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Chapter Five

Morris

Collin’s eyes were as wide as the anime characters’ he loved to watch so much. It told me he was processing what Austin was saying at least a little but I wasn’t sure what conclusions he’d come to.

Maybe none, but either way I wasn’t going to rush him.

“So.” Austin paused and glanced between us. “Do we need more processing time or are we ready to go jump around?”

Collin blinked, coming back to life again. “I… I kind of want to play.”

“Then we’ll play.” No matter if we did the naughty playing downstairs or the innocent kind upstairs, if he figured out something about himself, we were going to call the trip a success.

Collin was still worrying, though. Every thought was etched in his frowning face, like he didn’t think what he wanted was reasonable. “Remember, we’re exploring and having fun. There’s no right or wrong way to do that as long as we’re both happy with what we’re doing.”

Letting out a slow breath, Collin nodded. “We wanted to try a scene and talk to people. We wanted to get the tour from Austin. We’re still meeting our goals this way too.”

“It’s definitely a scene because here they’re not boring grown-ups and they get to have fun without censoring themselves.

” Austin frowned, hands going on his hips.

“Did you know that there are some video games that it’s not socially acceptable for grown-ups to play?

They hide their video games like they’re weird porn. ”

Yes. Even I had figured that out when Collin nearly had a heart attack when I’d looked at his gaming setup the first time.

“Yeah.” Collin found his voice with that question. “People are kind of judgmental, so I just don’t talk about those games. I just talk about the adventure and shooter stuff. It’s okay to like those.”

Austin rolled his eyes. “If I want to play My Little Pony with one of my little friends, then everyone else can kiss my naked ass.”

“I think I want to be you when I grow up.” Collin waved a hand in Austin’s direction. “Not the naked rich nut parts but the confident ones.”

Austin couldn’t decide if he was going to laugh or play offended, so he just threw up his arms and rolled his eyes. “No one appreciates my greatness.”

Because he was scary and probably trying to take over the world.

“Let’s go play.” Glaring at Collin, Austin looked strangely furious in the see-through outfit. “To make up for hurting my feelings, you have to let me win.”

“No.” Collin shrugged. “It’s computer related, so I don’t have to.”

Austin’s grumbling said that was some kind of actual rule that I hadn’t heard of and probably pertained to work in one way or another. “Fine. I’m going to find a loophole with that, though.”

Collin clearly wasn’t worried. “You can try.”

They were both stranger than they seemed to realize.

Austin was tired of losing, though, and whirled around. “Let’s go meet the Middles before I remember you’re a pain in the ass.”

Collin giggled and wiggled closer, rubbing up against my side as he turned to me. “I need your hand.”

That was interesting but I didn’t let it show as I released his neck and took his hand. “I like holding your hand, but it’s okay to let go when you decide to go play.”

With the other Middles?

I wasn’t sure how the sentence should’ve ended but it didn’t ring any bells for Collin. He smiled and nodded, and I could see him shifting into his excited phone-game expression. Clearly I’d missed some context clues with that.

“Okay. I’ll remember it’s okay to play and I’ll try not to worry.” Squeezing my hand tighter, he took a steadying breath. “They like playing, so we’re going to have something in common.”

“Absolutely. And you all know Austin and you’re at the club so there will be a lot of other things you’ll have in common too.” We were just going to stick to the Middle-appropriate ones for the time being. “Now, let’s make sure Austin doesn’t leave us and end up getting a turn before you.”

I must’ve hit the right tone because both ridiculous omegas laughed, just with Collin’s being happier and Austin’s sounding like he was a supervillain.

“I can cry on command. I’ll win.” Collin was now looking very supervillainish. “I’m good at it.”

I was going to have to remember to question him about that later. “Come on. Let’s go play.”

Fingers crossed playtime would go well.

“Yes.” Collin looked happy and excited for three more steps, but the closer we got to the doorway, the quieter and slower he got.

We were barely at a crawl as we finally approached the room, but he was still shuffling forward as the sounds of video games and laughter came echoing out into the hallway. I couldn’t help leaning down to whisper. “They’re louder than the Littles.”

For some reason Collin found that funny and it pushed him the last few steps to cross the threshold.

On some level it was a lot like the playroom for the littles.

There were Daddies hanging out on couches in the corner and the excited Middles hanging out in different areas, some playing video games and others doing stuff like crafting.

“This is my friend, Collin and his Daddy, Morris. They’re test-driving the title because it’s new but Collin loves games and he’s fun to play with.” Sounding like he’d already decided Collin was a Middle and I was his Daddy, Austin whirled deeper into the room. “What are we playing?”

Well, aside from the dancing game that had a variety of the subs laughing as two seemed to be competing against each other, I could see Legos and crafts that seemed to need a hot glue gun and two subs were doing their best to sneak up on the Daddies with Nerf guns that seemed to be top-of-the-line and fully loaded.

“Everything.” Collin was in love… with the room. “Look. They have the new Star Wars Lego set. That isn’t even out yet.”

Austin snorted and rolled his eyes. “That was easy to get.”

He bragged about the strangest things.

“What should we play first?” Austin was also very take-charge because he grabbed Collin’s free hand and started dragging him away. “Your Daddy-in-training can go play with the other boring people.”

Collin snickered as he released my hand and let Austin drag him away, but he turned back long enough to smile at me. “You’re not boring. You just might be a Daddy.”

And clearly that was boring to Austin.

The other boring Daddies, a mix of alphas, omegas, and betas, chuckled as well, but a few of them really didn’t see why it was funny or possibly why they were boring. I didn’t mind being boring because that seemed to be part of what Collin liked about me.

Based on the way he’d described me in the past, boring seemed to mean steady and dependable.

I was alright with all of those descriptions, and from what I understood about the Daddy thing, I was alright with that too.

