Work Text:
“Hey, look at this,” Susie says excitedly. She shoves her cellphone into Kris’ face, making their eyes cross for a moment. On the screen is a series of texts:
Hi! Is this Susie?
umm whose asking
It’s me, Noelle. Sorry if this is weird ^^; Kris gave me your number and I wanted to see if it worked!
“I didn’t give her your number,” Kris interrupts.
“Shut up! That’s not the important part!”
yep well its me lol....whats up
I was wondering, if you’re not too busy, maybe we could, do some studying?
no thanks lol studying is for chumps
uhh no affense
None taken ^^ If you don’t want to study, I was thinking about practicing some techniques. You know, for that other world?
oh like u wanna get beat up? cool
wait....why are u asking me?? and not kris
I wanted it to be a girls’ night thing! We haven’t gotten to work together very much in combat, but everybody else has… What if we got caught unawares?
oh ok
whats unawares
You should come over to my house tomorrow. We can even have a sleepover!
Kris blinks at the screen, then back up at Susie. “Girls’ night?”
“Yeah!” She grins, wide-eyed, before realization settles in. “Wait. What do you even do at girl’s night?”
“You eat bugs and dirt.”
“Whoa, really? Awesome,” Susie breathes. She thinks about this for a moment. Then she squints. “Hang on. That sounds made up. I’ve seen chick flicks and stuff before, and they never do that.”
Kris shrugs, saying, “It’s what we used to do.” Something in their eyes has gone cold.
“Yeah, but that doesn’t count. You’re not a girl.”
“Used to be.” Kris flops back on the couch and flicks through the channels on TV. “It counts.”
Susie rolls her eyes and snatches the remote from their hands. Monster Jam is supposed to be on right now, and she wants to see how big the monsters are this year. “What else did you guys do?”
“Hit stuff with hammers,” says Kris.
She can’t wrap her head around Noelle doing something like that, even with Kris pushing her. But now she’s starting to doubt herself. “Did she like it? Was it fun?”
“So fun.” Kris grins at last. “Do you want to try it?”
“Yes,” says Susie, the most serious and sincere she’s ever been in her life.
They rustle up a hammer from Toriel’s toolbox and head outside. When all you’ve got is a hammer, the world looks so, so smashable, and they take turns hitting things like acorns, glass bottles, flat hunks of rock that flake off in thin, black sheets. It’s deeply satisfying. Kris hits a walnut husk with particular vehemence when Susie starts talking about Noelle again, which is kind of weird, but she doesn’t say anything. But eventually, they have their fill, and they sit on the grass, flicking seeds at each other.
“I still don’t think she’s gonna wanna do that,” Susie says. Her skin is flushed with excitement. “Don’t you have any other ideas for what girls like?”
Kris just shrugs again. “I don’t know. You should think of something. Aren’t you a girl?”
Susie opens her mouth to argue on instinct, then closes it again. “Oh, yeah. I forgot.”
What girls want to do, she thinks, is go back inside and eat snacks. So she does. Mentally, she jots this down: girls love snacks. The two of them flop back down on the couch, enjoying the freedom of watching (and eating) whatever they want, at least until Toriel comes back home. It’s mostly boring stuff like infomercials and baby cartoons. However, when she flips past the Teen Moviez channel, Susie sits up straight.
“I know,” she says, hitting her palm with a fist. “Let’s watch some movies! With, like, girl stuff! They’ve gotta have sleepovers and stuff, right? It’ll be like… like research! But less boring.”
“I guess,” says Kris.
They scour the collection of movies underneath the TV for anything that might fit the bill. There’s lots of movies about old-timey crap, like women with big ugly wigs and dresses that take up the whole room, but not much in the way of feel-good Girl’s Night movies. Kris squats next to her, watching her run a finger over the cases, deep in thought, before they abruptly stand and motion for Susie to do the same.
