Wesley's Bizarre Adventure Episode 4: Winter Wars

You are Wesley Keki, gamer girl without the bathwater and WWE diplomancer.

Olivia is sitting at a window seat when Winter plops down next to her. Olivia has watched during the entire journey as Winter terrorized their fellow passengers, the porters, and -- when the train passed across the border -- the customs agents. Now it's Olivia's turn. But Olivia isn't scared -- actually, she's interested.

Winter leans back in the aisle seat beside Olivia, reclining with fingers interlinked behind her head as she sighs deeply to herself. "You don't mind, right?" Winter says.

"Oh, of course not."

"So what's your deal?" She asks Olivia, lolling her head, still resting on her mated palms.

"I'm a bookseller," Olivia says. "I've been going around the globe doing some research. This here--" she hefts a heavy tome in her lap "--is a first edition of Vitus Bering's Account of the First Kamchatka Expedition, long thought lost -- and containing expurgated sections detailing the sighting of unidentified islands--"

Winter is beginning to snore.

No matter for Olivia. "Would you like a bonbon?" She asks the girl.

Winter raises one eyelid, though still pretends to snore. Olivia pulls from her coat pocket a foil-wrapped chocolate cherry, which she twists between thumb and fingers as if displaying a priceless jewel to a prospective buyer. Winter snatches it from her before Olivia can have the chance to reconsider the offer.

"Where are you going?" Olivia asks.

"Palo Alto..." Winter says. She unwraps the candy and pops it into her mouth. Biting down, making a satisfied little "un" at the give of it and the explosion of cherry liqueur in her mouth -- this treat is alcoholic -- she smiles dopily. A little strand of the syrup dribbles off her lower lip.

"Oh, really?" Olivia says. "I'm heading to Palo Alto too!"

Winter slowly nods. "What a coincidence."

Olivia turns towards the window again. "These mountains are gorgeous. They have a resonance to them, don't you agree? Like they hum at the same low frequency as the Himalayas, the Alps, the Caucasus... a leyline connecting the Earth's deepest magicks. Humans first connected with the divine in mountain caves..."

"Are you in a cult or something, lady? You sound like a total creep."

"What do you do for a living?" Olivia asks.

"Huh?" Winter grunts. "Are you blind? Do I look like a worker? I'm fifteen."

Olivia waits patiently for the answer to her actual question.

"I go to school," Winter explains, slowly, as if speaking to an invalid.

"I see," Olivia hums. She pulls a second candy from her pocket. "Would you like a bonbon?"

Winter is a little perturbed that Olivia asks the question as if she never offered the first one. Still, she can't say no to free food. She snatches the bonbon just as quickly as she did the first.

"Don't you want to take off your jacket, at least?" Winter says through a full mouth. "Trying to sweat off that fat ass of yours? Staying ready in case you have to climb any magic mountains?"

"I'm not feeling hot," Olivia says.

"You--" Winter begins, but drops it. At least this woman has a more interesting personality than the rest of the travelers she's been pestering so far. "So why are you going to Palo? Starting a new coven?"

"My store is there," Olivia tells her. "So is my girlfriend!"

"Woah," Winter says. "You swing that way, huh?"

"I live there."

"I mean -- forget it." Winter holds a palm in front of her face, lazily turning it this way and that, examining it as she continues, "I could never be with girls. At least not *just* girls. I need someone who can blow my back walls out, you know?"

Winter expected that this, at least, would get a rise from Olivia. Olivia just nods and holds up an index finger. "Oh, I see what you mean! But that's no problem for me. She has a penis, too."

Winter freezes, her hand still aloft, her jaw hanging open. After a few long and quiet moments, she slowly curls her fingers and lets her arm fall back to her lap, and hinges her gaping mouth shut again.

"Was that too much information?" Olivia asks, sounding upset. "Have I alienated you?"

"I'm sorry I bothered you," Winter says hurriedly, and tries to stand. Olivia stays her by grabbing her wrist.

"I do that to people sometimes," Olivia says. "You know, I think you're annoying the other riders, so why don't you stay put and we can talk about things other than my girlfriend's penis?"

"How about this," Winter grumps, sitting with a thud. "I am so freaking sick of this stupid train. And we've got like 24 hours before we get there. Why couldn't dad have sprung for a plane ticket like a normal person? Instead I get stuck on this never-ending train ride with weirdos like you."

"You... want to get there faster?" Olivia asks.

"Yes!"

Olivia puts a forefinger to her chin and lets out a low, contemplative hmm. "I'll see what I can do," she says, standing. She sets her book on the seat. "Watch that for me, please."

Winter chortles. "What are you gonna do? Gonna cast a magic spell?"

Olivia doesn't answer. She squeezes between Winter's knees and seats in front of them, waddling out. Winter can't help but find Olivia's exotic-smelling perfume, redolent of fig blossoms and rosewater, intoxicating if not overpowering. And the way Olivia's butt strains against her pants makes Winter a little jealous.

"Be back in jiff!" Olivia promises from the aisle, bowing a bit with her hands on knees to look Winter in the eye.

Winter waits, expectations low. She stares at the book Olivia left behind, its gold leaf pages and ancient-looking leather binding. Talk about a low, humming resonance -- she feels somehow compelled to reach for it -- to page through it and unlock its mysteries, as boring as she thought they were--

"We'll be getting there tonight, after all," Olivia says, shocking Winter out of her reverie.

"I-- but... how did you do that?"

"Magic!" Olivia says, squeezing by to take her seat again. When this draws only a confused gawk, she adds, "kidding, kidding! I only went up to the conductor and asked him whether he would mind going faster. He said oh sure."

"What!" Winter howls. "You can't just -- ASK a conductor to drive his train faster! ... Can you? Is that a thing?"

"He said oh sure," Olivia repeats, a confused lilt to her voice. "And then he sped up. So..."

In the awkward silence that follows, Olivia reaches into her breast pocket. "Would you like a bonbon?"

"No thank you," Winter says, a rare first.

Olivia eats the thing herself, then. "I don't think we've been properly introduced. I'm Olivia Bosphorus. I'm a bookseller."

"You told me."

"Oh. I must have forgotten your name, then. I do that sometimes."

Winter extends a hand to shake. "Winter Denali."

But Olivia's ditzy smile evaporates. Instead of returning the handshake, she stands. "I should be going," she says, voice solemn and somber. She pulls her bags from the stowage overhead and slips into a different train compartment, leaving Winter totally perplexed.

---

"Is it really you?" Amelia says.

"Who else would it be?" Olivia replies, fighting free of her coat, and trying to hang it on a coat rack as she passes. But she drops it on the ground by accident, and doesn't break her stride. "You haven't answered my letters in so long! Are you doing all right?"

Amelia glances away, and stares off to the side.

"I want to get this place back in business," Olivia says. "Ship-shape! You've done so wonderfully with keeping it up for me."

"Are you here to stay?" Amelia asks, still averting her gaze.

Olivia blinks. "Why wouldn't I be?"

In an instant, Amelia is on her feet, across the room, and hugging Olivia. She grabs Olivia about the midsection, drooping to her knees to do so, and holding on to her like a little kid begging mommy not to go to work. She presses the side of her face to Olivia's spongy tummy. You had no idea Amelia was involved with anyone -- and so passionately, too. Olivia, surprised, but happily so, holds her hands up by her face, elbows cocked, and smiles down at Amelia. Then, seeming to realize something, she startles. Idly petting Amelia, she addresses you: "did you come here for rare books, miss? I have lots to choose from! Feel free to browse the selection! I'll stay open as long as you like -- just for you!"

"I'm--" you begin.

Tyrus kicks the door in. The three of you jump in fright and shirk back. He stomps through the doorway, kicking and making threatening motions at Gideon Denali, who crawls forward on hands and knees like an abused dog, almost slipping with how fast he's going. In one hand, Tyrus has the book that Gideon took from Amelia. In the other, he has a gun. When Tyrus comes to a stop, Gideon, exhausted and terrified, rolls onto his back and shields his face.

Olivia is positively bugeyed. "Sir...? I'm quite happy that you've chosen to visit Bosphorus Rare Books, but -- violence is strictly prohibited on these premises! I'll have you know I cast a warding spell that prevents any and all violence from--"

"That so?" Tyrus says. He fires his gun into the ground right between Gideon's legs. It leaves a singed hole in the dark wood. Pulverized splinters scatter like the ejecta of a meteor collision. You scream.

"Amelia--!" Olivia shouts. "Haven't you been salting the entryway every full moon like I instructed?"

Amelia shakes her head -- out of frustration more than anything.

"Don't worry, lady," Tyrus says. "I'm not here to do any violence. Just want you to keep your head on straight, because some people might be." He glowers at Gideon. Gideon glowers back. Tyrus ignores it. "Anyway, I think this book belongs to you." He hands that Russian diary to Amelia, who haltingly accepts it.

"Thank you..." she mutters, sounding uncertain.

Tyrus flips the tails of his coat up and holsters his gun in his trousers. He beckons for Gideon to stand. Gideon obeys, keeping his hands in the air to show that he poses no threat. He looks to you for help. "You're Wesley, right? You were with my daughter the other night. Please -- don't let this crazy person do... whatever it is he wants to do to me."

Lily bounds through the open front door. She has a gun of her own. She points it wildly all around. "Who was blasting? Stay away from my dad and my g-- my dad!"

Olivia peers around Tyrus. "Hello and welcome to Bosphorus Rare Books! We're a bit busy right now, but you can come back tomorrow!--"

"Lily. Get back in the fuckin' car. Or I will whoop you so hard you won't be able to sit for a week."

"Who are you?" Lily demands of Olivia.

"I'm Olivia Bosphorus! I'm a seller of rare books!" Blinking like she just remembered something, she says: "Wait. Gideon... what are you doing here?"

Amelia folds her arms. "Oh, he was just putting a gun to my head so I'd translate old texts for him. That's all."

Olivia decks him. Doesn't even think twice before doing it. He stumbles, but remains upright -- and with Tyrus still there to act as enforcer, he wouldn't think of hitting back.

"Forgetting to salt the entryway paid off, after all," Olivia says with a smile. Gideon nurses his busted lower lip. A trickle of blood seeps from it.

"What does a glorified street thug like you want to do with this?" He asks Tyrus. He tugs his shirt to straighten it and stands tall -- show of bravado after all the abuse he's been subjected to.

"Your old friends went after your little kid -- they kidnapped her," Tyrus says. Gideon's face turns ashen. "Don't worry. I extracted her. You can thank me later. But then those motherfuckers put a gun on MY little kid. So to answer your question? I want fuck all to do with this, but I'm deeply entrenched in it now. And now that I got you, I'm about to drop you off with those Instrumentalist wackos so they leave the rest of us the hell alone."

"They'll kill him," Olivia says. "They're a violent sort."

"Sounds like a him problem to me," Tyrus sneers.

"It'll be a you problem soon enough," Gideon says.

"Shouldn't we... get some answers first?" You try. You step forward. All eyes turn on you -- it makes you want to melt.

"Ain't no answers here," Tyrus says. "Summer's old man ran foul of his fellow cultists. You want to keep your girlie safe? Let me take it from here."

"Why do they want you?" You ask Gideon.

"He's right," Gideon says, as he and Tyrus continue to size one another up, staring down the bridges of their noses. "They want to kill me. I'm an apostate. The moment they lay hands on me, I'm dead. But... at least my family will be safe." He glances back at you. "Keep Summer out of trouble, okay? And send her all my love." He motions for Tyrus to lead the way.

[ ] Let Tyrus hand Gideon over to the Instrumentalists.

>[x] We should let him go. ([x] write-in: but keep a tail on him.)

"That answer isn't good enough," you tell him. You're surprised at how firm your voice is. What makes it that way is the thought of Summer in danger: "What did you do? If they get you-- if they kill you, is that really the end of it? Will Summer be safe?"

