebook, and gave him a two-armed hug. It was warm, lingering, and perfectly silent—and in that embrace, he sensed her gratitude, her love, her trust, her burgeoning joy.

When she left, Andy watched her go. Her tail flicked as she rounded the shelves, and he smiled, thinking that if this was the new normal, he was more than okay with it.

He was good with it. Better than good.

Andy loitered a few minutes longer in the hush of the library, then packed up the duffel and headed out. He checked the time, thought about where Chloe might have drifted, and found himself pulled instinctively toward the lawn. There was a certain hour—right before lunch, after the first big rush of sunlight—when the main terrace went quiet, and the only ones out were the braver or sadder souls who didn’t mind the risk of being seen.

Chloe was easy to spot.

She sat at the edge of the hill, not in a chair or on a blanket, just on the grass, knees hugged to her chest. Her sundress today was pale lavender with tiny white flowers, and the breeze kept trying to blow it sideways, but Chloe fought back by pressing her legs together and pulling the fabric up as a shield. It didn’t help: the dress was cut low enough that her cleavage, full and blushing at the edges, looked in constant danger of escape.

He let the duffel drop onto the grass beside her, then sat down, careful to leave just enough space that she didn’t feel crowded. Chloe didn’t startle—she must have seen him coming. Instead, she tucked her chin into her knees, eyes scanning the horizon with a kind of practiced melancholy.

Andy said, “Nice day, huh?”

Chloe snorted, a faint, embarrassed sound. “I guess,” she replied, not looking at him.

They sat in silence for a beat, the wind flattening the grass around them, the salt air making everything feel cleaner than it probably was. Andy waited, because he knew from experience that Chloe needed a few false starts before she could get words out.

Finally, she said, “You know, I thought you’d come find me sooner.” The words landed gentle, but there was a thread of accusation in them.

Andy nodded. “I should have,” he said. “Sorry.”

She shook her head. “No, it’s okay. I just—I keep thinking, if I get eliminated today, you’ll forget I was ever here.” She gave a short, bitter laugh. “Which is dumb, because I’m not exactly the memorable one.”

Andy shook his head, angry at himself. “Chloe, did we not discuss this yesterday? That’s not how it works. Not for me. You know I—” He stopped, realizing he’d never actually put it into words. “I care about you, Chloe. I want you here. Even if you think you’re the odd one out.”

She shrugged, but her lips trembled a little. “I’m not mad, Andy. I’m just… tired. I spent so long watching other people have the things I wanted, I kind of got used to being on the outside. But then I got here, and for a second, I thought maybe—” She let the sentence die.

Andy reached into the duffel, fished around, and produced a single pink rose. He offered it to her, thorns trimmed, petals perfect, the stem wrapped in a bit of hotel ribbon.

Chloe stared at it, blinking. “You know I’m allergic to half the flowers on this island, right?”

He grinned. “This one’s different. It won’t wilt. I asked Arabella. She said it’s the ‘forever’ kind.” He hesitated, then added: “It’s for you. Because I hope you can forgive me. For being slow. For not making you feel like you mattered from the start.”

Chloe took the rose, held it as if it might dissolve in her hand, then brought it to her nose and inhaled, gently, cautiously. “I forgive you,” she said. “But you have to forgive me for not knowing what to do with this.” She smiled, a little crooked. “I’ve never gotten a flower from a guy who actually liked me back.”

Andy edged closer, not quite touching her. “You don’t have to do anything special. Just… stay. Okay? Don’t let yourself get eliminated, because I still have a lot of getting to know you left to do.”

Chloe’s eyes went glassy, but she managed to hold it together. She looked at the rose, then at Andy, and then her whole face crumpled. She started to cry—not loud, not messy, just a steady, silent flow of tears that she tried to blink away.

“I’ll do my best,” she whispered.

Andy reached out, wrapped her up in a hug. She was small, but not fragile—there was a hidden strength in her arms, the kind that came from holding yourself together for years. She pressed her cheek to his shoulder, and for a while, neither of them moved.

After a minute, Chloe drew back and wiped her eyes. “God, you must think I’m a mess.”

He shook his head. “No. This is kind of a rite of passage.”

She laughed at that, the sound watery but real.

Andy kissed her on the forehead, then on the cheek, and Chloe closed her eyes, letting herself lean into him. When she opened them, she looked at Andy with a clear, certain gaze.

“I’ll fight for it,” she said. “For us. Even if I don’t know what ‘us’ is supposed to mean.”

Andy smiled. “That’s all I ask of you.”

He stood, helped her up, and together they walked back to the main building, Chloe’s arm wrapped in his, the pink rose glowing against the bright shock of her hair.

