Archive of Our Own ^beta

“I have something to tell you.”

Enid looked nervous. She always had a frantic energy about her, hair sleek but voluminous with static, eyes darting around a room as if searching for some shadowy prowler watching her every move. Aside from Wednesday, of course.

This wasn’t Enid’s usual anxiety, though. She was wringing her hands together like she might pull a truth out of them if she squeezed hard enough. She was looking at Wednesday’s shoulders, chin, nose, eyes (for a second, before she lost her nerve) in intervals. The shaking of her thin frame was palpable. Wednesday decided to put her out of her misery.

“What, Enid?” she said. She sounded bored, even to herself.

Enid finally met her eyes. Violent cornflower blue, like the most lurid sky.

 “I,” was as much as she got out before she had to swallow.

Wednesday wrinkled her nose — she could hear the mouthful of saliva going down Enid’s throat. It was extremely unattractive. Enid shook her head, putting her face in her hands, apparently in an attempt to gather herself. When she dropped them, she was red from the neckline of her uniform to the tips of her ears.

“I like you,” she said.

Wednesday stilled. Her thoughts stilled. The world seemed to still, even though Wednesday knew that was scientifically impossible, seeing as they would probably all be floating out into space by now if that was happening.

“Um, romantically,” Enid was now saying, because she could not sit in silence for more than four seconds at a time before compulsively filling it. “I know that probably freaks you out. How could it not? It’s so out of left field. I know we’re friends. Best friends. At least in my head, maybe not in yours, I don’t know. I also know you’re straight. That’s not my favorite thing in the world, but it’s true, I think. I can’t really change it. I’m not going to try to change it, either, God no. I’m not like that. You don’t have to tell me to move on and find a girl who can actually return my — um, you know, ‘affections,’ because I will. I just needed to get it all out first. Because sitting on it was doing nothing except, like, burning me up inside, and is it hot here? I think it’s really hot — Nevermore gets so hot in the spring—”

Enid didn’t say anything else. She couldn’t — Wednesday wouldn’t let her.

Wednesday didn’t really believe in love that brought that sort of urgency. Maybe for some people, like her parents (loathsome as their PDA may be), or Enid, who seemed like the type to love with all she had in her, but not for Wednesday herself.

She thought she might understand it now.

There was a tug in her gut, like fate pulling her forward with its burning fingers, and Wednesday was positive that there was nothing in the world she could do in this moment except kiss Enid Sinclair.

She did. And Enid shut up.

Enid’s mouth was soft and hot. Bubblegum lip-gloss soft, and werewolf hot, all panty and eager and desperate. Wednesday’s hand curled into her skirt, and Enid’s dug compulsively into the roots of Wednesday’s braids, and she wouldn’t let go, she’d never let go—

“Wednesday! Jesus, oh my God,” came Enid’s voice, cutting like butter through the images running through Wednesday’s mind.

Everything was suddenly very cold, even though the sheets were up to Wednesday’s neck, as they always were. She sat bolt upright in bed. Her eyes felt wide, but they probably weren’t — sometimes, Wednesday looked in the mirror during occasional waves of extreme emotion, and her expression hardly changed. She was never more grateful for it than in this moment. Enid could never, under any circumstances, know that Wednesday had just been dreaming about making out with her.

In fact, she could never know that Wednesday thought about making out at all. She shouldn’t even know that Wednesday dreamed in the first place.

Wednesday threw her blankets off in a rage and stood, then turned around and started making her bed with a vengeance. The cold was that early-morning one, when the sun was up but hadn’t smiled yet, and the birds were giving yawning chirps outside the window. Enid was on Wednesday’s side of the room, radiating body heat and sputtering.

“I — Wednesday, you were basically levitating,” Enid said, voice shrill and panicked. “Your back was arched so badly you were basically off the bed, and your head was thrown back… You looked like you were in pain. I didn’t know what to do.”

“I’m fine,” Wednesday said, because Enid needed to stop talking, and she couldn’t think of anything else to say that would make that happen. She thought, briefly, of how she had resolved it in the dream, and redoubled her efforts on her bed.

She leaned over to tuck her sheets firmly into the far side of the bed (she liked to feel them strangling her when she got into them at night) and then, when her hands had no more excuses to be busy, she crossed her arms and firmly didn’t look at Enid. Instead, she traced the lines of the wooden floorboards and wondered how many Nevermore students they had seen, and if any of them had as dramatic a life as hers.

“You obviously aren’t,” Enid said, stubborn as always.

Wednesday whirled around to glare at her. Enid was sleep-mussed, hair sticking up and eyes dry. She was wearing her pajamas and only one bunny slipper, like she had run over to wake Wednesday up in a hurry. She hurt to look at.

“Get dressed,” Wednesday muttered. “You look like an idiot.”

Enid went red. It was achingly familiar.

“Fine! Whatever,” Enid said, even though she obviously still cared, and stormed to her side of the room to ransack her closet like it had wronged her.

Halfway through, she turned around. It was the weekend, and so her sweater of the day had been tugged over her head, but was still sitting oddly at the hem and clinging to her waist. Her midriff was visible above her pink corduroy pants. Wednesday looked at the floor again.

“I know that wasn’t normal,” Enid said. Wednesday could see her pointing emphatically in her periphery. “I know you’re not telling me something. And you can do your whole I’m-Wednesday-Addams, tortured-soul, manic-pixie-girl routine if you want, but you have to ask for help when you need it.”

Wednesday’s fists clenched at her sides. She wished Enid would leave the room already so she could think.

“I’m not letting you almost kill yourself twice out of stubbornness, okay?” Enid said. She was quiet, for a while, like she thought Wednesday might respond.

“Pull your shirt down. Your entire stomach is out,” Wednesday said.

Enid let out a strangled sound of frustration, but pulled her sweater down so it sat more comfortably over her hips. Then she grabbed her tote bag and began stomping out of Ophelia Hall.

When the door slammed behind her, Wednesday finally slumped back onto her bed, her face in her hands. Her skin felt hot and angry where it should have been corpselike. It was moments like these that made her want to tempt a vampire so she would never have blood running through her flesh again — at least, not blood that she didn’t first drink.

Thing scuttled out from under Wednesday’s bed and started tapping on the wooden surface of her bedframe.

Was that a vision? he said.

Wednesday dropped her hands and glared. “It most certainly wasn’t.”

I saw it too, he said. Enid was right. It looked like a vision.

“Well, you should have your eyes examined. Or your fingernails — whatever orifice you see from,” Wednesday bit out.

