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It’s their sixth or seventh visit to the bathhouse when Zoey broaches the topic: “So, like. Jinu.”
Rumi is slouched low in the tub at present. They’ve done a lot of talking here. Shared a lot of private, painful things, had a lot of quietly intense conversations because there’s something about the haze of steam and hot water that gets you comfortable with being a bit open and vulnerable. Zoey often prefaces questions with, okay, so, this is a Safe Space, right… So any question about Jinu is half-expected.
What she doesn’t expect is when Zoey continues, “Did you guys, like. Do it.”
Rumi is saved from immediately answering by Mira’s interjection. “You can’t ask that.”
“It’s a Safe Space!” Zoey argues. “No judgement!”
“There’s a limit,” Mira says. “That’s her business, she doesn’t have to—” but then she catches a glimpse of Rumi’s red face descending further into the water and stares, eyebrows raised. “Did you?”
“No!” Rumi says, but it comes out muffled because her face was half submerged, so she lifts herself out again to repeat herself. “No, I have never. No.”
Mira and Zoey continue to look at her expectantly. Rumi blows out a sigh, tries to make a gesture that’s slightly lost in the milky water. “We held hands.”
Silence. Then Zoey whistles quietly. “Oh, shit.”
“Hope you didn’t get pregnant,” Mira deadpans.
Rumi sinks down into the water again. “Shut up.”
Zoey and Mira’s giggles echo in the room for a moment. Then it’s quiet for a little longer. Then Zoey pipes up again. “So, no kissing, or—”
“Oh my god,” Mira mumbles. “Leave her alone.”
“Safe Space!” Zoey says again. “So?”
“No,” Rumi says. And to make herself perfectly clear, she specifies, “Never.”
Quiet again. Then, “Like, never never—”
“Zoey.”
"Safe Space!”
Frustrated now, Rumi raises her arms out of the bath, patterns particularly prominent, shimmering in the low light and the water dripping from her skin. “I’ve had other things on my mind, if you do recall!”
“Valid, valid,” Zoey concedes. Then, “But you’re so hot, though.”
Silence. Conspicuous silence. Rumi glares at Mira. “What, you’ve got nothing to say?”
Mira shrugs one shoulder. “She’s right.”
—
A few days later, they’re watching a movie on the couch. It’s Zoey’s pick; the second film in an old franchise about vampires and werewolves, and Rumi’s actually pretty into it, right up until a sex scene starts and she has to pretend to be interested in her fingernails. In contrast, Mira and Zoey stare intently at the screen.
“So, like,” Zoey says, and Rumi’s hackles go up. “Have you ever, you know—”
“This is a bathhouse conversation,” Mira says.
“This is a nothing conversation,” Rumi says firmly. “I already said—”
“I mean, like—” Zoey pauses as the woman on the screen lets out a drawn-out, warbling moan. “Like, that.”
Rumi groans, pulling her hood on, and tries to disappear into the neckline. “I told you—”
“Yeah, okay, but—not even by yourself?”
Rumi wants to die. “No! I don’t do that!”
Silence except for the lingering romantic music in the background. Then, to her right, Mira starts snickering. Rumi looks at her sharply. “What?”
“Kinda explains a lot,” Mira says.
“Oh my god.” Rumi yanks at her hoodie drawstrings until her face is fully hidden. “Other things on my mind, remember!”
“Okay, okay! We’re sorry!”
Another minute passes. They’re back to vampires and werewolves and thankfully they all have their clothes on. Rumi stares at the screen through the small hole in her hood, feeling Mira and Zoey’s eyes boring into her.
Then Zoey nudges her with her elbow. “What’s on your mind now?”
“Stop.”
—
It kind of is on her mind, though.
Later on, long after they’ve all said their goodnights and retreated to separate bedrooms, Rumi thinks about it. She thinks about it in a way that she’s never really permitted herself to before. All her life she’s done her duty, with the weight of the world on her shoulders and her own secret hanging over her head. For some reason—probably something to do with the fact that she hadn’t experienced more than a lukewarm hug or a firm handshake until Mira and Zoey came into her life—it had never occurred to her that physical touch could be given for anything other than necessity, something done purely for the pleasure of it. She’s never really done anything just for the pleasure of it.
