Aspen #2
It was silly, she knew. Silence shouldn’t be so deafening. She’d grown up inside it after all. As a child, she had been left alone in quiet houses for long stretches of time. Her father and his new wife, Allison, gone for hours, days sometimes, trusting she would be fine. She always was.
At Christmas, they went to Allison’s family without her.
Nai didn’t want to go anyway, her father had said, Allison agreeing with the baby in her arms. And Nai never argued.
What was the point? She didn’t really belong with them.
She just lived alongside the man who’d once carried her on his shoulders.
Back when her mother was still around. Back when Nai was still the little boy her father had dreamed of raising.
So Nai learned to heat leftovers, to wrap her own gifts if any arrived—which they rarely did. She learned to keep the television on so the house didn’t feel too empty and scary. She’d thought her mother was in LA, making it big. That one day, she’d bring Nai out to live with her.
Nai snorted out a chuckle across the rounded rim of her wine glass.
Her mother hadn’t been making it. She’d been chasing fame.
Choosing ambition over Nai, waiting tables between auditions, working to pay for rent and new headshots.
The glamour had been a story Nai told herself because it hurt less than the truth.
These days, years later, there was no hurt.
There was no swell of sadness to match the memories or thoughts.
No ache sharp enough to label. There was only the ever-present absence of feeling and the knowledge of what should have been there.
The logical understanding that she should feel something, but didn’t.
Couldn’t. Like remembering a melody she no longer knew the lyrics to.
Nai’s fingers drifted to the chain at her throat.
The small gold pendant rested warm against her skin.
She rubbed it between her thumb and forefinger, slow and deliberate, anchoring herself in the pressure and the texture.
If she couldn’t feel the emotion of the moment, she could at least feel this.
Numbed sensations. She could still feel touch, just not as intensely as before.
Ever since Crickalade Bay, where she lost her ability to feel emotions, she’d learned how to anchor what should be a feeling in textures.
The cold weight of the glass, the familiar pull of fabric at her wrist, and the worrying of her gold pendant.
It helped her read the room in quieter ways.
It guided her toward whatever feeling the moment was meant to carry: warmth, ease, something close to joy as she listened to a story she wouldn’t remember by morning.
She moved to lean a hip against the kitchen island.
Immediately, another of Jillian’s cousins slid into the space beside her.
Bianca, early forties, white with long brown hair, blunt bangs, and glasses, her features pleasant without being memorable.
She wore a pale pink sweater with tiny pearl buttons, jeans that looked freshly pressed, and a gold cross on a delicate chain.
Prim, proper, and entirely unremarkable.
“Nairi!” She raised her glass, dipping it against Nai’s with a clink.
Nai smiled at Bianca who was flushed, and cheerful, and clearly already a drink—or maybe three—ahead of herself.
“Who knew being an influencer could be so lucrative.” Bianca said the word ‘influencer’ the same way someone called something cute, when it was, in fact, not cute at all.
A younger woman with Southeast Asian features, tousled waves of deep brown hair, high cheekbones, and curious brown eyes leaned across the counter. Jaslene, Jillian’s sister-in-law. “Jillian said you had eight million followers now. That’s incredible.”
Nai smiled, nodding. She’d always liked Jaslene.
She owned one of Colorado’s fastest-growing construction companies.
Her crews built half the luxury cabins up and down the valley, and everyone from welders to realtors knew her name.
Nai had to stop herself from whispering, you’re so cool! “It’s been a lot of hard work.”
“That’s just wild to me,” Bianca said, shaking her head with a laugh. She squinted at Nai’s glass. “And it’s just photos of coffees and things, right?”
Jaslene grimaced, wrinkles forming on her pristine golden brown skin. For someone in her forties, her skin was enviably smooth.
Another woman with frizzy bleached hair Nai hadn’t met before looked confused. “People look at that?” The new woman asked.
Nai smiled politely. “It’s more of a lifestyle brand. Building community and showing what a queer life can look like. Family and all. Giving young queer kids hope.”
“Oh!” Amy, Jillian’s aunt, said, brightening. “Do you get these brand deals and stuff? I’ve read some big influencers do.”
“Some. Mostly partnerships.”
“I saw you on the local news once,” another voice added from farther down the counter. “California, right? That was exciting.”
There was a murmur at that. A ripple of impressed sound.
