I flopped into bed, utterly burnt out.

Once we'd managed to get Manu into the car, he looked up the health system's website and found the shortest wait time in the city's urgent care centres. The best one turned out to be at the university hospital, so I essentially drove myself home. So after getting Manu settled and ready for a several-hour-long sit until he could see a doctor, he told me that I might as well head out, go get lunch, hang out with my dormmates. Sitting in an urgent care centre waiting room with a bunch of sick and injured people didn't really interest me, but I still asked Manu about five times if he was sure.

He was.

I was grateful, honestly. He didn't need me there being nerdy and nervous and tired while he was trying to not hurt. He promised to keep me updated, I left the car parked in the hospital lot, and I walked the seven minutes between hospital and dormitory. During that walk, every muscle I had used and overused over the previous twenty-or-so hours started to complain, not aching, but just being slow. I felt heavy. My clothes felt heavy. Kicking my shoes off in my dorm room felt like removing a ten-kilo weight from each leg, and with that sort of freedom on offer, complete nudity was just a must.

Lying in my own bed, on top the covers, naked as the day I was born, felt like floating on a cloud.

I only allowed myself a short rest there, though. I was still messy, I still had food and fluid and blood and sweat and grime on me that I wanted off me. That meant a shower. So, once the worst of the exhaustion had worn off, I wrapped myself in towel and bathrobe and headed down the hall.

Regina was there, sitting on the bench, naked except for a towel on her lap, her back to me. She seemed startled when I came in and turned suddenly, only to breathe a sigh of relief when she saw it was me, which I really didn't understand. She was holding something in her hand, but I couldn't really see it as she turned.

"Oh good," she said. "It's you. I've been hoping to..." she hesitated. I waited. "To talk to you, right?"

"Ah... yeah, okay, what's up?" I asked, letting the door close behind me. "It's not like I'm not around, so..."

"Yeah but... I mean, one-on-one." She stood, holding her towel at her waist with her left hand as she turned to face me. I could tell, then, that it was her phone in her right. "Without anyone else around."

"Is this the best place for that?" I asked. "Like, wouldn't you rather—"

"I don't care. I mean, I don't care, though I kinda get if you do? But I mean, when else are we gonna be alone? And I mean, I know this isn't really the place, but this is kinda the moment? I..." She paused, taking a breath. "Look, there's something in here, you know? There's... This space feels like... I..." She shrugged. "I have been making up excuses to take showers. And not just for others, for myself, too. I've been doing more jogging than I've ever done in my life just so I get sweaty. And it's probably really good for me, right, but... This... The shower room, I mean, it feels like..."

I listened, interested, while she collected her thoughts.

She put the phone down on the bench and used both hands to secure the towel around her waist, an action that seemed more like a nervous habit than anything. "It's like a sanctuary."

Regina seemed to be waiting for me to respond, maybe expecting me to laugh at the statement. I wasn't in a place to laugh at that, and I don't think I ever would have been. "What do you mean?"

"Okay, so." She took a deep breath and played with the damp hair over her right ear. "There are just some places where I'm—where I feel safe. Where I can..." She sighed. "Sorry, I'm about to talk religion and I don't know if... I feel God here," she said, as if it was the final thing she had to say, as if those four words were stuck in her throat and they just came loose at that moment.

I didn't really know what to say.

Regina seemed to take my silence as a request for clarification, and I could understand that. "My home church is a place like that, and yeah, even the university chapel I went to last week, but I can't go there all the time, but here..." She sighed. "The other day it started to feel like that, and the problem is it also feels like you."

That spurred me into speech. "Like me? Wait, how do you know what I feel like?"

"It feels like the other day, when you were talking about your time with Manu, and I..." She stopped herself there.

I didn't think I ought to pursue that line of inquiry. "Okay, so what does this all mean?"

"I dunno, really. But it felt like something we should talk about, right? Like... what are you doing? What did you do to us? What did you do here?" She stepped a little closer. "What did you do to me?"

In her voice, I could hear confusion, curiosity... but no fear.

I gave the only honest reply I could. "I don't really know."

"But you know it was something."

I nodded. "It's a long story."

"Yeah well," she said with a sigh. "There's a lot of long stories going around at the moment." Regina sat back down, whipping the towel off like it was the most natural thing in the world and putting it around her shoulders. "You know, there's something I do know that you know... yeah. You and Rita. You both... you know, right?"