But things are different now, right?
With that thought, she slips her hand into her underwear.
She tries, she really does: manages to curl two fingers inside of herself, feeling and pressing, wrist bent awkwardly and knees pointed at the ceiling. It’s unmistakable, allegedly, this thing she’s looking for, but after ten minutes of hapless fumbling she’s pretty certain that she isn’t going to find it; Rumi wipes her fingers off on the sheets and rolls onto her side, stewing.
Her patterns glow a little in the darkness of her bedroom—red-magenta, as per usual when she gets frustrated, and that just frustrates her more. She buries her face in her pillow, the unfamiliar heat in her lower belly making way for a lonelier, sinking feeling; maybe her body is only meant to be this—a vessel of duty, a finely tuned machine, made only for singing and dancing and violence.
Maybe she was never made to feel pleasure at all.
—
The following week, it’s Mira’s turn to pick the movie: the third film in the same franchise. Rumi sinks down into the cushions as another sex scene inevitably comes on, and feels the girls’ eyes on her long after it’s over, but dutifully they say nothing. Rumi, who would really like to put this topic to bed, so to speak, decides to rip the bandaid off.
“I’ve decided,” Rumi says, through gritted teeth, “that masturbating is overrated, actually.”
Over her head, Mira and Zoey exchange a long look.
—
A few days after that, Rumi comes home from her run to find a small gift bag on her bed. It’s black, with no apparent branding, but there is a card in an envelope that reads:
Something to take the edge off.
Love, Mira and Zoey
It’s certainly a bit cryptic, but Rumi smiles and warms a little; they’re always so thoughtful with their gifts. She opens the bag to find a layer of tissue paper, and a silk pouch with something hard inside. Rumi unties the ribbon and tips the pouch until the object slips out into her hand.
It’s a nice metallic purple colour, which Rumi appreciates, made of hard plastic, a few inches long and the shape of an oversized bullet, but that’s about as much as she can discern. Is it lipstick? A pen, maybe? She carefully inspects the object until she notices a button on the end and clicks it.
It starts vibrating.
Rumi’s cheeks flush. She clicks the button off again, shoves the thing back in the bag, and storms out to the living room. “What.”
Mira and Zoey don’t even look up from where they’re lounging on the couch, heads buried in their respective phones. “I think she found our gift,” Mira says.
Rumi brandishes the crumpled bag at them. “What am I supposed to do with this?”
“Aw, unnie,” Zoey says, engrossed in her Instagram feed, “do you need instructions?”
Rumi flushes even deeper, patterns pulsing magenta. “I do not need instructions!” She slaps the bag onto the kitchen counter in finality. “I do not need it, period!”
Mira and Zoey’s heads slowly swivel towards her in unison, twin smiles on both their faces.
“Figured it out, did you?” Mira asks.
“Not so overrated after all,” Zoey adds.
“Oh my god!” Rumi throws her hands up. “I hate you both!”
She storms out.
Only to storm back in again a moment later to snatch the bag off the counter so she can bury the offending thing in her bedside drawer, lest Mira and Zoey put it somewhere that the housekeepers might find it. She ignores their snickering as she thunders out of the room, patterns blazing.
—
(“We could just offer, you know,” Zoey says to Mira later.
“Nah,” Mira replies. “She’ll ask one of us eventually.”
“Okay.” Zoey squirms a little at the thought. Then, another thought: “If she asks you first, I’m gonna run you through with my knives.”
Mira smirks. “Hot.”)
—
The thing sits untouched, in Rumi’s bedside drawer, in the gift bag and its little silk pouch, for three full weeks.
Untouched, but not forgotten.
Rumi keeps stumbling upon it. In search of a pen, or a spare guitar pick, or a long-lost lipgloss, she inevitably opens that drawer and sees the crumpled bag. Scowls. Slams the drawer shut. Resumes the search for the item she was originally looking for, far, far away from that drawer. Rinse and repeat. The thought of the drawer burns quietly in the back of her mind, in the corner of her eye when she’s laying awake at night, and even though she’s curious—because she might be half-demon, but she’s half-human, too, okay—she refuses to touch it.
