Awkward Reflections
Maeve
You know it’s going to be a terrible night when you’re thirty seconds into the walk home and you already want to eat your own hands out of secondhand embarrassment. I’m not even sure who I’m more mortified for—me, or the balding man with the anime tie who spent most of our date attempting to explain NFTs to me using a half-empty sugar packet and the concept of “Schrödinger’s monkey.” His words, not mine. My only contribution to the conversation was to correctly predict, two minutes in, what he’d name his hypothetical firstborn son (it was Goku), and then, for the rest of the evening, to systematically destroy every shred of hope my parents had ever invested in my social abilities.
I walk home fast, partly because it’s cold and partly because I’m worried that if I move at any speed less than “being chased by wolves,” my own thoughts will overtake me. There’s the usual post-mortem: Why did I say yes to this? Why did I wear a hoodie with literal cat hair stitched into the hem? Why did I let him talk me into staying for dessert, and why, why, why did I order the chocolate mousse when everyone knows that’s basically a curse word for lactose-intolerant people? My stomach is already telegraphing bad things for the next hour.
My apartment is a solid thirty-minute walk from the restaurant, which would be fine if it weren’t because my phone is at 3% battery and, in a moment of pure cosmic spite, I dropped my backup charger in a puddle last week and now it’s just a very expensive paperweight. So I am alone, in the dark, on a sidewalk that could pass for a set from a post-apocalyptic zombie film, if the zombies were all stray cats and empty Red Bull cans.
I’m halfway through a silent argument with myself—something about whether I could convincingly fake my own death to avoid my mother’s post-date text—when it happens. The trip. It’s not like a normal trip, either, the kind where you catch your toe on a cracked bit of pavement and do a little hop-skip like, “ha ha, gravity, you scamp.” This is the kind of trip that sneaks up on you from a fourth-dimensional angle. One second I’m upright, the next I’m lurching forward, arms flailing, mouth open in a strangled yelp that sounds exactly like a dying goose.
But I don’t hit the ground. Instead, there’s this… resistance, like falling into a spider web made of static electricity. My vision goes white for a millisecond, and there’s a sound like a bag of microwave popcorn exploding inside my skull. The air around me gets weirdly thick and smells like rain on hot asphalt, which would be a sort of nostalgic if I wasn’t currently engaged in open combat with gravity.
Then, with no warning, the world just gives up on me. My face connects with something hard, cold, and so smooth it feels like the inside of a dental retainer. I slide a few inches, the friction burning through the fabric of my jeans, and come to a stop in a puddle of mortification and actual drool.
There is a beat of silence. I take stock.
- Limbs: all present, though at least three of them are bent the wrong way.
- Dignity: vaporized on impact.
- Cat hair hoodie: now decorated with what looks like a thousand microscopic diamonds, each one sparkling in the moonlight that I’m 95% sure wasn’t there a second ago.
I groan, half from pain and half from the sheer injustice of the universe, and try to push myself upright. My hands scrabble for support, but whatever I’ve landed on is so preposterously clean and cold and minimal friction that I just end up pawing at it like a dying seal.
It’s about now that I realize I am not, in fact, on my street anymore. Or any street, unless my neighborhood has spontaneously developed a taste for grandiose architecture and a color palette stolen from the dreams of an Instagram influencer with a thing for lunar aesthetics.
I blink. The afterimage of the street—broken lamplight, garbage bags, the smell of hot dog water—evaporates, replaced by something that looks like the inside of a cathedral, if cathedrals were designed by people who thought “understated” meant “cover it with more glowing stuff.” Everything is pale, shimmery, and slightly too sharp, as if reality itself got a software update and the new version is mostly just “sparkle filter” and “add drama.”
My first instinct is to look for the nearest exit, but before I can even twist my neck, my peripheral vision catches a movement—so fast and so deliberate that my lizard brain decides to just freeze all motor functions and let the rest of me die in peace. I am horizontal, wet, and possibly concussed, but I manage to focus on the direction of the motion.