She follows them back to Kris’ room. “Asriel probably has some,” they explain, crouching next to his bed and rummaging beneath. They pull out a fairly hefty lockbox from the furthest reaches. It doesn’t seem heavy, but it is very much locked; that is, until Kris fishes out a bobby pin from their pocket and jimmies the lock open.
“I didn’t know you knew how to pick locks,” Susie says, admiration palpable.
“I didn’t, either.”
Before she can ask what the hell Kris means by that, they’re in. Kris pops the lid open delicately, as if treading upon hallowed ground, but Susie, devoid of all those familial hang-ups, whines for them to hurry it up.
“Jackpot,” breathes Kris at last, pulling out a hot pink DVD case with a trio of teenage girls on the cover: blonde, brunette, and redhead. The classics.
“Sweet. Hey, why does he keep this stuff with all the nudie cartoons?”
“Dess made fun of him once. He wanted her to think he was cool.” This prompts them to roll their eyes. “She didn’t think all the religious ska was cool, either. But ‘that’s different’,” they say in a nasal, mocking voice.
They pick out a few choice options before shoving the lockbox back under Asriel’s bed, and the two of them head back to the living room. Kris gets all the fixin’s ready - popcorn, blankets, notebooks and pens - while Susie attempts to figure out the DVD player. She’s gonna be the most ready for this sleepover that anybody’s ever been.
Noelle tries to concentrate on her game, but her eyes keep darting to her alarm clock, fixated on the steady tick of the second hand. Everything’s been set in order: snacks stockpiled in her room, extra pillows and blankets arranged neatly on the bed, a stack of carefully-curated DVDs waiting to be played, and most importantly, her mother holed away in her study, hard at work on her latest bit of city planning: a single culvert to be replaced in front of the school. The permit is of the utmost importance, and Noelle knows to stay out of her business without needing to be told.
That should be no problem, she thinks. Her foot taps nervously. They’ll just stay in here. In her room. Together. All alone—
She’s jerked out of her train of thought by the sound of a small rock clattering against her windows. Noelle jumps a foot in the air, tamping down a squeal by slapping her hands over her mouth. After a moment to collect herself, she quickly smooths down her shirt, tucks a flyaway hair behind her ear, and pulls open the curtains to find Susie standing in her yard, another rock in hand. It’s a second away from being hurled.
She unlocks the window and raises it enough to pop her head out. Susie blinks, lowering the rock.
“Hey,” Susie says.
“Shh,” hisses Noelle, bringing a finger to her lips. “Be quiet! My mom might hear you!”
“Uhh, OK,” says Susie, a little quieter. But not much.
Noelle gestures for her to come up, leaving Susie confused. Then she gestures at a ladder propped up against the side of the house - Asgore’s handiwork, left there after cleaning the gutters and being scared clean off of it by an errant squirrel. (He's okay. Physically, at least.) Susie lights up with understanding.
She scoots it into place (loudly), clambers up the ladder (disruptively), and ends up face-to-face with Noelle, her teeth bared in a big grin (charmingly).
“’Sup.”
“Quick, before somebody sees you!” Noelle insists, backing away both to give her room and to hide her blush.
She holds out a hand to help Susie inside. It’s big. Warm. Surprisingly soft. Noelle files this information away for later. Right now, she’s being interrupted by Susie… apologizing? “Sorry for, uh. Stepping on your bed,” Susie mutters.
Dirt crumbles off of her sneakers. Noelle just laughs, dizzy with delight. “Please! You can do it again,” she says, landing herself a world record for the most baffling thing she’s ever said.
Susie lets out a surprised huff of laughter, too. “You’re so weird.”
They let go of each other. Noelle wipes the dirt off her duvet and onto the floor, the thrill of even this minor disobedience coursing through her, electric. Her hands tremble with it. For a moment, she wonders if Susie feels it, too.
Susie stops looking at her, though. “You got snacks in here? Nice,” she says, making a beeline for them.
