WWYK 3.1 (Patreon)

Here we go, getting into the swing of things fast this time around. Let me know what you think on this one, please. The tone is a little more serious than anything before in this series but we probably won't have such drama much more than this. Just want to know how it lands.

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Chapter 1 - The Quiet Confession

TrickiNicki: morning bb, it’s the big day!! u excited or what lmaooo

NEETSPEAK: I am comprised of mixed emotions ranging from excitement to anxiety and everything in between. I could be doing better, but I could also be doing worse. As you said, the time has finally arrived, and all I can do is face the choice I’ve made head-on.

TrickiNicki: cool cool

figured this would happen

u sure you don’t want me to swing by ur place before u head to the library?

I could do ur hair, pick u out a nice outfit, maybe try out a little makeup lollll

NEETSPEAK: No.

I appreciate the sentiment.

But no.

TrickiNicki: figures *sigh*

just trying to help raise that confidence of urs girl

NEETSPEAK: What confidence?

TrickiNicki: exactly

NEETSPEAK: Either it works out, or it doesn’t. I’m prepared to do anything it takes to make this succeed, but I don’t want to overly rely on your help.

How is he today, though? Is he excited or nervous as well? What general vibe should I be expecting?

TrickiNicki: he’s still asleep rn lmao he’s def gonna need some calming down once he’s up tho, if u don’t mind

got a fun surprise for himmmm

NEETSPEAK: Please.

TrickiNicki: aight, so what’s the game plan? I wanna know what ur strat is because there’s a lot of ground u need to cover

NEETSPEAK: I will tell Nate why I reacted the way I did during the tail end of senior year after he confessed to me. Hopefully, he will understand, and then we will discuss our feelings on the topic. If he hates me, that will be that. If he doesn’t, I guess we’ll see where things go from here.

TrickiNicki: kk, but make absolutely sure u don’t avoid any of that or clam up

we both know u have trouble with the whole ‘emotions’ thing and especially with conflict, so…

ugh, I would feel sooooo much better if u would just let me come with him and mediate

it’s amazing ur trying to do this on ur own, and I don’t wanna belittle that hard decision. I’m proud of u, but u also need to be realistic about ur strengths

NEETSPEAK: Thank you for your concern. I hope your fears are misplaced and we get the fairy tale ending where we all live happily ever after.

TrickiNicki: never read a fairy tale where prince charming rides off with two princesses instead of one lmaooo

NEETSPEAK: Maybe Nate can write one to that effect if he’s so inclined?

TrickiNicki: feel free to spring it on him lol gonna let u go now tho

K says good luck btw

NEETSPEAK: I know. She messaged me too.

TrickiNicki: just making sure, things are intense over there for her lol

is it cool if I stop by ur place after work to see how things went?

NEETSPEAK: I would appreciate that.

TrickiNicki: cool, good luck and see u then!!!

oh, wait

b4 I forget

DON'T RUSH THIS

that would be like the worst thing u could do

NEETSPEAK: I won't.

TrickiNicki: I'm srs

NEETSPEAK: As am I.

TrickiNicki: gud

***

Friday had arrived after two long, grueling days of waiting. The anticipation Nate felt during the build-up was even worse than the dread he went through while waiting for the early reception to Saving a Pair of Bitchy Maids, and even the continued success of his newest release did little to calm his nerves. His work on the follow-up story crawled to a halt, he was feeling less frisky, and his mind was grinding away as it turned over the same thought without end.

At this point, Nate had entirely convinced himself that Nicki's friend was none other than his primary crush in high school that ended poorly, Shizuka Hasegawa. Everything lined up a little too well for him to ignore the possibility. Nicki was weirdly pushy about his thoughts towards Shizuka, for one, and there was the fact that Nicki wouldn’t tell him her friend’s name or show him a picture. All he knew was that she was a virgin and a librarian, which was one of the few careers he could actually picture Shizuka thriving in.