There are… people? Figures? They stand at the far end of the enormous chamber, tall and straight and so gorgeously inhuman that for a hot second I wonder if my brain has finally finished its long slide into complete dissociation and this is what comes next. I have no context for these people. They don’t have the soft edges of actual humans; they’re all angles, shadows, and white-gold light. Their eyes catch mine and hold, unblinking.
I open my mouth to say something—an apology, or maybe a desperate plea for directions to the nearest bathroom—but my tongue is numb and my mouth is full of what tastes like pennies and regret.
Instead, I just lie there, breathing in the cold, expensive air, and try to pretend that this is all just an elaborate hallucination brought on by the chocolate mousse.
This, I tell myself, is probably the worst possible first impression anyone has ever made in the history of multiverse travel. And it is, as usual, entirely my fault.
The first rule of public humiliation is: always assume it can get worse.
Case in point, when I finally manage to pry my cheek off the marble—maybe quartz, maybe some kind of otherworldly mineral invented solely to make my face look as red as possible—I sit up, knees knocking together, and take in the full horror of my situation.
The chamber is so big it might have its own climate. Columns made of some gleaming, opaline stuff soar up and out, holding up a ceiling painted with a moon so real I catch myself squinting to see if it’s moving. I’m ringed by tiers and tiers of benches, every single one filled with… people, kind of, except no people I’ve ever seen.
Some are seven feet tall and so pale you could use their skin as a white balance reference. Some are made of shadow, or wind, or maybe just really expensive perfume. There are wings. There are tails. There are faces so perfect I have a visceral urge to check my own reflection for new zits just in protest.
And they’re all looking at me.
The kind of looking where you know you’re the punchline, you just haven’t heard the joke yet.
I do a quick survey of myself. Cat hair hoodie: intact, though now with bonus sparkles. Jeans: torn at one knee, which I’m pretty sure was already like that, but now it’s joined by a nice rug-burn mark. My hands are covered in a fine dust that, when I move, throws up little puffs of iridescence. I look like a failed Pinterest project. The only thing missing is a hot glue gun and a disclaimer.
A low, shivery sound ripples through the crowd, like the hum of an old computer monitor scaled up a thousand percent. I have no idea what it means, but my body interprets it as “danger” and tries to curl itself into a ball. I oblige, mostly out of muscle memory.
Above me, on the tallest platform, sit four figures so far out of my league it feels like a joke. The one on the far left is wrapped in black velvet, silver hair falling all the way to his knees, with a crown that glows like it’s powered by resentment and moonlight. Next to him, a man with skin the color of ancient parchment and eyes like someone took a pair of sapphires and ground them into knives. There’s a third—lean, almost boyish, with hair the color of a Mediterranean swimming pool and a smile like he’s already bored with the universe. And the fourth is built like a linebacker, but sits so still he might be a statue, except for the restless twitch of his jaw.
I meet the eyes of the first one and instantly regret it. There’s no malice there, just a kind of hollow sadness that makes my own problems feel like something you could fix with retail therapy and a weighted blanket.
I try to stand, but my foot slips on the glitter and I go down again, this time in slow motion. Somewhere in the back, someone snickers. I pray for a sinkhole to open up and swallow me.
“Is… this normal?” I whisper to myself, then, realizing the acoustics are probably engineered to carry even the tiniest fart, I wince.
A hush falls over the chamber, and every face (or whatever passes for faces here) turns toward the four on the dais. The silver-haired one stands, and the entire room holds its collective breath.
I try to remember if I’m wearing anything embarrassing under the hoodie, just in case I need to shed a layer and run. Spoiler: I am. It’s a t-shirt that says “HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE” in Comic Sans, a gift from my best friend and, in this context, a prophecy.
Glitter still drifting off my sleeves, I squint up at the crowd and wonder, not for the first time, if maybe I died on that date and this is just some cruel afterlife. If it is, it at least comes with good lighting.