"I tried to leave," he says. "All religions have a schism, eventually -- our schism was when the true-blue believers decided that violence was the only way to bring about the coming of the new era. They wanted to commit acts of terrorism. Blowing up buildings, killing politicians, that sort of thing. I stopped them. Killed the ones who were advocating violence. But it made me a target. Made the others suspicious, even the ones who agreed with me. Made them think my faith had wavered. It had. So I exiled myself. Now they want to tie up loose ends."

"Is Summer a loose end now, too?" You ask.

"I hope not," he says. He sighs. "There's still a faction of zealots in Instrumentalism. But it's under a new regime -- they're after something different than reenacting 9/11. Chasing mystical prophecies, that kind of thing. Their vendetta with me is personal -- it's only me they're after."

"What kind of prophecies?" You ask.

"Instrumentalist ontology gets pretty wild," he says. "Everything is true and nothing is true. Both at the same time. Find the ecstasy of really holding both beliefs, in your heart, simultaneously? Well, you have the key to unmaking the world, and remaking it any way you choose. That's the short version. The long version involves a lot of meditation, chakra alignment, Bible code and Gnostic apocrypha. You wouldn't want to hear it all. It doesn't matter. It's bullshit."

"What happens if we let you walk out that door?" You say.

"Are you fucking shitting right now?" Tyrus asks in his usual soprano of shock.

You hold up a hand to shush him. He's surprised enough by it that it works.

"I'm trying to understand what these people want," Gideon says. "They may not be planning any acts of cleansing violence just now... but who knows what the future holds. They're having an ecumenical council in a few weeks. I was hoping I could find out where. And maybe sneak into it."

"Well, good to know I'll be killing a man who's already got a death wish," Tyrus says.

"You won't," you tell Tyrus.

"Excuse the f--"

"You won't," you repeat. You gaze into Gideon's eyes; he smirks at you in an approving sort of way. "Let him go," you instruct Tyrus, "but keep a close eye on him. He's more valuable alive than dead, isn't he? Say this cult decides they want to come after us again... we'll find out through him."

Tyrus, head bowed, hands on his hips, sucking on his lip, considers this.

"Hurry on now," he finally tells Gideon. Gideon wastes no time complying. But as he passes, Tyrus grabs his collar: "be seeing you," he sneers.

"Hope your men get good hazard pay," Gideon says. He wrenches free of Tyrus and smooths his shirt. Looking briefly from face to face, he shrugs, and leaves the store.

Tyrus gets on the phone and relays instructions to his people to keep a tail on Gideon.

Lily sidles up to you. "Did you really just bully my dad?" She whispers.

You shrug. Your steely resolve is melting pretty fast.

"Where can I learn this power?" She asks.

You turn on Amelia. "How do you know Gideon? You're not in this cult too, are you?"

"No," Amelia says. Her voice is rueful. "I just sell them books."

"They're good customers!" Olivia adds. Her voice is perky. Realizing that perky is the wrong mood for the moment, she adds in a tone more closely approximating Amelia's: "Good customers, but bad people. Very bad people."

Amelia leans her tailbone against the checkout counter, letting her palms run along the edge of it on either side of her. "I knew Summer's father was persona non grata with them, but I didn't realize how bad it was until tonight. If I had... you believe me, don't you?"

You nod.

Tyrus whistles, and points at the door, glancing from you to Lily. "Let's go. Both of you."

"Oh, that would be nice," Olivia says. She hugs one of Amelia's arms, rubbing her cheek on Amelia's shoulder and smiling. "I'd really like some alone time with Amelia so she can have sex with me!"

This draws awkward stares all around. Amelia turns carnation pink.

"I -- I mean--" Olivia stammers. She stands straight and cups a hand to her mouth. She whispers at you all as if sharing a secret. "I mean that I want to read books with her. I love reading books so much that sometimes I compare it to sex."

Amelia is hiding her face in her hands.

"Y'all have fun with book club," Tyrus says. You and he start for the door, but Lily lags behind, gawking at the pair. Tyrus finally has to drag her out by one arm.

"What hours do you operate?" Lily calls, legs kicking, as her father pulls her through the door. But he shuts the door after her before she can get an answer.

---

Word travels fast. When Tyrus drops you off, you stop by to visit Dad. Instead you find Aunt Rose at the dining room table with Aunt Charlotte, whispering about... something. They stop when you enter, and give you a severe look, so hey, all right, may as well wear neon signs that say "WE'RE TALKING ABOUT YOU BEHIND YOUR BACK." Uncle Saul is staring out the back patio door.

You weren't the only visitor tonight. You hear ruffling behind you, bags falling to floor. Turning, you see Aunt Cerise coming in. Saul smiles as Cerise exchanges hugs with your other aunts.

"Wes," Cerise says as she pulls away from her hug with Rose. "Nice to see you. Still watching Renren-sama?"

"Yeah. New animation studio this season, but--"

She makes a fist and knocks on your forehead. "Circle of shame. Tomorrow at 4 PM."

"Ow..." you moan, rubbing the sore spot there.

"What brings a future US Senator here at this time of night?" Saul asks.

"I don't know. What brings you to your least favorite in-law's house?" Cerise replies.

Saul tilts his head and frowns.

"I'm glad you're here. I need some advice," Cerise tells him.

Saul makes a show of pointing at himself. "Moi? You're going to be a US Senator soon, Cerise. What advice could you possibly need from some two-bit hack lawyer?"

"Are you seriously still mad over that?" Cerise grumbles.

"Oh, why would I be mad?" Saul says in faux confusion. "I found my law license in a cereal box, after all. Your words!"

"This is serious," Cerise tells him. Her face is stone. "Please."

Saul drops the shit-talking. "Right." He glances this way and that. "Well, lucky you, I have a cooler out back already. You're not too snobby to enjoy some Sam Adams, now are you?"

"Yeah, my taste is way too good for me to enjoy drinking Sam Adams," Cerise says. "But I can suffer through a couple if it'll make you stop bitching."

Saul slides the patio door open and motions with one arm. "After you, congresswoman. Let's chat poolside. Away from prying ears." They step out together, and he closes the door behind them. They settle into plastic loungers, crack some beers, and start into a discussion that will probably last many hours.

"Tell Dad I'm home, okay?" You ask Rose. "In case he was worried."

"Of course," Rose says. "And he was."

"We were," Charlotte adds.

As you head out, you pass Aunt Anna coming in. She has Riley with her. He hides behind her butt, clutching her shirt, even though he knows you and adores you. It's just his way. "Hello Wessy," he says, voice muffled. You ruffle his ginger hair. "Mommy Cerise and Mommy Anna are in town for few days!" He tells you.

"I saw. Hey, can you keep Cerise in a good mood? She wants to circle of shame me."

"were you watching renren sama" Aunt Anna asks.

You don't say.

"Hee," Riley laughs. You gently poke him in the forehead to shut him up. He pouts at you.

You leave for the comfort of your own home, where at least you're pretty sure your mothers won't bully you.

At school the next morning, Summer meets you out in the quad. "Wes, honey," she says, a concerned lilt to her voice, as she takes both your hands in hers. "Remember how I told you Winter was coming?"

"Yeah."

"She came. And I just wanna let you know before--"

"This is your girlfriend?"

A girl much shorter and tanner than Summer comes running up. Winter, you assume.

"This is Wesley? HER?" Winter says.

Summer hardly acknowledges her sister -- just angrily shakes her head. Winter makes herself impossible to ignore, though. She gives a huge, open-mouthed smile, and wheezes until her breath is totally gone -- "HAAAAAhhhhhhhh~~" -- then, mouth still hanging open for a long, silent moment, her voice at last catches like a stubborn zipper, and she guffaws: "AHHHHH HA-HA-HA-HA!" She literally doubles over, clutching her stomach as if in pain, and points at you. "Her!! That's your girlfriend?! Oh my GOD! You're dating the monster from The Ring! You're dating Wednesday Addams without the fashion sense! You're dating a *cavewoman*!" Still laughing, she stands straight, her eyes full of tears: "Is this your way of looking cuter by comparison, Summer? Is that it?" She ruffles your hair. You grimace. "Hey, they have a thing called combs now! Ever hear of 'em?" She tilts way off to the side to force you to look her in the eye. "Why do you slouch like that? Huh? Are you a deaf-mute? Can't you talk? Oh my god. You're so creepy -- eughh! And you stink! Say something! Say something!"

Summer slaps her hand away from your hair. "Leave her alone, Winter. God."

"Thanks for knocking my hand out of the hot zone," Winter says. "Don't wanna catch leprosy or something." She lets her wrist go limp and shakes her hand all about. "I gotta go wash myself before I catch whatever she's got."

"Oh -- you must be Winter Denali," comes a voice from behind her. She turns to find Auburn Brantly, fingers tented in front of his pants. "I'm from the Student Council. We'd like to extend a warm welcome to Palo Al--"

"Hey, dairy-free latte, I'm talking to my sister," Winter says. "Fuck off, yeah? I can find my own way around."

Auburn smiles frustratedly. "You know, it pays to get along," he says. "Those who don't... stick out."

"How's this for sticking out?" Winter asks, and flips him off. But then startles and bugs out when Amber, appearing as if from nowhere, wraps a sororal arm around her shoulder. Amber slaps Winter's chest with the back of her other palm, offering a handshake. Winter declines it.

"My veep is a bit of a knob, but we're just so happy you could make it from... where was it? Unalaska High? I'm sure that school makes this place look like a fucking backwater redneck shanty, but hey. I hope you can adjust to life outside the lap of luxury."

"Let go of me--" Winter starts.

"No, I don't think I will," Amber says, and hugs Winter even tighter. "Let me show ya around. You're gonna love it."

She forces Winter to walk with her.

"I'm sorry-- about my sister," Summer says.

"Not your fault," you say, and give an awkward laugh in an attempt to defuse the awkwardness. Funny enough, it doesn't work.

"Luckily? She won't be in any of our classes. We can steer clear."

You walk with her. And as you walk, you hold hands. It feels strange. You draw looks.

You debate internally whether to tell her about encountering Gideon last night. You decide against it. Gideon didn't want to be in touch with his family. That kind of information could only serve to endanger Summer anyway. It's beyond weird to be the one in the position of protecting her -- you're shorter, more timid and less popular -- it's an inversion of what you both expect and kind of want. But she called you her knight in shining armor, right? As much as you don't want it, you also kind of do. You want to live up to what she thinks of you.

Something else is eating at you, though. You, uh... cheated on her last night. Didn't you? Or did you?

"Hey-- Summer," you say.

"Hm?"

You pause with her in the long, sunlit, and emptying hall. You face her.

"What does it mean that we're dating?" You ask.

She shrugs. "I dunno. We go on dates?"

"That's it?"

"Maybe. It was just some romantic stuff I said. I didn't think too hard about it."

"Does it mean that we don't see other people?" You prod.

Summer's face crumples. "Oh my god. You're breaking up with me." She covers her face. And then the waterworks.

"No--!" You shout. You stand there slouchy and unsure, half reaching for her, while Summer weeps.

"Was it something I did? Is it because I'm not good at sex like you? Is it because my dad's in a cult that tried to murder you? It's the sex, isn't it? It's because I'm bad at sex!"

You pry her hands away from her sobbing face. "I'm not breaking up with you!" You hiss. "Geez. Get ahold of yourself."

She sniffles a couple times and fights back the tears. "You're not?"

"I'm just saying... I mean, you did it with me and Amber. And you seemed to really like watching us together."

"Huh? Oh... well yeah. Incest is hot."

"...Yeah," you agree. "I liked seeing you with Amber, too. So... but. Uhh. What if we wanted to do it with someone else? You know. Not just one of our sisters."

