Kassandra brings you to a small but humble house on the edge of the city. She opens the door and the smell of freshly baked bread fills the room. She smiles at you and grabs a bottle of wine before pouring you a glass. The home is no palace but it’s warm and comfortable, unlike the streets.
“Welcome to my little dwelling!”
Kassandra has a small smirk on her face and motions towards the couch for you to sit down.
“This is a nice dry wine from Kephallonia, the town I grew up in.”
She extends her glass towards yours with a cheerful smile on her face.
“A toast to us, two bold women living on their terms!”
The two of you make a toast.
“Tell me about where you grew up, Kassandra”
You ask patiently, ready to listen.
“Of course! As I said, I grew up in Kephallonia which is a very small island. I was practically raised there, it's an amazing place that's full of life. The people there have big hearts but unfortunately are troubled by hard times. We are simply people just trying to get by.”
Kassandra reflects on her childhood and smiles, some hard times plagued her mind but she can reminisce fondly. The two of you chat back and forth, listening to the music playing in the background. The conversation seemed to flow easily, with both parties laughing and enjoying their time together.
“There was a poet named Sappho, from the island of Lesbos. She was known for her beautiful poems about love. Much of her works have been lost to time unfortunately but she lives on as a legacy for many.”
When Kassandra speaks, a sort of fire appears in her eyes. Every word is filled with passion.
“Ah yes, Sappho. I’m a big fan, her writing had a significant beauty about it.”
“Love is something extraordinary, isn't it? Look at us, two passionate women living our lives to the fullest. A life without love isn’t a life worth living.”
You smile in agreement with Kassandra, and the two of you lock eyes. She stretches her arms and lets out a sigh of relief before lifting the sleeves of her shirt.
“You see this? These scars, I got them from a mistake I made when I was younger. They used to make me a little insecure but I've grown to appreciate them now. They represent growth and change, I cherish them”
You place your fingers on the scarring, feeling every bump and detail on her skin. Humans tend to be over-critical of themselves but typically not as much when it comes to others. Kassandra kept a solemn expression on her face, the light from the sun shined down on her from the window.
“So tell me, do you like what you see?”
Kassandra says with a soft laugh.
“I do…” You say softly afterward, returning the question.
“I think you’re a goddess among mankind. I can't help but feel drawn to you.”
Kassandra pours the two of you another glass of wine. You both talked and talked for hours until the sun began to set. Kassandra takes your hand in hers and leads you to the rooftop, where you can see the sun hit the sea perfectly. The air is calm and warm, birds flock together by the seaside and the faint noise of the bustling city can be heard. You look to your side to see Kassandra's brown wavy locks flowing in the gentle breeze, a calm and peaceful expression on her face. The two of you continue to sip the wine, you can feel yourself get a light buzz. The moment is perfect and both views are beautiful.
“I’m drawn to you… I can’t explain it.”
Kassandra turns you and tilts her head slightly, extending her hand out to caress your face. You stop for a moment, and the two of you lock eyes. At this moment you could see every detail on her face, how her brown eyes shimmered in the sunlight. The sound of the waves crashing could be heard in the distance. You both leaned in towards each other, and Kassandra’s rough hands touched your cheeks ever so gently. She pulled you in for a soft kiss as your fingers traced her forearm. The kiss started slow and gentle but progressively more passionate. Skin to skin, the sound of your lips clashing together. You could taste the leftover wine lingering on her lips. The moment fled so soon, you both pulled away as your eyes slowly opened up once again.
“Kassandra…” You said softly.
Her thumb traced your lips, her eyes attentively watching in admiration.
“May I have you here, all to myself?”
You nodded in agreement, the excitement all too much to bear. Kassandra led you to her bedroom, not once taking her attention away from you. After the two of you stripped, she left you on her bed alone for a moment. The smell of, “Kassandra” filled the room for this was where she got ready every day. The smell of her laundry sheets, the leftover cologne in the air, and the incense that was once lit. Suddenly, you felt her presence behind you and her shadow hovering over you. A dark cloth covered your eyes as she leaned down to whisper in your ear.
“Let this moment be all about you, allow yourself to feel my touch. The outside world is irrelevant, this is our moment.”