“O-oh! Yeah, help yourself,” Noelle tells her. As if she isn’t already snout-deep in a sleeve of crackers. “I wanted to, um, save us some time! So we don’t have to bother my mom by making a bunch of noise in the kitchen.”
Susie pauses and squints at her. “Your mom’s kind of a control freak, huh?”
“What? No, she’s just…” Noelle searches for the words. “Particular! Anyway we should really just stay in here all night and be really quiet when we go to the bathroom.”
“Uh… okay.”
She resumes snacking. Noelle lets out a shaky sigh of relief. Okay, that should head off every potential problem that could happen tonight. So long as she keeps the door locked, anyway. It’s fine. Everything is fine and this was a really good idea.
“So, uh,” starts Susie, wiping her mouth, “what do you wanna… like… do?”
At this, Noelle perks up. This is what she’s been training for. “I’ve got some movies. And lots of video games, ha ha… My dad and I play a lot.” She catches herself and frowns, dragged back down to earth. “Well, we used to, anyway. So I haven’t gotten to play with anyone for awhile. But! I’ve got Mushroom Party and Blast Sisters! You’ve played those, right?”
Susie rubs her head. “I dunno. Video games are for dorks,” she says, sounding as if even she doesn’t believe what she’s saying.
“You can be the turtle queen,” Noelle says.
Susie starts to sweat. “Mushroom Party is for babies.”
“She’s got fire breath,” singsongs Noelle.
“Ugh, fine, we can play,” Susie says at last. “If you wanna do baby games so bad… instead of, uh. Whatever you do at girl’s night.”
She puts a curious emphasis on that last part. It catches Noelle by surprise. “Did you… have something else in mind?”
“No,” lies Susie.
She’s really bad at it. She won’t even make eye contact. Noelle puts a hand over her face to keep herself from laughing. “You can tell me! We’re friends, right?”
“If you say so,” says Susie, determined to keep staring at Noelle’s wall. “I just thought you meant, like. Girl stuff. Not gamer stuff.”
“Gamer stuff can be girl stuff, too,” Noelle says defensively.
That gets a smirk out of Susie. “Touchy,” she teases.
“Plenty of girls like video games. You like video games.”
“Yeah, well, that’s different,” huffs Susie. “It’s not girl stuff when I do it.”
This immediately raises a lot of questions that Noelle doesn’t have the confidence to ask. Instead, she sits on the edge of her bed and studies Susie for a moment - she’s on edge, gripping her sleeve, hiding under her hair. This must be hard for her, comes an unbidden thought. It startles her, like ice on the back of her neck. Push her.
When she opens her mouth, she finds herself obeying. “What is ‘girl stuff’, then?”
“You know… make up. Boys.” Susie makes a face. “All that crap that I don’t do.”
“Oh! Yeah, I guess so,” says Noelle. This is news to her, too. None of the girls she knows care about that stuff overly much. “Is that… We can do that! Maybe it would be fun?”
Susie’s cheeks flush. “Let’s play Blast Sisters,” she says abruptly, pointing at the consoles under Noelle’s TV.
They settle in. Noelle lets her use the good controller. Susie picks the turtle queen, of course, and Noelle picks the elven maiden. Her favorite - she wields magic like she’s on a great stage, with lots of flourishes of the wrist and a sense of total mastery. She tries to take it easy on Susie, who seems more fascinated by the queen’s tail whip attack than anything else, but even her best efforts can’t keep her from slapping Susie across the map.
“C’mon,” growls Susie, “stop hitting me!”
It’s disappointing in a way she can’t articulate. But she relents. She misses her inputs. Holds her hand up to her forehead and laments her losses. Susie’s teeth look very sharp when she smiles, Noelle thinks.
From there, it’s easy to talk her into another game. And then another. Noelle finds herself relaxing. Giggling. Spending time with a friend.
Wasn’t that the plan? Well, sort of. It didn’t have nothing to do with it. But there’s a thought simmering at the base of her skull, a lingering impulse. They’re alone together. With her mother just a stone’s throw away, utterly clueless. She wouldn’t know if Noelle does something a little bad. She wouldn’t know much about Noelle at all.
