Chapter 3: The Morning After
The first thing I became aware of was a deep, pressing urgency in my lower abdomen. It was a familiar need, but its location felt strangely emphasized, more centralized. The second thing was the weight. Two distinct, warm heavinesses resting on my chest, shifting slightly with every breath. Then the sheets. They weren't the worn cotton of my own bed; they were a cold, slippery silk that whispered against skin that was somehow too smooth, too sensitive.
I opened my eyes. A vaulted ceiling of white. Morning light cut in sharp, geometric shapes across the room, highlighting particles of dust dancing in the air. Mark’s guest room. The memory crashed back in, a cold wave that tightened my stomach and worsened the bladder pressure.
I threw back the sheet. Mark’s borrowed henley had ridden up in the night. The sight of the flat, pale plane of my stomach, the sharp cut of hip bones just above the waistband of the huge sweatpants, was still a shock. But the feeling was worse. As I sat up, the weights on my chest moved with a soft, jostling inertia that made my breath catch. I had to steady myself with arms that felt too slender, the bones too close to the surface.
Standing was an event. The floor was further away. My bare feet, small and narrow, met the cold marble with a slap. The sensation traveled up legs that were too long for this abbreviated height, a pair of unfamiliar stilts. I took a step. My thighs brushed together with a soft, continuous whisper of skin-on-skin. It wasn't unpleasant, just…there. A constant, intimate friction with every movement.
The walk to the ensuite bathroom was a study in unstable physics. My center of gravity was different, lower. There was a sway to my hips I couldn’t control, a side-to-side adjustment with each step that felt exaggerated, performative. And with that sway came other movements: a gentle, bouncing oscillation from my chest that was impossible to ignore. I held my arms out slightly, as if for balance.
I avoided the mirror. The need was too urgent. I fumbled with the drawstring of the sweatpants, my fingers—those small, foreign fingers with their stupid pink tips—struggling with the knot. I got them down and sat.
The mechanics were all wrong. The angle, the posture. It felt vulnerable, exposed in a way the old equipment never had. The sound was different. I flushed quickly, the roar loud in the tiled room.
Washing my hands, I couldn’t avoid a glimpse. A sliver of a face in the periphery. Blonde hair, wild from sleep. I kept my head down, drying my hands on a towel that smelled like someone else’s laundry.
A knock at the bedroom door made me jump. The motion sent a fresh, disconcerting wave of movement through my body.
“Justin? You awake?” Mark’s voice, hushed.
“Yeah. Come in.”
He entered, holding a small shopping bag from a boutique I knew was obscenely expensive. He looked tired, but his eyes were clear, focused. He took in my appearance—swimming in his clothes, hair everywhere, likely looking like a startled child.
“Brought you some things,” he said, setting the bag on the bed. “Couldn’t exactly raid my own closet. Figured basics. Size small. Hope they fit.” He rubbed the back of his neck, the awkwardness a tangible force in the room. “The, uh, underwear is just a guess. You’ll have to…deal with that.”
I stared at the bag. The reality of it was a fresh humiliation. “Thanks.”
“I’ve got coffee going downstairs.” He turned to leave, then paused. “We need to talk about a plan. But get dressed first.”
The door closed. I approached the bag like it might contain a live animal. I tipped it out onto the silk covers.
A black tank top, ribbed and tiny. A pair of grey athletic shorts, equally minimal. And a small, folded square of lavender fabric. I unfolded it. A thong, lace-edged. It looked like it would fit a doll.
A hot wave of resistance washed over me. I didn’t want to put these on. They were hers. Sabrina’s. But the sweatpants were already slipping down my hips, and the reality was absolute. This was the container now. It needed to be clothed.
I stripped, moving quickly, trying to be a mechanic servicing a bizarre machine. Don’t look. Just do. The cool air raised goosebumps on my arms and legs. I stepped into the lavender thong, pulling it up. The elastic settled at my hips, a faint, constant pressure. The fabric at the front felt insubstantial, a scant shield over terrain that was profoundly, terrifyingly alien. The back was a mere string that disappeared between my cheeks, a sensation so specific and odd I had to consciously stop myself from trying to adjust it.
The tank top was next. It was tight. I pulled it over my head, and as my arms went up, everything lifted and shifted. Getting my head through the neckhole, the material dragged across my face, catching on the studs in my ears. Once it was on, it was a second skin. The neckline plunged enough that the upper curves of my breasts were visible, pale and shadowed. The fabric compressed them, but couldn’t neutralize their presence. They were just…there, defined and prominent.
