Hot water streamed down her body.
Ginevra tipped her head back and let it pour over her, unhurried, as though the steady rush could rinse the day clean. Her gaze drifted to her wrist—where a Band-Aid had been carefully stuck over her skin, printed with an absurdly cute little rabbit. The sight of it tugged at something softer in her, and without meaning to, she gave a faint, almost private smile.
Too much had happened today. Far too much.
She needed to cool her thoughts—literally, if that was what it took—so she turned the faucet until the warmth thinned into cold. The first shock hit like a slap of winter air, and the chill sank into her bones, sharpening her mind in an instant. Under the icy water, memory surfaced in fragments, one after another, refusing to be ignored.
Jayna's bright grin.
That old man's leering, greasy face on the street.
The security guard's shadowed, sullen eyes.
Everything had unfolded with a kind of theatrical cruelty—as if the world had decided to stack scenes on top of each other just to see how much a person could take. And Ginevra knew, with a clarity that was almost frightening, that if even one turn in the road had gone wrong—if Jayna had gotten hurt—she would have been devastated.
Or perhaps… she wouldn't only have been devastated.
Perhaps she didn't even know what she would have done.
Beneath the cold spray, she lowered her head, letting the water beat down on her hair, her neck, her shoulders—silent, steady, and punishing.
(Ginevra? Are you done yet?)
Jayna's voice came through the door, blurred by distance and the thick damp air. Ginevra's fingers moved before her thoughts did; she shut off the shower.
"What is it?" she called, her voice calm, as if her mind wasn't still echoing with images.
(I just wanted to check if you're finished. I found you some pajamas—mine—and I grabbed a clean towel.)
"Got it," Ginevra answered.
Outside, Jayna stood with an armful of folded fabric and a towel draped over it, hesitating as though the door were something alive.
Then, more softly, she tried again. "You're so quiet… I'm coming in, okay? I'll just set them down."
Before Ginevra could respond, the latch shifted. A thin line of light appeared as Jayna eased the door open, and she slipped inside with careful, tiptoeing steps.
Steam hung in the air like a veil. The bathroom smelled of body wash—clean, sweet, intimate. Everything felt softened by moisture and warmth, edges blurred, sound muffled, the world reduced to breath and damp skin.
"You—"
Ginevra's eyes widened.
Instinct snapped through her. She turned the shower back on, the sudden roar filling the room, and stepped behind the glass partition, placing a barrier between them as if glass could substitute for distance.
Jayna froze, then jerked her face away so quickly it was almost comical. "I—I said I was coming in," she stammered, voice tripping over itself. "You didn't answer, so I thought you… I thought you were okay with it."
She swallowed, her throat working hard.
Because she had seen it.
A flash of pale skin. The faint outline of a body through steam and hurried movement. Only a glance—she told herself it was only a glance—but even that single stolen look made her pulse stumble.
"I—I—I'm putting the clothes here," Jayna blurted, words tumbling out. "I'm going out! If you need anything, just call me!!"
And then she bolted, fleeing the bathroom as if the heat itself were chasing her. The door slammed shut with a sharp, final thud.
Jayna stood on the other side, back pressed to the wood, cheeks blazing. She covered her face with both hands, as though she could smother the heat before it gave her away. Her heart hammered so hard it felt loud enough to be heard through the walls.
"Damn it," she muttered, breathless. "Why am I so nervous? We're both girls, aren't we?"
Still, she turned, and before she could stop herself, she leaned her ear to the door.
Listening.
The quiet inside stretched strangely, as if the bathroom had swallowed sound. Jayna frowned, puzzled, not even noticing how awful her own behavior was—how shameless, how childish—until the door suddenly opened.
She had been leaning too close. Her body tipped forward with the motion, and she stumbled straight into the person opening it, catching herself against warm, newly dried skin.
"…Hi?" Jayna offered weakly.
She lifted her face in a bright, ingratiating smile, the kind she used when she knew she'd been caught.
Ginevra looked down at her.
Her expression was blank—cool and unreadable—but there was a faint flush on her cheeks from the bath, a trace of warmth that made her seem, impossibly, more human. Jayna's pajamas fit Ginevra well, almost too well. The collar wasn't fastened all the way up; the line of her collarbone showed, and the soft suggestion of her chest was half-hidden, half-revealed, like a secret the fabric couldn't quite keep.
