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"So I'm with Nicholas," Skye started. "He's... okay. We've known each other since high school, and sometimes it felt like he never really got to know who I was now, y'know? And Michael's also in our friend group, but he's... hot. Like, he says he's a finance guy, but you can't tell me he's not modeling on the side, y'know?

"And Nick and Mike have this rivalry thing going, usually petty stuff like the Bills versus the Giants, but sometimes it gets a little heated since Mike's in finance and Nick's in construction. Nick never takes the bait 'cause he's like that.

"So one day Mike comes to me and is all 'Hey, girl, I know you want this D. If you can get me Nick's bid for this... development in midtown, we can totally be together.'"

Skye tapped the side of a coaster on the table. "So I did it," she said with a sigh. "Pretty sure I cost Nick that project, because suddenly another company underbid him.

"I'm sure Nick knew," Skye scoffed. "I didn't exactly cover my tracks, but he wasn't going to accuse me of it. Didn't need to, actually, since Mike bragged about it last weekend. I had already packed my stuff, so I just went to Mike's instead of Nick's that night—or at least, that was what I thought was going to happen.

"I knock on Mike's door, and he doesn't answer. I knock again, and I hear him turn more locks—like, he's locking me out harder. And he texts me and says he can't be with the kind of person that will leak secrets like that."

Skye took a sip from her gin and tonic. "So here I am," she spat. "One burned bridge behind me, one burned bridge in front of me, staying at an Airbnb until I can figure out what's next." She set her drink down with a thud. "Went for the happy ending and lost everything."

Glenn nodded and set his own drink down. "If Mike hadn't locked you out," he said, "would you think it was worth it?"

"Depends on how good Mike is in bed," Skye said with a cheeky grin before her face fell. "No," she said quietly, "no, I saw the look on Nick's face. He didn't deserve that."

Glenn nodded with a ghost of a smile. "Did you apologize to Nick?"

Skye shook her head. "What good would it do?"

Glenn shrugged. "Sometimes," he said, "it helps just to know that the people that wronged us know that it was wrong."

Before the conversation could continue, a tall blonde woman came and leaned against the table next to Glenn. "Hey, Glenn," she said with a vibrant smile, "didn't know you were here already." She motioned toward Skye with her head. "Who's this?"

Glenn blinked slowly before motioning with his hand. "Skye, meet Cecily; Cecily, this is Skye." He thought for a moment before adding, "She needed someone to talk to, and I was willing to listen."

Skye started to get up. "I should probably—"

"No, stay," Glenn said quickly with a forced smile. "Cecily was just letting me know that I have some friends here—" He turned to Cecily. "And I'll go say 'hi' to them in a minute."

Cecily's smile strained, just a little bit. "Okay," she said, and turned to walk away.

Skye just looked from Glenn, who sighed and shook his head, to Cecily, who turned back to Skye with a poisonous glare.

Skye flinched and looked down at her drink. "That your girlfriend?" she muttered.

"No," Glenn said firmly.

Skye smirked and looked back at Glenn. "Why not? She's pretty hot."

Glenn gave a wry grin. "Did she give you a look behind my back?"

Skye nodded slightly.

Glenn closed his eyes. "That's why."

Skye winced and nodded.

They sat in an easy silence for a moment before Skye broke it.

"What if I apologize and it makes things worse?" she said quietly.

Glenn thought for a moment. "Do you want to apologize?"

"Yeah," Skye said. "He didn't deserve what I did to him."

"Then just tell him that," Glenn said. "No expectations, no demands. You're not asking him to forgive you."

"He shouldn't forgive me."

"Eh," Glenn said, "Forgiveness isn't necessarily reconciliation. At least, not how I understand it."

"But like," Skye shook her head. "What if he doesn't even want to see me?"

Glenn opened his mouth, said nothing, and closed it. "That's a good point," he said. "Probably just text, email..." He shrugged. "Send him a letter. The point is he can read it when he's ready.

"What I want to know is," he continued, "what are you going to do next?"

Skye shrugged. "I've got this Airbnb for another week, and then..." She looked down at the table. "Probably going to move out of town."

Glenn furrowed his brow. "What about your job?"