His attempts during the last few days to get something out of Nicki to confirm his suspicions fell on deaf ears, as his girlfriend proved more guarded than ever. That she repeated the same stuff like ‘she’s shy’ or ‘she wants you to go in blind’ didn’t help convince him. More than anything else, Nate thought that Nicki’s refusal to outright confirm or deny said the most about the situation.

The words rang hollow and flat whenever she said, ‘it’s not Shizuka’. Was there a chance it was all in Nate’s head? Sure. But there was also a chance that none of this was real and that he’d wake up from a coma any second now, so that argument didn’t track. All signs pointed to yes, which only raised further questions.

How did Nicki even become friends with Shizuka in the first place, and why would she try to hook him up with his old crush? Perhaps the only doubt he had about all this was that Shizuka ghosted him after he’d confessed to her in senior year, so it was tough to imagine her signing up to be his fuck buddy four years after the fact. On that matter, Nicki kept saying how she was cool with whatever happened and that they’d work through it as a group if feelings became involved, but she couldn’t have picked a worse partner for Nate to fuck with no strings attached.

There were strings with Shizuka- enough damn strings to trip over them and get all tangled up in… but there was always the chance that Nicki was playing 4D chess while Nate was stuck playing checkers. It didn’t matter that she enjoyed playing the role of his bratty submissive. Nicki was anything but the blonde bimbo she loved to doll herself up as. She was unequivocally more brilliant than Nate, and he’d admit as much any day of the week.

Moreover, Nicki was, well… tricky, which only added to his the thoughts buzzing around his mind the last two days. At least it was almost over, and he could get back to work soon. Today was the day, and whatever happened, he’d finally be in on the secret.

Nate currently found himself sitting downstairs on his nicest recliner. It was twelve, and he was to meet with Nicki’s friend at the Willowbrook Public Library at two. “So you’re really not going to come?” He asked once again for clarification, hoping the answer would be different.

“I dunno, are you?” Nicki smirked up at him, the dull sound of vibration humming between his legs.

“I’m being serious,” Nate sighed and mentally kicked himself for somehow walking into that. “I just think it’d… mn… go easier on us both if you were there to introduce us…”

“Can’t. I already promised her I wouldn’t, and I told you that like five times already, babe. Why don’t you just chill and let it all go?” Nicki was on the ground before him, wearing a pair of pink, lacy panties and one of his Berserk t-shirts. If that sight wasn’t already heavenly enough, both of her hands were wrapped around Nate’s cock and slid up and down his shaft like mad, lubed to perfection by her excessive saliva.

“Maybe I’d have an easier time letting it all go if you took this thing off of me?” Nate complained as pleasure and frustration battled over his senses back and forth.

In response to his sudden spending spree on sex toys, Nicki had apparently stopped by a local sex shop after work last night to pick up a few small surprises. Nate promised to let her do whatever she wanted after he pulled the vibe and butt plug on her, true, but his current circumstances weren’t going to ease his tension any time soon.

Nicki had his cock and balls clamped by a tight, vibrating cock ring that paradoxically felt fucking amazing but also made it equally hard to cum. The device thrummed nonstop, teasing his sensitive nerves and sending riveting waves reverberating through his heavy, aching balls.

“I mean, yeah,” Nicki shrugged noncomittally. “It would be easier. But it also wouldn’t be as much fun… after last night, I could use a little more fun.” She gave him a pouty lip and a stink eye.

“You had plenty of fun!” Nate countered with a sudden hiss.

“Not enough!” Nicki snapped at him, her fingers dancing around his tip in just the right way to make him squirm and throb. “It was our one-week anniversary, and we barely did anything!”

“We… ngh- we went three rounds, you sucked me off twice, and I ate you out just as many times!”

“Exactly,” Nicki looked off to the side, dissatisfied. “Barely anything. I didn't even get to break out any of these toys on you, babe.”