Ginevra's long black hair was still damp, dark strands clinging to her neck. Water beads slid from the ends and vanished into the cloth. Her eyes, usually sharp and cold, seemed hazed now—fogged over by steam and exhaustion—so that for a moment she looked like a painting brought to life: vivid, beautiful, and slightly ruined.
Jayna blinked, suddenly unsure where to look. She bit her lip without meaning to.
"How long," Ginevra asked, voice low and flat, "are you going to keep leaning on me?"
Jayna straightened so fast she nearly hit her head on the doorframe. She forced a goofy grin, as if humor could cover embarrassment.
"Giny," she said quickly, scrambling for something—anything—to shift the mood. "Let me dry your hair."
She reached into the cabinet, grabbed a hair dryer, and waved it like a peace offering. She guided Ginevra to sit, all cheerful efficiency, as though the last thirty seconds hadn't happened.
Ginevra had already removed her contacts. Her nearsightedness wasn't severe, but she could still see enough to catch the way Jayna's expression kept changing—how she looked as if she wanted to say something, then swallowed it down.
Ginevra almost asked.
But Jayna was already lifting a towel, already gently pressing it to Ginevra's hair, and the simplest path was to allow it.
Ginevra sat still.
Her hair fell past her shoulders—soft, black, glossy even wet. Jayna patted and rubbed with care, more tender than she had any right to be after barging into the bathroom. Then she took a comb and lightly teased at the hairline, separating strands so the air could reach.
The dryer hummed.
Jayna worked slowly, section by section, blowing warm air through the dark lengths, her fingers occasionally brushing Ginevra's scalp, then slipping down to the nape of her neck. Every touch was feather-light—barely there, and yet impossible to ignore.
Ginevra's lashes lowered.
Without realizing it, she closed her eyes and let herself sink into that unfamiliar comfort, the steady rhythm of someone caring for her without asking for anything in return.
Jayna spoke, but so softly it was almost swallowed by the dryer.
"Ginevra… I think I'm sick."
She knew Ginevra wouldn't hear her—not over the noise, not with her eyes closed—so the words came more easily, as if she were confessing into a dark room that couldn't judge her.
"I don't know why," Jayna murmured, voice barely a thread, "but when I saw you like that just now, my heart… it sped up."
She swallowed, cheeks hot even though no one was looking.
"No—maybe it started earlier than that. A long time ago. Every time I imagine you being with someone else someday, it hurts. Like I'm losing something I don't even have the right to claim. I'm scared you'll… you'll stop wanting me."
Her voice trembled on the last words.
Then—suddenly—her hand was caught.
Jayna startled as Ginevra's fingers closed around her wrist. Ginevra turned her head, and with that small motion, she also turned off the dryer.
The room fell quiet, the silence sharp after the constant hum.
Jayna took a reflexive step back, heart jumping into her throat. Guilt rose fast, cold and prickling.
Had she been heard?
"What—what is it?" Jayna asked, trying to sound casual, failing. "Did you call me? Is something wrong?"
Ginevra stared at her for a long moment, the pause stretching until Jayna felt it in her ribs.
Then Ginevra said evenly, "Too hot."
She pointed at one side of her hair.
Jayna exhaled so hard it was almost a laugh. "Oh—sorry. I didn't realize." She hurried to part the hair, checking the roots, fingers careful as if Ginevra's scalp were something fragile. "Let me see."
Ginevra let her fuss, eyes steady on Jayna's face.
After a moment, Ginevra asked, "What were you thinking about just now?"
Jayna's hands stilled for the briefest second.
She didn't answer.
She only turned the dryer on again, this time on a lower setting, and resumed as if the question had never been spoken aloud. She had drifted; she had made a mistake; she didn't want to tell him—no, her—why.
Even with the small mishap, Jayna's "service," as she liked to call it, was attentive. When Ginevra's hair was finally dry and shining, Jayna rubbed a few drops of hair oil between her palms and smoothed it through the strands. Her fingers threaded into the thick black hair, lifting it, massaging gently at the roots, easing tension as if she could knead the day out of Ginevra's skull.