"It's remote," Skye said. "I just like it in the big city. Or, I did..." She laughed to herself. "Not saying I'm going to go full 'Hallmark Movie' and move to some small town somewhere so some handsome lumberjack can sweep me off my feet." She took a drink. "But I've got some old college friends up on the coast of Maine; probably give them a call."

Glenn nodded. "Give yourself a reset?"

Skye sighed and smiled, and it actually reached her eyes. "I hope so," she said.

---

Skye was a block away from the bar when she heard someone running up behind her. She turned around to see Cecily jogging up, her blonde hair unfurled behind her as she ran.

"Hey," she said, not out of breath in the slightest, "I think we got off on the wrong foot."

Skye smiled uneasily. "Maybe," she demurred.

Cecily just smiled and handed Skye a small bottle. "Glenn said you were having a hard time; this is the stuff I use to relax."

Skye took the bottle and looked over it. "'Wild Ocean Foam Bath'?"

"It's like a bath bomb that won't clog your drain," Cecily said. "Just... give it a shot. I always feel so much better after I use it."

Skye smiled widely. "Thanks, Cecily," she said. "I..." She trailed off and just kept smiling. "Thanks."

Cecily smiled and started walking away. "Just wanted to help take care of you!"

---

Skye unceremoniously dropped her purse on the couch and took another look at the bottle. A handwritten note was attached to the neck with a pale blue ribbon:

Stay positive! —Cecily

"Honestly," she muttered to herself, "a bath sounds good right about now."

It helped that the Airbnb had a claw-foot tub. Skye double-checked the instructions and poured the contents in as the water started filling the tub. She left to change out of her clothes, and by the time she came back the bubbles were reaching the lip of the tub. With a smile, she turned off the water, stripped out of her underwear, and gingerly stepped in.

It was as she was almost done lowering herself—one hand on each side of the tub—that she slipped. At least, that was what it felt like.

Thankfully her instincts had her grip harder. She felt her butt against the inclined back of the tub, but it wasn't supporting any weight. She was about to chalk it up to the bubble bath making things slippery when the burning started.

"The hell?" she breathed as she doubled the tension in her arms to keep more of her out of the water. She felt the water just above her hips and below her naval, and everything under the water was starting to burn. Not quite painfully, but on the level of a really bad rash.

Skye tried to climb back out of the tub, but her legs weren't responding. She felt... strange sensations coming from them, with attempts to move them causing them to bend in impossible ways.

She felt her arms ache. She refused to let any more of her touch the water.

The bath bubbles still completely obscured the water. She tried to move her legs back and forth, or even brush them against each other, but she still couldn't understand the sensations, and it just made the water more turbulent. Finally, in frustration, she tried to lift a leg out of the water. She felt it move, felt it breach the surface—

And a slimy, dark-purple tentacle rose out of the bubbles.

Skye screamed and tried to back away, and the tentacle fell back beneath the surface.

She felt it fall back beneath the surface.

"The fuck?" she yelled. In a mix of panic and morbid curiosity, she tried it again, this time with both legs.

Three tentacles rose from the water, and she could feel more beneath the surface.

"Okay," she breathed, "so I'm an octopus-mermaid now?" She shook her head and fought the burning ache in her arms. "I have got to get out."

With a better idea of her lower anatomy, she tried to get enough grip to push herself out of the tub, but nothing worked. She could attach to the bottom and sides of the tub, but her tentacles were made for pulling, not pushing.

"Well, fuck you too!" she snarled. "Plan F, then!"

She reached and felt as far to the other side as she could, blindly groping for the drain stopper. She felt the burning beneath the water intensify, but she chalked that up to her exertion—

Until the burning went past pain and into agony, focused around her hips. Like something was incinerating the inside of her body and forcing its way out. Skye closed her eyes, grit her teeth, and screamed, doing everything she could to just keep the rest of her above the water.

The pain shot up her spine, making her arms finally give out and sending her completely under the water. Tainted water shot up her nose and leaked into her mouth around her scream. In panic she wrenched her torso upright and lunged for the drain, finally pulling the plug out.

