Chapter Text
Judith's father's career doesn't stabilize until she is fourteen. During her childhood, his promotions and reassignments mean her family is moved around frequently. When she leaves her kindergarten friends, she sobs for days, but by second grade she is used to it. Kids tell her that they'll have their parents help send emails, but they never do.
She becomes adept at fitting in at her new schools. She becomes a good listener, and she always happens to share an interest with new friends. They love a book series? So does she! And then her mother's secretary takes her to the library and she checks out as many books from the series as she can. They love a TV series? It is also her favorite, and she goes home and streams as much as she can.
She loves theme parks and painting and ballet class and dinosaurs and monster trucks and dolls, except she doesn't.
Secretly, she enjoys none of it. She just likes being invited to things. She likes having friends, and being a friend means dulling the sharp edges of yourself until you can slot right into an existing dynamic.
In fourth grade, she meets Coronabeth Tridentarius. She has enormous hair the color of the very sun. She gives the best hugs. She loves roller coasters and scary movies, so Judith does, too.
Coronabeth has a birthday party at an amusement park, and Judith is invited. She assumes she will be one of many, but only a small handful attend. In fact, when they go on the biggest roller coaster in the park, she gets to sit right next to Coronabeth.
“Will you ride with me, Jody?” Corona asks with big eyes that look purple in the mid-day sun. Her hair is pulled back in two braids, and it makes her look smaller. “Ianthe won't come.”
Coronabeth's sister Ianthe is never much fun to be around. When Corona had told Judith that they were identical twins, Judith had laughed politely at the bad joke, but it hadn't been a joke at all.
“Of course,” Judith says, even though she has never been on a roller coaster in her life. It doesn't look fun, is the thing. It looks dangerous. She wants to see the safety test results, she thinks suddenly. But that's not the kind of thing you say out loud to kids your age and still get to have friends, she realizes, so she will just have to die on this nightmare of steel, this monument to the hubris of humanity.
She buckles her seat belt despite her brain telling her to get off the ride.
They start ascending a hill. She could have had different friends. Clara from her scout troop seems nice.
Coronabeth looks over at her.
“Jody, I'm scared. Will you hold my hand?”
She takes Coronabeth's hand in hers. Her skin is warm. There is no hint of callus on her palms or fingertips, just the smoothest, softest skin Judith has ever felt in her life.
They get to the top of the hill and she looks over at Coronabeth, golden in the sunlight, beautiful, radiant. She feels a sudden urge to lean over and—
Her stomach drops.
Oh no, she thinks, and the train goes down the hill.