A few days ago. I had spontaneously spoken poetry in the lounge. Eight women were entranced by my reading. And later, after some conversation, I looked over at Rita, and a flash of insight passed between, and I knew that Regina wanted to go to bed early to have some time by herself, where she could take the heat I'd inspired and turn it into a needed release.

I knew what it was that she knew that I knew. "Yeah," I said.

"How? How do you know? How do I know that you know?" Those words felt like they ought to be anxious, accusatory, afraid, something like that, but no, there was just more curiosity, more questioning. That was almost worse.

"That's what I've been struggling with for the past month, right?" I said. "All this... this-ness of it. It's so much bigger than I am. Bigger than Rita, too. Than all of us."

"Yeah, that's what I'm coming to figure." The soccer player closed her eyes, and I noticed just how muscular she was, now that I wasn't subconsciously watching her face. "So at least I know there's something going on. That's... well it's a relief to know it's not just me."

I nodded, not that she could see me. "That can be important, as a way to... cope, I guess."

"Sure, but..." her eyes opened, and I felt for a moment that she had caught me staring at her breasts. "I don't know. I don't know what I'm coping with, right? Or even that I should cope."

I tried a different tack. "So... when you're here, what do you feel, exactly?"

"Warm," Regina replied immediately. "And not just temperature-warm. Warm in my heart, just by being here. It's the same kinda warm I get in those religious spaces, like I said, which is why I call this a 'sanctuary,' right? And that comes from something about those places, not just the way they're built or the music in them or the art they're decorated with, there's something in them that makes me comfortable. Makes me want to be here. Gives me a chance to just breathe and find myself. I... I'm not super religious, you know, but I am a believer, and these sorts of places are kind of important for me to... to find worship. So I guess," she finished with a little twisted smile, "that I come here to pray."

"Huh," I said, not sure how to respond.

"Kind of what I was doin' with this," she continued, pointing to her phone. "Daily meditations. And, uh... while I'm here..."

I don't know why she did it. I don't know if she knew why she did it. But she opened her camera roll, and there was an artistic nude photograph of the dark-skinned anthropology student—though certainly she looked much more like a soccer star in the picture—in a relaxed, well-lit selfie pose, showing off everything of her muscular body.

She held the phone out to me, and I took it, in a bit of a meditative trance myself, and started scrolling through pictures. The blue towel Regina currently had around her shoulders made several appearances, sometimes giving her a moment of modesty, sometimes not. I was a little surprised at how little deliberate sexiness there was in the images; her body was on display, but it was the whole of her body, with as much if not more emphasis on her sculpted dancer's legs and her wiry arms than on her pert breasts or her peachfuzz-covered mound.

"You're such a good photographer," I said, moving through the images. "It's amazing what you can do with just a camera phone and this basic lighting."

"Thank you," Regina said, reaching for her phone. "It seems like, the past little bit, whenever I'm in one of these sanctuary places I just want to take pictures. And not just of me!" She flipped through more of the pictures as I moved to stand next to her and showed me some religious images. Stained glass and a crucifix and a black man (I assumed a priest or minister) in full white robes with a bright rainbow stole over his shoulders that draped down to his waist, every picture taken at a precise angle and with natural but somehow ideal lighting. "It's just that in here," she said, putting the phone back down, "there's really not much to shoot, you know? Except me. And, well, now..."

She looked at me. I flushed. "What?"

"Oh come on! You'd make a great subject! And there's no one else here."

No one else here? It was then that it hit me that Regina had been naked the entire time.

"Oh. Oh. You don't..." I stepped back. "You want to take..." My voice dropped to a whisper. "Naked pictures of me?"

"Yeah! Well, and pictures in the robe, and in the towel, and maybe some selfies together, you know?" The enthusiasm in her voice made it difficult not to get drawn in.

Still, I resisted. "How about not right now? I have to be ready to go when Manu needs me. But we can plan it for another day, if you like."

Her eyes widened. "Oh yeah, that'd be even better. Maybe there a couple girls we could get together? I could scrounge up some equipment, maybe get some outdoor shots or..." she paused, and smirked at me. "I think I'm starting to sound a little weird."

Starting? I thought to myself. I matched her expression. "You're starting to sound passionate," I replied. "Since when are you a photographer?"

