General Chemistry II Ch. 05

List of Characters

Jack: Our point of view. Smart, corny, neurotic, Jack has few friends at school outside of his study group. White. Lifeguards in the summer and has a big dick.

Pri: Jack's ex(?). Brilliant and reserved, she plays varsity soccer with her best friend Liv. Indian-American. Short and athletic with ass for days, darkly tanned with thick black hair.

Liv: Pri's best friend and Jack's study buddy. Funny and dynamic, she plays varsity soccer and does what she feels. Jewish. Tall with a heart-shaped face. She has a deep tan, small breasts, and sprinter's legs.

Marco: Liv's boyfriend and long-time friend. Charming and almost offensively handsome, he teaches tennis and studies literature. Colombian-American. He's fashionable, with a lean, muscular body.

Sylvie: Liv's long-time frenemy and Marco's ex. Grim and sarcastic, she's pre-law at NYU. Pale, Jewish, and tiny, with a cute face and a bull ring septum piercing.

Kay: Sylvie's friend from NYU. Laconic and up for anything, they study film and play volleyball. White and non-binary, they're over six foot and covered with tattoos. Bleached pixie cut and dark eyelids.

Grace: Liv's friend from college. Perky and energetic, she's All-State softball and loves to party. Chinese-American. She's muscular but feminine, with thick legs, big breasts, and fun tattoos.

~

Kay leapt to meet the volleyball, their raised hand momentarily blocking the sun. The light formed a halo around their long, lanky body, and they looked every bit like a valkyrie descending to land the killing blow on some peasant Briton. They grunted as their palm smashed the ball, rocketing it into the sand beside me.

It didn't kill me, but it was close.

"You win," said Yara with a tired wave. She was, apparently, one of our new Dutch friends.

"Yo, that's sixteen," said Liv. "It's to twenty-one."

"No, that is too much." Yara looked at us, her teammates, for argument. We didn't offer any. She was angular and lean, with a blonde undercut and a serious mouth. "On behalf of my team, we surrender."

I hunched over and wiped my face into my shirt, taking some space from the others. They laughed and congratulated each other, reaching under the net for handshakes and low fives. The past week's heat had finally abated to something almost pleasant. The sand was soft, the sky was clear, and the beach was crowded. Physically, I was a bit winded. Psychically, I was total shit.

The other Dutch girl, Isa, made a silly, worshipful bow towards Kay. "She is too powerful. I look at the tattoos and I think we should have known." With her thick accent, the word "think" came out tink.

"They're non-binary," I said without thinking. A little louder I said, "Kay is non-binary, so say 'they' instead."

"Ah ha!" Marco hooted. "We finally broke him! Another cis white for the coalition. That's a two-vote swing, baby."

Liv laughed and clapped while Kay just shrugged.

"Ah, we don't have this in Nederland," said Simon, the last of the Dutch. The sturdy, sunburnt boy had scooped up the ball and was hugging it to his chest. He was Isa's boyfriend and not, I realized, her brother.

Isa gave him a dirty look and said some choice words in their language. "No," she clarified. "Of course we have it. This stupid boy is from the forest. He doesn't know anything."

Simon made a face and raised his hands, as if it meant nothing to him in the end.

We were all of us playing except for Sylvie. She was slouched in her folding chair, reading a book beneath a floppy sun hat, ignoring us.

We'd bumped into the Dutch in the parking lot and Liv had attached to them quickly. So quickly, in fact, that I'd worried we were stalking them until I found out we'd been invited along. It seemed like Liv had been waiting for them, or someone like them, to shake things up. Maybe it was because they knew English, or because they were the same age, or maybe it was just the fact that they were tall and attractive. Maybe Liv was on the hunt.

As the volleyball game dispersed, I thought that maybe she'd bitten off more than she could chew. There was a subtle scramble, the two teams intermingling, and when the obviously queer Yara approached Kay with a smile and a dirty joke, Kay smiled back. Liv closed quickly in defense. I'd known that Liv had become infatuated with Kay but when a rival entered the frame it became painfully obvious. Both girls crowded the volleyball star, dangling off Kay's arms like desperate ladies-in-waiting.

Marco watched Liv grimly, whether out of second-hand embarrassment for his girlfriend or something more, I didn't know. He looked like he was about to do something about it when Pri hip-checked him. Her energy had been weird all afternoon, almost bubbly, shouting and rump-slapping the entire match.

Grace sidled up to join them and immediately clocked what I had seen from a distance: Pri was flirting outrageously. She'd grabbed Marco's forearm, laughing too hard at a joke, and made ditzy, pouty faces when he flirted back. If she'd batted her eyelashes any harder I'd have thought she was having a seizure. Grace nodded along to the madness with a pinched smile.

At the opposite end of the net, Isa and Simon had stepped aside. In the way that Spanish was flowy and dramatic, Dutch was bouncy and almost fun, and it took me a moment to realize they were still arguing. They'd angled themselves away from the group, though that didn't do much to hide their body language.

When I glanced back, Grace was already making her escape. She joined me at the edge of the scrum and mimed an anime-style sweat drop down the side of her face. Her t-shirt was soaked and clinging to her body. On the front was Goku flying on his little cloud thing.

"Before you start," I said. "I don't know what's up with Pri. Smooth exit though."

She made a sliding motion with his hand. "That's me: fucking smooth." We watched the others milling about. "Yeah, but it's not just her. Liv is like a total simp right now."

"Well, Kay seems to be handling it, if 'handling it' is being an enby hoe-slaying pimp I mean." We both laughed at that. I hesitated. "I feel like we haven't talked in a bit. How are you doing?"

"Goood," she said. "Sweaty."

"I mean like... how are you feeling? You haven't said anything."

"About the thing?"

"About the thing."

The thing was, of course, the big reveal: Liv and Marco, Pri and I, fucking each other round-robin style for months. The word of the day was polyamory. Grace considered me for a moment.

"I would have said it was none of my business, but after what happened... You know, it's like we were all playing a game, except ya'll had secret rules the rest of us didn't know about. Mean, kinda nasty rules. I don't feel, like, betrayed, but it feels shitty."

"I'm sorry," I said. "I should have said that before. I'm sorry. It's been eating me up."

"Yeah, obviously. Your face is like a dog taking a shit." She pushed a sticky strand of hair off her cheek. "Sorry, that's one of my dad's weird sayings. It sounds better in Chinese. Everything's just kinda weird now. I'm thinking about moving my flight up either way."

She was leaving.

My stomach felt like a brick. I didn't realize how tightly I'd been holding on to the idea of Grace. Ten little daydreams a day where yes, Pri dumped me, but I found this beautiful girl at the same time, that I didn't actually have to feel sadness or loss because I'd already moved on.

"Whoa." She patted me on the back. "You gotta chill out, dude. I'm watching ulcers form in real time."

Despite everything, I laughed.

"Okay, enough holding your dicks!" yelled Liv, cutting through the noise. She pulled her sweaty t-shirt over her head. As usual, she wasn't wearing a suit top, and her little tits wobbled as she threw the shirt towards our stuff. "Everybody in the ocean!"

A silly cheer went up, and the group began to strip down to their suits. Hair was tied into ponytails and khaki bottoms were flung.

"What's up, Jacky?" yelled Liv, waving wildly. "Get your ass in the water."

"I don't feel so good." I worked my mouth, searching for an excuse. "Probably just... hungry."

Grace had already ditched our awkward conversation and spun back towards me in mid-stride. "Oh, I'm hungry too!" she yelled, backpedaling in the sand, thighs shiny with sweat. "Get me something wherever you go!"

The others yelled out similar requests, not even bothering to look back as they ran for the waves.

"I saw a good place for pizza!" shouted Pri at their retreating backs. She'd already gotten her phone from the bags. Sylvie pulled her hat lower, looking conspicuously annoyed at all the yelling. "Pizza? Pizza okay?"

Liv double pointed at the two of us. "Sure, whatever! You're the best!"

Pri and I looked at each other for a moment, then she smiled and hooked her thumb towards the boardwalk. "Saddle up, cowboy." She turned to Sylvie.

"No," said the sour girl in the sun hat.

~

The walk was weird from the start. In spite of her earlier energy, Pri didn't seem to have much to say. Hands in the pockets of her shorts, she watched the crowds go by, humming a nameless tune to herself. Occasionally, she'd give me a smile and knowing glance, as though we had both witnessed some little slice of life worth remembering. We took a moment to shake out our flip-flops before the boardwalk began.

"My dad asked about you," I said. I'd never thought of my dad as all that perceptive but he'd caught her name out of the ether somehow. Hell, that was weeks ago.

"Did he really? That's cute. I hope he's doing better."

I shrugged and nodded, not wanting to get into it.

She leapt messily onto the sidewalk, filling her flip-flops with more sand than she'd just removed. She didn't seem to care. "Astha asked about you."

"Astha asked about me?"

"Echo..." She laughed as she started ahead. "Yeah. I said--Well, I avoided the question actually."

"Your sister knows about me?"

Pri had always been a fast walker and I shuffled to catch up. The boardwalk was packed with people: barefoot kids screaming, families huddled around trash cans eating ice cream, some teenagers playing German rap from a shitty speaker. A crepe vendor shouted gleefully at us from behind a two-wheeled cart, mostly at Pri. She smiled and waved at him.

No one was supposed to know about the white boyfriend. Or ex-boyfriend. I'd never met Astha, and though Pri had said she was a good sister, she'd also said she was a good daughter. If Pri's parents had found out about me I couldn't even imagine the fallout.

"She doesn't really know," said Pri when I finally caught up. Something about my face made her laugh, and she gave me a look like Are you nuts? "But she made some pretty spooky guesses. Not sure that matters any more."

"Why would that not matter?" All this tension, all these weeks of misery and weirdness, and the secret was closer to coming out than I'd ever realized. "After all this--" I gestured between the two of us, not really sure what to call it. "--you don't think it matters if Astha knows?"

She rolled her head around, her neck popping and cracking noisily. "I guess I just don't really give a shit today." She laughed again.

"Are you high or something?"

"Uh... yeah, maybe. You got me!" She leaned in and whispered, "I have Sylvie's vape. She left it on the table after the big blow up and I just... haven't got around to returning it."

"I was kidding," I said. I could count on one hand the times Pri had smoked weed. "Pri, you don't think you're acting pretty fucking weird?"

"Oh, come on. We're on vacation. I can't get high on vacation now?"

"That's not really what I mean--"

"Don't worry," she said, like it was some kind of wisdom. "Be happy. Have fun. Like, how was Sylvie? You didn't actually do it, did you? I feel like she'd be really rough." She clawed at the air like a tiger.

A line of tourists on rented bicycles came at us, ringing their bells. For a few seconds Pri and I were split apart, the cyclists dividing us like a school of fish. She looked at me expectantly when we came back together.

"C'mon, it's me." She bumped me with her shoulder. "You're really not gonna tell me?"

"I'm not, no."

For a fraction of a second she almost looked angry, then it faded. "Fine, be honorable or whatever. I guess I should appreciate that. You must not have done a very good job though. She's still being all Sally Solitude."