Nevermind that her dream was clear at the edges, with a realistic pace as if it had been played in real time. Nevermind that her brain had replicated Enid’s mannerisms, even ones Wednesday had never seen before, as if it were an exact science. Nevermind that the sounds had run crisp through Wednesday’s ears, and she had smelled the wet-dog musk that Enid tried to obscure with perfume, and that Wednesday’s only real kiss had been sort of strange and wet but the one in her dream somehow felt world-changing in a way that wasn’t fantastical.

She was vehement in her denial of Thing’s accusation.

“Dreams aren’t visions,” she said firmly. “Dreams don’t have to mean anything.”

—

Enid was an obscenely untidy roommate in the week leading up to the full moon. It was made especially frustrating by the fact that she was usually unbelievably anal, so depending on the time of the month, Wednesday got both ends of the annoying-roommate spectrum. It was either “Wednesday, fold your clothes when you take them out of the dryer — there shouldn’t be a laundry basket sitting out in the open” or there piles of dirty clothes strewn around the room in Enid’s hurry to take them off before she passed out face-down on her bed.

Today was the latter. Wednesday had come back from studying in the library to see Enid in a thin T-shirt and her dorky boyshorts, leg askew and half-lying on the floor, arms dead at her sides. Her hair was a rare birds’ nest. Her face was buried in her pillow.

Wednesday looked up at the ceiling in prayer, like some spirit or deity would come down to give her strength. None did.

She wasn’t in the habit of picking up after Enid, so she just hoped Enid would do it herself after her coma-like nap ended. That was until Wednesday began to walk over to her desk and realized that, in her hormone-addled exhaustion, Enid had somehow managed to toss her sock so far that it caught itself on Wednesday’s chair.

Wednesday immediately looked at Enid’s casually sleeping form and fumed. Enid only snored, mouth hanging open, entirely oblivious to the mental daggers being thrown her way. Wednesday had no idea how Enid could stand to sleep in the roiling midday sun.

Wednesday steeled herself before reaching out to grab Enid’s sock and delicately place it on Enid’s side of the room. She wasn’t in the habit of grabbing people’s dirty laundry in general, especially when it came to undergarments, and especially when those undergarments had been marinating on a pre-transformation werewolf’s foot. Wednesday wrinkled her nose and pinched the ruffled end of it.

Then her head was thrown back like someone had grabbed her braids and yanked.

There was sensation all around her.

Hands on her face and in her loose hair, mattress along her spine, pillow boxing in her ears. A warm, comfortable weight settled across her hips. Wednesday nearly choked when she realized where she was — what she was doing, what that endless softness was against her mouth. Her eyes opened a crack, and she was immediately relieved to find that everyone’s clothes were still where they should be.

Maybe Wednesday should have been more surprised at the head of blond, pink, blue hair hanging above her like a sleekly-conditioned curtain. She didn’t want to think that she was expecting this, but then again, she always noticed patterns more quickly than most.

Enid was making this extremely distracting curling motion with her tongue, and her chin was moving softly, pushing Wednesday backwards and down, down, down. Wednesday never thought she would enjoy being forced into submission by someone else’s hand, but here she was, letting herself go. The tension in her muscles unfurled.

Wednesday’s hands climbed up and over Enid’s shoulder’s as if willed by a compulsion she couldn’t resist. She couldn’t even remember having the thought that touching Enid’s spine was something she might like until it was already under her fingertips, and she was making an embarrassing sound into Enid’s mouth that she was extremely grateful no one would ever actually hear.

Enid’s hips were heavy, and their legs were intertwined, and the beginning of spring humidity made the places where their skin touched sticky in a way that was surprisingly tolerable. Wednesday was making more sounds, each more humiliating than the last, and her fingernails were gripping into Enid’s biceps, and she was telling herself mentally to stop, stop, stop, but she wasn’t capable.

(She wondered how much control she really had. Where the Wednesday standing at her desk actually was; whether she had been reduced to a conscience, a screaming, anguished voice in this body’s head as it did what it really wanted.)

Something in Wednesday’s chest twisted painfully when she realized that the emerging vibrations against her lips were of Enid’s gentle, giggly laughter. Wednesday pulled back the amount that she could manage and she was looking up the line of Enid’s button nose, into her absurdly blue eyes.

“It’s really you,” Enid was saying. Wednesday didn’t want to hear it. “I never thought it would really be you.”

Wednesday frowned. Her lips felt almost numb. “What’s funny about that?”

Enid rolled her eyes. “It’s not funny, loser. Just — maybe a little funny, but, like, cosmically funny. Like, how is it that I thought about this with you for a whole year and never thought I’d have it, and here you are, and you’re being so human. It’s absurd. And really nice.”

Wednesday glared up at Enid. Enid grinned down at Wednesday. It was all extremely infuriating.

“Just kiss me, you oaf,” Wednesday said.

This Enid was good at following directions.

Your roommate’s dirty sock was an embarrassing thing to wake up clutching, but that was how Wednesday found herself when she came back into her body. Her hair was stuck to her forehead with sweat, and she was mid-gasp, her back bent painfully backwards against the hardwood floor. She scrambled to her feet as soon as she realized.

Thing was looking at her from her bed. If he had eyebrows to raise, he would have.

“Shut up,” Wednesday said. Her thoughts were a mess.

Are you going to tell me what that one was about? he asked.

Wednesday drew her mouth into a firm line, then looked over at her roommate’s prostrate body. Although by now, Enid had apparently rolled over in her sleep, T-shirt stretched tight and awkward over her frame, arms shot up by her face. Her jaw was still hanging open (she was an obnoxious mouth-breather in the night) and there was drool sliding silvery down one of her cheeks. She looked so unaffected it made Wednesday’s cheeks hot.

In a rage, Wednesday crossed her side of the room and threw Enid’s sock directly at her face. Enid spluttered awake.

“Ew! Wednesday, is this a sock?” she was saying, batting it to the floor like it was a spider. “Gross, gross, gross!”

“It’s your sock, you blubbering imbecile,” Wednesday said. She had to acknowledge, internally, that this was probably not directly Enid’s fault, but it did nothing to quell the anger bubbling in her stomach. It felt as good to take her emotions out on Enid as it always did. “Stop throwing your filthy clothes onto my side of the room. They smell.”

Enid flushed, having the decency, at least, to look embarrassed.

“I’m sorry,” she said. Wednesday felt a touch guilty, but steeled her expression firmly into one of annoyance. “I was just so tired after track. I really wanted to sleep. I don’t know, I’m out of whack right now.”

“Because of the full moon,” Wednesday said, before she could stop herself.

Enid looked pleasantly surprised, eyes brightening. Wednesday wanted to kick herself.

“Uh, yeah,” Enid said. “Sorry. I didn’t know you kept track of that.”

“Other species have use for the lunar cycle as well, Enid,” Wednesday said, in her nastiest possible tone. “For instance, if I water my succulent at any other time of the month than the waxing crescent, it will grow teeth and eat you.”