She refuses to give Mira and Zoey the satisfaction. Not that they’d know—or maybe they would, because apparently she’s so pent-up that everyone can tell.
Whatever.
Then there comes a night where she gets back late from the gym.
Rumi feels good in her body, the kind of good that she can only get from a solid workout, finishing off by sprinting full-tilt on the treadmill and belting the lyrics to Golden to really get that rush. She takes her time in the shower after, soaping up her whole body, shaving her legs, washing her hair, singing quietly to herself as she rinses. She dries her hair—which takes a while—then braids it loosely and slips into bed, feeling warm and clean and content.
And maybe that’s why—just because she feels good in herself already, because she doesn’t feel like she needs to prove anything to anyone—Rumi reaches for the drawer.
She pulls the thing out. Rolls it between her hands for a while as she lays on her back, familiarising herself with the shape and weight, like she might do with a weapon. It’s unassuming enough. Friendly, even? She clicks the button to turn it on, feeling a little strange as the vibrations travel through her fingers, and discovers that by holding the button down, it vibrates faster. Interesting. She lets it rest against her stomach for a while, and that’s nice. Non-invasively nice. She can imagine how it would feel nice elsewhere, too.
Rumi lifts her hips to remove her underwear.
She trails the thing along her inner thighs at first, experimental: still nice. The closer she gets to the apex of her legs the nicer it feels, and when she decides to commit and press it there, that’s… also nice. Rumi shifts her hips thoughtfully, legs automatically falling open wider, a low heat beginning to build at the point of contact. She finds herself twitching and jolting a little as she holds the thing at different angles, until she just presses it flat against herself fully and suddenly has to bite down on her hand to smother a whine.
Nice doesn’t begin to cover it.
Whether by instinct or something else, Rumi rolls over onto her stomach. This is better, she thinks. This way she can just hold it and rock her hips a little and can bury her face in her pillow to stifle any involuntary sounds that threaten to spill out of her mouth. This way she can—she can—she can’t—
Rumi can’t think anymore, actually.
Her breaths come out ragged. She isn’t in control anymore, she doesn’t have words for this. This feeling, this crest, this climb, the way her body is thrumming. She grasps around in her mind for some kind of tether, for some way to document this, catalogue it, file it away for later.
Close, it supplies.
She is close. She knows she’s on the cusp of something, something all-consuming and wonderful and golden. Rumi lets herself chase it, her hips pushing against the mattress, thinking nonsensically, irrationally, about Mira and Zoey—what they would think of this, if they would be happy for her, if they wanted this for her, if they want her—if they want her—
The vibrating stops.
No.
“No, no—” Rumi whispers. She wrenches the thing up to her eyeline. Hits the button. Shakes it. Tries the button again. Nothing.
“No.”
She stashes the traitorious thing under her pillow and flings herself onto her back again, her hands over her face, borderline despairing as her patterns pulse and burn. She has never felt like this before: trembling, wet between her legs but hot all over, maybe close to crying. She could try with her fingers again, but her hands feel all funny from the vibrating, and it didn’t work the first time anyway, so.
She squirms, thoughts muddled, a word soup of pleasepleaseplease and closecloseclose, but one thought in particular loudly marches itself in front of all the others.
This is all Mira and Zoey’s fault.
Rumi yanks her underwear back on and swings her legs out of bed, her body taut and practically humming, nipples pebbled beneath her oversized t-shirt. She lets herself sit there a moment, one leg jiggling anxiously, until adrenaline and outrage carries her all the way out into the hallway.
Mira’s bedroom is closest.
Thankfully she’s still awake. She’s on top of her blankets, propped up against a pillow and scrolling on her phone when Rumi slips inside without knocking and shuts the door behind her.
“Hey,” Mira says casually. Then she squints a little—she’s not wearing her glasses—and immediately notices how disheveled Rumi looks. “Jeez, you’re all lit up. What happened?”
Rumi clenches and unclenches her fists, lightly tapping one knuckle frantically against the shelf next to Mira’s door. She shifts her weight from foot-to-foot, sucking in a breath at the friction.
