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To be completely honest, Trinity Santos had no idea why she felt like a total fraud. The competition the day before had been perfectly flawless: she competed in two apparatuses and won medals in both. It was the first competition in a long time where she had people in the audience cheering and waiting for her at the end of the routines to celebrate, and yet...
And yet, there she was, 24 hours later, sprawled on what she now considered her own bed, trying to focus as much as possible on the galaxy of fluorescent star stickers glued to the bedroom ceiling. The stars didn't form any specific constellation, but it was in them that Trinity found an anchor every night before sleep.
She reimagined and repositioned each one in her own head, keeping her mind fixed on something tangible, even if too far from her own fingertips. Everything had been so comfortable since she arrived at the new house, and she just wanted a new wound to open so she could poke it and feel the pain spread, making it all feel truly real.
Maybe she was ungrateful, trying to clean the dirt from her own body while failing to flush her own hurts down the drain, but who the hell could blame her for not feeling worthy of so much comfort? Trinity didn't consider herself worthy of any of the soft moments she shared during meals at the table with Robby and Jack. She felt even less deserving of the little moments when their evident affection overflowed and invaded her own carefully built walls.
She remembers crying before bed on the sixth day, when Robby came home from work with a new blue bottle in the same shade as her bag, talking about how she needed to stay hydrated as an athlete. She held back her own sobs on the ninth day when Jack prepared a full jar of lumpia beans for her to take to training. There were so many small gestures, like the compliments on the movie she chose, or the way they sat beside her, asking about school and offering help with her own homework.
The top row of bricks in the wall she had built came crashing down definitively the day before. The soft moment in the bathroom was what actually loosened the first brick: the way they supported her the whole way to the competition, the evident excitement in their eyes, the way they insisted she pick a place to celebrate afterward, and how they showered her with praise. Those were good reasons, but Trin recognizes that the row slid definitively at the end of the day, when, with the gentleness of picking up a baby, the two adults enveloped her in cozy hugs before bed.
She didn't know if she deserved this all this affection and compassion, the quiet and discreet care that came with recognizing the time she woke up, the way she excessively loved the fresh juices Robby made, and suddenly there was always a full bottle ready to put in her school bag every morning.
She couldn't understand what she had done to deserve it. Because she was still the same Trinity Santos who couldn't say she loved her mom back before leaving, the same one who had excessive difficulty fitting in with the other kids in the temporary homes. She was still the same crybaby girl who listened to her mother's screams, so it didn't make sense.
Why did they keep being so good to her, when no one else in the last few years had been? What was different now? Was this what it meant to be genuinely wanted by someone?
Her gaze unfocused from the ceiling when she noticed the metallic taste flooding her own mouth, along with the saltiness of her own tears. Damn, she hadn't even realized when she started crying.
As she forced herself to sit up on the messy duvet, she noticed how the room seemed more alive every day. The desk was filled with her own school supplies, the blue backpack full of embroidery hung on the chair, the duck on the chair now had mini sunglasses she had made in the last art class, the wardrobe was filled with clothes from the backpack and her gymnastics gear, the larger suitcase leaning in the corner still waiting to be unpacked.
There was more life there than on the first day. It was an inhabited room, not just by her as a physical person; her own essence seemed to overflow around the space. It felt like home.
Home was like that: safe, comfortable enough for the doors to stay open even when she wasn't inside, comfortable enough for her own body to recognize it as a truly safe place to relax and allow herself to cry.
Trinity noticed that since arriving, she's cried more. Her body relaxes in bed, and she lets the tears of frustration stream down her face. She knows that if Robby and Jack come in, they won't scold her for crying; that silent certainty that the welcome will be instant and safe.
It's all so safe. She wants to stay here forever, get lost in the rooms of this house, until it's easy to call it home.
Damn, she's pretty dramatic sometimes.
Trinity lets the tears dry on their own and the blood mix into her own saliva as she turns over, curling up more in her own blanket, before finally letting sleep take her.
Robby pauses on his way to his own room when he notices Trin's door open. He can't help but peek, and he watches the way the girl's body bundles up in the covers like a burrito. Her hair is a soft, tangled mess, and he smiles at how calm she looks.
Only the quiet of the night notices the small tear that escapes him with the realization that she feels safe enough now to fall asleep with the door completely open. He and Jack are doing well in making this house a home for three.