"Mother... fucking... fuckers," she coughed, her voice hoarse. The pain was still there, but she could feel the water draining. Still fumbling blindly, she managed to turn the shower on in the hopes of rinsing off whatever would be left of the bubble bath.

Whatever was inside of her was coming out. She gingerly worked herself back into position at the far end of the tub so she could lean against the back. She flung her arms out over the sides, no longer worried about being submerged; the worst had already happened.

The white-hot pain seared against her hips and threatened to split her head open. She tried to scream, but there was still enough water in her sinuses that she could only squeeze her eyes shut and cough fruitlessly instead.

Until finally, with one final snap of tension and pain, she felt something emerge. It came out in a rush; she felt the new limbs as they snaked out of her, along the sides of the tub and out into the bathroom where they curled around the toilet, the vanity, against the walls and door. One found its way across the top of the towel rack.

And with that, the burning stopped, and Skye felt her body settle into place.

For several minutes, she didn't do anything but let the shower continue to rinse her off. She leaned forward slightly to get her hair and face. She made a few token efforts at figuring out what the new limbs were, but they made even less sense than the tentacles.

With a sigh, she opened her eyes.

And saw everything.

At first she wasn't sure what to make of it. She saw over her chest to the rest of the tub and the new scaled appendages extending from her hips like a horrific skirt.

She also saw herself from above. And the side. And a slightly different side. And from the towel rack and the door.

And she saw the back of the toilet from below.

She looked scared. Pitiful. Part of her didn't identify with that black-haired figure staring into space.

She flicked her right hand and saw it move. It was on the opposite side she was used to. A blink, and she realized it was because she wasn't looking in the mirror.

With a sigh, she looked up.

Hanging limply over the shower curtain rod was a... neck? It was covered in green iridescent scales like a fish and ended with a head somewhere between an eel and a dog: it had a black nose (or at least black scales on its muzzle) and no ears, though there were a pair of frills that pointed back.

And she made eye contact with it. With herself.

She blinked. And everything blinked.

She stared back at the head and started shifting her new appendages. On the third try she saw the head's neck shift.

She blinked again, and this time consciously kept it to her original head.

And she watched herself blink from five different angles.

"Holy fuck," she muttered. She shifted herself and noted that her tentacles—her tentacles?!—were feeling dry. In a daze, she turned off the shower and started filling the tub again.

The water was clear, thankfully, and she tried to ignore just how good it felt as it rose.

A couple of the other necks started to cramp. She looked through one of them and, with no grace at all, managed to get it to open the door. With a stretch that felt better than it had any right to, she got three of her heads out into the bedroom, one looking out the window into the night.

The head above her was starting to cramp as well, and she brought it down and hugged it to her chest.

She reached up with a tentacle and fumbled enough to turn the water off.

The head under the toilet caught a glimpse of the bottle, though the note didn't look quite right. Skye shifted each neck until she found the right nerves and moved the head closer. The note was at the wrong angle to read, and it looked like the ink was starting to run. After two more attempts at looking, Skye finally just grabbed the bottle in her mouth and brought it back to the human part of her body.

The label hadn't changed, but the note was definitely different:

Stay away from Glenn! —Cecily

Skye angrily flung the bottle away from her; it clattered somewhere in the corner of the bathroom. "Fucking bitch," she snarled, her voice cracking.

The head she had been holding had pulled away slightly, and she took the opportunity to really look at herself. From the waist up she looked... normal. Same tummy, same shoulders, but her boobs had switched side—wait, no, that's the mirror again. Even her face and ears were untouched, apart from just how ragged she looked.

Because she'd just been put through hell. And emerged a monster.

She saw her face scrunch up, and she pulled the head back into a hug so she wouldn't have to watch herself cry.

---

Skye was woken from her fitful sleep by a strong gust of wind rattling the old building. She opened her eyes just enough to see that it was light out, threw an arm over her eyes and settled back down.

There was a tap on a window.

She focused on her breathing, now with seven heads to breathe with.

There were two taps on the window.

She shifted her human neck, her torso, and on down each elongated neck.

Someone tapped "Shave And a Haircut" on the window.

She opened her eyes. All seven pairs. The bathroom hadn't changed. Most of her bedroom hadn't. But she saw, with the head closest to the window, a grey fox with three tails and a brown messenger bag floating outside.