She shrugged. "Since never. Since like a week now? Since you gave us that nice reading in the lounge, maybe? Since I started to feel I could find sanctuary somewhere other than my home church?"

"Huh, yeah, sanctuary. Do you feel that in the lounge?"

She shook her head. "No, it's... it's different there, sure, it's nice, but it's not a quiet space of safety and reflection, it's a meeting place. Wouldn't meditate there, y'know?"

"What about your dorm room?"

She wrinkled her nose. "Uh. No, not really. Not yet, anyway? I guess it needs more... sanctuary-stuff." She sat again. "There's also something that's not really sacred about it, you know? If anything it's almost the opposite." A hint of embarrassment crept into her voice. "Especially since... well, yeah. And we're back to, 'how do you know?' and 'how do I know you know?' right?"

There was a click in my head as puzzle pieces snapped together. "I don't know about that. We don't just go around having sex all over the place. We kind of need that sanctuary space if we're going to indulge ourselves." I, finally, hung up my towel. "So when you went off to your room, you went to a safe place where you could privately... I hesitate to say 'meditate,' but you kind of were. You were thinking about words and feelings and emotions, and you were..." I stretched for words to continue the analogy.

"... Participating in ritual," Regina said softly. "I... I can't think of it, of that, as worship, but ritual, sure."

I wasn't about to question her framing. "So maybe your room is a sanctuary, but it's not looking like one yet, or not feeling like one yet. Different sanctuaries have different functions, right?"

"Hmm... Pictures here, worship in chapel, touching myself in my room?"

"Yeah, I think that's probably a little simplified, but that's what I had in mind." I shrugged. "You took a bunch of pictures in the chapel, too. And you were worshipping here. And you probably do... I dunno, bible readings or something in your room, too?"

"And I've taken a picture or two, yeah." Regina seemed to be thinking. "I guess you don't just do your writing in your bedroom, yeah?"

I took a bit of a breath. "These days, I, uh. It feels like the whole world is my sanctuary." I thought about flowers and steam, and about being naked under the stars, and about waking up mid-orgasm from a powerful dream, and even about reciting in the lounge.

"Wow," Regina said, and her eyes had the astonished look of a child being amazed at the possibilities of adulthood. Behind that look, though, I could almost see the gears turning and ideas forming. And behind those...

There was fire.

"Thank you," she said, and before I could react, Regina grabbed her towel, kissed me on the cheek, and ran out of the shower room.

For some reason, the flames in the back of my mind were laughing, and I didn't really appreciate it.

I also started to feel oddly out of place, as I took off my bathrobe. I was naked in someone else's sacred space and it kind of felt like I shouldn't be, even if that sacred space was just the second floor shower, and it was probably only sacred because of my poetry from the other night.

It was maybe the first time since returning to university that normal nudity felt uncomfortable. Given how often abnormal nudity had felt comfortable, it was downright odd. I didn't linger, just got myself clean and dried off. While I wasn't anticipating he'd be done anytime soon, I wanted to be ready to go help Manu as soon as he was done with the doctor. It gave me something else to think about, beyond the discomfort, and beyond the little patch of warmth where Regina's lips met my skin.

I could still feel it when I got back to the lounge, wrapped in my robe, towel over one shoulder. Saturday afternoon, I wasn't too surprised to see Kammy, Rita, and Soleil there, along with perpetually-joined-at-the-hip couple Azure and Levinia. It had been a week since I had recited the poem that sent the five of them into what Rita called an 'erotic trance.'

Levinia noticed me first and gave an oversized wave. "Heya! How are you doing?"

I sighed. "Kinda shitty," I said, honestly. "Let me get dressed first and I'll come chat?"

"Of course," Azure said. "Boy trouble?"

"That's why I never have anything to do with them," Levinia added with a giggle.

"I mean, kind of?" I said. "Not really, not relationship—you know, it's just way easier if I get changed first and I'll tell you."

"Sounds good!"

The sound of the conversation resuming followed me into my bedroom.

My door closed, shutting out that noise and leaving me alone in—

My sanctuary.

I hadn't lied to Regina. I felt like the whole world was sanctuary to me, but...

