Page 18

I left the library in a rush, not even taking in what porn was playing now on the big screen. I stumbled out into the cool night air to where Buddy lay, panting in the dirt, clasping my books to my chest.

“Look,” Finn said, “if you’ve got nothing on tonight...”

“What? You want to take me to the office sex club next?” I snapped out. I wasn’t sure why, Finn was unfailingly polite, though perhaps that’s what bothered me. I was gasping and blushing and stammering like a little girl with a very wet, dirty secret between her thighs, and he was always Mr Cool.

“Nah, that only runs on a Thursday. If you want me to make introductions I could…” I shot him a murderous look, and he burst out laughing.

“Sorry, I was just being facetious. No, I was going to say did you want to come over to my place and watch some TV? I should have shown you where I live anyway, in case you have any issues, but I have a pretty impressive DVD collection.”

“What? Like what they’re watching in there?” I quipped.

“There’s some, if that’s what you’re into. No, I was thinking more…” Netflix and chill? my brain supplied helpfully. “…a good comedy.”

Such was my unstable mental state that I was both relieved and disappointed by his response.

I was starting to wonder if sexually induced psychosis was a thing, I just seemed to be walking around constantly, horribly embarrassed and horny as fuck.

It’s because you aren’t comfortable with what you want , my brain commented.

I looked down at The Vixen’s Pleasure and thought that’s not what I want and I totally want to give that a go with as many guys I can find at the same time.

I sighed, I was straight up torn. I knew this, this was a popular trope in romantic fiction.

Female lead is offered sex or a relationship with a guy she didn’t like or thought was too good for her or acted like a wanker towards her or had a lifestyle incompatible with hers, yet her vagina throbbed only for him.

Cue: Should I? Shouldn’t I? Should I? Shouldn’t I?

ad nauseum until the leads finally fucked and went off into the sunset to live happily ever after.

I looked into the bag at the Vixen. She didn’t seem too conflicted, more like the cat that got the cream, and not of the dairy variety.

I glanced up at Finn who was waiting patiently, thinking god knows what while I indulged in this little rumination. “Yeah, sure,” I said.

There was more than a little deja vu as I walked up the hill in the dark with another strange, attractive man.

I’m not ashamed to admit the darkness changed things a little for me.

It was as if by dulling down the extreme visual stimulus, I became a whole lot more aware of what was around me.

I could hear his breath mixing with the night air, feel the warmth radiating off his body as we walked side by side.

The breeze gave me tantalising whiffs of spicy male scent.

Fuck, this was just like when Shaun walked me home.

Were we going to pash on the porch or progress a whole lot further, as I was going to his place?

Kelly’s advice about seeking permission before making it with the boss came to mind, as well as some tantalising yet uncomfortable mental images of what that would look like, or with Slade or both of them…

Damn Brandon and his book recs, he was putting ideas in my head I didn’t need right now. “Well,” Finn said, “here we are.”

It was similar to mine, though maybe a bit bigger. It had a better sized kitchen, a fair-sized lounge room with another flat screen and…one couch. It was a three-seater, but I still looked at it for long enough for Finn to notice. “Sorry, I don’t have many people over… Well, can I get you a drink?”

After the day I’d had, the only response was fuck to the yes.

Instead, I said much more politely, “Sure, what do you have?” I ended up with a rum and coke, and took a seat on one end of the couch.

Not awkward , I thought, not awkward at all.

“I haven’t had all that much time to see how you are going.

How have you found your first few days?”

Probably how the girl in the porn movie feels, wondering which dick is going to go where , I thought, or Alice in Dickland, completely bemused by all the weirdos, yet strangely turned on .

I don’t know what I’m doing, what I should be doing, or who I should be doing.

Like all the rules I’ve ever been told about romance and love and sex and guys are wrong, wrong, wrong, and I’ll be fucked if I know what’s supposed to replace them .