Kassandra blindfolded you, her breath was heavy on your neck as she began to place kisses on your neck from behind. Starting with the left side then the right and finally to the back of your neck and slowly down your spine. Her hands massaged your shoulders as she traced her way back up, cupping your face with her hand. Your lips locked and she kissed you graciously, slowly adding tongue as her hands grazed your skin. She began to nibble and kiss your ears, due to your sight being taken away from you, your sensitivity to her touch grew. There was a distinct excitement about not knowing where her touch would go next.
Silence filled the air as her presence moved from behind you to in front of you. Kassandra gently laid you back on the bed, your legs clenched together. The feeling of her hands trickling down your legs causes a whirlwind of emotions to course through your body. The room remained dark to you, all of your trust and all of your power is given to the woman in front of you. You could hear Kassandra moving around you before she began to place soft kisses on the front of your feet and ankles, slowly tracing up your lower legs. Her nose slid against your skin, her breath lingering with every kiss in worship.
“If you want me to stop, just tell me…” She hesitated.
“No, no… please, continue.” You shook your head.
“Lay down and relax…”
You lay on the bed, eagerly waiting to see what comes next. The thought of moving forward and her hands on your body filled you with hot and heavy excitement. Though you couldn’t see her, her presence felt substantial and powerful. You could hear Kassandra taking off her shirt and then undoing her belt, the clothes hitting the floor slowly. She gently hovered atop of you for a moment before you felt her bare legs underneath yours, her hands running up and down your upper thighs. The feeling of her breath hit your skin, she kissed you from your chest to your lower abdomen.
She readjusted herself to get comfortable, on her knees at the bottom of the bed. Before helping you slide your bottoms down, Kassandra wrapped her hands around your waist tightly to pull you forward, bringing you to the edge of the bed. She moved to your knees, parting them as her forearms gripped around your hips for support. A serious look fell upon her face, dark brown eyes filled with intensity. She started to place soft kisses on your inner thighs, tracing your skin with her fingertips.
“Say my name…” She whispered.
“Kassandra…” You said gently, the feeling inside of you growing stronger.
You lay there exposed in front of her, getting more wet with every passing moment. The sight is pleasing to Kassandra as if she’s doing a good job. Her lips met the warm spot between your legs, caressing your clit with her tongue. She started slowly before finding a pace that suited you as you struggled to remain still underneath her. Kassandra touched you perfectly with passion and patience. Her warm slippery tongue continued to flick at perfect speed and rhythm, occasionally coming back to kiss your thighs teasingly.
Her hands traveled along your body, gripping at your breasts and toying with your hard nipples as she pleased you with a fierce look that you couldn’t see. It was as if you could feel her smiling between every moan that you let out, pleased and satisfied with herself at how she made you squirm. You reached down to grip her locks before she firmly adjusted your hands back to the sides of your head, her body lifting and stopping before whispering in your ear.
“I’m in control right now…”
She lifted the blindfold from your eyes, revealing herself to you.
“So you do whatever I say.”
Kassandra sat down on the chair next to her desk before pointing at the mirror in front of her and patting her lap.
“Come, sit in my lap.”
You adjusted yourself and did as she demanded. She watched your every move in the mirror, her eyes darting up and down your body. She adjusted your legs and held you open, her hands gripping the back of your legs. Her large hands left an indent of pressure where her skin met yours. You could see yourself completely vulnerable in the mirror in front of you. Her fingers played with you, revealing how desperately wet you were. Kassandra smirked, a happy glimmer in her eyes. Your eyes darted lower at the sight of her strap between her legs.
“Now touch yourself for me while I watch.”
You were taken back yet excited at the command before you did as she said. There was a look of hunger on Kassandra’s face as you pleased yourself and moaned in front of her, her grip tightening and spreading you even further apart to get a better look. Kassandra’s passion only grew from the sight of you, weak in front of her. She realized the power she held at the moment.
“Just like that. You’re doing such a good job for me. I'm proud of you.” She whispered in your ear.
“Such a good job…” She repeated under her breath. “Let me help you.”
Her hand slid in between your legs as her other kept a good grip on you so you didn't stagger. She gently rubbed you, teasing your clit with the tip of her finger. Kassandra watched you eagerly in the mirror, her horniness begging to be unleashed. She slid a finger inside of you slowly, yet deeply. The slight feeling of her inside you encouraged you. After teasing you with a finger, she slipped the second inside you. You could feel the girth and length of her fingers inside you. Her middle and ring worked inside of you, hitting the perfect spot. Her fingers curled inside you slowly before ramming deeply into you. All focus on your G spot.