I just walked, jaw set. There were too many people around, too much noise, too much to take in.

"Don't be such a moper, oh my god." She rolled her eyes. "I never knew you took sex this seriously."

"I shouldn't have done that," I said. "This whole thing is getting out of hand. We need to stop, I dunno--"

"Wow, don't be such a hypocrite."

"What the fuck? How am I being a hypocrite?"

"How are you a hypocrite? What the f--!" She caught herself yelling and glanced around, annoyed. "The place is over here, by the way." The pizza shop was half a block from the boardwalk, a neon sign hanging. Softer, but with no less steel behind it, she went on. "You're really gonna have sex with Sylvie, with Liv, with me even though we're on break--Don't say a word about what a 'break' is. I'm not in the mood for your pedantics.

"You're gonna fool around with everybody... you're going to jerk off in front of us and sex shaman people and mope around in the most obvious bid for attention ever, but when I get a little loose, not even doing anything, I'm just smoking weed, and suddenly 'we've gone too far! What about our morals!' That's so selfish and honestly super fucking annoying. And, you know what else?"

Looking flustered, she cut off the thought. She held up a palm at me, like Sit, stay, and went inside the shop.

For a minute, a very real minute, I stewed. Sixty seconds, more or less, is a long time to stand in silence after you've been verbally torn in half. I thought I'd been putting on a good face for everyone but, looking back, it was a frail attempt. One word answers. Endless shrugging. Staring pensively out at the ocean. I was acting like Sylvie.

Pri came out of the shop looking calmer. She walked straight up to me, pulled my face down with both hands, and kissed me. It was brief, nothing special by our standards, but it was nice.

"I like you," she said. "I care about you. But you're being a little bitch right now."

"But your sister knows about us--"

"Shut up," she said. I did. "You're the one who said that this place is a fantasy. It's not real, right? You don't want to face whatever is going on between us, fine, but it goes both ways. I need this. No, I want this, and I'm sick of being told that 'wanting something' is not a good enough reason to get it."

"What is 'this?' I don't even know what you're talking about."

"Whatever I want, Jack. I'm literally going to do whatever I want. Like this." She fished Sylvie's weed pen out of a shallow khaki pocket and took a hit, blowing the vapor into the air dramatically. I gave an apologetic look to a dad walking by with his kids. "I'm probably gonna drink too much and eat too much. I'm not gonna stretch at all. I'm gonna screw Marco. I'm gonna do whatever I want. That okay with you? Do I need to run my plans by my big, strong man so I don't hurt myself?"

"No."

"Okay. You got anything you want to say?"

"No."

"Great." She looked over her shoulder. "Damn, that was fast."

Quickly inside, then out again, she stuck all four pizza boxes in my hands before taking off. I felt like a kid falling behind his mom at the mall. Between the boxes and the sun, I started sweating like a pig. We stopped at a mini market for water bottles and a brief blast of air conditioning, then again at some clothing racks outside a boutique. I rested the boxes on a windowsill and watched her thumb through dresses.

"What do you think of Grace?" she asked. She pulled a dress out before I could answer. "This is cute. Oh, not for a hundred euros though..."

"Uh, she's nice."

"Mhm," she said, waiting for more.

"What do you want to know? I didn't know her that well at school. She's more... thoughtful than I realized. And she's fun, but I knew that."

Pri pulled another dress, blue with white flowers, and held it over herself. With her other hand, she pulled her ponytail up into a pile. "You like the way she does her hair? I never do it like that."

I realized, in my dim sort of way, that she was mimicking Grace from a few days ago, from the night we got drunk and naked in Liv's room. The dress was almost identical, and although Pri's was curly where Grace's was straight, the pinned up hair was the same.

"I guess I like yours down, but maybe I'm just used to it that way..."

"Yeah, it's good to try new things though." She put the dress back with a clang. "She likes you, you know. And not just your pleasing personality. Do you like her?"

"What are you doing?"

"Sorry, I can be done here. I can't really afford any of this stuff."

Whatever else I might have said I pushed it down, not wanting to stumble into the emotional fog of war.

I knew Liv wouldn't have come up with the offer-Jack's-body-to-Sylvie thing alone. Pri was behind it, Pri who loved to play the matchmaker, who loved the idea of the sex shaman. Lending me to Syl was an outlier. I didn't believe that Pri really saw her as an issue. As a threat.

Grace, on the other hand, was actually interested in me, and I was interested in her. She was beautiful, and in all the ways that Pri was difficult, Grace was easy. Pri was practically throwing the girl at me. Even though she couldn't have been more casual about it, I couldn't shake the feeling that she was trying to resolve the problem of our relationship. Like she was trying to blow things up. Like she was trying to replace herself, to use a switcheroo and make her escape.

Saying that to her now would be like stomping a landmine, convinced you were fast enough to outrun the blast.

"The pizzas are making me sweaty," I said.

"Oh, sorry. Let's get out of here."

~

"I don't know, man." Grace puffed out her cheeks. "Just give me Entertainment again."

I offered the card to Pri but she shook her head. I cleared my throat and read. "What George Harrison song sounded too much like He's So Fine by the Chiffons?"

"Oh, fuck off," said Grace. "Who?"

"You don't know George Harrison?" asked Marco.

"He was in the Beatles, I'm not dumb. But He's Fine...?"

"He's So Fine," I said. "The Chiffons."

"Fuck that. Pass."

The birthday group was arrayed on the back patio, enjoying the ocean view but not enjoying the absolutely ancient edition of Trivial Pursuit in front of us. We'd pulled the outdoor furniture into a rough circle, the late-afternoon breeze rippling the potted ferns and tousling our hair. Sodas, snacks, and discarded game pieces littered the glass table. Marco, hunched over like a grooming ape, steadily picked the pretzels out of the bar mix. Liv had disappeared at some point, not that she was missing much.

"Okay, who's up?"

"Me," I said. "History. I guess."

Grace plucked a card from the box and, pulling her v-neck a little lower, fanned her chest. She'd taken some time to tan this morning and, despite our warnings, caught a bit too much sun. A bra was too painful for her and the shirt clung to her sizable, sunburnt breasts. They were gorgeous, full, round tits, hanging low from their weight, her nipples very faintly outlined. I looked up, hoping no one noticed my staring.

"How did Lawrence of Arabia die?" she asked.

"Er, I said History?"

"It is History."

"That's a real guy?" Crickets. "Uh, was he kicked by a camel?"

She tossed the card back into the box without comment.

"Okay Pri," said Marco. "Choose the method of your destruction."

We held our successfully answered cards, some more tightly than others. Even with the drastically outdated questions, Sylvie was able to rack up eight or nine, while Pri's stack was as thick as my thumb.

"Seems like I'm doing all the destruction," she said. Marco inclined his head gracefully. "How about Literature?"

"Alright, who created the private detective Philip Marlowe?"

"Raymond Chandler," she said instantly, putting out a henna-tattoed hand.

"Nice," said Sylvie, sitting up to count her cards again. "Insurmountable lead...!"

Syl leaned forward, the tips of her toes resting on her tennis shoes, keeping her perfectly white socks off the patio tiles. She was probably overdressed for lounging around: mom shorts and a sleeveless pink blouse cinched tight around the waist. While we oozed in the heat, she looked ready for brunch.

"God," said Liv from somewhere behind me. "The energy out here is embarrassing. How are you still playing that shit?"

"It's fun," said Pri. A groan rose from the group. "Okay, maybe it's not that fun. Uh, what are you doing?"

I turned to find Liv sashaying out from the kitchen with a frosty-looking bottle of liquor, every spare finger stuck into shot glasses. She was barefoot, her long legs sticking out of an insubstantial pair of running shorts. She rattled the glasses like ringing a bell.

"Announcement: I want to reset with everyone. Everything's weird and off and I recognize that it's my responsibility--"

"Fault," said Sylvie. "The word you're looking for is 'fault.'"

"Okay, whatever--"

"Fault."

"Okay, fault, Jesus. Relax, Blamey McBlamerson. I still wanna try to salvage the trip, so I've decided to answer whatever questions you all have about our non-monogamous thing--"

"The fuck you are," said Marco. "What are you doing?"

"I just said what I'm doing. We haven't been--I, sorry--I'm making 'I-statements'--I wasn't being fair with all the secretive shit. I don't mind answering questions; you can think of it as my court-mandated community service."

"What are you doing?" asked Marco again.

"They know, baby. The cat is out of the bag. I hate sitting around not talking about this thing that everybody is feeling, like we're pretending that everything is fine when it's obviously not. At least I can explain and get rid of some of this fucking weirdness. Unless you all want to play sad trivia for a week straight..."

"I like trivia..." said Pri.

"If you just want to rationalize your weird sex thing," said Sylvie. "You could have sent a text."

Liv pointed the liquor bottle at her. "Are you for real right now? This was your fucking idea."

"That's not--" Sylvie turned to Marco as if caught. "This is not what I meant at all."

"What the fuck, Syl?"

"I think it's smart," said Pri. "I mean there's not that much you all don't know already. I don't think it'll be that shocking."

"That's what I'm saying," followed Liv, quickly seizing on her backup. "It's just a thing that happened. We're not in a sex cult or anything."

Grace huffed a little laugh, as if that's exactly what she thought.

Pri looked at me earnestly. "What do you think?"

Trivia had been a nice distraction, to the point that my anxiety tumor had faded to an afterthought. I became aware of it again, pulsing in my stomach. While I was embarrassed to expose our "weird sex thing" any more than we already had, I desperately wanted things to go back to normal. Whatever normal looked like anyway.

I also wanted Grace to understand. Maybe she'd still think I was a pervert, or maybe she'd get it, but this seemed like the last chance to convince her to stay. Hell, I'd settle for her continuing to speak with me once we were back in the real world.

"I think it's probably--Not definitely, you know, I could be convinced otherwise, but--"

"Oh fuck, spit it out." Marco covered his face. "Sorry. But also, spit it out."

"It's a good idea." I placed my few trivia cards flat on the table, careful to avoid the pools of condensation. "Worst case, you all think we're slightly weirder than we are now."

"It's so annoying when you call us 'you all,'" said Grace. "You're the majority. It's four whatever-you-ares to three of us. And I'm not even counting the outrageous queer stuff between these two." She gestured tiredly between Liv and Kay. "It's like you invited me to girlie brunch but I get here and it's actually bossbabe MLM ambush. And, by the way, the brunch is on another fucking continent and I can't leave."

Liv took a deep breath and looked at her solemnly. "Grace," she said. "I know. I want to make it up to you. Listen carefully, because I think you'll appreciate this. Would you like me to teach you how to be your own boss and make thousands per month?"

Grace stared blankly for a half-second before cracking a tiny smile. "You fucking asshole," she said. "I'm not wrong though."

"You're not," said Liv. She held the liquor bottle to her forehead and closed her eyes. "I'm just trying to start over. And if you hate it, you hate it. Is that okay?"

We sat for a moment, decisions being made in silence.

