Page 3 of Apricity
“No, my dick will never say no to Aly’s ass. Just got the wind knocked out of me when fucking Jax fell on me too. Asshole,” Cole groans, side-eyeing me before continuing. “And another thing. No fucking fair with the distraction, no matter how hot and accurate it was. We were winning!” He finishes his rant with a smile so I know he’s not butt-hurt about me pulling that shit.
She loved it.
He loved it.
Absolutely no fucking regrets.
I laugh, pushing Cole in the shoulder. “Can’t win ‘em all, bro.” Raising my hands, I make ashooingmotion, silently asking them to move off of the Twister mat before I fold and return it to the box along with the spinner.
The game is one of the things that I’m happy I decided to have down here at the cabin. Most everything I had was up at the estate but a few things made their way to this neck of the woods over the years since I got the place.
There are a few more games hidden under the bed. Nothing much, just the usual getaway finds. A bicycle deck of playing cards, Skip-Bo, Monopoly, Clue. Although, I’m not sure I ever really put any thought into why Ididbring anything down here besides the bicycle deck. It’s a one-room hunting cabin with one bed and a tiny love seat. Who the fuck am I playing Monopoly with?
Regardless of my reasoning, I’m happy I had them here. Especially now with the power officially gone for the foreseeable future. It’s not that bad, I guess. Not like we used the power much before the storm… besides for lights… the fridge... the water and heat pumps.
Really gonna miss that water pump, though…
Without even thinking about it, I start to pace back and forth between the bed and the fireplace where everyone else is cuddled together. My hands clench at my sides in apoor attempt to release my anxiety. It’s not yet time for dinner so I can’t cook anything. The bed is already made. The dishes are done from this morning. It’s fucking pissing rain outside so I can’t get out of here. My chest compresses at the irritable feeling pressing in.
Fucking goddammit.
I force myself to take in a deep breath to calm my overactive nerves. The last thing we need is for me to get too worked up in my manic reaction to something that no one else seems to be phased by or worried about. I’ve pulled myself out of episodes in the past but right now… it’s not that simple.
Losing the solar panels and now the generator is a tough cookie to chew. I spent years prepping not only the estate but this cabin just in case. At the time, it didn’t matter what the future held for me. It was just a plan to help keep my mind at peace. Call it obsessive compulsive disorder or post-traumatic stress disorder. Fuck, call it whatever you will. But if I couldn’t control the future, I was at least going to prepare for the worst scenarios possible.
It was the same with Aly at first, mentally distancing myself so I wouldn’t have to take control in any untimely decisions that might’ve befallen her. I mean… I fucking failed at it since I ended up falling in love with her. Just means I need to take control even more so, now, to keep her and them safe.
It's strange. When Aly came into the picture and steamrolled into our lives, my nightmares came back. I thought history was repeating itself. That the same thing that happened to Emma, my ex, would ultimately become Aly’sfuture. The thought plagued my nights and immediately spilled over into my dreams. I needed to protect her.Needto protect her even more now.
After we started sleeping together, the nightmares went away. And now that both Hawk and Cole have taken residence alongside us in a giant dogpile every night, the nightmares don’t even stand a chance.
But now, after losing the security I spent so long trying to provide, I don’t know what to do. I feel… itchy. I can’t explain it. It’s like I need to get out there and fix something. Set up a perimeter fence. Stand post with Sadie at my side.Something. Even during a fucking hurricane just to keep my mind from tearing itself apart.
The game was a nice distraction. Cole with his never-ending psychological wisdom cracked the nail on the head with that one. It got me out of my deteriorating mind space, even for a little bit. Cole’s good at that - recognizing when a person needs to get out of their zone. Hawk, too, when he sees we need to be redirected. But now that the game is over, stupidly at my own doing, I’m back to thinking about… everything.
We no longer have any power. No electricity. No heat for the water. And, oh, no running water, now. With the electricity gone, the pump that brings the water to the house is useless. Thankfully, we still have the well outside which has ground access with a handpump. We’ll just have to get our water from it by hand each day. No big deal. We can work with that.
I guess we can work with no electricity, also. The candles seem to add to the overall horniness in the room so, I’m not objecting to that at all. Plus, the kitchen has a gasstove and we have matches so we can still cook and heat the water on the stove for bathing.
Gonna be interesting since there’s no bathtub here…
As if right on cue, Sadie plops her head into my hand as I return to the group in front of the fire. She can usually tell when I’m feeling anxious and knows just what to do to pull my head out of it.
She’s not a small dog by any means, being a German Shepard, so as she pushes her weight into my side to get me to stop pacing and sit down, I have no choice but to do by her will. Once my ass hits the floor, she covers my lap with her large furry body, grounding me in that simple touch. With the love of my life and my two best friends sitting next to me, smiling in my direction, my mind slowly retreats from battle mode and my breathing returns to normal.
There’s no judgement of what I know they saw. Let’s face it, the cabin isn’t large by any means. And here I was, pretty much stomping on top of them in my little meltdown. They may smile in my direction or take my hand, tousle my hair, nudge my shoulder, tell a fucked-up joke to get me out of it, but they never judge. Ever. It makes me love them all the more for it.
Cole takes the reigns this time when he sees me shake the stress from my shoulders. “So… I was thinking. Unless we want to play more board games or whatever, this might be as good a time as any to have a family meeting.”
Hawk and Aly perk up, just as I do. Family meeting? We talk about everything.Seeeverything. This place is barely six hundred square feet. What the hell do we have to hide from each other?
“Well, um, not sure how to bring this up delicately or whatever but, fuck it, might as well just get on with it.”
Well, shit, now I’m on pins and needles, racking my brain for something I might have done that could have potentially altered the delicate balance of our tiny household. I don’t get to think long on the matter, thankfully, because Cole dives right into our ‘meeting.’
“We never actually established ground rules for the bedroom. Or in this case… wherever the fuck we happen to be.” He smiles at Aly and the rest of us before Aly raises her hand tentatively.
“Um… not to sound stupid or anything but… rules? Aren’t we already having fun?” She looks around to Hawk and myself, looking for confirmation, which we return by vigorously nodding in her direction, happy with everything we’ve been doing. And we’ve been doingeverything.
