Charmed Thirds_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [9]
In the X-rated version, there is no wardrobe or intelligible dialogue. The plot is best left to your (okay, my) prurient imagination.
As you can see, I like my daydreams to have an element of reality to them. (I even do my own nude scenes.) It makes them that much more interesting, like, Oooooh, this could actually happen. Which in this case it almost did. Except I never pictured a G-rated version, in which I was—from the neck down—dressed as a stuffed animal. (Although, for plushy-loving pervs, it could have been confused with the X-rated version.)
As always, Marcus had the perfect entrance line. He gently stroked my pink pelt (any plushy pervs who weren't already turned on are definitely wanking it now) and said, “My, how you've changed, Jessica.” His surprise arrival proved that he hadn't changed at all. On the inside at least.
He definitely looked different since I'd last seen him. He gets so immersed in his studies that he forgets to eat, making him even leaner than he was before he left for school. He doesn't look gaunt and stricken; quite the opposite. The overall effect makes all that is Marcus even more so. His angular nose isn't merely dignified, but aristocratic. His eyes, more feral than feline. His cheekbones could slice through diamonds. He hasn't trimmed his hair since our good-bye, and it reminds me of fallen leaves, all burnt red and curling at the edges. His dusty jeans dipped down below his hips, and I could see the V-cut of his pelvis, pointing the way to happy territories below.
And he was wearing the summer version of the same outfit he was sporting the last time I saw him; that is, he'd removed the thermal from underneath his old COMINGHOME T-shirt. The iron-on letters I once wanted so desperately to stroke with my fingertips are faded beyond legibility and nearly translucent from so many sudsy tumbles through the washing machine. I once ached to touch those letters on his chest, to touch him. It was at the infamous high school Anti-Homecoming party at Sara's house, infamous not only because everyone who had ever attended Pineville High showed up for the beery lechery, but because it served as the backdrop for my first kiss with Len, not my first kiss with Marcus as it should have. (We wouldn't kiss until months later.) I compensated for that night's longing by wearing the COMINGHOME shirt after we made love for the first time, the second time, the third time. On those June nights, it smelled pungent yet sweet, like autumn decay. It still does.
Toward the end of last semester, I was dangerously close to running out of dining dollars, but I didn't want to replenish from my bank account because I was trying to save myself from financial ruin. So I went almost totally freegan: I limited my food budget to five dining dollars a day, and supplemented the rest of my meals with whatever I could get gratis at the various events thrown by any one of the bizillion campus organizations at Columbia. Bagels with Six Milks improv comedy group. Pizza with the Philolexian Society. Spicy chicken wings with Acción Boricua. No affiliation was too inappropriate for my hunger. (Actually, I did draw the line at the Columbia College Conservatives Club BBQ.) Sometimes the spread would already have been vultured by my fellow starving students by the time I got there, but most nights I'd be in for a feast. And no matter what was being served, it was always the most finger-licking deeeeeelicious meal I'd ever had in my life . . . not only because I needed it so badly, but because my nourishment was never guaranteed.
Seeing Marcus was like that. I wanted to devour him. Figuratively. Okay, more than a little bit literally, too.
So my initial response was: “MARCUS!”
Followed by: “I hate my hair! It's okay if you hate my hair!”
And: “Get me out of this poodle suit!”
However, stripping off the Pinky the Poodle costume was not something that could be done spontaneously or (let's face it) erotically. So I just