This space, here, was where I met the Presence, over and over again. Where She felt closest to me, and where She seemed to want to speak to me with no one else around. Rita was ready to share her experience of the Presence with me any time, any place, and I would make contact with the Presence wherever it felt right, but my dorm room was where the Presence made contact with me. In dreams, in meditations, in...

In the damnable image of fire sitting open on my desk.

"Why," I whispered, "are you coming to my sanctuary just to keep throwing me out of it?"

I imagined the reply. The Presence never spoke to me so clearly, so I knew it had to be my own voice. You're not meant to hide in here. You're meant to be out there.

But then the bathrobe came off and I felt. Manu was close, waiting. So was Rita. Soleil, Kammy, Azure, Levinia. Even Regina. My mind drifted to the sort of picture she might take of me, the poses she might ask, the display she might make of my body. And in that moment, the sweatshirts I wore to be comfortable felt... wrong. Like the shape of my body, generally unattractive as I felt it to be with my small bust, weird curves, and chubbiness, just shouldn't be hidden. It didn't make me any more excited to show it off, but it felt like I needed to.

I fought that urge, hard. Firstly, I didn't have much else that wasn't fancy evening wear that was appropriate, and as much as those women were friends and I was comfortable around them, I wasn't about to just go sit out there naked.

With a few words, though, they wouldn't notice, or wouldn't care.

Those sorts of thoughts didn't help at all.

Or maybe they'd even join you.

And those sorts of thoughts presented a completely different problem.

But also, that idea allowed me to solidify my action through my own sense of morals. Making that happen would take an intentionality that really felt wrong. Putting a song out into the world like Tempest did and having it incidentally affect people in unexpected ways was very different from walking out into a space and imposing my will using my artistry, knowing what it could do, without the permission of those affected. And understanding all of that made me wonder, just briefly, if knowing what I could do meant that just shouldn't do it anymore, but that thought was stifled almost immediately. I didn't have to stop, I just had to take care.

So I got dressed, discomfort with heavy sweatshirt and all. Just a normal day that started with passionate sex over breakfast, continued with my boyfriend waiting to see a doctor for a brutal cut on his foot, and was now my having a philosophical discussion with myself about the morality of creating art that I knew could impact people in very strange ways.

Before I put a hand to the door handle, I did briefly wonder at the power that would be required to turn Ellen Barker dormitory into a permanent nude celebration of the feminine form. Maybe that was a hypothetical to discuss with Rita sometime. Not to implement, of course, just a thought experiment about what we'd need and what we'd have to do to make it happen. I imagined the sapphic seer would be interested in that for more than purely aesthetic reasons.

The casual words, "Yeah, I'd be in then," greeted me when I stepped out into the lounge. They were spoken by Azure, and greeted by a cheer from Levinia and a smattering of applause and laughter.

Regina had joined the group, now dressed much like I was in an oversized t-shirt and black track pants. She was leaning on the couch that Azure and Levinia were sitting on, and she received a high five from Levinia just as I closed my door behind me.

"Oh hey, we were just kinda talking about you," Kammy said. "Regina's suddenly got this photography bug, apparently."

I looked at Rita, who just smiled knowingly back at me.

"We were wondering if you'd be part of a photo shoot," Levinia said. "Azure only agreed if I'd be there."

"What are we talking about here?" I asked, pretty sure that I knew what was coming.

Regina shrugged. "Like we discussed. Finding a small, comfortable well-lit space, and taking a bunch of pictures—"

Levinia interrupted. "—with or without clothes!" She sounded delighted by the idea.

I glanced around the room. Levinia and Regina were obviously enthused, and so was Soleil. I couldn't read Rita's expression, but it wasn't negative. Kammy seemed intrigued, and Azure resigned.

"I guess your passion for the subject is persuasive," I said to Regina as I sat down, a bit of a smile on my own face.

"Well, I don't know that I would have been half as convincing without Rita helping out." Regina grinned. "Then once Levinia joined in..."

"I didn't agree until peer pressure won out," Azure said, looking pointedly at Kammy. "And trust me, you're not going to win against it."

"That's not all I wouldn't win against, I'm guessing," I replied, directing my comment to Rita.

"Oh, you don't have to," Rita said in a tone that suggested that I absolutely would agree.

I shrugged, trying to be casual. "Sure, I'll be your sixth subject, time permitting." I paused as another small celebration passed. "Hey, Regina, can I chat with you privately for a sec?"

