Chapter 6: Like One of Our Own
The morning light through the blinds cut sharp lines across the rumpled and twisted sheets on Clair's bed. The apartment felt different in the light of a new day, the charged energy of the night before dissipated like smoke. Maya woke to the smell of coffee. She lay perfectly still, the memory of Clair’s fingers inside her, the taste of them both, flooding back with a nauseating, electric clarity.
She found Clair in the kitchen, dressed in denim shorts and a simple white tank top, looking obscenely normal. She pushed a mug of coffee across the counter.
“It's just us today,” Clair said, her voice bright. “I figured we could get out. See the city. Go shopping. My treat.”
Maya took the mug, the heat seeping into her hands. “I don’t know if I can face him.”
“You won’t have to. Not for hours. Come on. Fresh air. People watching. It’s too nice of a day to not enjoy it.”
The city was a barrage of sensation. Sunlight glared off windows, taxis bleated, the crowd on the sidewalk was a river of anonymous faces. Maya clung to the sheer, bland ordinariness of the city streets, desperate for anything stable to rest on. They walked for blocks without talking, the silence between them filled with the echo of skin on skin.
“I can’t stop thinking about it,” Maya finally blurted out, her eyes fixed on the back of a passing bus. “What he did to you. What I did.”
Clair looped her arm through Maya’s, pulling her close. “Don’t think about it as what he did. Think about what you felt. What you wanted.”
“That’s the problem,” Maya said, her voice cracking. “I felt… God, Clair, he’s your brother. It’s disgusting. It’s wrong. But when he was… when he had you on the table…” She trailed off, shame heating her face. “I wanted him to look at me like that. To want me like that. And that makes me a monster.”
“You’re not a monster,” Clair said softly, steering them towards the sleek facade of a department store. The blast of air conditioning was a shock. “You’re just honest. Most people lie to themselves about what they want. Nate doesn’t lie. And being near that… it’s addictive.”
They wandered through racks of clothes, the soft rustle of fabric a soothing white noise. Maya fingered a sensible linen blouse. It felt like armor.
“Here,” Clair said, appearing beside her with a hanger. It held a slip of a dress in emerald green, the silk so thin it was nearly sheer, the cut low and the back nonexistent. “This is your color.”
Maya laughed, a short, brittle sound. “Where would I even wear that? A corporate gala?”
“Who cares?” Clair’s tone was light, casual. She held the dress up against Maya’s front. The green made her almond skin glow. “It’s not about where. It’s about how it makes you feel. Powerful. Beautiful. Unforgettable."
Maya stared at her reflection in the nearby mirror. The dress was practically a dare to anyone who saw it. The thought of Nate’s eyes flashed through her mind, sending a shiver down her spine. Would he take that dare? “It’s too much.”
“Try it on. Just for fun.”
In the fluorescent-lit fitting room, the world shrank to the two of them. Maya slipped out of her safe jeans and t-shirt. The silk whispered over her skin, cool and alien. It clung to her athletic frame, highlighting the curve of her hips, the sleek muscles of her back. She felt exposed, vulnerable.
And thrilling.
Clair let out a low whistle. “Maya. Look at you.”
Maya turned, staring at the stranger in the mirror. The woman looked back, her offered skin a meager distraction from her hungry eyes. “I look like…”
“You look like you know exactly what you want,” Clair finished, her voice a murmur. She stepped closer, adjusting a strap that didn’t need adjusting. Her fingers brushed Maya’s bare shoulder. “You could walk into any room and have them all eating out of your hand.”
Maya’s breath hitched. The fantasy that Clair had just offered was at odds with the bizarre alternate reality she had spent the last day in, right? Surely they couldn't coexist. She wanted to vomit. She wanted to touch herself.
“I can’t buy this.”
“We don't have to buy it today,” Clair said, helping her unzip it. “We're just exploring. There's more to you than you are willing to admit, Maya."
The dress slipped from her shoulders and pooled at her feet like shed skin. Maya stepped over it, back into her own clothes, the cotton feeling coarse and childlike. They left the store empty-handed, but the image of that green silk clung to Maya’s mind, a persistent, taunting ghost.
“You're never going to be happy if your happiness is dependent on another person,” Clair said, as they pushed through the glass doors onto the sun-baked sidewalk. The noise of the city swallowed her words for a moment before she repeated them, clearer. “It’s about being the best version of yourself. That version of you in the mirror doesn’t need anyone’s permission.”
Maya didn’t answer. Her thoughts were a tangled knot of shame and that lingering, phantom sensation of silk. They walked another block in silence, the comfortable familiarity of their friendship now stretched thin over a fathomless new depth.
Clair stopped in front of a boutique with minimalist black mannequins in the window. “Work clothes,” she announced, her tone practical. “You said you needed new things for the office.”
Inside, the air smelled of sandalwood and new wool. Clair moved with purpose, her fingers flipping through hangers with a soft, decisive click. She pulled out a tailored charcoal blazer, striking and elegant. Then she found the matching skirt, pencil-thin, hitting just above the knee. A short search later and she found the final piece, a black lace blouse so delicate it was practically see-through.