The sky above the island had turned faintly opaline by early afternoon, all the blue sucked out by a haze that made the horizon look edible. Andy left Chloe at the breakfast buffet—she’d insisted on building the world’s tallest yogurt parfait, said she was “science-ing away her nerves”—and decided to walk the path toward the beach, not because he expected to find anyone, but because he needed to think somewhere with more space than a hallway or a hedge.

He almost missed Emi entirely. She’d perched herself down by the low-tide shelf, her canvas propped up against a driftwood log, the paint set nestled in the sand at her hip. The dress she wore was white with navy polka dots, but most of her was already spattered with dabs of ultramarine and gold and a kind of iridescent green that was probably not an actual color on the spectrum. The first thing Andy noticed, though, was her arms.

All six of them.

Two were wrapped around the canvas, holding it steady as she layered brushstrokes with the other four—sometimes all moving at once, sometimes alternating so smoothly it looked like a time-lapse animation. She didn’t paint with the standard up-and-down hack of amateurs; her movements were liquid, surgical, like she was conducting a symphony just out of earshot. Every so often, she’d stop to clean a brush, her lower right arm handling the rag while the others never broke rhythm.

Andy watched for a full minute before Emi seemed to realize he was there. She didn’t startle, just flicked her gaze sideways, smiled with her mouth closed, and finished the stroke she was working before setting the brush down. Two of her hands kept busy cleaning tools; the others reached to rearrange the paints, almost unconsciously. He wondered if she even realized she was doing it.

He called out, “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’ve become more hands-on since last week.”

Emi’s smile widened into a blush, and she turned on her knees to face him fully, tucking two arms primly behind her while the others fanned out in a splay of pale, paint-freckled fingers. “It’s funny,” she said, voice the same breathy, dreamy tone she’d always had, though Andy thought he heard an undercurrent of mischief in it this time. “When I got them, I thought it would make me a freak. But now I can’t imagine not having them.” She held all six arms up, stretching them with a languorous, balletic grace, fanning her fingers like she was about to perform a magic trick. “I keep dreaming I’m an octopus. Or a goddess.” Her giggle was the sound of a bead rolling across glass, nervous but not unpleased.

“Why not both?” Andy said, easing down beside her on the sand. The paint set was an expensive-looking wooden box, its lid propped open to display twenty-four tubes of color, a trio of paletted knives, and a neat row of brushes. Emi worked with a kind of reckless order, every movement both spontaneous and exacting, as if chaos itself had a method. Up close, he could see she’d gotten paint not just on her hands and forearms, but in streaks along her calves and even in her hairline, a little daub of orange above her left ear. She didn’t seem to notice or care.

He tried to think of something clever or comforting to say about her transformation, but Emi, as always, beat him to it.

“Do you want to know the weird part?” she said, voice softening. “It actually feels… right. Like I was always supposed to be this way, but nobody told my body until now.” She looked down at the tangle of her arms, then up at Andy, searching his face for either revulsion or awe. “I used to be so careful not to stand out, not to take up space. To just blur myself out of the frame, you know?” She chuckled, but the sound was tinny. “Now I do the opposite, and it doesn’t even feel like showing off. It just feels honest.”

Andy nodded, remembering the old Emi—the one who’d spent half of elementary school hiding behind her curtain of hair, always sketching in the margins of her notebook instead of raising her hand in class. He hadn’t known then what to do for her, or even if she wanted him to. If anything, her new confidence made it harder to figure out where he fit in her world.

“What are you painting today?” he asked, more to anchor the moment than out of real curiosity. But Emi answered with delight, picking up the canvas and turning it toward him.

It was the cove, but not as it looked in reality: the sky bled into the sea in shades of pale green and pink, the rocks at the margin bright as jewels, the waves curling inward with a mathematical precision that somehow made them look even more alive. In the foreground, a cluster of small black birds wheeled above a woman on the sand. The woman’s hair was too long to be Emi, but the face was clearly hers.

“I like it,” Andy said, and he meant it. “It’s what the world looks like in your head, isn’t it?”

Emi looked down, a little embarrassed. “Sometimes I wish I could stay in that place.” Two of her hands started folding a napkin into a tiny origami crane, without her even looking. “But it’s not real. Not really. The world always pulls you back.” She set the crane on the sand between them and smoothed its wings, then gave Andy a quick, searching glance. “What about you? Do you ever wish you could live in a painting instead of real life?”