"Feels good?" Jayna asked, leaning in, her lips near Ginevra's ear.
Ginevra's eyes were lowered. She answered with a quiet, gravel-soft "Mm."
She didn't know how that sound landed in Jayna's body—how it hit somewhere tender and reckless, turning a simple response into something that felt like an invitation.
Jayna's fingertips slid along the crown of her head, then down, grazing the back of her neck, skimming the edge of her ear. Every motion was slow, deliberate, impossibly gentle. Her gaze darkened as it followed the line of Ginevra's throat—pale and clean, elegant in its sharpness—down to the restrained, almost ascetic beauty of her posture.
Ginevra looked like someone who belonged to distance and snow.
Jayna's breath caught.
If she were a vampire, she thought wildly, she'd lose control. She'd sink her teeth into that perfect curve, just to see what warmth lived under all that calm.
"You used to not even let me touch you," Jayna said, bending closer with a smile that carried more meaning than it should. Her breath ghosted against Ginevra's skin.
Ginevra opened her eyes and turned her head slightly. "We weren't close then."
Jayna's hands paused.
Jealousy—sharp, childish, immediate—flared before she could swallow it down. "So what, then?" she asked, voice a little too tight. "If you get close with someone else… you'll let them touch you too?"
Ginevra listened to her awkward, twisted question and shook her head once. "You're overthinking."
And then, almost as an afterthought—unspoken but clear—there was that simple truth: I don't like being touched. I'm not like that.
Jayna's shoulders loosened. She let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding and forced herself to laugh lightly. "Okay, okay."
Still, the image wouldn't fully leave her—the idea of someone else's hands on Ginevra the way hers were now. The thought made her eyes sting with a hot, irrational envy. It wouldn't matter if it was a man or a woman. She'd still burn with it.
"Enough," Ginevra said suddenly, turning to face her. Her gaze dropped to Jayna's fingers as if they were something she had only just noticed. "Aren't you tired?"
Jayna shook her head, smiling as though she could disguise how fast her heart was moving. "Massaging you doesn't make me tired."
Then, with a playful tilt of her brows, she added, "But I do charge, you know."
Ginevra looked at her.
For the first time that night, the corner of Ginevra's mouth lifted—just slightly, a curve so precise it felt dangerous. She tilted her head and asked in that cool, familiar voice that still somehow sounded new:
"Charge me, then. Would this do?"
And in Jayna's mind—
Ginevra's fingertips brushed her lips, slow and testing. A kiss landed there, tender enough to steal the breath from her lungs, gentle enough that she couldn't resist even if she tried. Then it deepened, pushing past the first softness into something urgent—claiming, tightening, unraveling—until the kiss became a fierce, dizzying tangle she couldn't think her way out of.
…
"Jayna?"
A real voice this time. Close.
Jayna jolted as if she'd been shaken. Her eyes flew open, wide and stunned, and she stared at the person in front of her—Ginevra, looking at her with faint concern.
"Hm?" Jayna forced out. "You called me? What—what happened?"
"You zoned out," Ginevra said simply.
Jayna realized, with horror, that she had just been daydreaming—no, fantasizing—right in front of her.
Heat rushed to her face so fast she felt it in her scalp. She slapped her cheeks a few times as if she could physically knock the thoughts loose. Her gaze betrayed her anyway, dropping helplessly to Ginevra's lips—those thin, tempting lips that seemed made for trouble.
Jayna felt like steam was pouring out of the top of her head.
Flustered and irritated at herself, she shot Ginevra a glare—completely unfair, entirely misdirected—then whipped her face away and fled the bathroom as if escape could save her dignity.
Leaving behind a bewildered Ginevra standing in the doorway.
"…She's acting weird again," Ginevra murmured into the empty hallway.
When everything was finally settled, Ginevra went upstairs to Jayna's bedroom.
She could have taken the guest room. It would have been the sensible choice.
But Jayna had made a dramatic show of refusing, insisting she'd been frightened and needed someone nearby. To prove her point—because she was Jayna—she had blasted a heartbreak ballad through the house speakers at an unforgivable volume, a song that practically begged for someone to stay.