Your moans grew louder and heavier, but before you could reach any kind of climax she readjusted you. You turned around, facing towards Kassandra. You sat in her lap with your legs around hers. She adjusted her strap before sticking her girth slowly inside of you, looking in the mirror.
“Ride it.”
Her hands traced your back as you rode her slowly. You began to kiss her neck, her musky scent radiating off her warm body. Kassandra grasped onto the back of your neck to look you deeply in the eyes as you rode her. She pulled you in for a slow, passionate kiss. There was a fire in her eyes that couldn’t be sedated. Kassandra had the best view in town as you bucked up and down on her. She had a strong grip on your ass as she looked deeply into your eyes. The vein in her neck slightly popped out, beckoning to be kissed. Something animalistic began to stir inside the two of you. Kassandra guided your hips atop her as you took every inch that she had to offer. Your moans grew heavier with each motion.
“I want you on your knees and turned around, right now.” Kassandra said in a firm voice.
You readjusted yourself, head down, and ass up in front of the mirror. Before Kassandra continued with you, she took in the sight and basked in how weak you were for her. Still, your body craved more from the Greek goddess. Kassandra kneeled to your now dripping cunt before feasting on you from behind. Each motion of her tongue drove you insane and past the point of no return. She savored your taste, every drop your body gave to her. Her hands gripped onto your skin, a more intense experience at this point. Kassandra wanted to give you the experience of a lifetime, she wanted to bless you.
She stood up on her knees, teasing your entrance. She was in no rush to give it to you quickly as she enjoyed making you beg and plead for more. Her toned body stretched out from behind you to grip your ass. Her girthy piece slid up and down your sopping wet folds like butter.
“Say please.” Kassandra said as she teased you.
“Please, Kassandra. I can't take it!” You moaned eagerly as Kassandra’s lips formed a sly smirk.
“Say my name once more…”
“Kassandra…” Her name escaped your mouth with ease.
Kassandra stuck her tip inside of you slowly, making sure you felt every inch of it before steadily pumping into you with ease. Your hands stood firm on the ground, pushing your body against hers. Kassandra gave you a good spank before wrapping her hands tightly around your waist, pushing her length into your harder and faster this time.
“Such a good girl. Look how pretty you are when you take me.” Kassandra purred, pulling your chin up so you could look at yourself in the mirror.
Her hands traced up your spine to the back of your neck, her hands rested firmly on your shoulders. She pushed you back into her, as deep as she could go. Your moans were loud and heavy at this point as Kass pounded into you, mercilessly. Your heart began to beat fast, your body could barely take it anymore. You couldn’t help but close your eyes from the sensation being felt, a firm slap on your cheek caused you to snap out of it immediately.
“Up, look up at me.” Kassandra said with ease, in a stern voice.
She started pounding into you with almost superhuman speed, locking eyes. She grabbed your arms and pulled them behind your back, pinning them down. You could see the drops of sweat on her body and the muscles in her arms tensing. She made love to you like it was art, sensually and rough at the same time. Kassandra had one goal in mind: To get you off.
“Cum for me, baby.” She said, one knee bent over to the side of you for maximum penetration.
The outline of her toned legs could be seen in the mirror's reflection. Kassandra’s breathing grew heavy as she was fighting for air at this point, a drop of sweat coming down from her forehead. Your muscles began to clench as your body released every bit of ecstasy you had left inside you. Your moans were delayed and your body relaxed as you made a mess on her. You collapsed and turned over on your back, letting your breathing return to normal.
Kassandra removed her strap and placed it to the side before towering over your face, legs beside your shoulders. Kassandra looked heavenly above you, her stance was particularly fierce and strong. Your hands ran along her thighs, both of your bodies in agreement with each other. You teased her around her clit with your tongue, as if knocking before entering. Kassandra threw her head back and let out a deep sigh, her hands resting on her hips.
“Relax…” You assured her.
“Are you sure?”
“Kassandra, I want you to smother me.”
You nodded underneath her, letting out a, “Yes.” before she rested all her weight on top of you. You continued to flick her clitoris with your tongue until you found the perfect speed for her. Kassandra’s eyes close for a moment as she gets caught up in the heat of the moment. A smile spreads across her face, pleased with you. She lets out a deep moan as she rides your face, looking down at you as you eat her out.
“You’re so good at that… Fuck.”
