Glasshouse - Charles Stross [154]
“This isn’t such a good—”
“Shut up.”
“You’ll become, uh, pregnant.”
“Won’t.” Worry about it later. I run my hand around his back, feeling the thin man-fur that runs up the base of his spine, and I lean closer. “Not worried anymore.”
“But.” I feel him unzip my skirt. Hands on my thighs. “Surely.”
I kiss him to make him stop. We’re down to underwear. “Shower. Now.” My teeth are chattering with a rising tide of need that threatens to wreck what’s left of my self-control.
We’re in the shower cubicle, wearing our underwear, and I dial the pressure up to maximum and the temperature to fusion. His tongue—garlic and honey and a hint of something else, of him. Arms around each other, we stand under the spray, and I feel the tension in his back. He’s got an erection, of course. Why am I still wearing anything? Moments later I’m not. And a moment after that I’m crunched against the wall, my knees drawn up, gasping at the size of him inside me.
“You want to talk . . .”
The entire universe is in here. I wrap my arms around him and latch on to his lips, hungrily. I want to talk, but right now I’ve got higher priorities.
“Opening ceremony.”
“Yes?”
“On a MASucker. Yes!”
“Yes . . .”
“Only one T-gate out. Six gigs to next star system. If we break connection, bad guys can’t pay up on scorefiles. Breaks carrot side of dictatorship, no payoff for compliance. Yes . . .”
“Overthrow the—the?”
He heaves like the wild sea. I’m lost on him, abandoned. At first when I was Reeve, the idea of pregnancy horrified me. Then Hanta tweaked something, and it was no big deal. Now I just don’t care anymore: It’s survivable, and if it’s the cost of having Sam right now, I’ll pay. I want to focus, to plan, but we’ve gotten carried away. Sam is pounding away with no subtlety, and he knows better, which means he’s lost on the ocean, too. If we can find each other and cling together through the night, who knows? “Sam, I, I want you to—”
“Oh!” A moment later, a quieter “oh!” And a sensation of spreading warmth that drives me to grind against him until everything goes away, and I become the ocean for a few eternal seconds.
THINGS don’t go according to plan, but they go strangely well. After the first mad flush of lust, we collapse in the shower, then soap each other off thoroughly. Sam doesn’t cringe away from my hands this time but seems quiet, thoughtful. I kiss him, and he responds. After a while I begin to feel as if my skin’s about to fall off: I can barely see the bathroom for steam. “Let’s dry off and go to bed,” I suggest, feeling another little jolt of worry.
“Okay.” Sam turns the shower head to OFF and opens the cubicle door. It’s cold out there. I shiver, and for a wonder he wraps his arms around me.
“Are you feeling comfortable?” I ask hesitantly. “I mean, with this?”
He thinks for a moment. “I’m comfortable with you.”
“But—”
He kisses the back of my head. “It’s you. That makes it easier.”
There’s nothing left to divide us: We know exactly how fucked up we are. We’ve had such disastrous misunderstandings already that there’s nothing left to come. Sam freaks at the idea of being human and male and large? Yes. I have problems with the idea of pregnancy, and there’re no contraceptives in YFH-Polity? Sure. We’re past all that. It’s all going to be very simple from now on.
So we towel each other dry and I take his hand and together we go to the bedroom, where presently we make love again, tenderly and slowly.
THE next morning, I stumble downstairs late, disheveled and happy, to find there is a letter waiting for me on the front hall carpet. It’s like a bucket of cold water in the face. I pick it up and carry the piece of paper into the kitchen and read it while the coffee machine gurgles and chugs to itself.
To: Mrs. Reeve Brown
From: The Polity Administration Committee
Dear Mrs. Brown
It is now four months since your arrival in YFH-Polity. In this time, numerous