The budding photographer nodded. "Yeah, sure. Your room?"

"That's what I was thinking." We ducked quickly out of the lounge. I wanted to address what was happening, what Rita and I and Soleil were involved in, without letting the other two know and without Rita interrupting.

"What's up?" Regina asked, as the door closed.

I sat on my bed. "Are you ... are you really sure you—"

"Yep." That was it. No fuss, no question, just the affirmative.

"I just—"

"Whoa," Regina exclaimed, cutting me off. Her eyes were locked on the sketchbook on my desk, the picture of the flames that I couldn't seem to keep from leaving open those days. "That's..."

I waited. She was clearly going through something.

She walked over to look at the page. "That... that's it. That's it right there. That's what I want to photograph. Not..." her tone turned apologetic, "not literally that. But there's... God, what is that? I don't... I can't... It's... it's like the shower room again. This place..."

I maybe should have been more surprised that she started to peel off her shirt.

"It's sanctuary, isn't it," Regina said, reverently, not questioning anything as she removed her track pants. I watched, curious, not about to stop her; vaguely, the advice I'd been given to never wake a sleepwalker (not that I'd known any sleepwalkers) drifted to my mind. She put a gentle hand on my drawing, using her other hand to push her bright red panties down enough for them to fall to the floor, leaving her standing there, fingertips on my sketchbook, wearing only the bright red bra that perfectly matched the underwear currently on the floor.

"This picture. It's..." Though I couldn't see her fingers on the page, I could tell that she was tracing the lines of smoke, the half-formed, half-concealed letters that told me what I needed to remember from the dream it had come from, and I could see that it was telling her something else. "This is where it all comes from, huh. Well, no, not this, but what this is pointing to. This is a... a window. A dark stained-glass window we're looking through, into a huge cathedral. Even if it was clear, we'd still only see the tiniest part of the inside, and it's not, it's coloured, it's..." She took a deep breath, clearly in awe.

"I thought I was the poet here," I joked, and Regina laughed. Her hand came off the paper and she unhooked her bra as she turned, exposing her breasts to me for the second time in about an hour. Naked, she spun on a dancer's toe and sat next to me on the bed.

"You're taking all this well," Regina said, putting a hand on my knee.

"I... am?" I asked. "I didn't know there was a way to take a new friend coming into my room, having a religious experience, and getting naked."

"No I mean... everything. If this is what you've been going through since you came back to school, it's... yeah, wow, it's definitely something, right?"

"So," I said, turning a bit towards her and trying not to look. The kiss on the cheek she'd given me earlier burned. "What are you feeling?"

"Oh, dear poet," she replied, her voice full of a sincere awe. "I have this... urge, this..." Her leg started to shake. "I just need to move, right now. I need to..." She got up and just stood, quivering a bit. "Like David bringing the Ark into the city. I want to dance."

And she did.

In that tiny space, between my bed and my desk, with barely enough room for the two of us to move about comfortably, she spun and turned and twisted, never missing a single step, making her strength and power clear as well as her skill and technique. And her passion. Her years of training were absolutely evident. I wish I could describe it better, but it was probably the most impressive demonstration of physical prowess I'd ever seen, especially up close. I could see why the soccer team wanted her, and I could see what she loved so much about dancing, and I could also see that fire I was so familiar with pulsing through her body.

And thought there was no music playing in my room, I could hear the sound that Regina was dancing to, and of course it was Fly From the Flames. I could almost make out the lyrics in her steps.

It was beautiful. There was no other word for the display. Beautiful. The word escaped my lips as the first-year student sunk to her knees, placed her hands on the bed right beside me, and lowered her head. She was breathing heavily, and I could understand why.

I tentatively reached out and put my hand on her head. I could feel the heat there. Physical. Spiritual.

Sexual.

"That was..." Regina said through her gulping in air, and I could hear the edge of tears in her voice. "Thank you. Thank you so much. So much." I didn't know if she was addressing that to me, to the Presence, or to something or someone else entirely. Or to all of us.

Neither of us moved for a long moment.

"This is a blessing," she said, now finally shifting. I let her go and she sat on the floor, her back against the desk, legs splayed wide, hands resting on top of her head. The faint scent of sweat and sex drifted through the air. "There's such... a clarity in it. It's almost magical."