Kay was the first to move, unfolding themselves from their cushion, slipping their bare feet into their slides. The group's outfits clashed completely, like we'd all been invited to a party but had each received a different dress code. Where Grace looked dressed down to do spring cleaning, Kay looked like a Long Island boat-bum in black polo and skinny jeans.

"If that's what you want," said Kay. "How long have you--"

"Wait wait wait," said Liv, waving them off. "You can't expect me to do this sober." She fumbled the shot glasses onto the table in an alarming sequence of rattles and clinks. Setting one upright, she slowly poured herself two fingers. "This is some fancy vermouth Maury got for me. It's a big deal here."

"Like, vermouth from a martini?"

"It's just wine. Strong wine. Like port."

"I've never had that," said Grace, leaning forward.

"Okay, here, here, here."

The you-all's, Grace and Kay at least, accepted their smudged glasses, and it only seemed right that the whatever-we-weres would drink too, though Marco sat back with his arms crossed, looking surly. Sylvie just watched.

"Salud," said Liv.

"Down the hatch," I added.

I still didn't really know what the hell vermouth was, but I liked it. Like a salve, the alcohol coated my anxiety tumor. I placed my empty shot glass in the vicinity of the bottle, hoping for more.

"Kay," prompted Liv. "Dee mey."

Kay, smacking their lips, looked up with an arched eyebrow. "Okay. How long have you all been...?"

"Non-monogamously screwing," said Pri. "We used to call it Study Group though."

"Ah, so there's codenames," said Sylvie to no one in particular.

"Since April," said Liv. "But there was a big break for summer."

"But now the break is over," said Grace. "This is, like, actively going on?"

"Yes," said Pri and Liv at the same time.

Liv smiled. "Are you part of the Q and A now?"

"You need the help, Oblivia."

"So you two are actually flirting," said Grace. "Not just 'yas queen slay.' Like you two are...?"

Pouring another shot of vermouth, Liv nodded grimly. "I'm afraid so. Gay for my biffle." I pushed my glass a little closer and she obliged me. "Pri was my first girl. Well, my first real girl. Not, like, kissing Heather Druck at summer camp."

"So Jackson and Marco?" asked Grace, glancing at me.

My second shot of vermouth had reinforced the first and I found it funny, I wasn't sure why, that she'd think I was Marco's type. "Are you asking if he's the Snape to my Dumbledore?" I asked. "No, we haven't--We don't do that."

"I feel like there was some wiggle room there," said Sylvie. "You haven't even kissed?"

"What do you say, Coco? Time to break the seal?"

Marco had been staring off at nothing, projecting weariness. He finally smiled and patted his thigh. "Come to daddy."

I did a silly wiggle and waved at him. We both leaned in for shots, my third, his first.

"May our balls never touch," he said.

"So hetero of you," I replied. We drank.

"Are you polyamorous?" asked Sylvie. "I mean dating each other. Like, is it just sex or is this thing romantic...?"

"We're not--"

"No," said Marco with a chop of his hand. "She has to drink. No questions from the sideline."

For a second, Sylvie looked like she might fight, then she rolled her eyes. "Fucking babies." She grabbed a shot and downed it quickly, smacking her lips. "That's--Wow, that's so much better than I thought it'd be. Same questions. And don't, so help me God Liv, pretend you don't know what polyamory is."

Liv, at last, hesitated. She looked at each of the Study Group in turn: Marco, then Pri, then me. "Obviously, Marco is my boyfriend. But I'd be lying if I said I didn't haven't feelings for you two." Some thought came to her, bright behind her eyes. "I mean, I don't think I could have sex with someone I didn't have some feelings for. If I didn't like them then how could I lust them, you know what I mean?"

"That's a dodge," said Marco. "Why don't you answer more directly, dear?"

"Holy shit," said Grace with open wonder. "Is this not decided already? You haven't talked about this?"

No one rushed to fill the silence, though eventually Pri found something. "Jack and I made some decisions early, though I don't know what the hell they mean now with the break..." It may have been my imagination, but I thought she cut herself off from saying "breakup" in full. "I don't know if you need some elder poly wizard to bless your situation first, but we've been a..." She squinted and pulled her phone out from under her thigh. "I'm sorry, I wrote this down weeks ago..."

Liv gave me a look and I shrugged. Truly no idea.

"We're definitely polyamorous," said Pri finally. "It's called a polycule, with two primary couples--I have the word 'dyad' here but people can't agree on what it means--and everyone has heterosexual sex. The women have queer sex and the men are... metamours."

Kay nodded as though this was a perfectly acceptable answer but Grace shook her head as if Pri had just made up a bunch of bullshit and couldn't figure where to even start. I didn't know half the words she just said and I cut in without really planning to.

"I have romantic feelings for Pri," I said, blushing badly for some reason. "And also feelings for Liv, though they're more like... really sexy friendship feelings?"

Liv bit her tongue, smiling wide. "Ooh, I've never been really-sexy-friendzoned before."

"And Marco is my friend. My friend who I trust with Pri's feelings."

"Vagina, you mean," said Sylvie. I looked at her, not with malice, just projecting that she was being a dick. She'd been playing with her empty shot glass for some time and finally put it back down. "Sorry, I'll stop."

"So Kay is what in all this?" asked Grace.

"Don't have me fucked up," said Kay. "I'm strictly casual. Not that any of this bothers me, I just didn't sign up for anything with rules."

Marco found his place to strike. "We should have some rules for this."

"I asked you," said Liv. "I specifically asked you--"

"Did you ask them?" he asked, gesturing to Pri and I. "Did you ask me before you sic'd Jack on--"

"Hey now! Hey now," said Pri sing-songily.

"The dream is over..." I finished.

Kay threw back another shot of vermouth and frowned. "I know that song, right? What is that?"

"What did you just skip over?" asked Grace. "Something with Jack."

Marco tried to not to react but looked like he'd just eaten a lemon's ass. Liv took another shot to keep her mouth busy.

Grace fixed on me with an intensity that was totally unlike her. She seemed like she was preparing to be disappointed.

"I promised," I said. My stomach was sloshy with alcohol and my face was hot. "I promised not to say anything. And even if I have shit for brains and nerves like a diabetic Chihuahua, I can at least keep a basic fucking secret--"

"I fucked him," said Sylvie. "More accurately, he fucked me. Like a hurricane, I might add. I've been walking funny since." She grabbed another shot and sipped idly. "I made him promise not to tell because Olivia had to set it up for me. Like I was ordering a prostitute, and I'm fucking embarrassed."

"What the fuck?" said Grace. She gave me another mournful look. "Are you for real? So what? Liv says 'fuck' and you say 'how high?'"

I held my hands apart, trying to force some rational explanation to the surface. Nothing arrived.

Liv reached out to pat Grace on the arm then pulled back, thinking better of it. "Syl needed some help, some very specific, very physical help getting back into... men, I guess. So I asked Jack to provide that help. We have this thing. 'Sex shaman.' It sounds like a joke but it means something to us--Means something to me anyway. It's like a guide, a helping hand, but for..."

"Sex," said Grace. She sighed and gave Liv a nod for another vermouth. "Yeah, I caught that part."

"I did it for Pri and Jack. They were circling each other like kids at the middle school dance--"

"Hey," I said, unsure what I was objecting to.

"Hush. It'd been months and they were both too nervous to take the next step. I mean, they hadn't even kissed. So I, maybe, did some flirty flirty. Arranged some skinny dipping. Got them in touching distance. I admit, I put hands on him. I was single at the time--"

"'Put hands on him?' Is that some slang I don't know?"

"Handjob? I got them loosened up and out of their own way. And we had some casual sex, three-way adjacent stuff, and it was... really nice. Like Pri and I were sharing something--A moment, I mean. Not a man. Then they were together, dating and all that. That was the start of it all really." Liv grabbed a messy handful of bar mix. "Later, Pri and Jack did the shaman for me and Marco. Obviously the Marco thing goes back years and--Hey, I thought there were pretzels in this...?"

Pri found me with a rather sweet look, and I smiled sadly. That had been a brief point in time, when the happy chemicals were washing over us and we had no clue it would all blow up...

"I never felt it was wrong," said Pri. "I still don't. I won't pretend it was a spiritual experience, but this isn't some kind of nasty, exploitative thing. I learned so much about myself, things I never even considered before."

"Pri likes girls," teased Liv.

"That's one thing," Pri said with a sigh. "That's definitely one thing..."

"You're pissed off," said Sylvie suddenly, glaring at Marco as if they were the only ones there. "I would be flattered if it wasn't so toxic. I don't have to run things by you. You're not my problem any more."

"God, your ego," he said. "Did you even use a condom? Yeah. That's what I thought."

"You didn't use a fucking condom?" asked Grace. She looked like she might faint.

"We--" Marco cut off, almost rolling his eyes. "The polycule got tested."

"Did Kay get tested?" Pri asked.

"Shut up," said Liv.

"This is on you," said Marco. "You're always trying to fix the wrong shit."

Liv almost exploded. "You wanted me to reconnect with her--"

"I didn't mean reconnect us to her bodily-fucking-fluids!"

"You're disgusting," said Sylvie. "I don't have a fucking STD."

"Good to hear. Maybe Jack can get tested and we'll know for sure."

"I hadn't touched a dick in two years!" Sylvie's face, typically so pale and controlled, went as pink as her blouse. "I was literally celibate, you asshole. You're more likely to catch something from a fucking toilet!"

"Well I wouldn't want Jack to fuck a toilet either!"

The absurdity of the last hung in the air like a lingering musical note, almost vibrating. First was Liv, who covered her mouth. Then Sylvie, with her raspy laugh. Soon we were all laughing, even Marco. His was deep and rumbly and it took the air out of his lungs.

"Ho tendencies would fuck a toilet," said Grace, sending us into deeper spirals. I pounded my armrest and kicked my feet.

"I missed it," Marco wheezed. "Who is 'ho tendencies?' Is it him?"

Pri, almost crying with laughter, keeled over until her face hit my shoulder. "It's not not him!"

We laughed in circles for some time, Grace proudly explaining "ho tendencies" to Marco while we took turns naming things that "ho tendencies" would lead you to fuck.

It was fast and strange and unexpected, but something had changed. The fraught energy that had been bouncing between us was released, rising up into nothingness. Even after the joke had long faded, everyone seemed at ease somehow. We returned to the familiar patterns of snacking and sipping and chatting.

"Whatcha gonna do now?" asked Grace, almost bashfully. "If you two break up, I mean. Who gets Marco in the divorce?" Though she said it as a joke, it slid across a tender nerve.

Liv rubbed the back of her neck while Marco reached for more bar mix. Pri and I must have both thought to say our peace.

"I--"

"We won't--"

"I'm sorry."

"No, you go," I said. "I don't even know what I was going to say."

"Things are going to change for me soon," said Pri. Whether she intended it or not, she sounded mysterious and almost prophetic. "So I don't know. We can't know until we leave the vacation bubble and hash it all out. I know it's a non-answer but I can tell you what I will do." Pri's face scrunched up, like she was laughing at her own joke before she could tell it. "I'm gonna sneak into Liv and Marco's room tonight and screw whoever I find in there."

