Cherry Blossom Girls Box Set
Page 46
“It won’t take long,” she said. “I just want to get something small. Besides, I need to recharge.”
When my grandchildren ask me how I got the tattoo on my shoulder, I’ll be able to tell them about the night I almost got myself blown up at a scientist’s apartment in New Haven and how that same night I ended up getting a tattoo in Nashville to celebrate being alive.
Or something like that.
Dorian wasn’t wrong; it didn’t take long to get the tattoos, especially because hers was basically a ‘fill in the blank’ situation on her left arm that she’d already decided on. She went with the obligatory cherry blossoms, and while she got hers, I perused through tattoo books and found a pretty cool typewriter.
There were a lot of ironies about the tattoo I chose, and I probably shouldn’t have gotten one that night because I still had alcohol in my system, but possibly the biggest irony was that I’d never even used a typewriter. If you put me in a room with a typewriter, I wouldn’t even know what to do with the damn thing.
The only writers I knew that used typewriters were a couple of wackjobs in Portland who wrote poetry and tried to look cool when they took public transportation.
Actually, I didn’t know if those guys really existed; for all I knew, it was just something people made fun of that never actually happened.
But I was up next for the tat, and rather than think about almost getting killed by an explosion, I pulled off my shirt and took a seat in front of the grizzled tattoo guy.
The tattoo gun started up, and I squeezed my eyes shut.
Okay, so it wasn’t as painful as I thought, but it did make me feel a strange intoxication that revolved around a weird desire for the pain to continue, yet stop at the same time.
The tattoo artist mumbled that the top of my arm was a pretty easy place to get a tattoo and how some of the softer skin – like on the back of my arm or my stomach – would hurt a lot more. Apparently bones hurt too, so if I wanted to get one across my collarbone, I’d better get something to bite down on while he did it.
He couldn’t remind me enough to stop squirming, telling me that my typewriter would look more like a lunchbox if I didn’t stop. “Only losers and hipsters have lunchbox tattoos,” he said in a gruff voice as he focused in on his design.
But, as I plan to tell my grandchildren, and as I’m telling you now, I did get that damn tattoo, and it looked pretty good at the end, even though it was bound up in Saran Wrap.
Cherry blossoms coming out of a typewriter? Hell yeah.
Chapter Five: What Happens in Santa Fe, Stays in Santa Fe
I went hands to knees right away, still not able to fully process teleporting long distances. The vortex, seeing Dorian rocketing next to me, feeling like my body was about to tear apart …
It wasn’t for everyone.
Not as much sickness this time, but I did feel a wave of relief as I touched down in the living room, back on solid ground.
Veronique turned the television off and come over to us.
“We got tattoos in Nashville,” I said like an idiot. Still, it was better than going with ‘Hey, we almost just died in an explosion.’
I carefully rolled up my sleeve to show her the tattoo, and her first response, almost predictably, was to place her hand on it and drain some of my power. Not a lot, but just enough to turn her hand red and make me feel nauseous.
“Hey!” I said, stumbling away.
Veronique pointed at Dorian. “Do not leave alone with him again.”
“We can go wherever we want,” Dorian said. “And besides, we’re back, aren’t we? Everything is okay. Did you miss us or something?”
“It’s stupid to do that,” Veronique said.
“You’re right,” I told her, “but we had to be certain about something.”
I explained that we’d gone to New Haven to check on Dr. Kim and that an explosion nearly killed us. I tried to keep this explanation as short and sweet as possible, but I could tell by her expression that she was not happy about it.
“This is what I mean when I say you shouldn’t travel alone. You two could have died. Don’t do it again,” Veronique said with a finality that demanded no challenge. “I’m serious, let’s stick together. Because if something happened to you two, I don’t know what Grace and I would do.”
That last part surprised me a little. I’d never heard her sound so vulnerable before, and I could even see it in her face, her sharp features softening, a spark of fear in her dark eyes.
So I tried to lighten the mood.
“Well, we’re not too far from Mexico, so if something happened to us, you guys could have gone there. Grace could take over a drug cartel, and you two could live like queens in a villa on a mesa for the rest of your lives, having your drug cartel going around doing things. You know what I’m talking about. Have your own personal army is what I’m trying to say.”
She didn’t know what I was talking about, but she did get that I was trying to cheer her up.
“You’re right, we could probably survive on our own, but we’d rather you be around.”
“Me or Dorian?” I asked, not sure who she was referring to.
“Who do you think?”
“Both? I’m kidding – we’re safe, that’s all that matters, Veronique.”
As she had done before, Dorian dropped her hand into mine and turned for the bedrooms. Veronique looked from Dorian to me then back to Dorian, and a small grin crept across her face. “But you had him all night,” she said almost playfully.
Veronique wasn’t normally very playful, so it came off sounding more stilted than sexy.
But I got the point; she didn’t care what happened between Dorian and me.
Thank god for superpowered women who haven’t been brought up in a society with Judeo-Christian norms!
Rather than lead me to my bedroom, Dorian teleported us there.