Instantly, in the middle of that breath, I had envy. The flame had brought me confusion and complication. It had brought me wonderful things, too, fantastic creativity, an amazing relationship, close friendships, astonishing adventure, but clarity? Definitely not that, no matter how much I begged for it.

"I can almost feel my schedule just settling in," Regina continued, not helping. "There's room in there for dance. And photography. And... and..." She leaned forward a bit like she was sharing a secret. Her hands dropped to the floor and her flexibility went on full display as she bent from the waist with her back straight. "I can see my future stretching out. Potential futures. My plans, anyway, are..." She looked up at me. "I came here with no idea of what I wanted to do. The soccer scholarship gave me a place to go, yeah, but no idea what I wanted to study, and soccer here isn't a career, right? Especially women's soccer. So I took a few courses that looked interesting and anthropology called out to me but really, in my soul..."

The total trust in her eyes made my heart hurt, and not in a bad way.

"Four years," she said. "Bachelor of Arts, theology and anthropology. And then, into the ministry."

She reached out a hand to me and I helped her up. "Ministry?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said, spinning again on her toe to sit next to me. It was a singular, perfect gesture that was full of artistry and hope.

"This doesn't... this whole thing doesn't shake your faith or whatever?"

Regina shook her head. "No, but I can see how you might think so." Her hands tapped on the bed and she adopted a wonder-filled expression. "This isn't Jesus. It's not God. It's a way to those things, to those concepts, for me."

Fully-formed philosophy in a few seconds. I was jealous.

"Art's always a path to religion, right? Or a religious path to worship. Or whatever. Doesn't matter, right? Like I said, I feel like David, dancing for the Lord." Her feet were tapping in odd patterns I couldn't really follow, but I could tell were the rhythm of some dance she was experiencing as she spoke. "Like five years ago I decided I wanted to be a priest, and that's always been in the back of my mind, but I never..." She turned to me. "You're the first person I've ever told this. Ever."

I nodded, waiting for her to continue. Feeling jealous transitioned to, and lived side-by-side with, feeling honoured.

"I did some bits of research for myself, but didn't really know how I wanted to go about it. I just sort of focused on the thing in front of me, right? So school, where I did pretty good, and dance, where I was pretty good, and soccer because it was fun and I got the scholarship. And I don't plan to stop playing soccer, I can keep doing that until my body breaks down, right?" She giggled. "But now, school has a very clear path. A choreography, you know? There's a dance there, too. I know what information I need, the people I probably need to talk to... And what I have to do for the next, oh, decade or so." Regina's grin was both self-teasing and genuine.

"I wish I could find that," I said, honestly.

Regina's expression got serious. "I don't think you're meant to," she said, and my heart sank. "At least not right away. I can feel the confusion in you. I just wanna hug it right out of you, but I don't think that'll really help. And I mean, I felt that confusion myself, when I saw your picture, but it was a moment of fog that just lifted away and everything was cleared, but you... you're living in the fog, huh."

And then she did hug me, pressing her naked body against me, and I wondered when it was that I took my own clothes off. We held each other there for a moment, on my bed, and part of me wanted things to go further than that, but neither of us were moving in any other direction. Stereotypical university experimentation or not, having only had my first girl-girl makeout the evening before while under the influence of mind-altering artistry that left me with practically no clear memory of it, it was hardly the moment to try to move the needle on my sexuality from 'straight' to 'bi.'

I heard my door open and close quietly, but neither of us moved. Without looking, I said, "Hello, Rita."

A little laugh came from entrance. "Two friends hugging it out naked? That sounds like exactly my moment to step in."

The three of us giggled as Regina and I separated. "Guess we should get dressed, huh?" Regina said.

"Probably, yeah, because there's a text message about to come in—"

As if on cue, my phone pinged.

"—and Manu needs you," Rita finished.

I smiled as I stood up and stretched. "You know how frustrating that whole 'seer' thing is?" I said, smiling.

"Yep, you've mentioned."

"Hey, hold on," Regina said as I picked up my phone. "There's a perfect picture here. Wanna give your boyfriend a fun tease?"

I have no idea why I agreed. I have no idea why Rita agreed to join us. I just know that my reply to Manu was that I'd be a few minutes, and it featured a gloriously artistic, casual photo of the three of us, lounging, laughing, naked on my dorm bed.