Nate sighed at how difficult his lover could be, then shook his head. “As much as I’d like to make up for how… how distracted I’ve been lately, shouldn’t I be- mn- getting ready soon?”

“As soon as you get off, yeah. I already told you not to expect sex from this first meet-up, but I think you’d be better off if you relieved some tension before you go. The ring is helping. When you cum, it’s gonna be huuuuuge…!” Nicki’s eyes sparkled with mischievous intent, showing precisely where her interests lie.

“Then make me cum already, damn it…!” Nate whined as Nicki gave his tight balls a loving squeeze.

After checking her phone and the time, Nicki relented. “I guess we do have to get a move on sooner or later… fine, but only because you’re cute as heck like this, babe. Just for you, I’m gonna pull out the big guns.”

Nicki rifled through the bag from the sex shop and opened up something outside of Nate’s view. The next thing he knew, she was pouring a bottle of lube all over his shaft and massaging it into his sensitive flesh nice and deep. He let out a sigh of contentment and allowed himself to close his eyes for but a moment- all the time Nicki needed to strike.

Nate gasped as the cold, pleasurable feeling of a silicone fleshlight slid its way down his titanic cock, its insides ribbed and spiked for his pleasure. “Gah- fuck, Nicki! Are you serious right now…?!”

“Surprise!” Nicki beamed. She was eating up the sight of him all helpless like this. “Feel free to have at it, babe. You’ll cum in no time flat after you’ve had a little of this!” She said, emphasizing her words with deep and powerful strokes of her hand.

Each stroke made Nate quiver and twitch, and if he weren’t so distracted by the thought of his oncoming mystery date, he surely would’ve been flooded with inspiration for his writing. He loved how this woman kept him on his toes, and that wasn’t about to change.

“Well?” Nicki asked. “How do you like it?”

“It’s great, but…”

She raised an eyebrow. “But?”

“I’m just- ngh… just saying it’ll do the job, but it’s not the best stroker I’ve ever had or anything.”

“Wow,” Nicki jokingly made her mouth drop low enough for her lollipop to fall straight out. “Last time I get your ungrateful ass an anniversary present.”

“Nicki, if you had a dick, you’d understand that there’s just no beating the kind of pocket pussies coming out of Japan. That shit is on such a different level than everything in the world. It’s not even fair.”

“Hm, hm. I see how it is. Only the finest onaholes imported straight from Tokyo are good enough for Mr. Masters, huh?” Nicki sped up, causing Nate’s shaft to throb harder and his voice to grow heavier as he moaned at her relentless pace. “Guess it’s no use, and I should just quit while I’m ahead and save myself some effort? I mean, if it doesn’t compare, why bother…?”

“Wait… wait…!” Nate bucked his hips into the fake pussy, adoring how her hand squeezed it around his cock. “It’ll get the job done, I’m… I’m not far off… I wasn’t saying you should stop or anything like that, I…”

“You’re so lame.” Nicki snorted. “Seriously, babe. Like I was ever gonna stop.”

Nicki went into overdrive, watching her man in total enthrallment as she sped up as fast as she could go. Nate had a date soon, and he needed to get ready. There was no reason to hold back, and she was interested in how hard the tag team of sex toys would end up getting him off when it came down to the wire.

The answer was ‘ludicrously’ hard.

Nicki slammed down the silicone tube onto his vibrating base one last time as Nate howled heavily, his groaning echoing throughout the living room. The pleasure he felt was so mind-numbing that the cock ring couldn’t stem the tide, and the pressure it released was enough to make his vision fade to white. His typical inhuman amount of cum quickly filled up the pocket pussy and gushed onto his pelvis with every shot fired until he was firing blanks, and Nicki turned off the ring and slipped both toys off of her lover, looking quite pleased with herself.