Enid’s nose wrinkled. “Oh.”

“Also, you snore,” Wednesday said, because she couldn’t think of anything else, then stormed over to her desk and took the lid off her typewriter. She tried to pretend she couldn’t feel Enid’s eyes on her back as she began to write.

—

Wednesday thought that whatever was bringing on her new wave of visions would have the decency to keep them to the privacy of her bedroom. She was embarrassingly wrong.

In the front row, Divina was being handed a thick stack of stapled workbooks. Some of the class groaned when they saw them. Wednesday was tempted to join them, but only because worksheets were a feeble attempt at keeping the mind active and should never be considered an actual assignment. She resigned to complete it anyway, though, because she wasn’t about to ruin her stellar grade over an arbitrary conviction, no matter how stubborn some people thought she was.

The workbooks were passed down each row, then to the person behind them. Wednesday watched idly as they made their way towards her and Enid’s desk. Xavier turned around in his seat to give them to Enid, and in the meantime, took it upon himself to flash a knowing grin at Wednesday.

What, she mouthed.

He raised his eyebrows and looked meaningfully at Enid. He was obviously losing his mind, and doing it in a terribly boring way.

Enid had picked out her workbook and written her name in pink gel at the top (she dotted her I’s with hearts like a schoolgirl) and then was pushing the stack towards Wednesday.

Possibly what happened next was Wednesday’s fault. She was usually extremely careful about touching people, but something foreign arrested her in that moment and she found herself softly brushing her fingertips over Enid’s hand as they curled around the pages. It was the barest touch of skin-on-skin.

Her spine wrenched.

Oh no.

Nothing was touching her — thank God — but the room was filled with light. It could hardly be called a room, actually, because it encompassed a living setup with plastic-wrapped couches, a small table-less dining room, and a kitchen whose counters were piled with still-boxed kitchen appliances.

The windows were wide and modern and looked down on a metropolitan area. There were palm trees on the street, and the crisp smell of saltwater. The west coast. Wednesday’s limbs were filled with lead.

“Um, so, I kind of have a surprise for you,” came a voice from behind Wednesday.

Immediately, she turned in place to see who it came from — but she already had an inkling. Sure enough, Enid was staring back at her, cardboard box in arms and a half-angry, half-teasing expression on her face.

“Wednesday!” she said, laughing. “You said you wouldn’t look!”

“Sorry,” Wednesday said thickly, like her mouth was filled with cotton.

Enid wasn’t Enid. She was taller — a bit taller than Wednesday, and she had to turn down slightly to look Wednesday in the eye. Her hair was longer, riddled with waves and layers, and it was the kind of color that made Wednesday think it was once dyed a uniform shock-pink. It was faded like bubblegum, or like the sunset dusting on clouds.

She was in casualwear. Sweatpants — pink ones, although Wednesday was fairly sure that Enid didn’t own sweatpants of any kind — and a Nevermore 2025 hoodie that looked thin and faded with use. She was wearing her old bunny slippers, now dilapidated, and her heels were sticking out of the ends.

“You have to retire those slippers,” Wednesday found herself saying, eyeing them suspiciously.

“Lay off the criticism for five minutes and look,” Enid said, and pulled the lid off the cardboard box. Wednesday could now see it had breathing holes.

Inside was a mewling cat. It looked adolescent, just past bumbling kitten-age, and it was nearly entirely black aside from starlight dottings of white.

“I just sort of stumbled onto him at the pound, and he looked so lonely,” Enid was mumbling. “Sorry, I know we said we weren’t going to get pets for a while, but I knew someone else would take him, and he looks so much like you, and our landlord said cats were fine anyway as long as they don’t pee on the carpet…”

“Enid,” Wednesday said, not breathing.

Enid swallowed. It was always this showy movement, her neck bobbing dramatically.

“I thought we could name him Nero II,” she said. “Or — something else. I don’t know.”

Wednesday crossed the room, pushed Enid’s hair aside with both her hands, and kissed her like it was habit. Enid softened against her mouth as easily as she wrote blog posts, collected stuffed animals, and annoyed the daylights out of Wednesday. (Like she did it all the time.)

Wednesday pulled back and Enid was looking at her with a dazed smile.

“Hello, Nero II,” Wednesday said, peering into the box. The cat had rolled onto its back, clumsy thing, and Wednesday’s head snapped up. “Enid, this is a girl.”

“Oh,” Enid said. “Well, we can keep the name, right?”

“Nero was a Roman emperor. A male Roman emperor.”

“Well, we can come up with a cute nickname. Or call her Nera!”

“Enid—” Wednesday pinched the bridge of her nose. “We cannot call her Nera.”

“Julie!” Enid said, suddenly grinning. Wednesday looked at her questioningly. “Like, Julius Caesar.”

“No,” Wednesday spat. “Absolutely not.”

Wednesday gasped for air, and the first thing she was aware of was the utter silence dominating the classroom. When she opened her eyes, she found herself thrown across the tiled floor with twenty Nevermore students staring at her in horror. She stood up and dusted herself off.

“Carry on,” she said, hoping her cheeks weren’t burning the way they felt they were, and handed the stack of workbooks to Bianca.

Enid was gaping at her.

“Carry on?” she said, shrilly. “We can’t carry on. Wednesday, what the hell was that?”

Mr. Fitts looked concerned. He crossed his arms. “Ms. Addams, if you’re feeling unwell, I encourage you to go to the infirmary.”

“No,” Wednesday said, teeth gritted. “I’m fine.”

She refused to look at Enid. She wasn’t sure what would happen to her if she did — whether she was so raw and vulnerable right now, magic still thrumming through her system like a heartbeat, that she would launch into another vision, or if she would blurt something humiliating, like: “I actually like kissing you in my head, and have been doing so with increasing frequency.”

It made Wednesday squirm with discomfort just to think about saying. The fact that it had entered her mind at all was the sign of a burgeoning problem.

The classroom was dead silent for a while longer, as if no one was really sure what to do. Some people started muttering, as if waiting for Mr. Fitts to insist that Wednesday go to see the nurse, but thankfully, he didn’t. (This was why he was one of Wednesday’s preferred teachers.)

Wednesday pushed her fountain pen into the paper until it bled. Chatter started up again, and for once, she was grateful.

—

The visions wouldn’t stop.

The breeze embraced them with its kind, spindly hands. Enid was smiling with her eyes closed. Wednesday couldn’t stop herself staring if she tried — and she did try, because for once it was preferable to observe the brutish colors of a meadow (as much as they burned her retinas), since the alternative was mooning over Enid like this — any of this — was remotely possible.