Kassandra sits on your face with all her weight, you can hardly breathe. You become enveloped in the scent of her and the pleasure that you give to her. Your heart grows heavy as she moans deeper and louder, your name escapes her mouth repeatedly. Her eyes roll back before she drops her head down, biting her lip and getting another good look at you. She grinds and bucks, using your tongue to get off.
“I don't know how much longer I can last if you keep doing that.” Kassandra says, nearly out of breath.
You keep pleasing her just as she likes.
“Cum for me, I know you can do it.”
Kassandra lets out a deep moan, her bucking intensifying. You like how she uses you like a toy, focusing on cumming. Your heart skips a beat watching your lover ride your face. Kassandra becomes so overwhelmed and excited by your touch, she loses herself for a few moments before climaxing. You savor the salty-sweet taste of her on your tongue.
“Fuck…” Kassandra whimpers before collapsing on the bed.
She reaches over to the side table of the bed before sitting up, pouring you and herself a glass of wine. You rest your head on her chest and entangle your legs with hers. You can hear her heartbeat slowing down, the air growing more calm by the second. Kassandra hands you a glass of wine before proposing a cheers.
“To us…” Kassandra whispers with a sweet smirk on her face, afterwards giving you a kiss on the forehead.
Behind me, the club exhaled. Bass flowed up through the floor as a steady pulse. Laughter lifted, strained, then softened—people practicing pleasure at the volume the place required. A server stepped around me with the stealth of a cat, tray balanced like a mirror catching fragments of starlight. I tipped my glass and discovered there was nothing left to discover at the bottom.
I wasn’t hiding. I told myself that, at least. I was just orbiting the edge of other people’s gravity, letting the room’s demands slide past me. I belonged to the city the way a secret belongs to a locked drawer—part of it and not of it, present and deliberately out of reach.
The doors hissed open behind me. Silence didn’t fall, exactly, but the room adjusted itself the way a throat adjusts for a low note. I didn’t look—habit, caution, some old superstition that said if I pretended indifference the night would drift past me without collecting anything I couldn’t afford to owe.
“Still hiding on the edges?” the voice asked, velvet-lined and amused.
I felt the answer before I heard it: the muscles at the back of my neck remembering the shape of attention, the thin, bright edge of adrenaline that arrives when you’ve been seen by exactly the person who means to do something about it.
I turned.
Kassandra never really arrived anywhere. She took possession. It wasn’t the outfit—though the black shirt, open just enough, fit her like trouble written in an expensive hand; it wasn’t the jacket, a knife of tailoring that knew where to love her shoulders, where to relent. It wasn’t even the way she stood—loose at the hips, balanced as if the ground itself tried to adjust to her weight. It was simply that if the night had a mouth, it would have said her name to find out how it felt.
“You found me,” I said, and it was almost steady.
“I looked,” she said, the smile slow and unbothered. “The city kept offering me imitations. I declined.”
She didn’t reach for me. She leaned on the railing a careful distance away, enough air between us to pass for manners. A strand of hair had slipped from behind her ear; the wind tried to claim it and failed. The earrings were simple—gold, no apology. She smelled faintly of cedar and something sweeter I couldn’t name.
I let my gaze drop to the street, where taxis flowed like fish under lit bridges. It didn’t help. My awareness recalibrated around her anyway, measuring the shared silence, the crooked angle of her wrist against the chrome, the way she didn’t fill spaces so much as lend them her weight until they learned something about themselves.
“You disappeared,” I said, aiming for casual and landing somewhere near accusation softened by a laugh.
“Work.” She didn’t dress the word up. “And the kind of rest that requires a different sky.”
“Your rest looks like jet lag and a knife tucked under a pillow.”
“Only sometimes.” She tipped her head, eyes glinting. “Your rest looks like pretending to dislike a party until you can get outside and flirt with the skyline instead.”
I felt my mouth curve and let it. “The skyline flirts better than most people.”
“I’m offended.”
“You don’t miss.”
She looked pleased at that, but she didn’t close the distance the compliment opened. A server appeared with two glasses, as if summoned by the rhythm of our conversation. Kassandra didn’t ask—she nodded once, low-voiced thanks, then pushed one toward me, stem steady between her fingers.
“Let me guess,” I said, taking the glass. “Something that pretends to be gentle until it isn’t.”
“Something that tells the truth,” she said, tapping her rim lightly to mine. “To the night.”
“To not being found until we mean to be,” I offered, and drank.
The champagne was colder than the air and brighter than the city, tiny suns breaking on my tongue. Kassandra watched me watch the city. I watched her watch me. The music shifted—someone downstairs had decided the evening was now a little more expensive.
