"You really need to tell him."
Gina looked sheepishly at the floor. "I know. I just look into his face and . . ."
John groaned and rolled his eyes at the ceiling. "You know how hard it is to explain to a date, 'no she's just my friend but because I'm a push over I occasionally tire her up and masturbate in front of her so she can pretend I'm someone else.' Yeah that goes over so well."
"I'm sorry. You know you don't have to say yes." She looked at him harshly.
"I know that's my fault. I can't do what you really want anyway." John sighed and walked towards his roommate. "That's why I won't do it anymore. It's not helping you and it makes me feel awful."
"I understand. If I wasn't such a freak I'd date you." Gina smiled up at him and rose to hug him. "You deserve three really great women."
"Could you maybe put that on a flyer and circulate it around the city?"
"Soon as I'm no longer broke." Gina giggled and let go of him. "I wouldn't mind the crappy salary so much if I actually liked my job. Do you have plans or will you have dinner with me?"
"I am Looser the Viking King of course I'll have dinner with you." He went for the cabinet and began setting the table out of habit. "Just as long as it's something ready made. You can't cook for shit."
Gina swatted him with a spatula. "I screw up one dinner."
"One dinner?"
"Ok six. Just set the table while I microwave something."
"You know that club you keep pacing in front of, too chicken to go in?"
"Bound? And thank you so much for making fun of me."
"Yeah, when I went out the other night with the guys and they wanted an adventure." He nodded at Gina.
"What's it like? Please tell me." Gina hopped in her t-shirt and sweat pants.
"Where's my food?" John smiled and took his hungry man meal from her. "You have to wear a mask to get in; they rent them at the door if you don't have your own. Mine really stank. There's this stage or platform in the center."
Gina bounced her legs and didn't eat the lean cuisine. "What'd they do! I want every wonderfully horrible detail."
"Actually, I didn't get to see much, the guys got a bit freaked, like myself, and we ended up in a sports bar."
Gina sighed and flopped against the back of the chair. She scowled at her food, but began to eat it.
"What I did see was, well it's more of a who." John smiled as he heard Gina's fork drop.
"He wasn't?"
"Right on the stage about to do something to a woman being brought up the steps."
"I'm gonna stain the chair. Oh God. How'd you know it was him if everyone was wearing a mask?"
"That dragon tattoo on his shoulder you told me about in ridiculous detail."
Gina moaned in the chair and twitched.
"I talked with a few people before we left. Apparently, a lot of people just about beg him to do anything to them. Sometimes he does, but no one seems to ever have actual sex with him. The rumor is that at heart he's a big romantic."
Gina moaned a little louder.
"I'm so glad we made that rule about everyone cleans up their own bodily fluids. I'd really hate to have to clean up after you." John took a drink. "You really have to tell him. Look at how you're reacting to something you didn't even see."
"I know." Gina drew designs with her fork in the left over sauce.
"You have lunch with him about every day don't you?"
"Yes." Her breathing had become a little heavy. "I don't know how I've kept from striping in the middle of the restaurant and asking to be his slave."
"So I talked to him. Verifying it was in fact him. I was surprised he remembered me." John wiped his mouth. "And I invited him over for dinner tomorrow with the two of us. He accepted."
"John!"
"He's showing up at eight."
"John!"
"At the very least it'll give you the opportunity to correct the fact that he thinks we're a couple."
"Why did you?!"
"We better order something in."
"John!"
"Oh, and right after dinner I'm going out with the guys and sleeping over at Thom's."