Chapter 20

20

A llienna | Sacramento, CA | Late 1900s

Walking down the street wearing snow boots and a loose fitting parka drew too many stares for Allienna's comfort. She pulled up her hood, hid her brown hair, and adjusted her black parka over her growing belly, sweating in the California sun.

There were only two scenarios as far as she was concerned, the first being that the Life Gifter was unforgiving and killed them all. Her childhood friends and her lover were gone. The other scenario would be that Arryn finds out about the bargain she made with Ayurveda and did something drastic trying to protect her, and in doing so, put their child at risk. She thought the latter of the two was more probable. He was the original, the most important of them all. She couldn't imagine him dead. No, they all had to have survived. She refused to plan for otherwise.

Allienna decided in the temple to flee and hide to protect the baby growing in her womb. She did love Arryn but suspected he would grow cold, jealous even of the child. He would come second in her life and she was willing to die, give this baby her immortality. That was the deal that she had made with Ayurveda, and Arryn would never allow that, she knew it in her very core.

If there was ever a true emergency, being in the same city as Reign felt good, safe, but a solemn truth lingered in Allienna's mind. Reign was too close with Arryn, possibly even a better friend to him than she was to her. Allienna didn't trust that Reign wouldn't eventually give in and share their location.

No, she would do this alone and still, it made her happier than she could ever imagine. This is exactly who she was meant to be: a mother. For the first time, she was going after what she wanted. She was taking care of herself. She could do this.

Spending her entire life inside that temple with little reason to leave, Allienna didn't account for her lack of skills or understanding of survival when traveling to the only place she'd ever been without Arryn, at least in the Earth realm.

Here in Sacramento, she risked Reign finding her, but her plan was to find a home further out from the city, living with the comfort of knowing that family did lay close by should she need it.

"Your godmother will always be near," Allienna whispered to her belly, growing larger by the day. Sweat had begun to bead up at her brow as she passed an old baby blue movie theater and popped inside. With no plan and nowhere to go, she stared at an unfriendly looking teenager holding her hand out, asking for her ticket.

"I don't have a ticket. I was just hoping to get out of the heat," Allienna sighed.

"That's not how this works." The teenager seemed bored. "You can start by taking off your parka. It's, like, ninety degrees outside."

"Right, good suggestion," Allienna replied, embarrassed, leaving the theater through the same door she had entered.

Maybe she'd made a mistake, coming here alone. Where did people go the first time they were on their own? Perhaps she should have found some money .

She continued walking down the street, passing various cafes and businesses, fighting off the stares for her odd attire. She couldn't have removed the parka. She had nothing underneath it.

A shop on her right side had a large sign in the window saying "Now hiring."

"Perfect, a job," Allienna said out loud cheerfully and walked into the glass retail front to be welcomed by trendy, loud alternative rock music and a receptionist with more facial tattoos than Allienna had ever seen.

"Can I help you?" the receptionist asked, her eyes bright, friendly, and large. Her overlined lips split into a grin, and Allienna, dressed in all black, felt like she fit in here better than she had in the street.

"I saw your sign in the window," Allienna started, "I am interested in the job." Allienna looked around the shop and noticed about twelve cushioned plastic chairs behind the receptionist, some filled with people and a matching counterpart chopping or working on their hair.

"Do you have any experience or a license? We were the first barber shop that opened in the area that supports, how do I put this, the non-conforming communities. Demand has exploded. We need good people urgently. I'm Paisley, the owner," she added.

"My name is Allienna, and yes, I am licensed and experienced," she lied, wondering briefly why Paisley was being so choosy with their words.

"Great, why don't you come back tomorrow around eleven? We will pair you with a senior barber and give you a test run," Paisley said. For the first time, Allienna felt like maybe she could figure out what she was doing. A huge rush of relief hit her, her shoulders relaxing, and tears began to pool in her eyes.

"Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow," Allienna said as she turned to leave, not sure what she was supposed to do until then.

She continued to walk and decided that she needed a place to rest. Her body was tired from the flight, and pain from hunger stabbed into her abdomen, reminding her that a baby needed nourishment. She wasn't immortal now; she needed to take better care of herself, and her aching body would not let her forget about it.

Allienna passed an older brick building with a large unlit electric sign that looked as if it might have been bought secondhand, announcing that she was at the Saint Mission. There was a line of people wrapping themselves around the building. Allienna recognized the look in all of their eyes.

Hunger.

"Excuse me," she went up to a thin woman who looked to be in her sixties, sporting two braided pigtails and a colorful yet worn vest. "What is this line for?"

"For food." The old woman smiled, yet her eyes remained sad. "And shelter if you don't have any place to sleep for the night like me."