“Get naked,” she said.
I almost saluted her but figured I’d just do what she said instead. I stripped down to my underwear about as fast as a human could.
“What are you doing?” she asked with a flirty smile.
“Wait, did I mishear you?” I noticed she wasn’t undressing.
I couldn’t see my own face at that moment, but I’m pretty sure it was the color of Veronique’s hands when she drained someone’s energy.
Awkward.
I even crossed my hands over my chest, not real stoked about unveiling my nipples nor the bruise I had over my heart from getting shot by a bullet in Austin.
Damn, my life is crazy, and thank Jeebus for bulletproof vests.
“I was just getting ready for bed,” I told her bashfully.
“I’m just messing with you.” Dorian grinned and took off her boots.
Her tank top came off next, and she was now in her bra, shorts, and fishnet stockings. Then her breasts came out, bouncing just once as she tossed her bra to the side.
I wasn’t going to have a debate with my little writer as to why men were so attracted to breasts. It was clear; we all had mother issues, and we all wanted to get back up inside the womb and stay warm and away from this godawful world.
She took a step closer to me, unbuttoning the front of her jean shorts. She bent forward, wiggling out of them so that she was now just in her panties and fishnets. Then she straightened and came into my arms.
My hands fell to her lower back and from there onto her ass, which was poorly shielded by one of the thongs we’d bought in Austin. Poorly shielded, I should say, because thongs are ridiculous.
As I kneaded her ass, she stood on her tippy toes and kissed me once, her eyes softening. “We’re going to have to get creative about this,” she purred.
“I am down as fuck.”
Little did I know what that meant.
Here I was, thinking we were going to be doing some cosplay or that she was into some super kinky BDSM stuff, or maybe some foot worship or wax play.
Boy, was I in for a surprise.
“I don’t know how I should take that,” I said as she moved her hand up and down.
“Like I said, we’re going to have to get creative,” she whispered.
“Give it your best shot.”
Dorian turned back around and kissed me a few more times.
With my hands resting on her waist, I moved my lips to her collarbone and down toward her breasts. I sucked her nipples, my neck bent forward like I was trying to look at something on the ground, and once the posture started hurting, I moved back up and continued kissing her.
We ended up on the bed, Dorian on top, rubbing her wet panties against the front of my boxers. I was seconds away from getting down there and doing what I was put on this earth to do when she stopped grinding and said, “I can’t.”
“Okay,” I said as she continued gyrating her hips.
“Let’s just do this …” She got off me and lay on her side. She stuck her hand in the front of her panties and went to town, stretching her neck back to kiss me.
Is she on her period? This thought was quickly replaced with, No, you are an idiot, Gideon!
Then what is it? I asked the condescending voice.
You’d know if it were that, the voice replied.
“You look confused,” she said, still moving her hand up and down.
“Sorry, having an argument with myself. Please, continue!”
She moaned, grabbed my hand, and placed it on my crotch, which I took to mean that I should probably pleasure myself too.
It’s always weird jerking off in front of someone. It only goes to remind me how closely related we are to monkeys. It’s just so primal, so physical, tug and tug until the top pops off!
But it didn’t feel as weird with Dorian touching herself right next to me, and eventually, she let me stick my hand in her panties as well. Of course, I had stopped jerking and tugging by that point, my load long since blown.
Normally, I would have wanted to get that sticky shit off me asap, but I had a moaning superpowered woman next to me, and ignoring my own mess seemed like the right thing to do.
With my hand in her panties, I lightly touched whatever the hell the top part of the vagina is called. Aside from labia, I’m pretty much out of the loop when it comes to female body parts.
But I gave it my best shot, and just having someone else’s hand there seemed to get her moaning even louder.
The surprise and heightened sensuality from my intrusive act quickly subsided. Dorian placed her hand on mine and guided me into the right position, instructing me to move my finger in a circular pattern.
“Like this, and don’t put them inside,” was the only thing she said before she started enjoying it again.
She kept going, and I kept going alongside her, and eventually she arched her back, gasped, then gasped again, and after about thirty more seconds, she let out an additional, pleasure-laced sigh.
“I’m done,” she announced. “Did you finish?” She sat up a little, so she could see that I indeed had finished.
“Yeah. I’m going to go clean up.”
“And you’ll come back after?”
“Definitely. Hang tight.”
Chapter Six: Wichita, I Hardly Knew Thee
I woke the next morning before Dorian.
She was breathing lightly, sleeping on her side, and with the bit of sun peeking through the window, I could see her new tattoo, which was still wrapped in plastic. She had cleaned it, of course, just like I had mine, but she’d bound it up again overnight, saying that was the best way to keep it.
And she would know. The woman was pretty tatted up.
As I took her in, I instantly felt sorry for the guy who’d tried to have sex with her; the one who ended up blowing his dick and legs off.
Fuck that, but I guess there are worse ways to go.
She’d told me the whole gruesome story as we lay in bed together and how she wasn’t able to control the charging aspect of her power once he was inside her. This had been the reason she’d never gone that far with anyone since and why she didn’t want me going there as well.