Nate was reduced to an insensate puddle of quivering aftershocks, but it was hard to deny how much better he felt once his climax had subsided. This wasn’t just his typical morning milking. It was a full body cleanse of electric bliss that renewed the soul and left him ready as he’d ever be for the day ahead.

Grinning up at him like a cat, Nicki removed her lollipop and drew closer. “So, how are we feeling?”

“Amazing…” Nate was forced to admit. “But I maintain that I got off so hard because of the quality of your service, not the quality of the fleshlight.”

“I’ll take the compliment,” Nicki snickered. “It was only ten bucks, anyway. Not like I was expecting a world-class fake pussy- that’s why I doubled it up with the ring for maximum effect.”

“It was a shockingly powerful combo, no doubt. Thanks a lot for the present, Nicki.”

“No prob, babe. Now don’t mind me while I help myself to mine.” Nicki looked into his eyes as she proceeded to do the sexiest thing imaginable. She tilted the fleshlight over like a can of beer and let the thick dick juice pour into her mouth, making exaggerated sounds of deliciousness as his cum slid down her throat.

Just as Nate was about to sigh at the beautiful sight, she leaned onto his lap and started licking up all the cum that spilled over the side. She lapped up his pelvis with her hot tongue like the crazed sex kitten she was, horny as ever for more. Nicki just had to end the service by giving him a cleanup blowjob, but unlike usual, she managed to keep herself from getting too absorbed in her work and eased off once he’d been sucked clean.

By the time she was done, an immense weight had been lifted from Nate’s chest. A lot of the tension was gone, and he was ready for whatever came next- at least for as long as his high lasted. He’d probably relapse once it got closer to go and see Nicki’s friend, but for now, he was golden.

“Have I told you how much I love you yet today?” Nate asked as he reclined in his recliner, Nicki draping herself over the arms and resting her back across his lap.

“Sure did, right after we woke up,” Nicki ran one of her painted nails along his chin to his scruffy chin stubble. “But far be it from me to say it doesn’t bare repeating.”

“I love you, Nicki.” Nate sealed the statement with a kiss which was reciprocated and then some.

“Love you, too.” There was a blush on her cheeks, and her pupils dilated from romantic excitement, but the hesitation over saying those words had just about fully cleared up for her. It was still marginally embarrassing, though, so she quickly sped things along to the next topic. “Now, let’s talk about what’s gonna happen in a bit here.”

Nate went in for the kill. “Yes, sure. I’d love to hear all about how I’ll be meeting up with Shizuka today, please. Really, any details you could share with me on that would be just grand.”

She didn’t flinch, but she did look away for a split second. Nicki was mulling something over in her mind. If Nate had to guess, he figured she was arguing whether or not it was worth keeping this charade going any longer. The truth was a bit more complicated, but he was close enough.

When she spoke, it was in a hushed and deliberate tone.

“Putting Shizuka aside for a second, let’s say my friend is someone you have a complicated past with.”

“Hypothetically.”

”Yes, this is purely hypothetical,” Nicki nodded studiously. “What would you do? How would you react?”

“I’m going to meet her,” Nate sighed. “Doesn’t that say enough as it is?”

“Humor me, babe.”

“I humor you way too much as it is,” Nicki jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow, prompting a follow-up response. “Alright, alright,” he laughed. “I’d be nervous as fuck about it, but I’d want to know what the hell is going on, too.”

“Are you open to clearing the air, then?” Nicki looked hopeful.

“I’m open to a lot. I just… don’t know what to expect, and that scares me.”

Nicki nodded, and things were quiet momentarily as she chose her words carefully. “A lot can change in four years, Nate, but some things stay the same. Don’t judge until you have all the facts. That’s all I can really ask of you.”

“I’ll try and keep that in mind, but I just don’t get what you’re after with all of this. You can say you wanna have kinky threesomes with me all you like, but trying to hook me up with someone who I’m obviously still hung up on despite having the best girlfriend in the world? I don’t follow.”