When Enid opened her eyes and fixed them on Wednesday, she knew what would happen next. She found herself leaning in subtly as Enid kissed her, this warm, closed-mouth thing, dry in its chastity. The sound of far-off people barrelling towards them made Enid pull away, laughter evident in the curls of her expression.

They were torturous, and completely false. Each time Wednesday emerged from one she was reeling, though in front of others, she schooled her expression to patent coldness. Some of them were so sickly-romantic it made Wednesday feel as if she was stealing something.

Lights flashed cheerily from a high ceiling, and awful pop music blared. Wednesday should have felt annoyed. She did, in part, but there was also a body against hers, and a waist under her hand, even through coarse tulle-laden fabric. Wednesday hated that she had to look up as they slow-danced.

“I wish they’d play something good,” Wednesday muttered, tucking her head into Enid’s bare shoulder, inhumanly warm.

“If  you liked the music, you’d be dancing on your own. Not with me,” Enid said back.

“Well, I suppose I must enjoy some part of the evening,” Wednesday said.

Enid smiled like she understood. She was light-spangled from the disco ball an d her expression was reverent. Wednesday rocked up onto her toes.

Enid’s fingers were over Wednesday’s mouth instead of her lips. Wednesday felt disappointed, then completely foolish, looking up into Enid’s wide eyes.

“Wednesday,” she hissed, looking around. “There are so many people here.”

Wednesday wrenched Enid’s hand away. “Don’t you want people to know? You are always nagging me about your public relationship status.”

“Yeah, but.” Enid bit her lip. It was pink and Wednesday wanted to eat away the gloss. “You said you wanted to wait.”

Wednesday blinked. Her feelings and thoughts were, as always, a confusing mix of her own and the ones the vision was projecting onto her. All she could think in that moment, though, was who wouldn’t want the world to know they were dating Enid Sinclair?

As if she were pushed to do it, Wednesday kissed Enid so hard the breath was knocked out of both of them. There were probably people looking. Wednesday didn’t care.

Some of the visions left Wednesday feeling even worse than most, like she saw something that wasn’t for her. She felt voyeuristic, violating. She tried to squeeze her eyes shut as much as she could but that didn’t erase the sensation.

(Slick, hot, noiseless heartbeats. Everything was breath and skin, skin, skin.)

That brand came at night, most often. Wednesday was glad, because she had a few hours to try and erase those images before having to attempt to speak to Enid again.

As time went on, and the full moon came and went, Wednesday was finding it increasingly difficult to look Enid in the eye — not that she relished in it before, of course, but the total inability to do so was infuriating. If she tried, it wasn’t long before she felt a blush coming on (and the redness would trigger hives, which could become a whole vicious circle) and she had to look away.

Enid was noticing. It was becoming a thing.

The table was silent. Enid’s brothers’ eyes were big and slightly amused, and her mother was beet-red, and her father a mountain at the head of the table. Enid flinched whenever her knee knocked into Wednesday’s and she chewed her dinner with single-minded determination, eyes not leaving her plate.

Wednesday was never good at pleasantries. She said the wrong thing at the best of times, when it was only her and Enid, and she had no idea what to do to impress parents. (It hadn’t been hard to impress hers.) (And she wanted to, now. To make Enid’s family want her around, because then a bit of Enid’s life might unknot.)

Wednesday threaded her hand through Enid’s and kissed it, barely brushed her lips along Enid’s knuckles. She saw, out of the corner of her eye, Enid’s mother watching the movement, her fingers pulled yellow over her cutlery.

Her jaw softened, with obvious effort. “So,” she said, tightly. “How did you girls get it together?”

Enid looked up from her plate with shining eyes.

—

“What do you do,” Wednesday said, slowly, steeling herself, “when you can’t stop thinking about someone else?”

Eugene’s mouth fell open.

Wednesday would wonder why she was going to Eugene Ottinger, of all people, for advice on human interaction, if it weren’t for the fact that she already knew — his bee sanctum was far away from everything, and no one apart from him ever went there. (Also, if he started spreading rumors about her visions — which she already planned on divulging as few details about as possible — it wasn’t like anyone would believe him.)

“Who are you thinking about, Wednesday?” Eugene said, and he sounded both curious and unbelievably gleeful, like he had just uncovered the next juicy bit of Nevermore gossip.

“Not important,” Wednesday said, tone clipped. “Talk.”

“Well,” Eugene said, words dripping with fake-thoughtfulness. “I guess I’d have to know what kind of thinking you mean, at least.”

“Dreams,” Wednesday said shortly, after a moment of thought.

Eugene’s eyebrows raised. “Oh.”

“Oh?”

“Well, with that kind of thinking, you can’t really do anything except take care of it, right?” he said. Wednesday stared at him, not speaking. “Sorry, this is weird. Shouldn’t this be ‘girl talk?’”

It hit Wednesday all at once.

“Not like that, you complete boor,,” she said indignantly, crossing her arms (even though it was, really, a bit like that).

Eugene froze, tentatively putting his hands up in surrender. “Sorry?”

“Ugh,” Wednesday said, storming out of the cabin without a second thought. That was the last time she tried him for advice.

—

“Good God, Enid, you’re so—” Wednesday blustered. Enid was the sun and she was always there. Wednesday wasn’t sure how looking at her so often wasn’t supposed to be blinding. “You’re so—”

“I’m what?” Enid said, nostrils flaring.

She didn’t wait for an answer. Three steps and her tongue was down Wednesday’s throat.

Wednesday had never liked being shut up before.

—

Wednesday made absolutely sure that Enid wasn’t lurking in some distant cranny of their room before locking the door, sitting down at her desk and calling for Thing. He crept over her bedsheets and hopped onto her desk.

Are you ready to talk? he said.

“I resent the implication that there is something I have not been talking about,” Wednesday said, arms crossed.

That’s a yes, though, right?

Wednesday glared at Thing, then at her stupid multicolored window, at Enid’s idiotic pile of stuffed animals, at the line between their halves of the room. Now that she had made absolutely certain that there was no way to avoid this any longer (Enid having plastered herself over every miserable aspect of Wednesday’s life, in sunset hues no less) she looked back at Thing.

“Yes,” she ground out with effort.

Was it possible for a hand to look smug?

“I need friends my own age,” Wednesday said. “And with my own anatomy.”

You do, Thing said. Which begs the question, why aren’t you talking about this with Enid?

“Oh, you are always on her side,” Wednesday blurted, knowing it hardly made any sense even as she said it. “Not everything is about Enid.”

If you say so. Thing didn’t seem to believe her, which would have made her feel indignant if she had even one leg to stand on. What have your visions been about?

Wednesday looked up at the ceiling as she said it, quiet as possible: “Enid.”