"Oh, you whore!" said Liv. "What if I'm in Jackson's room?"

"Even better."

"You're drunk! Drunk Pri has holes in her brain." Sniffing loudly, Liv poured the last of the vermouth into uneven shots. "I have another one inside," she said, standing. "Don't drink without me. Nooo touchy!"

The moment she was out of sight, Marco put his elbows on his knees, looking somber. Sylvie crossed her arms and waited.

"You shouldn't have--"

"I know that," she said. "Don't project your thing onto me."

He nodded and hung his head. When he looked up, he said, "I'm glad you're talking to Liv again."

This, of all things, made Sylvie blush. She shifted in her seat, probably feeling all of our eyes on her, and gave Marco a tiny shrug. He leaned cartoonishly and plucked a shot for himself. His waggling fingers gave us all another laugh.

Grace was sitting across the table from me, fanning herself, plucking her t-shirt to keep it off her sunburn. Her shorts were rolled up as high as they could go, her thighs shiny and red and corded with muscle. When she caught me staring, she blinked expectantly.

You good? I mouthed.

She seemed on the verge of some big reaction, but she just sighed and stuck her tongue out at me.

When Liv returned, she brought what was obviously vodka in addition to more vermouth. "The hard stuff is now available," she said, sinking into her seat. "What are we talking about?"

Sylvie picked a corn nugget from the bar mix and hit Liv in the chest. "Truth or dare," she said thickly. Fortified wine goes a long way when you're a hundred pounds.

Liv hummed for a comically long time before smacking her lips. "Truth."

"Why did you set me up with Marco when you already had a thing for him?"

"Shit, wow. Can I still choose dare?" Liv half-laughed. Sylvie waited. "You're really gonna make me do this? It's unrelated to the polyamory thing, so it should be off-limits."

"It's Truth or Dare now. That's iron-clad. That's the kind of lawyer shit you learn for sixty grand a year."

Liv looked deflated for a moment, then puffed up for her big answer. "I didn't think I was good enough, and I thought you were. You were so much prettier and smarter--"

"Livvy..." started Marco. He looked distraught.

"You were like a better version of me. I thought, maybe I could trick him into dating me for a few weeks but he'd figure out I was dumb and boring. If you two got together, everyone would be happy and no one would figure out how much of a loser I was."

"You were so hot," said Sylvie. "I can't believe this. I was jealous of you. You're so... tall."

"I am definitely not drunk enough for this..." said Liv, pouring more shots, first with vermouth, then others with the antiseptic stink of vodka. She downed a vodka and shivered in disgust. "Gah! Okay Marco, truth or dare."

"I'm really not up for it..." Instinctively, we booed him, Kay going so far as to kick his chair, rattling him. "You're such bullies. Fine, dare."

"I dare you... to get Sylvie's clean white socks and rub them in the fucking dirt."

Marco grinned, rising. He began to stalk around the edge of the table.

"No no no no!" cried Sylvie, tucking her feet beneath her. "Don't do this. Don't--!"

She squealed as Marco reached under her ass, muscling past her flailing until he had peeled both socks off. With his spoils in each hand, he walked over to the giant potted fern and dramatically ground them into the soil. Sylvie couldn't bear to watch and covered her face, so she didn't see when he paired them into a ball and launched them deeper into the yard.

"Kay," he said as he fell back into his seat. "Truth, or do you dare to dare?"

"Okay, question askers have to take a shot--"

Before Liv could finish, Marco had downed a vodka, returning the glass with a scary crack! He was too proud of himself.

Kay looked up, their dark eyelids fluttering as if searching the heavens for an answer. "Truth," they said.

"Shit, I had a dare ready. Hold on..." He rubbed his chin audibly, a few days past needing a shave. The vodka must have started a fire inside him because he quickly undid two buttons and yanked his joggers up to his knees. "What's the deal with the chest binder? You thinking about switching teams?"

"Oh my god," groaned Liv. "You fucking spastic, you can't ask that! Only you could be a bi poly Latino boy-slut and still think that's an appropriate question."

"What's a spastic?" asked Grace.

"Like a dumbass, I don't know. It's a British thing."

"It's a slur," said Pri. "It's literally hate speech for disabled people."

"Oh." Liv pinched her lips. "Fuck. I learned it from some guy. Fuck. I didn't--He still shouldn't have said that!"

"It's fine," said Kay. They put a hand to their chest, feeling the seams of the binder. "I don't care, really. I'm just trying it out, somewhere a little more chill than the U. S. People get weird about shit like that, case-in-fucking-point." They thought for a moment, scratching their forehead with a thumbnail. "I dunno if I like it yet. With my gender stuff, it's like I don't know how I'm gonna feel that day. Sometimes I wake up and I feel okay with all this." They made a flourish as if indicating their entire body. "But sometimes I wake up and it all makes me feel like shit. Like the parts are just... wrong." As if remembering his question, they added, "I'm not gonna become a boy. Probably."

An appreciative silence fell over us.

"I guess it's all on the table..." said Pri.

"Guess so," said Kay. "Truth or dare?"

Pri winced. "Shouldn't have said anything." She downed a vodka shot, coughing loudly and fanning her mouth. "God. Shit. Okay, okay, truth."

"Which of these three--" They gestured in a triangle, indicating the other members of the Study Group. "--is your favorite to fuck?"

Liv looked stricken, while Sylvie, leaning back in her seat, clapped. "You evil bitch," she said with pleasure.

"That's deeply, deeply opposed to the spirit of the polycule," said Pri. "It's kinda gross too."

"Okay, I don't give a shit. It's truth or dare, and plus I know you just made up that polycule shit today."

Pri covered her face, a purple blush rushing to her dark skin. For a moment I thought she would quit the game entirely. She opened the top button on her shirt, a cream-colored blouse with fun little stripes. We could see where her brown cleavage met her sports bra. "Did it just become like a million degrees out here? Alright, I'll tell you: Marco is the best at intercourse."

"Intercourse!" shouted Grace.

"Intercourse king," said Marco happily. "Kiss the ring."

"Liv is the best kisser," said Pri. "And she just... knows me, if you know what I mean."

"I think we do," said Sylvie. "O-lezzy-a, slay."

"And Jack is the best with his hands."

They gave me a half-sarcastic applause. I froze for a moment, then dabbed woodenly.

"I guess size doesn't matter," said Liv. "Unless you're talking about hand size."

"Yeah, but you totally didn't answer," said Grace. Though she spoke to Pri, she looked at me, or more accurately, she looked at my hands, my chest, my neck. She ate me up with her eyes. "Who's your favorite?"

"I can't pick a favorite like that..."

"Pick," said Kay. "That's the fuckin' law. Truth or dare law is--"

"Liv," said Pri. "It's Liv."

They ooh'd, and Grace finally met my eyes with a pouting expression, like Poor baby. Her cheeks were cherry red, eyes shiny from the alcohol.

Adjusting in her seat, Pri untucked her blouse from her shorts. "Maybe it's because the woman thing is new," she continued. "I don't think I could ever stick with one person exclusively though. Not any more."

"Oh...?" said Grace.

Off the cuff, drunk Pri had been more honest to the group than she'd been with me in months. Never one person, never exclusive again. I couldn't say why it happened now, but the first pang of jealousy, five months delayed, finally hit me.

"Gracie, truth or dare?"

"Definitely dare," she said. "You guys are horrible."

"Unlock your phone," said Pri. "And show us your hidden folder."

"Hm? What's that?"

"Yeah, nice try."

"Fuck, man. There's other people in there!" Grace had her phone out, scrolling frantically. "You're abusing my ho tendencies. I don't know you all like that. Ugh, you can see faces!"

"Tough shit."

They crowded around the back of Grace's chair, laughing and pointing. I had to admit I was curious. A theme quickly became obvious.

"There are so many cocks in here," said Liv. "Like an impressive variety. Oh! Oh, go back. God damn!"

"I like to sext," was all she said, her blush merging with her sunburn. A thin sheen of sweat coated her forearms and chest as the others surrounded her. "Honestly, there's probably a lot of my tits floating around out there..."

Around half the photos were of herself, almost always her breasts or side shots of her amazing, plump ass. She was a thirst-trap expert, showing more than enough skin but never a nipple and never her face. The group leaned in, hand-fighting on the screen, flipping forward and back. Dick, dick, breasts. Dick, dick, ass.

Hovering over her right shoulder, I ignored the phone and looked instead down the vee of her t-shirt. It was so easy, I couldn't have been the only one. Without a bra, I saw the deep valley of her breasts and the smooth, plump skin of her stomach. In under twenty seconds I was as hard as a rock, and I limped back to my chair before it was obvious.

Sylvie and I hadn't gone yet, and it was Grace's turn to pick. She tapped her chin dramatically and turned to Sylvie. "Jack," she said, whipping around with a grin. "Truth or dare."

"Dare," I said without hesitation. There was no way I was letting these people any further into my head.

"I was hoping you'd say that, because I dare you to take those shorts off."

"Are there rules about this?" I asked, trying to laugh it off. "Like, one article of clothing at a time?"

"That's strip poker," said Marco. "Show us your dick."

"No," said Grace. "Just the shorts. Underwear can stay."

"Awwww." Liv shuffled her feet in her best imitation of a tantrum.

"Undies stay, but you can't cover up at all. Call it the horny-ometer." Grace held up her arm, bouncing it like the needle on a gauge. "I got a feeling he's already hard. That means we're doing good. If he starts to go soft, you all need to step it up."

"I love it," said Pri. "You're so smart and pretty and smart."

"We should hang out more."

"I was just thinking that!"

Chattering incessantly, they watched me like coyotes from the brush. It wasn't the first time I'd stripped for them, though I guess the stakes were a little lower now. I adjusted myself and dropped my shorts, my heart thumping, my swollen cock poking down the leg of my boxer briefs. They were gray and tight, the outline looking like a fabric dildo, a few precum stains marking where I'd pushed myself around. I sat, legs apart so I wouldn't be accused of breaking the rules.

"Jesus," said Sylvie. "Like, what am I even looking at?" She shifted in her seat, and I hoped her pussy remembered the shape of me.

"I knew it," said Grace. "It was the dick pics, wasn't it? I think you still have a chance, Marco."

"I don't get off on turning the straights," he replied. "Leave them in the closet where they belong..."

"It's your turn, Sylvie," I said. "If we're going in order."

She blew out her cheeks. "I was hoping you guys would fail on pattern recognition."

"She'll do truth," said Liv. "Because she's a chicken."

"We're stooping to psychology--Uh, backwards psychology? God, alcohol makes me fucking stupid. Reverse psychology!" She blinked, looking relieved. "I reverse your reverse. Even though Jackson would take it so easy on me with truth, I'm doing dare."

"Oh, um." I hadn't even begun to think, dare, truth, or otherwise. Like pure inspiration, it came to me. "Go piss off that railing."

They roared.