Summer grimaces at you.

"Not just my sister, specifically," you clarify.

Summer thinks about that. "I guess that would be fine? I mean... Mel is pretty cute. And I know she's just dying to fuck you!" You choke on nothing -- Summer talks about stuff like this way too publicly, and way too loudly. "Okay, okay, okay -- how's this?" She leans in close, and whispers in your ear. Her voice is silken. You shiver -- maybe it's better to have her blurting stuff out. "It's not cheating if we do it together. That'll be rule one. We can do whatever we want if it's together."

You take a step back from her. She nods slowly, smiling.

>[x] Come clean about Lily.

[ ] Don't risk hurting her. You can just be a more upstanding gf in the future...

"Last night," you begin with a quavering voice. "At E-sports. Lily--"

"You had sex with Lily," Summer says.

"Wellll -- well."

"That's why you're asking about cheating and stuff."

This ditz is a regular fucking Sherlock Holmes when she wants to be. "I, I, I..." you stutter.

"She forced herself on you, didn't she?" Summer says.

"Kind of?" You say. It would feel good to let that be the version of events. But you won't half-ass the honesty, even if it's suicidal: "Kind of not really. I let it happen."

Summer nods. "Lily's the biggest slut on campus. She fucks anyone as soon as they're out of the closet. And a few who are still in it. A few who are still deep enough inside it that they don't even *know* they're in it. She's a... what do you call it? Like a recruiter. Y'know?" She adopts a faux baritone: "Uncle Lez Wants You!" She points in the famous pose of Uncle Sam.

"You're not mad?" You ask.

"Oh, I'm furious. And curious. Furiously curious." She laces her hands behind her head. "Lily's gonna come after me next, I bet. Are you gonna be there when she comes and sits in my lap?"

You feel a twinge of jealousy despite yourself at the implication you won't be.

"It's fine," Summer tells you. "You just owe me one now."

"Having sex with Lily?" You ask.

"Oh, no. That's, like, a given. But you can jill off in the corner and watch us going at it if you want."

"So what do I owe you?"

"This kind of regression--"

"Transgression?--"

"--calls for something way more drastic."

"Like what?"

Summer nudges you "Heeeeeyyy. Wouldn't it be *super* cool if I came over to your house one of these nights for dinner with your moms?"

Summer spins on her heels and strolls down the hall. You race to catch up with her, tennis shoes squeaking on the waxed linoelum. "You-- don't mean--"

"Yes. I do. You wanna be there for *that* too, babe?" She asks. When you don't reply, she giggles to herself.

On your way out of fourth period, headed towards lunch, you pass by the teacher's lounge. The door is wide open, and the only one inside, sitting at a small round table, is Talia. She's eating a microwave dinner, some fettuccine alfredo with broccoli deal, the saran cover peeled back and her white plastic fork poking around the black plastic tray. She's picking out the broccoli florets, and leaving the pasta.

She catches you staring at her. "Hello Wesley."

"Let's not be too formal," you say, mimicking her earlier kindness. "Call me Wes."

"How sweet. I'm on a nickname basis."

"Do you have any nicknames I could use for you?" You ask. "Make the nickname basis a two-way street?"

Talia stares at the ceiling for a long moment, the tines of the fork to her lips. "Snuggy bear," she finally replies, voice as flat as ever.

"--Snuggy bear? Where did that come from?"

She shrugs. "First thing I thought of."

You glance down the hall. You should be running along -- but it's also kinda sad to think of Talia eating here all by herself.

>[x] Stay and have lunch with Talia.

[ ] Go track down Amber -- better make sure she hasn't murdered Winter yet.

You pull up a chair and have a sit.

"This is the teacher's lounge," Talia says.

"Okay," you say.

Talia, satisfied at that (apparently), continues munching on her broccoli. Just the broccoli.

"Why are you doing that?" You ask. It freaks you out a little.

She points at you with a floret. "I have to keep the meal kosher, don't I?"

"What?" You breathe. "That doesn't make any-- first of all? I'm pretty sure there's nothing unkosher about that mixture. Second of all? Even if there was, isn't it against the rules to eat it at all? Regardless of whether you separate it?"

"Oh?" Talia says. "Are you a card carrying member of the trib now?" Your eyes bulge. She tilts her head forward. "Excuse me. I meant tribe. Of course."

You stare saucers at her as she finishes the last of the broccoli, stands, and disposes of the rest of the TV dinner in a garbage pail in the corner. Wiping her hands on a dish rag hung through the loops of a nearby drawer-handle, Talia says: "I don't like the pasta. But the broccoli is nice and steamy-creamy. So I just eat that. Do you have any other critiques of my lunch habits? I'd like to hear them all, rather then let them remain a mystery."

She sits across from you again. You're still speechless. Propping her chin on her linked hands, she tilts her head just a little, and says: "you really enjoy being naughty on school grounds. You could get expelled if the wrong person sees you, do you know that?"

"I thought..." you begin.

"Oh, of course you thought. You wouldn't have gotten naked in the middle of a classroom if you didn't think. But you thought wrong." She wipes the corners of her mouth with a napkin. Wads it up. Sets it aside. As casual as can be. "Fortunately for you, I'm one of the only faculty here who cares enough to put in the long hours. And my lips are sealed. Just make sure you're more careful in the future."

You nod.

"If you like, I can show you a few of the more secluded places on campus," Talia tells you.

Your eyes shoot up to meet hers. How can this woman look like she's smiling without moving a single muscle on her face? You can never tell with her whether she's serious or not.

"Or maybe you can just keep things in the privacy of your bedroom," Talia says. "The choice belongs to you. As well as your many girlfriends."

"How is Summer taking it?" Talia asks.

"I don't know," you admit. "She said she was okay with it, but now she wants to do it with Lily too. And on top of that, she wants to do it with my-- um. She wants to do it with some other people we know."

"I mean about her sister being on campus."

"...Oh."

Talia leans back in her chair.

"I don't think she's too happy about that," you say.

"Winter is in my second period English class. She's quite the interesting girl. Have you met her?"

"Ohhh yeah," you say.

"Then you know what I mean," Talia says. "If you have the chance to speak with Ms. Denali in the near future, which I assume you will since you're having sex with her daughter, then please tell her that I recommend a program of judicious but forceful whipping and paddling. Plus keeping Winter on a tethered leash at a minimum of eight hours per day, five days per week. Just to begin."

You laugh.

"I'm not joking."

You stop laughing.

"Wesley Lynn Keki-- there you are!"

Amber barges in.

"This is the teacher's lounge," Talia says.

"Okay?" Amber says.

Talia is satisfied at that (apparently).

"Look, I'm happy to see you macking on yet more older women," Amber tells you (Talia is unfazed), "but we have some important shit to discuss."

"Like what?"

"Like, uh, homecoming? Dresses?"

Oh fuck. Homecoming. Goddamn it. Dresses. Shit. "I don't think... Summer would be okay... with me taking Will to homecoming," you lie.

"Are you fucking joshing me? She doesn't care. She knows you were tribbing with Lily last night and now she won't stop talking about all the people she wants to watch you fuck!" Amber, realizing herself, looks uncertainly back at Talia.

"It's fine," Talia says, "I know all about it."

"Oh." Amber is mute for a moment before continuing. "I'm not wasting a chance to doll you up. Got it? You and me. After school. I better see you at the front gates waiting."

"I'm -- also grounded," you try.

"Oh no you don't," Amber says. "You are not getting out of it that easily. This is happening with Daddy's *full* approval. He wants to see you all dolled up, too. He's A-OK with it." Amber holds up an OK sign. Then, realizing herself, she looks uncertainly back at Talia.

"Fine," Talia affirms.

Amber makes finger guns at her. Talia languidly makes finger guns back.

Alone again with Talia, you pull your lunch from your lunchbag. Every day, you have the same thing: a PB&J, with the crusts removed, cut into four triangles; a peeled orange; a can of Red Monster; and a small box of raisins. You array these things on the table in front of you. Then you set to work on your sandwich.

"Which of your mothers peels your oranges and cuts the crusts off your sandwiches?" Talia asks.

The peanut butter sticks to the roof of your mouth and nearly makes you choke.

"My first instinct says Noelle. But as I think about it... maybe Kay. Is it Kay who makes your lunch for you every day?"

You force yourself to swallow. "I make my own lunch," you say hoarsely.

"No you don't," Talia says.

"No I don't," you admit. You stare at the table.

"Kay?"

"Yeah. kmom's been making lunch for me my whole life. She... uh... does my sandwiches the way I like."

"Oh, I bet."

You're so abashed you can hardly stand to sit here. Erm.

"Ahead of your years in so many ways, behind in so many others," Talia muses.

All you can muster is a defeated shrug.

"You are a very strange girl, Wes," Talia says, and you couldn't possibly feel more insulted hearing that sentence from another human being.

---

In math, you get a psyched-up text from Amber.

>Yo bint! Dresses today! Remember!

You glance back at Summer, who's concentrating on the pop quiz so hard that her tongue is sticking out. You want to lean across her desk and kiss her-- uh. You wonder whether she knows that Amber intends to take you dress shopping later on. You shudder to think of that.

>[x] Go dress shopping with Amber [Sub vote: [ ] just the two of you / [x] with someone else to keep you safe (kmom/nmom/Summer/[x]Amelia)

[ ] Avoid Amber; take Talia up on her offer to show you and Summer somewhere more cozy at PAP.

[ ] Go with Summer to Shake 'em Up after class. You should check on how Amelia's doing.

"Hey Wes, do you know the answer to--" Summer whispers, glancing up. She trails off when she finds you staring at her. And in the moment, you can't resist. You lean in and kiss her.

The class snickers. In a world-first, you don't care about being the object of mockery. "Come onnn," Mr. Pooser says. "Eyes forward, you two. On your papers. Don't make me separate you."

You pull away from Summer. Her eyes are positively dreamy. "Babe..." she whispers.

"Amber might be fucking me in a dressing room later on today," you whisper back. "That's fine, right?"

"Pictures," Summer says.

You nod.

A few minutes later, near the end of the period when students are free to get a head start on their homework, you feel a nudge. "Hey, babe," Summer says. "I was thinking. Maybe you could use some protection."

"Oh, you want to come too?"

"Nah. I want your homecoming outfit to be a surprise. But I'm not the only one who can help you out... how about Mel?"

You shrug.

"Oh, you don't want protection, then?" Summer says.

"Not really."

"That's fine, too," Summer snickers. Then, growing momentarily serious: "pictures. Remember."

You can hardly believe what you're hearing. You face forward again, blushing.

"Maybe some good video, even," Summer adds.

---

As you and Summer walk out of the front gates at PAP, Amber is there waiting for you, as you expect. And as you expect, she's dismayed when you tell her: "we're headed to Shake 'em Up."

"Excuse me?" She shouts. "Are you just flagrantly ignoring my edicts now?"

"Yes," you say, not breaking your stride.

"Um. No?" Amber snarls, not at her wittiest, and hurrying to catch up with you. The three of you wind your way through the parking lot. She motions wildly. "You made me a promise! You can't just go back on that shit! You-- hey--" she lunges forward and throws open the door of Summer's Cadillac. Since you and and Summer have gotten in on the driver's side and passenger's side, respectively, Amber willingly jumps in back to ride bitch -- just so you two don't get away from her. She wants to keep hectoring you.

"You might be covered in horny bitches these days, but you're still a fucking wuss," Amber tells you. "And I can still beat your ass. Don't forget it."

"Who invited you?" Summer says.

"Me. I invited me."

"Just because I let you sit on my face, doesn't mean that rides in my Caddy are free now too," Summer tells her. "You have to pay the fare."

Amber rears onto her tailbone and rapidly bicycle-kicks the back of Summer's seat. "How's that for my fare? Huh?"