She feels insane just talking about this. “It’s the thing you got me.”
Mira quirks an eyebrow. “The thing?”
“The thing,” Rumi grits out. “You know the thing, don’t make me say it.”
“Oh.” Mira smirks. “That thing.” And then her eyes go a little wide. “Oh, shit. Did princess have her first orgasm? Do you want a cake to mark the occasion?”
“No!” Rumi hisses. “I—almost—before it stopped.”
“It stopped?”
“It, it—all of it. Stopped.”
“Did you put in new batteries before using it?” Mira asks. At Rumi’s blank expression she starts laughing. “Oh, man, rookie mistake.”
Her nonchalance is infuriating; Rumi actually stamps her foot. “It’s not funny!”
Mira puts her fist over her mouth to stifle herself. “Oh my god. You’re all worked up right now, aren’t you?”
Despite herself, Rumi laughs too. She feels drunk, borderline manic. She pulls her hands through her tousled hair, tugging a little at the roots to ground herself and try to distract from the urgency between her legs. “What do I do?”
Mira laughs harder. “You’ve got hands! Go back to analog.”
“I can’t!” Rumi protests, stepping further into the room, legs trembling. “I tried, I can’t figure it out—stop laughing.”
Mira’s actually wiping tears from her eyes. “What the fuck else do you want me to do?”
“Help me.”
It comes out… way more desperate and needy than she meant it to, and all laughing stops. Mira looks up at Rumi again, seriously this time, taking a long, sweeping glance up her body, from her curled toes to where she’s pressing her thighs together, to her flushed face and then down again. Her t-shirt reaches mid-thigh, and any other time would be a perfectly acceptable choice for nightwear, but under Mira’s burning eyes, Rumi realises she may have miscalculated.
Mira says, “Okay. Sit on my face.”
Rumi splutters. “What does—sit on—how does that help?”
Mira scoffs, setting her phone down on her side table. “Oh, she of little faith. Trust me, it’ll help.”
She moves the pillow supporting her shoulders and shuffles down the bed so that she’s lying on her back instead. “Knees, here—” with her thumbs, she points at the mattress on either side of her head, then points at her mouth, “You, here. Get it?”
She says it like they’re working on a new move in the studio. Rumi stares at her, face heating even more as she gets the full picture. “No, no, I just meant, like—tell me what to do.”
“I’m telling you what to do,” Mira says simply. “Look, I had a long day, I want to be lying down. You want to come?”
Rumi exhales hard. Her thighs press together.
Mira notices and smirks. “Come here, then.”
“I can’t do that,” Rumi says. “I can’t let you do that.”
Mira shrugs elaborately, quite a feat considering she’s flat on her back. “So don’t. Go back to bed.”
Rumi does not move.
Her hesitation is evident; Mira smiles at her, extending her hand, and Rumi’s just… straight-up embarrassed at how little convincing she needs. She takes a few more wobbly steps up to Mira’s bedside, brimming with nerves. As soon as she gets there, Mira reaches out and wraps her hand around the back of Rumi’s thigh; Rumi’s knees very nearly buckle. “God.”
“You’re a mess,” Mira murmurs, not unkindly. “What have you done to yourself, Ryu?”
Something about her voice makes Rumi shiver. “Shut up.”
“Hey, seriously.” Mira lets go of Rumi’s leg to take her hand instead. She sits up a little, propping herself up on one elbow. “Do you trust me?”
Rumi releases a breath. “Unfortunately.”
“Rude. But fair.”
Mira helps Rumi climb on the bed without any further preamble, all business. They’ve been closer than this—touched more than this, during training, during sparring, during long afternoons in the dance studio where Mira has to hold Rumi against her chest and physically direct her by the wrists and elbows because she still can’t get the choreo right. Rumi is reminded of that now, in the way that Mira encourages her legs to move, her knees to bend, her hips to tilt, until Mira’s laid out on her back again and Rumi’s hands are braced against the headboard in front of her, knees planted on the mattress on either side of Mira’s neck.
