“Because you smiled. When she said goodbye, you smiled.” A pause. “I… hadn't seen that before, and… your smile is nice.”
The words land strangely in my chest. Too soft. Too sincere.
Sera starts worrying at the silver ring on her right hand, twisting it once, twice. The furrow between her brows deepens again. Always worried. Sera clears her throat. “I actually came back in to ask if you wanted a shower.”
Shower.
I smell myself now she’s mentioned the word. Sweat dried into my skin. Fear soaked so deep into me it feels permanent. Leah hugged me while I smelled like this. Shame crawls hot under my skin.
Now that I’m thinking about it, I can’t stop thinking about it. Hot water. Clean skin. The need rises sharp and urgent enough that I almost sway toward it.
Sera’s mouth softens into a small smile, and something twists painfully low in my chest because I realize I like her smiles too.
“There’s a nurse waiting outside if you’d like one,” she says gently. “A beta.”
Relief hits so hard it almost hurts. Stupid, humiliating relief. I nod before I can overthink it.
Sera opens the door and asks the nurse to come in. She’s older, gray threaded through dark hair, her scent neutral and easy in a way that lets my shoulders unclench a fraction. Beta. Safe enough for my body not to panic.
The bathroom is small. A plastic chair waits in the shower stall. The nurse turns on the water, tests it with her wrist, adjusts.
“I'll be just outside the curtain while you wash,” the nurse says. “You don't have to say much. Just make a sound and I'm there.”
I ignore the residual bruising on my skin. The IV marks and scars around my wrists and steps under the water.
Heaven.
I drop onto the plastic chair under the spray. The heat moves into muscles I’m clenching. Not just days. Years. The tension doesn't release so much as briefly pause, shocked out by the water.
I scrub until the chemical smell is gone, then keep scrubbing. By the time the nurse helps me out, I'm hollow. Emptied. She unfolds a towel and the warmth of it hits me. Someone put this in a warmer. Someone thought it through and ended atwarm towel. I'm not going to cry about a towel. I refuse.
The nurse helps me dress in soft trousers and a shirt that doesn't scratch at my skin. Her touch is quick and professional. She helps me from the bathroom and back to the bed, and I lie down gratefully. A simple shower has me panting like I’ve run a marathon. The nurse pulls the blankets up as Sera watches every move. Sleep claims me instantly.
I surface to afternoon sun filtering through the curtain. Sera is on the chair by the window. A book is in her lap. She's not reading it. Her focus is aimed directly on me.
Sunlight strips across the floor and over the bed. I move my hand under it and for one second I'm eight years old in my mother's garden, grass itching against my arms, sun heavy on my closed eyelids.
“It’s a lovely afternoon and there's a garden on the roof. I could take you up. If you wanted some real air,” Sera says.
I blink at her, my attention swinging to the sunshine outside and then back to her.Did I hear her right?
“You don't have to,” she adds, and I hear something shift in her voice, not backtracking, more like she's trying to pull the offer back so it doesn't feel like pressure. “You've been in this room for days. You're stronger. But if this is where you want to stay —”
I haven't felt sun on my skin for so long. “Will there be other alphas there?”
“No one will touch you. I’ll make sure of that.”
I can’t help it. The thought of real sunshine on my skin is too much. I manage one jerky nod.
Her scent opens up, cedar deepening, blood orange blooming warm. She's pleased. Relieved. She walks from the room and returns with a wheelchair.
“I can walk,” I say.
We both know that's not true and she doesn't say so.
She waits. Let me fight my own battle with what I can and can't do. The truth is unglamorous: I can have my dignity or I can have the garden. Not both. Not today. I lower myself into the chair. The vinyl is cool through my trousers, and my hands lock around the armrests too tight.
Sera steps behind me. Her hands settle on the handles. She pushes gently. We move through corridors. Pale blue on the walls, warm cream. Someone made deliberate choices here. Real plants in the window boxes, their leaves reaching toward the light. No chemical undertone in the air, no suppressant residue, no fear ground into the walls by years of omegas trying to be small enough to survive.
