Chapter 24
twenty-four
butts touching junk
“You know what I’m thinking?” Damien asks as we lie—fully dressed—in my tiny twin bed like a pair of nested spoons. Where we’ve been for the past…I don’t even know how long. Fifteen minutes? Three hours? Who’s to say?
“That my butt is touching your junk?” I say with a snort, and his laugh is a gust of air at the back of my head. This was weird at first, not gonna lie, but we’ve been chatting like usual and now it just seems like a thing we do. Butts touching junk.
“No, I’m trying not to think about that,” he says.
“Okay, then what are you thinking?”
“That we should do another collab in a couple weeks,” he says, hugging his arm tighter around my waist. “To celebrate the tenth anniversary of Stones 3.”
“Oh, wow, I forgot that was coming up soon.”
“I don’t really feel up to a main quest speedrun, but I’ve seen people do it for other things, like faction quests. We could do the Swindlers Syndicate quest line or something.”
I rest my hand over his hesitantly. “Yeah, maybe—” I stop when a thought occurs to me, and I squeeze his hand to get his attention. “Wait, didn’t you say Stones 3 came out around your birthday?”
“Yeah.”
“So is your birthday in a couple weeks?” I ask, turning my head as far as it will go to look at him.
“Yeah, but it’s not a big deal.” He shrugs with one shoulder. “My roommates are taking me out for drinks the Saturday after next, but I know you have your family dinner then—”
“I could skip it,” I say quickly. “If you want me to come, I mean. Not that you have to—It’s okay if you don’t—”
“Of course I want you to come.” He kisses my temple. “I just didn’t think it was your kind of thing.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not my kind of thing.”
“Then why are you even...?” I ask, right before I say, “Malcolm,” at the same time that he does. “Of course.”
“He’s always trying to get me to be more social, and once in a while I let him,” he says. “Though, if you want, you could invite your friends too. Might make it more comfortable for you.”
“Pal and Malcolm in the same room?” I laugh. “That sounds risky.”
“Well, maybe Evan will keep Malcolm on his best behaviour.”
“One can only hope.”
“Do you want to come, though?” he asks more seriously. “Because I’d like you to. But I won’t make you.”
“Well, if anyone could make me come, it’s you,” I say, but I don’t hear how it sounds until the words are out of my mouth. “Oh my god, I didn’t mean—”
He chuckles and tucks his head at the base of my neck, holding me closer. “I know what you meant.”
“But you probably could, though,” I add without thinking.
He doesn’t say anything for the longest seventeen hours of my life. Or maybe it’s eight seconds. Either way, it’s too long to leave that hanging, so I laugh awkwardly.
“Sorry, that was—”
“Do you want to find out?” His voice is quieter than it’s been the whole time we’ve been talking here, but I can hear him just fine when he’s this close to my ear.
“Um.” I can’t think when he flattens his hand against my stomach. It’s enough to make my pulse race, and I nod in response.
I expect him to start doing…something. Anything, really. But he’s just running his thumb back and forth over my t-shirt, and I realize he’s waiting for me to tell him what I want. For cripes sake.
With an impatient huff, I tug my t-shirt up to expose my stomach and then push his hand towards the waistband of my sweatpants—because I’m not too classy to have worn sweatpants to dinner with my family. “Yes, I want to find out.”
For a moment, I think he’s going to make me do all the work myself, in which case why is he even here, but then the tips of his fingers slip under the waistband and my breath hitches. Okay. We’re doing this.
Whoa. We are definitely doing this.
My ex was always too aggressive about this. Like he thought it would be done sooner if he just went full tilt right out of the gate, but it was just uncomfortable—and it certainly never worked. Eventually I told him I didn’t need that, and he stopped trying, which was a relief.
Damien is not like that at all. At first, I worry it’s going to be the opposite problem—not enough. But he gradually increases pressure until my back arches involuntarily, and then sticks with it. Firm but not rough. And holy fuck.
He’s wrapped around my body so completely and I can’t even keep track of everywhere we’re making contact, but I am burning up with it as the familiar tension builds, only this time I’m not in control of it—it’s terrifying not to be in control, but I don’t want him to stop—
He stops suddenly and I let out a pathetic whimper—I was so close, dammit—but then he’s dragging a finger lower, and I can feel how wet I am as it slides over me.