“You came up here to think,” she said. “Or to not think.”
“Which would you recommend?”
“Both have hazards.” The corner of her mouth lifted. “Thinking too much, and you’ll come to conclusions you don’t enjoy. Not thinking at all, and you might wind up saying something true in a room full of professional liars.”
“You’re calling everyone here a liar?”
“I’m including myself,” she said, almost gentle. “I’m simply very good at it.”
“And tonight?”
“Tonight,” she considered, rolling the stem between thumb and forefinger, “I thought I’d try honesty in small doses.”
Wind caught the hem of my jacket again. I set the glass down on the railing, feeling the faint tremor of the bass travel through steel into my fingertips. Inside, the doors breathed open and shut, open and shut; the club was a lung.
“What does honesty taste like in small doses?” I asked.
“Electric,” she said. “Like a storm announcing itself on your tongue.”
“You’re mixing metaphors.”
“I prefer to mix people,” she said, then laughed at herself. “Forgive me. I haven’t slept.”
“Yet you look like a weapon someone polished for the occasion.”
The look she gave me was not surprise and not triumph. It was something quieter—an admission she’d been waiting for me to say exactly that, and now that I had, the night fit better on its bones.
“Come inside,” she said. “Or the skyline will think you love it more than me.”
“I didn’t realize we were keeping score.”
“We’re always keeping score,” she said, and tipped her head toward the doors. “We just pretend it’s dancing.”
We crossed the threshold together. Heat touched my face; the club’s scent enveloped us in layers: oud, cardamom, expensive restraint. The room was built to be seen in—the kind of lighting that forgives and flatters, the dark velvet of booths where people leaned too close to be mistaken for anything but a conspiracy.
Kassandra didn’t touch me. She did something worse. She walked half a pace ahead, then to the side, an orbit that invited and denied at once. When the crowd pressed, her shoulder brushed mine by necessity and not by chance, and the consequent electric flicker across my skin took all the air and set it back differently.
We took a corner table that put the room at an angle: enough to watch without being watched, enough to be approached without being crowded. A candle burned between us. I watched the light climb the curve of her glass as if it hunted a throat.
“Tell me about your day,” she said, a command disguised as curiosity. “Tell me what you ate. Tell me the most boring thing first and the most dangerous thing last.”
“Boring,” I said, feeling the smile tug. “Emails. A walk that turned into an argument with a crosswalk that refused to grant me right-of-way.”
“And who won?”
“I jaywalked.”
“An outlaw,” she said, mock-reverent.
“Dangerous,” I continued. “Booking a last-minute flight to be here.”
Her eyes warmed. “For the party?”
“For the possibility.” I let my finger coast around the lip of my glass, the thin rings that sound makes singing lightly. “Your turn. Boring first.”
“I bought socks,” she said without hesitation, smirking at my surprised snort. “All of mine live in different cities. It’s becoming a problem.”
“And dangerous?”
“I opened a message that wasn’t meant for me,” she said, voice cooling a degree. “Then decided it was meant for me anyway.”
“Fortune favors the… intrusive?”
She tilted her head. “Fortune favors the prepared.”
“Are you prepared for tonight?”
She didn’t look away. “Yes.”
The music downshifted, a subtle rearrangement that made conversation feel like a privilege won rather than a thing the room simply offered. People laughed at a pitch that suggested they wanted witnesses to their happiness. I fought the impulse to fidget with my napkin, and lost.
Kassandra pretended not to see the way my fingers kept finding a fold that didn’t need straightening. She propped her chin on her hand and listened the way very few people do—as if quiet had finally found a task worthy of it.
“Why here?” I asked. “Why this city?”
“It doesn’t sleep,” she said. “And when I can’t sleep, I like being among things that justify it.”
“You could have chosen any skyline.”
“I chose you,” she said, and took a sip without blinking.
I swallowed amused annoyance that she could still do that—gently unholster a sentence, fire it at will, and clean the barrel on my silence. “You made it sound as if you tracked me like a comet.”
“I tracked you like a streetlight,” she said. “Reliable. Necessary. The kind of thing I take for granted until I’m in a place that forgot to install any.”
“Flattering.”
“Honest in small doses,” she reminded me.
A couple slipped past our table—too much perfume, too much laughter. Kassandra sat back, letting them pass. The movement reconfigured shadow along her collarbone. I felt my gaze go there and hauled it back, aware of my own betrayal.
