Chapter Seventeen
Kira
Two days later, I’ve just woken up from my post-shift power nap and am watching Grace play a very intense story-driven video
game in a glazed-over state when Nic hobbles through the door.
“I thought this wasn’t supposed to happen until I was thirty,” Nic groans, holding her lower back with a grimace.
“Maybe you’re just an overachiever,” Grace says. Impressive how she’s able to summon snark even while engaged in an intense
boss battle—research for her work as a game developer, but also for fun.
“What happened? Did you get hurt?” I ask, the fog instantly lifting from my brain as I leap off the couch, going into triage
mode.
“No, no, nothing like that, I’m fine ,” Nic insists.
She is clearly not fine. She is, in fact, hunched over like an eighty-year-old and making a face like she just licked a hot stove. I grab her
elbow and let her lean on me as she hobbles to the couch, lowering herself gingerly into a sprawl. The overly soft, semi-broken
couch envelops her, and she sinks into it with a groan that’s half pain, half relief.
“So, Nic, how was your day?” Grace prompts.
“It was good,” Nic says, gasping as she attempts to change position. “I think... this couch might be bad for my back, is
all.”
I’m instantly flooded with guilt. I was so entranced by the idea of having her here that I neglected to mention a critical
fact: while I find our couch incredibly comfortable, it is also incredibly soft , and that’s not always great for a full night of sleep.
“Riiight,” Grace says, tapping her bottom lip with the controller. “When my friend from DC visited at the New Year, he hobbled
through his last two days sleeping on that couch. There’s clearly only one solution here.”
It takes a second, but the penny eventually drops.
“One solution... oh. Oh , right. I guess you could, uh... share with me? Unless that makes you uncomfortable or something.”
I barely let half a beat of silence go by before I crack.
“You know what? I’ve been thinking we need a new couch anyway,” I babble, giving the couch a thump for good measure. “I wonder
if there’s anywhere still open that could do same-day delivery? Or at least tomorrow. I guess it’s too late for today, but—”
“We can just share. Really, it’s okay,” Nic cuts in. But she won’t meet my eyes. Is she worried I’ll come on to her or something?
Is she thinking about that one night...
“See? It’s okay ,” Grace says, clapping me on the shoulder. “Sorry, Nic, I’d offer to share my bed, but I don’t want to.”
Nic and I blink at each other, then bust out laughing, shaking our heads as if to say, oh, Grace .
“I guess sharing is the only option that will keep us both fit to work,” I say, shrugging so casually because there’s absolutely nothing wrong with this scenario. No problem. Why would there be? Because I was all ready to pursue this girl, right up until I found out she’s getting over a ten-year crush on our
mutual best friend? No, that’s nothing. We’re just friends who slept together once, and this is going to be no trouble at
all.
I just love getting the chance to help a friend .
That night, as Nic settles into bed next to me, I realize just how critical my error was.
My terrible, traitorous brain chooses to dredge up the memory of the tarot café evening and replay it in detail as Nic sighs
into her pillow. Straight-up sexual fantasies would be better, rather than throwing all this feelings stuff into the mix.
It wasn’t a date, but it was better than any actual date I’ve been on in the last... god, I don’t even remember.
All my dates in recent memory have either been awful or intentionally brief. That evening with Nic was everything I’d always
hoped to find via my twelve thousand dating apps: honest conversation, good chemistry, a fun time together, and a genuine
connection that leaves me wanting to see someone again. I have been looking, I swear, no matter what Skylar says. My job gets in the way a lot, but I know what I want long-term, and I really
have tried. For me to have found it completely by accident with Nic...
But that’s not what the evening was. That’s not what we are. This is just me inviting a friend with a bad back to share my bed so she doesn’t hurt anymore. She wouldn’t be up for
anything sexy anyway, feeling the way she does. And I’m not sure I am, either, given all the recent revelations. Her history
with Skylar. I need someone emotionally available, and Nic seems the total opposite right now. It’s fine .
It’s... definitely not fine. My body is acutely aware of her shape beneath the covers, her hair fanned out on the pillow,
the scant inches of space between us.