Allienna thanked her and, following the pain in her belly, walked around the side of the building to stand in the line. After waiting an hour and watching colorful scenes play out with some patrons in the line, she reached the front. A young woman with a name tag reading volunteer made eye contact with her and cocked her head, likely noticing the clothes that she wore.

"We are out of beds for the night but are happy to provide you with a meal just inside," she said, ushering Allienna inside to a meek food hall where bowls of rice and chili were served from plastic folded up tables holding an array of electric crock pots.

Once the ache in her stomach subsided, Allienna left the building and walked down a path that highlighted the river. The sun had begun to set, and a small bridge nearby was illuminated, painting a scene of serenity before her.

Finding a patch of grass covered by a few trees, Allienna sat down, letting her body sink into the earth. Her exhaustion had reached its peak, and with a heavy heart and a whisper of love towards the life that grew inside her, she closed her eyes and slept.

The sunrise brought warmth to her face the next morning, and she was surprised to see two other humans sleeping around her on cardboard boxes and blankets. It seemed like she had picked a good spot. Allienna stood, her back stiff and her stomach heavier, dusting any earth and grass off of her. She was cold and sweaty at the same time. She needed to clean up.

Walking back to the mission, the volunteers let her into the building to shower and eat breakfast; the smell of sausage and eggs alone almost gave Allienna cause to weep. There was even a pile of donated clothes that a gray-haired man helped her sort through until they found a black button-down shirt, a pair of black maternity pants, and worn-out running shoes that made her stand out a lot less in public. She left the parka and the snow boots with the rest of the donations, just in case she could return the favor somehow.

Allienna left the mission feeling like a new person.

"We can do this," she said to her belly and, with a new determination and direction in her step, sauntered down the street, making her way back towards the barbershop.

Once she stood in front of the storefront, the floor-to-ceiling windows looking into a dark, uninhabited retail space made her heart sink. Was she early, or did something happen?

"A woman after my own heart," Allienna jumped at the voice and saw Paisley walking up to the entrance, pulling out a jingling set of keys. "You're early, I like that. And you lost the parka. I'd say we are starting great."

Paisley turned to wink and Allienna, and she could feel her cheeks heat up. Unable to come up with anything to say, she giggled, suddenly realizing she was nervous.

Allienna followed Paisley inside. The low thump of both pairs of sneakers seemed like thunder against the black and white mixed tile in the otherwise silent storefront. Paisley left her alone in the middle of the room as she scuttled over to the back and went behind a black curtain. The lights turned on, and the energizing zing of the electric guitar was pushed through the speakers in the ceiling before Paisley reappeared just a moment later.

"Right, well, let's show you around," she said, gesturing for Allienna to join her in a tour around the space. Twenty minutes later, a man with short, black spiked hair walked through the door, beaming at the sight of Paisley, his single gold hoop earring glistening in the light of the window.

"Zade, I've got a recruit here following you around today," Paisley told the man, tilting her head toward Allienna.

"Oh, great, some new blood to recruit into our cult," he said. "Do you work with short hair often?"

Allienna wasn't mentally prepared with her story and instinctually told the truth, shaking her head no.

"That's okay. These cosmetology schools only teach on mannequins these days with cheap costume wigs, I understand. We can break your virginity here in just a few minutes." Zade walked to the back area behind the curtain and returned with a rolling cart of supplies. Moments later, the front door opened, and a customer came in.

"You must be the eleven o'clock, here to deflower my new girl here!" Zade winked at her. The male customer didn't notice the comment, pulling out the headphones from his ears and checking in with Paisley behind the desk.

The customer sat down in the first chair on the left-hand side, as directed by Zade.

"If you could just even my situation out," he instructed Zade and Allienna, not knowing who to address. "I used to have a buzz cut, and it's been a solid year since I've been in so it's just a mop." He put his headphones back in, deaf to the world around him, and Zade handed Allienna a black cape to drape over him to keep the hair from sticking to his clothes as it fell.

"Alright, this one should be easy; carts are all set up for you, so I'll just let you do your thing and see how it goes," Zade said, popping into the empty chair behind her and lounging out.

Allienna's heart thumped. She had no idea what she was doing. She looked at the tools on the tray before her, picking up an electric razor and turning it on and back off a few times as it sent tingles throughout her whole body.

"That kind of power can be addicting," Paisley joked over her shoulder, watching Allienna play .

Allienna felt the heat in her cheeks again. There was something about Paisley that made her feel childlike, and she wasn't sure if she liked it.

"Here goes nothing . . ." She took a deep breath and pressed the razor to the client's scalp before jumping back and gasping at the shaven head in front of her face.

"I am so sorry!" She looked back at Zade, horrified. "The baby kicked, and it startled me," she lied again, trying to avoid any suspicion of her total inexperience.

"Baby?" Paisley asked, surprised from the counter. "I had no idea that you were pregnant."

