After what happened I was afraid I would see less of Nikki but if anything the reverse was true. We had been the kind of friends who usually hung out a couple of times a month and exchanged texts a couple times a week. Now it seemed we were hanging out once a week or more and texting a few times every day.
I did notice that we only hung out with other people around. I figured she probably still felt bad about what happened and didn't want to be alone with me which I couldn't really blame her for. We were both pretending very hard that nothing had happened and that was easier in a crowd.
Almost a month to the day after what happened we were chatting by text on a Saturday night when suddenly she sent "I'm a li'l drunk. Typing too hard. Call me?" So I called her. She picked up right away. "That's better" she said brightly.
"So you have your usual half a beer and get wasted?" I said. This was definitely a joke because, for all that she was a lot shorter than me, I was pretty sure she could drink me under the table if she wanted to.
"Ha ha," she said. "No I had two beers but I haven't eaten any dinner yet so I'm a bit buzzed. I didn't want to start filling my texts with typos."
"No dinner?" I said. "You should make Greg hurry up and feed you already."
"He's not here," she said, "he's gone to his parents again."
"Seriously? Does he go every weekend?"
She laughed. "No, but his hours got cut back at work and he wanted to borrow money from them. He says they're more generous when he does it in person."
"I guess that makes sense. Poor you, having to cook your own dinner."
"I'll manage," she said, "at least I'm still allowed to do that for myself." She sounded bitter.
"What does that mean?" I asked.
"Oh nothing," she said, "I shouldn't have said anything."
"Oh come on now you've got me curious. You might as well just tell me."
"Fine," she said. "It's just that I found out why he doesn't like my vibrator."
I was surprised. This was as close as we had gotten to any taboo subjects in weeks. But I figured I would play along. "Why's that?"
"He considers it cheating."
"What?" I said, in disbelief.
"Yeah he says if I really loved him I would be satisfied with just him. Satisfying myself is being unfaithful."
I let that one roll around in my head for a moment. Then something occurred to me. "Wait does that mean you can't masturbate either?"
"He asked me not to while he was away," she said. "He said it would be more special if I waited for him."
"Oh my god that is bullshit for so many reasons," I said. "First of all who the hell is he to tell you what you can and can't so with your own body?"
"I know right?" she said.
"Second and more important, is his plan just to make you wait until he gets back so that you'll be horny enough to let him do whatever he wants to you without having to warm you up too much?"
There was a long pause. "Do you think that's what he's doing?" she said. She sounded shocked, and a little pissed off.
"Probably," I said bluntly.
"Son of a bitch," she said. There followed several minutes of her generally cursing and swearing. When she got mad enough she had a vocabulary like an angry pirate.
I basically waited it out, throwing in a lot of "mm-hmms" and "yeah, you're rights."
Finally she ran down. "Sorry," she said after a moment's silence. "I got a little carried away there."
"Hey, I'm on your side, remember. If you need a friendly ear to vent to, I'm all yours."
"Thank you," she said softly, sounding happier than she had the whole conversation so far. Then after another moment she asked, "what do you think I should do?"
"About the whole situation?" I asked.
"Yeah," she said.
"I think you should probably just do what you want while he's gone and have a little chat when he gets back."
"You do huh?" she said.
"Frankly I think you owe it to yourself."
"I do, don't I?" she asked.
"Unless you want to let down all womankind."
She laughed. "Well we wouldn't want that would we?" I noticed her breathing was faster and her voice a little husky.
"Did you just already get started?" I asked. I was a little surprised, thinking she would have hung up first. Surprised but not disappointed.
"Well it sounded like you didn't want me to waste any time," she said.
I laughed. "I admire your ambition," I said. "And your stealth. I didn't even hear you taking anything off."
"Oh I was already naked," she said. "I usually am when I'm alone in my room."
That was news to me, and certainly not bad news. "That explains why you never want to video chat." I said.
She laughed again, the tail end of it turning into kind of a moan.
"Well for future reference," I said, "it's considered polite for a lady to let a gentleman know when she's masturbating for him."
"Oh I'm sorry sir," she said, "I am currently masturbating for you, if that's okay. Seeing as someone else I know doesn't seem to appreciate it."
"I'll allow it," I said. "Just try to keep things to a dull roar, for the sake of your roomies."
"Oh, they're not here," she said.
"Really?" I said, "got the place to yourself do you?"
"Mm-hmm," she said, tapering off into another quiet moan.
"Then in that case, I think you should go out into your living room," I said.
"What?" she said, sounding startled.
"Think about it," I said, "you want a good story to tell Greg later, to show him who's boss right? Well what would be better than telling him that not only did you not wait, but that you got yourself off in the living room because you were that much of a bad ass?"
There was a pause. I was starting to think I'd pushed my luck too far, but then she said, "Oh you're going to get me in trouble." I heard the sound of a door opening, and the creak of floor boards that I recognized as being in the hallway to her living room.