Thing was silent. Wednesday leveled him with a glare.

“Do you have something to say, you sorry waste of phalanxes?” she spat.

No. Only the observation that I’m usually right.

Wednesday huffed out all the air in her lungs. This was why she had avoided bringing it up for as long as she did — other than the vain hope that it would go away. It was impossible for her to talk about. Impossible for her to think about, in any tangible way, because it made no sense to begin with.

“I don’t,” she started, then stopped. “I don’t know where they’re coming from.”

Thing made a gesture as if to say “go on.” Wednesday drew her mouth into a line.

“My visions are usually of the future,” she said next. “But nothing in these — they couldn’t possibly happen. Not like this. If they’re of a future, they’re not of mine. They contradict each other. It’s like they’re running in circles — things happening over, and over, and over.”

What are they of?

Wednesday couldn’t look at him. “They don’t feel like they used to. Not… violent. Not like I’m looking through a window, or through someone else’s eyes. They’re always through mine. And I feel everything.”

If that wasn’t telling enough, Wednesday kept speaking. She felt like a faucet someone forgot to turn off.

“I can’t look at her. I can’t talk to her, not anymore. I can’t be her — friend — now that I’ve seen her in all these ways I shouldn’t have, Thing.” Her voice was quiet and slightly raw at the edges. “It’s like I’m taking something good and twisting it, and not in the fun way. She’s not … mine.” She swallowed. “Not to have, not like this.”

Thing let her breathe before he spoke. Or, rather, gestured and tapped.

What are they of, Wednesday?

Wednesday set her jaw. She was about to speak when the door burst open.

“Wednesday? Wednesday, I think you bolted it by accident,” Enid said, standing in the threshold. She touched the place where the silver lock was hanging off the wall. “Yeah, bolted. Sorry, you never do it anymore so I just thought the door was stuck. I guess I don’t know my own strength sometimes, huh?”

Enid extended her claws with a soft shing and grinned like anything could possibly be funny in this moment. Wednesday glared at her from her desk, her own fingers gripping the backrest of her chair like a vice. She knew Thing well enough to tell that he looked caught-out and sheepish right now, and once again cursed the fact that Enid had learned his mannerisms.

Enid’s friendly face faded off into a miffed sort of frown. Her claws retracted.

“Wednesday?” she asked. “Um, is something going on?”

Enid was right. Wednesday was acting strange. She would normally be ignoring her and writing, or giving some sort of witty retort, or chewing her out for breaking the lock clean in two. 

Wednesday stood up out of her chair, grabbed the latest chapter of her manuscript to read over, and made for the door where Enid was still standing dumbly.

“What?” she said. She reached out with both hands as Wednesday tried to shoulder past her. “Wednesday, I—”

“Don’t touch me!” Wednesday spat, flinching back. She had no idea what kind of visions she would summon if Enid touched her directly, looking down at her like that with her wide eyes and her mouth parted in shock.

Enid stared at Wednesday as she backed up hard against the doorway. Then, she stepped aside, her lower lip trembling.

Wednesday couldn’t look at her. She shut the door and fled.

—

Enid trembled in Wednesday’s arms, blood-streaked and dirt-ridden. Transformations got harder as werewolves got older — Wednesday had read about it before. Tendons and ligaments lost their elasticity, and sometimes tore. Even with their superior healing ability, it took time to recover.

Wednesday trailed her hand softly up and down Enid’s spine. She was crying, but neither of them were acknowledging it. Wednesday stayed silent and let the wet patch forming on her knee grow and grow. Enid clutched her hand weakly in Wednesday’s shirt.

It was quiet in their apartment. Something stupid and light was playing on the TV. It was a night like last month’s, and in another twenty-nine days, they’d be here again. Wednesday found herself not minding it. (Routine was usually worse than a grave.)

Without thinking, Wednesday slowly lowered her head, pressing her mouth in a soft trail along the skin above Enid’s low-hanging collar. Enid shuddered and her hand started to unclench, her spine easing. Wednesday imagined she was absorbing the pain in increments through her lips. That when she pulled back, Enid might not ache so badly.

—

Wednesday was avoiding Enid outright. There was no point in hiding it, so she didn’t.

Enid walked into their room, and Wednesday either turned to face the wall, went to sleep, or walked out. Enid approached her in class, and Wednesday turned to talk to another classmate, who often looked more confused than anything by her sudden eagerness to socialize. Enid tried to sit with her in the dining hall, and she got up and left. (She missed a lot of meals before Enid got the hint.)

One thing Wednesday never did was stick around to see what Enid did afterwards. She could imagine it well enough — the pinprick of hurt, and then the slow, sure spread of it. Enid’s eyes getting big and wet and her mouth forming into a pout, her fists clenching and unclenching at her sides.

Wednesday was becoming increasingly sure that Enid’s angsting would destroy her. Nowhere, in any of her visions, was Enid upset with Wednesday. (Not directly. Not for long.)

Wednesday didn’t know when she became so susceptible to another person’s emotions, but she wanted to find the senseless being that was doing this to her and break their neck.

Unfortunately, avoiding Enid did nothing to mitigate Wednesday’s visions. Not only could they occur, and frequently did, as she slept, but her mind quickly expanded what constituted an “Enid-object” now that Wednesday was diligently avoiding touching any of her belongings.

Wednesday was strolling through the grounds in an attempt to clear her head. It was swimming constantly these days. Even when she wasn’t attacked with visions directly, she was thinking about the ones from last night, or yesterday’s breakfast, or her last trip to Jericho (which had been especially embarrassing).

She bent down at some point to examine a patch of foliage. She reached out idly to pluck a flower, turning it over in her hand and staring sullenly.

Something came over her and she thumbed the petals, feeling the softness on the pads of her fingers.

Cornflower blue.

“That’s probably the grossest drink on the menu, FYI,” Enid said, grimacing.

Wednesday blinked. This wasn’t Nevermore — or their apartment, or Enid’s childhood home. The lights were lurid and fluorescent. Enid was wearing a garish uniform and looking at Wednesday like she’d never seen her before, without a pinch of affection. It stung unexpectedly.

“It’s espresso,” Wednesday said. Her voice was flat. “There is nothing ‘gross’ about espresso. It is the quintessential classic caffeinated beverage.”

Enid rolled her eyes, but it was sort of teasing. Light and flirty. “Alright, whatever. What’s the name for the order?”

“Addams,” Wednesday said.

Enid frowned. “Like, plural ‘Adam?’ Is that even a name?”

“It’s a family name.”

“Well, it’s weird. Just give me your first name.”

“I’m not arguing with the Starbucks barista,” Wednesday spat, glaring. “It’s bad enough I have to come here at all.”