Guilt lingers in the back of her mind, but she wrestles it back into submission. They are friends. It’s nice to hang out. It’s fun to set your controller down and tuck your hair behind your ears and ask Susie if she wants to do something else.
“Uh,” she says, “okay.”
“Let’s get our pajamas on! You brought PJs, right?”
Susie shakes her head. All she brought was the clothes on her back. Noelle knows this.
“Oh, well, maybe you can borrow some?” Noelle’s heart beats faster as an impulsive thought takes her. “My sister probably has some in her closet… I’ll be right back!”
She leaves Susie alone in her room and tiptoes toward Dess’ bedroom. It’s just as she left it. Except for the faint disruptions in the patterns of dust, evidence of their past transgressions. All her clothes, however, remain untouched. The drawers smell strange, like Dess but mustier, a dozen generations of moths shedding dusty scales and chewing tiny holes in the fabric. Noelle holds her breath.
There’s an old, tattered pair of flannel pants and a worn band T-shirt that won’t possibly fit Susie, but it’s the principle of the thing. Noelle tiptoes back to her room, heart beating so hard in her chest that it dizzies her.
Susie does try them on, though. The shirt stretches across her chest and shoulders, warping the logo on the front. A stitch on her pants strains to the point of breaking. But for some reason, Susie doesn’t change out of them. She just stands there, stiff and awkward.
“Thanks, I think,” she says, looking herself over.
“Don’t mention it!”
Her own pajamas are burning a hole in the back of her closet, an ill-advised purchase on her mom’s credit card that she explained away as a surprise gift for her dad. She’s only worn the thing once before. On a whim. Just to see how she’d look.
She hurriedly shoves something sheer and white under her normal holiday-print pajamas. In the privacy of the bathroom, the straps nestle into her collarbones, hollow under the cold light. A nightie flutters into place around her. She takes a deep breath. It gives her a form, stately and delicate, unlike her usual baggy cardigans and knee-length skirts. The answer to that question, she’s discovered is… mature.
Her nipples stiffen. She frantically rubs at her chest to force them back down again.
“Hey, Susie,” she whispers as she approaches her bedroom, peeking through a crack in the door before creeping inside.
Susie stops partway through bringing a snack cake to her mouth. It hangs open.
Noelle tugs coyly at the hem. “Do you like it?” She does a quick twirl, causing the nightie to flare out around her thighs. “I wanted to go all out, ha ha.”
“Cool,” is all Susie manages.
Noelle claps her hands together, startling her. “So, um,” she starts, “do you want to do some, girl’s stuff?”
Susie clears her throat. “If you say so.”
Despite her casual tone, Susie shows a remarkable amount of interest in painting her nails. Particularly when Noelle reveals that the only color she has is black. They splay out on the floor, centered around a small hoard of makeup, small tubes of concealer and cheap palettes of eyeliner, the gaudier colors visibly unused.
“Do you really use all this stuff?”
Noelle tilts her head. “Um, I guess so. I don’t like to go overboard.”
“Huh. It’s just, like… a lot.” Susie scratches the back of her head. “It seems like a huge pain in the ass.”
She laughs nervously. “Kind of, yeah. But I just do the basic stuff, so it’s not so bad…”
Across from her, Susie makes a face. “Yeah, you sound really believable,” she says. “I don’t do this crap.”
“Why not?”
She shrugs. The face stays. “I dunno. My mom made me wear it once for some stupid wedding. Why would I wanna look ugly and feel weird on purpose?”
Noelle takes one of Susie’s big hands and examines her claws. They look so pointy. She has to resist pricking a finger on the tip. “I’ve had to to the same thing,” she says. “My mom even made me wear lipstick. I felt like a little doll, or something.” She shudders.
Susie barks out a laugh. “I bet you looked like a total clown!”