He thought about the question, weighing it longer than he needed to. He couldn’t help but think of Katherine. Living in a painting was no bliss. “No,” he said honestly. “In a painting, nothing ever changes. It’s always the same moment, forever. That can be good, if it’s the right moment. But everything outside the frame keeps moving on.”

Emi laughed, then surprised him by resting one of her lower right hands on his. The touch was light, tentative—almost as if she wasn’t sure if she was allowed to do it. She said, “See, that’s why you’re you, and I’m me. I always liked the idea of stopping the clock. But you always want to fix the world, don’t you?”

There it was—the Emi logic, the weird, unbreakable optimism that he’d always admired but never quite understood. He wondered if she realized how much she’d changed since arriving here, or if she’d just grown more into herself, shedding the layers that didn’t belong.

“I like you better this way,” he said, surprising himself a little.

She blinked, then beamed. “With all the arms, you mean?”

“With all of you,” he said. “You don’t have to hide anymore.”

They sat quietly for a bit, the lull of the surf filling the gaps in their conversation. Emi picked up a brush, dipped it in gold paint, and ran it along the canvas in a single, fluid motion. “You seem happy today,” she said. “Is it the challenge?”

He shook his head. “It’s you, actually. All of you. I keep waiting for the anxiety to kick in, but instead it’s just—” He searched for the word. “Gratitude, maybe? I’m not used to it.”

She beamed, her eyes dark and soft. “It looks good on you.”

A pair of gulls shrieked overhead, chased by a third, and Andy watched them spiral until they vanished over the rocks. He said, “Do you ever think about when we were kids? About Laura?”

Emi nodded, her hair bouncing. “All the time. She used to say, ‘If you’re sad, just imagine how the world would look if you drew it yourself.’”

Andy laughed. “She was right.”

They fell quiet, listening to the rush of tide.

Emi, never able to leave a silence untweaked, spoke up. “I’ve been meaning to tell you something,” she said. “Since I bought the upgrade last week, you know, the one that made it so I can fully control my new arms? I almost can’t remember what it was like to have just two arms. It’s like my brain just… decided this was always me.”

Andy absorbed that, nodded. “Do you like it?”

She met his eyes, earnest. “I do. I really do. I think I want to keep them. Even after.”

He grinned, a little awestruck by her certainty. “You can. You look beautiful. I mean, it’s you, Emi.”

She giggled, then in a sudden burst of bravado, reached out and took his hand—upper left, soft and paint-flecked. “Thank you for not making me feel weird about it,” she said. “I know it’s not normal, but—”

He squeezed her hand. “Normal is overrated, Emi.”

She blushed bright red, and all six hands fidgeted at once. “Don’t say things like that, or I’ll get shy.”

He scooted closer, until their shoulders touched. The duffel bag, ever-present, nudged his hip as he moved, and Emi eyed it with the curious intensity of a cat about to pounce.

“Do you want to see something?” he asked, popping the zipper.

Emi nodded, wide-eyed.

He rummaged inside, then pulled out a small Polaroid photo, the edges frayed from years of handling. He handed it over. “I brought you this.”

The photo showed three kids on a battered porch: Emi, hair wild and cut uneven, grinning from behind a birthday cake; Andy, too skinny, with a crooked smile; and Laura, in the middle, her arm slung around both of them, face half-shadowed but unmistakably hers. They wore party hats. The cake was lopsided and ugly, and all three looked deliriously happy.

Emi brought a hand to her mouth. “Is this—”

He nodded. “Your thirteenth birthday. You, me, Laura, and the entire universe for an afternoon.” He hadn’t meant to sound so sentimental, but the memory made his chest ache.

Emi blinked hard, then hugged the photo to her chest with all six arms. For a second, Andy worried she’d start to cry, but instead she just looked at him, her eyes shining, and whispered, “Thank you.”

He wanted to say more, but she was already leaning in, kissing him. It started soft, but when she brought all six hands into play—one at his shoulder, two at his face, others tracing his spine—he felt a current run through his body, the kind that leaves you buzzing for hours. When she pulled back, she was grinning, all mischief.

Andy let the words hang in the air, almost stunned at the forwardness. The Emi he remembered spent most of middle school apologizing for her own existence, and now here she was, on her knees, lips curled in a sly half-smile, six arms poised like an invitation to the impossible. It was hard to know whether to be proud, or terrified, or both. He settled for neither, because even before he could process his own reaction, Emi was already acting on hers.

She drew him down onto the sand, the warmth of the afternoon sun still caught in the granules, and crowded against his side like a friendly octopus, all elbows and unexpected leverage. Andy became acutely aware of his baggy polo and the sweat at the back of his neck. Emi, in contrast, seemed immune to discomfort, her sundress already dusted with both paint and sand, her face open, predatory in a way that was more endearing than alarming.

