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“Have fun,” I said as she crunched back down the icy steps toward the front of Galen den’ Mora. I raked my snowy boots across the grating before shucking them off and adding them to the pile of drying shoes by the door. Warmth greeted my cold nose and cheeks, the smell of cinnamon lingering in the air as I sidled down the narrow corridor to where Ora sat.
“So...,” they said, spreading out different fabrics: satins, beads, feathers, velvets in every hue of the rainbow. “What do we think?”
What did I think? I took in all the different options with a shake of my head. “I’ll be honest, I’d half-forgotten about the performance with everything else that’s going on.” The moment in the forest with Grae still echoed through me, contending with Sadie’s new oath for pride of place in my mind. I clenched my too-long sleeve around my cut palm.
“Masquerade.” Ora tossed the word around, tapping their fingers across the different materials as if summoning a spell. “Dark and sleek, bright and fun, glittery and elegant . . . Whatkind of performer are you going to be? What do you want to wear tonight?”
I blinked down at the fabric and two completely different answers leapt instantly into my mind, canceling out my decision before I could even speak it. Why was this so hard for me? Why couldn’t I just pick one? These answers shouldn’t feel like a knife twisting in my gut, forcing me to reflect on everything that I am.
That nagging feeling came back again, the one that had been growing in me for days since Malou first asked my favorite color, since I first admired Ora’s wardrobe, since I first started asking questions of myself that I’d never asked before. But now, I knew it was so much more than colors and clothing, it was the rudderless searching part ofmethat felt... clashing. At war.
There was the person I positioned myself as, the one I showed to everyone: the shadow, the warrior, the one I felt Ineededto be. I knew how she dressed, what she wore, not because she liked it but because it made sense for the person I created her to be...
But then there was this other person, someone freer and more vibrant, someone who was beginning to claim more and more space in my mind, and they were starting to shout to be heard over the sound of who I was supposed to be.
“I don’t know how to pick,” I murmured, that inner voice screaming at me for the cowardly answer. “I’ll wear whatever you think is best, okay?”
Ora clasped their hands together, seemingly reading the silences between my words as readily as they heard my words themselves. “I told you before: it all starts with what appeals toyou.It shouldn’t matter whatI’dwant you to wear,” they pushed, ever so gently. “I can’t tell you who you are.”
“Who am I?” I wasn’t sure if I was asking them or myself, but the words shook out of me regardless, that shouting growing louder in my mind. I balled my fists, wanting to punch one through the wall.
Ora took the needles out of their mouth and stuck them back into a giant ball of felted wool. Standing, they walked over tomy side of the bench and sat back down, the action making my eyes well. It was so careful, so tender, it made me feel like they saw under all my layers: the frustration, the realization, the grief, and release, all the words so close to being spoken and yet tucked down so deep.
“Who are you, love?” Ora asked the question with such gentle warmth, finally giving me the courage to turn toward the thoughts that had been gnawing at me.
From the moment I met Ora, it felt like a missing piece was placed in the puzzle of my mind. No, I remembered what I had first thought. A key in a lock that fit, but I wasn’t sure if it would open. There was this restless agitation in me that had no name... but now, knowing that there were actually people who thought how I thought, who felt how I felt, who eschewed the confines of constructs that never fit them, it made that key start turning. And now, being put on the spot and asked that question, knowing such endless kindness waited patiently for my answer beside me, I felt the tumblers finally click. I could deny it no longer.
A tear slid down my cheek and Ora kept radiating that calm warmth, seemingly knowing that strange sort of joyful release that was washing through me.
“I was always searching outside of myself to find who I was—for someone else to tell me.” My voice cracked and I took a shaky breath. “How could I find out there something that was always within me? I shouldn’t have been searching, I should’ve been digging. I was buried there all along.”
Ora’s lips pressed together to keep from smiling. “And who have you unearthed?”
“I don’t know how to describe it, but I’ve never felt more certain of anything.” The words were on the tip of my tongue and I took a steadying breath. “I-I just don’t know that woman is the right word for what I am. I’ve always had one foot outside of it, felt further away from that name than others somehow. It’s not who I am, nor who I want to be.” I felt lighter and lighter as the words tumbled out, speaking my deepest confession aloud forthe first time. “I like my body better when I don’t have to beher. I like my voice, my clothing, my personality... I likemebetter. It feels like the most honest thing I could be—both a part of and outside of—and moving through everything in between, and yet, I don’t have a word for it...”
“And yet I understand.” Ora put their hand on my forearm and more tears slipped down my cheeks.
“Gods, I can’t stop crying today.” I sniffed, wiping my eyes. “These aren’t sad tears.”
“I know,” they said. “If anything, you seem relieved.”
“I am.” I still couldn’t believe the words came out of my mouth. Shock coursed through me. But Ora, of all people, seemed to be someone who wouldn’t judge me for it. “It felt good to say that out loud even if I don’t know exactly what it means. I know who I am, even if I don’t have a word for it.”
“A part of, outside of, and moving in between...” Ora cocked their head at me. “I think in Olmdere you’d say ‘merem.’”
I tossed the word around in my head. In Olmdere, humans had words for man and woman, words for those who were both and those who were neither, and then there wasmerem. It meant “with the river.” I loved that. With the river—flowing, carving its own path. That river was taking me further away from all the things I was told I should be. It was the language of my people, and yet, not my word. Wolves spoke in only black and white, but I was now filled with every color.
“I like merem. I’m still just me, just Calla, but...” I shook my head.
The confession I was saving for Grae came spilling out to Ora instead, but they seemed like the right person to tell, a safe person, one who would understand me without me having the words myself. I thanked the Moon that I met Ora, that they opened me up to the possibility that I could exist beyond what I was forced to be. I took a shuddering breath. Maybe it would be easier to say a second time to Grae now that I’d said it aloud once. “Maybe one day I won’t have to contort myself to make sense anymore.”
“Maybe you’ll be the one to change that for yourself,” Ora said. “And for others, too.”
“Maybe,” I whispered.
Maybe one day Wolves would also use these words for people who flowed between man and woman, for people who existed outside either, and for people who were all of them at once. It wasn’t the Wolf way and I’d never questioned choosing something for myself before that wasn’t solely for the good of the pack. Wolves clung to tradition and, for some reason, I’d thought those traditions would keep us safe. Yet as soon as I stepped outside of that world, I realized how hollow it all was. It wasn’t for safety. It was for power.
And notmypower.