As Noelle unscrews the cap, she can’t help but smile. “That’s what I felt like. I think it’s nicer when you’re not being forced to do it, you know? Now, hold still…” Noelle carefully spreads a thin layer of black lacquer on Susie’s thumbnail. It glimmers, inky and liquid, under the light of the TV.
“What’s with the black?” asks Susie, snapping her out of her focus. “Doesn’t really seem like your color.”
“Oh! Um, I used to be kind of a goth?”
“Cool.” This time, she sounds genuine. “Why’d you stop?”
Noelle moves on to her other fingers. Before she starts in earnest, though, she trails a curious finger across one of the claws. Thin, smooth grooves run down the length of it. They take the nail polish well, like a glass pen takes ink. “I guess it just wasn’t me. I was just… trying it out. My mom hated it.” She laughs. “Maybe that’s why I was doing it in the first place.”
She carefully paints each of Susie’s nails, taking the time to avoid her cuticles. Like this, on her stomach with her legs kicked up, she can see down the front of her gown, and it occurs to her that Susie can, too. Maybe that’s why she’s so intently focused on her claws.
“These look sick,” breathes Susie, as she holds out one finished hand to examine it. Her fingers flex in delight.
“They’ll take a while to dry,” Noelle tells her. “You might not want to touch anything.”
Susie stops herself partway through reaching for a cheese puff. Then she groans. “Aw, what? For real? Girl stuff sucks.”
Noelle giggles.
After she paints the nails on her other hand, Susie balks at any further painting or general making-up. She’s determined to keep her hair hanging in curtains over her face. A twinge of disappointment thrums in Noelle’s chest - part of her envisioned getting to push it out of her eyes and see them up close. But this will have to do.
“Now what,” says Susie. She examines her hands in the light again.
“What about a movie? That’d give you time for the other hand to dry, too.”
She doesn’t take no for an answer. Noelle kneels at the foot of the entertainment center, delicately, so as not to show anything too risque. A number of horror movies stand out - Shout, The Milkman, Night of the Living Bread - but she’s feeling daring. So she pulls Medieval Dead out of its sleeve.
“I hope you like horror movies,” she says, laughing a little. “They’re my favorite.”
“I’m not scared of anything.” Susie leans back with a real confidence. For the first time all night, Noelle’s convinced that she’s being honest.
A warm feeling rises in her chest. It threatens to choke her.
She shakes herself, then she gets to her feet. Susie’s eyes follow her legs up, up, before landing on her face and immediately looking away. Heat prickles on Noelle’s skin. That confidence is contagious. Noelle grabs the duvet off of her bed and flings it over the both of them on the couch. Her legs are cold. That’s all. And Susie’s quite warm. Noelle can feel her body heat where it’s trapped under the blanket. She inches just the slightest bit closer.
Unfortunately, unlike Susie, Noelle is very scared indeed. Even her old favorites still rattle her - she squeals at the first shot of a zombie lunging toward the screen.
“Haven’t you seen this before?” laughs Susie.
Noelle huffs. “It’s still scary!”
She pulls the blanket over herself, leaving Susie with just enough to cover her legs. Like this, she has privacy enough to run a hand down her own leg, feel how soft and bare the skin is—
Her heart rate spikes suddenly, violently. She shouldn’t. She wouldn’t do something like that. She’s a good girl who doesn’t think about things like that. Good girls get scared by movies like this, and they don’t wear out the tape in one specific place, rewatching the same scene where the fair maiden wanders into the fen in the dead of night, over and over.
It teems with life, humidity rolling off the hills, and the things that lurk in the depths reach out to grab her by the ankles and spread her apart. Noelle’s fingers find their way between her legs. Quietly. Slowly. There’s a wetness there.
Rotting hands hold the maiden fast. Then they probe between her legs. It’s so visceral, so out of step with the humor of the film. It’s disturbing. The maiden squeals. Noelle’s thighs tense.
