Chapter 5
I’ve been possessed. It’s the only explanation. All the reminders that I need to keep this strictly business have been muted, hushed over by the opening notes to an intimately familiar song.
I’m standing over my ex-best friend, holding my hand out expectantly, my throat too thick to speak the words I’ve wanted to say in so many iterations.
Do you want to dance?
Will you dance with me?
Can I have this dance?
Dance with me, Genevieve!
When she takes too long to react, shame burns in my throat and cheeks and I make to retract my hand.
But her palm is suddenly in mine, her grip firm but loose. My skin tingles, and my heart thumps hard against my rib cage. If my afro wasn’t in braids, every single strand would be standing straight up like I’ve just been electrocuted.
We’d been so tentative when we’d first become friends, so careful around each other—two reserved girls each with less than favourable social experience, hovering and gravitating around each other’s orbits so that every accidental touch felt like being struck by lightning.
Genevieve had been braver than me, back then.
A palm on my shoulder. A hand wrapping around my forearm.
Fingertips brushing against mine when we passed each other something.
Then, eventually, teasing shoves. Grabbing my wrist to pull me in a certain direction.
Innocent little touches that built up until I no longer jumped or flinched.
When I shyly began doing the same, she’d never reacted, at least not too obviously.
But I’d always been perceptive of her—our silences making space for all my other senses to angle toward her like a flower in sunlight.
Every time I’d returned a touch in kind, she’d gone briefly still, before practically melting like she wanted to sink into me.
She stands, closing the space between us, and I promptly forget how to breathe. She’s half a head taller, and it has never felt more apparent than now, her head tilted down so she can keep her eyes locked on mine.
Her arm wraps around my waist, the fingers of her left hand tangling with those of my right. My free hand moves up to her shoulder, and we both shiver when my bare palm finds a place on her equally bare skin, the muscles underneath flexing at my touch.
The house morphs, the space between the dining and sitting area expanding until we have our very own dance floor.
I giggle helplessly, charmed even though I’ve witnessed greater magical feats.
Genevieve’s lips twitch with amusement. She takes a step sideways, and I automatically step with her.
Another and another until we’re standing in the middle of this new place the house created for us, swaying to the sound of an old, familiar song.
We’re in sync, as we’ve always been, Genevieve’s hands dropping to frame my waist as mine go up to wrap around her neck.
We’re both trembling, both unable to maintain eye-contact for more than a heartbeat. Intent smoulders between us like its a physical being.
I’m trying futilely to remind myself of tomorrow, but find myself helplessly getting rooted to now.
“Rosemary.” I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from swooning at the way she says my name—the way she’s always said it, like its a confession in and of itself.
“How long have you been an oerhwu?” She asks it lightly, teasingly, her voice a low whisper.
I feel the sound like hot Milo spreading deep in my belly.
I glance at her, then away, shy. “All my life,” I whisper just as lightly.
“Is it something you’re born with? A special gift only certain people get to have?”
I don’t look at her, ignoring the way my pulse skips at the word “gift”. “No, not really. Everyone has the ability to connect to the eshé.”
“Oh?”
“Think of it, in simple terms, like learning a new language. Or a new skill. It’s easier to absorb the teachings when you’re a baby. In Maraya, it’s tradition—sacred knowledge that’s passed down mostly from mother to daughter.”
Her lips quirk, drawing my gaze.
“So, all those times …” She trails off, still amused.
My pulse skitters as I think of the moments she must be referring to—times I hadn’t been able to resist using my abilities.
When she’d lost a pen. Forgotten her textbook in the hostel. Didn’t have a little extra money to buy something. Wished for extra hot water in the showers. Small “coincidences” that clearly hadn’t escaped the watchful eyes of my best friend.
“Yes,” I admit with a deliberately careless shrug.
“Magical girl,” she whispers, again in Ibiiom.
My hands tighten around her neck; hers tighten around my hips. Her hands are big. Warm. My belly hasn’t stopped dipping and rolling since we’d started swaying in the middle of our dance floor.
You need to stop, Rosemary.
You need to end this, now.
“Can’t believe you’d been keeping this little secret our entire friendship.” She’s still teasing. “I feel like maybe I should be upset.”
