In Which Entirely Too Much Information Is Conveyed
“You know, I’m really glad I don’t use my butt for anything except sex,” Amaranth said cheerily as she set her breakfast tray down on the table.
It was just me, her, Celia, and Mariel… who’d explained that Puddy had a headache. Everybody else seemed to be sleeping late. It suited me fine. I’d rather it’d just been Amaranth, actually. I wanted to talk to her about everything I’d learned about Sooni… and maybe what had happened with Puddy. Though, that had been kind of private. If it was over anyway, like I thought it must be, there was no sense dragging it out into the open.
“Not that I don’t like a bit of pain,” Amaranth continued. “But, after being reamed out by a half-ogre and a centaur in one night, I can’t imagine that I would enjoy having to… oh, wait.” A slightly–only very slightly–embarrassed look crossed her face. “Mortals don’t like discussing one bodily function while performing another. I always forget that one.”
I was more than a little disturbed–having just added another item to my “people really do that?!?” list–but I hadn’t got any food, and Celia and Mariel seemed completely unconcerned. Mariel’s whirlwind arms were cutting pancakes, pouring syrup, and peppering scrambled eggs. She looked like she had enough food to choke a giant. I wondered where the hell it all went. Celia had eschewed solid food entirely for this meal… she’d got an even bigger glass of milk today, and another one with chocolate milk.
“So… hold on,” Celia said. “Which one is the sex hole… front or back?”
“Front,” I said.
“Either,” Amaranth said. “Though only the front one’s used in reproduction. It’s also quite a bit stretchier, but the back’s just got more depth built into it,” she continued in a horrifically cheerful conversational tone. “Some guys, there’s just no way of being able to take them all the way in any other way.”
“Sex as a multiple choice question,” Celia said. She shrugged, and took a swig of her chocolate milk. “Fucking weird.”
“It isn’t really,” I said. My world was expanding a little too quickly. I was busy trying to shove it back down into a size that would more easily fit inside my head. “Multiple choice. Normal people, uh, I mean, most people… you know, normally…”
“My boyfriend was always trying to get me to do anal with him,” Mariel said. “He was like, ‘it’s actually very pleasurable for both partners’, and I’m like, ‘Okay, smart guy… you first, then.'” She giggled. “I was actually bluffing, but he headed off towards the nearest human town and came back with a big purple strap-on… and after that our relationship was never better.” She shivered a bit, a dreamy expression over her face.
“Wait, you have a boyfriend?” I asked. This surprised me… she’d glommed onto Puddy so fast…
“Oh, yeah, and boy, was he pissed when I called him yesterday and told him that I’m a lesbian now,” she said. “I bet my dad’s going to be even madder.” She seemed pleased at the idea.
“So, you aren’t really a lesbian…” I said, a little confused.
“I don’t know. Maybe I wasn’t really straight,” she said. “It’s college, Mack… we’re supposed to try new things! Like you and make-up. Oh, which reminds me… I want to do your hair.”
“What, you mean, cut it?” I asked suspiciously.
“I mean style it,” she said.
“But, does that involve cutting?” I said.
“Um… frequently,” she said, wringing both sets of hands.
“In this case?” I pressed.
“In this case… that would be sort of a general yes-ish,” she said.
“No, thank you,” I said. I wasn’t unhappy with my hair. I was less happy at the thought of Mariel near my head with anything sharper than the allegedly soft eyeliner pencil she’d mauled me with the night before.
“Oh, but I’ve got some really cute ideas for you,” Mariel said.
“I think your hair’s cute as it is,” Amaranth said. “All kind of… scruffy, tousled.”
“Why not just shave the whole thing?” Celia said, rubbing her own smooth pate.
“Well, anyway,” Mariel said, “I hope you’ll let me, because it could be good advertising. See, I’m thinking of earning extra money as a stylist… you know, out of my room. I’d be pretty cheap, because my customers would be other students who maybe couldn’t afford to go to a full salon, you know? I’d probably just charge something like one silver for the basic treatment, and go from there.”
That was cheap?
