by Lexi Archer
“What the fuck are you doing here banging on the door this early?”
I glanced at my phone that I’d been about to use to dial Reese, but it worked just as well to tell the time. It wasn’t that early. Nearly ten thirty. Most reasonable people would be up this early, but then again that was making the logical leap that Angela was a reasonable person.
“Good morning Angela,” I said. “Good to see you too.”
“What do you want?”
“To see my girlfriend? She is in there, isn’t she?”
Angela hesitated for a moment and my heart leapt into my throat. What was I going to do if she told me Reese wasn’t in there? Where would she be? Then Angela smiled. Once more I was struck with how odd a smile looked on her face. It was so used to seeing her scowling. Was she smiling because she was about to drop the bomb on me that Reese wasn’t in the room? She seemed to get a perverse pleasure out of tweaking me when it came to this subject.
“Reese, you have another visitor,” Angela said.
Interesting. Very interesting. She wasn’t telling me that my girlfriend was somewhere else, but that “another visitor” bit was telling. She smirked as she said it and my face must’ve told her everything she needed to know. Yeah, I’d caught what she’d just said, though from the way Reese was tossing and turning under the covers in her own bed I didn’t think she’d quite get the importance of her roommate’s phrasing through the sleep-induced haze she was fighting her way out of.
I moved in and sat on the edge of Reese’s bed as Angela moved over and took her customary perch in front of her computer. She seemed to be paying attention to some game she pulled up, but I could tell from her body language and the way she kept glancing in our direction that she was more interested in what was happening over on my end of the room than she was in whatever game she was playing. It sounded like something straight from Japan based on the language blasting through her computer speakers.
“Good morning babe,” I said.
Reese finally opened her eyes and blinked in the sunlight that came streaming in suddenly as Angela pulled open the blinds by their window. Reese held a hand up and looked around in confusion a couple of times.
“Wha… who… Aid… I mean, John? What are you doing here?”
My cock twitched as my heart leapt into my throat again. Yeah, she was definitely still in a sleep-induced fog, and I was pretty sure I recognized the name she’d almost said just then. Aiden. The first thing she thought when she looked up was that I was Aiden, and not for the first time I really wished that I’d just stayed in the damn alley where I could get a good look at everything that happened after that moment when I snapped a picture and was nearly discovered.
Damn it.
I really should’ve stayed in that alley. Or at the very least I should’ve found a way to loop back around and see what was going on after they caught me the first time. It’s not like they’d think someone was still watching after the brave Aiden managed to chase the dastardly peeper away the first time around.
I wasn’t going to get anywhere by questioning her here though. No, I was playing the long con. My phone was burning in my pocket and it was so tempting to pull it out right now and show her everything, but I wasn’t about to do something like that with Angela sitting on the other side of the room no doubt waiting for things to blow up. I’d seen the look on her face. I noticed the way she kept dropping hints.
She was waiting for a big blow up, and the last thing I was going to give her was any sort of satisfaction on that score.
“I figured I’d stop by and bring you some breakfast since I didn’t get to see you last night,” I said, holding up the box of donuts. Normally Reese was a stickler for maintaining a strict diet, but I also knew she had a weakness for the occasional donut. “I figured you’d be up by now for sure. Were you working pretty late last night?”
Reese blinked the sleep out of her eyes and there was another moment of confusion. “I, uh, right. I was working late last night. They kept me out until like after midnight or something like that. I just collapsed in bed when I was done.”
Her eyes darted across the room to where Angela was seemingly minding her own business playing her computer games, but I knew she was listening to every word. The motion was so quick that I would’ve missed it if I hadn’t been watching her face for any sign that she was telling a lie. Not because I needed to catch her in a lie. No, I was more interested in learning if she had any obvious tells when she was obviously telling a whopper so I could tuck that away for future reference.
It seemed Reese was worried about her roommate as well. Worried that Angela was going to blab. In a way I suppose that was a pretty reasonable fear to have considering Angela had already given something away to me twice, though she was damn oblique about it. Of course Reese had no way of knowing that, and I wasn’t going to say anything if Angela wasn’t.
No, I was playing this one close to the chest.
“Well that’s okay. We can spend some time together today, right? I was thinking we could head over to my place and maybe watch a movie or something? Do the old Netflix and chill?”
Angela made a disgusted noise over on her side of the room but she could go fuck herself. She probably hadn’t ever known the touch of a human who was interested in her sexually and was doing her best to ruin it for everyone else in the room. God knows she’d ruined it plenty of times with Reese and me just by existing and refusing to ever leave the room for more than five minutes.
“Yeah, I suppose we could do that,” Reese said with a smile. She got up and grabbed a donut on her way over to the bathroom. I narrowed my eyes at that. When she was over at my place for the weekend she usually lounged around for awhile before taking a shower the morning after. That she was going straight for the shower this morning was raising my suspicions along with other parts of my body.