Mira’s hands settle on Rumi’s thighs, which is within the realm of normal and fine, but then she looks up at Rumi with something like reverence and that’s… nice. Rumi’s toes curl a little, only to curl a lot when Mira’s hands begin inching upwards to her hips, fingers caught on the fabric of her shirt, anticipation sending jitters all through Rumi’s body. “Shirt and panties staying on?”
Rumi’s face burns at the word panties, but other parts of her burn hotter. “I don’t know. I guess.”
“Nothing I can’t work around,” Mira reassures, pushing the shirt further up. “Just want you comfortable.” As Rumi’s upper thighs and underwear are fully revealed, she stops and lets out a breath. “God, you’re fucking soaked.”
Rumi’s patterns flare again. She buries her face against her own shoulder. “Stop it.”
“You want me to stop?”
“No, just, stop—stop talking.”
“Stop talking? You want me to stop telling you how pretty you are?”
Rumi’s about to say, you never said I was pretty, but Mira wraps her arm fully around the back of her thigh, and then she doesn’t need to say Rumi is pretty—she feels it in the burning, open mouthed kiss Mira presses at the juncture of her leg, right at the edge of her underwear. Rumi’s jaw goes slack, hips twitching forward of their own accord, nails digging into the upholstered headboard. “Mira.”
Mira’s only response is to nuzzle her, nose pressed to the skin there, humming softly against wet fabric, rucking Rumi’s shirt up over her abdomen. She drags her mouth down Rumi’s inner thigh, along the jagged pattern there, then—skimming the wet gusset of Rumi’s underwear with only her breath—does the same thing on the other leg.
Rumi thinks she might cry, actually. “Please, just—just do something.”
Mira laughs. “Okay, okay, I won’t tease,” she says, and Rumi quivers anew, acutely aware of her underwear being tugged aside, feeling Mira’s breath, hot against where she’s even hotter, aching. Rumi can feel her lips move when she next murmurs, more to herself than Rumi, “Man, Zoey’s gonna kill me.”
Rumi’s about to ask what that’s supposed to mean, but then Mira opens her mouth—opens her mouth, and drags the flat of her tongue all the way up along the seam of Rumi’s body.
Rumi has been singing since she could talk. The general public and her vocal coaches alike have been astounded by her range, but here, pressed against Mira’s mouth, Rumi reaches a note beyond even her own comprehension. Mira’s tongue—Mira’s tongue—does not vibrate, is not made of hard plastic, but it presses up into Rumi, fits against the subtle ridges and contours of her body, laves over her again and again until she’s gasping against the headboard and unconsciously pushing down into Mira’s mouth.
Half out of necessity, half out of a desire to keep herself quiet, Rumi pulls the lower half of her shirt up to her face so she can hold it between her teeth. She’s immediately glad for it when Mira takes advantage of having a free hand and smooths her palm up along Rumi’s flank, tightening on her waist, encouraging her to arch her back, roll her hips, and when Rumi does it—rocks herself down against the delicious slide of Mira’s tongue, the moan she lets out is barely muffled by the fabric.
Mira moans, too.
Mira moans, and Rumi feels it everywhere: a full-bodied shudder that starts at the top of her spine and ends where Mira licks her between her legs. And Rumi doesn’t know what she’s doing, has no gauge for what’s normal or appropriate, but she can feel that cresting starting again, an urgency building low in her belly, coiling hot and tight as she allows herself to grind down, feeling the bite of Mira’s nails against her skin, razing.
Close, her mind supplies.
Rumi’s entire world is reduced to Mira’s mouth. Her entire body is trembling now, her movements out of her control again, and Mira only pushes harder, Mira does not relent, arm wrapped around Rumi’s thigh to keep her there, her grip only tightening when Rumi whines through the shirt between her teeth, so loud and so closecloseclose that she doesn’t hear the harried footsteps out in the hallway—
The door crashes open. “What the fuck?”
Rumi yelps and tumbles sideways onto the pillows as Zoey—pyjama-clad, hair mussed, infuriated—storms up to the bed.
“You’re eating her out?” Zoey says in outrage, pointing an accusing finger at Mira. “Without me?”
Mira—still on her back, mouth and chin still shining with Rumi’s slick, unbothered—raises her palms in surrender. “Hey, she came to me. I’ve been lying down this whole time, I swear.”
