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This takes place after Simone’s Week.

PHL Terminal A. 11:17 a.m.

Arden’s boots hit the floor like the airport owed her money.

She walked like a problem looking for a narrative–aviators on, bag slung low, no plan, no real idea where her charger was, and still reeking of whatever cologne Simone had worn when she said “And I don’t leave people waiting anymore.” at Whole Foods.

The plane ride had been short, mean, full of static and a seatmate who’d tried to convert her with a pamphlet about Jesus and long denim skirts.

Now Philly air hit her lungs like a slap. Damp. Familiar. Full of exhaust and pigeons and half-remembered regret.

She paused at the SEPTA kiosk. Not for a ticket. Just to stare at her reflection in the plexiglass.

Still hot.

Still her.

Still fucked.

“Gods,” she muttered, raking her fingers through her hair. “I’m a fucking cliché.”

And then–out loud, to no one–

“Don’t say it. Don’t say her name.”

She said it anyway.

“Emerald.”

The word tasted like wine gone warm. Like a bandage she didn’t remember wrapping.

She shouldn’t want to see her.

Shouldn’t need to.

But Emerald didn’t say shit like “You scare me emotionally.” She didn’t close the door mid-cry. She didn’t smell like eucalyptus and moral superiority.

Emerald was safe. Dangerous. Pathetic. Real.

Emerald wanted her. Needed her. Arden was sure of it.

Could be folded in half with a word and stay pressed flat just to be near Arden’s fucking gravity.

That was better than love. That was control.

And Arden was tired of losing.

Her phone buzzed–Quinn, probably. Or Carolyn. Or chaos in another area code. She didn’t check it.

Instead, she boarded the Airport Line train like she’d just made a decision she didn’t believe in yet.

Because here’s the secret:

Arden almost grows here.

She almost says, Maybe I need something gentler. Maybe I need to be wanted in a way that doesn’t look like conquest.

She almost cries. Almost texts Simone thank you and you were right.

Almost.

Then she looks out the window, sees the skyline inching closer, and scoffs.

“Nah,” she says. “Fuck that.”

And somewhere across the city, on an altogether different bus, Emerald’s breath catches. Not because she knows. But because some part of her–the part that still remembers Arden’s voice in her ear like gospel–feels it.

The shape of her day just changed.

Again.

Toward the front of the altogether different bus, just behind the driver’s booth, a girl sat so still she seemed sculpted there–dark-haired, blue-eyed, hands folded in her lap like the world owed her reverence and hadn’t delivered yet.

Her name was Margeaux.

You wouldn’t notice her right away. Not unless you were looking for silence. The kind of silence that hums like power before a storm. She wore layers like secrets–soft gray sweater, worn velvet skirt, boots that didn’t make a sound even when she stomped.

Her lips moved.

Just a whisper. Just a breath.

“Viridis… lucet…”

The traffic light up ahead flicked from red to green half a second early.

No one noticed.

Not really.

The driver muttered something about lucky timing. A biker cursed and pedaled harder.

Margeaux exhaled.

“Motus sine impedimentum.”

The next intersection obeyed.

Every time she rode this route, the bus ran smooth. Lights greening ahead of schedule, congestion parting like someone nudged reality sideways. Just a little. Just enough.

She wasn’t trying to impress. Wasn’t trying to be seen.

A proper wizard doesn’t perform. She simply exists.

Margeaux didn’t need a wand or a staff or a lineage chart pinned to her chest. Her bloodline ran back to the First Veil, through treaties carved into stone beneath rivers that don’t exist anymore.

She whispered old spells the way some girls hummed Taylor Swift.

And Philadelphia listened.

The engine hummed lower as the bus coasted through another intersection, easy as breath.

She glanced around once–met Emerald’s gaze for half a second–and smiled. Not warm. Not unkind. Just knowing.

Then turned her eyes back to the front. Whispered again.

“Lux… transitum.”

And the city moved for her.

Just a little.

Just enough.

Emerald’s mind wandered, not from some spell, but from regret.

A fuckin’ flashback.

Philadelphia, Summer 2023

Emerald was eighteen.

Grief clung to her like sweat. It was in her breath, her clothes, her fuckin’ shoes. Everything felt too loud, too bright. Her mother’s perfume still haunted the hallway. Sometimes she heard her voice in the sink pipes. She didn’t cry in public. She didn’t cry at all.

She just… wandered.

Until Arden found her.

They’d met a few weeks before. Mutual friends. A rooftop party. Arden had been the loudest girl at the affair, hair the color of fire alarms, laughing like she wanted to be arrested for it. She wore eyeliner like a dare balıkesir escort and drank tequila like a priest guzzling expired holy water.