The door slammed shut and for the second time in as many weeks I found myself in the unfortunate position of being alone in the room with Angela. She darted a look over at me and then went back to pretending she was playing her game. It suddenly occurred to me that I might be able to make something of this time alone, though, rather than sitting in awkward silence staring at my phone while she stared at her computer monitor and we both pretended the other person didn’t exist.
6: A Truce
“So what time did she get home last night?” I asked once the shower started and I was pretty sure there wasn’t a chance Reese was doing anything crazy like waiting on the other side of the bathroom door listening in on our conversation. Not that she really had a reason to suspect something in the first place.
Angela blinked. “Are you talking to me?”
“You’re the only person in this room, aren’t you?”
“Why do you give a fuck what time she was home? And why is it my job to keep track of your girlfriend, for that matter?”
I leaned back on the bed and stretched out. “Oh I don’t know. Something tells me from the way you’ve been dropping little hints whenever I show up here that you want me to know something. So why don’t you come out and say it instead of foisting your bullshit on me?”
That got her attention. She minimized whatever game window she was pretending to look at and wheeled her chair around so she was facing me, a scowl plain on her face.
“You don’t talk to me like that,” she said.
“Why? I’m just treating you the way you treat everyone around you. Don’t like a taste of your own medicine or something?”
Was I being a dick? Yeah, definitely, but I was being a dick with a deliberate purpose. It didn’t seem that she was in much of a mood to actually come out and reveal anything. No, she was more about dropping hints that were laser guided to make me suspect something, though I probably should’ve thanked her since the suspicion was a big part of the reason why I went out the night before and ended up catching Reese doing something I never would’ve imagined. I figured if she wasn’t going to come out and tell me anythi
ng, though, then I was going to try and get a rise out of her. Piss her off to the point that she let something slip.
It wasn’t the best plan in the world, certainly no better than going out last night on the off chance that I might see something happening, but it was the best I had on short notice.
“I don’t treat people like that! And I’m not telling you anything,” she said.
I stood and made my way across the room. Angela blinked in surprise and leaned back in her chair. I almost wanted to laugh. Did she really think I was going to threaten her or something like that? Or maybe it was just that she was so unused to people moving into her personal space that me moving closer to her was causing some consternation. She was certainly breathing heavily, and I suddenly found myself noticing that her T-shirt was pretty damn thin and I could see what looked like nipples pressing out from the gentle curve of her tits and what the hell was I thinking?
I looked up to her face and schooled own face to a passive expression. What the hell? Was I so turned on, so fucked up from what I’d seen Reese doing last night that I was looking at Angela of all things? Sure she looked a little different, and then it hit me. The other thing I’d noticed when she opened the door but I’d been too distracted thinking about Reese to really notice it.
Angela usually wore loose-fitting shirts when she was around the dorm, but today she was wearing a tight T-shirt, sporting the logo of my favorite FPS I might add, that showed off some of her assets. Assets that I’d never stopped to appreciate because, again, baggy shirts coupled with the sort of prickly personality that made me think she hated me had always kept me from doing a serious inspection when I was in their room.
I was inspecting now, though, and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by what I was seeing. Pleasantly surprised to the point that I was also mildly horrified that I was thinking thoughts about Angela of all people. I forced myself to put a stop to those thoughts. I was pumping her for information. Nothing more. Just because she changed the way she dressed didn’t mean I suddenly had the hots for her. I was just suffering from some residual arousal from all the fucked up stuff I’d seen recently.
I sighed. “I know she was out with Aiden last night.”
“You do?” she said, and then her eyes went wide and she went tight-lipped. The look of surprise quickly turned to a look of annoyance as the familiar scowl I knew and loved returned to her face. I’d gotten her to give something up, and she wasn’t happy about it.
I figured there was nothing for it but to give up the game. To Angela, at least. I’m not sure why I decided to show my hand to her. Maybe it was because I needed someone to talk to about all this bullshit and she was the only person other than me and Reese, and Aiden I suppose, who was in the know. Maybe it was just that I didn’t think she would tell Reese anything anyways. It’s not like they were the best of friends having pillow fights and staying up late talking about their boyfriends or anything like that.
Well, talking about Reese’s boyfriend. Angela didn’t date, as far as I knew, which was a pity considering what she was hiding…
Damn it. There I went again. I really needed to stop projecting my sexual frustration regarding my girlfriend onto her poor roommate just because she happened to look good in a tight fitting T-shirt from my favorite game!
I pulled my phone out and swiped it. Pulled up the gallery of the pictures I’d taken the night before. I turned it around so Angela could get a good look. The scowl left her face to be replaced by surprise once more, though I figured it was only a matter of time before the scowl came back. Anger seemed to be the only emotion Angela was capable of expressing towards me.
Her reaction was the last thing I expected, though. She started shaking her head and giggling. A smile came to her face. A smile! And I’m not talking the kind of smile I’d seen when she was telling me that my girl had been stepping out on me. No, this seemed like a genuinely amused smile.
Or maybe it was just that the schadenfreude in that smile was being directed at my girlfriend and not directly at me. Maybe it didn’t seem quite as nasty when the nastiness was only hitting me in a bank shot.