“Jeez, sorry. Didn’t realize you were too good for us.” Enid grinned.

It was at some point near the middle of the day, before the lunch rush. There was no line. There was nothing to stop this strange flirting. Wednesday had never been hit on before — not like this, not by a stranger.

“I’m Enid,” Enid said, and the real Wednesday wanted to scream, Obviously! “Or, sorry — Sinclair. Family name, right?”

Wednesday pursed her lips. “Wednesday. Wednesday Addams.”

Enid smiled. “Lovely,” she said, and wrote Wednesday’s name on the cup.

When Wednesday retrieved it, it had a phone number and an obnoxious winky face.

(Enid took her home on the first date. Her apartment was theirs, from all those other times, and Wednesday knew it intimately, even though she kept walking into things in this clumsy version of her body. They made out softly, getting to know each other, no dredged-up messy feelings underneath their kiss. Wednesday pushed Enid against the granite countertop in the kitchen.)

Wednesday woke up and vomited into the dirt. None of her visions so far had given her this much vertigo.

She felt like she’d traveled far. Far away from this world, this time, this plane of existence. Her hair was drenched and she was gasping and gulping air like a fish out of water. She was a wreck.

In that version of the world, Wednesday had only half-known Enid. Memories of the real her — teenage her, roommate her, werewolf her — came in brief, dazzling flashes. Wednesday stood up on shaking legs and realized, with terror, that she couldn’t imagine going back to a time when she didn’t know what Enid’s bedhead looked like first thing in the morning.

—

The visions started to change. There were still those snapshots of domestic life, those angry interrupting kisses in their bedroom, those stupid cheesy dates in the sun, but with growing frequency came images that couldn’t come from any conceivable future, realistic or not.

Enid, middle-aged with her hair pulled back by a pencil, wore an outfit that screamed eclectic academia and held a laser-pointer, gesturing at a layout of cut fabric cast onto the whiteboard by a projector. She was telling the crowd of half-invested students something about hemlines when Wednesday appeared in the doorway.

Her hair felt tight, like it was in one braid instead of two. She was also wearing heels, which she swore she would never do on a casual basis. It didn’t matter — Enid was looking at her intensely and trailing off.

“Okay,” she said, voice throaty. “Class is over early today.”

Wednesday pulled her to her office and they locked the door. Enid quickly pushed her against some towering filing cabinets, the silver handles of the drawers digging into Wednesday’s back. She couldn’t care when she was being kissed senseless.

“Addams,” Enid said, swallowing, her eyes ever-bright. “You make me feel sixteen.”

Wednesday’s nose wrinkled. “Oh, don’t say that.”

Enid laughed.

Every night.

Morticia gestured for Wednesday to step forward. She did so as delicately as she could manage, despite hating the performance involved in these sorts of rituals. Her back was pulled straight by her corset and from her waistline spilled an ostentatious black-silver skirt. She was fairly sure she looked beautiful.

“Miss Wednesday Addams.” (Gomez made the introduction.) “Miss Enid Sinclair.”

Enid was in a well-tailored suit, a light almost-pink with cream ruffles spilling from her collar. Her legs looked obscenely long. She grinned, showing all her white teeth, slightly crooked in a way that was strangely endearing. Wednesday suddenly felt hot in her kidskin gloves.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” Enid send, bending into a bow. Her hair was swept into a ribbon at the back of her head. When she looked up again, she was reaching out a hand, and Wednesday took it. Enid pressed her lips softly to Wednesday’s knuckles and watched her with unwavering focus.

Every day.

Enid was yelling at Wednesday, eyes set aflame, hands flying in every direction. Also, Wednesday was fairly sure he was a boy. His hair was cropped short and always getting in his face — he kept running a hand through it to keep it back. His jaw was sharp and his cheeks were ruddy and hot.

(Wednesday looked around the expansive room they were in and saw milky starlight slipping past the window. They were also possibly in space.)

“I can’t do it anymore. I can’t live like this,” Enid was saying, sounding on the verge of tears. For a while, it was almost giving Wednesday deja vu. “I can’t — you’re going to get yourself killed one day, Wesley, and I can’t watch that happen. I can’t.”

Wednesday looked down at herself in mild surprise. Oh.

“The fate of the galaxy does not rest on the shoulders of your comfort, Eddie,” he found himself saying, his arms crossed tightly, his voice low (both in pitch and volume). He was glad the vision allowed himself to run his hands through his hair (long, but loose) and satiate his curiosity.

Eddie shoved Wesley in the chest. He stumbled back, arms falling to his sides.

“Screw you for saying that,” Eddie said. His eyes were alive, alive, alive. “Like I don’t matter. Like I’m not a part of the equation for you. Screw you.”

Wesley scoffed. “As if I’m in your head when you’re racing down an asteroid belt like it’s a highway of your precious San Francisco.”

Eddie was close. (Closer than he’d ever been.) “You’re always in my head,” he said, and Wesley was being kissed, hot and angry, up against the window of an intergalactic spaceship.

Wesley never thought he’d be into something like this. Wednesday-Wesley. Wednesday, she meant, because apparently she was losing her entire mind. But she cracked an eye open, and it was Enid’s button nose, and Enid’s eyes screwed shut in concentration, and Enid’s mop of blond hair, and she let herself float.

Every time Wednesday thought of her, her, her.

(It was compulsive.)

Enid trembled, prone in Wednesday’s arms. The sounds of the forest closed in on them, leaves curling around the half-moon above like the spidery hands of a thief. Enid was dressed thinly in a white nightgown, cast artfully over her form, and she threw her head back, baring her throat. Wednesday was suddenly hungry.

“Oh, bite me, savage beast of the night,” Enid wept. “Resist your temptations no longer.”

Enid’s thin, red-knuckled hand was coming up to grope somewhere around her own sternum. It found what it was looking for — an ornate gold cross on a long chain. She lifted it out of her dress and Wednesday snarled — she couldn’t help it. The sound was animalistic and foreign.

With a hard tug, Enid snapped the cross’s chain off her neck and threw the charm somewhere into the shrubbery. Wednesday’s hunger became insatiable. Enid pushed a hand into the hair at the base of Wednesday’s neck.

Wednesday descended on Enid like the night and Enid cried out. Enid’s skin went cold under Wednesday’s hand, and her own started to feel warm.

Wednesday was barely aware of what day it was by the time she stumbled into Xavier’s painting studio and collapsed on the floor.

—

Wednesday awoke to find herself being fed water from a bottle like a child. She batted it away the second she had the strength, letting it skitter somewhere on the floor, contents glugging out slowly and soaking the ground around it.

Xavier sighed. “Well, I guess you’re feeling better.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “Why would you say that?”