It takes me two hours to get to sleep.
This is going to be hell.
Nic takes three days, much ibuprofen, and an awkward amount of stretching to recover. And sleeping in my bed, of course. The
key to it all, keeping the whole thing from getting worse.
Well, the back pain situation, at least. My sanity, on the other hand, is suffering . It’s a good thing I was away at the fire station for one of those days, because the constant low simmer of my libido is
making this arrangement a rough hang. Even worse is the fact that we’ve taken to watching TV at night, the tablet propped
up on our chests as we straight-up cuddle in bed.
Tonight is especially bad, because Nic’s head is nestled just above my breast while I hold the tablet, her arm slung low over
my stomach, and I can’t stop picturing a scenario that begins with me arching against her until my nipple is in her mouth.
I have to stop this, have to get it together. Nic is a guest in my house, and she’s only in my bed because she got hurt. I don’t
want her to feel pressured or taken advantage of—plus all the other reasons it would be a terrible idea that I... can’t
remember at the moment.
The episode ends, and I shut off the tablet and set it on my nightstand. It’s going to take me an hour to fall asleep when
I’m this keyed up, so I may as well get started.
“Good night,” I murmur, turning onto my side so my back is to Nic. I expect her to do the same, facing away, but she leaves
her arm in place as I roll over. Instead of getting space, I’ve instead rolled over in her arms, my ass nestled against her
hips and her breath on the back of my neck. Her hand dangles just above the waistband of my shorts, not touching, but an electric
buzz crackles between the tips of her fingers and the bare inch of skin between my tank top and shorts. I want her to slide
her hand down, slip a finger through my slickness and circle my clit the way I need her to so badly—so badly my nipples are
peaked against my shirt and—
And my hips press back against Nic, all on their own... just as she grinds forward into me, her thumb resting on the waistband.
“God, sorry,” she whispers against my neck, dragging her hand back from the precipice in a way that’s probably supposed to
show restraint, but that skates over my skin and turns into a hold on my hip instead, hanging on instead of pulling away.
“I’ll stop. I’ll go somewhere else. I—”
“Don’t,” I gasp, grabbing her hand and pressing it against my side before it can go too far. “Unless you want to, I mean.
But—”
The rest is cut off in a gasp as Nic’s hand slides straight inside my shorts without a second’s hesitation. But not down the
front where I want her hands to go. No, she dives straight down the side of my shorts, blunt fingernails dragging over my hip, the side of my ass, my upper thigh, taking my shorts partway down along
with her hand.
“Oh, thank god,” Nic says with a graze of teeth on my shoulder. “Sleeping in this bed with you has been torture.”
I laugh, grabbing her hand and guiding it up under my shirt. “Torture for you? I’ve been lying awake every night trying to
get my body to calm down while you sleep peacefully like a sociopath!”
“That’s because I was having incredibly vivid dreams about all the things I wanted to do to you,” Nic says. “Very awkward,
waking up on the edge of an orgasm next to your sleeping roommate.”
“Next time, wake me up,” I say with a hitch in my voice as Nic’s fingers find my nipple.
“I will,” she promises. “All I wanted was to roll over behind you, just like this, and—”
Rather than finishing the sentence, she shows me, grabbing my entire breast in one hand and hitching her leg up over mine
so she can grind against me. She catches my nipple between two fingers as she cups me, and the heat of her center bleeds through
to my skin. Suddenly, I need nothing more in the world than to feel that heat on my tongue. I haven’t gotten to taste her
yet, and that’s criminal.
I turn over in her arms and capture her mouth in the kiss I’ve been desperately wanting for days, pouring every ounce of my
pent-up need into her with a muffled moan. Her leg slides up over my hip again, the perfect opportunity for me to roll her
over onto her back with me in between her legs. She scoots back for a second, and I freeze... but she’s just getting enough
room to take off her shorts, which I fully support.
“Can I see your utterly perfect boobs, please?” I ask so politely, motioning for her to strip off her shirt as I take over sliding her shorts down her legs. “I want the nice view
while I work down here.”