But he doesn’t go in. I told him during one of our phone conversations that I’ve never really enjoyed having anything inside me, and he seems to be respecting that, instead circling around maddeningly.
Ah, fuck it.
I politely make a request for more—i.e. beg desperately—and he rises up to lean over me for a better angle as the exploratory finger slides in.
And holy fuck again. I’m not even going to pretend to know what the hell he’s actually doing—literal magic?
—but it makes the stupidest noises come out of my mouth. I don’t even care.
I turn my head to give him a kiss, or at least the best approximation I can manage at the moment, and by the look on his face you’d think he was as into this as I am.
He groans into my mouth when he increases his efforts, casting his spells or whatever, and the indirect pressure of his palm is enough to get me over the edge.
Every muscle in my body tenses at once—my hands, my legs, my throat—and I feel suspended in time before my release jolts me, and I let out a strangled cry that is unlike any sound I’ve ever made in my life.
I’m pretty sure I would be mortified about this if I weren’t still being buoyed by the residual ripples of that tidal wave.
His hand makes its way back over my stomach and he kisses the hinge of my jaw gently while I’m still breathing too heavily to do much of anything.
“Holy fuck,” I actually say out loud, and I can feel his breath of laughter against the side of my neck.
“I guess we found out,” he says somewhat mockingly, though his voice is pure affection.
“I guess we did,” I reply, putting my hand over his again. He shifts behind me, and it becomes glaringly obvious that this has had an effect on him as well. “Um. Do you want…?”
He kisses my shoulder through my t-shirt, but I can feel him shake his head. “I just want to stay here like this for a while,” he says, squeezing his arm around me again. “This is nice.”
“Yeah,” I say, letting myself melt against him with a sigh. “It is.”
The sidewalk glistens beneath my feet, under the streetlights in this early-November drizzle, and I pull my jacket closed to keep out the water as best I can. It’s not a long walk to the bar from the streetcar, but the weather makes it less than pleasant.
Although Pal has been singing the Adventure Time theme song the whole way here, which does have a spirit-lifting effect. I think they like that we’re all going out out tonight, instead of just grabbing a mid-afternoon pint, but Victory and I are a bit more hesitant.
I’m by far the most awkward of the three of us as we step inside, as I’m immediately struck with the urge to go home and curl up on my couch already.
I try to scan the place for Damien and his roommates, but there’s so much going on, I don’t even know where to look.
At least not until Malcolm stands up at a table towards the back and catches my attention by being the tallest thing—human or otherwise—in the room.
He waves us over and calls my name—Adorable Audrey, actually—and now he’s caught everyone’s attention. I steel myself and head towards the back, but only because bolting out of here seems rude.
Malcolm is still standing by the time we reach the table, and he greets me with an enormous hug, once I shrug off my jacket—turns out he’s a good hugger, but my face gets awkwardly smushed against his collarbone, even though he’s bent down, because he’s just so tall.
He’s a bit less forward with my other friends, though no less welcoming.
“Good to see you both again,” he says to them with a grin. He turns slightly so that he’s partially facing the table with all the others as well. “I’ll do the introductions, because you’re all socially inept.”
He points at each person around the table and shares their name and pronouns, but the only one I don’t recognize is the woman next to the chair he just vacated.
Unsurprisingly, he introduces her as Evan, and I get why he’s obsessed with her; the two of them are dressed sort of like they just came from a Renaissance Faire or something, although they are both wearing matching royal blue nail polish that is much more modern.
She has the most gorgeous dark hair cascading over her shoulders, and even sitting down I can tell that she’s quite curvy.
It’s impossible not to tell, in that dress.
I greet Damien’s other roommates, Elliot and Nathan, whom I only met briefly before now.
Elliot seems a lot like Damien, in some ways, but way more shy and awkward—if that’s possible—and Nathan seems very rigid, like he needs things to be just so.
He keeps twisting his glass on the table every time he sets it down, making sure it’s facing in just the right way.
I honestly don’t know how someone like him lives with Malcolm, but apparently, they’ve all been making it work for years.
“Audrey, it’s so good to finally meet you,” Evan says to me across the table once we’ve ordered our drinks and taken our seats. “Malcolm has told me so much about you.”
“Has he, now?” Damien says, narrowing his eyes at his roommate.
“All good things,” Evan assures him with a laugh.