“Un. Fair.” Mira’s torso newly vacated, Zoey wastes no time scrambling up onto the bed and straddling her waist. “Let me taste her,” she says, taking Mira’s face in her hands, “I’ll kill you later.”
Zoey leans down and kisses her. Mira does not seem remotely surprised, threading one hand into Zoey’s hair as she kisses her back, open-mouthed and filthy and completely unrestrained. Rumi watches them blearily, t-shirt tugged down to cover herself again, so worked up and disoriented she can hardly believe what she’s seeing. Mira’s hand fists at the back of Zoey’s head, tilting their faces so the kiss deepens further, like they’ve done this a hundred times, a thousand times, and Zoey moans into Mira’s mouth, her hips rocking forward—
“Wait!” Zoey breaks the kiss suddenly, shooting upright to look at Rumi. “Did you come already? Did I miss it?”
“No,” Mira says gruffly, wiping her mouth. She pushes Zoey off of her and props herself up on her elbows. “You didn’t miss it, you ruined it. And her new vibe died, that’s why she’s here.”
Zoey laughs as she topples off Mira, sprawling out next to Rumi. “Aw, didn’t change the batteries first, huh? Been there.”
She reaches out and pats Rumi’s thigh in a way intended to be sympathetic, and Rumi is, frankly, embarrassed at the sound that comes out of her mouth. She’s oversensitive, patterns flared up as visual proof that every nerve in her body feels fried, a patch on her shirt spit-soaked from where she was biting it. She can’t speak, her mouth dry from panting, and as her vision swims a little, she realises she has tears in her eyes.
Zoey tuts, eyes on Mira. “Why’d you edge her like this? It’s not like she’s used to it.”
“Fuck you,” Mira says. “I had every intention of letting her finish, you’re the one who crashed the party.”
“I am the party,” Zoey says smoothly. She turns back to Rumi, properly sympathetic now. “Seriously, though, my bad. Can I help make it up to you?”
Rumi, chest heaving, practically lightheaded from having already been denied twice, looks between the two of them. Zoey, all flushed and eager—Mira, more muted, but warm and earnest all the same. Rumi feels like she isn’t quite one with her body, still caught somewhere between ecstasy and agony, and she wants to chase it again, wants to know what it feels like to get all the way there, with them. Together.
Rumi puts her hands over her face. “Okay,” she says weakly. “Please, just—yes.”
“Okay,” Zoey says, businesslike in a way Rumi has hardly ever seen her. “Okay. How should we do this? Mira?”
“I’m staying right here,” Mira says. “I had a long day at the studio.”
Zoey scoffs. “Uh-huh, I’ve heard that one before. Help me out a little, though—”
Mira reaches out at the same time Zoey does, and Rumi finds herself being pulled on top of Mira. She’s practically boneless, only squirming a little as she’s manhandled, Mira easily arranging her limbs until Rumi’s back is flush against Mira’s chest, like they’re back in the studio and Mira has something to teach her. Rumi’s breath hitches as she settles there, both at the heated look Zoey levels at her, and at the realisation she can feel Mira’s heartbeat hammering against her back. They’re into this. They’re both into this.
How long—?
She doesn’t have time to linger on the thought, because Zoey’s hands travel up her thighs, and Rumi’s hips buck of their own accord. She isn’t sure what word she tries to say, but it hardly matters, because she chokes on it anyway.
Zoey pushes Rumi’s shirt up a little and whistles appreciatively. Rumi’s underwear are still pushed to the side, still wet from everything. “Mira, you did all this?”
“She did it to herself,” Mira says, her voice in Rumi’s ear, vibrating through her back. “I take zero credit.”
“You can take some credit.” Zoey’s fingers curl around the waistband of Rumi’s underwear. To Rumi she says, “Can we take these off?”
Rumi can only nod helplessly. It seems pointless now—she’s fully on display anyway. Zoey peels her underwear off, Rumi exhaling heavily as her thighs press together to allow it, then the offending garment is gone, and Mira uses her hand and her own knees to spread Rumi’s legs apart again as Zoey shuffles in between them.
