A group of friends streams their gaming on Wednesday nights. But not all the action is on the dining room table.

-==-

Chapter 31: Pillow Talk

Was I dreaming?

It had to be a dream, I decided, because we were on a beach, watching the sunset, and I didn't think Lake Travis was big enough to lose the horizon in the water and clouds.

It also had to be a dream because, for whatever reason, I was wearing a bikini.

Even in a dream, I couldn't help but roll my eyes at that. My whole life, I'd been called a girl, told I looked like one, acted like one, even sounded like one. Despite all that, until the past week, I'd never crossdressed or anything outside of cosplay... and, okay, a few one-off times with Maria. Now even my dreams were getting in on it.

At least the sunset was nice, and the waves crashing on the beach.

The company wasn't bad, either.

"Whatcha thinkin'?" Brian asked me, leaning back on his elbows and basking in the warm light. He was one of those guys who always had just a touch of a tan, and it glowed in the afternoon sun. Unlike me, he was wearing a very practical pair of grey-and-white trunks.

"I shouldn't be in a bikini," I whined, picking at the silly suit with the strings tied on my hips and my chest barely covered by the triangles of material that passed for a top. At least it had the good sense to be a nice plum purple and not something godawful like pink.

"Why not?" Brian smiled and reached out to untie one of the bows holding my bottoms on.

I batted his hand away and scowled. "Because I'm not a girl."

"You sure about that?"

I glared at him. "This is my dream. Shouldn't you be trying to seduce me or something?"

"Don't work when you know it's a dream," he said, in the same kind of deadpan-with-smirk way his waking-world counterpart would. "And is that really what you want?"

I thought about that for a moment. "I mean... it might be nice? It's been a while since...." I trailed off. "This is stupid."

"Well, it's your dream," he said, standing up and plucking a surfboard from the sand next to him.

I stood up too and stepped forward, once again by his side.

"Even in my dreams, you're a butt."

"Yep!" He agreed. "Also, honk."

"Honk?"

Then he reached over and squeezed my right tit.

#

"Wha?!"

I jerked awake, dislodging the very real hand that had just groped me but not the arm it was attached to. I only panicked for a moment before remembering the night before.

Conversation.

Pizza.

Kissing.

I took a deep breath and felt my heart rate slow as I sank back into the mattress, cuddling up to the shape behind me in the bed -- not a bolster, but Brian's chest, gently rising and falling as he breathed.

He snuffled a bit as I snuggled in, raising the hand that had groped me to move my hair out of his face, but soon enough, the arm returned to its place around me, the hand this time settling into a gentle pat on the faux baby bump I still wore.

"G'sleep," he mumbled, still muffled by my hair despite having moved it.

"I am," I assured him, getting another pat on my baby bump in response.

A quick glance at the alarm clock on my side of the bed showed me the time was barely after six a.m. Brian was right: I needed to go back to sleep.

Not that I could.

With my eyes closed tight and the sound and rhythm of Brian's steady breathing filling me with a sense of calm, I lay there and thought.

I thought about the upcoming game and felt the fluttering in my belly as I wondered how the night's performance would go.

I thought about the robe, dress, whatever it was I would be wearing, and felt a fluttering of an entirely different sort at the idea of being so exposed.

I thought about kissing.

Specifically, I thought about kissing Brian.

The last guy I could remember kissing was in our sophomore year of college. I'd been experimenting at the time, and I'd gone on a couple dates with him. I let him kiss me, and it was nice, but he was adamant that the kiss lead to something more, and I wasn't ready for that. It was our last date.

I'd kissed a couple of girls since, not counting Maria, and there was the time Sydney got drunk at a party and tried to make out with me. Those had all been fun, but there had been something missing in it.

Something exciting that I needed from it and wasn't getting.

Something I'd found, immediately, when Brian kissed me. His lips warm, his hands gentle, the tilt of my head as....

I sighed and snuggled back just a little more, getting another grumble from Brian and a poke from something lower down.

The kissing had been wonderful. The first one, the second one, the fifth... but kissing was all we had done. Brian's hands had not lingered north of the band of my bra, and my hands had stayed safely above his waist.

The kissing had been enough, but....

I thought about the last time I'd felt that same prodding and blushed.

If I hadn't been drunk and passed out on Thursday night... if we had talked about all of this before the trip... would we have?

The bolster was gone, but there was still one important question we never answered the night before:

I was pretty sure that Brian was, officially, my partner -- my boyfriend -- now. Provisionally at the very least.

But what did he consider me?

Seemingly sensing my unease, Brian squeezed me again and mumbled something that might have been "pancakes."

The more I thought about it, the more the answer seemed clear to me, if no less confusing despite that clarity. For all my arguing I wasn't a girl, for all Brian's acceptance of me for being me, I couldn't pretend like there was anything like a boy-boy dynamic between us.

Brian might try to soft-pedal it, but if I couldn't even convince myself that we were boyfriend and boyfriend, I was pretty sure he wasn't convinced either.

Sigh.

I thought about my commitment I'd made only -- was it really only two days before? -- to let what was fun be fun, and not over-think it all. At the time, I'd known -- if only subconsciously -- that would include trying not to fight what was going on between me and Brian, trying to relax and see where things went.

I hadn't thought things would all change so quickly, though.

I guess if anything, that was just proof they hadn't changed as much as I thought, I just wasn't trying to ignore them anymore?

Somehow that wasn't as comforting as I'd hoped it would be.

Despite my confusion, I didn't pull away from Brian.

I didn't want to.

If we both wanted to be together, then did the labels really matter? I knew they would to some folks, even some of our own friends, though I didn't think many of them would make a big deal about it even if they disagreed with us.

Should we be together, and risk it making it hard to work together?

That was just me being paranoid, and I knew it. I couldn't imagine a situation where, even if we broke up -- once again presuming we were a "thing" now -- that I would stop being at least friends with Brian. We went back too far, and I knew him too well: if that were going to happen, it already would have, and I'd seen him with enough girlfriends to know he wasn't likely to pull any Asshole Dominant stuff.

Girlfriends.

Girlfriend?

I thought about it some more and fought the urge to shake my head again. I knew that in the eyes of most folks, that was what I was.

Hell, in the eyes of most folks, I'd been that for a long time.

But it still didn't feel like it fit to me. Didn't feel cromulent.

"Mrvf vm."

"Hmm?" I asked, turning my head to once again get my hair out of Brian's face.

"Luff yoo."

I felt a pang in my heart, like the tiniest guitar string being plucked.

"I... I love you too."

"Gud. Then go sleep. Yer think'n's wakin' me up."

"Sorry," I half-apologized, half-chuckled, once again snuggling myself in. "I'll try to think more quietly at least."

"Think later. Sleep," he said, kissing the back of my head.

"Alright," I agreed, and tried to comply.

Lover?

I thought about the word and rolled it over in my head a couple of times.

I wasn't Brian's boyfriend, I didn't think. Not really. And girlfriend didn't seem right either. Too much to unpack there, both in terms of who others saw me as and how the last couple of weeks had made me start to reconsider myself.

Too many distractions, not enough certainties. Too many questions, not enough epiphanies.

But lover?

Lover, I think, I could handle.

With that settled, I smiled and felt myself begin to drift off again, the feeling of Brian's breath on my neck reminding me of sand, and beachside breezes, and lying in the sun together.

###

Sorry for the delay folks. We're caught up to me in terms of posting, but I'm hoping the next (and last!) three chapters won't be delayed.

Comments and kudos welcome!