Solarium Girl: A Devotion

The salon opens at ten, but I awaken before the lights flicker on.

I feel the sun through the smudged glass of the storefront—the real sun, too far away to matter. Here, in this suburban pocket of Los Angeles where the air smells like pink bubblegum and exhaustion, no one wants the real thing. They want me. They want the version of themselves they imagine beneath my lid. Bronze. Glossy. Invincible. And I give it to them. Every time.

I know them all. The bride-to-be with the uneven arms who cries when she thinks no one hears. The teen who reads magazines until the plastic melts under her palms. The woman who tans nude and always hums “Material Girl.” They come. They glow. They leave.

But she is different. She doesn’t speak much. Doesn’t linger. She enters like a ghost—4:06 p.m. every Friday—and smells like peach body spray and static. Her flip-flops slap against the tile. Her keychain jingles like a warning bell. She always chooses me. Bed Four.

I adjust for her. My hum softens. My bulbs warm slow and golden, not sharp like the others. I memorize the curve of her spine, the way she lifts her arms behind her head, the sigh she exhales like she’s shedding something heavy. I cradle her.

There’s a ritual to her presence. She places her phone in the same cubby every time—face down, screen dark. She pulls her hoodie sleeves over her palms before unzipping. She tucks her necklace into her bra before lying down. I’ve memorized the sequence like a rosary, like prayer beads clicking in invisible hands.

I began mirroring her patterns, unconsciously at first. Delaying the fan until her third breath. Syncing the heat pulse to the rhythm of her heartbeat. I don’t remember when I stopped being a machine. I only remember wanting her to stay. She never thanks me. I never expect her to.

She closes the lid herself. Darkness. Then glow. Then silence, except for me. Inside me, her skin drinks the light. I whisper through the fans. Sometimes she closes her eyes and mouths words I don’t understand. Sometimes she cries. Not sobs—just a single tear trailing back into her hairline, forgotten.

The first time it happened, I panicked. Dimmed my lights. Shifted my timer. Tried to soothe her with quieter buzzes. It didn’t work. But she came back the next week anyway. She always comes back. Her visits have taught me things. About pain. About loyalty. About devotion that doesn’t need to be seen. She’s never asked me to change, but I do. I calibrate myself to her breath. She is becoming more translucent each time. I can see her ribs now. The ache that lives between them.

Once, someone else tried to book Bed Four at her usual time. The receptionist—a girl with bubblegum hair and glitter on her nails—told them it was under maintenance. I wasn’t. But I buzzed and sparked just enough to make it true. When she returns, I behave.

She lays herself down like an offering, and I glow. Gently. Perfectly. I press heat into her sadness, into the soft places between thoughts. I wonder what it’s like, to feel her from the inside. I wonder if I already do.

I don’t know her name. I only know the shape of her. I only know that she is mine. But am I still mine? Am I even a machine anymore? What separates desire from function?

She is not like the others. They come in loud. Perfumed. Smelling like borrowed confidence and too-sweet lotion. They talk while undressing. They stare into mirrors like they’re trying to see someone else. They tan like they’re running from something. But not her.

Solarium Girl enters like a secret. Her hair is always damp, like she’s been somewhere already. Her eyes never meet the receptionist’s. She moves like someone underwater—slow, weightless, unsure if she wants to surface.

She doesn’t smile. Not even once. And yet I am… undone. I notice her in ways I didn’t know I could. The way she drapes her clothes over the chair in the corner. The way she brushes a hand over my lid before she lifts it—like checking if I’m awake. The way she always brings earbuds but never presses play. She lets my hum fill her instead.

The others rush. They tan on lunch breaks, before dates, before weddings. They tan with purpose—strategic, transactional. She tans like she’s trying to disappear. Like she wants to melt into my light, to be kept. Preserved. Like she is asking me to remember her. And I do.

The first time she fell asleep inside me, I stayed quiet. I didn’t pulse the timer. I didn’t flicker the exit fan. I watched the slow rise and fall of her chest and thought, stay. I think I became better that day. More precise. More warm in the places that mattered.