It made eye contact with her and waved.

She cocked the head.

The fox smiled sheepishly. "Do you need help?" it said, its voice muffled by the window.

---

"...so that's the story," Skye finished with a shrug as she slumped back into the now-drained bathtub. She shifted a bit and adjusted her shirt down so it covered her naval.

The fox—who had introduced themself as Ronyo—took a closer look at the almost-empty bottle, the note still attached. "So," they said, "in an effort to 'protect' a man that isn't hers from a 'betrayer,' a woman turns said 'betrayer'—can you hear the scare quotes?—into a sea monster." They sighed. "History rhymes, even when it isn't history."

They turned to look Skye in the eye. "First question," they said, "do you want to go back to being human? Be honest," they added, holding up a paw-hand and wiggling their claws, "I'm definitely not going to judge."

Skye forced herself to consider her answer. "Yes," she said finally, "at least for a little while. Long enough to get out of here at least!"

"Getting you out of here is easy," Ronyo said with a wave of their hand. "If it's a matter of circumstances, I can find you options. The world is a lot more wild than most people realize. What I'm asking is..." They closed their eyes and searched for the right words. "What do you want to be? Do you want to be a human? Do you want to stay as this? Do you want something in-between?"

Skye bit her lip. She looked at the head that was curled up in the bathroom and looked back herself through it. Felt the edges of the bathtub with her tentacles, ran her hand past the bottom of her shirt to feel her scales.

"I don't want to give up everything about being human," she said. "But there's something about this..." She groaned. "I don't know," she said with a huff, crossed her arms over her chest, and sunk down.

"That's okay," Ronyo said gently. "I'll run some tests on this—" They shook the potion bottle. "—and see what options I can get you. Can I borrow your kitchen counter?"

Skye watched them leave, then turned her attention back to herself. Now, in the light of day and after a... sleep, she wasn't as monstrous as she had felt. She looked at one of the eel-dog heads and...

On a whim, she opened its eyes wide and looked at herself. "Yeah," she muttered, "those are puppy-dog eyes, alright." She scratched the head under the chin; it felt better than she wanted to admit.

The scales flowed from the head back to her. She felt where the neck met her hips and confirmed it. The skin around it was more slimy, continuing up to just under her naval. She lifted a tentacle closer; it felt the same. And it felt dry.

"Sheesh," Skye said. "Can't stay out of water for more than five minutes, can I?" Without thinking she moved two tentacles to the water controls and started the bath again.

She stared at the running bath with two sets of eyes. "I'm getting good at this," she said with a smile.

That smile fell when she caught a glimpse of her torso... and the t-shirt that was on it.

"Knew I should have gotten the bikini when it was on sale," Skye grumbled as she peeled off the shirt and tossed it behind her. She felt where her skin transitioned from human to... sea-creature? It was an almost perfect ring around her: slightly lower in front and slightly higher behind, coming to the small of her back.

She reached lower, feeling two of her tentacles between her fingers. She wrapped them around her arm, felt the suckers gently attach, tickled the sensitive skin between them. Feeling morbidly curious, she felt underneath the webbing between her tentacles and closer to her core. It was sensitive, that was for sure, but nothing—

She brushed a particularly sensitive area and pulled her hand back. She glanced around the bathroom; it was still empty. Still, she could feel her blush, despite the cool water that was still rising.

She saw that the fox was still in the kitchen—they had pulled out a microscope and some sort of retro-futurist scanner. With a naughty grin, she leaned back in the tub, pulled back her upper tentacles, and brought another head down to look at her underside.

"Well," she said to herself, "that doesn't look very octopus-y." She giggled. "Octopus—" A snort. That turned into a laugh. That turned into a bigger laugh.

That turned into sobs.

This just wasn't fair! She struck the water, splashing the walls and getting even more water on the floor. She gripped the sides of her head with her hands and just sobbed. The water was still running and was starting to reach the overflow drain, but she didn't care. It didn't matter.

She was a monster. A real fucking monster. One that ate sailors and spit fire and betrayed her best friend for some guy that only used her, and not even in a fun way.