“Because you basically walked in here looking like hell, mumbled something about blue eyes, and passed out. And now you’re, you know. Not passed out,” Xavier said, crossing his arms. “What’s been going on with you? You haven’t been to a full day of school since, like, Tuesday. The last time you were this erratic was when the world was ending, and even then you sort of had your shit together.”

Wednesday pursed her lips, and looked around. The walls seemed solid. The paintings accurate and precise as always, and of subjects Wednesday could not possibly think up herself. Xavier was here. Then, of course, there was the telltale sign that Enid Sinclair was nowhere to be seen.

No, Wednesday decided. This was real.

“I’m fine,” she said.

Xavier had never looked less impressed. “Really.”

“Yes.”

“Yeah. That’s complete bull,” Xavier said. “You’re obviously having a psychotic break.”

“I am not.”

“Well, you’re on your way towards one. Tell me — are you having visions again?”

Wednesday looked to the side and tried to rifle through her scattered mind. It was normally a filing cabinet from which she could pull any information she wanted. Now, it felt like someone had upheaved every drawer onto the ground, stomped on the pages, stolen a few, and lit the rest on fire. Wednesday was clutching desperately onto the burned fragments.

There had to be a reason why she came here, specifically. Even in her vision-addled brain, she never made an illogical choice.

“Oh,” she said, and turned to Xavier. He was watching her with what seemed to be genuine worry, but that wasn’t important. “You seem like the kind of person to believe in the multiverse.”

Xavier blinked, slowly. “Yeah.”

“So, you’ve thought about it? Maybe read a bit on the subject?” Wednesday asked, voice as close to eager as it ever got. Her brain still felt slightly fried.

“Uh, yeah. Sorry, is this — are you making fun of me?”

Wednesday shook her head vehemently. “I wanted to ask you something.”

Xavier’s eyebrows raised. “Shoot.”

“Is it, or is it not, possible that my psychic abilities are transporting my consciousness into different versions of me across the fabric of space and time without my consent?” Wednesday rushed.

Xavier stared at her for a long, long time. “Uh. Probably.”

“Then, that’s what’s happening,” Wednesday said. “How do I get it to stop?”

“Woah, woah. Okay. So, you’re telling me that your visions are, like, showing you glimpses of your alternate selves?”

“Yes,” Wednesday said through clenched teeth, hoping she wouldn’t have to explain any further to get Xavier’s nerd advice.

“How?”

Wednesday huffed. “I thought, at first, it was showing me the future. But the evidence contradicted itself — the same things happened more than once, in different ways.”

“What kinds of things?”

Through Wednesday’s mind ran all the first kisses she’d had with Enid, all the first apartment doors unlocked, all the first pets brought home, and she waved her hand dismissively.

“Doesn’t matter,” she said. “Because then, the scope expanded. Things started happening that couldn’t possibly happen in this timeline. First, I was meeting people I had already met in different ways, then I was in a strange lesbian version of an Austen novel, and I was a gay man in space, and I was one of those really cheesy vampires from 1980s horror, and I was biting her…”

Xavier was looking at her thoughtfully, like things were starting to click into place. “‘Her?’”

Wednesday swallowed. “Again, not important.”

“Right,” Xavier said, skeptical. “‘She’ wouldn’t happen to be blond, a werewolf, and totally obsessed with you?”

Wednesday crossed her arms. “Enid’s not obsessed with me,” she said, but she didn’t deny the rest. What she left unsaid was not in the way I’m obsessed with her, at least, because the evidence spoke for itself. Wednesday was going steadily insane, and it was all Enid’s fault.

“So. You’re having visions where you’re sucking Enid’s blood, courting her at a regency ball, and apparently being a gay dude with her on a spaceship,” Xavier said.

Wednesday felt hot around the collar. It was all so ridiculous, and so unfathomably real. When Xavier talked about those lives, even that flippantly, the memory of them came to the forefront of Wednesday’s mind like she had really lived them.

“Basically,” Wednesday said, “yes.”

“What else?”

If Wednesday was humiliated before, it was nothing compared to now. She wanted to be swallowed whole by one of the monsters in Xavier’s paintings.

“We,” she started, but she couldn’t get the words out. She looked at the ceiling. “We make out a lot.”

“Ah.”

She looked at Xavier and saw that his eyes were sparkling with mirth.

“What!” she said indignantly.

“Nothing,” Xavier said. “It just seems like there’s one super-obvious thing you haven’t tried yet.”

Wednesday frowned. “And that is?”

“Talk to your roommate,” Xavier said. “That should be your first point of action with any issue you have, actually, but especially when your issue is literally that you’re dreaming about spending your life with her.”

“They’re not dreams.”

Xavier looked at Wednesday flatly, as if to say that that was not the point of what he said. She knew that, of course, but had to defend herself somehow.

“How do you know I haven’t talked to Enid?” she mumbled. It was so unlike her to mumble — she really was losing the plot.

“Aside from the obvious fact that if you had done it by now, this would probably be resolved, and you would definitely not be running to me?” Xavier sighed. “Because she’s been looking like shit recently. I don’t know how you haven’t noticed, you live with her.”

Wednesday tried to puzzle through her memories of Enid. They were all tangled, now.

“I think she’s been staying with Yoko,” she said. “I’m not sure.”

“Well, it’s not working for her. She has crazy purple eye-bags and I’m pretty sure she hasn’t done laundry in a week.”

Wednesday considered this. “I have been avoiding her.”

Xavier snorted. “No shit.”

“Well, I can’t exactly tell her,” Wednesday muttered. “Not now. Not like this.”

Xavier shrugged.

“I don’t know what to tell you, Wednesday. I don’t think you have a choice.”

—

“You’re so pretty,” Enid mumbled through sticky lips, heat pressing in at the walls of their room. They were breathing each other’s oxygen. “Your hair is pretty. So sleek and shiny and it never gets tangled. And your skin, I sort of like that it’s almost gray, because when you blush you blush so well. And your shoulders — they’re so narrow under your stupid blazers that I have to put my hands on them. Have to. And your eyes — no, Wednesday, stop looking at me like that, I can’t handle it.”

—

Their room wasn’t empty when Wednesday walked into it, head marginally clearer after her talk with Xavier. Of course, she looked at Enid sitting on her pink-piled bed right afterwards, and her brain was foggy again.

“Hello,” she said, voice thick. The word was so flimsy.

Enid stood up, slowly, in obvious disbelief.

“Hello?” she said. She sounded more hurt than angry, her voice cracking ugly down the center. “Hello? You ignore me for three straight weeks and that’s all you can say? What the hell, Wednesday?”

Wednesday stared at her shoes. They were scuffed and had leaves and mud stuck to them. She wasn’t completely sure how long the muck had been there.