The shorts were mercifully simple, though they clung to my hips and the swell of my ass. I looked down at myself. The outfit was less clothing and more a topographic map of a stranger’s body. I felt naked, hyper-visible.
I was padding barefoot down the sleek hallway, the cool floor against my soles, when I heard the voices from the kitchen. One was Mark’s, low and tense. The other was a woman’s, bright and sharp as polished glass.
“—just thought I’d surprise you! You’ve been so quiet, Mark. I had a key, you know. From when you let me water the ferns.”
My heart seized. Jasmine.
I froze at the entrance to the great room. The kitchen was all stainless steel and sharp angles. Mark stood by the espresso machine, his back rigid. Jasmine Rodriguez leaned against the island, one hip cocked. She wore a tailored cream pantsuit, her dark hair a perfect wave. She held a porcelain mug as if it were a prop.
“Jasmine, this isn’t a good time,” Mark said, his voice strained with a forced calm.
“Nonsense! I brought those contracts we talked about—” Her eyes lifted past him and landed on me.
They widened, then narrowed, performing a rapid calculation. I saw it all: the assessment of the tiny clothes, the bare feet, the sleep-tousled hair, my obviously just-woken-up state. Her smile didn’t fade; it just cooled, hardening into something dangerous and sweet.
“Well,” she purred, the word dripping with faux delight. “Who is this?”
Mark turned. His eyes met mine, and I saw a flash of pure panic before he locked it down. He moved, almost imperceptibly, placing himself slightly between me and her. “Jasmine, this is…Sabrina. Sabrina, this is Jasmine Rodriguez, a…colleague.”
I just stood there, my mind a blank, white wall. My name. My old name was gone. I was Sabrina now.
“Sabrina,” Jasmine repeated, as if tasting the word. She set her mug down with a precise click and walked over. Her heels were loud on the floor. She stopped too close, her perfume—something floral and aggressive—washing over me. She looked me up and down, a slow, comprehensive inventory that made my skin prickle. “Aren’t you just a little thing. How…young.”
“Mark’s helping me out,” I said. My voice came out as a breathy, quiet thing. I tried to inject some force into it, but it just cracked slightly. “I’m…a friend of a friend.”
“Is that what they’re calling it?” Jasmine’s laugh was a short, brittle sound. She looked past me to Mark. “Really, Mark? This is the ‘prior engagement’ that made you miss the investor lunch? Babysitting?”
“Jasmine.” Mark’s voice held a warning note.
“I mean, look at her. She’s a child. She’s wearing…” Jasmine gestured vaguely at my outfit, her lip curling. “Did you even have clothes that fit, sweetheart?”
The condescension was a physical slap. My old self, Justin, would have fired back with a sarcastic remark about her personality being as tailored and empty as her suit. But Justin was dead. Sabrina just stood there, heat flooding her face, feeling small and ridiculous under this woman’s gaze.
“She’s staying here for a while,” Mark said, his voice final. “It’s not up for discussion.”
Jasmine’s mask slipped for a second. Raw, incredulous jealousy flashed in her eyes, hot and startling. She’d been circling Mark for years, and in her mind, this…this girl had just waltzed in and taken up residence.
“How cozy,” she said, the sweetness now entirely venomous. She picked up her leather folio from the island. “Well, don’t let me interrupt your…arrangement. Mark, those contracts need your eyes by noon. Don’t let yourself get too…distracted.”
She didn’t look at me again. She walked out, her heels hitting the marble like gunshots. The front door opened and closed with a solid, echoing thud.
Silence flooded back in, thick and heavy. The smell of her perfume lingered.
Mark let out a long, shaky breath and ran both hands over his face. “Jesus. I forgot she had that key. I’ll get it back.”
I was still rooted to the spot, trembling slightly. The confrontation had been short, but it had exposed everything. Our cover was paper-thin. I was an unstable element in Mark’s ordered world, and now Jasmine had seen me. She was a woman who schemed, who remembered, who held grudges.
“She hates me,” I said, my voice barely a whisper.
“She hates anyone who gets near me,” Mark corrected, moving to the espresso machine. He poured a shot into a mug and handed it to me. “Drink. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I took the mug. The warmth seeped into my hands, my new, delicate hands. I was a ghost. But I was also a tangible, visible problem now, wearing a lavender thong and a target on my back. The safe harbor of last night was already leaking. The storm was inside the house.