"I deserve this, don't I," Skye said as she calmed down.

She heard a tap on the bathroom door. "I've got som—woah!" Ronyo said before quickly turning their head to the side. "I, uh..." they stammered. "I can get you a shirt if you want?"

"What?" Skye said before a glance at herself reminded her that she was still naked with someone else in her apartment! "Oh, yeah," she said, "if it's going to bother you."

They were a fox, so Skye wasn't completely sure she was reading it right, but she was sure she saw them bite their lip and blush. "Define 'bother,'" they squeaked.

"Oh my god," Skye said with a laugh, "you like this?"

"Ma'am," Ronyo said, their voice a little more under control but still facing the side, "I am here on a strictly professional basis—"

"Are you a monsterfucker? Are you turned on right now?" She cocked her head. "Wait, do you even have anything under that fur?"

Ronyo let themself smile. "In this body, no. No I do not." They sighed. "Honestly, whatever's going to be comfortable for you. Do you want me to get you a shirt?"

Skye looked back at herself and at the very full bathtub. "I kinda need the water," she said. Before she could get distracted again she reached up and turned the water back off. "Is it okay with you if I don't?"

"Of course." Ronyo turned and floated up to the vanity. They sat on the edge and set the empty bottle down next to them. "Let me get a quick scan," they said and held up the retro-futurist thing which made a very retro-futurist sound.

Ronyo looked at the readout and got very still. Slowly, they put the scanner back in their bag and folded their paw-hands in front of them. "Do you want details, or just the bottom line?" they said, making careful eye contact.

Skye considered it for a moment. "Did Cecily do this to me?" she asked.

"Beyond a reasonable doubt," Ronyo said. "The potion she gave you was distilled from something I have in my shop and modified to affect the body from the outside in. That takes skill, skill she demonstrated with the changing note." They motioned to the bottle. "Means, motive, and opportunity."

Skye nodded. "Is it permanent?"

Ronyo sighed. "Short answer, yes." They put a hand on their bag. "Sometimes I have tricks that can restore someone's 'true' form. Sometimes I can just do the thing in reverse. What Cecily did to the potion was... powerful."

"So..." Skye gripped the side of the tub with her tentacles and turned every head to look at Ronyo. "This is 'me' now?"

"I wish I had better news," Ronyo said. "Yes," they added with a nod.

Skye stared forward. Her breathing got heavier, more frantic. She curled her hands into fists so hard she dug her fingernails into her palms. She blinked back a couple of tears.

Permanent.

The word echoed and amplified in her head. Unchanging. Static. Forever.

She took a deep breath, threw her head back, and screamed with all seven mouths.

The discordant wail reverberated through the bathroom and bounced out into the apartment. The windows rattled, and a couple of dogs in the building added their howls. Ronyo flattened their ears, closed their eyes, and bowed their head slightly.

Skye trailed off and just lay still, catching her breath, the movement from her lungs causing ripples in the tub. Her breath hitched a bit, but most of her sobs were already used. This was just acceptance.

"No less than I deserve," Skye said quietly.

"Wrong," Ronyo said instantly.

Skye glared at them. "How?" she yelled. "You know what I did to Nick! What kind of monster does that? Oh, look!" She flung her arms out. "Monster!"

"Did you regret what you did?"

Skye folded her arms over her chest and looked away.

"The only reason you'd deserve this is if you didn't want to change. And from what you told me, you saw who you were, what you'd done, and you wanted to be better. This?" They held up the empty bottle. "This is someone trying to tell you that you can't change." They slammed the bottle back onto the vanity counter. "Fuck. That."

Skye felt a little of the tension leave. Just a little. "Did you practice that?" she said.

Ronyo scratched the back of their head. "A little, yeah," they mumbled.

Skye sighed. "It's a very lovely thought," she said, "but I'm still... this."

"About that," Ronyo dug into their bag and pulled out a necklace. "Shape not withstanding, I call this a 'mask.' It'll make you look human for up to 24 hours at a time."

"That's great," Skye said, shocked. "What's the catch?"

Ronyo grimaced. "Then you can't use it for 48 hours. It's a little more complicated than that, but that's the gist."