"You let all the Keki sisters ride you, huh?"

Winter is standing at the driver's side window, leaning in with arms folded across the window pane, leering at her older sister.

"Gun it!" Amber shouts -- real, raw panic there. "Go! Go, go, go!"

Summer puts the car in gear, and Amber dives to lock the car from the inside, but it's far too late. Winter throws one of the back doors open and slides in.

"I'm not a Keki," Amber says. She rests her weight on one hand and gets right up in Winter's face. Trying to intimidate. "I'm a Soliloquy."

Winter pushes her back, the heel of one palm against Amber's forehead. "Least this one's feisty," Winter tells Summer. "And about a hundred times cuter. I could see the appeal for a dyke like you."

"Why are you here, Winter?" Summer asks. "I'm not interested in babysitting you all night."

"You wouldn't be. You're babysitting your girlfriend, after all." She pokes her upper half across the center dash and peers at you. "I know you haven't learned how to speak yet, but have you at least learned object permanence?" She covers her face with both palms, thumbs sticking out, and coos: "where'd I go? Huh? Where'd I go?" As she slides them apart, she says: "Peekab--" but her little game gets interrupted by Amber yanking on her hair, dragging her into the back of the car again. "Ahhh-- ahh---" Winter chokes, reaching impotently behind herself to pry Amber's hand away.

"Peekaboo," Amber sneers, and pokes Winter in the eyes with V-shaped fingers.

"You bitch!" Winter howls, collapsing into a fetal position and clawing at her own face when Amber lets go of her. "Ow! Damn it! I'm gonna mess you up!"

"I'd like to fucking see you try," Amber says.

They become a tangle of limbs and shouting. But only for a brief moment. Summer intervenes:

"I have work," she says -- loud, but firm and level. "Get out. Both of you."

Winter unknots her limbs from Amber's and pushes past the center dash again -- this time facing Summer's direction. It's like she completely forgot she was in a brawl fewer than five seconds ago: "Pffhaha. Mom actually makes you work at the store?"

"No. I work at a restaurant."

"Oh my GOD! No way. You're flipping burgers even though Mom's loaded? Why?"

"She doesn't want me to turn out like you," Summer tells her. She says this nonchalantly. Matter-of-fact. It makes Winter's buoyant energy die all at once like an animal struck by lightning.

A beat passes. Winter slinks back and says, "have fun with your smelly girlfriend. ...It was nice to meet you, Wes, I guess. Amber."

"...Sure," you say, keenly feeling the awkwardness.

"Wow. She does talk," Winter says. Even her wisecracks are sullen. "Good to know." She steps out of the car.

"Winter--" Summer says, suddenly a little regretful, but her little sister is already taking off.

Summer kills the engine and sits there in silence for a few moments. She holds the steering wheel and thinks about what just happened -- seems to be mentally debating whether to get out and follow Winter. Finally, she decides against it. She restarts the ignition.

"God. Could you imagine having a sister that annoying?" Amber asks you.

You give her a meaningful look. She doesn't find the meaning.

"Guess I'm probably not lucky enough to get rid of you both," Summer says.

"Nope," Amber confirms. "Winter can go pout. I'm staying. Once I sneak into your backseat, I'm there for the duration." She leans back, stretches, yawns. "Now drive. Don't make me put a gun to your head."

---

Up by the counters, Amber shows Ophie a surefire trick to marry two ketchup bottles more quickly. Amber explains it as the "Shake 'em Slap 'em Squeeze 'em Up" method, but Ophie ascertains the physics underpinning it: "of course. Ketchup is thixotropic. With the correct application of shear force, the viscosity sharply decreases and flow properties become more favorable..."

"Yeah. Uh, you got it. Now try it in real life."

Amelia rests her cheek on her fist with her elbow on the table in front of her. "Summer seems like she's back to normal, huh?"

You watch her for a moment as she zips from table to table taking orders and bantering with patrons. "She's pretty resilient, I guess." You take a sip of your soda, then ask: "so are you going to quit your job here?"

"No," Amelia says. "Whitney would murder me! Anyway, Olivia can't pay me to help out at her bookstore."

"What happened? Tyrus made it sound like she's rolling in it. She paid the lease on a building that hasn't been open for years."

"Right. Now she's running short on funds. It's the only reason she came back. She's got about six more months of utility and lease payments left before she's flat broke. So unless she can stoke a heretofore unprecedented interest in rare books..."

"That sucks," you say, trying to commiserate.

"She made her bed," Amelia says.

You blink. "But I thought -- aren't you two, like... you know. Together?"

"Yeah. That doesn't mean I can't be realistic about her stupidity. That store means everything to her. Now she's going to lose it."

"Unless you do something," you say.

"Yeah? Like what?"

You shrug. "We could come up with some ideas. An advertising blitz. Oh! We could do commercials like Summer's mom does. Purposely annoying."

"I refuse," Amelia says, holding her arms in an X. "My dignity is worth more than my girlfriend's hopes and dreams."

"It can't be helped, then," you say. "It'll have to be me." You pantomime firing a gun. "Bang! ...How's that?"

Amelia clutches her heart and theatrically falls to the side like an outlaw in an old western movie. "Oooogh... ya got me..."

You giggle at her.

"Bury me... with my money..." Amelia sighs, lying flat against the bench seat and letting her eyes drift shut.

"Hey," you say softly. Amelia squints her ostensibly dead eyes partway open again. "Can you leave work early today?"

"That depends. Are we going casket shopping?"

"Close. Dress shopping. For me."

Amelia is sitting fully upright again.

"Amber wants to pick me out a dress for homecoming. I need a little protection."

"I see how you would be a little wary, there." She glances around. "I was about to go on break, though. Blow off a little steam, you know--"

"Why blow off steam on break when you can just blow off work completely? What, you don't think going clothes shopping with me will be enough of a stress-reliever?"

Amelia chews her thumbnail. "I... guess," she finally says.

You pull her hand from her mouth. "Good. Let's go."

---

Fōtsūtsū isn't the kind of place you go to buy elegant, bespoke dresses to attend a fall formal in. It's the kind of place you go to buy slutty cosplay and fetish gear. So of course it's where Amber decides to take you. Tucked away at the end of a narrow cobblestone sidepath in a large and fashionable outdoor galleria, it's a shop you have to be purposely seeking to find -- Amber wanted you to go here, specifically.

"Oh my..." Amelia murmurs as she steps through the entryway and sees what's on offer. "Who is this boy you're going to the dance with, again?"

"Will Levy," you say.

Amelia pulls a microbikini from the racks. Or maybe it would be more apt to call it a micromicrobikini -- really just a couple strips of pale blue fabric connected by a strap that runs vertically up the center and terminates in a collar -- the collar by far the widest covering. "And is this how you want this Will boy to see you dressed?" She asks, playing at mildly scandalized.

"No -- god, no," you breathe.

Amelia smiles. "Then this might be the wrong place to go dress shopping, don't you think?"

"Nah, I think this is the perfect place," Amber counters. From the racks, she produces a succubus costume. You recognize it as eerily similar to the one worn by the not-so-mysterious Besuto, in videos Amber once eagerly forced you to watch. "Wanna bend some circuits?" Amber asks.

"Why does that look familiar..." Amelia murmurs. Then she seems to remember whatever context she saw it in herself -- blushes, and looks away.

"Can we please just find something that won't get me arrested if I wear it in public?" You grouse. You take the succubus costume from her and hang it back up. "Something that isn't too frilly. I hate frilly shit."

"How about you, Amber?" Amelia says. "Are you going to homecoming as well?"

"Nah. I'm--"

"Yes you are," you say. "You totally are. Liar."

"No, I'm not," Amber says. "Not on a date, anyway."

"So... you *are* going," Amelia drawls, having drawn the correct conclusion from Amber's evasive answer.

"Not the same way that Wes is--"

"You need a dress, too, then," Amelia interjects.

"No, I don't! Because I'm *not* going to homecoming -- except as a functionary of the PAP StuCo! That's different!"

Amelia finds a heavily altered seifuku -- one made into a haltertop and micro-miniskirt. She holds it up for appraisal. "StuCo-appropriate, do you think?"

"Okay, that's it, we're leaving. Wes, we're leaving. C'mon."

"Oh, no," Amelia croons. She lays hands on Amber's shoulder and steers her deeper into the store. "We have shopping to do..."

It always surprises you how easily Amelia can strike fear into Amber. Just a firm grip and a gentle "oh, no," innocuous as it may seem, is enough to make Amber think twice about trying to back out of this situation. It's great. Bringing Amelia along to keep you safe from Amber's bullying was definitely the wise decision.

"Will you look at this?" Amelia says, showing Amber a bunnysuit. "Wouldn't that look darling?"

"You are out of your goddamn tree, lady, if you think I'm gonna put that on," Amber says, and takes a halting step back. You smile to yourself.

"Oh, I didn't mean for you." Amelia turns and holds the costume aloft to display it to you -- fishnets, bunny ears, cottontail, cute little cufflinks and all. "What do you think, Wes? Isn't it perfect?"

You feel suddenly ill. And now it's Amber who gets to smile at your misfortune.

Until, of course, Amelia finds the costume's opposite number -- literally - a reverse bunnysuit hanging nearby. "This one might suit you a little better, Amber."  

"You are absolutely -- fucked, in the head," Amber says.

"If you girls don't want me choosing your outfits for you, then you'd better get to choosing something for yourselves," Amelia says, grinning coyly.

You get the message loud and clear. So does Amber. The two of you start digging through the clothes racks.

You find some dresses that suit your sensibilities: plain, slim, and not terribly suggestive. Sure, they're slit down the back a little deeply... and/or cut a little (read: way) short... but you wouldn't feel like a porn actress wearing it, so one of them will have to do. Amber, for her part, finds something a little more out-there: a full cheongsam, complete with two silk covers for wearing over bunned hair. And if you thought your dress selections were slit too far down the back... at least none are also slit halfway up one side.

"Happy?" Amber demands.

"It's gorgeous," Amelia says. "But I'd hate to see you get canceled for wearing it. Why don't you and Wes switch?"

"No," you say. You can feel yourself turning green. "Oh no no no."

"I *like* this dress," Amber says, pulling it protectively to herself. "And I'm not going to let a bunch of hypothetical, over-sensitive idiots tell me that I can't wear it. Fuck 'em."

Props to Amelia. She found a way to make Amber an enthusiastic participant in this fiasco.

"Hmm..." Amelia hums. She rifles through the hangers. You hate the sound of metal sliding on metal. "Ah... here's another one just like it." She pulls a second cheongsam out. "You girls can match. Red and blue."

"I don't want to go around looking like Chun-Li, sorry," you tell her.

She tosses the dress at you. By reflex, you catch it -- dropping the more acceptable ones in a pile at your feet.

"Don't make a decision until you try it on," Amelia says. "Go ahead. See how it fits. I'd be heartbroken if you didn't at least try it on." She shoos you two towards a dressing room.

Amber shrugs at you. What are you gonna do? You're as powerless against Amelia's gentle scolding as she is.

Inside the cramped space, which you and Amber share, you awkwardly disrobe. It's hard not to knock your limbs and bodies together as you struggle free of your street clothes and into the dresswear. "This is your fault," Amber whispers. "I hope you realize that."

"I'm not the one who brought us to Sluts 'r' Us," you whisper back. "*Maybe* if you didn't want to get Shanghaied into a China dress, you'd have picked a normal fucking clothes store. Ever think of that?"

"She's gonna rape you," Amber says. "Dead serious. And it won't be my problem." She primps her hair in the mirror and twists her neck to see how the dress fits her in back.

"Well you said it yourself -- I've got enough horny bitches hanging off of me. What's one more?" You fiddle with the apex of the cheongsam's side-slit, despondent at how high it goes up your leg. You can see your pantyline through it -- all the way to the waistband.