"Taking it fucking easy on you, huh?" laughed Marco, smacking his leg. "Let's see that ass, Syl!"

"She won't," said Liv. "There's no way. There's no fucking way."

Sylvie reached for another shot of vermouth. She didn't even wince this time. "Watch me, you degenerates."

She stood, wobbling only a little, and marched to the balcony railing. It was made of wood and it was definitely wide enough to sit on. Without waiting for her nerves to catch up to her, she turned towards us, unbuckled, and dropped her shorts. Instead of panties she had what looked to me like a leotard under her outfit. We heard the crotch snaps unbutton, click click click.

"Oh, a body suit!" said Grace. "That's so cool."

"I used to have a ton of those." Liv leaned back, loving every second. "They haven't been in style in forever."

Holding down the front flap for cover, Sylvie grabbed the rim of a giant plant pot, hoisted her bare ass onto the railing, and carefully scooched until she was in position. While we continued drunkenly talking, she just stared at the sky, looking more and more flustered.

"Syl?"

"I didn't realize the pissing would be the hard part," she said. "Jesus Christ, what am I doing? Don't look at me."

"Waterfalls!" I yelled. "Babbling brooks."

"Water slide," added Liv. "A warm pool!"

We shouted piss-inducing thoughts at her, cheering her on until she was smiling. Beet red but smiling. I expected to hear a splashy noise as the pee hit the level below, but we only saw a trickle slide down the wooden post, setting off the loudest cheer of all. When she finally returned to her seat, never once showing us anything more risqué than her pale thighs, the congratulations flowed.

"Okay," she said with a measured tone. "Liv, truth or dare."

"Nah, you can't do me twice in a row."

Grace burst out laughing. "That's what she said."

"I think she's right, just pick someone new."

Sylvie pointed at Liv with exaggerated menace. "Lucky. So lucky. Then Kayby, truth or dare."

Kay, out of all of us, seemed the soberest, though that may have just been their cool demeanor. Slowly, a goofy smile spread across their face. I reassessed my judgment of "soberest."

"Dare," they said.

"I bet you don't remember how to handle a man. Go give Marco a ghost blowjob."

Kay's eyebrow raised and they shrugged like they had no idea what that was.

"Just pretend. Like, mime it over the pants and we'll give you pointers."

"Suck one dick in two years and suddenly you're an expert..."

The others laughed. Sylvie actually hadn't sucked my dick during our hookup, but they didn't need to know that.

Unfolding their incredibly long legs, Kay rose, then approached Marco with intention. "Don't nut in your pants," they said as they kneeled. "Wait, first... Pri. T or D?"

"Dare me."

Kay looked over their shoulder, reviewing the state of my cock. I'd wilted a little since they stripped me down. "Piss play ain't doing it for Jackson, so show us that big ass and let everyone smack it."

I don't know what Pri had been expecting but she just laughed. "Oh my god. Yeah, fine." She hopped to her feet and started to unbutton. "You have to come to me though."

Kay was so tall that, even kneeling, they were almost eye-level with the slouching Marco. They said some quiet words to each other that I didn't catch, and Marco smiled. Slowly, Kay placed a hand around his invisible cock, stroking it up and down, twisting slightly.

"I'm gonna take care of you," I heard Kay say. "I'm gonna make you cum in my hand like the stud you are..."

"Oh," said Marco, blushing.

Smack!

Pri was bent over between her chair and the love seat, pointing her muscular ass towards the center of the circle. She held her waistband below the meat of her ass, bouncing her big cheeks as a target. While her legs and arms were tanned a deep brown--the farmer's tan from hours of soccer practices--her ass was still its natural pale brown.

My cock jumped. It took some restraint not to bite my knuckle.

Liv had leapt up to be the first smacker and left a decent handprint behind. She laughed and shook her limp wrist like she'd injured it.

"Weak!" yelled Pri.

Sylvie was next. She lined up her shot, raising her hand a few times to measure the stroke, and ended with an ineffectual thud.

"No offense Syl, but super weak!"

Nearby, Kay stared into Marco's eyes, their long, pink tongue tickling the air above their closed fist. "It's so big," they whispered. "I don't think I can take it, but we can try anyway..." They hawked spit from the back of their throat and mimed drooling it onto his crotch.

Marco gripped his armrests, his mouth slightly open. Somewhere along the way he'd forgotten it was a game. His hard cock was tenting visibly.

Smack!

"Shit!" shouted Pri. "I thought you'd take it easy!"

Grace laughed. "It's not in my programming, baby girl."

I'd missed it again, but the evidence was there: dead center on Pri's cheek was a glowing Grace-sized handprint. Before my eyes, it flushed deeper and darker as the blood vessels dilated.

"I'm not gonna be able to sit if you all pop me like that!"

My turn. I stood, holding my hard cock so it wouldn't escape in one direction or another, and started to amble over to Pri.

"Cock-ometer is back at full," said Grace gleefully. Looking around for the others to notice my condition, she did a double-take. "Holy damn, Kay!" Kay was bobbing their head in Marco's clothed lap, making fake gluck gluck gluck noises for our benefit. Marco looked like he'd been drained already. "Kay knows how to suck dick!"

Once I was at Pri's side, I gripped her waist and held my palm over the hot spot that Grace had left behind, but something was off. Pri wasn't riffing with me like she had with the others. She was laughing with Liv about some bad back-of-thigh sunburns they once had, and she barely looked back as I lifted my hand. For some reason, if my heart had ever been in it, it wasn't any more.

I gave her a medium-firm thwap, enough that I couldn't be accused of pulling it, and received a hearty "Weak!" for my trouble. By the time I was back in my seat, I'd missed Kay's big finale, though the others gave them a short round of applause. Marco, in particular, seemed moved.

"I wasn't going to," he said to the jeers. "I had control."

"Then what's that?"

"It's precum. I'm good. I'm good." As an afterthought, Marco turned in his seat and gave Pri a weak rump smack, followed by a loving pat. "This ass is always better than I remember. I'll leave the door unlocked tonight, Pri."

"Don't expect head," said Pri. "I'm not following that. Kay, I thought you preferred girls..."

"Gonna have to burn a truth to learn that one," said Kay, reaching for another shot of vodka. The drunken conversation had picked up again, bouncing around the patio. Sylvie was holding Kay's wrist, the two of them leaning conspiratorially and laughing. Grace checked with Marco across the table, making sure he was going to make it to the next dare. ("Just think about trains, buddy.")

Pri, seated again, pounded her armrest. "Livvy! Truth or dare?"

Liv sighed oh-so-dramatically. "Is truth really on the table at this point? Officially, on the record, I choose dare."

"Yesss. It's a two-parter though. You have to give your phone to Syl first so you don't chicken out."

"Oh god, there is no way I'm gonna like this." A good sport, Liv unlocked the phone first then put it in Sylvia's palm with a satisfying smack.

"Liv, you're gonna help Syl add Ryan to your family chat."

"No. You wouldn't!"

A mixture of cheers and sympathetic noises came up from the group.

"This is evil," said Grace, shaking her head. "You really are a fucking genius."

Pri just posed and batted her eyelashes.

Ryan, we all knew, was Liv's ex. They'd broken up in the spring, starting the chain of events that led to the Study Group: me, Pri, Liv, and Marco, together. Even worse in this case, since Ryan was the one who dumped Olivia. Adding him to the Ackerman family group chat was fucking diabolical.

With extreme reluctance, Liv stood over Sylvia's shoulder and guided her to the right app and contact. With a dramatic, hovering finger, Syl tapped the screen and Liv hung her head.

"My dad is gonna shit," said Liv wearily. She looked up, her eyebrow raised. "Marco, did you go once or twice?"

"Uh, once, I think. But Jack didn't go either!"

"Truth or dare, honey."

"Oh, god." Marco kicked Pri's chair. "You had to wind her up, didn't you?" Pri shrugged, like Not my problem. "Fuck, okay. Dare."

"Take off your shorts. Underwear stays on though." She pointed at Grace, as if citing her inspiration. Grace gave a double thumbs up. "Then, in your underoos, grind on Pri until you cum."

"Fuck!" Laughing, Sylvia stomped her bare feet on the tile. "This just took a fucking jump!"

"Ew, you can't..." Marco searched among us, one by one, for backup, resistance, anything. He landed on me. "This is a little too far, right?"

"My name's Paul," I said. "And this shit is between y'all."

"Pulp Fiction!" shouted Kay.

"This is also, like, bordering on assault," said Marco. "Pri, c'mon."

Pri tilted her head and patted her lap. "Why wait for tonight, Coco? I can get you off right here."

"You fucking slut," said Liv. "I should have known you'd like it."

Marco, as if carrying the weight of the world, stood and kicked his shorts off. He was a swollen mess beneath his underwear, huge precum stains in multiple spots, his cock pulling his waistband away from his body. Sylvie pitched over gleefully, touching her head to Kay's bicep. Marco straddled Pri, shifting awkwardly until his parts touched her. They sat without moving for a moment.

"You okay?" asked Marco quietly. "I'll try to be fast."

Pri bit her lip. "Use me, daddy." She grabbed Marco's brief-clad ass and began to rock his hips for him, like he was riding her cowgirl.

"Pri--!" said Liv. "Fuck!" She tried to pour herself more vermouth and spilled badly, soaking a few trivia cards in amber. "Wait, Marco, you need to truth or dare someone first!"

Marco continued his momentum, dry humping my ex-girlfriend. "Jesus, let me do this first you psycho."

"Look at that butt!" said Sylvie. "It's like he's hiding two hams down there."

"It wasn't like that when you dated?"

"No way. He always had a skinny little bottom. Did I ever tell you about the time..."

The sun had taken its leave and the cozy purple twilight fell around us. The first of the patio lights, sensing our movement, turned on with a fluorescent click. The buzzing and chirping of insects reached us from the tall bushes. I felt like they'd always been there, playing their music, but we'd been too loud to notice. I checked my phone out of habit. Ooh'ing and clapping from the others made me look up.

Marco was rolling his hips, hands on armrests to support his weight, grinding against Pri's stomach like a stripper. Her hands had wandered under this shirt, touching and grabbing and stroking. They were violently making out, tongues wrapping together, switching the angle and direction of their faces as though trying to discover some new method of kissing.

Marco groaned as if his time was near.

"Okay," I said. "That's my cue."

"Oh, come on!" said Liv. "It's just a dare!"

I made a show of laughing. "You know that doesn't bother me. I just have to pee."

"Good luck getting it into the toilet," said Grace, eyeing me over. "Liv, d'you know about the two-streams thing?"

"The what?" asked Liv as I snuck around the back of the chairs. She turned to touch my arm. "Hey Jacky, don't take forever. It's gonna be your turn soon." As if punctuating the thought, Marco groaned again. "And don't put shorts on. It's bad sportsmanship. And can you get some snacks or something? Pretzels, if we have them. Thankss." She turned away and I realized I was dismissed. As I slipped through the kitchen slider, I heard, "So what is the two-streams thing..."

