Even Better (Stripped 2.50)

It’s a cold reminder that this isn’t my condo.

I just live here. I want to be secure with Blue, to really trust that he wants me here for good. But I have too much history of being kicked out, of getting moved around from foster home to foster home, of being unwanted. It’s hard to shake an entire childhood of conditioning that I’m unworthy.

I try to shake that feeling though. Blue is worth it. And somehow West makes me feel comfortable, even though he’s just arrived. We spend the next day together at the apartment while Blue is at work.

“No way,” I say between gasped breaths.

West is laughing too. “I swear, he had no memory of getting a tattoo, but we were all looking at the evidence of it. I mean all looking at it. He wasn’t wearing any clothes.”

I bite my lip to hold in a laugh at the thought of Blue after a hangover, trying to be stern for his squad but totally naked. I’ve seen Blue naked more than enough times to picture it. Although… “How come I haven’t seen this?”

“He got it removed.”

“Who got what removed?” I turn to see Blue striding into the room, tossing his suit jacket onto the couch and loosening his tie. “You aren’t telling stories about me, are you?”

He gives West a dire look that just makes me grin like an idiot. “Maybe he wouldn’t have to tell me if you told me,” I say pointedly.

Blue snorts as he sits beside me—and proceeds to drag me onto his lap. He flicks off West. “Some things are better forgotten.”

God, that is the truth. “Not this, though. What was the tattoo of?”

West grins but says nothing.

“This is definitely evidence of how much I love you,” Blue says

with obvious suffering. He grimaces. “It was a….a moon.”

I blink. “A moon?” Then understanding dawns. “As in, a blue moon?”

It’s too much. I break down into giggles, and before I know it, Blue has me turned over his lap and he’s swatting my ass. “Are you laughing at me, beautiful?”

“Yes,” I gasp out, and then he’s spanking me some more, but it only makes me laugh harder.

By the time we’ve righted ourselves, I’m straddling Blue’s lap and he’s kissing me. It’s a deep, sensual kiss, the kind he usually gives me when he’s back from work. That look makes me want to slide to the floor and give him a “welcome home” blowjob. We’re only abstaining because we have company, but I can tell from the tension in Blue’s body that he’s thinking about it.

He gently shoves me off his lap, and I cross my legs in my own chair, not quite able to meet West’s eyes.

Blue is the one who starts up the conversation. “Settling in okay?”

“Settling in a little too well. Your place is so damn comfortable, and Hannah here made me lunch. Not much motivation to find my own place, I’m afraid.”

“If you think her sandwiches are good, wait until you try dinner.”

“I believe that.”

“Well, hell. Stay as long as you want. Not like we’re using the room for anything else.”

“Yeah,” I echo softly. “Stay.”

Of course that just reminds me this isn’t my place to offer. Or maybe it is. Blue insists that I should feel at home, but I have something in common with West. I’m comfortable here. Too comfortable. And I’m not sure that I really belong.

Blue studies me, eyes curious and sharp. “You’ve got a break between classes, don’t you?”

“Something like that.” I don’t add that I didn’t register for the next semester. I didn’t know what the hell to take. It was easy when I was studying for my GED. And then taking the kind of English Lit 101 classes that are required from everyone. I felt like I was catching up with the rest of the world, knowledge I should have had all along.

But if I keep going, I’ll have to narrow down my focus. Pick a major, a career. And I have no idea what it should be.

“Don’t feel like you have to babysit me,” West says to me. “Even though I enjoy talking to you. It…makes the reentry a little smoother to have someone I can share this shit with.”