So loud it rattled the air.
Jayna even "accompanied" it with mournful humming and pitiful little gestures, acting like a tragic heroine in a cheap romance.
Ginevra listened in silence.
Jayna's voice, she had to admit, was good—sweet, clear, made for music. When the song ended, Jayna turned to her with those wide eyes, soft and pleading, silently sending one unmistakable message:
I need you.
"Giny," Jayna coaxed, sitting on the bed and patting the space beside her with exaggerated shyness. "Come on. Hurry."
Ginevra walked closer, hesitant. "I can sleep on the floor," she said, already thinking about laying the blanket down. It would be simple.
Jayna's brows knitted together. "On the floor? My floor's clean, sure, but the bed is big enough for both of us." She lifted her chin, indignant on Ginevra's behalf. "And you're the guest. Who makes their guest sleep on the floor?"
As if words weren't enough, Jayna scooted back, then flopped onto the bed like a starfish, arms and legs spread, measuring the width with her entire body.
"See? Plenty of space." She looked up at Ginevra, grinning. "And I sleep like an angel. I won't steal the blanket."
Ginevra's lips twitched. She couldn't help it.
Jayna's dramatics were ridiculous—and strangely disarming.
Ginevra sat down at last. Her fingers brushed the soft blanket, thin and smooth under her touch. She let her gaze wander around Jayna's room.
It was nothing like hers.
Jayna's room was saturated with pink—soft pink, bright pink, glittering pink—like a child's dream of a princess bedroom that no one ever grew out of. Plush toys lined the headboard. Little boxes and trinkets sparkled faintly in the light.
"You like these?" Ginevra asked, pointing toward the stuffed animals and the shiny keepsake boxes.
Jayna scratched her head, suddenly shy. "Not exactly. The plushies were gifts. Since I was little—my dad used to travel for work and bring me one whenever he came back. Then it became a habit, and even now he still buys them." She shrugged, a little helpless. "So they just… pile up here."
Her gaze flicked to the trinket boxes. "The jewelry, though—I do like. Who doesn't like pretty things?"
Ginevra nodded.
It made sense, she thought, that Jayna would be drawn to beautiful objects.
Jayna herself was beautiful.
"You want a higher pillow or a lower one?" Jayna asked, moving behind her to straighten the pillows. Her hands were quick, practiced, making space as if she'd been waiting for Ginevra to appear here all along.
"Lower," Ginevra said.
"Same," Jayna chirped, pleased. "Better for your neck."
She finished arranging everything and patted the mattress like it was a stage.
Ginevra looked down at the blanket.
One blanket.
They would be under the same cover.
Her throat moved as she swallowed—an instinctive, uninvited reaction. Not necessarily nerves, not necessarily anything else, but the simple fact that she had never shared a bed this way. Not like this. Not with anyone.
While she was still thinking, Jayna had already wriggled under the covers, only her eyes visible now—dark, bright, fixed on Ginevra as if she were watching something she didn't want to miss.
"What are you doing?" Jayna asked softly. "Get in."
She reached out and gave a small tug at Ginevra's arm.
Ginevra drew a slow breath and lay down, stiff as a board, as if her body didn't know how to be human in a bed that smelled like someone else.
The mattress was sweetly soft—almost like cotton candy, absurd and plush—and it made her feel even more out of place, like a knife laid on satin.
Jayna giggled. "Ginevra, you've never slept with someone before, have you?"
She could feel it—the rigidity in Ginevra's posture, the careful stillness, like any movement might cause disaster.
Ginevra turned her head and asked, very calmly, "Have you?"
Jayna blinked, actually thinking. Childhood sleepovers didn't count. And she'd never stayed over at Calista's either.
So… no.
She lifted herself onto one elbow, then shifted closer without hesitation, bracing her weight above Ginevra. Her long hair draped down, brushing Ginevra's ear like a curtain. Jayna's eyes—star-bright, unguarded—looked straight down into Ginevra's face.
"You're my first," Jayna said.
The night held its breath.
Outside, the world was quiet, every sound swallowed by darkness. Inside the room, there was only the soft rustle of fabric, the warmth of shared air, and the hidden, restless thrum of two hearts beating too loudly in the same small space.