Page 30 of Badd Baby

"I did," I said. "And it's fine. This is pillow talk. It doesn't have to be sexy."

“You’re such a weirdo.” She sighed again. "So anyway, that day, I was feeling particularly shitty. Heavy flow, bad cramps, all the fun stuff. But he'd been whining for days about how horny he was, how long it had been since we had sex, blah blah blah."

I scoffed. "Had it been longer than a month?"

Rune snorted derisively. "A month? Try less than a week! We’d just had sex the day my period started. It made it start as a matter of fact.”

"Fucking hell, what a selfish tool."

She shook her head. "I really, really didn't feel like it. But he was just so fucking whiny and pathetic about it, and I did love him, and I figured I'd do something nice. Take care of him. You know?"

"What the fuck did he say, Rune?" I demanded.

"After I was done, he patted me on the head like a fucking dog and said, ‘That was great, babe, thanks. I feel better now.'"

"I literally cannot roll my eyes any harder."

"Right?" She scoffed again, disgusted. "I'd have been fine if that was the end of it. The head pat? Condescending and massively shitty, but at least he said thank you when I did something I very much did not want to do just to make my boyfriend feel better."

"But that wasn't the end of it."

"Oh no. No, no, no. It was not. I got up, intending to go, you know, rinse my mouth out. Maybe brush my teeth. Not that he tasted bad or anything, I just—"

I touched her lips. "You don't need to explain or justify a damn thing, Rune.”

She playfully nipped at my fingers, and then continued. “I went to kiss him. I wasn't, like, gonna open-mouth French kiss him or anything, just a quick little kiss on the way to the bathroom." Again, the small, hurt voice. "He turned his face away. Denied me the kiss. He said, and I quote verbatim, because I'll never fucking forget it as long as I live, ‘You just swallowed my cum, Rune. That's gross. Why would I kiss you after that? Who wants to kiss a girl with cum-breath?’”

I blinked in stunned silence. "Bullshit. There's no fucking way he said that out loud."

She laughed, but it was bitter. "Oh, but he did. He absolutely said that to me."

"And he's still alive?" I asked, not really faking the disbelief. "The girls in my family? Some dumbfuck says something like that, he ain't walking away. If she didn’t murder him, the rest of us would. Do not fuck with the Badd Clan. You come for one of us, you get all of us."

She regarded me cautiously. "I don't know if you're entirely joking, Duncan."

"Me either," I said with a laugh. “He wouldn't be murdered, but it would not go well for him." I looked at her. "I still can't believe your ex said that to you.”

"I couldn't either." She sighed, squeezing her eyes shut. "I know it's stupid, but I just…I've never been able to let that go. He did and said a lot of dumb, hurtful shit in the years we were together. He cheated on me, and that's what made me break up with him, but he did a lot of other stuff before that. I honestly forgave him for way too much, let way too much go. I should have broken up with him over that alone, but I didn't. I don't even really know why."

"Rune, it's not stupid."

"It just…it hurt, you know? Like, why is that gross? It's gross to you? I put your penis in my mouth. I swallowed your cum. You let me do it, and you certainly enjoyed it. But then it's gross?"

"Did he ever return the favor?" I asked.

She shrugged. "Sometimes. It wasn't his favorite thing, but he'd go down on me once in a while."

I shook my head. "There's nothing gross about it. It's an act of generosity, Rune. If you don't think it's gross, neither should he. He should be grateful you did it at all."

"I certainly never did again," she said, "I can tell you that. And guess what? Not a month later, I found out he cheated on me."

"Wow. What a fucking tool."

She looked up at me. "I haven't done that to anyone since then, Duncan. After he cheated on me and I found out, I broke up with him, kicked him out of my apartment, and left LA. That was over two months ago. I've been on a self-imposed celibacy kick ever since. Until now, at least."

"Rune, I—"

"You don't have to say anything, Duncan. I know you're not him. It's okay."