Emerald had stared. Arden had noticed.

And now, here they were.

The apartment smelled like incense and leftover pad thai. Vinyls leaned against the wall like lazy memories. She lit a candle with a match from a bar she couldn’t remember getting kicked out of. “You look like a cathedral,” Arden said, half-joking. “And I’m feeling blasphemous.”

Emerald didn’t laugh.

She didn’t say anything.

She just took off her hoodie.

Arden stepped in close.

“You okay?” she asked.

Emerald nodded. Lied.

Arden didn’t press.

She kissed her instead.

It was slow at first.

Not in the way some people say “slow” to mean boring or tender or careful. It was slow like smoke–intentional, creeping, designed to fill the empty spaces before you noticed they were hollow.

Arden knew how to read a pulse. Knew when to touch and when to hover, when to bite and when to hush. She kissed like she’d been dared to, tongue just a little too greedy, hands just a little too reverent. Not possessive. Hungry. Like she thought she could fuck the sadness out of a girl if she tried hard enough. Maybe she believed it.

Emerald didn’t move much at first. Let herself be touched. Let Arden take the lead, because agency felt like a hat she couldn’t find in the dark. Her mother was still gone–a freshly packed absence. Emerald hadn’t been able to feel anything in weeks, not even grief, not even hunger, just a background hum of wrong. But when Arden’s hand slipped under her waistband, heat bloomed behind her ribs like something was trying to grow there again.

Arden undressed her like she was unfolding a letter she’d been dying to read. Carefully. Curiously. With those long, nimble fingers that always looked like they belonged to a magician or a pickpocket. Her shirt was gone, then her jeans, then the plain black bra that still smelled like the detergent her mom used. Emerald flinched when it hit the floor. Arden noticed. Paused.

“You’re okay,” she murmured.

Soft. Not condescending.

Like a priest, if the priest smelled like cloves and heartbreak.

Then her mouth was everywhere. Hot. Confident. Kissing down Emerald’s stomach, biting at her hip, murmuring something filthy that made Emerald twitch hard enough to knock her knee against the wall. Arden laughed. Kissed her knee. “Sensitive. That’s hot.”

Emerald’s breath came in short, controlled gasps–like she was scared she might sob if she let go. And Arden knew. She didn’t say anything, didn’t ask, just kept kissing her thighs like worship. Slow. Warm. Patient.

Then–

“You’re not broken, baby,” Arden whispered, mouth pressed just beside where Emerald ached. “You’re just open.”

And somehow, that cracked something.

Not in a way that hurt.

In a way that spilled.

Emerald came fast and hard, shaking, eyes open wide like she was seeing stars on a ceiling that couldn’t possibly hold them. Her legs trembled around Arden’s shoulders, her hands clawed at the sheets, and for a moment, she wasn’t drowning anymore. She was moaning. She was there.

And she was crying.

Not from pain. Not quite.

The kind of crying that leaks out because your body finally gave you permission to feel.

Arden stood at the foot of the bed like she’d just kicked in the door of heaven and lit a cigarette in the vestibule.

She peeled her shirt off without ceremony–tight black cotton that stuck to her ribs in the summer heat. Her bra was mismatched, plum lace under a punk band tank, and when that came off too, Emerald forgot how to think. Her tits were fucking perfect. Not fantasy-perfect, not airbrushed bullshit. Real. Big and natural and high enough to defy reason, tipped with dark nipples that looked like they’d been kissed hard more than once and hadn’t apologized for it.

Arden’s waist was cut like a dancer’s, taut and angled, but with a rap sheet. Hips flared like an invitation wrapped in a dare. Emerald’s eyes traced the outline of muscle over her stomach, the way her body moved like everything about her was designed for impact–choreographed violence in lipstick and denim.

She kicked off her jeans, letting them puddle around her ankles. No underwear.

There she was.

Naked. Glorious.

Confident in the way only someone who’d made a series of terrible choices and survived all of them could be.

Her pubic hair was dark, curly, and soft-looking–grown in but edged with intention. Shaved three weeks ago, maybe. Enough time for rebellion to start creeping back in. Just a little fuzz on her thighs, her underarms. Real. Honest. Sexy as fuck.

And then Emerald saw it.

A tattoo, right on the inside of Arden’s left thigh.

Heisenberg.

Not Bryan Cranston-as-Heisenberg, no. The Santa Muerte shrine sketch. Crude, cursed… Hat, mustache, and glasses.

Emerald’s jaw dropped.

Arden laughed. “Don’t bartın escort judge me. It was a phase.”

“You have Walter White on your inner thigh.”

“Yeah, and you’re about to get his perspective.”

Emerald blinked. “What the fuck does that even–“

“Come here.”