“Clair, come on,” Maya whispered, glancing at a nearby sales associate. “I can’t wear that to a meeting.”
“Why not?” Clair held the pieces together. The contrast was jarring: professional authority on the outside, a secret on the inside. “It’s all about perspective. What you choose to show. What you choose to keep for yourself.” She pressed the hangers into Maya’s hands. “Just try it. See how it feels to wear a secret."
Maya stood before the fitting room mirror, her breath caught somewhere between her throat and her lungs. The charcoal blazer hugged her shoulders with a tailored precision that felt like armor, while the pencil skirt showcased the powerful curve of her thighs and ass, a silhouette of pure, restrained strength. The black lace blouse beneath was a revelation, its delicate web clinging to her skin and shadowing the dark points of her nipples, a blatant secret whispering through the professional facade. A slow, warm current of arousal pulsed low in her belly, astonishing her with its intensity as she admired the controlled, commanding woman in the glass. She unlatched the door and stepped out, her movements unnaturally fluid in the elegant skirt, seeking Clair’s verdict.
“See?” Clair spoke as her eyes drifted down Maya's body, a low murmur. “You’re still you. Competent, powerful Maya. But now you have a piece of last night with you at the boardroom table. A little piece of what you really are.”
Maya’s hand drifted down her chest, fingertips brushing the lace. She imagined sitting across from her manager, crossing her legs as the blazer opening ever so slightly, knowing what the slightest movement of cloth might reveal. A flush of heat, utterly separate from the store’s climate control, spread through her. She closed her eyes. The image that came wasn’t of her office. It was of Nathan’s apartment. Of his hands gently removing the blazer to reveal everything beneath.
She darted back into the fitting room and tore the clothes off, her heart hammering against her ribs.
They bought the set. The transaction was a blur of ringing tills and tissue paper. The black bag dangled from Maya’s hand, heavy with implication.
Lunch was salads at a sidewalk café, the bustle of the street providing a veneer of normality. Maya picked at her arugula, the memory of the black lace prickling against her skin like a physical touch.
“It’s okay to want things,” Clair said, sipping her iced tea. She looked across the table, her blue eyes unsettlingly direct. “Even complicated, messy things. Especially those.”
“I wanted him,” Maya confessed, the words barely audible. A pigeon strutted near their table, pecking at a fallen crumb. “While he was… with you. I was disgusted with myself, but my body… it didn’t care. It just wanted.”
Clair reached across the small table and took her hand. Her grip was warm but firm. “Your body is smarter than your brain. It doesn’t do morality. It does truth.”
After lunch, the shopping lost its tentative quality. Clair guided them into a store selling expensive loungewear. She picked out a set of shorts and a cropped tank top in a pale, creamy silk. The fabric was so thin it was nearly translucent.
“For relaxing at home,” Clair said, holding the top against Maya’s chest. The silk was cool, liquid. “Comfort is key, right?”
Maya thought of Nathan’s apartment, of his bare skin against the worn sofa. She imagined wearing this, barely-there, on that same sofa. There would be no pretense of coverage, only the intimate suggestion of form beneath the delicate material. She bought it.
The final stop was a lingerie boutique, a hushed palace of lace and satin. The air here was thick with perfume and quiet money. Clair moved through the aisles like a curator, her hands barely grazing the delicate merchandise.
She didn’t suggest anything. She simply held pieces up for a silent moment—a bralette of black lace with thin, precarious straps, a matching thong that was little more than a suggestion. A chemise in blood-red satin that would caress her skin. A babydoll, navy blue and sheer, falling just to the thigh. She let them hang in the air between them, their meaning screaming in the silence.
Maya’s mouth was dry. Her skin felt too tight. Last night’s taste, salty and musky, seemed to bloom on her tongue again. This wasn’t about feeling powerful in a boardroom. This was about surrender. Becoming a gift that was meant to be unwrapped.
“I can’t,” Maya whispered, her voice cracking.
“You already have,” Clair said, her own voice preternaturally calm. She placed the navy babydoll in Maya’s hands. The silk was cold, sinful. “This isn’t for him. This is for you to see yourself in. To remember who you were last night. Who you are when you stop thinking.”
Maya stood at the register, the scrap of blue silk and the other items piled before the cashier. Her pulse thrummed in her ears, a frantic drumbeat of panic and anticipation. She handed over her card, the plastic feeling flimsy and insignificant. The bags she collected were weightless, yet they carried the density of a decision.
Stepping back onto the street, the late afternoon sun felt like an interrogation lamp. The normal world—the tourists, the traffic, the smell of pretzels and exhaust—seemed like a poorly constructed set.
Clair linked her arm with Maya’s again, her touch grounding and terrifying. “Well,” she said, as they began the journey back to the apartment, to him. “I think that was a productive day.”
Maya looked at the shopping bags in her hand, each one a neatly packaged step deeper into a labyrinth she no longer wanted to escape. The conflict wasn’t resolved. It was simply dressed in silk and lace, waiting for the fall of night.