The first time, I was sure I had imagined it. I didn't so much as look to check. The difference between fantasy and reality was perfectly clear-cut. I felt the same way the second. There was a fan on in the room, things were moving around, the sensation on my chest couldn't have been what I thought it was. Impossible. The third time, I allowed myself the briefest of glances down.
I managed to suppress most of my reaction, but I couldn't help widening my eyes for a fraction of a second. No two ways about it- her finger was tracing its way around the edge of the collar of my T-shirt. My RA from down the hall, two years older and apparently more or less unattainable.
About an hour ago, she'd followed up on a promise to come by and look at an interesting anime we'd discussed earlier. We'd watched the first episode, agreed that is was pretty good, and sat down to talk about it for a bit. Being a bit of an otaku, I'd mentioned that I identified with the main character's copious porn collection. This wasn't exactly a point of pride, but it had slipped out in casual conversation. Much to my relief, it only really elicited an eyebrow raise.
A few minutes later, the conversation turned to hard drive space. I took a look to see just how much of mine was empty. To my immense chagrin, she'd asked the question that I was most hoping to avoid: "well, shit- how much of that is porn, anyway?" I couldn't do much besides laugh. Neither of us had had anything to drink, but it was late at night, getting towards the peak of exam season, so there was a certain sort of intoxicating quality to the tiredness. That was probably why I decided to take the "manly and courageous" approach and be honest.
"Yeah, probably a couple of gigabytes of images, if I'm being honest."
She seemed surprised by that, but, to my relief, not totally disgusted.
"What, just a few gigs? Lame."
In my mind, this was already absurd. I was talking about my porn folder with Steffi Goldman, the girl I'd had a bit of a crush on more or less since I first saw her, and who'd always seemed in that mysterious female dimension several miles above my own. In that spirit, without really thinking much, I pressed my luck a little further.
"Hey, some of us save for quality, not quantity. Prime material."
As soon as the words left my mouth, I felt like an idiot, wincing a little as I braced for the inevitable. Instead, she responded with a bemused laugh, sitting back on the couch with an utterly nonchalant slouch.
"Pff. Yeah, right. Probably a parade of totally generic lesbianism and overkill tits."
"Come on now, I'm not that boring."
The next words might as well have been a shotgun blast. But, with a shrug, I set hand to trackpad and reacted when she said, "Prove it."
Grimacing with embarrassment but, for some reason, determined to stick to my guns, I double-clicked the folder entitled "Female Appreciation" and began the "show." In an attempt to mitigate the awkwardness- not really her concern, but I definitely felt it- I kept up a running commentary as I ran through the files. By a few minutes, I was appreciating the Youtube-esque commentator quality of my voice, and feeling oddly comfortable in the bizarre moment.
"...so yeah, that's a penis. And that's a ballgag. That... well, she's cute, that's about all there is to it. That's pretty damn dominant. Oh look, so's that one." I realized that I'd hit a vein of BDSM content, nestled in between plenty of more conventional material. "Yep, she's doing some interesting stuff with his penis. That's a gag again. Neat. Mhmm. Handjob. A little dull, but I liked the visual style."
Right around there, I felt the first contact. A few seconds later, there was no doubt that, for some inexplicable reason, she was playing with my chest. I had no idea how to react. This was decidedly not in the playbook. With no other options presenting themselves, I kept rolling forward, trying not to let my confusion leak into the "guided tour."
About a dozen pictures later, I was hoping, increasingly frantically, that my collection would take a turn in a different direction. In the back of my mind, I berated myself for not organizing. Right about then, I felt my voice catch for a split second, slipping a few syllables and forcing me to take a second to restart. My pulse accelerated a little. More surprisingly, she laughed.
"You were saying?"
I swallowed, still far from capable of rationally dealing with the situation. She seemed to lean in a little closer, an unignorably present warmth next to me, hand casually wandering over the front of my shirt. Breathing a little more heavily, but trying as hard as I could to keep it under control, I kept talking, pace slightly accelerated as I worked to keep speaking without paying heed to the rest of the situation.
At some level, I was fully aware that I enjoyed it. Even so, nervousness carried the day by a huge margin. Her side was in contact with mine. Her hand was on my chest. I was confused.
"Hey, you know, I can stop if you want. I'm tired, I'm sorry, this is inappropriate as all hell."
"No, it's okay, I... I don't mind."
I felt blood surge to my face as soon as I shut my mouth. Any sort of decision-making capacity had been utterly bypassed for that one. I swallowed hard, suddenly aware of just how much I didn't mind. Her arm slipping around my shoulder did nothing at all to help the situation. Part of me wanted to reciprocate, but I was terrified of overstepping some sort of boundary. Nothing about this was remotely predictable. Frantically drumming my fingers on the arm of the couch for a moment, I reached back to the laptop, clearing my throat and attempting to do the one thing that I understood here.
"If you're sure you're okay with this... well, might be fun if you took your shirt off."