It would be so easy. There’s no way Susie would notice. She’s transfixed, too, her mouth parted in rapt attention. Noelle can just… touch. Feel herself. Slip a finger between slick folds, swift as a whisper, right as the horde of zombies does the same, and she—
She gasps. Crap.
Susie blinks at her as if roused from a trance. “What— Are you good?” she asks.
“Y-yeah! Totally! I just, um, got a little scared,” she lies.
“Seriously? What are you so scared of? Swamp zombies aren’t real.”
She takes the opportunity to scoot closer to Susie, under the guise of being oh-so-scared. “Maybe not,” she admits, “but it’s still kind of…”
“Freaky,” Susie supplies in her stead.
“Yeah. Freaky.” When she shifts, she can feel something smear between her thighs.
Their thighs touch, one clothed, one bare. Something sparks at the contact. Susie yawns, loud and dramatic, as she stretches an arm out behind Noelle. It’s subtle. Noelle lets her sling it around her shoulders.
The movie ambles toward its conclusion, but Noelle’s long since stopped paying attention. She’s more focused on the warm weight. Susie seems distracted, too; her eyes keep darting around, alighting on Noelle briefly before looking away again. It’s strangely charming.
Her hand slips out of herself. She surreptitiously wipes it clean on the underside of the blanket before resting it on her thigh, right next to Susie’s, resisting the urge to—
Push her.
That impulse wells up in her again, nameless beast that it is. Noelle squeezes her other hand tight. So much so that she digs little half-moons in her palm. She doesn’t know where that came from. Doesn’t know why it’s scaring her so much.
You know you want to.
Of course she wants to. She’s dreamed about scenarios just like this before, thinly-veiled excuses to touch each other. But something in her balks. As if—
Do it.
Noelle nearly gasps again. A wave, hot and sickly, crashes over her. She’s reminded suddenly of— of sitting here on the couch, with Kris, staring at that ring of thorns, her heart lurching in her chest as it’s pushed closer, closer still. Did she want it then? Did a part of her hope that Kris would make her, just to avoid taking responsibility for it all? No… surely not. She’s a good girl.
She looks up at Susie, underneath her bangs, and sees her in a different light. Her fingers move to stroke the outside of Susie’s thigh.
Susie tenses. Then she blinks down at Noelle, who blinks back up at her, doe-eyed.
“I was thinking,” Noelle says at last, “um, I really liked that scene. From earlier. Did you?”
Her sharp, sharp teeth glint in the dark as she licks her lips. “Uh.”
“We could watch it again,” offers Noelle. She sounds as sweet as sugar, even as her hand rubs small circles into Susie’s thigh.
For once, Susie is silent.
Noelle steels herself against a wave of embarrassment, the feeling that this is a really bad idea. “I could show you what it did to me.”
“Okay,” says Susie stupidly.
She takes the invitation to shuck off the duvet, revealing herself. Her thighs, where the nightie’s ridden up. Her nipples, hard again, betraying her. And after a moment, she slowly lifts the hem of her gown, revealing soft fur, and nothing but - no panties, no nothing. Just the hot pink skin of her slit.
Susie’s eyes are as big as plates. Nerves force Noelle to giggle. She tightens involuntarily against nothing, and she hears Susie choke.
She doesn’t hear anything more from Susie as she rewinds back to the scene with the maiden. She can’t even look at her now. There’s a ringing in her ears, a hissing, like she’s coming up from deep underwater, and it fills her with a strange sense of dread. But she’s in too deep now. She’s already played her hand. All that’s left is for Susie to call her bluff.
The maiden reappears on the screen, flushed with terror. Masses of greedy hands reach for her once again. And this time, Noelle doesn’t hide away as she explores her folds with her fingers.
“This is crazy,” mutters Susie. Noelle’s eyes flick up. She’s focused more on Noelle than the movie, eyes locked on her body as if she’ll blink and miss it. Something about that focus, that attention, all for her, makes her skin burn.