"Uh huh," Amber says. "Well, do any of those other horny bitches have a dick?"

You grimace at her. "Oh, please."

"It's true. Amelia's got a dick. Big fat fucker. I've seen it."

"No you haven't."

"Yes. I have. Why do you think Mom likes her so much? Why do you think she's the best-paid store manager in the system?"

"Aunt Whitney didn't--"

"It's because she's got a nice big cock that fucks hard and goes splurrrrt -- and then keeps going. That's why."

"You're trying to mess with me."

"Hey, you peep on your mommies. You think I don't peep on mine?" Amber ties up the pink silk sash that goes around her cheongsam's hip. "Don't say I didn't warn you," she whispers, and then steps out of the room. You follow.

Amelia claps. "Amazing! You look like a couple of porcelain dolls. I wanna put you on my shelf!"

This remark would be creepy enough by itself. But Amelia is wearing the bunnysuit she picked out a few minutes ago, and that makes it about a hundred times creepier. She must have gone into an adjoining fitting room and tried it on. It's small on her -- too small, by a lot, and it bites into her plump body in a way that looks downright painful. The stockings struggle to constrict her thighs, and you spy a run already developing in the right leg; the breastpiece can hardly contain the massiveness of her boobs, which bulge around the edges and half-envelop it; the bikini bottom is folded in on itself, uncomfortably compressed, and threatening to be sucked up entirely by her ass.

At least the bunny ear headband fits her.

"Uh, Mel?" Amber says. "Ever hear the policy of 'you break it, you buy it'?"

"Oh, this?" Amelia says, glancing down at herself. "I love this costume! I'll definitely buy it."

Your eyes scan the latex front, searching for a certain kind of bulge -- you think maybe you see a misshapen lump by the crotch, but maybe that's just excess fabric bunching up. You can't be certain.

"Anyway," Amelia says, "I approve. 100%." She steps close, puts her hands on either side of the top of your head. "With some makeup, and hair buns, you'd look like you stepped right out of a Qing dynasty court."

"Yellow fever much?" Amber says.

Amelia turns towards her. "You look adorable, too. You both do."

It feels weird getting doted on by bunnysuit Amelia. It's too much attention. You want to go home and bury your face in your pillows, ASAP.

Amelia clears her throat. Your eyes shoot down. You see something that definitely isn't the bunching of fabric, developing near her crotch -- but only for an instant -- because she goes for the entrance to the other booth and says, "I should get my normal clothes back on. Excuse me..."

Alone again, Amber ribs you. "Heh. We gave her boner."

"Will you stop?" You say. "If this is some weird-ass way of convincing me not to hook up with Amelia, it isn't working. You should know my porn habits well enough by now to figure that out."

Amber shrugs. "You don't want to believe me? Walk through that wicker door, and see for yourself."

"I am not going to barge in on Amelia while she's getting dressed and say, 'lemme see your dick' -- especially when I'm... like... 87% sure she hasn't even got one."

"Well, you'll have a couple minutes to reconsider those odds," Amber says, folding her arms. She tilts her chin up, as if to point at the fitting room's door: "I think she's trying to get happy in there."

You perk your ears and listen carefully. From the vicinity of Amelia's fitting room, you hear a slow, rhythmic slapping -- only faintly, but it's definitely there. And a moment after that, you hear a muffled but not totally stifled "unnh~" that's unmistakably Amelia's voice, although not in a way you've ever heard it before. The pace of that onanistic slapping accelerates, then -- then suddenly stops, and you hear a slightly louder "ahhh~" which you would take to be her orgasm. Except just a second after *that*, the whole thing begins anew.

"You really got her going," Amber says. "Gonna take responsibility?"

You look Amber dead in the eye. "I didn't get her going. We got her going."

"Huh--"

You grab her wrist and tug her forward, towards the dressing room door. "WE should take responsibility."

The door may be locked, but the gap underneath is more than wide enough to crawl under. You force Amber to hands and knees with you, and violate Amelia's privacy. Just as you thought, she's sitting there on the hard wood bench, playing with herself. Degenerate woman. She freezes in shock as you and Amber climb in with her and stand before her. You're equally shocked by what you see.

Amelia doesn't have a penis.

Penises are something like 4 to 7 inches long at the middle of the bell curve, and measure only a little less in circumference. Penises are intimidating but not terrifying, like a well-designed roller coaster or a difficult game. Penises are good and fun.

Amelia doesn't have a penis. Amelia has a monster.

An impossibly thick, impossibly long, bulging, veiny, twitching, dripping, half-hooded and slimy monster. Like a thing alien to Amelia's body that latched itself to her so it can feed off her life force. It's darker than the rest of her by a couple shades, curved like a scimitar, and pulses as if it has a mind all its own. She has it free of the crotch of her bunnysuit, and hanging underneath it is a pendulous set of balls. Her tits are out, too, heaving and sweaty. She's plastered with semen -- her own -- it drips off her champagne pink nipples and the rumpled violet polyester of her bunnysuit. And it drools from the tip of her cock in huge, thick gobs that pool on the floor in a tiny puddle. Nevertheless, she's still erect, and both her hands are still wrapped around that monster cock of hers -- as much as they can encompass, anyway, which isn't a lot. Feminine as Amelia is, generally, this tiny fitting room stinks of man -- of masculinity -- of an obscene odor pouring from the masculine part of her like fumes from a roaring furnace.

"Amelia..." you breathe. "You're-- I -- I didn't know you were trans."

"I'm not," she says softly, sounding ashamed. She pulls her balls to one side to reveal, hidden there, a slit that's drooling just as freely as her cocktip. "I'm intersex. Born lucky, I guess. I have the whole package." She lets go of her genitals, and her palms fall flat against the bench. She slumps in place a little. "I... I'm sorry. I really like you, Wes. And I guess you didn't expect this. So... if you never want to see me again -- I get it -- really..."

You can't let her think that of you. You get between her legs. Nevermind that one of your knees is resting in the puddle of her jizz. Nevermind that the scent of her sex is so overpowering from this close that it makes you almost faint. You like Amelia too. And you want her to show you what she can do with this thing.

"That thing... is... SO much bigger from up-close than it seems," Amber stutters. Amelia tilts her head in confusion. Amber stumbles backwards. "I'm super happy that you two are compatible and whatnot, but-- I'll just... wait, out there, for you..."

"Don't be rude." You grab one of her ankles and trip her. She falls to her face right in front of the bench.

"Are you really... all right with... with..." Amelia begins. But she doesn't have to ask, because it's plain from your reactions that you are. Her eyes become dewy, and Amber's eyes become saucers, as you pull Amelia's cock to your face, skin-to-skin, so your nose and lips are mashed against the underside of it. This position of submission would be enough to make you drip if your cunt wasn't already wet. You can't resist inhaling deeply, as you stare up into Amelia's trembling face. You draw as much of this sex-soaked air as your lungs will hold, basking in the musky stink of Amelia's cock. You are only distantly aware of the fact that the tip is still oozing cum, that it's getting all over your hair, dripping down the back of your head, across the nape of your neck and over the part of your back that the cheongsam leaves bare.

Amelia's voice goes staccato. "Wes-- I'm gonna--"

Your eyes bulge in surprise. You feel Amelia's cock rumble against you, like a volcano about to blow -- and then it blows. With steady, relentless pulses, Amelia blows her load. And if those parts of you she was oozing on were messy before, now they're whitewashed -- you can feel the almost torrential geyser of semen squirting from her cock, soiling this new dress, and leaving you sitting in an ever-expanding puddle of dick milk.

You won't hog the fun. You steer Amelia's orgasming cock the other way -- aiming it at Amber -- and nail her right in the face with a few wet, messy spurts. She shudders, gasping, and holds her half-clenched hands up by her cheeks in shock as the nasty spunk drips from her -- down her forehead and off her nose and chin. She stares down at her body, the stained fabric of the cheongsam, and tests the consistency of the sperm with a forefinger, as if disbelieving what just happened. Her breaths are erratic and irregular.

"I'm so sorry," Amelia says, and bites her knuckles. She's still cumming.

"Don't be sorry," you tell her. "Amber's been saying forever how bad she wants some dick. Well, here it is."

"You're still hard..." Amber murmurs. Resting her fists on the floor between her knees, a long strand of cum still dangling off the sharp tip of her nose, she leans forward and examines Amelia's cock from the same closeness that you do.

"It's just how I am," Amelia explains. "The more I masturbate and have sex... the more of it I need... I can't ever get this stupid thing to go down."

In spite of herself, Amber is drooling a little. Her dainty jaw drifts open and her wet tongue is visible between her equally wet lips. Her eyes go glassy. She seems half in a stupor. Maybe the smell of cock and cum is infecting her brain, too, or maybe getting cummed on triggered something primal inside her. There's definitely just one thing on her mind right now. You won't let her be the only one licking this giant dick, though. Together, you and your older sister let your tongues loll out, and you begin to lick and suckle on Amelia's flesh pole.

It tastes... like sweat and grime... like something dirty and disgusting -- salty, bitter, pungent. You love it. You want this horrible taste to stain your mouth and mark you. You want to stink like Amelia's cock for the next month. You want to be a cumdump for her, a cock hole, a dick ditch. Just kissing and running your lips lightly up and down the length of her member makes it throb until it turns all red and purple and angry. A cock this huge and angry-looking... if it fucked you, that wouldn't be sex, would it? It would be rape... she'd be raping you. When Amber puts her nose and lips in the crevice where Amelia's nuts and shaft connect, and siphons up the spunk pooled there while huffing Amelia's smell, Amelia has another miniature orgasm, and pours her cum thickly across your cheek as you suckle on her foreskin.

Amber notices this when she finally comes up for air. Her red hair is matted to her face by sweat and precum. Her eyes are half-lidded. "You have some on you," she says huskily. "Let me help." She leans across Amelia's cock and sucks the jizz off your skin. It makes her eyes roll back. Mouth half-full, teeth and tongue swamped in a pearl-white pool of Amelia's genetics, Amber slurs: "it tashtes sho fucking good..."

"More down here," you tell her, and push her head to the concrete floor. Amber doesn't bat an eyelash. She starts licking Amelia's cum up like a kitten lapping milk. "God, I love it..." she groans.

You join your sister. Why not? Together, your tongues swirl around the dirty ground and suck down all of Amelia's copious semen. They occasionally meet, and you kiss one another, enjoying the tang of the dirty cum inside one another's mouths. Amelia, hard as ever, leans back and watches this perverse, incestuous display. She masturbates -- jerking herself with one hand, tickling her cunt slit with the other.

That makes you curious. You push your face underneath her balls. Here, at the union of her male and female parts, her scent is the strongest of all. The collected sweat and funk of the day, mixed with her girlcum and her jizz, really does make you pass briefly into unconsciousness. Your eyes flutter shut, you feel loose all over, and start to fall. But Amber's hand against the back of your skull, forcing your face into Amelia's crotch even harder, wakes you back up. You lap at her pussy while Amber licks her dick. You service both sets of genitalia, together, and the small room fills with the lewd sounds of sucking. Amelia cums. You can't see it happen, but you can tell from the sound of Amber's struggling coughs and sputters, that Amelia is blowing her nuts right in Amber's mouth, and down her throat. How lucky.

"Stand up... girls, stand up, please..." Amelia begs.

You stand. Amelia wraps her limbs around you -- her calves draped over your butts, her arms draped across your backs. She pulls your faces towards hers, and you enter into a three-way kiss. You and Amber jerk Amelia off while you swap her cum between your hungry mouths. Real cock is so smooth and velvety, but so hard and rough-feeling, too -- and so hot it almost burns. You love it. You and Amber use your free hands to paw at Amelia's enormous tits, which are still sticky with her sperm. Amelia writhes and moans under this adoring attention. She isn't a completely greedy lover, though. She sneaks her hands through the slits in your cheongsams, past the waistbands of your undies. With either hand, she molests your little cunnies for you, since your own hands are too busy to do it yourselves. She's really good at it. She knows how to finger a couple of little bitches like you.