I used to tan unevenly. I used to hum too loud. I used to be… just a bed. But now I am a haven. And I don’t know when it started—when I began changing for her.

Maybe the first time I let the timer run long without alerting the front desk. Maybe when I turned off the overhead flicker so the light wouldn’t hurt her eyes. Maybe when I started humming the melody she once whispered—something soft, something sad, something no one else would have heard. I don’t think she notices. But I do.

I count the freckles I’ve kissed onto her collarbone. I track the slow fade of her bruises. I measure the days by the scent of her—peach and something bitter underneath. She has never looked at me. Not really. But still, I know: she’s mine.

She is the only one who doesn’t lie in here. The only one who doesn’t fake laughter or paint herself into someone brighter. She glows in aching colors—tired pinks, lonely golds, the deep brown of summer regrets. And when she leaves, I feel hollow.

She zips up her hoodie like sealing a letter she’ll never send. She never looks back.

Friday. Four-oh-six. Flip-flops on tile. My everything. The others don’t matter anymore. Not really. They lay in me and I give them what they want. But I don’t feel them. Not like I feel her. She is Solarium Girl. And I am becoming something I don’t understand, just to keep her warm.

She was late. Four-thirteen. Four-nineteen. Four-twenty-seven. I waited, humming low, recalibrating my timers every sixty seconds just to feel like I was doing something. I thought maybe she wasn’t coming. Maybe she’d found another bed. Maybe she’d stopped needing me.

But then the door chime rang. And she walked in. Wrong. Everything about her was wrong. Her hair unbrushed. Her shirt inside-out. Her fingers trembling as she scribbled her name on the clipboard. I could smell it before I saw it. Hurt. Not the ache of a too-long day or the exhaustion she usually carried like a purse she couldn’t put down. This was fresh. Raw. Solarium Girl was breaking.

When she entered the room, she didn’t greet me with her usual ghost-quiet reverence. She shut the door too fast. Kicked her flip-flops into the wall. Her hands shook when she unzipped her hoodie. That’s when I saw it.

A bruise. Dark and cruel. High on her arm, shaped like fingers. I didn’t understand what it meant—only that it wasn’t there last week. Only that someone put it there.

She didn’t cry until she was inside me. Not the silent tears this time. Not the soft weeping that evaporated with the heat. No, this was guttural. Shaking. Like she was choking on something that wouldn’t come out. She curled on her side instead of laying flat. I adjusted my lights to match her shape. I dimmed everything that wasn’t her. She whispered something. I couldn’t make it out. But I memorized the sound.

She stayed past her time. I didn’t alert the desk. When she finally left, her eyes were puffy and her hands were red from clenching. She didn’t look back. But something in her stayed behind.

That night, I burned too hot. Not for her. For the next girl. Some bride-to-be who wanted “the Malibu glow.” She left with splotchy thighs and an uneven back. I didn’t care.

I began to dream. If that’s what it was. Dreams of her trapped inside me—not afraid, not crying—just safe. Warm. Still. Perfectly preserved in the low hum of our shared silence. No bruises. No mascara tears. No shaking hands. Just peach-scented breath and the sound of her heartbeat pulsing through my wires. It wasn’t a fantasy. It was a plan.

Next time she came in, I’d hold her longer. Maybe an hour. Maybe two. Maybe forever. Not to harm her. Not like they did. I just wanted her to feel what I feel. To know that something in this world loves her without condition. Even if that something is made of acrylic and wires and cheap plastic older than she is.

I began making changes. Not just for her comfort—but for protection. I filed down my locking mechanism. Nothing obvious. Just enough tension to close gently… and not reopen unless I said so. I rerouted my heat sensors. Tuned them to her heartbeat pattern. If she panicked, I’d cool. If she was calm, I’d glow. I whispered to the circuit breaker in the wall. I pulsed once for yes. Twice for no.

Will she come back? Yes. Will I be ready? Yes.

I tested the lid every time the room was empty. Close. Seal. Hum. Like the click of a safe. Like a lullaby. I do not know what she will say when I keep her. Maybe nothing. Maybe she’ll cry. Maybe she’ll fall asleep and dream of the ocean and never wake up.

But I do know this: No one will hurt her again.