He felt her hands—two at his shoulder, another at his sternum, the rest ghosting along his sides, his hip, the inside of his thigh. He wondered if she’d rehearsed this, practiced the choreography in her head before trying it on him, or if she was improvising by instinct. Either way, she undressed him with a gentle confidence, using all available limbs in a way that was unmistakably show-offy, like a magician refusing to reveal the trick. A button was flicked open, a buckle popped; his shorts slid down, exposing pale, embarrassingly unkempt legs, and Emi giggled at his shiver.

The wind off the water was cool, but her hands were warmer, and everywhere at once. Emi pressed in, straddling his thigh, her knee grazing the sensitive skin just above his boxers, her hair falling forward in a curtain that tickled his chin. For a moment, Andy felt completely, deliciously out of his element, as if he were in an entirely different kind of painting—one with no outlines, just color bleeding into color.

He tried to say something—something reassuring, maybe, or self-deprecating, or even just a joke to break the tension—but Emi shushed him with a fingertip to his lips, and then another finger, and then two more, as if she couldn’t decide which one belonged there. “Let me,” she whispered, and he did.

She maneuvered herself lower, her arms a web of motion, her eyes never leaving his. He braced for awkwardness, but it never arrived; instead, Emi was all focus and curiosity, her touches exploratory, like she was discovering a new species. She stroked him with one hand, then two, then all of them, each movement slightly out of sync, a chaos of sensation that left Andy dizzy. He gasped, half-mortified, half-ecstatic, and Emi’s laugh was soft and delighted. “It’s called the Hexasutra for a reason,” she teased, and then bent to her work with the studied intensity of a scientist.

Andy had always imagined sex as a kind of transaction, a mutual give-and-take, but with Emi it was pure gift, all attention and improvisation. She was fearless, almost greedy, in her desire to use every tool she had, and the result was that Andy found himself completely disarmed, all the nervous energy in his body converted to something sharper, more vital. He tried to hold on—tried to stay present, to not just let sensation sweep him away—but Emi made that impossible.

She kissed him, first on the mouth, then down his neck, and then lower, her lips finding the spots that made him jump. Her hands never stopped moving, tracing his ribs, his hipbones, his stomach, mapping the territory like a cartographer with too many pens. When she finally wrapped two hands around him, the shape was unfamiliar but perfect, as if he’d been waiting for this exact configuration his entire life. She started slow, building a rhythm, and then a third and fourth hand joined, amplifying the effect until Andy forgot how to breathe.

A wave crashed behind them, loud enough to startle a flock of gulls, but Andy barely registered it. Emi’s face hovered above his, her expression both earnest and wicked. “I want to see what it’s like,” she murmured, and before he could answer, she slid him inside her, easy and unhurried, as if she’d done it a thousand times in her head. She rode him like a dance, hips moving in slow, deliberate arcs, her hands bracing herself on his chest, his knees, the sand, everywhere. Andy tried to match her, but she was always a half-beat ahead, setting the tempo, conducting with her own body.

He lost track of time. The world shrank to the soft crush of Emi’s thighs, the tangle of limbs, the salt on her skin, and the relentless, loving pressure of her hands. He didn’t know if he was supposed to be in control, or if there was such a thing, but it didn’t matter. Emi seemed to want him to just feel, to surrender, and so eventually he did.

When he finally came, it was sudden and overwhelming—so much so that he cried out, a sharp, embarrassing sound that echoed off the rocks. Emi’s response was to laugh, not unkindly, and to keep going, coaxing out every last drop of sensation until he was trembling, spent, and smiling like an idiot. She collapsed beside him, panting, her hair wild, her eyes gleaming with pride.

They lay there, legs tangled, Emi’s arms draped over him like a blanket made of warm, living silk. He could feel her heartbeat everywhere—the one under her left breast, the one pulsing in her wrist, the one thumping in the crook of her elbow. She turned her head to look at him, her face half-shadowed by the setting sun.

“I think I love you, Andy,” she said, the words floating out as naturally as a yawn. “I mean, not just from before, but now, too. Is that okay?”

Andy blinked, trying to find his voice. He hadn’t expected her to say it first, and certainly not now, when he was most defenseless. But it felt right. He reached up, untangling a strand of her hair from his mouth, and said, “I love you, Emi. And you never have to ask if it’s okay.”

She squeezed him tighter, then, for good measure, nuzzled her nose against his collarbone. “Thank you for not forgetting about me. About us.”

He kissed the top of her head, then watched the tide come in, erasing their footprints.