“I’m sorry,” she muttered, because at this point, she really didn’t know who she was anymore. Someone rattled by exhaustion, and plagued by visions of impossibilities. In any case, Enid physically flinched at the word, taking an exaggerated step back.

“‘Sorry?’” she croaked. “Did the great Wednesday Addams just apologize?”

A smile was beginning to gether at the corners of her mouth, and Wednesday wanted to groan, because she didn’t deserve forgiveness yet, not when she hadn’t said anything. The hard part wasn’t nearly over.

“Yes,” she said, voice tight.

Enid stepped forward. Every cell in Wednesday’s body screamed when she felt her body heat radiating over. Enid ran ridiculously hot — it was probably a canine thing.

“I am still mad at you,” Enid said. “Hey — come on, look at me.”

Wednesday didn’t want Enid to do something stupid like attempt to tilt her head up by her chin, because she would probably convulse and collapse and then this would all be over, so she looked up.

She could probably count every freckle on Enid’s nose and every eyelash fanning across her cheeks. If she was given the time, she would do it gladly. Enid smiled and the corners of her eyes wrinkled.

“I’m sorry, too. I think I knew you weren’t okay but I was more mad about the fact that you weren’t paying attention to me,” Enid said, and shrugged. Wednesday had no idea how this was so easy for her. “It’s okay for you to have bad weeks. Or bad months. You probably should have, you know, told me that you wanted to be alone, but I get that it’s hard for you. Right?”

Wednesday nodded slightly. She was transfixed, only half-listening to Enid’s insufferably kind words. Then she shook her head, because she came here with a plan, but the neverending problem of her expressions being too subtle for Enid to notice came back to ruin her yet again.

Enid was looking at her softly. “I’m here,” she was saying. “Always here. You know that.”

Her hand was coming up over Wednesday’s shoulder as if in slow motion. She wanted to duck, or flinch, or spit at Enid to keep her hands to herself, but all she did was stand there and stare as Enid delicately tucked a loose strand of hair behind Wednesday’s ear.

A moment of nothing. Then her neck nearly snapped in two.

“Do you ever think about what might have happened?”

Wednesday turned to look at Enid and her heart almost stopped. Her face was creased with a thousand gentle wrinkles, her blonde hair was a wispy gray clinging onto her scalp, and her blue eyes had been nearly swallowed by her skin. Wednesday could still see through to the core of them, though — the way they sparkled. Enid looked like someone who had been loved and loved and loved.

“What do you mean?” Wednesday said. Her own voice was crackly with age.

Enid took her hand. “If I hadn’t said something. Back at Nevermore. Do you think you would have?”

Wednesday’s throat felt so dry. “I don’t know.”

Enid shook her head, still shining.

“I don’t think you would have,” she said. She was toying with Wednesday’s fingers like it was a habit. “I think you were too shy. Not to mention emotionally constipated.”

Wednesday grimaced. Thank God her mouth didn’t open to speak.

“Don’t get me wrong, you were cute,” Enid said. She was so herself that Wednesday marveled at it. “But sometimes I think, if I hadn’t kissed you first. Would we have just … graduated? Maybe seen each other at the five year, ten year, fifteen year reunion?” She looked Wednesday in the eye. “Would you have forgotten me?”

No, Wednesday wanted to say, but her voice wouldn’t come.

Enid was the sun. One day, Wednesday was going to be blinded.

When she came back into her body, her limp hands were clutched in Enid’s, and a litany of curses and prayers faded out from static into tangible language. The second Enid saw that Wednesday was awake, there were arms around her.

“Careful,” Wednesday said, with barely any room to breathe. “You’ll trigger another.”

Enid pulled back. Her eyebrows were pulled together, and her eyes big again. Her skin was soft with life, her clothing stupid and fuzzy and lurid, and her hair tri-colored. This, Wednesday thought foggily. This one is mine.

“‘Another?’” Enid repeated. “Another what, Wednesday?”

Wednesday sat up on her elbows, bringing them almost nose-to-nose. She had probably done this over just about a thousand times, but was disappointed to find that there were still nerves roiling like hell deep in her gut. She tried to breathe.

“When we get together, in my visions,” Wednesday said, and Enid made a hacking, choking noise, but didn’t pull away, “you always make the first move. Did you know that?”

Enid blanched, staring at Wednesday incredulously. “Uh, no. Obviously not. What?”

“Sometimes I kiss you. Sometimes you kiss me. But you always start things off,” Wednesday said. “Even when we’re talking about the past, it’s you. Always you.”

Enid was barely moving. Her mouth was open a touch, like she wanted to say something but couldn’t think of what. Wednesday was looking up the slope of her nose like the barrel of a shotgun.

“I think, maybe, I just got saddled with the you that’s a coward,” Wednesday kept going. “Or maybe the you that’s straight. I don’t know. I’m about to find out.”

Enid’s eyes were flickering to Wednesday’s mouth, which was an astonishingly good sign. She seemed to have put aside the visions of it all, at least for the moment, in favor of the looming possibility in front of her. (Wednesday sympathized with this, and was also incredibly grateful, because she had never been more starved for human contact in her life. She had probably never been starved for human contact at all.)

“Enid?” Wednesday said. “Do you know what else always happens in my visions?”

Enid swallowed, showily, and her lips were wet. She whispered, “What?”

“This.” Wednesday tangled a hand in Enid’s hair, and kissed her.

Every one of Wednesday’s visions immediately paled in comparison to the reality of it. Wednesday sagged, finally feeling the exhaustion in her bones, but Enid caught her by the neck and refused to let go.

—

The visions quickly disappeared. The dreams didn’t, not quite, but Wednesday had it on good authority that it was acceptable (and even expected) to have frequent dreams about one’s girlfriend, especially of the risque variety, so she decided not to worry.

Kissing still happened almost as frequently as it did in Wednesday’s head. She appreciated and encouraged this development greatly, as long as it didn’t cut into her writing time. Even then, as she hacked away at her novel, Enid took it upon herself to press her mouth along Wednesday’s shoulders and neck, wrapping her arms around Wednesday’s chest, until Wednesday either snapped or gave in. (It was usually the former.) (When it was the latter, it was an especially good day.)

(Today was an especially good day.)

Enid made a sort of “mmph!” sound when Wednesday whirled out of her chair and put her hands on Enid’s face. She would have expected to get quite good at making out with all the mental practice, but they were still clumsy and new at it, which Wednesday liked more than she ever thought she would.

She pulled back, for a moment, to look into Enid’s eyes. They were bright with the grin that was spread across her mouth.

Wednesday wondered how many other Wednesdays were looking over her shoulder right now.

Then, she kissed Enid again, and decided that philosophizing could wait until tomorrow.