“Did you know the clitoris has over eight thousand nerve endings?” Zoey remarks, her hands sliding up Rumi’s thighs again. “Some studies indicate the number might be over ten thousand, even.”
“I am aware,” Mira deadpans, holding Rumi in place as she squirms and whimpers under Zoey’s ministrations. “I just had my mouth on all of them.”
“Well, that’s impossible, actually,” Zoey retorts, hands pausing inches from where Rumi needs them, “because most of the clitoris is internal—”
“Zoey,” Mira interrupts, just as Rumi lets out a pathetic, needy whine. “Would you stop torturing the girl and get her off?”
“Sorry, sorry!” Zoey laughs, and before Rumi even has a moment to brace herself for it, Zoey leans down and kisses her, with the same focused intensity she had kissed Mira on the mouth, only right between her legs.
Rumi lets out a shuddering gasp, her head rolling sideways onto Mira’s shoulder, trying to cover her mouth with her fist. Mira does not take kindly to that, taking both of Rumi’s wrists in one of her slender hands, and with the other, grasps Rumi’s jaw, forcing her to face forward again.
“Nuh-uh,” Mira says. “Watch Zoey, now.”
Rumi does watch Zoey. She watches as Zoey’s eyes flutter closed, watches as one of Zoey’s hands slides up over the flaring patterns on her stomach, watches as her other hand wraps around the back of her thigh, watches as Zoey’s mouth opens, watches as her own body yields to the press of Zoey’s tongue. Rumi whimpers at the pressure, whimpers at the feeling of being restrained, whimpers at the heat rising in her body again.
Then Zoey fully closes her mouth over the place she’s kissing and sucks, gently, like she’s trying to draw the juice from an overripe fruit, and forget the note she hit before with Mira—the noise Rumi makes could possibly shatter glass.
“You’re doing the sucking thing, huh?” Mira says.
“Mhm,” Zoey replies, mouth full.
Rumi barely hears them. Again, her world narrows down to a single point: the heat and pressure of Zoey’s mouth, the wet slide of Zoey’s tongue as it swirls over her, carrying her higher and higher and higher. She’s arching desperately, every breath a mindless gasp, struggling fruitlessly against Mira’s grip on her wrists and jaw, doing everything she possibly can to chase that feeling, up and up and closer and closer and she is right on the precipice, she is right there—
Zoey’s head jerks up. “Wait—”
Rumi does not scream, but only because her throat can’t manage it; she lets out a strangled, pathetic cry.
“Zoey,” Mira snaps. “You are going to kill her.”
“I know, I know,” Zoey says blithely, over Rumi’s tortured keening. “Rumi, can I put my fingers in you?”
Rumi is past the point of thinking, her voice wrecked when she tries to speak. “I don’t care,” she’s gasping, mindless, all breath, “I don’t care, please—please just let me, let me—”
And then Zoey’s fingers are inside her, and something wordless must have passed between her and Mira because Mira’s hand is down there too, and then they’re working her together and Rumi is utterly lost to the relentless pace that they lay into her body. The reprieve was brief enough that the momentum is still there, and they seem to know this, hands precise and insistent, like they’re chasing it just as much as Rumi is. Mira’s fingers working steadily, Zoey’s curled and pushing and pushing, faster and faster, and this time—this time Rumi refuses to let it go without a fight, forcing the words out, needing to make her urgency known.
“Don’t stop,” she gasps, arching against Mira’s chest, head tipped back over Mira’s shoulder as Zoey curses quietly above them. “Please don’t stop, please don’t stop.”
“We won’t,” Mira murmurs back, “you’ve been so patient, been so good.”
Rumi draws in one keening, shuddering breath—
—and finally, finally—
Rumi comes pulsing iridescent. Rumi comes crying. Rumi comes on Zoey’s fingers, convulsing, wrists jerking uselessly in Mira’s gentle grip. Mira’s other hand stills, just pressing, letting Rumi’s rocking hips do the work to ride it out, while Zoey keeps thrusting, slower now, following the rhythm of Rumi’s body until the waves subside and she collapses, quivering, spent.
She comes back to herself eventually.