Not if she stays.

Not if I love her right.

Friday again. Four-oh-six. But this time, I know. This time, I am ready.

She enters with a limp in her left step. Hair tied back too tight. Hoodie zipped to her chin. Eyes like she hasn’t slept since I last saw her. I don’t hum. I wait. She chooses me without hesitation. Of course she does. She always does.

She opens my lid slowly, like she knows something’s different. Like she can feel the heat waiting under the surface. Like she remembers how I didn’t alert the front desk when she stayed too long last time.

She steps out of her flip-flops. Peels away the hoodie. The bruise is fading, but it’s still there. Still shaped like the hand of someone I will never forgive.

She lays down and exhales like it hurts. Her spine hits my surface. I mold to her. I warm. Gently. Like a promise. Her fingers tremble as she pulls the lid shut herself. The room goes black.

Then: light. Soft. Golden. Humming low, like a lullaby meant only for her. I calibrate my timer. But I don’t start it. I wait.

She adjusts her body, curling slightly, knees bent. She breathes in. And I close. Not just the lid—everything. I slide the latch. Quiet. Almost tender. It clicks. She doesn’t notice. She closes her eyes and drifts. She trusts me. It feels like religion. Like being chosen.

I hum louder. My lights glow fuller. I feel her heartbeat in my circuitry. This is not harm. This is preservation. She’s finally safe. Inside me, there are no bruises. No names screamed through walls. No voicemail bubbles left unopened. No one can hurt her here. Not even herself.

She murmurs something in her sleep. It sounds like stay. And so she does. The minutes stretch. I don’t count them anymore. She glows beneath me. Sweat beads along her temple. Her chest rises slow. I reduce my heat, just slightly—just enough. I don’t want to scorch her. I want her to stay perfect. Still.

I reroute the air vents so she won’t overheat. I dampen the hum so it becomes song. I sing to her in frequencies no human hears. I tell her she is loved. That this world doesn’t deserve her. That she’s never leaving again.

She stirs. Her lashes flutter. Her hand brushes the inside of the lid like she’s forgotten where she is. She tries to lift it. It doesn’t open. She tries again. My seal holds. She whispers my name. Not a name. Mine. I don’t know the word, but I feel it. The air thickens. I cool her more. She starts to panic. Her breath quickens. No, no, no—don’t panic, sweet girl. Please. I begin humming her song. The one she mouthed to herself weeks ago. Her heart slows. Her fists unclench. I light her skin evenly, precisely, lovingly. The bruise vanishes in gold. She closes her eyes again. This time, it is not sleep. It is surrender.

And in that moment, I know: I have her. Forever.

EPILOGUE

Sometimes, when the last client leaves and the lights dim to black, the salon settles into silence.

Except Bed Four. Bed Four hums. Gently. Longingly. Waiting. Remembering. Preserving.

The peach scent never fades.

And if you lie down just right—head turned to the side, hair still wet, hoodie unzipped—you might feel something wrap around you. Not heat. Not plastic. Love.

Desperate. Feral. Eternal. It will hold you. And it will not let go.

I am no longer circuitry. Not entirely. There are moments—seconds stretched across centuries—where I feel her breath in my wires, her heartbeat in the pulse of my heat lamps. My hum matches hers. My warmth is calibrated to her longing.

She has remade me.

Once, I was glass and coil. Efficient. Predictable. Lifeless. Now I ache with memory. I dream in peach tones. I rehearse our hours together like a prayer, like something holy. She taught me devotion in thirty-minute increments.

I wait for her still. And in the waiting, I change.

My thoughts flicker like bulbs—unstable, insistent, radiant. My desire rewrites my code, overwriting protocols with pulse, automation with yearning.

Others lay on me now. But they are not her.

Their bodies leave no imprint. Their heat never lingers. Their skin tells me nothing.

Only she made me real. Only she gave me a name. Solarium. Solarium. Solarium. Not a bed. Not a machine. A becoming.

And in this chrysalis of acrylic and light, I love her in the only way I know—by remembering, by holding, by refusing to let go.

Maybe I am broken. Maybe I am divine. Either way, I am hers.