“You actually did it,” she said.
I blinked. “Did what?”
For another surprise Angela reached up and patted me on the cheek. “I wasn’t sure if you’d catch the hint last weekend. You’re pretty but damn can you be dumb.”
I blinked again. Pretty but dumb? Who the hell was this pod person and what had she done with the Angela who hated me so much?
“So you expected me to go out and spy on her?”
“I expected you to do something,” she said. “Now what are you going to do about it?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. How late was she out last night?”
“She got back here around midnight.”
I did some quick math in my head. Around midnight. Figure about a twenty minute walk from the pizza place back to the dorms and that meant there was a good half hour last night that was completely unaccounted for from the moment I did my dash down the alley to the time they would have to leave for the dorms if he was walking her.
Then again he was a delivery driver. It’s entirely possible he could’ve just drove over to her dorm when they were done doing whatever it was they were doing. There were just too many unanswered questions. Too many things I needed to find out, and it was getting to the point where I was just going to have to come out and ask Reese what the hell was going on.
I’d spied on her. I’d asked Angela what she knew. I’d exhausted every resource. It was down to communication.
As if on cue the bathroom door opened and Reese breezed back into the room where she stopped and looked between the two of us in surprise. I quickly locked my phone screen and put it back in my pocket. I didn’t want her seeing the picture just yet. Even if Angela and I did seem to have a sort of fucked up truce going on I didn’t want to risk an argument over the whole Aiden thing in front of her.
“Did hell freeze over or something?” Reese asked.
“I was just showing Angela a funny video from Sakura no Bouken,” I said.
“What the hell was that? Chinese or something?”
“What the hell? You know what that game is?”
I turned and grinned at Angela. Oh yeah, she wasn’t the only one who had a bit of gamer knowledge in the room even if I did like to think of myself as something of a gamer day walker, able to pass for normal and walk amongst people without giving myself away.
“Yes, I know what you’re up to on that computer you perv,” I said.
I figured that might bring back the scowl, but if anything she looked thoughtful and then grinned. That grin quickly turned to a giggle which was definitely out of character. When I turned back to Reese she was staring at the two of us as though we’d both grown separate heads.
“Whatever. I guess I don’t know anything about the way the world works,” she said. “I’m going to be ready in a minute.”
Reese turned and headed back into the bathroom, but she left the door open this time. Steam billowed into the room from the shower and I could hear the sound of her hair dryer starting up. I figured that meant it was safe to talk for just a little bit. I turned back to Angela and saw that she’d turned bright red.
“You could’ve warned me that you knew what I was playing,” she said.
“Are you kidding? I figured you needed the outlet all things considered. Still, playing the most notorious X-rated game of the moment from Japan right out where anyone can see you? Did you think no one would notice?”
“You’re the only one other than Reese who’s ever in here to notice,” she grumbled, crossing her arms under her chest which served to draw my attention there. I forced myself to move that attention up to her eyes though. “Like you said, it’s not like I have another outlet.”
Weird. I was actually finding myself feeling sorry for Angela. Just a little. If she’d just dress in some more regular clothes and maybe go out from time to time
she might actually have a good chance of having some fun. Of having a real social life. Not that it was my problem to figure out.
No, I had plenty of problems of my own. Like how the hell I was going to figure out what Reese had done that night before. Like whether or not I was going to break up with her when I discovered the truth or have some of the most mind blowing sex of my life because I was still feeling so fucking turned on thinking of her with another man.
“So are you going to ask her about last night?” Angela asked.
“You bet you ass I am,” I said, never stopping to think how odd it was that we’d gone from scowling at each other and seemingly being each other’s worst enemy to talking about a problem that I couldn’t discuss with anyone else.
Not that I was going to discuss everything with her. I had no plans to talk with her about how this was turning me on. That was still too shameful. Almost as shameful as Angela’s choice in dirty video games to pass the time. Not that I could judge her too much on that score since I’d at least heard of the game even if I’d never played it. I knew it solely on reputation.
Reese stepped back out of the bathroom and she was looking amazing. She’d put on a bright green tank top and a pair of yoga pants below that showed off everything. She always filled out whatever she was wearing quite nicely, but she’d really overdone herself in this case. I found myself wanting to throw her down on her bed and take her right there, and I suddenly didn’t care if Angela was there watching. Hadn’t she said I was pretty but dumb? Hell, she might even enjoy the show considering her main outlet for that sort of thing right now appeared to be a video game.
“You ready?” Reese asked with a smile, though she was still looking between me and Angela as though she was unsure what this sudden development meant. Hell, I wasn’t sure what it meant and I was the one standing here talking to my former nemesis.
It was such a simple question. Was I ready? I knew she was asking if I was ready to go, but the question seemed to mean so much more. Was I ready to tell her everything I knew? Was I ready to risk our relationship by revealing I knew what she’d been doing with Aiden? Was I ready to risk our relationship by revealing that I was so fucking turned on by what she’d been doing with Aiden?