“My haircut only cost me fifty copper,” I said.
She stared at me for about eight seconds longer than was strictly necessary.
“Oh, and it looks so good on you!” she said. “But, anyway, obviously I wouldn’t charge you, since you and Puddy are… you’re… hey, what exactly are you and Puddy?”
“We’re friends,” I said.
“Right,” she said, sounding unconvinced. Since she’d slept with Puddy both of the nights we’d all been there, I don’t know why she would have a hard time believing there was nothing else between us… or why she wouldn’t seem to mind the idea that there was.
Was I really so sheltered? Was there nobody left in the world who didn’t just want to find one person–of possibly even the opposite sex–and just, you know, date them? Sex optional, hold the strap-ons and double-teaming… and reaming… and doughnut-licking.
But, as long as the subject was sex, maybe I could clear up a point or two for myself.
“Um, so, Amaranth,” I said. “That guy who picked you up in the hall… with the half-ogre, I mean. Was he a satyr, or a faun?”
“Oh, Rorick? He’s a faun,” Amaranth said. “They both have goat-like legs and tiny feet, but if you look closely, the satyrs have toes, where the fauns have actual cloven hooves. There’s some difference about the facial structure, too, but it’s more subtle… satyrs are generally a bit rougher-hewn, with animal-like ears, and more hair on the upper body. Fauns are more sharply divided between goat and man. Then, of course, there’s the fact that satyrs have disproportionately large genitals, where as fauns are built exactly like humans in that regard. Still, if you have any doubt, it’s easiest to just check out the feet.”
“Wait, you mean… that was a normal human… sized… thing?” I asked, goggling at her. He’d seemed so huge in the hallway.
“Yeah, Rorick’s pretty close to average,” Amaranth said with a shrug. “Maybe just a little bit on the eastern slope of the bell curve. Not much over six inches, but I’d say when he was really happy, he might have got up to about six and three eighths, six and a half.”
“Hold on… you mean they change sizes?” Celia asked. Her hinged jaw had dropped.
I was thinking the same thing. Mariel was staring at us with an amused expression on her face. I was glad to know my ignorance made for good entertainment.
“Well, there’s a bit of give to it, you know?” Amaranth said. “It’s just more apparent with the larger guys. I tend to notice regardless because, well… I know cock.”
“And he… Rorick… isn’t one of the ‘larger guys’?” I asked.
“No, not especially,” Amaranth said. “Why?”
When I’d seen him, all I could think was, “That couldn’t possibly fit where it’s supposed to!” I mean, guys call it a slit for a reason. It’s a fucking slit! You can’t jam something like that into a slit. It’d be like… trying to deliver a package through the letter slot.
I’d read a lot of trashy romance… and trashier porno stories… that talked about women “opening like blossoming flowers” in anticipation of their lovers’ touches, or shit like that, but I always figured that was mostly hyperbole.
I’d sure never felt anything like it.
It’s not just that I was a virgin… I was extra virgin. Like olive oil. My only experience with vaginal penetration at that point had been gynecological. In case you’re a member of a gender that’s never had the distinct pleasure, let me tell you that it’s not an experience to seal forever in the scrapbook of your memories. My feeling was, if a trained healer who specialized in the female anatomy couldn’t poke around down there without causing that much pure physical discomfort, it was hard for me to imagine some guy like Rorick bludgeoning away with a six-inch meat hammer could bring any sort of enjoyment.
“You okay, honey?” Amaranth asked.
“I think you’ve turned me off sex forever,” I said.
“With guys, anyway,” Amaranth said, picking at her bowl of puffed wheat cereal. She opened a book she’d brought–something about pendulums, by the cover–and started leafing through it in her usual haphazard fashion.
“Yeah, with…” I started to agree, before realizing what she was saying. “Wait, no… at all. I’m not into girls. I like boys.”
“Of course,” Amaranth said agreeably. “You just can’t imagine yourself having sex with any of them.”
I glared at her.
“You told me that you believed me when I said I wasn’t a lesbian,” I said accusingly.