It’s not graphic. The worst of it is depicted off-screen, just out of view. But maybe that’s what makes it so appealing. She can see wrists and ankles, gripped by a hungry horde, but she has to imagine bony fingers scrabbling at a pair of bloomers, some filthy, horrifying creature desperate to push itself inside. She does the same, spreading her legs a little wider so she can screw her own fingers inside. This time, she lets herself gasp.
When Susie doesn’t move, however, she wheedles, “Come on, Susie. We’re both girls, right? It’s okay.”
“Right,” says Susie, dazed, as if she’d forgotten. She tears her eyes away from Noelle to look at the TV instead. A hesitant hand palms at the front of her - Dess’ - pajamas. “Is this what girls do?”
“It’s normal,” says Noelle. It’s anything but. She curls her fingers, skin burning with the knowledge that she’s doing something dangerous right now. Crossing the Rubicon.
But Susie’s playing along, somehow, slipping her hand into her pants to touch herself properly. Her fingers move just out of sight. Noelle can’t help but watch.
The scene goes on too long, she thinks. It lingers. But it gives her enough time to justify pulling her fingers out to rub at herself. She’s close already, dripping onto the couch. (She knows she’ll have to clean that later, before her mom sees. Right now, though, she grinds down into it, leaving her mark.) And Susie’s— Susie’s squirming out of the flannel, revealing dark hair, sparse on her shins, thicker between her—
Noelle licks her lips and finds them dry. She has the insane thought that her fingers are wet enough, right? She could pop them into her mouth. Relieve her thirst. But she stops herself before she has the chance to embarrass herself like that. Some things are still a step too far.
“What,” says Susie, defensive.
“N-Nothing!”
Susie’s posture clams up. “Those clothes were too fuckin’ tight anyway—“
“It’s okay!” interrupts Susie. “Keep going! Um, please.”
She grumbles, but does as Noelle asks. They’re both bare from the waist down, now. On the same level. But where Noelle’s got her legs splayed open, inviting Susie to look, Susie’s legs are angled so that all she can see is her strong thighs, tensing and flexing.
That’s okay. She can use her imagination.
The scene ends. They keep going. The voices fade away in the background; louder is the sound of their breath in the dark room, the only sign that anything is amiss. Otherwise, the two of them are silent.
Susie’s eyes bore a hole in her. She wants her to look. She wants to shrug off her nightie, baring all of herself, her skin pale and washed-out in the glow from the TV. Objectively, she knows she’s not much to look at - she takes after her mom, lean and wanting, still hoping for a growth spurt to magically transform her into something like a Woman, capital W. Susie’s pupils grow sharper at the sight of her regardless.
After a moment, remarkably brief, Susie scrambles to do the same thing. The shirt, too tight by half, comes off, another stitch popping as it does. Noelle stares at her.
“You look so pretty,” she says.
“Shut up, man,” grunts Susie in response.
It’s the truth, though. She is pretty. Maybe nobody’s ever told her before, but they should have. Susie’s breasts look so full and heavy that it dizzies her. She had no idea what Susie looked like under all the baggy clothes, but now that she does, it’s like a precious secret for her to keep. After all, it’s so nice to look at her. It’s so nice to be looked at. And it’s mutual, each of their attentions fully hooked by the other, the movie long since forgotten.
She watches as Susie rubs at herself, furiously, artlessly. Slivers of pink peek out from between her fingers, a different pink from the rest of her. Warmer. Wetter. Her curls glisten with it. It never occurred to her that Susie would have hair there, or anywhere, really. Noelle doesn’t. She’s got the same uniform coat of fur everywhere she looks.
She’s gripped, suddenly, by the urge to explore. Figure out more of their differences. But that would be greedy, wouldn’t it? She’s already taken so much.
“Do you do this with all your friends?” pants Susie. Her voice comes out husky.
“N-No,” she admits, rubbing herself faster.
“Not even Kris, huh? Just - ah - lil’ ol’ me?”