Instead I took a hefty mouthful of my drink, enjoying the sweet burn as it went down. “Oh, it’s been OK,” I said instead.

“The guys are treating you OK?”

Well, Shaun treated me greeeeat last night , I thought, though I’m sure that’s not what you wanted to hear .

Seriously , I fought the urge to shiver, rocked my world .

Slade is determined to tell me the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, which is curiously appealing right about now.

Probably all part of his evil plan. There was me, shutting down his advances, and him with that gorgeous fucking body, out of loyalty for a guy I’d spent one night with.

I should have just fucked him in the dirt, I thought .

Hmm… my brain helpfully supplied a wide selection of mental images of what that’d be like.

He looked like he had a huge dick too. Wonder if it was curved, you know so it rubs…

“Julie?”

“Hmm, yeah, they’ve been fine.”

“I know many of the women who come from the outside to work here, they find the male attention a bit overwhelming at first. Just let me know if that gets too much.”

Was it too much? Too much to get work done, that was for sure.

I had no idea how people followed Kelly’s clinically delivered work conditions: work then play.

Maybe if you no longer had to worry about when you got laid, it became just like having a shower, sleeping or having a shit, just part of day to day life.

I took another long swig of the drink and was surprised to see I had finished it.

“I’ll be honest,” I said. “I don’t really know how to deal with it.

For the past few years, I’ve been living in a semi-ghost town with the retired set, and my only chance of getting laid was when someone amenable came through.

This place…it's an embarrassment of riches, except I’m the one who’s always embarrassed. ”

“I know you don’t want to hear this, but you needn’t be.

We don’t have the same hang ups about sex and attraction here.

You seemed to have a moment back there with Brandon.

He won’t be anything other than pleased and flattered, and perhaps optimistic something might happen between you. You’re not being disloyal to anyone.”

“So everyone here is genetically incapable of getting possessive or jealous?”

“Of course not, those are basic elements of our natures. But so is anger, envy, malice… These are all unacceptable in most workplaces, yes?”

“Yeah…”

“Well, we’ve just added a few more sins to our list of unprofessional behaviour. Just because we’re a workplace that’s open and accepting of sexual and romantic behaviours, doesn’t mean you have to engage in any of them. If you don’t want this, what’s the issue?”

Yes, what is the issue , I thought. They all sound like they’d give me a raise for creating better staff morale by fucking a bunch of them, but that isn’t the barrier.

No, like most women, I’d been raised in the cage of what men wanted and expected from a sexual or romantic partner, and what these guys were proposing was a radical departure from that.

I was a rat in a cage, and I was too scared to venture out, expecting to get electrocuted even though the door had been opened.

All day long I think about fucking… my brain did the best imitation of Korn it could.

“No issue,” I said, wanting to end the conversation. “Do you mind if I grab another drink?” I got up when he said it was OK, topping up his glass as well. I walked over to his shelf of DVDs while he turned the TV on. “Comedy?” I said with a grin. “Most of these are rom-coms!”

He shrugged lazily, “What do you want to watch?”

I picked one and it was the usual fare. Couple meet, are attracted to each other, but klutzy heroine and uncomprehending romantic lead struggle to get it together, and hijinks ensue.

It felt good to laugh, which became a whole lot easier after the second, third and fourth drink.

Then the heroine and the romantic lead started to have sex.

“So what’s the appeal of these films for you?

” I asked, slinging my arm along the back of the couch and turning to face him.

Finn took a bit to pry his eyes away from the actors getting naked.

“It’s exotic to me, I guess, one man with one woman. It feels kind of… titillating in a way.”

“What? One girl, one guy is kinky for you?”

He sighed and paused the film, turning as well.

“Me and most of the men here were raised by a mother and several dads. That’s ordinary, garden variety relationships to us.

” I snorted at this. “You were obviously raised very differently. Watching a rom-com with characters similar to what I grew up with would probably be equally as odd and alluring to you.”