Bianca tilted her head, studying Nai with renewed interest. “You know, I never would’ve guessed,” she said lightly. “I mean, when Jillian first brought you home. Like, just looking at you, you look like a real—”
“What kind of brands?” Jaslene cut in, smoothly but firmly, allowing no room for interruption.
Nai gave her a grateful look while the others shifted uncomfortably, throwing uneasy glances at Bianca who mimed ‘What?’ in defense.
“Mostly fashion related. Sometimes family things for the girls.”
From the other side of the island, someone said, “How does that work, with the divorce?”
Nai’s fingers tightened briefly around her glass. “We haven’t made anything public,” she said. “Not yet. With us being a queer joy and family brand…”
“Ohhh,” someone breathed. “And the new girlfriend?”
“That’s Sophie,” another person said quickly. “Jillian seems really happy.”
A few people nodded. Someone smiled into their drink. The conversation drifted on, satisfied, as if everything important had been covered.
Nai stayed where she was, the cool stone of the counter steady at her hip, the weight of the glass anchoring her hand.
Jaslene sidled over just as the room’s attention slipped elsewhere.
“I’d better go make sure my husband hasn’t decided to reorganize the book shelves by genres again,” she said with a sigh full of affection.
“But hey, if anyone gives you trouble tonight, I’ve got a bulldozer parked outside.
Just say the word, I’ll let you flatten a McMansion or two. ”
Nai laughed, the tension easing in her shoulders. Somehow she could imagine Jaslene forcing her family into a bulldozer for a trip up the mountain. “Only you would bring a bulldozer to a party.”
Jaslene grinned. “Okay, maybe it’s down the valley, but if you need a smoke break or a quick getaway, find me by the dessert table.
That’s where I discreetly judge the gingerbread houses.
I know a thing or two about construction, after all.
” She squeezed Nai’s arm, winked, and then she was off to wrangle her family.
Nai took a breath and let herself recover from the interrogation.
She sipped her wine, warm now, her gaze drifting across the room.
It caught on Jillian and the girls. Jillian stood near the tree, one hand resting on Sophie’s stomach as she spoke to someone.
Junie and Alina were sprawled on the floor beside their cousins now that the adults had moved to the sofa.
The kids were surrounded by toys and books and utterly unbothered by the noise or the mess. They looked happy and content.
Nai’s mouth softened into a real smile. This was all she’d ever wanted for them.
A childhood where they never had to question if they were wanted or loved.
Where love didn’t have to be earned by being invisible or not too loud or too much.
Where existing as themselves, whoever that ended up being, was enough.
Junie looked up then and spotted her. Her face lit immediately.
She lifted one hand in an enthusiastic wave.
Nai raised her own, blowing a kiss across the room.
Junie beamed, catching it like it was something tangible, something meant just for her.
Carried by that thread of affection, Nai crossed the room and bent low, pressing kisses to the crowns of her girls’ heads.
Their hair smelled like strawberry shampoo and sugar cookies.
“How much sugar have you two had tonight?” She murmured against Junie’s hair.
“Not that much,” Junie said sweetly. “Justin ate so many more cookies than us.”
“Mmhmm,” Nai said, standing as Mitch, Jillian’s younger brother, walked into the living room with a tray of roasted meat in his hands. Everyone in the room ooh-ed and aah-ed in delight.
“Alright everyone, food is ready. Just grab a plate and help yourselves to the buffet in the kitchen.” He set the tray down. When no one moved, he wheeled his arm. “Come on, Bennetts! Last one in gets stuck with the Brussels.”
At that, the kids scrambled from the floor, and it didn’t escape Nai that Jillian was right behind them.
Chuckling, she moved obediently into the line forming for the buffet.
Jillian, for all Nai’s efforts, had never really taken to that whole kale and cabbage diet she once tried.
In her defense, Nai had barely stuck to the diet herself.
All effort, no heart, that ended up being just another failed trendy cleanse she’d jumped on and tried to push on Clustr.
She couldn’t help laughing at herself. What the hell was I thinking? I hate kale.
Jillian glanced back, catching the look, and arched an eyebrow. “If you so much as mention that Glow Reset Method, so help me God, Khachaturian…”
Nai raised her hands in the air. “Relax, Bennett, I’ve reformed from my wicked ways.”