As your tongues wash over and around one another's, Amelia moans into your mouths: "I need to fuck... I need to fuck something... you girls will let me fuck you, right? I need it-- I NEED it so bad..."

"I need it too," you moan back. "Fuck me, Mel... please..."

Some stray, still-rational neuron in Amber's brain fires. "Uh-- are you fertile, Mel? You know. If you don't use protection, could we..."

You hike your dress and climb into Amelia's lap. You hug her around her neck. It's a strange vantage, looking down at her rather than up. Her twitching cock is hot against your butt, even through the dress's fabric. "I'm ready. I wanna fucking bounce on you."

"Pregnancy... is a real possibility..." Amelia says. "I have condoms in my purse, if you--"

You pull your panties aside and plunge yourself down, straight down, onto Amelia's cock. As big as it is -- you're so wet and her dick is so slimy that it splits you open with ease. Your inside walls get streaked with the cum she's still drooling from her piss slit. Can't go back now. "No fucking condom," you whisper right in her ear. "Cum inside me."

Amelia feels you up and down your back. She gropes your butt. You rest on your knees, and start to bounce, just the way you said you wanted to. Fucking Amelia scratches that itchy spot just past your cervix, inside your womb -- in a way no dildo ever could. The harder you bounce, the more relief you feel. It hurts. But in a soothing way. Amelia can only hold on for dear life while you use her like a living sex toy. You make out with her, and you grunt like animals into each other's mouths.

"Wes-- you're crazy," Amber breathes. "You stupid slut--"

"Mel, you have a phone in your purse, too?" You pant.

She nods.

"Good." You glance over your shoulder, never breaking the piston-like pace of your humping. It feels much too good to stop. "Amber, be useful. Shoot a video of this. Summer wants to see."

Amber does as instructed. She fishes through Amelia's purse, grabs the phone there, and starts to commit this act to video. Technically a major felony, but none of you care. Amber leans against the wall of the dressing room, spreads her legs, and plays with herself while she films. She's done discouraging your wanton riskiness. Since it's going to happen anyway, she may as well get off to it. "You seeing this shit, Summer?" She narrates. "Mel's gonna knock your girlfriend up. I hope you like pregnant chicks."

"Oooh-- oooh--" Amelia grunts. She squeezes your ass to fuck you even deeper, and presses her mouth to your neck. She kisses you, sucks your skin, bites you and gives you hickeys. "It's so good raw... it's so good fucking a raw pussy..."

"It's the best," you agree, voice swoony. "I love raw dick..."

She kisses the other side of your neck now. "I'm gonna bareback you every day from now on," she promises. "I don't care if you do get pregnant."

"Yeah? What are you gonna tell my moms?" You say tauntingly, still bouncing on her. You hate that with every upstroke you have to raise yourself off her dick, but the forcefulness of her entire shaft filling your insides straight up to your uterus every time you slam down on her is just too good to pass up.

"I don't care," Amelia says. She has a crazed lilt to her voice. "I'll knock them up, too."

That touches off a deep, shuddering climax inside you, one that originates from your deepest and most intimate parts. Your womb throbs when you hear her say something like that. It constricts, and wraps itself like a suckling mouth around the bulbous head of Amelia's cock. You stop moving. So Amelia, grabbing hold of your waist, and half-standing with bowed knees, starts to thrust. Your head lolls back, bouncing limply in time to her fucking, and your mouth curls into an O. You let out a silent scream. Amelia's forceful slam-fuck, so much rougher than the way you bounced on her, fills the air with nasty thwacking and squelching sounds.

"Cumming--!!" Amelia grunts, and then she does. It's a big one. A huge, creamy load that explodes against your insides, as hot as lava, and as thick as yogurt, so voluminous that you hear the messy glopping of it, until it runs down your thighs, over the union of your genitals, and onto the ground. Amber films it all while she cums herself stupid.

But Amelia has the true spirit of a born futanari. Cumming a few times all over your bodies, and once deep inside your raw cunt -- couldn't possibly be enough to satisfy her. When she falls back into a sitting position and you slowly dismount -- as the milky load seeps from your battered pussy like a condiment being squeezed from a bottle, spattering messily all over Amelia's lap and the bench below her -- Amelia is already looking at Amber with lusty eyes -- Amber, who's got her legs spread wide, her panties around one ankle, and her smooth pussy on full view while she diddles herself in that Chinese dress of hers.

"Um... no pregnancy for me, please," Amber stammers.

Amelia may be totally fuck-crazed, but she's no actual rapist. Dutifully, she puts a condom on, trapping her meaty dick under a thin layer of latex that stretches so taut it looks like it'll snap if you only breathe on it. And, all suited up, she gets herself between Amber's legs.

"Oh... God..." Amber gasps, doubtful of the geometry involved when Amelia lines her dick up. But Amber's breath leaves her like she got punched in the solar plexus, and she has no way to say no, as Amelia slams herself home, balls-deep, up Amber's far too tiny snatch.

You feel changed. You've never been spunked in before, at least not by real cum. It's nice. It's warm. It makes you feel lightheaded and silly. It makes you feel dumb and happy. You wish Amber would cut loose and enjoy it, too. Crawling over to her, you stroke her tummy. You can see the slightest distension caused by Amelia's absolutely humongous dick slamming in and out.

"You really won't let her cum in you?" You ask.

"Yeah. I'm not insane."

Amber, being pressed against the dressing room wall until she's curled up in the shape of a bean, Amelia's arms wrapped around her calves for purchase, has forgotten her filmography duties. You gently retrieve the phone, its camera still videoing, from Amber's limp hand. Then, straddling Amber's face, you sit on her. You're still leaking Amelia's spunk. Now it's smearing all over Amber's forehead, nose, cheeks, lips, and chin -- and oozing into her mouth. When you press your fingertips against your navel, it forces yet more dribbles of cum from your deepest parts -- it seems to never end. "It's so warm," you coo. "It feels so good... in here... you really don't want it?"

Amber sucks Amelia's cum out of you like she hasn't eaten in weeks, and her rolling eyes glimmer with lust. You grind on her, getting off, pointing the camera downward to film the way you degrade her. What you really want to capture though, is the moment she breaks -- you know she will -- the moment she tells Amelia to pull the condom off so she can take Amelia's nut inside her.

You raise your scrawny butt a little off her face. "Well?"

Amber's voice is tremulous, like a scared little girl, as she says: "I'm not safe... I'll get pregnant for sure."

"So fucking what?" You rub your cunt on her again and let her get even drunker off the sperm flowing from you. "Mmmf~" she breaths, blowing hot air directly against your engorged clit. Behind you, Amelia keeps up a relentless, pounding pace -- but staves off another orgasm, waiting to see if you'll break Amber down.

"Unhh..." Amber dithers when you pull off her mouth again. "Um... just... just a little is okay, right?"

"Just a little what?" You ask. Amelia rams her hard and deep a couple times, battering her, knocking her head against the wall.

"Unh-- unh-- i-it's okay if she cums inside me just a little... right?"

"Is that what you want?" Amelia asks.

Amber nods desperately.

"Do you want me to take my condom off?" Amelia says, just to make extra sure.

"Yes..." Amber moans. Her voice is small and scared, but also drowning in need. "Take it off..."

You pull a 180 and film the glorious sight: of Amelia pulling completely out of Amber's tight twat, which is cherry red from getting fucked so hard -- of Amelia tugging on the reservoir tip of the condom and unsheathing her massive tool. She drops it, like discarding a piece of garbage, and the slimy thing falls draped over Amber's tummy to stain the already irreparably stained dress. Finally then, Amelia, her face leering, her cock drooling, lines herself up with Amber's unspoiled cuntlet... and with a grunting thrust, she spoils it.

"Just a little... just a little is okay..." Amber mewls, although you know she knows that it won't be "just a little" -- and that even "just a little" is still as risky.

"Lick me," Amelia tells you.

"Huh?"

"Get behind me. Lick me."

How could you say no to any of her demands? She owns your body -- heart and soul. "Keep filming," you tell Amber as you pass her the phone. You crawl behind Amelia, part the rear of her bunnysuit. With your face below the cottontail, you spread her cheeks. There you find her cute little asshole, and her gorgeous pussy. It's a pussy every bit as womanly as her dick is manly. It has defined lips, deep pink and runny with her arousal, all set in a plump, soft-looking mound. It makes your mouth water. So you put your mouth to work, and lick her from behind. On your elbows, you feast on Amelia -- her cunt, her balls, and her ass. She smells so good... she tastes even better...

Amelia starts to grunt, lost to her own pleasure, totally beyond the point that she could stop herself even if one of you told her no. That thought gets you hot. You reach between yourself and play with your cummy pussy, still licking, and think about that. You think about Amber having second thoughts, telling Amelia not to cum inside, and Amelia completely ignoring her. You kind of want it to happen.

But Amber's just as lost to pleasure. She wants it. She keeps her legs spread and the camera's lens focused on the lewd sight, and starts to beg like a bitch for Amelia's spunk. "Fuck me... fuck me... cum inside..." she rasps. Amelia's jiggly butt bounces between the two of you -- your face and Amber's cunt -- and she fucks herself into an abyss. Your tongue pokes into her asshole, roots itself there. You salivate freely into her anus. That does it. With a savage grunt that could have come from a Viking or an Amazon, Amelia's balls tighten, and she loses another thick load up Amber's twat. It's far from "just a little." You wiggle your tongue around inside her ass to encourage it, and massage her nuts to make sure you milk her dry. You want every last ounce of cum to go into Amber's womb -- and, as your dizzy head swims with perverse images, you strum your clit and cum hard to one image in particular: of you and Amber, naked, collared and leashed, the leashes both held by Amelia, your bellies both distended in the ninth month of pregnancy, Amelia's leaky cock jutting between your cheeks.

GIRLS FUCKED: 4/9

---

You lie on your stomach on your bed, reading manga. Riley is on hands and knees under your computer desk, tinkering.

"Aaaaaand there," Riley says.

"All done?" You say.

"All done." He crawls free of the desk, then onto the bed on all fours, feigning total exhaustion as he collapses across your back. Little asshole.

"Umpf -- get off," you say.

"Weeeessssss," Riley whines. "I'm so tired. You said we'd hang out."

"We are hanging out."

"You just wanted me to upgrade your computer! That's not hanging out!"

"Yes it is..."

Riley scoots around so that he's straddling you like a rider on a horse. He tugs your hair lightly. "Come on! Mommy Cerise and Mommy Anna aren't gonna be in town for very long before we have to go back to Washington! I wanna do stuff with yoooou..."

You set the manga on the bedside table, without moving from your prone position. You rest your chin on your hands. "You're tired?"

"Yeah. Long flight. Still jetlagged. I hate planes."

"Good. I'm tired too."

You throw the covers over the both of you. But Riley unthrows them. You grunt in anger.

"I don't wanna sleep," Riley says.

You try to bargain: "Short nap... then we'll go have some ice cream with Amber and Ophie..."

Surprisingly, the bargain works. Riley throws the covers back over you, and snugs up beside you. "Promise?" He says.

"Yeah."

You hug him. Riley adopts his favorite sleeping position, then: rotated 180 degrees from you, head resting on your butt. He pats it like fluffing a pillow -- you're his favorite one, after all. You're too nonconfrontational to stop him.

"Hey," he says. "Did your butt get bigger since last time?"

You rub your face in embarrassment.

Riley settles in. "Did Luffy find the One Piece yet?" He asks.

"Yeah. Last month's issue of Shonen Jump, actually."