For a moment, nothing moved. Not even the dust motes, which, in this place, are presumably made of something artisanal and gluten-free.
The silver-haired king glides (there is no other word for it) to the edge of the dais, cloak swirling in a way that suggests it has its own feelings about dramatic entrances. The three others follow: Knife-Eyes, Pool-Boy, and the linebacker who could break me in half by accident. They arrange themselves in a row, all of them staring directly at me. My internal organs seize up in a coordinated strike.
The air goes heavy and weird, like right before a thunderstorm, except instead of the earthy smell of rain, it’s ozone and… is that vanilla? I think it’s vanilla. Or maybe the lingering aftertaste of mousse. I’m not a scientist.
Then, all at once, their eyes light up. It’s not just a metaphor—there’s actual light, silver and sharp as a camera flash, slicing through the blue haze of the hall and pinning me to the floor. I want to look away, but I can’t. It’s like those dreams where you’re falling, except this time I’m falling into four sets of eyes that want to eat me alive.
There’s a low pulse, like a bass drop in a club I would never get into. Something slams into my chest, hot and cold at the same time. It’s not a heart attack. I’ve googled enough WebMD to know this is way more dramatic. It feels like someone poured lighter fluid into my ribcage and then set it off with a sparkler.
I clutch at my shirt, hoping to smother whatever’s trying to burst out of me, but all I get is a handful of glitter and the faint tang of my own sweat. The pain crescendos, then plateaus, then starts to fade, leaving a weird buzzing behind, like I’ve just mainlined three Red Bulls and the concept of shame.
The kings don’t move. They just keep staring, their eyes now back to normal, but with a little extra shine around the edges. The one in black velvet tilts his head, like he’s trying to remember the word for “absolute train wreck.” If I had to guess, I’d say they were expecting someone else.
I’m trying to think of something clever to say (“So, is this the part where you dissect me for science?”) but the words dissolve into vapor before they hit my tongue. All I manage is a tiny, pained wheeze, which echoes in the vast, unkind space.
The burning in my chest is gone, but something’s left behind. A sensation, like a string tied tight around my heart, pulling it in four different directions. It’s not painful, exactly—more like a reminder that my insides are now on loan from someone else.
I don’t know what’s worse: the fact that I’m apparently the main attraction at an interdimensional talent show, or that, for one brief second, it actually felt good.
My entire body is still vibrating from the soul-zap, but apparently we’re not done yet, because the silver-haired king takes a single, gliding step off the dais and everyone in the room leans forward like they’re watching a live episode of “Will He or Won’t He Commit Public Execution?”
He approaches, slow and deliberate, black velvet cloak dragging behind him like a storm cloud. Up close, he’s even more ridiculous: tall, pale, with cheekbones sharp enough to slice bread and eyes the color of deep-space ice. I have a sudden, stupid urge to reach out and poke his arm just to see if he’s real, but I restrain myself.
He stops just out of poking range, fixes me with a look of such raw, unfiltered yearning that for a moment I forget how to breathe. It’s like being hit by a train made entirely of regret. I want to shrink into a glittery puddle, but my body’s too busy reeling.
“Genevieve,” he says, and his voice is softer than I expect, but it shakes, like he’s been practicing this line for centuries and is terrified he’ll mess it up.
And, because I am genetically incapable of handling a meaningful moment with any kind of grace, I blurt: “Uh… it’s Maeve. And your crown looks like rusty leafs.” I hear it as I say it—leafs, not even the grammatically correct leaves. I am going to die here, and honestly, it’s probably for the best.
There is a split second of silence, and then the world explodes.
The guy to the king’s left—midnight hair, violet eyes, a smirk like he’s just won a bet—lets out a low, delighted laugh. The blue-haired one flashes a grin so wide it almost splits his face, while the mountain of a man just stares, mouth twitching at the corners like he’s trying to suppress an existential scream.