She smiled as if catching a coin I’d thrown without thinking. “Dance?”
“I don’t,” I said, reflexive, immediate.
“You do,” she corrected. “You dance in elevators when you think no one can see you. You dance at crosswalks when you’re cold. You dance when you’re alone in a room with too much good news in it and no one to hand it to.”
“I… find it suspicious that you’ve been auditing my joy.”
“I audit my own,” she said, standing. “Come on. I’ll behave.”
“You never behave.”
“I behave exactly as much as the night deserves,” she said, offering a hand.
I looked at it—rings catching candlelight, knuckles nicked by some old life. I took it. Warmth traveled up my arm like a secret I hadn’t meant to tell.
We threaded the room. The dance floor wasn’t a floor so much as a soft swell of bodies marking time together. Light made slow circuits, plating faces in gold and then letting them go. Kassandra found a corner that wasn’t a corner—an invisible boundary where we could move without being touched by anyone else’s insistence on being noticed.
“I’ll lead,” she said, and softened it with a question: “May I?”
I nodded, already knowing I would agree to more than this before the night was out.
She didn’t pull. She invited—hands at a distance that allowed refusal, eyes that promised to accept it if I offered. I stepped forward. We found a rhythm built on the city’s pulse and our shared stubbornness. I was acutely aware of every point where we didn’t touch. It created a map of heat in the air between us.
“You’re not counting,” she murmured.
“Should I be?”
“Not if you trust me.”
“I haven’t decided.”
“Decide slowly,” she said, and turned me with the kind of care that felt like a kept secret.
The song melted into another, then another. Sweat gathered at the base of my neck, and Kassandra’s gaze followed one bead of it as it slid under the collar of my shirt. I felt the sway in my knees that comes when a night finally succeeds in persuading a body to belong to it.
“You’re staring,” I said, because I needed to throw a word between us like a rope.
“I’m learning,” she said.
“What?”
“How you look when you’re not guarding anything.”
“I’m always guarding something.”
“Not right now,” she said, a little wonderingly, as if the night had done some work on my behalf and she had to admit it.
Someone brushed my shoulder. Kassandra tightened the air between us by one inch. It wasn’t possessive. It was territorial on behalf of safety. I didn’t mind being someone’s kept territory if the keeper knew the difference between ownership and care. Kassandra did. She always had.
The music softened into a track meant for conversations that could be heard in the space of a hand span. She stepped closer—still no contact, but the implication threaded through both of us. I could smell her again: cedar, heat, the faint shock of something cold from the terrace still clinging to her clothes.
“I missed you,” she said, quieter than the bass could carry.
“You didn’t say so.”
“I’m saying so.”
“You’re late.”
“I am.” She didn’t look away. “Will you let me be?”
“For how long?”
“As long as the night holds its breath,” she said, a smile tugging, “and the morning agrees to wait outside.”
“You’re bargaining with time.”
“Only with ours.”
I realized I had stopped pretending not to stare. It wasn’t that she was beautiful—though she was, indisputably. It was that beautiful things stood closer to her to see whether the word applied to them, too.
The song concluded itself; we let it. Kassandra cut us a path back to our table, hand at my lower back without quite making contact, a phantom touch that felt more intimate than anything else she could have chosen. When we sat, she reached for the candle and moved it three inches to the left to improve the light on my face, and I decided I would think about that for a week.
“Tell me something you shouldn’t,” she said, voice back to that slow velvet that made lies feel overdressed.
“I keep a postcard in my wallet from a place I’ve never been,” I said, surprising myself. “I bought it because the photograph made me feel like a future I hadn’t earned yet.”
“Where?”
“A coastline with cliffs like broken teeth. A sky that looks newly invented.”
“Let’s go,” she said immediately.
“Now?”
“Now is a kind of honesty.”
“I have work. A plant I’ve finally convinced not to abandon me. Friends who would stage interventions if I disappeared without a text.”
“I’ll write your text,” she said, deadpan. “‘Borrowing your friend. Back when the cliffs agree to give them up.’”
“You’re reckless.”
“I’m precise,” she corrected gently. “Which often passes for reckless when you’re looking from a safe distance.”
“You think there’s a safe distance here?”
“I think there’s courtesy,” she said. “And I’m trying it out.”
Her phone chimed—a low, private sound barely audible in the pause between tracks. She glanced down, thumbed the screen without apology, and put it away.
