When I heard the giggling through my dorm door, I knew what game scene I was about to step into. I took a deep breath and tiptoed in.

Yep. There were Antoinette’s friends, lounging on both our desk chairs and Antoinette’s bed. They were no longer eyeless, hastily-drawn NPCs with the typical anime slash for a mouth and nose. Three lovely sharp faces turned to me like alerted foxes, ready to dig into a blundering hen.

Worst of all was Antoinette. Terribly, terrifyingly, heart-wrenchingly, she was trying on a gorgeous silk pine-green gown–the back was unzipped and giving me an eyeful of her milk-white skin and the side of a perfect breast. She whirled around to me.

"God! Knock, Chloé!"

"Sorry, sorry!" I shut the door. "It’s my room too."

"Yes, and I’ll respect your privacy in full." She scoffed, turning back to her full-length mirror. The room came with plain oak mirrors that hung to the wall, so Antoinette must have brought this one from home: it was made of gold-flake wood with lion head designs sculpted along the edges. It stood on feet shaped like clawed paws.

As her friends whispered and giggled, at a perfect volume to make me worry about what I wasn’t catching, I put my things away. I made sure to tuck the calligraphy set deep into my bag; I would put it in Antoinette’s bookshelf later. I was hasty. I felt like I had a measure of control over Antoinette because I’d played the game so many times and daydreamed about her every word for my fics (I was practically the patron saint of her Fandompedia page), but her friends…they were mean girls, right? The kind where you didn’t know if today would be the day that they chose to bring up a flaw of yours they’d noticed ages ago, or if their patience with you would totally run out.

I was always shy and modest in person. Online? Well, running with girls like that was fun.

Anyways. If clothes were the theme of the scene, I may as well sort through the stuff Étienne brought me. While I folded and sorted and hung up my new clothes (how many outfits did Étienne think I wore in a day?), Antoinette continued to try on dresses without any attempt to shield herself. Her friends ducked into the lavatory or behind her armoire’s open doors, but Antoinette changed right in the open.

Was this the game world’s way of making sense of how there was no text explaining where she got changed in this scene? No, probably not. The game also didn’t describe my math and lit classes, but I’d sure just sat through hours of those. Maybe the game thought I was doing too well at hopscotching around its challenges so it decided to torture me.

Ugh, I hope not. If the game was sentient, I was really screwed.

But if this was its way of torturing me, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad…

I asked, "These dresses are for the Samhain Formal, right?"

Antoinette stared at me in her mirror, scowling. "I'm sorry, Sam-hane? Did you forget how to read, too? Or did you never learn?"

Yikes. Hey, I’d never heard the word said out loud! The pretentious, witchy goths of my high school days were laughing at me across the universes.

Antoinette corrected stiffly, "They’re for the Sah-win Formal, yes. I had them delivered from home."

Along with some extras, apparently, if the new trunk pushed into my half of the room was anything to go by.

"What about your dress? I can’t imagine the prince delivered you here with anything–" She faltered.

That line was lifted right out of the game and was supposed to be a triumphantly embarrassing moment for Antoinette. The crown prince had given poor, modest Marie all the dresses and jewels she could ever dream of, after all! How did Antoinette forget? (Marie wasn’t actively organizing those clothes as they spoke, I guess, so I had to cut her a little slack.) But I felt kind of bad. I’d value a beautiful dress the same amount if it came from Étienne’s personal tailor or from a thrift shop. Fashion, status, and value were Antoinette’s mother tongue.

Man, I’d love to give her one of these dresses. I’m sure there were some gowns in here that’d suit her better. Especially now that I knew that none of her curves were lost in her transformation into a real young woman. I wanted to see her in…well, anything. Everything.

I said mildly, "I’ll find something to wear, I guess," and kept putting things away.

I’d given Étienne some guidance when he sent out his staff to shop for me, and thankfully, it looked like he’d listened. There were tons of soft cashmere sweaters in pastel colours to deal with Eavredor’s brisk October. Jeans were a bit too anachronistic for even these game designers, so Étienne packed me a few heavy ankle-length skirts and some pressed slacks. He’d offered me his team of tailers in case anything didn’t fit, but I had a feeling that game logic would work in my favour here: everything was gonna fit perfectly.

