Chapter 5 Chapter 4: The Sanctuary and The Betrayal
I stood under the waterdrop for a long time, maybe five minutes, just letting the hot, monsoon-like water beat against my skin. I needed the heat to seep into my bones, to steam away the grimy memory of the alley. The bathroom was filled with a thick, comforting mist, and I closed my eyes, trying to lose myself in the sound of the spray.
When I finally opened them, I faced a colourful array of bottles lined up on the metal shelfs. I picked each one up, sniffing the caps, searching for a scent that felt like a sanctuary. I settled on a shampoo that smelled of warm nec-car and spiced van-in, a comforting, sweet aroma that promised to erase the night. I worked the rich lather into my shoulder-length hair, then used the soapy remains and a gritty pink scrub to scour my body, as if I could physically wash away the filth and the shame. I let the water cascade over me, willing it to carry everything down the drain.
“Are you okay in there?” Silver’s voice, gentle but clear, cut through the sound of the water from the other side of the curtain. “I’ve hung a towel and a T-shirt on the back of the door. It should be big enough to sleep in.”
Her practicality was a rock. “Thanks,” I called back, my voice hoarse. I turned the knobs, and the sudden silence was deafening. Wrapping myself in the soft snuff, I roughly dried my hair before wiping a clear circle in the steam-fogged reflector.
My reflection stared back, pale, with eyes that still looked a little raw. I would make an okay Polli, I thought with a hollow resignation. The features were there; the softness Joel’s transformation had revealed. If that was my fate, so be it.
“I’ve made leaf whenever you’re ready,” Silver called from the living area.
I pulled on the T-shirt. It was soft and smelled of her laundry detergent, but it was a little too small, hugging my frame in a way that felt both vulnerable and intimate. The thought of Joel surfaced again, a sharp, painful thorn. Not the Nate he was now, with his condescending consolation, but the Joel I knew, the beautiful, enigmatic question mark I thought I’d loved. If I was destined to be a Polli, it wouldn’t be for him. A bitter laugh caught in my throat. Who am I kidding? Will I ever get my Trembling at all?
I turbaned the towel around my head and pushed the bathroom door open. Silver was perched on the sofa, a book in one hand and a mug of leaf in the other. Even with her small stature, she seemed formidable, radiating a strength and peace I desperately envied. She stood as I entered, offering a warm smile and gesturing to the second mug of leaf steaming on the sofa table.
“Take a seat. Mi casa es su casa,” she said with a slight smirk.
I sank into the cushions, wrapping my hands around the warm mug. “No sugar, thanks. This is amazing… thank you. So much.” The words felt inadequate.
She disappeared for a moment and returned brandishing a hairbrush. “Let me brush your hair for you,” she said, her tone leaving no room for argument. She didn’t wait for an answer, simply sat behind me on the sofa and gently unwound the towel from my head.
“Okay… thanks. You’re being so kind.” My voice was barely a whisper.
She began to brush with a practiced, soothing skill. Each stroke was deliberate and gentle, untangling the knots with a patience that felt like a mother’s love. It was a care I hadn’t realized I was starving for.
“I hate Nates,” she said suddenly, the words sharp and bitter, slicing through the quiet moment.
I remained silent, absorbing the confession. I just let my eyes fall closed, focusing on the feeling of the bristles against my scalp, a simple kindness that was somehow healing a part of me I thought was broken.
“You can stay with me tonight,” she continued, her voice softening back to its gentle tone. “I don’t have Uni until ten.”
The real world intruded with the mention of my dead-end job. “I have work tomorrow,” I sighed. “I’ll have to leave early.”
She laughed a little, the sound light and easy. “That’s fine. There’s a hopper stop just down the street.”
The gentle rhythm of the hairbrush through my hair was the most tenderness I’d felt in what seemed like a lifetime. Each stroke was a silent apology to my scalp, to my body, for the harshness it had endured. I let my head fall back slightly, giving myself over completely to Silver’s care.
The brush stilled. I could feel the warmth of her close behind me, a comforting presence in the quiet room. Then, I felt it, the soft press of her lips against the crown of my head. It wasn’t a grand gesture, just a whisper of contact, but it sent a shockwave of pure, undiluted feeling straight through me. My breath hitched.