The kitchen was dim, violet from the disappearing sun mixed with tinny white from the patio lights seeping in. The murmur of the party felt distant.

I opened and shut a cabinet, then fumbled around in the fridge, for what I didn't know. I filled a cup from the sink, combing my hair back with my fingers, and wandered into the great room sipping my water.

It was half-dark inside, the bruised sky visible through the room's immense window. Someone had left the bathroom light on up on the mezzanine, and the huge potted plants were eerie in their shadows. I couldn't see the others, Liv and Grace and them, through the great window; I could only see their stretched-out shadows, weak and diffused, sliding along the ground outside. Flowering trees framed the scene, and I sat on a couch to take it all in.

What was I doing? If things are going so well, why didn't I feel better? Were things going well? I drunkenly assessed myself.

Intrusive thoughts? Under control.

My poorly hidden feelings? Still hidden poorly.

The cooling stickiness in my underwear. Unpleasant.

I should probably get back. I was going to get grief as it was.

Through the great window, on the cool tiled patio, Marco and Pri stumbled into view. The automatic lights flicked on, bathing them in yellow, looking for the world like actors thrust on stage long after their cue. They clawed at each other, kissing faces and necks. Most of the furniture had been pulled to the trivia circle, offscreen. Remaining was a single loveseat made of dark wood with thick green cushions.

Pri pushed Marco hard, knocking him backwards onto the seat, his head snapping back. His cock was long and stiff, emerging from over the waistband of his underwear, and he looked up at her with wild eyes. Showing his teeth, he said something I couldn't hear, something rude and provoking. Her back to me, Pri pulled her half-buttoned blouse over her head and mounted him, grinding her crotch on his. For a moment they were a mess of groping hands and squeezing knees.

"There you are!"

I started, arm up to defend myself, undoubtedly making a stupid face. It was only Grace, lit from behind by the forgotten bathroom light. She was carrying the half-empty vermouth in one hand and a bag of chips in the other.

"Chill out terminator! What are you--Hey, what the fuck!" Suddenly she was over my shoulder, leaning on the back of the sofa. The chips crinkled. "I was out there like two seconds ago. Jee-zus, they're really going at it."

"They just walked over," I said lamely. "I was sitting here already."

"Oh," she said. "Oh." She lowered her head, whispering kindly. "You're not, like, a cuck, are you? It's cool if you are..."

"I'm not a cuck! I just said--Fuck, I know what it looks like. I was seriously just sitting here." I held up my glass. "I'm drinking water, dude."

"That's crazy. So they just..." She limply pointed the vermouth at them, unsure of what to call it.

"Yeah, like thirty seconds ago. A minute tops."

We said nothing for a second, then Grace began to noisily climb over the back of the couch, holding her booze and snacks out wide for balance. I shied away, trying not to get clocked with the bottle. Huffing, she bounced into her seat with a creaking of springs.

"Owie..." she said. "My ass is so fucking burnt. You're supposed to be looking out for me! But no, you let it happen."

The lovers were attempting to remove Marco's shirt together but they were endlessly interrupted by their need to tongue each other's mouths, so it was a lengthy process. In spite of that very worthy distraction, I gave Grace a look.

"What? Since when?"

"Since I've been looking out for you."

"You're looking out for me?"

"No fucking duh, man. You play ball and I keep you from ruining the vacation with all your... depressingness."

"I guess that sounds familiar--uh." Pri's sports bra came off, tossed against the side of the house. We could see only her broad, tan-striped back, rippling athletically under the harsh lights. "Are they really gonna...?"

"That would be incredible." Grace tossed the chips onto the coffee table and took a swig of the vermouth. She offered me the bottle. "Ya'll done this before, I'm guessing." Grace seemed to have a well-hidden southern drawl that only peeked out a little when drunk. It was cute.

I took the vermouth and paused. Done this before? Did she mean have sex in front of people, or watch other people have sex? "Yes," I said, taking a sip that I really didn't need. "I mean basically yeah."

"It really doesn't bother you? She's, like, your girlfriend."

"It never has," I said. I was suddenly and deeply certain I had just dodged the question. Before I could examine that thought, Pri dismounted, kneeled before Marco, and began to suck his dick. We couldn't see much from our angle, just the motion of her head, the swaying of her hair, the rise and fall of her jerking elbow.

Something flew in from "off stage," skittering across the tile. Muffled laughter came from the direction of the lights. Then another, bouncing off the side of the loveseat. The others were watching and throwing ice, not that either of the lovers noticed.

God, my cock hurt. It was rock hard and confused, chafing and straining against my underwear. It's not like it was hidden, but I crossed my legs at the knee anyway. Holding the vermouth, at least, gave me something to do with my hands. I drank again. It was sweet and thickly herbaceous in the back of my throat.

Grace stared out the window, while Marco, looking blissful, threaded a brown hand into Pri's hair, his legs spread wide. When his head lolled around it seemed for a moment like he was looking at us.

Grace and I froze. What must we look like right now? Before the moment could torture us any longer, his head fell back again, no recognition showing in his eyes.

"That was crazy!" said Grace. "Fuuuck me, I almost had a heart attack!" She pulled a foot up on the couch and slouched against her knee. After a moment, she sighed. "This has to be the weirdest week of my life."

"I know exactly what you mean," I said.

"I doubt it!"

We silently watched the silhouette of Pri's blowjob for what felt like an hour. Eventually Marco said something and Pri stood. He sat forward and pulled her close, one arm wrapped around her waist, and they fumbled against each other until, from the angle and motion of his elbow, he had obviously started fingering her. Pri looked down at him, and if I knew her at all, encouraged him softly.

"Is this really okay?" asked Grace. Her concern was genuine. I wondered if she could read my mind, if she knew how confused I felt about watching Pri with someone else, even if that person was someone intrinsically good like Marco. "I mean, the others are watching so it's not that different if we watch too."

"Oh," I said. Idiot. I sighed and drank more. "We're fine. They clearly don't care."

So we watched too. Marco fingered my ex-girlfriend for a long time, squeezing her, admiring her. I'd spent my fair share of hours with Pri's tits, bra-covered or otherwise, in my face. She always made these lovely, satisfying grunts when you touched her just right...

Grace shifted, just slightly. Though her upright leg blocked most of her body, it also created a narrow gap between her calf and thigh. She may have thought she was hidden, but through that gap I could see that her hand was inside her shorts, moving in little circles.

My cock was flowing freely now, hot precum disgracing my underwear. I wanted to jerk off so badly but I hadn't planned as well as her. It would have been too obvious. My heartbeat throbbed in my shaft.

Meanwhile, Marco's rocking hand pulled Pri's shorts lower and lower until, finally, we could see the top of her crack. He'd gotten tired waiting and suddenly ripped her bottoms to the ground, underwear and all. The brittle patio lights reflected on the handprints we'd slapped onto her big brown ass. He pressed his face into Pri's ribs and spanked her five or six times, hard, drooling as he shook the weight of her cheeks in his hand.

Grace made a choking noise, like phlegmy hum cut short. She cleared her throat and glanced at me over her knee, her round face glowing purple-red with embarrassment. I didn't know if she'd cum a little or if she was just so turned on she forgot how to swallow.

"It's okay," I said. "Same, T B H."

"I couldn't help it," she said softly.

"I don't care. I get it."

"I guess you do." She let her head drop against the cushion, looking at me sideways. "You look like you're gonna tear through those drawers."

"Hey, be nice. You're the one who took my shorts."

She laughed, then shook out her hair, shiny and black, before clipping it back up in a pile. When she was done, she seemed to have nothing to do with her hands. They flopped with anxious energy.

"Uh, would you--Do you wanna masturbate?" she asked. "Like, I'm totally cool with it if you did."

"Seriously?" I huffed a laugh. "I mean, yeah. I want to so bad."

"Yeah? Okay. You don't mind if I do too?"

"Of course not."

"Okay, I just didn't want it to be weird..."

Neither of us moved. We were waiting, I thought, for the other person to start, to make it real. Eventually I couldn't help myself. I grabbed my cock through the wet fabric and squeezed blood into the head.

"Fuck me," I mumbled.

Jerking into motion, Grace stood and unsnapped the button of her shorts. It was torture to not stare openly. I rolled to the side to pull my underwear down. My cock sprung out, waving and glistening, like it was happy to be free.

With a hip wiggle, she dropped the shorts to the floor. The hem of her t-shirt was bunched up on the shelf of her wide, immaculate ass. It was a weightlifter's ass, high and round with muscle but plumped and heavy with body fat. As she kicked her clothes to the side, it bounced and shook. She was so fucking thick that normal, everyday movements made her twerk inadvertently. Her vivid pink sunburn highlighted the stretch marks along the top of her round cheeks. You could lose a hand in those depths. God, it was perfect.

Grace sat again and fidgeted, drawing her naked legs up, then lowering them, tugging at her shirt and then dropping her restless hands. I worked my cock, doing my best not to stare, until she finally realized there was no right way to sit. Her erect nipples were short and thick, forming little tents in her t-shirt.

She spread her muscle-thick thighs and lowered a dainty finger onto her clit. The image of her smooth, hairless pussy hadn't left my mind since the dick-measuring a few nights ago, and it was just as I remembered. Her outer labia were puffy and rounded, and even fully turned on they almost completely covered her tiny inner lips. As red as her burns were, her pussy was redder, more flushed, more swollen.

"Fuh-uck," she said as she stroked herself for the first time. The slick gliding of skin against skin was audible. "I'm so fucking wet lol. I mean, look. Look at this."

Using her toe, she lifted her discarded underwear into the light. They were so damp it looked like she'd peed in them a little.

"Fuck off," I laughed. "Same." I was lost for a moment, bent over, searching for mine. It wouldn't be great if someone found my underwear jammed between the cushions. I held them up, showing off the copious cum stains.

Her eyes snapped up to my hands, then to my face. She looked unsure if I'd caught her checking out my body, checking out my cock.

"Damn," she said. "I thought you were making a mess out on the patio but they're totally disgusting now." She stared as I placed them on the couch cushion between us. "Totally fucking disgusting..."

Our eyes drifted back to the show. Without her shorts, Pri's hairy mound was easily visible, and Grace and I watched raptly as Marco curled two, maybe three fingers inside her, spreading her thick lips. He was rough, pumping into her pussy and squeezing her waist so hard that her skin went bloodless under the indentation of his fingers. She was loving it, every fucking second.

So was Grace. She'd settled into a rhythm, her flexing bicep held tight against her body, her middle finger passing back and forth across her clit, like flicking a switch. On, off, on, off, on. She'd sunk deeper into the couch, eyes glazing over.

"Is that always how you do it?" I asked. "You said you had toys, right?"

She bit her lip but didn't seem to mind the question. "I do like something inside me. Something, uh, big..." We both glanced at the eight inches of wet cock I was pumping in my fist. "But I'm pretty hard on my clit. It gets really stiff, so I end up like..." She pushed it side to side, slowly and intentionally. "Clicking it almost. You can't hear that, can you?"

"No." I almost laughed. "That's probably in your head."