And then I found the gowns. I admired them quietly while Antoinette and her friends tried on earrings and necklaces and hairdos. I’d never felt such fine fabrics. Even my prom dress had a sort of plastic feeling to it thanks to modern textiles, but this stuff was supple and smooth as warm butter. A beige stole with real rabbit’s fur was likely meant to compliment a sugary pink gown, and a glittery, half-transparent shawl lined in lace was folded with a wine-red dress. I had the decency to blush. This was more than I deserved.

"Damn it, there’s no fixing this!" Antoinette snapped. She tossed aside a set of dangling earrings, glaring at her reflection’s gold dress. "It’s too brassy. I had my doubts in the fitting, and it’s so much worse in this light. And this ruching on the hips, ugh. Why did father think this garish yellow would suit my hair?"

No surprise: she looked stunning to me.

One of her friends hurried over to unlace the false corset back. Maybe she was hoping Antoinette would pass the dress onto her in pity–her fluffy pink dress did her no favours.

"Chloé," Antoinette said, a purr crawling into her voice. "What have you got there?"

Uh, a blue dress? I knew the shape but hardly even the names of the fabrics. I flipped it so she could see the front, its ribbed bodice studded with what I was super afraid were tiny little diamonds. Antoinette’s eyes lit up. At the same time, her scowl deepened. I could practically see her warring with her instincts: take something away from me vs get a pretty thing vs admit to the entire room that she had to steal from someone else because her tailors made a bad choice.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

"This dress would suit you much better. It’s the colour of your eyes, n’est ce pas?" Okay, I always thought the random French tossed into the script was silly, but hearing her say it practically melted my brain. "Come over here."

I did, heart trilling. Being close to her shot electricity through my fingers. Her warmth brushed against my skin; her gaze raked over me. As she tugged me close in the mirror and glanced between us, (poking me hard in the back so I stopped slouching), I had the burning, humiliating memory of all the fanfic I’d written.

Back then, it was fun. Free of consequence. Besides the anti-fans getting in my comments about how Marie/Antoinette was glorifying abuse. Now, I was living in a fanfic. I had control over Marie–now Chloé–to do whatever she–I–wanted. And what I wanted was to help Antoinette find a better ending, just like all the fics I’d read or written before this.

What I super wanted was for her to keep holding me.

"Yes, it’ll fit."

Antoinette’s friends helped her take the dress off over her head. One great rustling of fabric later and she was standing there in a strapless bra and underwear, holding out the confusing mountain of gold fabric to me.

"You can go into the bathroom to change. But we’re roommates, Chloé. Sometimes I change outfits thrice a day and I’m not about to hide away from you each time."

Those lines blasted through the fog in my brain. This was from the game! We’d taken a slightly-windy road to get here (no Sam-hane blunder, for one…) but here we were.

Antoinette gave Marie her dress. Marie, intimidated and shy and unsure if she could make sense of all the layers of the dress, would change in the bathroom. She’d take so long figuring it out alone that when she came out, the girls would be shamelessly rummaging through her things.

Marie was embarrassed about her private space being stomped all over. Chloé, though? Well, Chloé would be skinned and hanged because she had Antoinette’s beloved pen set and a planner recording her every future move.

So. Was I gonna do this?

"Can someone help me with the laces, then?" I asked, pulling off my uniform. Apparently I was.

Antoinette gave me a stiff smile. She waved over her friend in pink and shrugged into a black silk robe before perching on the edge of her desk to watch me. She looked like a queen, one who didn’t need jewels and fancy fabrics to express her power.

As I undressed, trying to both not burn my face off with a blush and keep an eye on her friends, Antoinette began her monologue. I could probably quote it.

"The Samhain Formal is, to the students of La Belle Lavande, a yearly debutante ball. A chance for those who couldn’t catch any eyes in a uniform to claw for prestige in a dress."

In Love Blooming, she said all this through the bathroom door, probably to cover up the sounds of her friends opening Marie’s drawers. Now, she watched me step into the pile of dress, probably making sure I didn’t tear it.