She placed the brush down on the sofa beside us. Her hands, now free, came to rest on my shoulders, her thumbs gently kneading the tense muscles there. I leaned back into her touch, a silent permission.
“Nanda,” she whispered, her voice husky and close to my ear.
I turned my head, and our eyes met. The easy-going confidence she showed the world was gone, replaced by a raw, vulnerable intensity. The space between us crackled with a new, terrifying electricity. I saw my own longing reflected back at me in her gaze.
Slowly, giving me every chance to pull away, she leaned in. I didn’t move. I couldn’t. Her lips met mine.
It was nothing like the hungry, claiming kisses in the alley. This was a question. It was soft, exploring, a tentative sip of water after a long drought. Her lips tasted of leaf and van-in and a sweetness that was uniquely her. A small, broken sound escaped my throat, and I felt her smile against my mouth.
I turned my body fully towards her, my hands coming up to cradle her face. Her skin was impossibly soft. I deepened the kiss, and she responded in kind, her hands sliding from my shoulders down my back, pulling me closer. The too-small T-shirt rode up, and the feeling of her palms on the bare skin of my back made me gasp.
She broke the kiss, her forehead resting against mine, our breath mingling in the small space between us. Her eyes were dark, her pupils wide.
“Is this, okay?” she breathed, her voice a ragged whisper.
Instead of answering with words, I closed the distance and kissed her again. This one was fiercer, filled with all the pent-up confusion, desire, and desperate need for connection that had been boiling inside me. I poured everything I couldn’t say into that kiss, my gratitude, my fear, my startling, dawning want for her.
She understood. Her arms wrapped around me, one hand tangling in my damp hair, the other splayed against the small of my back, holding me as if I were something precious. We sank back into the soft cushions of the sofa, a tangle of limbs and soft sighs.
Her kisses trailed from my lips, along my jaw, down to the sensitive spot on my neck. I arched into her, my fingers clutching at the fabric of her shirt. This wasn’t about obliteration or transaction. This was about discovery. Every touch, every whispered endearment, felt like it was mapping a new, beautiful territory on my skin.
She hovered over me, her weight a comforting pressure. “You are so beautiful,” she murmured, her eyes tracing the features of my face as if memorizing them.
Tears welled in my eyes, but they weren’t tears of sadness or pain. They were relief. They were the feeling of being seen, truly seen, for the first time all night, maybe for the first time in a long time.
I pulled her down for another kiss, my hands sliding under her shirt to feel the warm, smooth skin of her back. She shuddered at my touch, a soft moan escaping her lips.
In that moment, surrounded by the quiet of her apartment, with the scent of van-in in the air and this strong, incredible Polli in my arms, the labels didn’t matter. Nate, Polli, Changeling, they were just words. This feeling, this connection humming between us, was the most real thing I had ever known. It wasn’t a Trembling that would define my gender, but a different kind of quaking, one that started in my soul and promised to make me whole.
The deep, velvet peace of sleep was the most profound I’d ever known. Wrapped in Silver’s arms, our legs entwined, her breath warm against my neck, I existed in a hazy, blissful limbo. Half-awake, half-dreaming, my mind painted sensations of warmth and light, of gentle, phantom touches that promised pleasure. A deep, thrumming heat began to pool in my core, a comfortable, building pressure that felt like the natural extension of the night’s intimacy. In my dream state, I arched my back slightly, pressing closer to her, a soft sigh escaping my lips as the warmth spread, a delicious, lazy unfurling.
And then it wasn’t lazy anymore.
The warmth became a furnace. A searing, electric current ripped through me. My anther was pressed against her. Silver awoke. She gasped, her body tensing against mine. In the dim pre-dawn light filtering through the curtains, I saw her eyes fly open, wide with sleep and confusion. Then they focused. They dropped from my face, down the line of my body, to the space between us.
Her expression shifted from confusion to disbelief, then to a sharp, cold horror.
“What the fuck?” The words weren’t a question; they were a weapon.