She obeyed.

Crawled forward like a prayer in motion. Like something pulled by gravity instead of courage. She had never touched a woman like this. Never tasted one. Never thought she’d get to. And now here Arden was, spread open on Egyptian cotton sheets in a strange apartment, legs wide, looking down at her with the kind of smirk that launched bad decisions into legend.

Emerald started slow.

A hand on Arden’s thigh, tentative. A kiss just above the inked sunglasses.

“You’re trembling,” Arden whispered.

“I’m not scared,” Emerald lied.

“No,” Arden said, voice low. “You’re starving.”

And Emerald was.

She kissed her way in with shaking hands and wild hunger, breathing her in like smoke and sweetness and sweat. Arden was wet already–hot and soft and slick with invitation. Emerald licked once, awkward. Then again. Slower. The taste hit her like a realization: oh. Oh. This is what I want. This is what she’d been wanting. Not in fantasy. Not in porn. Here. Now. Her.

Arden sighed, low and throaty, hips tilting in approval. “Just like that, baby. Just–fuck.”

Emerald’s tongue circled, then pressed, and she got the rhythm fast. She was a fast learner. She wanted Arden to remember this. Wanted Heisenberg to fog up his fucking shades.

Arden gripped the sheets, then Emerald’s hair, moaning now, body tensing like a bowstring. “Don’t stop,” she said, panting. “Don’t you–fuck–yeah, yeah, there–“

Emerald held her thighs apart, deeper now, licking, tasting, learning the shapes of Arden’s desire like a language she’d always known but never spoken. It wasn’t graceful. It wasn’t choreographed. It was messy, humid, desperate.

It was real.

And when Arden came–loud, teeth bared, back arched like a godsdamn painting–Emerald didn’t look away. She wanted to see. Wanted to own it. Her mouth wet with sex, her chin slick, her eyes wide and stunned like did I do that?

Arden fell back, breathless. “Holy fuck, Emerald.”

Emerald wiped her mouth, still between her thighs, blinking up like someone who’d just looked God in the eye and licked Her.

And Heisenberg?

He looked very pleased indeed.

Afterward, she lay there, skin sticky with sweat and grief and breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. Arden didn’t cuddle, didn’t swoon–just rolled off the bed like she’d completed a successful spell. She lit a cigarette. The match hissed. The smoke curled.

“That was nice,” Arden said, like she’d just performed a card trick. She handed Emerald a glass of water. The same hand that had made her come now offered hydration, like a cosmic joke.

“You should stay the night,” Arden said, already crossing the room. “But I’m gonna be up writing.”

“In the morning, we’ll have Eggs Monterey.” she said.

“What’s Eggs Monterey?” Emerald asked.

“It’s where you eat scrambled eggs while jerking off to videos of Paulina Villareal.” she grinned. “Now sleep.”

Emerald blinked. The ceiling above the bed was plaster, cracking in the corner like it had something to confess. She curled under a blanket that smelled like too many people. Shampoo and strangers. Arden touched her shoulder–once. Light. Almost like an apology.

Then she turned away.

Sat at a desk littered with old coffee cups and incense stubs.

Opened her laptop.

Started typing like nothing else mattered.

And Emerald?

She lay there in strange bed, in a strange apartment, naked and raw and very aware that the sex had been the only real thing in the room.

It had been good.

Too good.

Dangerously good.

But now it was over.

And so was Arden.

Emerald drifted into sleep with her body still pulsing and her soul already bracing.

She didn’t know yet that she’d be alone in the morning.

But some part of her–some dark, grieving, too-smart part–already did.

9:07 a.m.

She woke alone, sunlight scalding her eyelids. Arden’s leather jacket still hung off a dining-chair back, but Arden herself had vanished. Emerald stretched, winced at the ache in her thighs, smiled despite it, and padded naked toward the smell of fresh coffee–hoping for a lazy Sunday sort of morning.

Instead, she met her.

A stranger stood frozen in the kitchen doorway: late twenties, sharp bob, blazer over workout leggings, a tote bag with MoMA in block letters. Keys dangled from her still-extended hand. Her eyes flicked from Emerald’s naked breasts to the sheets dragged half-off the bed to Arden’s ash smear on the rug.

“Um,” the woman managed. “Who the hell are you?”

Emerald’s pulse spiked. “I–uh–Arden said this was her place?”

The woman’s expression did a full sunrise of outrage. “Arden? The redhead who watches my cat batman escort sometimes? Again?”

There was no cat in sight–probably traumatized, hiding under a mid-century credenza.

Emerald snatched a throw blanket off the sofa, clutching it to her chest. Heat rushed her cheeks; her grief felt suddenly stupid, her choices stupider. “I’m–Emerald. I’m so sorry.”

