Morning at the Y began with bells and chatter. Luxe tugged on Grace's cardigan while Aurora perched at the desk, her notebook open. She chewed the end of her pencil, brows furrowed as if she were solving a riddle.
"What are you doing?" Luxe asked, lacing her shoes.
"Writing," Aurora murmured. "Like Margaret said. It doesn't have to be good. Just has to be mine."
She scribbled a line, crossed it out, tried again. Luxe leaned over and caught the words:
Two girls, a river, a door we didn't choose.
Two girls, a city, a door we'll build ourselves.
Aurora glanced up, cheeks coloring. "It's clumsy."
"It's true," Luxe said.
Aurora's smile bloomed slow and fragile, like a flower in the wrong season.
At Salvatore's, the lunch rush roared louder than ever. Plates clattered, sauce sizzled, orders flew fast in Italian and English. Luxe kept her head down, arms aching from the rhythm of scrub-rinse-stack. Aurora worked beside her, humming again—this time the tune from last night's poetry circle.
"Quieter," Luxe warned.
But the cook nearest them—an older man with gray at his temples—grinned. "Better than the radio," he said, wiping his hands.
Aurora flushed. Luxe kept her expression steady, but her chest tightened. Every kindness was a risk. Every notice could turn to scrutiny.
When the break bell rang, Luxe herded Aurora into the alley again. For a moment, the air was theirs alone.
Until it wasn't.
Daniels appeared like smoke slipping under a door. His cap shadowed his eyes, but his grin gleamed sharp.
"Back again," he drawled. "You two must like soap more than most."
Aurora stiffened, half-hiding behind Luxe.
Daniels leaned against the wall, lighting a cigarette. "You know, most girls who wash dishes all day end up breaking sooner or later. Unless they've got someone watching out for them." He blew smoke toward them. "Someone like me."
Luxe's fists clenched inside her pockets. "We don't need anyone."
"Don't you?" Daniels's gaze slid over Aurora, slow enough to make her flinch. "Funny thing about this city. Girls disappear all the time. No one notices. But I'd notice. I'd notice if it were you."
Aurora's breath hitched. Luxe stepped forward, putting herself between them. "We're not your concern."
Daniels smirked, as if her defiance only amused him. "Everything in my city's my concern."
He flicked his cigarette to the ground, crushing it under his boot. "See you around."
Then he was gone, leaving smoke and the sour taste of threat behind.
That night, back at the Y, Aurora read her lines aloud to Margaret in the common room. Her voice shook, but Margaret clapped anyway.
"See?" Margaret said. "You've got something. Keep going."
Aurora ducked her head, smiling shyly. Luxe sat nearby, pretending to read a magazine but keeping her ears sharp.
The sound of her sister's laughter, though—it was the only thing Luxe allowed herself to believe in.
Aurora lingered in the common room even after Margaret left, her notebook balanced on her knees. The other girls drifted upstairs in twos and threes, laughter trailing like ribbons, but Aurora kept writing, head bent low, lips moving with each word she tested.
Luxe sat in the corner chair, a magazine open but unread. Her eyes flicked from door to window, then back to her sister.
Aurora read a line under her breath, then scribbled it out, biting the pencil eraser. "Everything sounds too simple," she whispered.
"It doesn't have to be complicated," Luxe said softly. "It just has to be yours."
Aurora looked up, startled, then smiled faintly. "Like us."
"Like us," Luxe agreed.
Aurora returned to her page, writing slower now, more deliberate. Luxe let her, listening to the faint scratch of pencil against paper. It was a sound she hadn't realized she missed—the sound of making, not just surviving.
When the matron finally snapped the lights out, they climbed the stairs together. Aurora's notebook was tucked carefully under her arm like contraband. In their room, she laid it on the dresser before changing for bed, smoothing the cover as if it were fragile glass.
Luxe watched her with a mixture of pride and unease. Pride, because Aurora's light was finally shining again. Unease, because light always drew shadows.
As Aurora curled under the blanket, she whispered, "Do you think Ruby writes? Or Grace? Maybe that's why they understand."
"Maybe," Luxe said. She sat on her bed, untying her shoes. "Or maybe they just know what it's like to survive and want to help someone else do the same."
Aurora's smile softened into sleep.
Luxe stayed awake longer. She pulled the curtain back just enough to scan the street below.
Fog rolled heavy, cloaking the lamplight. For a moment, she thought she saw movement near the corner—too still, too patient, the silhouette of a man in a hat. Her breath caught.