The court erupts in a wave of gasps, laughter, and, somewhere in the back, what sounds like a very fancy snort.
King Klayden (I’m guessing that’s his name; he has big “I enforce rules at the expense of joy” energy) goes still. His face does a weird contortion, as if it’s not sure which emotion to commit to—devastation, amusement, or “I would like to yeet you off the nearest balcony, but I am a professional.”
I feel my cheeks flame so hot they could probably power a small city. “Sorry,” I add, because I am now operating on full autopilot, “I just… it’s very shiny, and the shape is, um… autumnal?”
The violet-eyed king leans over to the blue-haired one and murmurs, “She’s funnier than the last one,” and they both crack up. I want to die. I want to be erased from all possible realities, including the ones that haven’t been invented yet.
Klayden’s eyes are fixed on me, but now there’s a flicker of something behind the longing. Maybe hope, maybe “how quickly can I get this over with,” maybe both. He opens his mouth, closes it, then tries again: “You… do not remember?”
I shake my head, more sheepish than a sheep at a wool convention. “Sorry. Never been here before. At least I don’t think so?”
He lets out a sound halfway between a sigh and a sob, but catches himself, standing even taller, if that’s possible. “You are… different. But you are her.” He sounds so certain it scares me.
I try for a joke—“Maybe you’ve got me confused with someone who doesn’t dress like a raccoon on laundry day?”—but it falls flat. My insides are melting.
The room is still vibrating from my outburst. Every face (some with actual fangs, I realize belatedly) locked onto me. My hands tremble, so I stuff them in my hoodie pocket, where they come up coated in more glitter. I resist the urge to lick it. I have standards. Not many, but some.
All I want is to escape, but my feet are glued to the marble, my mouth is working on its own tragic script, and the four kings—especially the one with the heartbreak crown—are looking at me like I’m the answer to a question none of them are ready to ask.
The next sixty seconds are proof that the universe has never heard of “too much drama.”
First, the court erupts. Hundreds of voices, all at once, some high and clear, some so low they rumble the floor. The sound is less like a crowd and more like a pack of wolves arguing over who gets the first bite. I shrink back, but the attention is a physical force, pressing in from every side.
The four kings react as if they’re in a competition for “Most Cinematic Response.” The one with the violet eyes—Nyx, according to my internal fanfiction—tilts his head and gives me the kind of slow, predatory grin you’d see in an ad for cologne that costs more than my rent. “She’s got spark, I’ll give her that,” he purrs, voice smooth enough to butter toast.
The blue-haired one, all sunshine and trouble, is doubled over with laughter, the sound rolling out in waves. “I told you she’d be different!” he crows, elbowing Nyx with enough force to almost knock him off balance.
The linebacker—Draven, I guess—doesn’t laugh. His arms are crossed, and his jaw tightens so hard you could crack walnuts on it. He just stares, equal parts disapproval and… is that sympathy? I don’t know if it’s better or worse that someone here might actually feel sorry for me.
And Klayden, the main event, the king with heartbreak built into his DNA, just keeps looking at me, like if he blinks he’ll wake up and I’ll be gone.
That’s when the real weirdness starts.
It’s subtle at first—a little tug at my ribs, like someone’s got a fishhook threaded through my sternum. Then there’s another, from the opposite side, and another, and another, each one pulling in a different direction. North, south, east, west—or, in this case, Silver, Shadow, Sea, and Stone.
My soul, such as it is, is being drawn and quartered by four supernatural hotties, and there is absolutely nothing in the self-help books about how to cope with this.
My head spins. The room tilts. For a hot second, I am sure I’m about to either hurl or pass out, and honestly, passing out would be the better PR move. The only thing holding me together is the glitter on my hands, and the certainty that if I collapse, at least three of these guys will make it a point to catch me in the most embarrassing way possible.
I try to focus on something—anything—other than the sensation of my insides being repurposed as a tug-of-war rope. The crowd. The architecture. The weird, blue-white banners that hang from the ceiling, each one stitched with a symbol that looks like a fancy ampersand.
