Page 88 of Medium
I laughed. “Sorry, I’m not laughing at you, I promise. But we all think about weird shit. And all the bonded couples sayyou learn how to wall it off. So we’ll have our privacy eventually.”
His body lost its tension. “Okay. Good.”
“I have an idea.” Shane reached through the gap in the seats and patted Rory on the arm. “Let’s tell each other some of the stupid crap we think about. Just get it out there.”
I looked back and raised my eyebrows at him. “You can go first.”
“Duh.” He leaned back in his seat and drummed his fingers together. “Okay, like I’ve been imagining getting one of my old coworkers to discover a landscape design Ileft behind.” He made air quotes. “Ricky would be all over it and sell it to the next client who came along. But it’ll be made up of plants that’ll change colors with the season and suddenly for a period of time there’ll be a giant dick in the middle of their esplanade.”
Rory and I laughed, but Shane sighed. “I know. It’d be hilarious, but I can’t do that to the poor unsuspecting company. They’re not the ones I’m mad at.”
“Alright, I guess it’s my turn.” I tried to think of something “weird” to discuss, but all that was coming up was dirty thoughts I’d been having about Shane and Rory. I was slightly panicking when I remembered something. “Oh, I have one. I’ve been wondering what form Ms. Jackson will choose when they finally take on a human shape.”
Rory stared at me a little too long and I had to point at the windshield to redirect his attention to the road. “Holy shit,” he muttered.
“Y’all haven’t thought about it?”
I glanced back at Shane, and he winced. “I thought about it, but I didn’t want to, so I stopped.”
I threw up my hands. “Okay, whatever. Rory, what weird thoughts should Shane and I brace ourselves for?”
He glanced at me, then he ran his hand over the stubble on his jaw. His beard was as blond as his hair, so when he didn’t shave he got a sort of golden glow on the bottom half of his face.
Shane leaned forward. “You don’t have to play this game if you don’t want to.”
I frowned, but then I noticed the unease coming through our connection from Rory. “Shit, man. This wasn’t supposed to be some sort of test or anything. We were only playing around. No need to participate if it makes you uncomfortable.”
Rory lifted one shoulder. “It’s not that. It’s just, I have more of a question for you guys, and I guess it’s kind of awkward.”
He had both of his hands on the steering wheel, so while I wanted to grab one of them, I settled for putting my hand on his knee. “We’re about to be the equivalent of married without the possibility of divorce. We need to hear anything that’s bothering you, and I promise we won’t laugh.”
He blew out a breath. “I guess you’re right. Um, I’m curious about the bonding itself. I mean, I understand we’ll have sex, but is that all there is to it? Is there—I don’t know—a ritual or something?”
I grimaced, and when I glanced back, Shane had a similar expression. “I’m so sorry, Rory. We’ve been rushing this, and we didn’t make sure you understood everything that was happening.”
“Yeah, it’s a good question.” Shane lifted his phone. “There’s a whole series of entries on bonding inCal’s Campaign Compendium. Why don’t I read those to you, and then Ellis and I can answer any questions you have afterward?”
Rory nodded, seeming relieved. “Sounds good. How can I get access to that compendium for myself?”
I squeezed his knee. “First we have to get you on our Discord server. There’s a link pinned there. We’ll message Cal and ask him to send you an invite.”
“Okay.”
Shane read the entries to us, and I learned some things I hadn’t known. I should probably read the entire compendium, but who had that kind of time? I still couldn’t believe how quickly Cal had put the thing together. Didn’t he have a full-time job?
Rory relaxed more and more as Shane read. I felt awful for how stressed he’d been about the bonding. We’d all have to do better at communicating with each other. But was Rory really okay with bonding so quickly? The three of us still barely knew each other.
And it wasn’t only Rory being rushed. It was my fault Shane had ended up with the burden of all my connections on top of his own. Which were causing issues with hishealth.
All I could do was take them at their word that they were ready and try to make it up to them after we were bonded. Or, heh,duringthe bonding.
“What are you smirking about?” Rory’s question snapped me out of my reverie.
“Oh, sorry. I was imagining our bonding, if you want to know the truth. I’m looking forward to finding out what y’all like to do in bed.”
“Yeah?” Rory wiggled his eyebrows. “We’ve still got a while to drive. We could play a guessing game. Though you probably already know what Shane likes, right?”
I ran my hand over my hair. “Um, actually, we didn’t really discuss preferences. It was more of a spur-of-the-moment thing. We just sort of pounced on each other.” I glanced back and winked at Shane, who blew me a kiss.