“Urgent?” I asked.
“Less urgent than this.” She gestured infinitesimally: the candle, the table, the wedge of night we’d carved.
“I don’t know what ‘this’ is,” I said, honest enough to sting.
“It’s a place,” she answered. “Like your postcard. We can live in it for as long as we behave.”
“I thought you didn’t.”
“I behave when the reward is worth it.” The smile flickered. “Stay with me tonight. Just the night. We’ll walk. We’ll eat something too late. You can tell me I’m wrong about everything, and I’ll pretend to learn.”
“You don’t pretend.”
“I pretend constantly,” she countered, amused. “I just choose my audience.”
I should have said no. I should have said later. I should have said anything except “Okay,” which is what I said.
We left the club through a side exit meant for deliveries and people who wanted out of a room without announcing it. The corridor smelled like lemons and cold metal. A security light flickered, unsure whether we were worth the electricity. Kassandra let me pass and followed, the soft thud of her boots a metronome my breath pretended not to need.
Outside, the city lowered its voice. We walked the long block without touching, shoulders aligning, pace finding itself without negotiation. At the corner, a bakery slept behind glass, trays of tomorrow waiting like promises that didn’t require trust, only morning.
“Hungry?” she asked.
“Always.”
We found a place still serving—nothing lavish, nothing designed for photographs. A narrow bar. A patient bartender. Two plates slid toward us: olives and something warm with garlic and good oil. Kassandra picked up a toothpick and speared an olive like she was daring it to disagree with her. I watched her mouth without meaning to and pretended to evaluate the wine.
“This is the part I like,” she said.
“Olives?”
“The intermission,” she said. “Where nothing dramatic happens and everything important does.”
“Like what?”
“Like you deciding whether to laugh at me for ordering a second plate of bread. Like me deciding whether to tell you why I can’t sleep when the wind sounds like an airplane.”
“You just did.”
“Small doses,” she said, and did not ask for praise.
We ate. We didn’t rush. People came and went; the bartender wiped the same square of counter with meditative dedication. Kassandra told me a story about a taxi driver who recited poetry in traffic jams. I told her about a neighbor who grew tomatoes on a balcony that never saw direct sun and called the harvest a victory anyway. She laughed—real, unguarded—and the sound settled at the base of my spine and locked the door.
When we stepped back onto the street, the night had turned tender. Rain had come and gone, leaving the asphalt dark and willing. We walked toward the harbor without agreement. The air tasted like promises I’d promised myself not to make.
“Where are you staying?” I asked.
She named a hotel and I almost laughed—not for the luxury, which didn’t surprise me, but for the exactness of it. The place had a lobby that believed in silence and a view that believed in forgiveness. Of course she’d chosen it.
We stopped at the edge of the water. Boats shifted, ropes humming softly. Wind tugged at our clothes in different directions and gave up.
“Do you want to say goodnight here?” she asked, no pressure in it.
“Do you?”
“No,” she said. “But I will if you want me to.”
“I don’t,” I said, and felt in my chest the small, stubborn satisfaction of telling the truth.
We walked again. The hotel’s doors parted and let us into a world that smelled like lilies and money. The elevator mirrored us back—twice, three times—until we looked like a small crowd. Kassandra pressed the button with her knuckle, a courtesy she extended to every object with a reflective surface. The ride was short. I felt each floor separate us from the city’s noise and deliver us to something not quieter but more honest.
The hallway was the kind that doesn’t bother with artwork. The door took the keycard with a soft electronic sigh. Kassandra held it open, and I stepped inside first only because she insisted with a tilt of her head that somehow looked like respect.
The room did what rooms in such places do: it pretended to be simple and expensive at the same time. Floor-to-ceiling glass opened onto the city—lights like constellations someone had poured and left to settle. A bottle of water sat on a tray with two heavy glasses and no note. The bed was too white.
“We won’t do anything you don’t want,” she said immediately, as if I might have mistaken the invitation for anything else. “We don’t have to do anything at all. We can just watch the city be a city and make fun of the people who staged their throw pillows to impress their neighbors.”
“You’re good at this,” I said.
“At what?”
“Making chaos look like courtesy.”
She laughed softly. “I promise you, this is courtesy.”
We didn’t take off our shoes. We didn’t sit on the bed. We stood at the window and let the night do its work. At some point she handed me a glass of water and I drank half of it without tasting anything but the relief of having something to do with my hands.