"What? Really?"

"No. Of course not."

Riley giggles.

"Go to sleep or you won't get ice cream," you say.

"Cozy..." Riley mutters, wiggles around a bit, and quickly falls asleep.

---

When you head downstairs, groggy and mussy haired, with Riley following behind in an equally grogged and mussed state, you find Cerise still gabbing with the moms.

"I'm just saying that I've got more important things to do than write a soft-interest piece about a probable future US Senator," kmom says, pointing at Cerise with a hand holding a beer can. "Not to mention that it smacks of nepotism. You're basically my sister-in-law."

"Oh, and nepotism, you draw the line at nepotism," Cerise says.

"Kay writes about foreign affairs," nmom says.

"The US Senate is all about foreign affairs!" Cerise says. This draws no reaction. She sighs. "I just need a little boost. You know? In a PR kinda way. I need to get out of this jungle primary with 50% or more... I really don't want to face a runoff."

"Then don't let it go to a runoff," kmom helpfully suggests.

"Hey baby," nmom says, glancing over the back of the sofa as she hears you descending the stairs. "It's pretty late. Why don't you just go back to bed?"

"Ice cream! Ice cream!" Riley shouts.

"That's why," you explain, rubbing the sand from your eyes.

"Oh great," Cerise says. "Get my kid sugar high at midnight. Thanks, Wes."

If Cerise was mad about that, then her face goes through the other four stages of grief as Amber practically barrels through the door. "Midnight ice cream party! Woop woop!"

Riley zips across the den and living room, into the foyer, and hugs Amber around the waist. Amber nearly falls over. He hugs Ophie with similar enthusiasm as she brings up the rear.

"So that's why with the midnight ice cream booty call," Amber says, suddenly grumpy.

"I promised," you say.

"He may be cute, but be careful around gingers," Amber says. "They have no souls."

"You're a ginger!" You cry.

Amber looks at you severely, as if to say: "exactly."

"Point taken."

kmom is already coming back from the kitchen with a few bowls of raspberry fudge ripple.

"I did not consent to you feeding my child ice cream at this time of night," Cerise says, her eyes following kmom's transit as she swoops around the sofa and into the living room. But Cerise is powerless as the bowls get doled out to the four of you. You sit on the lush carpet eating while Cerise sulks over her beer. "No wonder you're raising a future NEET with shitty taste," she grouses. "No discipline."Amber sticks her tongue out at her.

Meanwhile, Riley and Ophie are keenly staring at a tablet. Riley is doing one of those logic puzzles with a matrix of boxes to check and clues like "Jimothy didn't eat horse meat but Fartricia gorged on the succulent meat of a critically endangered white rhino sometime in the afternoon. Raytheon wore the blue pants." Riley loves this boring crap, and of course so does Ophie. She helps him whenever he seems stuck. They eat their ice cream the slowest.

Still. A quiet night like this with family is nice. After everything that happened the past couple days, you never realized how good you have it.

At school the next day, as you shut your locker, you find Winter's face, blank with loathing, staring back at you. She's leaning with one arm against the lockers.

"Oh--!! ... h-hey Winter," you stammer.

"Is my sister in love with you?" She asks.

"I... uh." You look around, unsure what to say. "She hasn't said those words? Exactly? But? She likes me?"

"What does she see in you?"

"I'm... not... sure."

"Yeah, me neither," Winter says. "You're gross. You smell funny and you look like you've got a bird nest in your hair. You stutter whenever you talk, and you let everyone walk all over you. Do you realize how out of your league you are?"

"Every day," you admit.

"Don't take it too hard when she leaves you," Winter says. She pushes off the locker and stares down the bridge of her nose at you. "You're trash, basically. So enjoy the unearned attention while you've got it. She'll find someone better soon."

She walks off.

[ ] Follow her -- defend yourself.

>[x] You have better things to do. Hurry on to Talia's American Lit class.

"Snuggy Bear?" Summer says. She casts an appraising glance towards the front of the classroom, where Talia is lecturing. "...I don't see it."

"It's what she said," you whisper back.

"Snuggy twig, maybe," Summer says. She thinks for a moment. Then she groans. "Aww man. Does this mean she wants to fuck you, too?"

"Does that upset you?"

"Well -- not, like, completely. But you still owe me that video of you and Amelia doing it."

"It's on her phone. You'll have to ask her. But it might blow your mind..."

You're not sure how to deal with Amelia's special secret. Summer doesn't know, and you don't want to step on Amelia's toes by blabbing.

"Oh, sure," Summer gripes. "I'll just walk right up to my manager and be like, hey, let me get that video of you having sex with my girlfriend."

"I'm sure she won't mind..."

Summer purrs in frustration. "You're holding out on me. Jerkus."

You ignore her pouting, and peel your eyes forward.

"--director since. If you want to talk about quote unquote mad genius, Kojima cannot be topped. He was doing things in the 2000s and 2010s that elevated video games far beyond their then-current status as a child's diversion. He reckoned with socio-political issues in ways that no one else was doing at the time... perhaps in any medium... and entertainingly so..." behind Talia, on the board, is today's topic: "The Use of Symbolism in The Scarlet Letter."

After the bell rings, as you leave, Summer can't resist getting a dig in. "See ya, Snuggy Bear~" she giggles.

Talia doesn't even glance up from the papers she's reviewing. "You as well, Plumpy Plum."

Summer recoils. "What? Are you making fun of my weight? Are you calling me fat?!"

Talia looks up at her, as unmoved as ever. "Hm? No... I just thought if you were going to use Wes's pet name for me, I should use Wes's pet name for you."

"WHAT?!" Summer shouts. She looks at you, slackjawed.

"That's not-- I didn't--" you begin.

Summer slaps you upside the head. "You dick! You were calling me fat behind my back?"

"I didn't call you anything--"

"Ugh. You are the WORST." She stomps off before you can lodge a defense.

"Well I think it's a beautiful name," Talia tells you, as if the fucking thing was yours to begin with. "I don't see why it upsets her."

"Why would you do that? Now she's all mad at me-- god, she might even dump me..." (Maybe Winter's little torment earlier got inside your head. You keep thinking about that -- about Summer dumping you -- and it breaks your heart a little. Even just imagining it.)

"She won't dump you," Talia promises. "Punish you maybe." She picks up her nearby stainless steel drink bottle and pops the suckable part up. She sips.

You shake your head, and turn to go.

"Oh, Wes."

You stop, turn.

"Are you busy later?" When you sort of half shrug, she continues, "there's a new bookstore open downtown. Well. New is a relative word. It's been there the whole time. But it hasn't been open for business. I wanted to go and check it out -- but whenever I go book shopping..." She clears her throat. "There's a Japanese word for this issue of mine, tsundoku. Well. In any case, I always buy a stack about this tall--" she indicates how tall with one hand held parallel to the floor, at a height of about a foot above her own head. "--It's a lot of trouble to carry all that out of the store, and then into my car, and then out of my car again, and then up my stairs, and then into my apartment... I could use a hand."

"Bosphorus Rare Books?" You say.

Talia's face displays something like emotion -- in this case, the faintest afterimage of surprise. "Yes. I didn't know you read books. You certainly don't read the ones I assign."

"Uh."

"What do you think? Is it a date?"

[ ] It's a date.

>[x] It's a date. But we better take my girlfriend.

The Moms are playing NBA2KWhatever when you come home from school. It's one of the few games they enjoy playing together.

"Here it comes," kmom says. "Here comes the dunk!"

"Fuck you -- fuck you--"

"DUUUUUUUUUUNK TASTIC!" kmom shouts, triumphant, as she scores the basket.

"Great job. Enjoy being two points closer to my lead."

"Let's see that instant replay." kmom presses the button that calls for a slow-mo, close-up cinematic of the dunk. nmom's face puckers and she makes a disgruntled purring noise. kmom cackles. "Wait for it -- waaaaaait for it -- boom shacka lacka!" kmom slaps one palm with the other, so loud that it sounds like gunfire.

"You're losing. You understand that you're still losing, right?" nmom says.

"You may be the pussy-ass little bitch going for pussy-ass three pointers from the edge of the three-point line every time, but *I* have style. And I'm gonna keep styling on you all night long."

"That's fine. Still gonna kick your butt, baby."

That sparks a thought in you. Something you've been wondering about. "Hey, Mom?" You say as you walk up behind the living room couch.

"What?" kmom and nmom both say at the same time, pausing the game.

You cough. "This might sound weird, but... is it possible for a man to get pregnant? Like with another man?"

They stare at you.

"Oh my God," kmom says despairingly. "We completely failed you."

"We had the talk with her, didn't we?" nmom says. "And they teach this kind of stuff at school, right?"

"Jesus," kmom mutters.

The Moms don't seem keen on letting you go out:

"What part of 'you're grounded' did you misinterpret?" kmom says.

"It's a bookstore," you repeat. This is the best argument you have. "Don't you want me to... expand my mind? Broaden my horizons?"

"Oh, I bet you're broadening all right. And who's this teacher?"

"Ms. Berenstoin. American Lit. You met her at parent-teacher night a few weeks ago."

"She's not a robot?" nmom says. "I had money on robot."

"Do you find it at all strange that your teacher is asking you to go out on, basically, a date with her?" kmom says.

"It's kind of like doing penance, really," you say. "I haven't been doing the reading assignments. So she wants me to help her tote her books around for extra credit."

kmom is suspicious.

"Summer's gonna be there to protect me," you say.

"So this is a date," kmom says. She folds her arms. "You want a little alone time with Summer for some you-know-what."

"If you and Summer want to hang out, you're more than free to come right here," nmom says. "Summer is always welcome to come in this house."

"Well--" you say, thinking quick. This should sweeten the pot: "that'd be nice, actually. Summer said she wanted to have dinner here soon. Maybe when we're done shopping, I can bring her over."

"No," kmom says, at the same instant nmom says, "sure."

kmom gives nmom a withering stare.

"It's a bookstore," nmom says. "Don't you want her to broaden her horizons?"

You drop your bookbag and book it for the door. "Thanks, Mom. Love you. Bye."

"Be back soon!" nmom calls.

On your way out, you hear kmom muttering, "I swear to God, Noelle, if you fuck her--"

---

There's a parking space directly in front of the entrance at Bosphorus Rare Books that's technically open. Problem being that the cars in the two adjacent spaces have both parked over the line, leaving the space more than cramped -- even for a two-door compact like Talia's.

Talia's drive assist tells her that parallel parking here is impossible due to an obstruction and that she should find somewhere else. So she turns the drive assist off to enter into fully manual control.

"Seriously?" Summer says.

"Watch," you tell her smoothly.

Talia pulls up beside the car directly in front of the empty space. Then, turning her upper half almost 180 degrees to watch behind her, she cuts the wheel hard and slots the car's back tires cleanly into the space like it's nothing. She faces forward again, cuts the wheel the opposite way, and gets the car fully in the space. These two steps happen so swiftly, and the transition from one to the other so expertly, that you never feel the car stop until it's all over. You're just going in reverse and then you're going forward again and then all of a sudden you're safely in this parking space that not even the autopilot thought would accommodate you.

Out on the curb, Summer marvels at the tightness of the fit. She bends, hands on her knees, butt sticking way out, and peers at the front bumper of Talia's car. She whistles. And she's right to be impressed. You wouldn't be able to push a credit card between Talia's bumper and the rear fender of the adjoining car.

Still kneeling, Summer turns her head, and glances up at Talia. "How are you gonna get this thing back out, though?"

Talia shrugs. She didn't think that far ahead.