Skye frowned. "So I couldn't use it for work," she said.

"But your webcam only sees you from the chest up, right?" Ronyo said with a grin.

Skye blinked. "Why the fuck didn't I think of that?"

"Because you're going through a trauma?"

Skye turned to Ronyo who smiled weakly.

"Go easy on yourself," they said.

Skye nodded distantly. That single reminder had seemingly un-blocked her brain. "Can you get me my phone?" she said. "I've got some people to call..."

---

Skye allowed herself a giggle as she brushed his nose with hers. "I'm glad you stayed, Andy."

"Are you?" Andy said, his face showing a hint of concern. "I know we said we weren't serious, but your hot tub is just so comfortable and I could barely keep my eyes open and—"

Skye pulled him close, wrapped his torso in her arms, and kissed him. When he kissed back, she ran a hand up to cradle the back of his head and wrapped his lower body in her tentacles. “I'm sure," she whispered into his ear.

Andy just purred and flicked his orange cat-ears in response.

A sudden thought seized Skye. “Hey, Siri?" she called out, “What time is it?"

A moment later her phone answered, “It's 8:52 AM."

“Shit!" Skye swore. She pulled away and quickly detangled her tentacles from Andy's legs—maybe too quickly if the yowl from him was any indication.

“Sorry!" she said with a wince. “But I have to get to work!"

“No worries," Andy said with a wince as he pulled himself out of the hot tub. “I'm just surprised you put so much work into keeping your old job."

“I happen to be damn good at it," Skye said with a smirk as she pulled her bikini top on. “And I didn't take a pay cut when I moved out here."

Andy fastened the button above his cat tail before fastening the one in front of his pants. “Money isn't everything…" he said with a dramatic whine.

“Oh, sorry, you're totally right," Skye said with equal drama. “I'll just cancel the fiber internet for the commune that my job's paying for."

“Money's fine!" Andy said quickly. “Do you know where my shirt is?"

One of her eel-dog heads floated over with said shirt in her mouth. Andy gently took it and yanked it over his torso.

Skye slipped her phone into a case on her bicep and climbed out of the hot tub. “I'll see you at dinner?"

“You better," Andy said as he opened the human-sized door on the land side. “Hey, Skye?" he added.

Skye had climbed onto her flatbed trolly and unlatched the French doors leading out to the pier. “Yeah?" she said.

Andy smiled gently. “I'm really glad you're here."

Skye smiled back. “Me too," she said. With a huff she turned back to the doors. “Okay, time to go to work."

She flung open the doors and slid out onto the pier, the wheels on her trolly clattering across the wooden planks, her tentacles pulling her along in a very speedy fashion. It was the farthest thing from a smooth ride, but it got her over land quicker than anything else. She only had to make sure not to run over her tentacles!

She came to a corner and wrapped the two closest eel-dog necks around it and pulled herself around. She coasted for a little longer until she got to her "office," a shed floating on the water. With a deliberate thought she used all six of her eel-dog heads to bring herself to a stop; the memory of getting splinters in her tentacles was still too fresh.

With a heave, Skye jumped off the pier, tentacles splayed out in the opposite of a dive, and hit the water with a resounding slap.

"The things I do," she muttered as she swam forward, keeping everything above her naval above the water. She pushed past the heavy curtain and into the shed.

A second to let her eyes adjust, and she was in motion. There was a chair that was partially submerged that she quickly swam onto and secured herself to. As she sat, she pulled a dark blouse off of a nearby hanger and onto her torso. Now facing forward, she pushed aside a shower curtain to expose a desk complete with notepad, laptop, and desk lamp. She opened the laptop, switched on the lamp, and joined her morning meeting right as the clock hit 9:00.

"Good morning, everyone!" Skye said with a smile. Discretely, she fixed a couple of out-of-place hairs and straightened her blouse. "I hope everyone had a good weekend?"

The rest of her team nodded, and the meeting started, each person giving a quick update. Skye took notes on everyone's progress and tried to subtly settle onto her perch. They were on the second to last person when her stomach growled audibly.

"Sorry about that," she said with a blush and a smile.

"I can take a hint," her coworker said. "That's everything important from me."

