Tattoos and Tatas (Chocoholics 2.5)

She chugged a good amount of wine before letting out a loud, satisfied sigh and lying back down, resting the bottle on her stomach. I set the unopened bottle next to me in bed before grabbing Claire’s and taking a sip.

“Okay, so frat parties aside, we should really talk about the sex club,” I told her.

“You’re going to have to ply me with something a hell of a lot stronger than wine with only four percent alcohol in it to get me to agree to that shit,” Claire informed me, snatching the bottle back and taking another sip.

“Fine, it doesn’t have to be JUST a sex club. Maybe we could pair it with something you’re interested in. Make it sort of a joint company. What are you interested in, Claire?”

She thought about it for a minute while I curled up next to her and we passed the bottle of shitty but delicious wine back and forth.

“It would probably be easier to tell you what I’m not interested in. Like say, a club where people are doing gross things to each other in public,” she told me, sticking her finger in her mouth and mock-gagging.

“You are such a fucking buzz kill. Fine. We can rethink the sex club aspect, but we WILL own a business together. Maybe if you’d finally give it up to someone, Virgin McVirginsen, you would be more agreeable to all things involving sex,” I reminded her.

The virgin comment was Claire’s cue to punch me in the arm. I loved this girl to death, but she was wound up entirely too tight, pun motherfucking intended. I’d been trying to convince her to get rid of that pesky virginity since high school, but she was dead set on finding “the one.” She didn’t need to find “the one.” She just needed to find the one who would do for a few hours. Scratch that, we’re talking college boys. A few minutes, tops.

“Stop talking out of your ass. I’ll show you. Maybe I’ll drag you to one of those stupid frat parties and have a one-night stand,” Claire threatened.

I started laughing. And once I started I couldn’t stop.

“Shut up! It could totally happen!” Claire argued.

“Right! It will happen just like My Little Pony will make a comeback. Give it a rest, Claire. You’re not the one-night-stand type and that’s perfectly okay. One slut in a friendship is one slut too many.”

Claire shook her head at me. “You’re not a slut. You’re just equal opportunity. You buy eight pairs of shoes at one time because you can’t stand the idea of leaving a pair in the store to get lonely. It’s only natural you do the same with your vagina. You never want your vagina to be lonely. It’s so beautiful.”

I chugged half the bottle of Boone’s while Claire laughed.

“Okay, in all seriousness, I really want to own a bakery some day. What if we sold like sexy lingerie on one side and cookies and cupcakes on the other?” she suggested.

I started to make fun of the idea, but then I thought about it. And thought about it some more. I thought about it while I polished off the rest of the bottle and then chucked the empty onto the floor.

“Heeeeey, wine whore!” Claire complained as I jumped up from the bed and started pacing the room.

“Sex and cookies,” I muttered.

Claire paused in the process of opening the second bottle of wine. “Huh?”

“Sex and cookies. Oh, fuck, Claire! You’re a GENIUS!” I shouted.

“Wait. Let me drink some of this and catch up to you before you shower me with more compliments.”

She held her hand up in the air in the universal sign of “hold the fuck up” while she downed half the bottle. She wiped her arm across her mouth and belched loudly. “Okay, I’m ready. Tell me more. Make sure to add how pretty and nice I am.”

I walked over to my desk and sat down, grabbing a pen and a notebook. I wrote “Sex and Cookies” really big at the top of a blank page.

“So, I like sex and you like baking. Jesus, this is brilliant. BRILLIANT!” I screamed as I made a list of things we could sell at this store and a rough estimate of how much money it would take to get something like this off the ground. Turns out my Business Administration classes were actually useful. Who knew?

“Fuck. They put more than four percent alcohol in this shit. I think I’m drunk,” Claire mumbled as she squinted her eyes and tried to read the label on the bottle.

“Nah, I just roofied you.”

Claire sniffed the opening of the bottle and then shrugged. “Cool. Make sure you take advantage of me when I pass out. Anyway, back to this Snack and Sex thing. Tell me more.”

I scribbled a few more things on the paper before turning the chair to face her. “Sex and Cookies, asshole. It’s the name of our future business endeavor, although we might have to tweak that a little. I’m not sure the city would allow us to put the word ‘sex’ on our sign, but whatever. You can have your bakery on one side and put people into sugar comas every day and I can sell sex toys and lingerie and shit like that and put people into erotic comas on my side. Then, we can make sure the building has a loft upstairs and live above our businesses and throw awesome parties every weekend. WINNER!” I shouted.

Claire bolted forward on the bed so fast she smacked her head into the wooden slats of the top bunk.

“SON OF A BITCH!” she yelled, rubbing her hand on her head as she got up and walked over to me.

I got up from the chair and we stood staring at each other for a few minutes before both of our faces broke out into huge smiles. We grabbed onto each other and started screaming and laughing and jumping up and down in the middle of the room like a couple of assholes.