“I think she’s done,” Mira is saying, as if from underwater, despite her mouth being directly next to Rumi’s head. Distantly, Rumi can feel her smiling against her neck.
“Yeah, we can give her five minutes.” Rumi’s vision returns to see Zoey shaking out her hand, rotating her wrist. “She got your pyjama pants all wet, Mir.”
“Sick.”
“Well, yeah, I’m just saying, maybe you should take them off?”
“I see.” Mira turns her face into Rumi’s neck again. Despite her exhaustion, despite being only half-aware, Rumi smiles a little, heart fluttering. “I’m gonna move you off me, Rumi, okay?”
Rumi can only hum in agreement, feeling herself shift onto the mattress. She still has her shirt on, damp with sweat now, and they rearrange it to cover her again, to preserve her modesty, or something. She finds the thought incredibly funny but is too out of it to laugh.
Blissed out, she stares absently at the ceiling, mildly registering a shuffle of fabric, the sound of clothing quietly being stripped away. Twin sighs reach Rumi’s ears, and when she looks over at Mira and Zoey again, they’re fully bare, legs all tangled together; Mira on top, sitting up, arm wrapped around Zoey’s thigh for leverage, wet heat against wet heat, skin against skin.
Something like joy fills her chest as she watches them together. Mira’s face is softly flushed, expression unbearably fond, rolling her hips effortlessly with a dancer’s grace; Zoey, pressed against the bed, just arches her back and takes it.
Beautiful, Rumi thinks.
It doesn’t take long for either of them. Zoey gets there first, keening and gasping as it breaks her, which seems to set Mira off. She’s quieter than Zoey is, but her whole body reacts with it—back bowed as she rides it out, moaning softly, trembling.
“That looked nice,” Rumi says weakly, once they’ve gone still.
“I’ll show you how to do it later,” Zoey says dreamily.
“Like hell you will,” Mira says, rearranging their limbs to untangle them. “Who’s the choreographer here? Who showed you how to do it?”
“Details, details,” Zoey says. She rolls over to face Rumi properly, taking her hand. “Nice to see you fully cognizant again.”
“Yes,” Rumi says. “I think I went briefly insane.”
Mira scoffs, properly sitting up, now, collecting their clothing that’s scattered around the bed and throwing everything into one pile. “Baby girl, you got yourself so worked up you didn’t even realise you could just get fresh batteries.”
Rumi’s cheeks heat a little, but she’s past the point of feeling embarrassed. “I guess.”
“So,” Zoey says, thumb tracing little circles on Rumi’s hand. “How do you feel?”
Rumi takes inventory. Her limbs feel like they’ve been liquefied, in a nice way. “Good. Really good.”
“A little more interesting than just holding hands?”
“A little, but holding hands is nice too.” Then Rumi frowns, mind backtracking over everything, and says, “I still haven’t been kissed, though.”
Zoey bolts upright. She and Mira exchange horrified glances.
“I didn’t kiss her,” Zoey says, putting her hands over her mouth. “Mira, did you—?”
“No, me neither, I forgot.”
They round on Rumi, eyes pleading. “Can we kiss you?”
Rumi laughs. It seems ridiculous that they’re asking permission, but she loves that they do. “Yes, please.”
Her girls need no further encouragement, the two of them leaning in at the same time to gently press their lips to the corners of Rumi’s mouth. Then Zoey tilts Rumi’s face towards her to kiss her properly, then Mira does the same, and Rumi can’t stop smiling, glowing softly in the dim light of Mira’s bedroom.
With Zoey moved on to her neck, Rumi’s lips remain occupied by Mira. Renewed warmth rushes through her as Mira’s tongue coaxes her mouth open, acutely aware of what else it can do. Way better than the vibrating thing.
Zoey seems to read her mind. “Did you like the gift we got you?”
Rumi hums and breaks the kiss. “I like you two better.”
“Correct answer,” Mira says. She draws back a moment to brush away the loose strands of hair around Rumi’s face. “Do you wanna call it a night? Or should we try for one more?”
In response, with herculean effort, Rumi sits up just enough to take her shirt off.
Her girls descend on her.