The Dirty Ones

“You’re not mad at me?”

“For what?” I ask, turning my head to see her.

“Being with Connor.”

I shrug. “He’s half yours, Sofia. Always has been.”

“I know, but it felt like things changed yesterday. You two were pretty attached to each other.”

“Yeah,” I admit. Then I turn all the way back over onto my side so I can see her properly. “But that’s just because we forgot.”

She blushes. Closes her eyes for an extended second. And when she finally opens them again she says, “I forgot too. But Hayes reminded me. I figured he and I would be together, for the most part, anyway. But then Connor—”

“We’d finished,” I say in way of explanation. “It was just your turn. That’s all.”

She nods. Silent. Then says, “Do you think this is weird?”

I nod back, then whisper, “Yes.”

“Do you think it’ll work?”

“I dunno, Sofia.” Then I sigh. “But I’ve been sharing him with you for as long as we’ve been friends. I just want to know my place, that’s all. And if I made you jealous that last night Connor and I were alone together in the tower, then I’m sorry. I didn’t want him to myself to keep you away. I just wanted to know what it felt like to be the only one.”

She stares at me for a few silent seconds. “Did you like it?”

I nod. “I did. But I think I like what we did last night better.”

“You mean… with Hayes?”

I nod again. “It feels good to be back together. Do you think that makes me a bad person? You know, because of how it all started?”

“No. Just a normal one. I like being with you guys too.”

“Hey,” Hayes says.

We both sit up and find him standing in the doorway looking like a man who’s been fucking three people at the same time.

Hayes and I have been friends for a long time and never once has he even tried to kiss me outside of senior year when we were all together. Not once. I don’t know how I feel about him, or Sofia, or even Connor, for that matter. I just know I want them with me. Always. Every day. Every night. I never want to go home. I never want to go back to that sad, solitary existence again.

“Where’s Con?” Sofia asks.

“Work,” Hayes says. And it comes out kinda angry.

“Oh,” Sofia and I say in the same breath.

We have no work to go to.

Well, that’s not true. We’re just stay-at-home workers with no set schedule.

Also not true. We have deadlines. Especially me, since I publish a lot more than she does. But they are my deadlines, not anyone else’s. And I don’t have to meet them if I don’t want to.

The point is, we don’t wake up and go to work. Not like Connor and Bennett do. I have no clue what Hayes does with his days. Not even one. So whether he’s used to lounging around all day on a Thursday, I have no idea.

“Well, I need to go home and shower. You wanna come with me?”

At first I think she’s talking to me, but then I realize she’s looking at Hayes. And then… it hits me that she’s talking to both of us.

“Yes,” he says. “Get dressed, ladies. We have a lot to do today.”

He turns away and disappears.

“What was that about?” Sofia asks.

“I dunno. The book? Maybe?”

“Shit, that stupid fucking book. I’d forgotten all about it. I wish it would just disappear. Just leave us alone.”

I stare at her for a moment because I’d forgotten about her sadness. Which is the kind of sadness that permeates a person. That wraps itself around a person like a blanket. And she has always been a girl who snuggled up to sadness.

But in these few minutes since waking she was someone else. Someone unfamiliar to sadness. Someone happy and content who didn’t need that blanket emotion to hold on to.

Sofia throws her legs out from under the covers and swings them over the side of the bed. She sits there for a moment, her back to me, long, dark hair hanging almost to her waist.

I reach out and touch it and she looks over her shoulder. Hunching them a little. And if I were in front of her, instead of behind, I’d see how that movement pushed her breasts together.

She has nice breasts. They’re a little bit bigger than mine. Very round and firm.

She smiles at me, then stands up. I let her hair fall away from my fingertips and study her shape. The curve of her hips and the length of her legs. She bends over, flashing her pussy at me, and picks something up.

My nightgown, I realize.

Then she slips it over herself, shoots me a smile over her shoulder, and walks out of the room.

Fucking Sofia… isn’t bad, I decide.