"I thought so." She dipped her finger between her pussy lips, deep, down to the last knuckle, and shuddered, pulling out more lubrication for her angry button. "Fuck fuck fuck..." she moaned as she resumed her "clicking." I lost track of time watching her play with herself. Eventually, she turned back to me. "That's not how you do it, is it?"

"What do you mean?"

"Don't you need, like, lube or something?"

I knew that a lot of guys used lotion, or even actual lube, while some just jerked it "dry." I wasn't exactly in either category. I shrugged. "Does it look like I need it?" My cock was slick in my hand, the thick veins catching the light.

"No," she laughed. "Not really"

"I make enough precum. Like, once I get into it, I mean." To demonstrate, I milked myself from the base, pushing a huge, pearly bead out of my slit. It slid slowly down my shaft, all the way to my balls.

"That's amazing..." She suddenly squeaked. "Oh fuck, they're doing it, they're doing it!"

Through a window the size of a cinema screen, lit unevenly by the outdoor lights, we watched Pri crawl onto Marco's lap, holding his cock upright with one hand. Marco's joggers had disappeared. Knowing him he'd probably tossed them into the bushes or something equally hasty. With his fingers digging into her skin, Marco guided Pri's fat ass on to his dripping member.

Grace and I groaned as Pri sunk down onto Marco's cock. The patio lovers kissed deeply, Pri's hips rising and falling, over and over. There was no warm-up, no testing the depth. They'd been doing foreplay for thirty minutes. Pri swallowed him whole, her ass clapping against his athletic thighs with each bounce.

We watched in silence. I found myself imagining the sounds that we couldn't hear through the window. The heavy breathing, the wet slapping of skin, the pillow talk.

"What kind of porn do you like?" asked Grace, sounding almost out of breath. I'd been wondering if she was going to play with her breasts, and she'd finally given in to the desire, pulling and twisting at her nipple through her shirt. I still somehow hadn't seen her bare chest. I wanted to so badly. I needed to.

"Sorry, what'd you say?"

"What kind of porn do you watch?" she asked, as if it was nothing. "I watch hidden camera stuff sometimes and, like, I know it's totally fake, but it's just like this. Well, it's also usually step brother shit."

"Right? What is with all the step brother shit?"

"I have no idea. I don't even think about it anymore." She squeezed her fat outer labia together around her clit and jerked herself up and down for a moment. I'd never seen that before, even in porn. "Fuck me, this is the hottest thing I've ever seen. So, uh, what do you like to watch?"

"I dunno," I said, hesitating. I beat my dick slower, gliding from balls to glans in long, agonizing strokes. "Um, I like people who are really in shape, like athletes. Big asses, big dicks. Interracial stuff."

"Like, with Asian girls?"

I glanced at her as she pulled on her nipple and diddled her clit. I knew she could see me but she just stared straight ahead. "Yeah," I said. "Like with Asian girls."

Outside, Marco and Pri were already changing positions. She dismounted quickly and grabbed him by the back of the head, pulling him to his knees like a rag doll. He went willingly, his brown cock waving, his abs shiny. Standing in profile to us, Pri took a wide stance and shoved Marco's face into her recently fucked snatch. Taking two handfuls of his black hair, her head fell back as she ground herself on his nose and mouth, her ass cheeks clenching with each hip thrust.

"Jesus in heaven..."

"Jesus? She never did that with you?"

"No. Uh, that's new." I didn't want to cum but I felt like I was already entering into painful edging territory. Watching Pri dominate Marco almost made me blow right there. "'Gender swapped facefuck.' Something I didn't know I needed to look for."

"If you find anything like that, send it to me."

"Send you...?"

"I can send you stuff too. If you want." She drew both feet onto the couch, thighs wide, knees spread. Her clit flicking was beginning to sound messy. "Fuck, I wish I could hear out there. You know them. What kind of shit do they say?"

"Oh, ummm... Pri doesn't talk that much at the beginning, but when we've been fucking for awhile, when we're close to cumming, she'll curse, like 'Shit, damnit," and she'll like..." I made some rough, back-of-the-throat type grunts, like an animal in heat.

"Damn, you obviously love that. You started jerking so fast for a second."

Somehow I blushed and dialed back my stroking yet again. I stretched my legs and decided to leave them propped out on the coffee table. "And Marco, I guess he kinda narrates a little bit? Like, 'I'm fucking your pussy. It's so tight, baby. I wanna cum soon...'"

"I like that," she said. "He's not saying much now..."

Without being able to hear, I couldn't know if Pri had cum already, but her hips started to thrust in overtime while Marco played the part of a bicycle seat.

Grace seized up for a second, her knees knocking together. Once, twice, three times. It passed quickly. "Oh fuuck... I'm getting a lot of little ones, and when I get a lot of littles ones I'm close to the fucking huge one."

"I could cum right now," I said. "But I don't want to."

"This is great, right?"

"This is fucking incredible."

Pri's thrusting went a little manic, herky-jerky as she visibly orgasmed. Her thick back muscles clenched as we watched her cum all over Marco's face.

Grace and I had nothing to say. We listened to each other's heavy breathing and the erotic sounds of our own wet, sliding skin.

Finally, she looked over at me. "I've never done this before. I've done some shit but nothing like this. It's--It's crazy to be this close to someone while they jerk off." She peeled her pussy lips apart and slid two fingers inside, squeezing her eyes shut. When they opened, she looked over. "Hey, can you take your shirt off?"

"Yeah," I said. "You too?"

"Uh, yeah. This thing is killing me anyway."

I tore my shirt over my head while she was more ginger in removing hers. Relaxing again, she took me in, her eyes traveling over my chest and stomach. Without thinking, I turned my hips, pointing myself a little more in her direction. She did the same, dropping her inside knee flat.

Grace's tits were worth waiting for. Each one was two huge handfuls, definitely D's or even larger, swinging heavily against her ribs as she settled into place. The sunburn formed wicked lines across her formerly pale torso. Her areolas were goosebumped and dark brown, large, almost as big as coasters and perfectly suited to her. Her stubby nipples were fucking biteable.

We were distracted for a second by Pri throwing herself over the armrest of the loveseat, Marco right behind, squatting and bending down until the angle was enough to enter her. His thrust went straight to the hilt, his long cock disappearing inside her, her fat ass rippling. He hit her deep and for a moment both of her feet lifted off the ground, kicking madly, toes pointed. Marco pushed her face into the cushion, stealing every inch of leverage she had, and began to fuck her senseless.

As fucking hot as it was, I couldn't tear my eyes away from Grace. I watched her flex her muscular shoulders, fanning her fingers across her clit. She pinched her little nub of a nipple, biting her lip and breathing through her teeth. She watched me play with my balls, stroking my cock violently, jizz foaming up around my slit. I clenched up, a tiny arc of precum squirted out the tip, and she gasped.

Her chest rose and fell, her hanging, shiny tits reflecting in the light. My abs clenched, a bead of sweat rolling down the center.

"I'm so fucking close," I said. "Do you--Do you want to help me cum?"

"Yes," she said instantly.

"Suck my cock?"

"God yes."

Stark naked, burnt, and coated with sweat, Grace pitched over and crawled the foot-and-a-half to put her face in my lap. She collapsed onto her hip, her breasts draping sideways, one expanding flat against the couch cushion, the other stacking on top of the first.

Without even an introductory lick, she opened wide and slowly took me straight to the back of her throat. Her mouth stretched obscenely around my girth and, with agonizing slowness, she sucked her way back out, inch by inch, until she only held my engorged head with pouty lips. Her eyelids fluttered, her tongue lashing against my frenulum, her expression almost drugged.

I slumped, groaning, and rested my hand on her thick waist. Her skin was burning to the touch.

Taking a moment, she rested her head on my knee, eyes dazed, watching herself jack me off. Her forearm, thick from her weightlifting, flexed as she tightened her grip.

"You like it?" I whispered.

"I think I'm in love with your cock."

Pulling it down like a lever, she brought the tip to her lips and kissed it lovingly, frenching the slit. She popped my shiny, purple glans into her mouth a few more times, then slid it deep into the pocket of her cheek. Eyes shut, she slowly rocked her neck and head, nursing on my cock and slowly drinking the endless spurts of precum as they came.

She searched for my face again, finding me slack-jawed and panting, and released me with another pop. "You want me to eat your ass too?"

"No, no, keep going," I practically begged. "Please, you're so fucking good."

She bit her lip at the praise and returned to worshiping my cock. Grace knew how to milk me from the root, though her thumb and forefinger weren't quite able to close around my girth. She knew how to keep me lubricated, continuously drooling a mixture of cum and saliva evenly into the strokes of her twisting hand. She knew how to tease me, grazing my cock ridge with her teeth, making me curse and squirm. She slid the edge of her tongue down the groove of my cum slit, sawing back and forth, flicking devilishly at the end.

I was in an almost ASMR-like trance, locked into the pleasure while watching an expert casually cycle through the moves in their cock sucking repertoire. She was playing with me, freestyling. She was a fucking succubus.

I'd been staring for a while, eyes hooded, and finally thought to cup her fat, swinging breast, teasing her nipple with a fingernail. Immediately, she grabbed my wrist and forced my hand down her plump stomach to her pussy. Between her thighs, her clit was as shiny and stiff as a piece of polished stone. I pushed it from side to side, feeling the little "click" over and over. There was something impossibly satisfying about clicking her little shaft back and forth, seeing her eyes roll back in her pretty face, her mouth still stuffed with cockmeat.

I couldn't believe that I'd held out this long. On cue, the white-hot tingling began by my balls. Grace was pushing me over the edge, her tricep flexing, her hand gliding rapidly up and down my shaft. Schlick, schlick, schlick, the sounds of skin against skin.

"You're so fucking good, Grace. I'm gonna cum."

She didn't pause or react, not even to hum a response. My toes scrabbled against the cold floor. I'd never gotten head like this before, never been with someone who had this level of talent and desire. She was perfect, joining her stroking hand to her mouth to extend the depth, pushing further and further until my glans was crushed by the pressure at the back of her throat. She stroked my balls and moaned in sonorous waves, just to add more sensations to the act.

"I'm trying not to but--Fuck--You're making me feel so fucking good. I'm gonna cum, okay? I'm gonna cum right fucking now...!"

For two excruciating seconds, the warm, orgasmic glaze trickled over my brain before I ejaculated. I moaned.

She made a pained gulping noise, the lines around her sunburned throat clenching as she tried to swallow it all. Curling two fingers in her pussy, I stroked directly on her G-spot and shot another huge rope onto the back of her tongue.

The first spurt was huge but manageable. The second jet of cum was too much for her. She choked and coughed, hot bubbly cum exploding out from the corners of her mouth. Her eyes watered and clenched but she didn't stop sucking. Pushing deep, she bobbed her head, a long strand of cum dangling from her chin. I shot again, practically down her throat this time but she never fucking stopped. She didn't seem to care if she fucking drowned, she was determined to drink every drop.

Whimpering, my quads locked out, my curled fingers yanking her sturdy pussy so hard I actually pulled her a few inches closer to me. I pounded the cushion with my palm, seeing stars.