She blinked. The fog shifted. The corner was empty.
Still, she let the curtain fall. Her hand pressed against the dresser top, steadying herself. Daniels didn't need to be there every night. The idea of him was enough to keep her from resting.
She whispered into the dark, low enough not to wake Aurora: "Try me."
Across town, Daniels leaned back in a bar chair, swirling bourbon in a glass. His companion, a younger officer, muttered something about paperwork. Daniels chuckled.
"Paper's not where you find people," he said. "You watch where they eat, where they sleep. You see who they smile at. Then you squeeze."
He tipped his glass, smirk cutting sharp through the haze. "And those two? They'll squeeze easy."
The younger man shifted uneasily, but Daniels only laughed, the sound spilling out into smoke and noise.
Back at the Y, Luxe finally lay down, her hand resting against Aurora's arm like a tether. Aurora stirred, murmuring something soft—door, light, river—half-dream, half-poem.
Luxe closed her eyes, clutching the words like weapons.
Two girls, a city, a door we'll build ourselves.
If Daniels wanted to squeeze, he'd have to break her first.
Perfect — let's give Chapter Seven one more layer so it feels like a full, multi-thousand-word installment the way a webnovel chapter should. We'll linger in Aurora's tentative joy, Luxe's sharpened paranoia, and close on a heavier sense that the net is tightening around them.
The next morning, Aurora was up before the bell. Luxe woke to the soft scratch of pencil on paper and found her sister perched at the desk, hair tangled, cardigan sliding off one shoulder.
Aurora glanced back, eyes bright despite the hour. "I think I finished it."
She turned the notebook toward Luxe. The lines were uneven, smudged, but the words were clear:
Two girls cross a river.
Two girls find a city.
Two girls learn their names again.
Luxe's throat tightened. "It's good."
Aurora bit her lip. "You mean that?"
"I mean it." Luxe reached out, brushing her sister's hand. "It's ours."
Aurora's smile was shy but radiant. She closed the notebook with reverence, as if sealing the moment.
At breakfast, Margaret slid into the bench beside them, balancing her tray of oatmeal. "Morning, poets."
Aurora flushed, glancing at Luxe before opening the notebook. Her voice shook, but she read the lines aloud. The other girls at the table went quiet, listening.
When she finished, Margaret grinned. "See? Told you. You've got something."
Another girl, plainer, with wire-framed glasses, nodded. "It sounds like a hymn. Not churchy, but… hopeful."
Aurora's cheeks turned pink. Luxe felt pride swell in her chest, but she tamped it down, reminding herself that attention—any attention—was dangerous.
Still, for one breakfast table, they weren't strangers. They were girls.
That afternoon, Salvatore barked louder than usual, the kitchen a storm of noise. Luxe scrubbed harder, keeping her head down. Aurora, buoyed by the morning, hummed again—this time louder, her rhythm steady against the rattle of pots.
The older cook chuckled. "Better voice than my radio."
Salvatore shot him a look but said nothing. Luxe's stomach knotted. Every kindness was a pinprick in the veil they'd built.
And then, as if summoned by that thought, the back door creaked.
Daniels.
He didn't step all the way inside, just leaned against the frame, hat tilted. Smoke curled from the cigarette between his fingers.
"Busy bees," he drawled. "Working hard for your supper."
Aurora froze, hands slick with soap. Luxe's jaw clenched so tight it ached.
Daniels's gaze slid over the sink, the stacks of plates, then back to them. "Don't burn yourselves out. Plenty of girls find easier ways to earn a meal." His smirk widened. "And some of those ways come with protection."
He tapped ash on the threshold and left as casually as he'd come.
Salvatore muttered something in Italian under his breath, face dark. Luxe couldn't tell if his anger was at Daniels for intruding—or at them for attracting him.
Either way, the air in the kitchen never felt clean again.
That night, Aurora clutched her notebook to her chest as they climbed into bed. Luxe sat by the window, curtain drawn back an inch.
The street below was quiet. Too quiet.
She thought of Daniels at the doorway, his words like grease staining the floor. Easier ways. Protection. She thought of Beaumont—still a name, still a shadow—but closer now, creeping closer through men like him.
Aurora murmured something in her sleep, her lips shaping the word door. Luxe reached over and laced their fingers together.
"We'll build it," she whispered. "Even if I have to fight him every step."