“Maybe the fact that I’m trying to hook you up with someone you’re obviously still hung up on is part of why I’m the best girlfriend in the world, babe.”

“You realize you just totally said the quiet part out loud, right?”

“Hypothetically, perhaps,” Nicki shrugged, aloof as ever. “I still haven’t named any names.”

“Right,” Nate rolled his eyes. “And you’re doing this solely out of the kindness of your heart?”

“Yes, Nate, but it’s not just a kindness to you. This person, this… mutual acquaintance of ours… she really is a good friend of mine, and she means a lot to me. She wants this to happen with you, and that’s more than enough reason for me to want it, too, even putting aside my kinkier motives. Do you have any idea how much courage it took her to agree to this, babe?”

“I’d imagine a lot less than it would’ve taken if you hadn’t spammed her with pics of me railing you the shit out of you?”

“That was all just greasing the wheel,” Nicki waved him off dismissively. “And I only kept sending them because she asked me to. You know what that means, right?”

“Yes,” Nate nodded with a lack of confidence. “Or at least what I think it does.”

The implication that Shizuka- the girl who ghosted him after his confession four years ago- wanted to fuck him… well, it was hard not to dwell on that and how little sense it made. To even think that she was getting off to their pics and sex tape- getting off to him… it was more than Nate could process.

He had to stop himself short lest he lose precious time trying to puzzle that one out. “Either way, none of this will make any sense unless I just go and meet her, right?”

“Pretty much,” Nicki sighed. “Babe, being totally real for a sec, you know that being all secretive with you is a total trucking drag, right? I wouldn’t be doing this vague, cryptic bullshit if she didn’t absolutely insist on it.”

“I figured that much out, yeah. I know how… particular she can be.”

“Exactly,” Nicki followed up with an even more profound, more relieved sigh than the one that came before. “I can tell you so much more once you’ve gone and gotten on with it, but she’s adamant that all of this be done her way, or else she might chicken out or panic or whatever. I wanted to be there when you guys reconnect, but… I don’t know, babe. This is important for her.”

Nate appreciated the honesty, and he now knew how badly the last few days had dragged her down, too. Even so, there was still a burning question on his mind.

“I’m not expected to outright forgive her, am I?” He asked pointedly.

“No,” Nicki placed her hand on his should and frowned. “No, not at all. Your feelings are totally valid, babe, and neither of us is trying to take away from the genuine pain you went through because of her. God knows I’d feel the same in your shoes. I’m only asking you to listen to what she says and keep an open mind. If not for her, then for me.”

Nate closed his eyes and took in all of Nicki’s words, letting them stew in his thoughts for what felt like minutes.

“So it really is Shizuka.”

“Yes,” Nicki said. “My friend is Shizuka… hypothetically.”

Nate nodded his head in silence. It was as good an admission as she could give him, but it was better than nothing. This was really happening, then. He probably should’ve felt plenty of emotions at the revelation, but Nate experienced a calm, quiet mix of nostalgia and apprehension more than anything else.

“Guess I should get ready, then…” Nate said, patting Nicki’s thigh and gesturing for her to get up. “I assume you’re going to want to help?”

Nicki sat up and gave him a funny look. “What, you assume just because I like doing my makeup and wearing fancy clothes that I’m the kind of overbearing girlfriend who’ll want to fuss over you and make sure you look nice and stylish for your date?”

Nicki slumped her shoulders and pouted when Nate responded with a silent stare. “Fine, you got me. Any objections?”

“I don’t mind letting you have your way with me-”

“Phrasing.”

Nate rolled his eyes. “You already did that,” he countered, then moved on. “I was only going to say that it’s not like she’ll even care what I look like when I show up.”

“That’s probably true,” Nicki sighed. “But this is more for me, babe. I’m nervous, too, and it’ll make me feel better knowing I did my best with you before sending my man off to the proverbial slaughter.”

“Huh. A rare misfire from the talented Miss Parker. You’re usually so good at hyping me up for things.”