"Parents come to make sure their children are shaping up exactly the way they hoped; students pitch themselves to the finest amongst each others’ families to lock down opportunities in marriage or otherwise. Photographers from the crown city pour in, passing out business cards and collecting sordid photos they can sell to gossip columns… Tch. This is a chance to show off who you really are. Though I suppose you don’t know who that is, do you?"

None of this was really me! Not even the part that changed clothes in a room full of strangers!

"The Samhain Formal is also a chance to get to know the suitors of the year. Most are already engaged thanks to their family’s meddling, but, well–most don’t actually care. Would you have the confidence to test a man’s loyalty if he caught your eye, little Chloé?"

Antoinette’s friend was lacing me up. Marie’s body was much more petite than Hanna’s–er, than mine–and much shorter than Antoinette’s. The skirt was pooling on the floor around my feet, not to mention the loose space in the cups and hips. No way Antoinette didn’t know it wouldn’t fit. She only wanted me tugged into her sphere–

Right on the edge of the mirror’s reflection, I spotted one of the girls opening my desk.

"Hey!" I said. "What do you think you’re doing?"

Another friend opened my armoire drawers, shoving aside the few sweaters and shirts I’d just put away. I made a move to stop her, but Antoinette leapt into my path, stopping me from tripping over the sheets of skirt.

"Don’t worry," she sighed. Yet another friend opened my closet. My schoolbag… The journal… "Look, how do you expect me to feel? I get roomed, sans warning, with a girl I’ve never met and not even that terribly nosy Louis knows anything about her."

I tried to dodge around her. Antoinette caught me by the waist, tugging me back a step, until she was behind me, her low, musical voice right at my ear.

"You must have picked up that I’m a very important woman, yes? Aren’t I right to be a little suspicious of a stranger who demands entry into my space?"

"That isn’t fair. I’m not out to get you, Antoinette." I was so shocked by her closeness that I could only paraphrase the video game’s original script. Her perfume smelled of powdery flowers, bringing to mind the red velvet of petals, so like her hair and like her voice near my ear.

"If you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to worry about."

I tensed up as they opened my bag, taking out my schoolbooks and a journal with a red cover. The very journal where I’d been recording Antoinette’s whereabouts and everything I remembered about the game and–

"This is yours!" a friend cried. She was holding the calligraphy set.

Antoinette’s hands tightened on my waist. "Why did you have that?"

I slipped away, turning so I could plead to her face. "I found it in the study rooms. I was going to return it, that’s all."

"Then why didn’t you? Why was it in your bag?"

In the game, Antoinette and her friends never find anything. They spend their time giggling about poor orphan Marie who needs handouts for everything from gowns to notebooks, asking if she whimpered her way into getting the prince to buy her hairbrushes and stuffed animals, too.

But here was Antoinette’s wrath about her calligraphy set, an early version of the argument we were supposed to have tomorrow when she realized it was missing. She’d guess that Marie stole it. She’d cool off when she remembered that she’d just gone through Marie’s things and didn’t see any pen set.

"You were busy, Antoinette. Why would I distract you from your jewels and gowns with something so silly?"

Her cheeks went delicately pink. Out of anger?

"Ask Sylvain if you don’t believe me. We ran into each other when I was taking it back from the study rooms."

She scoffed. She held out a hand and her friend dutifully placed the calligraphy set on her palm like a servant passing a king the crown jewels. She flipped it open and ran her finger along all the contents, as if making sure that every piece was accounted for.

Over her shoulder, I saw a little engraved plaque on the inner lid. The game had never bothered to even render a closed version of the calligraphy set.

Pen your own tale of romance. Love, Maman.

Antoinette clicked shut the box and put it on her desk. She flicked a hand at me, clearly ticked off, and said, "That dress makes you look like a golden goose. Francine, you can have it for all I care. Let’s go to dinner, girls."

Once they were gone, I hurriedly changed back into my comfortable clothing. Antoinette’s ire still burned me, and I couldn’t shake off the feeling of her hands firm on my waist, her breath hot on my ear. One emotion cleaved through all of that, bright and reassuring.

The game never mentioned Antoinette’s mother at all. So there were depths to her beneath the game’s code all along, and I was already beginning to discover them.