“Why aren’t you?” I’m being only partly serious.
All her amusement fades. “I have secrets of my own, Rosemary.”
I look away. I don’t know how to respond to that. The statement hadn’t been an invitation, so I don’t push. But I want to. Selfishly, I’m upset I don’t know everything—that she won’t give me anything, even though I’ve only just given her one hidden bit of me, and only because I’d had to.
I refuse to let my petulant feelings ruin the moment, though. I’ve wanted this—yes, just this, being wrapped in her arms with unmistakable intent—for too long to let it.
“Did you also think this song was ours? Back then?” I whisper, staring at her chin because I can’t look into her eyes.
“Obviously,” she whispers back.
Strangely, my eyes burn. I shuffle infinitesimally closer, burying my face in her throat. Her breath hitches. She’s shaking, very lightly—vibrating, like she’s trying to hold her skin together. I know exactly how she feels.
I wonder if she’s going back to that night like I am. Socials had been an almost-weekly occurrence at our university, but that had been the first one we’d attended since we’d discovered our feelings—since we’d indirectly acknowledged them by not acknowledging them at all.
I remember, not unlike just now, how we’d just finished having a conversation when the song had begun.
I remember how close she’d stood beside me, so close the back of her palm had brushed against mine.
How we’d stared out onto the dance floor in lieu of staring at each other, and just stood and stood, barely moving, barely breathing, hands just touching, while Johnny Drille crooned about Romeo and Juliet with such yearning it had almost fooled me into believing the original tale had been a sweet romance, instead of a pitifully avoidable tragedy.
An apt song both our subconscious had seemingly chosen to be ours.
Genevieve exhales, her breath warm against the sensitive side of my throat. On my hips, her fingers spread, almost helplessly, like she wants to touch as much of me as she humanly can. The tips end up dipping into the space between my top and skirt, brushing against the edges of my waist beads.
“Shit,” she curses, her voice low and tight.
And I start to grow wet, just like that, my nipples stiffening against the padded insides of my bra.
My right hand drops from her neck, and she automatically lifts her left, joining our fingers, the sides of our faces still pressed close.
Her breathing speeds up, as does mine. She’s tracing the lines of the four thin strips of colourful beads with her right hand, like she can’t help it.
My throat and waist have never felt so sensitive, breaking out in goose pimples with each quick, tiny exhale—each hungry, exploring stroke. I feel like a landmine—thirteen years of need, buried and ignored, ready to detonate at the slightest pressure.
Maybe, if I believe hard enough, if I cling onto this moment—onto her—hard enough, tomorrow might never come.
Maybe, just for this, just for now, I can pretend feverishly that it won’t.
Our hands are squeezing tight, the joints protesting, bones creaking. Neither of us stops or breaks the connection, the pain par for the course. I want to claw my way underneath her skin—I want us so entangled no one will ever be able to extricate me from the tapestry of her.
“F-Fuck.” Her voice is deep and low. Her hand spasms on my waist, like she’s fighting the urge to shove it further down the back of my skirt—low enough to grab my ass. Or perhaps she’s struggling not to rip the beads right off my hips.
I’m soaking my panties, thinking, oh God, oh please—
Her head turns slightly, her cheek softly caressing mine.
The words are on the tip of my tongue, my lips tingling at even the barest thought of a kiss.
I start to turn my head, and I’m suddenly holding onto thin air, blinking with confusion to find Genevieve across the room, in the shadows of the foyer.
Her eyes look entirely black from sclera to pupil, her hands flexing by her sides.
Her fingers are thinner and abnormally long, her nails sharper, curved wickedly like talons.
I blink again and she’s back to normal. A trick of the light, perhaps.
She doesn’t say a word. Just turns and disappears into the darkness of the stairs, leaving me standing there alone until our song comes to its bittersweet end.
I’m hunched over in an unfamiliar hallway.
I’d been running, but stopped to catch my breath. My chest hurts from the exertion, and I’m drenched in sweat, one hand pressed to my smarting ribs. I don’t know what I’m running from; I just know whatever it is has me horribly afraid.
Don’t, my subconscious begs. Don’t turn around.
This is a dream, my conscious whispers. It’s only a dream. You’re safe.
Turn.
You need to know
You need to see.
I turn.