The tenant planted hands on hips. “She breaks in, screws whoever, and leaves them here? That’s her idea of house-sitting?”

Emerald’s throat closed. She tasted last night’s whiskey and humiliation. “I didn’t know. She said–“

“She always says something,” the woman snapped, exhaling hard. Then her voice softened a notch. “You look… wrecked. Did she even give you water? Breakfast?”

Emerald shook her head. Tears stung, sudden and mortifying. She wasn’t crying over Arden–she was crying over Mom, over another abandonment laid on top of the first like fresh bruises on old bone.

The woman sighed, anger deflating into resigned compassion. “Bathroom’s down the hall. There’s a clean robe on the door. I’ll get you coffee. Then we’re calling you a ride home, okay?”

Emerald nodded, shame and gratitude warring in her chest.

9:52 a.m.

Robed, caffeinated, phone buzzing with a Lyft ETA, Emerald sat on the pristine sofa while the tenant–Mara, she said–tidied evidence of Arden’s tornado. Mara didn’t pry, didn’t scold further. She just hummed under her breath and tucked a granola bar into Emerald’s tote like a mom at a school field trip.

At the door, Emerald faltered. “You should press charges.”

Mara huffed a laugh. “Against Arden, or against my terrible taste in friends?” She squeezed Emerald’s arm gently. “Whatever she mined out of you, take it back. Don’t let her keep it.”

The Lyft beeped. Emerald managed a shaky smile, stepped into humid Philly morning air, and realized the ache between her legs was nothing compared to the void under her ribs–but at least now she understood its shape.

Three Hours Later — a string of texts

HEY

sry about the exit had to chase a vibe.

u r incredible.

Emerald deleted it without saving the number. Then she blocked every unknown call for months, but the ghost of those texts kept ringing whenever she let herself hope.

That was the day Arden’s gravity became Emerald’s orbit. A one-night solar flare that burned a permanent silhouette on her heart–proof you can be abandoned twice at once: first by the dying, then by the living.

And Arden? She kept roaming constellation to constellation, never noticing the scorched worlds in her wake–until 2025, Sunrise Griddle & Fry, when one of them finally set herself free.

2025, because of course.

The bus sighed to a stop in front of Sunrise Griddle & Fry, the vinyl awning sagging slightly, the neon OPEN sign flickering like it had doubts. Emerald stepped down like the concrete might reject her. Hoodie sleeves tugged over her hands. Mouth neutral. Eyes already bracing.

She hated this. This liminal moment between transport and destination. The crossing of thresholds. The forced optimism of doors. The uncertainty of arrival.

She pushed through.

Bell above the door jingled. The place smelled like fry oil and burnt toast and the ghosts of a thousand bad dates.

“Morning, sunshine!”

Lottie.

Lottie was already waving one hand in the air like she was hailing a cab in 1955. Her apron was crooked. Her hair was too blonde and too high. Her nametag said “Hi, I’m LOTTIE :)” and the smiley face was drawn with a Sharpie that bled like it was weeping joy.

She bounded–bounded–over to Emerald like someone had said her name three times and given her a treat. She was a tail-wag in human form.

“Oh my gods, you made it in EARLY! I was worried you’d ghost me, and then I’d have to do the booths alone and probably die in a tragic syrup accident.”

Emerald blinked. “I–uh. Yeah.”

“Anyway!” Lottie spun on her heel like a fucking dance break. “We’re slow for now, which means it’s the perfect time to learn the register. I mean, it’s possessed or cursed or whatever, but I have a system. Just don’t touch the F2 key. Ever. F2 is where hope goes to die.”

She grinned. Emerald’s stomach did something unfamiliar. Not quite dread. Not quite nausea.

Lottie was glowing. Unironically. Like she’d been kissed by the morning and hadn’t stopped smiling since.

She handed Emerald a fresh apron. It was still warm from the dryer.

“C’mon,” she said, “I’ll show you how to load the coffee. It’s important. This place runs on caffeine and divine punishment.”

Emerald stared.

Lottie beamed.

She was tall-ish, tan, built like she’d done sports once and then replaced them with enthusiasm. Brown eyes danced. Her ponytail bounced when she walked. Everything about her said I’m happy you’re here and I will remember your birthday even if you tell me not to.

Emerald tried to hate it. Really.

But Lottie was impossible to resent.

It was like trying to yell at a golden retriever for knocking over a vase. She was already licking your face and apologizing with her whole body.

They reached the counter. Lottie slapped the register like it was a misbehaving child.

“This bastard hates me,” she announced. “But I flirt with it anyway. Sometimes that works.”

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