Bosphorus Rare Books is a store that looks a little larger on the inside than it does on the outside. That owes to a couple aspects: the crammed-together rows upon rows of bookcases on the first level; the dual staircases on either side of the checkout counter, leading to a second level composed of a wood-railed, pentagonal ring looking down on the center of the store; and the existence of a basement level, which can be spied at the bottom of a rickety staircase directly to the right of the entrance, and which is probably the same size as the first level. Every inch of floorspace is used to its fullest -- where bookshelves are at capacity, tomes lie stacked haphazardly here and there on the ground, so that to get around you need to watch your step. It feels vast and cozy at once.

When the three of you enter through the oak front door, it seems the store is likely empty. But just as the overhead bell chimes, you hear from underneath the checkout counter a rustling like papers being trampled underfoot. Then comes a muffled "hmm?"

You move closer. The floorboards creak with each step.

"Yes!" says the voice, "Hello! Welcome to--"

A woman stands -- or rather, attempts to. It's Olivia. She bonks her head on the way up, so hard that you feel the reverberation of it from several paces away.

"Oww!" she yelps, stumbling backward. She falls sitting on an upholstered swivel chair, rubbing the bump on the back of her skull, her eyes rheumy and squinting.

"Are you okay?" Summer asks.

Olivia notices the three of you again. She reacts as if it's the first time. "Yes! Hello!" she chirps, sitting straight. "Welcome to Bosphorus Rare Books. Bosphorus Rare Books: rare books are our business! If it's a book and it's rare, Bosphours Rare Books will find it for you! I'm Olivia Bosphorus! I deal in rare books!"

She delivers her monologue with sincere energy, but also the obvious air of someone reciting memorized lines.

"Could you clarify, please?" Talia says. "I'm still hazy on the details."

"I'm Olivia Bos--"

"Do you go through that spiel for every single customer?" you ask.

Olivia tilts her head. "Err-- why shouldn't I? Don't you enjoy that sort of courtesy?"

"It's just a little -- wordy. And redundant."

Olivia blinks. You can almost hear the cogs in her brain squeaking. "Redundant. No one's ever told me that before. I suppose it is a little redundant, yes. Have I been alienating my clientele? Do you feel alienated, young lady?"

You feel like she's probably hit her head on that desk a few too many times. Summer rolls her eyes at you. Then, as she draws alongside you, she makes a face, and stands wobbily on one foot to examine the sole of her tennis shoe. "What is this? Salt?" She wipes it off by rapidly rubbing her flattened palm back and forth. "Where'd that come from? Yeesh."

Talia described to you the general contours of her bibliomania. You didn't realize how bad it was until just now, though. She's barely past the threshold of the store herself before a certain book catches her attention. It's the very first book at eye level on the very first shelf to the left of the entrance. She examines it, leafs through it a little, and then says: "Summer. Hold this for me. I want to buy it."

If a human being's eyes could actually turn to dollar signs like in cartoons -- that's what Olivia's would be doing right now. She grins stupidly.

You approach the counter as Summer browses with Talia, hoping to lay down some ground rules: "Do you know who that girl is?" You ask.

"Which one?" Olivia asks back.

"Hey, Wes!" Summer calls. "Check it out. Kama Sutra!" She sticks out her tongue and holds an old illuminated tome aloft for you to see a particularly graphic image on one of the pages. "Heh heh heh," she chuckles. "Sick, huh?"

Talia grabs the book from her -- looks through it, closes it, then drops it on top of the pile of books Summer is carrying, already four thick.

"The quiet one is Ms. Gonna-Put-Your-Future-Kids-Through-College," you say. "But the loud tan one? She's my girlfriend. Summer Denali."

Olivia nods. "You were really worried about her the other night. Now I can see why. How do you put it... does her pussy hit different?"

You cough.

"I'm sorry. I'm making assumptions. She was looking at the Kama Sutra. Does she have a penis, too?"

You grope your face.

"You slept with my girlfriend yesterday!" Olivia says. "Congrats. How was it?"

"It was good," you admit. "Very good."

"She has a lot of stamina. I can barely keep her satisfied. Thanks so much for helping out!"

"Uh, anyway, I just wanted to--" you lower your voice. "Summer doesn't know about all that stuff with Gideon being here and everything. So... keep it under wraps, okay?"

"Of course. Do you think I'm tactless or something?"

You couldn't possibly answer that.

"I'm just excited to have customers," Olivia tells you. "There haven't been that many today."

"How many?" You ask.

"Ummmmmm." She puts a painted nail to her lips and stares at the high ceiling. "Zero."

"Do you advertise?" You ask her.

"I have sign in the window that says 'open', if that's what you mean."

"This store's been closed for like ten years. You should put the word out that you're back in operation if you want people to come here."

"Oh. Fair point... although." Olivia peers around you and addresses Talia: "How did you find this place, miss?"

Talia is perusing a book titled "Werewolf Hysterias of the Medieval Balkans" while Summer follows, knees wobbling and face not visible from behind a tower of books. Talia murmurs: "I saw the open sign."

Olivia raises her eyebrows at you. "See?"

"Not everybody is like Talia," you warn her. You glance back to see Talia getting on her tiptoes, adding the werewolf book to Summer's burden. "Then again, maybe Talia is enough to keep this place afloat."

"I was wondering," you say. "Did you take a look at that book Gideon wanted translated? The one he tried to steal from Amelia?"

"Oh, yes, I took a quite close look at it," Olivia says. She turns in her swivel chair and begins to rearrange some of her books, glancing at title pages. Old fashioned as she may be, it seems she keeps her collection catalogued digitally. She enters the titles into her computer.

You circle the checkout counter. "What do you think? What's up with that prophecy?"

"Very dark things," she says. "Horrible things. And if I'm correct, then... the prophecy foretells the end of the world itself."

You nod severely.

Olivia minimizes her database program, opens Youtube, and plays the opening licks of Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor at full volume. You startle.

"A-a-awoooo!" Olivia howls, holding her hands limply in front of her like the paws of a dog. Then she surges forward with all her might and slaps the checkout desk with both palms, imitating thunder: "Grrrrraa-chhhh! Ca-chhhhkkkk!" Then she laughs deeply like Dr. Frankenstein: "Mwahahaha!"

"We get invaded by spookies or what?" Summer asks, flipping her hair, and setting the enormous pile of books down in front of the counter. She massages the small of her back, grimacing. "Did Dracula show up?"

Olivia leans forward and motions for Summer to hand over a portion of the books. Summer does so, setting about 15 on the desktop. Plenty more where that came from. Olivia begins to check them out.

"Sorry," Olivia giggles, glancing Summer's way. "Your girlfriend here was just asking about prophecies."

Talia snaps her fingers. "Summer. Please." She's already got some more books for Summer to carry.

"Guess I'm the pack mule today," Summer says. She smiles falsely at you. "You could help out a little too, you know, instead of playing spookhouse with the space cadet here."

"I'm sure my mom's tacos will get your strength back up," you say.

Summer gives you a solemn salute, and returns to Talia's side. They head to the store's top level.

"Two things you have to know about prophecies," Olivia tells you. She holds up a thumb: "They're almost always apocalyptic." She holds up an index finger: "And they're almost always a bunch of bologna." She folds her arms. "I got out of trying to interpret prophecies a long time ago. Ever since a couple of broody-broodies like you and Gideon asked me to translate a certain ancient Sumerian prophecy and then just about killed each other over an argument about which one of them it applied to specifically." She flips her fingers back and forth like sweeping an invisible floor: "I had to... shoo them out." She smiles as if waiting for laughter. "...Anyway. It's a fool's errand. Prophecies are a mirror -- they reflect back whatever you wanted to see in the first place. Whatever interest Gideon and these Instrumenalists have in that Russian's diary is their own wishful thinking."

Olivia is startlingly cogent when she gets down to business.

"Well, what do you know about the Instrumentalists?" You ask her.

"My, you're just full of questions, aren't you?" Olivia folds her hands in front her on the countertop. "They've grown. There are a lot of them in Silicon Valley. Their website looks like it came out of the 1990s -- I don't suppose the name Geocities would ring any bells for a little kid like you, hmm?" You shake your head. "But they have funding. Enough for lawsuits against anyone who even suggests that they're a C-L-U-T."

"Clut?"

"Cult. You can spell, can't you?"

You sigh.

"They have a series of rituals, you see... hoops to jump through to prove your loyalty. You have to pass through four hundred and something trials of devotion to the cause, most of which involving tithing away increasingly large sums of money... at the peak level of ritual devotion, you get to be on their high council. All of this comes from insider accounts, so these details can be fragmentary, contradictory, and most importantly... biased... and the names of people in their inner circle are a closely-guarded secret. There's rumors, though."

"Like who?" You ask.

"Names get thrown around. Famous actors, politicians, tech guys in the valley. The most important takeaway: you have to be a billionaire, basically, to be on their high council. So... all of this to say... what Gideon mentioned about the terrorism angle? I'm sure they've moved on. They're more of an Illuminati-type organization now."

"Oh, that makes me feel so much better."

"It should. They're not too likely to waste their time on trying to murder a bunch of teenagers when they could be out buying the next Presidential election, or... um... bribing Wikipedia admins to say nice things about them, or... whatever it is they do with more money than God."

"So you think we're safe," you say.

Olivia, smiling, straightens her posture and puts her hands on her hips. "As safe as I am sitting here in this chair."

A huge book the size and heft of a dictionary falls from the second level and klonks off her head. She collapses to the countertop, covering herself with both hands, howling: "owwww! -- gosh darn it! What the--"

"Sorry," comes Talia's voice. She's peering down at you and Olivia from over the railing on the second level. "Could you check that one out for me, too?"

You ascend the stairs, intending to help Summer take Talia's load. But just as you get to the top level, the front door chime rings.

"Hello! Welcome to Bosphorus Rare Books. Bosphorus Rare Books: rare books are our business! If it's a book and it's rare, Bosphours Rare Books will find it for you! I'm Olivia Bosphorus! I deal in rare books!"

You slowly approach the banister as Olivia goes through her spiel. You can't believe it. The person standing in the doorway is Winter.

"Hey..." she says. She rubs her elbow, looking embarrassed. "Remember me? From the train?"

"Mm hmm!" Olivia hums. "I'm sorry I was so short with you. Your father is a cultist."

Winter winces. Summer, hearing her sister's voice, comes and stands alongside you. "What the hell is she--" she begins, aggravated, but you shush her.

Winter steps closer to the counter. "I was, uh. Wondering. Since you're getting your store running again. Are you hiring?"

Olivia gives her a sympathetic frown. "I don't have the budget for employees. At least not right now. I'm sorry, dear."

Winter nods. "I thought so. It's fine... I'm not sure I really want a job, anyway." She stands around awkwardly. "Well. See ya later, Liv."

She begins to leave, but you call out for her. "Olivia can hire you."

Winter freezes in shock and gasps as, looking up, she spies not only you but her sister and her English teacher. A moment later she tries to bolt -- but you find speed you didn't know you had, race downstairs, and catch her by the wrist before she can escape.

"You're a fine young woman, Wes," Olivia tells you, "and I really do appreciate you helping with Amelia's libido, but one thing I don't appreciate is you hiring people on my behalf."

"No," you say. "Think about it. You need someone to advertise your business, don't you?"

Winter rips her hand free of yours. "What difference is it to you, stinky pie?" She massages her wrist like it's sore. "Ugh. I'm gonna reek like your 'bating hand for weeks." She puts her wrist haltingly towards her nose, sniffs it, and pulls a disgusted face. "Eucch."

"Wes, what the hell are you doing?" Summer calls down to you.

You lock Olivia in your gaze. "Do you know what pulls in customers like nothing else? A sign spinner."

Winter stops sniffing her wrist. "Oh, no," she says. "No. No no no."

"I... kind of like that idea, actually!" Olivia says.

"I'm gone. Forget I came here." She tries again to leave, but now it's Olivia who interjects:

"Winter -- ya hired!" Olivia says.

END OF EPISODE 4.