Allienna shrugged her shoulders and grimaced, the people pleaser in her now suddenly worried that, too, would be a problem that she hadn't considered before.

"Ah, don't worry about it. There's very little you can fuck up that I can't fix," Zade said, spinning his chair in a circle. "Take a breath and keep going. You're just shaving his head down."

Allienna did as she was told and took a breath before bringing the razor back up to the client's scalp, the slight hum of the tool purring in her ear as hair fell toward her feet, hitting the floor.

***

A few months had passed, the colors of the tree leaves turning brown, and Allienna's feet crunched as she walked the sidewalk into the barbershop. She was more than comfortable with a razor in her hand now despite her now large belly getting in the way.

"How's the new place?" Paisley asked Allienna as they entered the shop front on a late winter morning.

"I just cannot believe that we got here," Allienna replied, swinging an apron over her body and getting ready for the day's work. "I have a shitty car and a tiny house in a shitty neighborhood, but it's all mine. I created that for this baby by myself."

Paisley looked at Allienna's pregnant belly with apparent discomfort.

"Well, not all by myself, of course. I couldn't be here if you hadn't taken a chance on me," she said, walking up to Paisley, taking her hands in hers. Allienna felt the tension, the ache pulled out of Paisley's body. Paisley's want for her, need for her, struck all of Allienna's sensitive spots. The constant rush of hormones in the last trimester wasn't helping, but Allienna often thought about Paisley's lips. The piercing on that bottom lip they had . . . what would it be like if she pulled it with her teeth?

Allienna blushed at the thought and dropped Paisley's hands immediately, turning around to busy herself with setting up the shop.

"I can't believe you are going through this alone. That you'll be raising a baby alone," Paisley said, eyes at their feet.

"She's got us, honey," Zade said, walking in through the door as loudly as possible with a gorgeous smile spreading on his face. "I expect to see a little toddler running through here stirring up as much trouble as possible."

The day progressed as Allienna had grown used to. She worked through four clients before taking a lunch break, treating herself at a deli she'd found wandering the block during her first week working at the barbershop. She returned from lunch and helped Zade bleach the tips of a man's hair, which took the rest of the day.

She packed up before saying goodbye to Zade and Paisley and walked to the car she'd bought with cash saved up from tips, a black Toyota sedan that may have looked old ten years ago. It drove, that was the important thing, and it had the proper safety measures needed to install a car seat she already proudly had sitting in the back middle seat.

Allienna hadn't thought about the life that she left much, especially since she had been so focused on figuring out how to provide for her unborn child. Now that the countdown was on and human doctors had given her scans and blood tests, poking her in every place that she did not want to be touched by strangers, she knew she was ready. Allienna was feeling good. She was ecstatic. This had been all she ever had wanted.

The drive from downtown Sacramento to her new rental house was about thirty-five minutes. Allienna had the windows down, even in March, and preferred to drive silently. The radio in her car often didn't cooperate, often getting stuck on a tape that didn't want to turn off.

She felt the baby kick often now, small hands and feet sliding along the inside lining of her stomach as if they were trying to reach out to her. She tried to touch them back, often not fast enough for the proper hello, but Allienna felt so much love inside her that was all hers and no one else's.

Pulling into a suburban street and then the driveway, Allienna exited the car to approach her front door. She'd signed a lease for the next two years, and her landlord gave her a lower deposit for an extended term. She was settled; this was home.

She walked into the living room, still full of boxes and a secondhand couch that Paisley helped her find off of something called the internet.

It had been two glorious days since the keys were put in her hands. Two glorious nights since she could afford not to sleep in her car while showering at the mission. Seeing the sympathy of the volunteers as her pregnancy progressed had been unbearable for her. Having to hide all of this from her co-workers and her friends had been logistically difficult.

Still figuring out what free time now looked like with all her basic needs met, Allienna rubbed her achy lower back and dug for a novel in one of the boxes filled with gently used items that Paisley had insisted she needed at home. Allienna didn't quite understand why she needed a foot-high statue of a frog holding an umbrella, but she supposed that humans appreciated their knickknacks more than they appreciated their minimalism.

The kicking in her belly seemed to intensify, and after Allienna found her hardcover fantasy book and sat on the couch, she was surprised to feel the balloon underneath her shirt harden, rock-hard to the touch. She felt so uncomfortable, sweating and feeling a small amount of vomit creep up the back of her throat before swallowing it back down.

She pushed her hair out of her face, rolling back and forth until her bottom reached the edge of the couch cushion and she could manage to stand, hands on her knees and panting.

She gagged again, suppressing it, and then took a step forward before feeling a river flow in between her legs, gushing wetness with every small movement. A contraction took over her body, beads of sweat trickling down her brow as she moved with the measured breaths of labor.