“You’d think a writer would understand hyperbole when he sees it, but I guess that one might be a bit beyond the scope of your subject matter…” Nicki strategically licked her lollipop and batted her eyes at him. “Now, are you gonna let me do my thing, or what?”

“I leave my humble self in your oh-so-capable hands, Nicki.”

Satisfied with his acceptance, she led him upstairs, and they shared a brisk shower where Nicki made sure every last nook and cranny of Nate’s body was thoroughly cleaned. The obsessive-compulsive way she washed him ended up giving Nate a hard-on thanks to just how explorative she got during the shower, but he wasn’t getting any help with it, no matter how much they both wanted it.

When they finished in the shower, Nicki showed off a skill he didn’t know she possessed and helped trim his stubble, refining his scruffy chin goatee into something a little less ‘chill stoner’ and more ‘chill stoner who is actually somewhat cool’. She brushed his shaggy black hair thoroughly and sprayed it down using a multitude of products that had seemingly manifested themselves in his house overnight. It had only been a week since they started dating, and she’d already made good on her word to conquer the bathroom… they would need some shelves or something for all the hair products and makeup Nicki had been smuggling over at this rate.

For all the junk she sprayed on him, Nate’s naturally shaggy black hair didn’t look all that different than it usually did. Maybe it was a bit more trendy, but fuck if he saw a difference. All that mattered to him was that Nicki seemed satisfied with her work, giving it her approval before moving on to his wardrobe.

Nate’s personal style could best be summed up in two words- ‘apply yourself’. He didn’t care about looking good or spending money on clothes, opting for whatever was comfortable and enjoying graphic tees that broadcasted his love for many of his nerdy interests.

There wasn’t much to work with, but Nicki still scrounged up an ensemble out of the aether that made Nate look great. It consisted of a nice hoodie, some baggy jeans, one of his few button-up shirts, and a cheap silver necklace Nicki found lying around that used to belong to his uncle. Everything was minimal, but that was all it took to bring out his latent charm. Nate was the kind of guy who could pull off ‘lazy’ and absolutely rock it, but he never knew it until now.

He whistled at himself in the mirror after everything was over and done. “Damn. No idea who the guy staring back at me is, but he looks like he’s ready to go and neg some girls until they throw their pussies at him.”

“Not how that works, babe.” Nicki raised a brow and held back a snort.

“Pft, like you would know. You’re just a dumb female ruined by modern feminism, tricked into thinking you matter as anything more than a warm hole.”

“This sounds scarily practiced,” she teased. “You didn’t have a secret incel phase I never knew about, did you?”

“It’s an abyss I find amusing to gaze into from time to time, and I like laughing at all the online weirdoes who refer to women exclusively as ‘females’ who stare back.” Nate shrugged and turned to face his love, summoning up a smile.

“Very progressive coming from someone who specializes in writing the most chauvinistic form of erotica under the sun.”

“Sure, but you love me for it.”

“I do, you handsome, chauvinistic bastard…” Nicki gave him a sarcastic sigh and a peck on the cheek. “But try and leave the alpha-incel gigachad pickup artist crap home for today, okay? The goal is to reconnect with her, not trick her into camgirling for you in Romania.”

“I’ll try and remember that,” he laughed softly and checked the time on his phone. It was half past one, meaning he really had to be on his way.

The Willow County Public Library was only a few minutes away, but Nate truthfully didn’t want to wait any longer than he had to. Whatever was about to happen, it had been a long time coming. He was still full of confidence from Nicki’s tension relief exercise earlier that morning and from the excellent job she’d done making him look nice, so he wanted to get going before the anxiety of reuniting with Shizuka inevitably crept back in.

Nicki went with him downstairs, and she was now wearing a white, unbuttoned blouse that exposed her leopard skin bra and some tight black jeans. She fussed with his outfit a tiny bit at the door before giving him her final approval. Before leaving, Nate made the obligatory gesture of asking what she planned on getting up to while he was gone.