“Oh, I absolutely do,” she said. She looked up from her book, gazing at me over the rims of her too-thick glasses. “And when you tell me that you are one, I’ll believe that, too,” she said placidly. “Self-identification is important. You have to come to terms with some things on your own.”
“Personally, I don’t know what you’re complaining about,” Celia said. “At least if you’re a lesbian, you’ll never have to deal with some guy’s junk just sort of… hanging there… even when it’s not being used. The first time I saw a naked human, I thought he’d had some kind of hernia.”
“What, nagakin aren’t like that?” I asked.
“Our boys put their toys away when they’re done playing,” Celia said. “I never even saw my old boyfriend’s stuff. That’s fucking classy.”
I was learning way too much about male anatomy in one day. It was time for a subject change.
“Talking about reptiles,” I said. “What’s the name of that lizard girl who’s on the skirmish team? She’s the only one on our floor whose name I didn’t catch.”
“Oh,” Celia said. “You mean…” and she made a sharp, short hissing sound overlaid with some weird rattle from the back of her throat. “I talked to her a bit downstairs while I was checking in. She’s pretty cool.”
“I couldn’t begin to pronounce that,” I said.
“I heard Belinda and Rocky calling her ‘Hissy’, but you might not want to call her that unless she’s introduced to you that way,” Amaranth said. “She might not accept that level of familiarity from somebody she doesn’t know.”
“‘Hissy’,” Celia said, shaking her head. “I can’t believe she’d let a couple of mammals call her something so demeaning. If she lets a pinkskin do it, I’ll lose all respect for her.”
“Okay, I’ve had about enough of this ‘pinkskin’ crap,” I said. “I can understand Sooni and the nekos calling me pink, since she’s kind of a deep copper and the cats are furry, but your skin is the exact same texture and color as mine… and Rocky, whatever color or consistency her skin is, is actually more human than I am… so what the fuck exactly gives?”
“Are you calling me pink?” Celia asked. She stood up. “Are you… calling me… pink?”
“No! I’m not calling you anything,” I said. “I’m just saying…”
“I kind of respect you, Mack, but I will fucking bite you if you don’t respect me,” Celia said, sitting down. She slammed the table with her palm. “Fuck!”
“I just don’t understand,” I said.
“Epithets are often more about ideas than solid facts,” Amaranth said. “Most oppression is perceived to come from the humans of the Imperial Republic… who are mostly of a general pinkish sort of color.” She shrugged. “So, ‘pinkskin’ becomes the term for humans by those who resent them… as well as for anybody in sympathy with humans. Elves and dwarves are seen to be aligned with the humans, so they’re often lumped together, too, even though elves in particular generally have as little to do with humans as they can. Meanwhile, a race like the nagakin, which shows their human ancestry in their skin…”
“Oh, don’t you fucking start, too!” Celia snapped.
“…but has a more adversarial relationship, historically, are not usually grouped in,” Amaranth said. “Though, of course, you get differing levels of chauvinism, too… there’s some members of some races that would consider everybody at this table too human for their comfort.”
“Maybe by appearance,” I said glumly. “I have a hard time imagining myself as ‘too human.'”
“If it makes you feel any better, you’re way too fucking human for me,” Celia said. “Most races just don’t think that much about demons… it’s a human thing.”
“Holy fucking sky, you’re a demon?” Mariel screamed.
Amaranth is a regular Hermione, isn’t she? She’s rapidly turning into my favorite character.
I’ve been so busy lately haven’t had time to read even a chapter a day, sigh! Maybe this weekend I’ll get some time!
Hahaha! I would NOT have thought of that comparison, but there are similarities if you go to look for them…
…especially if you’re looking in the slash-fic aisles. 😉
I wouldn’t have made that connection either, but now that it has been mentioned…. Yeah. Definitely there.
I remember my wife, whenever men complain about how easy women had it, she would bring up; “Poor babies. Get your self up on the table, your feet in the stirrups and a pack of auto mechanics pretending to be doctors, shoving cold implements and big hands up inside of you! Then I might listen to your whining.”
Oh nice one.