She Stays

The Dissonance closed the door and the soundproofing sealed and the Concord was gone and Wren's hands were still on the Dissonance's face and the wet was still on the Dissonance's cheeks.

Wren kissed her. Not the hallway kiss. Not the forehead kiss. A kiss with teeth and want and mine in it. The Dissonance's mouth opened under hers and the sound she made was a raw, shattered breath, and Wren took it and swallowed it.

The Dissonance's back hit the door. Wren was on her, the dress and the jacket and the layers, and Wren's hands found the jacket and pulled and the Dissonance made a sound and the jacket stopped being a jacket and was gone and the shirt was gone and the skin was under Wren's hands, warm, scarred, real.

You, the Dissonance said, broken. You.

Me.

Wren's mouth went to the Dissonance's throat and she bit the muscle where neck meets shoulder and the biting was a claim, was the teeth, was mine back. The Dissonance's hands found Wren's hips, the ownership grip, but the ownership was two-way now and the hands pulled Wren closer and the closer was not close enough.

They did not make it upstairs.

The hallway floor. The Dissonance pulled her down and Wren went and the going was choice. The Dissonance's mouth was on Wren's breast, the teeth on the nipple, and the bite was ache and the ache was the circuit and Wren's back arched off the wood floor.

The Dissonance's hand went between Wren's legs. Three fingers, deep, and the fullness was a note that went through the body, upward. Wren's hands were in the Dissonance's hair, pulling, and the pulling was the teeth.

More, Wren said, and the word was a command.

The rhythm was desperate, the rhythm of a woman who had been told to destroy the thing she loved and had refused and the refusing had cost her everything and the everything was worth it.

Wren's legs wrapped around the Dissonance's hips and the wrapping was the holding, was the staying. The Dissonance's fingers were inside her and the collar hummed in her throat and between her legs and the two hums were one. The Dissonance's mouth was on Wren's neck, the teeth in the shoulder, and the biting and the stroking and the humming were one composition.

Come, the Dissonance said.

Wren came. The collar held this time, the sound trapped inside, vibrating against the leash, and the trapping was the Dissonance's and the Dissonance's was the point. The Dissonance came with her, the sound she made quiet, broken, and the two sounds met in the air between them and harmonised.

The Dissonance did not stop. Her mouth went down, the tongue finding the wetness, and Wren was still coming and the tongue extended it, sustained it, and Wren's hands were in the dark hair and her hips were off the floor.

She came again. Deeper. Slower. A wave. The fullness was the being-held thing and the holding was mutual.

Wren pulled the Dissonance up. Kissed the wet face. Tasted herself on the Dissonance's mouth. My turn.

She pushed the Dissonance onto her back. Straddled her. Pressed her wetness against the Dissonance's thigh and rocked her hips and the rocking was the claim, was the taking of pleasure, was mine back. The Dissonance's hands found Wren's hips and the hands pulled her closer and the closer was the falling.

Look at me, Wren said.

The Dissonance looked. The grey eyes, the crack, the open door. Wren reached down and found the Dissonance's hand and pressed it between the Dissonance's own legs.

Touch yourself, Wren said. I want to watch you.

The Dissonance's breath left her. The grey eyes were wide and the crack was in them and the breathing was uneven. She had not been touched in twenty years. She had not been told to touch herself in twenty years. The telling was the giving of permission and the giving was the fall.

Her hand went between her legs. Slow. The fingers found the wetness and Wren watched, rocking against the thigh, and the watching was the power, was the reversal, was the woman who had been kept now keeping.

I want you to come, Wren said. I want you to come with me watching.

The Dissonance came. The sound was the true note, unleased, filling the house, and the instruments sang and the walls hummed and the sound was not dissonance. Was harmony. Wren felt it through the bond, through the collar, and the feeling triggered her own and the two orgasms met in the air between them, the two sounds harmonising, and the sound was a chord, a real chord, sustained and held and not breaking.

They knelt on the hallway floor. Facing each other. Wren's hand on the Dissonance's face, the Dissonance's hand on Wren's face. The collar hummed. The house held them and the instruments played and the flowers on the third-floor table had four blooms and the stones on the sill hummed and the composition in the notebook was finished and the veil was torn and the world behind the world was visible and the two women were inside it, inside the music, inside the score beneath, and the score was theirs.

Later they lay in the bed on the third floor. The room that was tuned to Wren's note, except the note was different now, was fuller, had the Dissonance's harmony woven through it. The stone was out. The clamps were off. The collar hummed, low, barely there, a murmur. Largo played from the corner, soft, slow, and Wren hummed with it and the house hummed with her.

The Dissonance's head was on Wren's chest. Wren's hand was in the dark hair. The sharp body was resting, all of it, the edge put away, and what was left was the woman, just the woman, tired and open and held. The October rain had started outside, a slow percussion on the window, and the rain was part of the score, was part of the house's breathing, was part of the quiet.

Wren looked at the window. The slice of sky was not porridge tonight. It was dark and wet and alive, and the rain ran down the glass in threads that caught the faint green light of the streetlamp below, and the green was not the wrong green, not the drowned green of the underpass. It was the green of things growing. The green of the flowers on the table, four blooms, kept alive by a house that had learned to keep things.

The Dissonance's breathing was even. The wrong note was quiet. Almost gentle. A lullaby. Wren closed her eyes and hummed, low, the viola voice, and the house harmonised, and the collar hummed, and the rain played its percussion, and the two women lay in the instrument of the house that kept them both.

Then the Dissonance spoke.

Irin.

One word. Quiet. Against Wren's chest, spoken into the skin, into the bone, spoken the way you speak a thing you have not said in twenty years and are saying now because the person you are saying it to has earned it and the earning has changed the shape of your mouth.

Wren's hand stopped in the dark hair.

My name, the Dissonance said. My real name. Not the title. Not the word they use when they are frightened. The name I had before I was the thing they point at problems.

Irin. The name was a sound. A small, private sound, not a wrong note, not a sustained tone, not a frequency that broke things. A name. A woman's name. Spoken into Wren's skin in a bed in a house in the rain and the name sat in Wren's chest the way the collar sat on her throat, warm, present, kept.

Irin, Wren said. Tasting it. Feeling it in her mouth, on her tongue, in the place where the viola voice lived. The name was different from the title the way the viola was different from the violin. The title was the mask. The name was the real voice. And the Dissonance, who had said you will call me the Dissonance, nothing else, not until I decide you may, had decided. The deciding was the last wall coming down. The last door opening. The fall, complete.

Irin, Wren said again, and the name in her mouth was tender, was the thing the Dissonance had no category for, was the forehead kiss and the blanket and the flowers and the staying all compressed into two syllables and given back.

Irin's hand found Wren's hand. The fingers laced together. The collar hummed. Largo played. The rain fell. The house breathed.

I am not going anywhere, Wren said.

I know, Irin said.

The knowing was the fall. The fall was the freedom. The freedom was the staying. The staying was the thing.

The house breathed. The collar hummed. The rain played its slow percussion on the glass. And the two women lay in the instrument of the house that kept them both, and the note went on and on and on, and did not stop.