“Just gonna keep grinding village quests,” Nicki shrugged. “Farm for a better insect glaive, prop up Kamura’s local economy by inflating the market with more monster parts than they could process in a lifetime, you know the drill. After I get off work tonight, I was thinking of stopping by our mutual friend’s place to hear how things went straight from the source.”

“Planning on coming back here or no?”

“Depends,” Nicki played with her lollipop and frowned. “I’m hoping you’ll be in a good mood, but… there’s still no telling how this is gonna go, and I’m just putting it out there that I can stay at my bro’s tonight if you need some space.”

And there it was.

It was just a hint, but the anxiety was coming back. There was a chance things could go very, very wrong the moment he and Shizuka were face to face, and Nate would be forced to confront four years' worth of bottled-up emotions.

Nicki picked up on the shift in his mood as soon as it happened, grabbing his hands and squeezing them tight. “That’s just a worst-case scenario, babe. If you go into this with negative expectations, a negative outcome is all you’re gonna get.”

“I don’t even know what kind of outcome I want from this, though…” Nate admitted with a long, drawn-out sigh. “I’m torn between wanting to make up with her, wanting to yell and vent at her for how she made me feel, and wanting to throw caution to the wind and just… do it, if she’s actually willing. It makes me feel like a scumbag for having these thoughts about her, but-”

Nicki took back her hands, placed them on Nate’s cheek after removing her lollipop, and pulled him in for a deep kiss with plenty of tongue included. Though it was full of passion, it ultimately soothed him more than anything else. He stared into her bright blue eyes as she pulled away.

“You’re doing the brain thing too much again, babe.” She said in total seriousness.

“…And what is the ‘brain thing’, again? Just so we’re on the same page here.”

“Using it,” Nicki said, then placed her pointer finger over his heart. “Try going with whatever this one says instead. It might take you to some strange places, but it probably knows better than the noisy asshole upstairs who won’t shut the fuck up about every little thing that might go wrong.”

Nate laughed. His worries were excised so swiftly that it was like they’d never been there at all. He grabbed Nicki by the wrist and pointed her finger at his groin. “And what about this one?”

“Him? He’s got his upsides, but he’s the worst of the lot.” Nicki clicked her tongue and popped her candy back into her mouth. “Don’t follow his advice, or else you’ll totally end up doing something even dumber than either of us can see coming.”

Something about that rang true to Nate, and he was thankful for the advice. “I’ll be on my way, then.”

“She’ll be waiting for you in the manga section.”

“Shocker.”

“Yeah, yeah. Take your time,” Nicki waved him off as he turned away, her eyes glaring at his backside. “Those jeans might be baggy, but they fit snug as a bug where it counts, babe. Snug as a bug.”

Nate didn’t even bother saying anything back to that, simply laughing to himself and allowing Nicki her right as his girlfriend to check out the buns until he entered his crappy car and drove away.

As Nate crossed the empty afternoon streets of Willowbrook, his thoughts drifted toward the destination they were destined to arrive at- Shizuka. He tried to recall the last time he’d ever seen her, which was their graduation ceremony. It was a little surprising that she even attended, what with how much she disliked large crowds, but he assumed her parents probably wouldn’t have let her skip something so important.

He watched her go up and grab her diploma, and even to this day, he could still remember how red and sweaty the poor girl was. Nate would’ve been sympathetic if he wasn’t so hurt by her at the time, but he was hurt, and the only things he thoughts he had toward her at the time were things he didn’t like looking back on. As she turned around with the parchment in hand, Shizuka stared at him straight on out of everyone in the crowd. It had to have been an accident, but the eye contact caused her to linger on the dais for an awkward amount of time until a few douchebags laughed at her, causing Shizuka to hurry away to do who knows what.

