Guess what? I didn’t stop here.

I immediately moved into the next project after sending my debut for edits. If you’re unfamiliar with the time these things tend to take, Things We Tried to Bury has been wrapped up since October and edited since the end of January. While touching it up, I launched the next idea that began to gnaw at me. This piece is more overtly queer, inspired by the nightlife spaces that took me in as I navigated my own identity. It’s a horror-themed love letter, if you will. When society sees you as the monster but all you see is safety, you find ways to process it.

Following is an excerpt from Sodium Vapor Orange, releasing October 28th:

“What did you get me just now?” I asked, nerves telling through my tone. He didn’t comment as the bartender set it in front of me, an exact copy of the color of his drink. It was dark, which I normally didn’t go for, and smelled like cherry syrup with a bite of dark liquor. In the short glass floated an orange peel and a single cherry, as if trying to mime to me what the taste was like before testing me outright. Jett simply lifted his own glass, encouraging me to do the same in response.

“Cheers, old sport,” he joked, bringing the glass to his lips as I did the same. The heat of bourbon filled my mouth, my throat, and followed all the way down my chest like a rolling fire threatening to incinerate me. I coughed once, placing the drink back on the bar. I wasn’t wholly disgusted by it, but was surprised; Jett seemed like a vodka soda or a gin and tonic kind of guy—but bourbon?

“Oh my god, that’s strong.”

“Cherry old fashioned,” He answered, placing his own glass down with far less force than I had. “It’s not everyone’s thing.”

I blinked at him in disbelief. “I’m… not sure it’s mine, if I’m honest.” A brief flash of disappointment crossed his face, which I watched him try to hide by looking back to the bar. “I-I’ll still finish it. I just wasn’t expecting you to be a liquor guy.”

He rolled his eyes playfully, looking at me with a lighthearted disdain saved for chiding lovers. The way it made my heart skip was sinful. “And what were you hoping for?”

I attempted another sip, and quickly abandoned the idea. “I like beer, I guess. Gin is fine. I usually drink vodka.” I paused, twirling the drink hopelessly in my glass. “It’s light. You can, y’know… mix it.”

He huffed through his nose then, holding out his hand for my glass. I gave it to him pitifully, and watched as he set it beside him for later, as if wasting it would be the true shame. I waited silently as he ordered me a very tame vodka cranberry, a playfully disappointed smile on his face the entire time. I thought about running away again, but he didn’t feel accosting so much as comfortable enough to tease me. He stayed still, sipping before finally asking me a question.

“How long have you been in Seattle?” He asked, his eyes fixing on me once more.

“Um, about a year?” I couldn’t remember properly, through the fog of nerves plied with alcohol. My new glass was presented in front of me then, and I turned to mouth a ‘thank you’ before swirling the straw through the ice. The condensation gathered and dripped onto my jeans as I picked it up. “I mean, I’m from the area, though. I went to college at UW. Before I—” I hesitated, realizing I was oversharing, a growing habit around him. “—I didn’t finish. I moved instead.”

“Life?” He pried lightly, a hint of real concern in his voice. It disarmed me.

“Yeah,” I said. “Life.” I set my glass down and kept my hand there, fingers hovering like I’d forgotten what they were for. My gaze slid away from him, then back, then away again—anywhere to avoid seeing my own reflection in his face. I could hear myself, how flat and over determined I sounded, like I was trying to make something ordinary seem profound.

It hadn’t been dramatic. It hadn’t been noble. My life hadn’t been unbearable; it had just been… thin. Small. A few rooms, a few people, habits calcified into something I mistook for stability. Hardly the kind of story you offered up on a first date unless you wanted to kill the mood outright.

And yet here I was, sitting in an underground bar I’d somehow never seen, drinking bourbon like it meant something, talking about upheaval as if it justified itself. I felt foolish, suddenly—too earnest, too exposed, like I’d skipped ahead in a conversation that was supposed to unfold more slowly.

I took a sip and winced at the cold, welcoming the distraction. I told myself to stop. To scale it back. To remember that this was a date, not a confession. And then I looked at him again, hoping I hadn’t already said too much to take back.

“So,” I began, desperate to coax the worried expression off his face. “What do you do for work?”

He straightened a little, the shift subtle but unmistakable, like pride finding its posture. “I dance. Margo’s.”