So was Collin.

There was a part of the lifestyle where he got to play games and let someone take care of him… yep… that fit him to a T.

Now it was time to see if I fit in with the rest of the Daddies.

Fitting in with the Daddies was weird… seeing Collin fit in with the other Middles was not. It was adorable and seeing him flop down on the floor dramatically after barely winning against an omega who looked like he wanted to strangle him made it even more real.

Collin was even more real.

I’d seen that side of him before when he was playing games and doing his best to convince me that he needed five more minutes, but that’d only been after talking online for months and dating for weeks. Part of me wondered if I should’ve been jealous but I wasn’t sure for what.

“He’s fitting right in.” Larry, a Daddy whose sub was currently rolling on the floor with laughter at the chaos Collin’s win had caused, chuckled. “We’ve been coming since the beginning and it’s good to see a sub who just throws himself into accepting this side of himself.”

“Most of the time it’s harder for them?” Larry’s nod had me looking back over at Collin who was trying not to laugh even though he had to be getting worn out.

The Legos hadn’t been nearly as exhausting as the dancing game was.

“I can see that. I think actually seeing them playing a game he loves made it a lot easier.”

It might’ve been different if there’d been nothing he could relate to or they had nothing in common.

I could see that making Collin incredibly uncomfortable, but between Austin and the games, Collin seemed to be thoroughly enjoying himself.

Even Austin having to leave us to go handle an issue downstairs hadn’t thrown my giggly boy.

“I’m glad it’s worked out.” Larry waved as a couple of the other Daddies finally led their subs out of the room.

We’d been hanging out long enough there’d been a turnover of people, but Collin seemed to have gotten along with all of them.

“Middles have a tendency to get lost in the kink world. They’re not as obvious as the Littles and they usually just get tagged as childish adults when that’s not it. ”

I could guarantee that was what Collin had been labeled plenty of times, which was probably why he still thought his games were something he needed to apologize for or hide.

Hopefully he’d see that it wasn’t the case, but I’d also learned that part of the role of the Daddy was to make sure he had balance in his life.

Which made sense as long as I could differentiate between this version of subspace and when he was an adult who wanted to handle his own business.

And I was really going to see if Austin had a new limits list because none of the current topics we were discussing were on our original one.

“I agree. This is different. I’d just never thought about it.

” There were a lot of things based around kink that I’d never thought about before.

“I thought the way he liked games was cute and he’s…

well… he seems to be very smart and those kinds of people are generally more interesting than average people. ”

Smart generally meant weird.

Austin proved that perfectly, so I was glad Collin wasn’t at that level of curious.

Larry chuckled. “I can understand that, and as comfortable as he is with Austin, I’m not going to ask what he does for a living.”

Good, because I had no idea.

“That’s for the best.” For a variety of reasons. “But like I said, the fun side of him with his love of games hasn’t been an issue for me. Neither of us thought of it in terms of BDSM, though.”

I thought it’d been cute and he’d been learning not to hide it from me.

“We’ve learned to ignore or hide the bits that make us more interesting than average and that’s usually stuff that relates back to kink in some way.” Larry shrugged, shaking his head. “We compensate in incredibly bad ways if we’re not careful.”

“Please don’t tell Austin he’s saving the world one flogging at a time.” He’d never be fit to be in the same room with after that.

Larry’s booming laughter caught Collin’s attention and he rolled over to bounce up off the floor. He was almost floating he was so happy, with an ear-to-ear grin, snickering when he plopped down on my lap and I pretended to groan. “Did you see? I won.”

“I did.” I wasn’t sure how he’d won but everyone’s reactions agreed with his assessment. “You are an amazing dancer.”

Larry smiled, rising to walk over to his boy as he gave us privacy. Collin didn’t seem to notice one way or the other, but that seemed to be part of this side of his personality. It was very focused, and usually on games and fun things. Now it was me.

“They play games like me and they have Daddies who take care of stuff but they’re not like the Littles.

They’re fun but not bottles-and-binkies fun.

They color too, though, because everyone can do that.

” Collin barely paused to breathe before charging back in.

“I might have to try to color but I played Legos and video games and no one told me to grow up.”

That seemed to be amazing.

“No one here wants you to grow up.” I shrugged as he nodded with an amazed and slightly confused expression. “They want to play with you or watch you play with their subs.”

Wiggling around so he was straddling my lap, he was so absorbed in his amazement and fun he didn’t seem to realize how sexy he looked. “They have Daddies or they want Daddies. Some of them met online and they come together to play even though they don’t have Daddies yet.”

It had to be hard finding the right kind of Daddy when the Dom might not know Middles existed.

“I’m so glad they found the club and came to play here.” Collin was definitely in his five more minutes in my game headspace. “I take it you want to come back and play with your friends again?”

His head bobbed excitedly for several seconds before he froze. “Did you have fun? I had fun playing and making friends, but did you?”

Before he could start worrying about my being bored or not doing anything together at the BDSM club, I hugged him tight.

“I had a lot of fun and I’m so glad you didn’t ask me to play the dancing game.

I’d have killed myself trying to be nice, so I’m very happy that you have new friends to do that with. ”

Giggling, he leaned in and rested his forehead against mine. “Daddies don’t dance?”

“Not like that.” I shifted my head quickly and pecked his cheek. “I’ll old people dance with you, though. I can waltz and even foxtrot.”

Collapsing against me in a fit of giggles, he snuggled into me and sighed. “You’re so silly.”

My being silly seemed to reset his sub barometer, though, because as he’d straightened, he started shifting back to my grown-up sub. He even gave me a shy smile and wiggled on my lap. “Let’s go see what other games my Daddy likes to play.”

Fingers crossed we found those games to be just as much fun as the ones we’d found in the hangout room.