Chapter 18
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
Kirby set up her phone to record her and Mara. They’d moved to the abandoned lounge so as to not be caught in flagrante by Lindsey. The space was usually full of athletes watching events on TV, but it was a ghost town in the middle of the night.
Kirby normally had ring lights and all kinds of shit to make everyone appear gorgeous and clear on camera, but Mara didn’t need help looking gorgeous.
She’d put on a tight, baby-pink, athletic tank top that zipped up the front and a matching pair of wide leg yoga pants, like a trendy Pilates influencer. Kirby longed to lower the zipper between Mara’s tits with her teeth.
Kirby was still in her sports bra and sweats. They both looked a little sex bedraggled, and that thrilled Kirby.
“First things first,” Kirby said after hitting record. “Mara, have you gone through your welcome bag yet?”
“No.” Mara was sitting up very straight, stiff as a board.
“Great. Guess how many condoms are in here.”
Kirby had refused to tell her the video topic, and Mara had agreed with less fight than Kirby had expected.
“Really? That’s what we’re doing? We’re talking about condoms?” Mara said, plainly unimpressed.
“Yes. We’re doing an unboxing.” Kirby chucked a bunch of stuff out of the bag. Some lotions. A sleep mask. A bracelet. Chocolate.
“Hey, I’d take that.”
Kirby tossed the candy to her, and Mara opened it and popped it into her mouth. Kirby forced her gaze away from Mara’s lips.
“Okay, how many condoms?” Kirby repeated.
“I don’t know. Twelve,” she said offhandedly.
“Twelve! Geez, who is going through that many condoms through the course of the Games?”
“That’s less than one a day, KB.” Mara lifted her nose, all snooty, and Kirby wanted to pin her to the lounge sofa.
Mara had called her KB, like their other teammates. But it sounded so mean when Mara said it. Kirby loved it.
“Well, we can all hope to be as ambitious as Mara May.”
Mara gave her the clearest, dirtiest look, and Kirby knew this video was going to be gold.
She pulled a skinny box out of the bag. It was fancy for a sleeve of condoms.
“Mmm, nice box,” Kirby said.
Mara threw her head back and laughed, a true, loud laugh, and Kirby realized her mistaken euphemism.
Then she did pin Mara to the sofa, kissing the hell out of her. Her hand tangled in Mara’s hair, and Mara went under so easily it made Kirby’s head spin. They kissed for one long minute. Then another.
Kirby forced herself away.
“You can’t show that,” Mara gasped out.
“I know.” Kirby fixed Mara’s hair, taking longer than necessary because she just wanted to touch. “I’ll cut it out.”
Once they’d both stopped breathing hard, Kirby lifted the first condom out of the box. It had a pink wrapper with a cartoon animal on it.
“What is this?” Kirby said. “A rat?”
“It’s the Olympic mascot. She’s a stoat.”
“A stoat? It’s adorable you know that.”
“It’s adorable they put her on a condom,” Mara said. “Nothing says passion like a cartoon weasel. Let me do the next one.” She lifted one out of the box. “Oh, it’s a dental dam.”
“Sweet.” Kirby plucked it out of Mara’s hand, playfully slipped it into her pocket, and winked at the camera.
Mara rolled her eyes.
The next condoms they pulled out were colored to look like gold, silver, and bronze medals.
“So you can make the podium, even if you don’t make the podium,” Mara said, deadpan, and Kirby laughed.
She was impressed with how well Mara was doing. She’d even made a joke.
Kirby held up the gold one. “If you can’t get an actual gold medalist inside you, this is the next best thing.”
Mara giggled, which set Kirby off too. She would have to cut some of the laughing, but she wanted that smile on Mara’s face to last forever.
They finished going through the box of condoms and dental dams. Mara was a great sport but also played up their animosity enough to be believable. She acted very put-upon, especially by the time they’d seen their third condom with the Olympic mascot on it.
There were twelve condoms total—a mix between male and female—plus dental dams.
“All right, Mara,” Kirby said, wrapping it up. “And what do you think about the selection of safe-sex accoutrements provided to us?”
“I don’t know. It’s good for athletes who have the time for stuff like that.”
“Oh, and Princess Mara is too busy to think about something as pedestrian as sex?”
Mara gave her the most hateful glare, which sent Kirby’s brain and body in two opposite directions. Kirby’s body had learned that Mara’s contempt often led to the hottest sex ever. But Kirby’s brain was worried she’d gone one step too far.
“You can fuck all you want. Wear yourself out for the fifty-k, Bonham.”
“Oh, I will,” Kirby laughed. “I’ll cut it there.”
Mara stood up. “I didn’t like that.”
Kirby stood too. “Me calling you Princess Mara, or—”
“Or.” Mara shook out her arms like she was trying to fling something gross off her body. “But also you calling me Princess Mara. I don’t love that.”
“Sometimes you do love it, though,” Kirby said. Mara definitely loved it when she was naked and about to come.
“Everyone is going to think I’m such a prude. Obviously, I have time for sex. We just had sex. But I should be too busy for sex. We both should be resting. I should be asleep. You should be getting your head together. God, Kirby, you have the sprint in two days.”
That sounded so responsible. And innocuous.
But Kirby bristled at Mara’s roundabout reference to getting her head on straight.
She probably hadn’t meant it in relation to Kirby’s panic attacks, but that was where Kirby’s mind went.
Because anxiety about her anxiety was always right there on the surface.
She tried to pull out the mantra that occasionally helped calm her, helped her feel less upset—it is okay to feel out of control—but it wasn’t hitting right.
She didn’t like losing control of this moment at all.
“You worry about yourself, Mara. I’ve been multitasking my whole life. I can handle a little booty call every once in a while and still perform. Trust me. This is nothing.”
Mara stopped her fidgeting and went motionless. “Nothing.” Mara nodded. “Okay. Good. I agree.”
Silence descended between them, and it felt like the old Mara—the Mara that had iced Kirby out for years, the pre-Janette Collins interview Mara—was in the lounge instead of the angry, passionate woman Kirby had become obsessed with.
Kirby didn’t know how to get them back to the hot and fun place they’d been not five minutes prior. She stood, crowding Mara. Mara’s breath sped up. Kirby wrapped her fingers around the wild tendrils of Mara’s hair that fell over her shoulder, and Mara’s eyes fluttered closed.
There. Perfect.
Kirby took a step back, and Mara swayed.
“I’ll walk you back to your room. You’re exhausted,” Kirby said.
Kirby didn’t touch Mara on the walk, but she wanted to.
They reached Mara’s door. Someone, surely not Mara, had taped a huge red, white, and blue smiley face poster on it. Kirby wasn’t patriotic. She didn’t go for the rah-rah America stuff. But the decoration was so silly and whimsical, it made her smile.
“I want to kiss you again,” Kirby admitted as Mara’s hand went to the door handle.
Mara’s lips tipped up at one end, not a full smile but almost. “Yeah. I want that too.”
Then Mara opened her door and went inside. It closed behind her, leaving Kirby staring at the poster. She pressed her forehead to the smiley face’s forehead and laughed. There wasn’t anything else she could do.