“Only if you do the same,” Nic says, ripping off her shirt. I get distracted halfway to taking off my own shirt at the sight
of her bare breasts, bigger and rounder than mine, with nipples that are begging for my tongue.
“Shirt,” Nic demands, and I shake out of my breast-induced daze, artlessly yanking my shirt over my head.
“Hell yes, thank you,” she says, leaning up to grab me around the waist and pulling me down with her. I fall forward, forearms
braced on either side of her, and take her mouth in a long, intense kiss. It’s... more than I mean to make it, too much spark, too much of that need that has nothing to do with sex. But I can’t help it. I angle my head, deepening the kiss as I run a hand from her collarbone
to her hip, shifting until the flickering pleasure of her nipples teases against my own. Beneath me, I feel her hand snake
between us to circle her own clit, and that is something I have to see.
I break the kiss, pausing for a brief second to take one of her nipples into my mouth before leaning up to watch Nic touch
herself.
“Sorry, I... I can—” she stutters, but I grab her wrist as she starts to pull her hand away.
“Keep going,” I say, my voice low and gravelly. She arches against the bed at my words, her hand going back to work, and she’s
so sexy, so beautiful, so...
I cut the thought off before it can go any further, shuffling back on the bed so I can lie between her legs. Focus on the
here and now. Trying to make it anything else is a bad idea, such a bad idea...
But then my tongue slides inside her, and everything else falls away.
The next morning, we both startle awake to the dulcet tones of Jerry Lee Lewis singing “Goodness gracious GREAT balls of fire!”
Normally Nic wakes up before her alarm and turns it off, so I’ve not yet had this particular experience. I don’t recommend
it.
Well... maybe not that part .
But then there’s the part where Nic buries her face in my neck with a groan of complaint after it goes off. The feel of her
fingers curling over my hip, as if holding on to me can prevent the day from starting. The slow slide of her body against
mine as she reaches over to silence the alarm. Her nipples poke through the baggy shirt she threw on last night before we
fell asleep, and it takes all my willpower not to push that fabric up and put my mouth to work on her. She needs to get ready
for the day, and she’ll be very late if we start on that. But when she pulls back, something of my thoughts must be on my
face, because she grins and leans down for a long, lingering kiss.
“I gotta shower,” she says, then pauses for another kiss. “But we should talk after, right?”
Well, that’s like being thrown into the bay in January.
“Uh, right,” I say, sitting up with the covers held over my bare breasts. “Talk. Yeah. I’ll make breakfast.”
“You’re the best ,” Nic says, then bounds out into the hallway with an armload of clothes, heading for the bathroom.
Well then. Guess I should put on some clothes and make good on my promise.
I throw on a pair of leggings and a slouchy T-shirt, then go about my morning routine of coffee, brushing teeth, and breakfast
prep. Normally I’m a smoothie person, especially on shift days, but thanks to Jerry Lee Lewis, I’m up earlier than normal,
and I don’t want to wake Grace with the blender. I run through my mental catalog of breakfast recipes, cross-reference with
what I find in the fridge, and end up going for an Everything Frittata. As in, everything left in the fridge. Whatever leftover
vegetables we have, that half can of leftover black beans in the fridge, the butt ends of three different blocks of cheese,
all of it seasoned and then dumped in a cast-iron skillet and baked into a crustless pie type thing.
The frittata has about five minutes left to bake when Nic comes out, damp, clean, and smelling good, with wet hair drying
in loose waves over her shoulders. I pass her a cup of coffee prepared just how she likes it (maple syrup and so much oat
milk it’s practically lukewarm), and she looks down at the cup like she’s been waiting for it all her life.
“You’re incredible,” she says, having a spiritual moment with her coffee while I check on the frittata, then pull it out of
the oven to cool. Nic’s eyes go wide.
“Oh my god, did you actually cook something for breakfast?”
I shrug, suddenly self-conscious. Is this too much?
“It’s barely cooking,” I say, waving it away. “It’s just a bunch of leftovers dumped in some egg. Lower your expectations,
please.”