And I was totally cool with that because no one in their right mind wanted to have their dick blown off, let alone their legs.
I shuddered again at her description.
“I was on top,” she’d told me, her head resting on my chest. “Then he went inside and …” She swallowed hard. “All blood, the bed was charred too. And he was screaming. All that was left were his feet.”
Like I said, gruesome.
Rather than lie next to her and think about fucked-up explosions, I silently got out of bed and went to the study to check my sales.
Talk about through the roof. It was weird seeing so many books sold. I almost felt like it was a scam, like I was scamming myself, but nope, each sale increased the height of the bar graph in real time.
This was tangible proof that my books mattered and that people were picking them up.
Gotta love that.
Page reads were up too; I’d had over a hundred thousand page reads the previous night. It was sad, in a way, because the page reads were going to pay me some hella cash, money I wouldn’t be able to collect unless I wanted to use my cards.
And I didn’t even have my cards anymore. Forgot to mention that, but all my stuff was confiscated in Austin at the military prison. So I was cash only.
I opened the drop-down menu to check sales on How Heavy This Axe?
Damn! I’d sold six copies, which was three more than I’d sold the previous day. Were readers finally ready for a transgender dwarf story? Maybe they actually are, a voice at the back of my mind said.
I used to listen to that voice, but now that I’d had success, I’d listened to that voice a little less.
After a few more yawns, I decided it was time for coffee and made my way down to the kitchen, only to find that Veronique had already brewed a pot. She sat at the bar, sipping from her mug as she flipped through a golfing magazine.
“Fun night?” she asked without looking up at me.
“Yeah, it was interesting at least.”
“Poor Dorian.” Veronique snapped the magazine shut. “She can’t ever have a man because she thinks she’ll blow off his penis.”
“She told you?”
“We share everything, including you.”
“Um, yeah,” I said awkwardly as I poured my cup.
“Hey.” Grace entered the kitchen wearing a pink robe. She kissed me on the cheek and asked for a cup of coffee as well. “I hear you got a tattoo,” she said, drumming her fingers on my shoulder.
“You hear, huh?”
“And that you had a pretty interesting night.” Her face began morphing into Dorian. She had the punk rocker down in a heartbeat, from her bangs to her dark eyes and dimples.
Veronique laughed as Grace joined her at the bar. In an instant, Grace was back in her base form, wrapped in the pink robe.
“What can I say? I had a crazy night.” I poured a cup for Grace and added a bit of nonfat creamer. Rather than dive further into the conversation, I changed the topic to what happened in New Haven.
Veronique already knew about it, and technically, Grace already knew about it too, but I figured I should recap. The recap ended with me rolling up my sleeve and showing them the tattoo.
“Will it always be so pink?” Grace asked.
“For the next few days at least.”
As we sipped our coffee, our conversation shifted back to the contents of the zip file Dr. Kim sent me.
“Where should we go to check out the contents?” I asked. “I don’t want to do it here.”
“How about somewhere in the Midwest?” Dorian came into the kitchen wearing a tank top and boy shorts. She opened the fridge, got some milk, and drank straight from th
e jug. “Sorry,” she said, wiping her mouth as she realized everyone was looking at her.
“It’s not a bad idea,” I told them. “But it is kind of in the middle of nowhere. Just pick a city?”
Dorian shrugged.
I pulled out my smartphone and located the great state of Kansas. “Wichita will work. They’re an hour ahead of us, so that means it’s nine fifteen in the morning there, and I’m pretty sure Okay Buy opens at nine.”
I did a quick GoogleFace search to confirm this and found some pictures of one of the Okay Buys in Wichita. “How’s this?” I asked Dorian, showing her the phone.
It would have been an even better trip if we hadn’t had to go through Dorian’s whirling vortex again, which also made Grace a little sick to her stomach.
But what can you do?
Once we arrived in Wichita, Kansas, we took a few minutes to shake off the teleportation effects and get to work. It was a nice day out, just starting to get warm. Birds too. Lots of chirping birds in the electronic store’s parking lot.
Grace and I had gotten ripping off the Okay Buys down to a science. It took us under ten minutes, while Veronique and Dorian scouted the parking lot looking for a good car.
So this was how we ended up at 9:30 a.m. in Wichita, Kansas, driving a black cherry Cadillac with a brand new laptop and a lipstick-sized three-terabyte portable hard drive in the back.
I’d never driven a Cadillac before, and now that I had, it would be something I looked for the next time we borrowed a vehicle.
Predictably, Dorian and Veronique were in the back, Grace next to me. I had taught her a little about using a smartphone, so I asked her to find us a nice breakfast restaurant.
She took out my phone, did a GoogleFace search, and found a place called Beacon Restaurant.
“Do they have pancakes?” Dorian asked.
“They sure do, and coffee,” Grace said as she skimmed through the reviews.
“Works for me,” I said.
“Me too,” said Veronique.
Grace turned up the volume on the phone so it could route me to the diner.