“Tomorrow,” she said, “I’ll send you the postcard.”
“What postcard?”
“The cliffs,” she said. “The sky that looks newly invented. I’ll find them. I’m good at that.”
“You’re insufferable.”
“Not disagreeing.”
We stood long enough that the window collected a faint fog where our breath touched it. Kassandra lifted a knuckle and drew a small line through it, a horizon, then erased it with the heel of her hand, gentle, as if apologizing to the glass.
“Will you let me see you again?” she asked, and there it was—no game, no smirk, just a question built on the infrastructure of everything we hadn’t done and everything we had.
“Yes,” I said, and heard myself believe it.
She nodded once, slow, accepting without triumph. “Then I’ll walk you downstairs.”
“You’re not going to argue?”
“I’m going to respect the part of the night that knows its own ending,” she said. “And trust that it has an appetite tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow is greedy,” I said.
“Good,” she answered. “So am I.”
We rode the elevator down. The lobby dared us to make noise; we refused. Outside, the doorman raised a hand and hailed a taxi as if we’d asked him to. Kassandra touched my elbow only to guide me around a puddle that didn’t need guiding. It still mattered.
At the curb, we faced each other like people on opposite banks of the same river. Rain began again somewhere beyond our shoulders and slowly crossed the street to join us.
“Small doses?” I asked.
“As prescribed,” she said.
She didn’t kiss me. She didn’t even reach for my hand. She took one step closer and let her breath touch my cheek, barely, the way a promise touches the future—lightly, carefully, with enough pressure to leave a mark on the morning.
“Goodnight,” she said, and the word felt like a key I hadn’t realized I’d been carrying.
“Goodnight,” I said back, and climbed into the taxi before I could decide to be foolish.
As the car pulled away, I looked back. Kassandra stood where I’d left her—hands in her pockets, head tilted, the city making jewelry of the rain around her. When the light changed, when traffic finally insisted, she lifted two fingers in a lazy farewell that landed with the weight of a vow.
I leaned my head against the cool glass and watched the club’s rooftop slide past, its little garden still burning in electric green, the night continuing without us. My phone buzzed in my pocket. I didn’t look. I wanted to keep the night exactly as it was for one more block.
At the next red light, I gave in. The message was a photograph—blurry, close, a candle caught mid-flicker, the edge of a glass, the shadow of a hand not quite touching the table. Beneath it, no words. None needed.
I sent back a picture of the taxi’s ceiling light, haloed and absurd, and typed: Small doses.
The dots appeared, disappeared, returned. Tomorrow, she wrote.
I put the phone face down and let the city carry me. Somewhere above the river, a plane banked, its lights sweeping the edges of the clouds like a hand parting curtains. I imagined cliffs. I imagined a sky new enough to be worth our first argument and our second apology. I imagined Kassandra laughing with her head tipped back the way she had when I said the skyline flirted better than most people.
The taxi slid into the street where my hotel waited, humble, soft-lit, unambitious. I paid, stepped out, lifted my face into the thin rain like a plant relearning its job. In the lobby, a sleepy clerk looked up and decided not to comment. In the elevator, my reflection did not attempt to talk me out of anything.
In my room, I set the phone on the bedside table and watched it until it decided to behave. I didn’t undress. I didn’t put on music. I stood by the window and looked at a slice of city too small to claim anything and too bright to ignore.
I thought about courtesy and chaos and postcards and the exact pitch of her voice when she said my name, gentle like an apology, precise like a blade. I thought about small doses of honesty, about how they tasted like a storm far away and a storm coming closer, and the strange relief of not running for cover.
When the phone buzzed again, I let it. I knew what it would say even before I picked it up.
Sleep, the message read. I’ll handle the horizon.
I smiled at the glass until the glass smiled back in a dull, obedient way, then turned off the light. The city kept glittering without me. It could. I closed my eyes and—against all habit, against the weight of a past that liked to anchor itself to my ribs—slept.
I’m posting to let you know I have created my very own Eivor character ai bot. She seems to be running pretty well, click here to test the Eivor bot out.
(the bot still needs to be trained so some replies may be off, the more people that chat with it the more accurate it can be. swipe right on a message to generate a new one from the ai. be sure to rate the replies 1-4 stars depending on how good the replies are!)
I also have a Kassandra bot! Click here. I’m very impressed with how she’s turning out!
Happy chatting, hope you enjoy and much love! 💓
Update: I have made a new playlist to listen to while chatting, here!