Nic shakes her head with a small smile and opens the cabinet, pulling down two plates.
“I don’t think you know how good of a cook you are,” she says. “I’ve eaten your dinner on two separate nights since I moved
in, and it’s always delicious.”
And there’s the awkwardness I’ve been waiting for. The second she says “I’ve eaten your...” both of our minds immediately plunge into the gutter. We’re both acutely aware of what she’s eaten recently, if her blush is anything to go by. She sets the plates down and walks me back into the counter, pinning me there
with her hips as she leans up for an intense kiss. My brain goes completely blank as I let my hands drift around her lower
back, tracing skin just above the waistband of her pants with my thumb and letting the kiss wipe out my fears, just for a
moment. I know that, at any second, we’ll have to actually talk about this, but for right now...
Nic breaks off, then visibly forces herself to step back, hands in the air.
“Sorry, sorry, got carried away,” she says, lips and cheeks flushed from the kiss. “I gotta leave soon, and we’re supposed
to talk.”
“Yes, talk,” I say. I take a few slow breaths in through my nose as I slice the frittata and serve it up, letting myself slip
into something akin to firefighter mode. I’m an adult. I can have an adult conversation with this girl I like, who I just
slept with for the second time. Drawing boundaries is a good thing. I sit down at the table with my plate and glance over
at Grace’s door. Pretty sure she came home super late last night—the studio she works for is in major crunch mode—so we should
have privacy for a while. Nic takes a bite of frittata, hums appreciatively, then sets her fork down.
“I just want to make sure we’re on the same page about this... thing we’re doing,” she says, gesturing between us. “I feel
like we’ve both been through a lot lately, and I’m only just starting to untangle the Skylar stuff. I’m not sure I’m in a good place to be falling into something new. That makes sense,
right? I’m not an asshole?”
“No, you’re not an asshole,” I say, even as my heart pulls in on itself for protection. “Probably smart to give yourself some
time.”
It’s weird now if I put it out there, right? If I come out and say, I’m developing feelings for you, but I can handle it , that’ll multiply the awkwardness exponentially.
No, I can keep a hold on my own heart. I’ve done it this far. Nic really is smart to focus on herself for a while, figure out who she is and what she wants. It would be very not smart of me, in fact, to try to be with her before she has a chance to do that work. Nic smiles down at the table, then looks
up, meeting my gaze.
“So, it’s okay to keep this casual for now?” she asks. “Keep... you know, hooking up when we want to, and just making sure
to talk if things get weird?”
Oh. Oh. That is not where I assumed we were going with this. I thought we were heading for “this was fun but it can’t happen again” territory.
Instead, we’ve landed in the “friends with benefits” zone. But... do I want that? Can I stand having Nic in my bed knowing
I can’t have anything else? There’s also the matter of her job only being a one-year contract, and her possibly leaving again
to pursue a PhD. Leaving is the one thing I truly can’t do. If it comes to that, then it’s over for real. I haven’t spent the past ten years fighting to make it in the Seattle Fire
Department, struggling for every inch of progress, to just give up on it completely. I grew up here. My whole life is here.
A brief memory of the Ten of Swords tarot card flashes across my brain, that figure lying in a pool of their own blood because
they couldn’t change their ways. But how am I supposed to know what it’s referencing? Which changes should I be making? Maybe
it’s Nic that’ll be the sword in my back. Maybe we’re only meant to help each other, not be together. Or maybe I really am
supposed to give up on SFD and go somewhere else, like my instructor wanted...
I shove it all away. It’s irrelevant to the decision in front of me: Can I be chill with Nic?I look at her across the table,
remembering how it felt to have my legs thrown over her shoulders and my fingers buried in her hair as I fully rode her face...
then cut myself off, my cheeks burning hot.
I can make this work. It’s not like we can never be together. I just need to be patient. Give her some time, wait until she’s ready... and have fun until then. “Yeah,
okay. I can do casual,” I say.
It’s not until Nic has housed the rest of her breakfast and flown out the door for work that I can admit to myself: I have never done a single casual thing in my life.