As my ejaculations got smaller, she took them more easily, and by the fifth or sixth she was able to swallow them fully. Her mouth and cheeks were glazed over and, still fucking sucking me, she looked up with glassy, reverent eyes.

I can do this as many times as you want, those eyes said. I'll do whatever you want, whenever you want.

When I finally slumped backwards, balls empty and aching, Grace continued to gently suckle my cock. When she was finally satisfied that my limp, red dick was clean, she wiped at her face and licked her fingers. Then she crawled up into my lap, straddled me, and, as if all her energy vanished at once, she collapsed. As she rested her head on my shoulder, I ran my fingers down the contours of her back and waist, then back up again, hypnotically stroking her feverish skin. Her hair smelled like herbs.

Our shallow breathing was out-of-sync, and like metronomes set to different tempos they would slowly line and then diverge again. While the post-orgasm drowsiness flowed over me, Grace shifted in my lap, then shifted again, and again until I realized she was trying to rub her clit against my stomach.

"Do you want to cum?" I asked.

Her resting head nodded, her hips moving a little faster.

"Do you want to cum in my mouth? I want to suck on your clit. I want to taste your beautiful pussy."

"Yes," she whispered. "Please, yes."

The kitchen lights snapped on, followed by clashing voices. Liv, Kay, and Sylvie.

"No, no, no." Grace buried her face into my neck and froze. "Fuck, please, no..."

A strand of her cooling pussy cream dripped onto my flaccid cock from above. My fat, hanging shaft twitched and began to grow, like a movie monster returning from the dead.

"Hey, you freaks were watching too?" Liv, down to just her panties, walked in from the kitchen. I'd been so focused on Grace that I didn't notice that our voyeuristic show had ended. Outside, naked as the night is long, Pri sat with her legs thrown into Marco's lap. They must still not be able to see us, because they sat, smiling and talking. "I gotta say, way better than the audio-only--Whoa! Oh my god, you guys fucked?"

Syl's voice rang out from the kitchen. "They fucked? Who did?"

Grace, if it was possible, shrank even further.

"Jacky and Grace are buck-ass naked on the couch and--" Liv perched over the back of one of the other couches, giving us a thorough review. Her bare breasts were flushed pink and her lips were cherry red from kissing. "That's a recently emptied cock."

Sylvie and Kay followed. Syl's blouse was unbuttoned and thrown open, as were her chunky little shorts, showing off the black bodysuit beneath. Kay wore nothing but gray boyshorts, their polo and jeans thrown over their shoulder. I saw, for the first time, their entire body, uninterrupted. Lithe and athletic, not just with visible abs but visible veins across the thin skin of their torso. Despite their insanely low body fat, Kay's breasts were way larger than I would have guessed, easy handfuls with little cherry-red nipples. The chest binder was gone, though I guess they weren't concerned about that now.

"Damn," said Sylvie. "He got you too."

"We didn't have sex," I said. "You guys are freaking her out."

"Uh huh, so that's someone else's cum?"

"I didn't say--We didn't fuck, okay?"

"Relax, guy," said Kay. They leaned over Liv, crossing their arms over the nape of her neck. "It's all good."

Liv's voice softened. "Did we mess you up? We can go."

Grace whispered, too low to hear.

"Are you okay?" I asked into her ear.

"I'm so fucking wet," she whispered. "Jack, I need to cum really bad..."

"I'll make you cum," I said. "Lay down and I'll make you cum."

"Ah, part two?" asked Kay, tickling Liv's ear. "You wanna go again?"

"Go, go!" laughed Liv.

They pushed at each other, hand fighting around an end table, racing. While Grace and I were coupled together on the center-most couch, Liv and Kay collapsed together on the couch to our right, groping at each other's breasts and kissing, playful at first, then rough with passion. I watched until Kay's hand drifted down to Liv's panties, pulling them to the side so they could tease her clit. My cock jumped again.

"Take it easy," said Liv with a whine. "I came like three times already."

"That's it?" said Kay. "You want three more?"

"Three...?" She moaned under Kay's expert fingers. "Oh fuck. Fucking--fucking ravish me then..."

My cock jerked, swollen again, love tapping against Grace's smooth, sunburned ass. I clenched my pelvic floor, smacking my glans harder and harder against her until I felt fresh precum splatter against a butt cheek.

Grace, her arms around my neck, let herself fall sideways, pulling me down with her. We fumbled for a moment, trying to get her trapped leg out from below us, and eventually I was laying on her chest, her tits crushed beneath me.

She looked up with soft eyes. "Are you gonna...? Please?"

I smiled. "Please? So polite."

"Don't do that," she said. "Don't--"

I kissed her roughly, probing with my tongue, pressing her silky loose hairs against the side of her face. After a dazed moment, I moved south, leaving an oozing trail of precum down her stomach, and paused to find a surer place for my hands. Grace looked down between us, eyes wide.

My cock, purple-red and fully engorged, was resting on her mons. I had intended to eat her out, I was moving in the right direction, but I was close to something very different. A slight change in angle and a thrust of the hips and she would gasp and I would be inside her. Her clit was rock-hard under my swollen meat, her face a mixture of fear and anticipation.

I finally recognized that I was hovering. Grace looked away, tilting her head straight back as though she couldn't bear to watch whatever I decided to do.

There was no question. I couldn't, not without her invitation and definitely not without a condom, but it was stiIl difficult to move on. My breathing slowed, and after a long, searching moment, I continued to crawl backwards until my face was between her massive thighs.

"Fuck," I whispered to myself. "It's so fucking beautiful."

Trying to match even a fraction of the reverence she showed for my cock, I slowly lapped at Grace's cunt, sliding my tongue between her pretty pussy lips, each time finishing with a nudge across her clit. Each time she would flinch, knees wobbling, breath caught in her throat.

Unlike the other girls I'd been with, Grace didn't seem to have distinct taste. She was so fucking turned on, so flushed and so dripping, but it was almost flavorless. I rested my head on her inner thigh, the heat radiating into my ear. Forming a sideways bubble of suction over her mound, I stiffened my tongue and "clicked" her little clit, left, right, left.

She shook and moaned. Through one eye, I looked up the landscape of her body. She was squeezing her breasts together with full hands, pinching her nipples with bloodless fingers. Her legs trembled, inching closer and closer together until I had to pin her knee down. I bent my elbow awkwardly beneath us, found her slit, and slid a finger inside.

She bucked. "Uhn, shit," she panted. "Do that. Oh my god, just do that. Do that... Do that..." She'd taken one finger so easily, I went right to three, curling them across the bumpy area of her G-spot again. "No, you can't--Jack, please. Oh fuck, do it, do it, do it..."

Grace released a little gush of cum into my mouth, her pussy contracting around my fingers. Her knee jumped again, forcing me to pin her harder, this time putting my shoulder into it.

Click, click, click went my tongue across her clit. Click, click--

"Shi--uhhhn...!" Grace cried, whiny and breathless. "Shit-shit-shit-t-t..." As she squirmed and flailed, hips thrusting, I was tempted to take another peek, to see how fucking good she looked, to see her sunburned face turn purple as I tongue-fucked her brain into mush.

Instead I kept my head down, clicking, stroking her insides, using my neck and arms and tightness of my core to keep her knees apart, rolling that orgasm on and on. Each contraction, deep and pulsating, flooded my mouth with a little more girlcum. I drank it all like the ambrosia that it was.

Then fingertips brushed my forehead, followed by a smack across the eyes. Just a love tap, but the next few were increasingly violent as Grace tried to push me away.

When I lurched back, her knees and meaty thighs clamped shut in my wake, her legs crossing tightly at the ankle. She covered her face with shaking hands, her hips rocking side to side. Every inch of skin I could see, whether it was burned or not, had turned bright, blotchy red.

All at once my world expanded beyond Grace's body, and I heard some highly obscene moaning coming from behind me. Before I could turn to look, I made eye contact with Sylvie.

Syl had stuck herself deep into the farthest cushions of the third couch, watching us. Wearing only the sleeveless black bodysuit, the crotch flap opened and curled up on her stomach, her knees were spread, one foot up on the coffee table. She was naked from the waist down and rapidly fucking herself with a dark green sex toy. Beyond a few languid blinks, her face was almost blank.

She paused for a moment, pulling the toy out of herself, and checked it for some button or setting. It was a rabbit, the curved dildo with the little extra arm. Whatever she was looking for she found, and the toy buzzed to life. Lowering the rabbit back to her pink pussy, I realized she was holding it upside down, the extra arm hanging below instead of up above. Sylvie had previously ordered me to never play with her clit, but I was still a little shocked. The instant the vibrating rabbit arm touched her asshole, she grimaced with pleasure.

Behind me Olivia and Kay were doing some kind of twisted sixty-nine. Elbows wrapped around knees, all rigid back muscles and mussed up hair, they ate each other out with a forceful tenderness, moaning loudly into each other's pussies.

I was drunk, out of breath, and erect, surrounded on all sides by incredible naked bodies, swollen nipples and happy, flushed vaginas.

"Jack," mumbled Grace. "I'm... I need to go to bed. Can you help me up?"

"Of course," I said, taking her grasping hand. Whether it was the alcohol or just a way-too-intense orgasm, she was totally out of it. "You're okay. I've got you."

Upright again, chest flushed, Grace rubbed at her face. "I'm sorry, I can't even... Can you--Can you walk with me?"

"Of course. Nothing to be sorry about. You were incredible."

When we got to our feet, Grace glanced around at the others. She made a face. "Were they here the whole time?"

"I don't know," I said. "I mean, no. Not the whole time. Come on, this way. Watch the edge there."

Squeezing hands, we trudged up the stairs. I convinced her, I wasn't sure how, to put on some panties and a t-shirt before helping her into bed. Feeling both embarrassed and a little intrusive, I took another pair of panties from her drawer and, with a little saliva, wiped my cum from her mouth and face. Eyes already closed, she tried weakly to smack my hands away.

"Good night, Grace," I said. Looking back as I shut her door, she was beautiful and already asleep.

Standing on the mezzanine, I was still hard, still horny, still dripping. I could hear the moans from the pussy-eaters below, and I wondered with guiltily if they would let me join them, tangle up with those hard bodies, kiss Kay and touch their taut shoulders, put my cock in Liv until she was squirting all over the three of us.

I also heard the buzzing of Sylvie's vibrator, but it was closer than it should have been. Her door, the next one down from Grace's, was wide open. Inside, Syl was lying face down on her perfectly made bed, her pale ass raised just enough for her hand and toy to fit underneath. She must have followed right behind us, migrating to somewhere a little more comfortable.

"Fuck, Syl," I said, leaning on the doorframe. "You feeling good?"

Sylvie pulled the vibrator away and dropped it, still buzzing, off the side of the bed with a thunk. Looking over her shoulder with a dazed expression, she wiggled her knees a little wider on the duvet.

"Oh thank god," she said thickly. "Come fuck me."

I crawled on top of her and did what I was told.