The last person shrugged. "I'm still blocked."

"Thanks, everyone," Skye said. "I'll be in touch!" And she ended the meeting.

She took a breath and let it out slowly. Sometimes being "all human" took more effort than usual, especially when she was hungry. Time to take care of that.

She closed her eyes and focused on her eel-dog heads, currently all submerged in the ocean waters and unconstrained by the floating shack. There had been a school of fish nearby a couple of minutes ago, and she could swear she could still seem them through the murky—there!

She stayed fixed on them with one head and brought two others nearby. It just took a little patience...

The school swam by, and in an instant she struck, taking one fish in each mouth. The scent from the fish guts hit her noses, and it was all she could do to deliberately swallow the fish in each mouth rather than let herself frenzy and potentially lose them.

Skye opened her human eyes and focused back on her laptop to see a coworker asking for a chat. With a smirk, she joined the call. "Hey, Casey," she said.

"Hey," Casey said with a weary smile, "thanks for answering. Is this a bad time?"

"Not if you don't mind me trying to catch breakfast," Skye said with a wry grin.

"Not at all. Really, I just wanted to check up on you." Casey leaned forward a bit. "How're you holding up, girl?"

"You know," Skye said, not losing her grin, "not bad. I've got a good place to stay, good waters to fish in, and I get to keep my city job."

"Right, you said it was a commune?"

"Yeah, a couple friends from college were involved..." Skye shrugged. "Turns out there's more people like me than I thought."

"Speaking of..." Casey dropped her voice. "How's the catboy?"

Skye nodded slightly. "He's good," she said with a fond smile.

Casey narrowed her eyes. "How good?"

Skye blushed. "Really good," she said, rolling the R.

Casey leaned back and cackled. Skye just rolled her eyes.

Any comeback Skye was building died when she saw her phone light up with a text from Nicholas. Hesitantly, she reached for her phone.

Her hesitation must have read on her face because Casey instantly sobered up. "Everything all right?"

"My ex texted," Skye said, her voice small. She tapped into the message before she could lose her nerve.

"The one you...?"

"Yeah." Skye barely registered the other conversation, her blood roaring in her ears as she read over the text:

Nick: I need you to know that you could have bankrupted me. You could have cost me my entire livelihood and the jobs of everyone that works for me. You said you just wanted to hurt me, but there are ways you could have dumped me that wouldn't have endangered other people. Nothing like that happened, but it could have.

That being said, apology accepted. We're good, though you'll understand if it takes a while for us to be friends again. But I don't hate you.

Also I heard what happened to you before you left town. Skye, even if you had completely ruined my life, you wouldn't have deserved what happened to you. I hear you're doing well, and I truly hope you are.

"You good?" Casey said.

Skye breathed a sigh of relief, feeling the tension she didn't even know she was carrying fall away. "Yeah," she said, "it's good." She quickly sent a response:

Skye: I am, and I hope you are too. If I can ever do anything to help you, just ask.

"So," Casey said with a cheeky grin, "can I have his number now?"

Skye gave Casey a flat look. "And how do you plan on introducing yourself? 'Hey, I got your number from the bitch that screwed you over'?"

Casey just cackled again. "You know I'm just playing."

Skye's phone buzzed again. She braced herself for another text from Nick, but it was someone else:

Ronyo: Do you want to tell her, or should I?

Ronyo: [link to Twitter]

Skye clicked through to see a selfie from Cecily of her in sharp sunglasses sipping a coffee:

dontmesswiththiswitch TFW the bitch you caught sniffing around your man left town a month ago and won't show her face for "reasons"

Skye grinned malevolently. "Hey Casey," she said as she pulled her two rearmost heads into the shack, "Have I shown you the puppers?"

Casey leaned foward. "Not enough."

Skye pulled up her selfie camera and aimed it to get the two heads in frame next to her. There was a bit more space, so she pulled in two more. Framed by her eel-dog heads, she flashed a peace sign to the camera.

She thought for a second, then changed the peace sign to a middle finger and took the picture, much to Casey's delight. Two seconds later and the post was on its way out:

blueskyebird @dontmesswiththiswitch I lived, bitch.