But no matter where I look, there’s always a pair of eyes dragging me back. Four of them, each more intense than the last. I can’t decide if I want to scream, run, or just curl up and take a nap until this whole thing blows over.
Instead, I do what I do best: I panic in place.
“Is this… is this normal?” I ask, voice about three octaves higher than usual.
Nyx’s smirk widens. “For you, darling? Always.”
Kairos, the blue-haired disaster, claps his hands together, sending a spray of seawater droplets into the air. “You’re adapting faster than any of them. I’m impressed.”
Draven rolls his eyes, but his lips almost (almost) twitch into a smile. “Don’t encourage her.”
Klayden doesn’t say a word. He just watches, and I realize—terrifyingly—that I’m the only thing he’s seen in centuries that makes sense.
The yanking sensation in my chest finally plateaus, settling into a kind of thrumming ache, like a pulled muscle after a marathon you didn’t train for. I wipe my hands on my jeans and look up at the dais, doing my best impression of someone who isn’t seconds from a catastrophic meltdown.
“Well,” I say, “I guess we’re all having a normal one, huh?”
The court howls with laughter. The kings join in, even Draven, whose smile is like a rare solar eclipse—blinding and brief.
I try to smile back, but I can feel the flush all the way to my ears. The worst part is, the longer this goes on, the less I want to run. Something in me—something that’s probably not even me, anymore—wants to stay.
Something warm unfurls in my chest, spreading outward like honey in hot tea, easing the tightness in my shoulders I hadn’t even noticed was there. My fingers stop fidgeting with my hoodie strings. The air here suddenly doesn’t feel so foreign in my lungs.
You know that moment in sitcoms when someone believes they have gotten away with something, only to immediately make things a thousand times worse? That’s where we are now.
I try to stand, because I am a grown woman and, on some level, still believe in the dignity of bipedalism. The marble is slick under my sneakers and my legs are less “limbs” and more “overcooked noodles,” but I manage to get halfway upright. The problem is, the second I move, the glitter starts falling off me in little clouds, trailing me like a comet of shame.
The kings are still watching. The court is still buzzing. I need to do something, anything, to break the spell. So I take a bold step forward, intending to make a break for the nearest doorway or at least duck behind one of those massive columns.
I trip.
Not a dramatic, slow-mo trip. More of a stutter-step, catch-my-foot-on-my-own-jeans, oh-no-here-we-go-again kind of trip. My hand flails out, desperate for an anchor, and lands on the first thing within reach: King Klayden’s robe.
The fabric is so soft it barely registers, but the sound it makes when it tears is a perfect, echoing rip that could silence a stadium.
And it does.
Every voice in the hall dies. The other three kings go as still as mannequins. Even the air holds its breath.
I freeze, hand clutching a fistful of midnight velvet, half-expecting to be turned into a decorative shrub on the spot. Instead, Klayden looks down at me, his face unreadable, and then—very deliberately—he drops to one knee, bringing his gaze level with mine.
The blue light from above picks out every sharp plane of his face, every line of moonlit anguish and hope. He leans in, close enough that I can see the flecks of silver in his eyes, and says, quietly but with absolute finality: “You’re home now… whether you like it or not.”
His words are both chains and wings, binding me even as they set something free. Somewhere behind me, Nyx lets out a low, appreciative whistle. Kairos mutters, “Well, that’s that,” and Draven just nods once, satisfied.
I let go of the robe, hands shaking, and try to find something smart to say. Nothing comes.
Instead, I just stand there, covered in glitter, staring into the eyes of the man who just claimed me in front of an audience of immortals.
My life is a catalog of missteps and fumbles, but this moment—his silver eyes locked on mine, the torn fabric between my fingers—feels like crossing a threshold I can never un-cross, like the first domino in a chain reaction that will rewrite everything I thought I knew about myself.