She bites down a whimper. No, of course not. They never played doctor growing up, or anything weird like that. And she doesn’t like Kris like that. Or at least, she didn’t think she did; now, the very idea is enough to make her breath catch in her throat. It’s so easy for her to recall Kris’ face. Kris’ eyes.
Do it.
The origin of that voice reveals itself with alarming clarity, the one that’s been haunting her all night. Not Kris, but something close. Something familiar. She remembers the way Kris’ eyes looked, right here, under their heavy bangs. Dark. Intent. And she sees a similar hunger in Susie’s gaze. It makes her moan aloud. Noelle immediately slaps a hand over her mouth, but it’s too late.
“Thought you said we had to be quiet,” taunts Susie.
“Shhh!”
Susie laughs, but quietly. It trails off into heavy, open-mouthed breathing as she palms her breast, squeezing it. Something hot lurches in Noelle’s gut. She mirrors the action, grabbing at herself, rolling her nipple between her thumb and forefinger.
This feels… special. Like they’re connected. Just two girls, naked as the day they were born, touching themselves the way girls aren’t supposed to do. Not to other girls. Not at all.
Noelle leans back against the armrest, giving herself more room to spread her legs. Her hole gapes open. Her head lolls back. Susie shifts, too, facing her head-on, allowing her to see everything. She could just reach down there, she thinks, head spinning. Susie’s dark interior calls to her. She could easily push in a finger, two, even, feel her from the inside, hear the noises Susie would make—
“Susie,” she blurts out, “I’m really close, I, I think I’m gonna—“
“Yeah,” says Susie, “yeah, me too. Fuck. You’re so hot.”
Noelle flushes from head to toe. “Oh gosh. You think so?”
Across from her, Susie nods frantically. Something winds tight behind her navel. She jams her hand into her mouth, teeth clamping into the meat of her thumb, fighting against a noise that wants to tear out of her, and her other hand moves so fast that her wrist starts to ache, and she—
She—
She comes, whining hard into her hand, hips arching up to chase that feeling. And she doesn’t stop until she’s sore and whimpering. Distantly, she hears Susie panting, her breath hot in the confined space, and she watches Susie’s eyes screw shut as she tips over the edge, too.
Noelle’s limbs feel so heavy all of a sudden. She lets them fall to her sides, gravity overtaking her. Her eyes flutter closed. Susie remains silent, too, so that all she can here is the DVD menu underneath the hissing in her ears.
“Wow,” she breathes.
Susie blinks at her, bleary-eyed. “Cool,” she manages to get out.
What do you do after something like this? She defaults to the practical, offering paper towels to clean themselves off with. Underwear to change back into. Susie accepts both gratefully. Then, once she’s done, instead of sitting in awkward silence, Susie spreads her arms open wide.
“C’mere.”
Noelle’s eyes go wide. “H-Huh?”
“Bring it in.” She gestures come hither with her hands. “You’re not gonna leave me hangin’, are ya?”
She lets out a surprised little “oh”. Was that part of it? She hadn’t planned out this far. But there’s something strangely fragile about Susie’s expression that tells her, definitively, that this is part of it now. So she squirms closer, feeling skin against skin. Susie wraps her arms tight around her, making her squeak, and she buries her snout in Noelle’s hair and huffs. That strange guilt from earlier creeps back up on her. She closes her eyes anyway.
They fall asleep like that. Susie’s body heat is enough for the two of them.
Susie sneaks out in the morning after managing to worm free from Noelle’s grip. She’s turned into a real octopus in her sleep. And she’s so soft, besides. It’s hard to let go. It’s not that she wants to leave, exactly, but she knows when she’s not wanted. Even if Noelle’s mom hadn’t said so to her face, she’d get the idea. There’s a reason Noelle wanted her to stay so quiet.
When she walks in the front door, nobody stirs. She texts Kris with trembling thumbs.
dude i think i might be gay
This doesn’t get a response. She falls back asleep on top of her bedding, phone on her chest, waiting.