23. Warren
23
WARREN
“Princess Daisy, you bitch-ass, cock-sucking two-faced brunette whore!” Kira screams, bouncing in my lap. I squeeze my hold around her middle tighter as she shakes her pink controller at the screen, where her avatar dramatically hangs its head after coming in eighth place in the race around Rainbow Road.
“Keeks, that’s not a very girl-power thing to call another woman,” Stephen taunts from his spot in the large recliner across the room. Kira flips him the bird and Stephen “catches” it in the air, as if he’s catching a kiss blown to him.
“Feminism doesn’t exist in Mario Kart, Stephen. If Princess Daisy is going to throw red shells at me like a cock-sucking whore, I’m going to call her a cock-sucking whore.”
“I thought you were Princess Daisy,” I say, still trying to figure out all the new characters in this universe. The last time I played anything Mario-related, there were only a handful of pixelated stars of the show.
“I’m Cat Peach, Ren. Keep up!” Kira huffs, falling back into me and crossing her arms over her chest.
It’s a Friday night and we’re at Amir and Rachel’s house for what I’ve been told is an adult sleepover. I was always under the impression that an adult sleepover was a cutesy euphemism for two people spending the night in bed getting it on, but apparently I was wrong. According to Kira, it’s when she and her girlfriends get together and spend the night at one of their homes drinking, playing games, and having fun together like teenagers.
Sometimes, like tonight, the men are invited, and each couple shacks up in their own room at the end of the night. When it’s just the girls, Kira says they often share a bed. I think it must be nice to have the kind of intimacy some women share so openly in their friendships, sharing beds and hugs and secrets. Not that I necessarily want to share a bed with anyone but Kira, but the idea still stands.
“See, this is why we can typically only cozy game with Kira. She’s too competitive. Last time we played Mario Kart she threw her controller at my head. As if it’s my fault that I fucking rule this game and she can never crack the top five,” James says.
“James, I will literally cut off your balls and feed them to you if you don’t shut up. ”
I snort and press a cheek to my feisty woman’s cheek.
“What is cozy gaming?” I ask.
“It’s like non-competitive games with low stakes. The kind where you just sort of bop around, planting gardens and making friends,” Rachel answers.
“Oh, that sounds way more my speed. You should show me some of these cozy games, darling.” I haven’t even bothered to play Mario Kart since the first-round tonight. I could barely figure out how to accelerate my cart and I was quickly booted to last place.
“Oh, that’s so sweet!” Georgie claps. “I just read a book recently where the hero plays a game that the heroine loves because they’re long distance and he can send her flowers every day in the game. It was so sweet. They also have sex while he wears a Santa suit, which unlocked a whole new world of kinky possibilities for me.” She wiggles on her husband’s lap, and he waggles his eyebrows.
I don’t know that a Santa kink would ever do it for me, but I will say that since mine and Kira’s dinner in New York, I’ve developed a deep appreciation for romance novels. They’re good for the soul and the sex life.
“Speaking of kinky possibilities, Kira–what’s the verdict on the cock piercings? Yay or nay?” Amir says, and my eyes go wide as saucers. I know they all know about my–as Kira calls it– bejeweled dick, but I didn’t think we’d be discussing the appendage tonight. I should have known, though. If there’s one thing I’ve learned since becoming a Pussy Posse significant other, it’s that there are absolutely no boundaries.
“Am, Jesus Christ. Is nothing private and sacred?” Kira laughs.
“What? I’m curious. And you lost your ‘private and sacred’ privileges the day you bent my pointer finger back until I caved and showed you the inside of the playroom.”
I furrow my brow, looking around the room we’re in. A screen takes up one wall, a projector displaying the game. It’s filled with recliners, a sectional, oversized bean bags and gaming chairs. Movie posters line the walls, there’s a snack bar made to look like a concession stand and in the closet lives every gaming console and game made in the last forty years.
“Is this not the playroom?” I ask Amir, and everyone laughs like they’re all in on some joke that I don’t quite understand. Kira pats my cheek.
“Oh Ren, my sweet summer child,” she coos, and then informs me of the actual meaning of the word ‘playroom’.
An entire room dedicated to fucking, like having a sex club in your house. I think I just gained a newfound respect for Amir and Rachel.
“And to answer your question Amir, the ladder is a big, huge yay from me,” Kira winks, then presses her lips to my cheek. I preen like a peacock .
“How does one decide to pierce his dick?” Stephen asks with a full body shudder. I shrug.
“I was in my thirties, already going through a bit of a midlife crisis. I’d been going through a breakup and was feeling particularly snippy one day. I snapped at someone who didn’t deserve it, and when I heard myself, I sounded exactly like my father. I hated my father. So, on a whim, I decided to do something that the man would never do and would thoroughly piss him off if he was alive to know. I’d contemplated a tattoo, but…here we are. I have no regrets.”
“Your dad may have been a royal ass, Ren, but I would like to send my thanks to him down in hell for the Jacob’s ladder and the impeccable genetics.” Kira punctuates her statement with a kiss to my cheek.
“Now that deserves a toast. To shitty parents who fucked us up, but at least they blessed us with carved jaws and fat cocks,” James says, holding up his bottle of beer. We cheers, and something warm settles in my chest. With Kira in my lap and in a room full of people whose company I genuinely enjoy, I feel like I’ve finally found something. Like that spiraling loneliness I’ve battled with for so many years has finally calmed.
I feel…settled.
Content.
Happy.
And so fucking in love with the woman in my arms.
When I decided to buy Spin Sync, I’d been searching for something. Friendship, community, a purpose, and I found it. Not in the building, not as CEO, but in Kira. She’s flipped my world upside down in the most excruciatingly perfect way. She’s the shining ball of light guiding me home. She’s given me so much–her trust, her laughter, her body and mind–and it’s time for me to give back what belongs to her.
Later, when she and I are curled up in one of the guest bedrooms, our heads on one pillow as we look into each other's eyes in the glow of the moonlight, I decide to show my hand.
“Kira, darling, I have to tell you something,” I say, ready to lay my cards on the table and give Spin Sync to her, the way it always should have been. It’s a frightening feeling. Our entire relationship has been built on the trust she had in me when I told her I didn’t know who she was when I bought Spin Sync, and now I’m going to admit I’ve been keeping a secret from her. It’s a good secret–I hope–but I’m still worried that the whole charade will piss her off and send her running from me.
But I can’t care about that. I’m so in love with this woman that it makes me ache everywhere. She deserves the truth. She deserves what’s hers. And if that means making her angry and potentially sending her running from me, that’s a risk I’m going to have to take.
Her eyes search mine, and something I can’t quite read crosses her features.
“I’m sleepy, babe. Can it wait?” She says, nuzzling closer to me. The warmth of skin radiates against mine, soothing my heartbeat .
“It’s...it’s important, love.”
“Will it still be important in the morning?” She asks.
“I suppose so,” I answer.
“Then let’s wait until then, Ren.”
She cuddles in close, nuzzling her face into my chest. Within moments, a soft snore escapes her.
So, I hold my woman tight, keeping her close.
I’ll make things right in the morning.