That was the last he’d seen of her, but it wasn’t the last time they spoke. He sent Shizuka sporadic texts for a few months after graduation, texts he wished he had never sent and that reflected poorly on him. Though he never adopted any of the incel talking points he and Nicki had made fun of earlier in these texts, they were still pretty bad.

After the fifth one, Shizuka broke her silence with a single sentence that served as the last line of communication between them for four years.

‘I’m sorry.’

Those two words sobered him up and made him realize how immature he’d been, and Nate chose to simply move on as best he could and pretend none of it had ever happened. That wasn’t an option anymore. By confronting Shizuka, he’d also have to own up to his own mistakes, and that was fine by him.

The library was just around the corner, and Nate’s time to quietly contemplate the future was coming to an end. As he pulled into the parking lot, he tried to break down the reasons he was doing this. It wasn’t out of a shallow desire for potential sex to improve his writing, it wasn’t to appease Nicki, and it wasn’t in the hopes of magically working out all of his problems with Shizuka, either.

Nicki had prepared him for the worst-case scenario, but what was on the other end of the spectrum?

Did Nate actually want to enter into a relationship with Shizuka after all this time- sexual or otherwise? Were the embers still burning for her in his heart even strong enough for that? The answer evaded him, and Nate was partially glad it did. Shame he had to go and discover the answer.

As Nate parked, he realized there was only one car in the entire lot besides his own. At first, he thought the place was closed, but that wasn’t the case. The hours listed on the front door said as much. Even though it was a Friday afternoon before school let out, Nate still couldn’t help thinking the empty lot said something depressing about the current state of libraries in his country.

The thought crossed his mind that if the other car presumably belonged to the head librarian, how did Shizuka get there? That was before he recalled how terrified she was of driving back in the day, so she likely wouldn’t have had a car, anyway. It must’ve been a bus, or maybe she walked, or…

Where was Nate even going with any of this? Nowhere, that’s where. He was idling outside of the front door. Buying time. Stalling. After catching himself in the act, Nate forced himself to be done with it, took a deep breath, and marched inside.

The Willow County Public Library was a place Nate was familiar with, having visited its halls many times in his youth to satisfy his craving for the sort of literature his uncle didn’t provide- the weird kind of books that didn’t have any pictures in them. It was the only public library he’d ever been to, but it was reasonably large by his account, and Nate imagined there was nothing that stood out about it compared to any other.

He looked left and right, scanning his surroundings. There was a help desk to his right where the head librarian, an older, white-haired woman in her early fifties who Nate vaguely recognized, was in the middle of an afternoon catnap. No, not a catnap. She wasn’t just dozing- the woman was knocked the fuck out to the degree that she was snoring. Guess this place saw even less traffic than he thought...

Nate’s familiarity with the building led him forward. The manga section was in one of the back corners, so he took the shortest path to get there. Along the way, Nate crossed the audiobook aisle and had to restrain his bitterness. The damn things were so expensive to produce, and they were a giant gamble for an indie author such as himself, so he’d never dipped his toe in that side of the business but wasn’t above feeling jealous over those who did.

Maybe if his works sold better, it would be something to look into, but not now. It wasn’t worth dipping into his inheritance purely for an experiment that would likely go tits up.

Audiobooks became the least of Nate’s concerns as the manga section grew ever closer. It was isolated from the rest of the building, blocked off by three large bookshelves in a way that made it like its own little room. The outward-facing shelves had American comics, and the backside ones had manga. You couldn’t see inside the manga room unless you were directly at its entrance, so Nate had a moment to prepare his nerves before taking the plunge.

He lingered there for nearly a minute, fighting his nerves and struggling against his anxiety. He tried to listen closely and see if he could pick up the sound of her breathing or any other clue that might tip him off if anyone was waiting for him within, but after a certain point, Nate gave up and focused on summoning his resolve. It was time to figure out what he wanted from all of this.

Nate turned the corner and stood at the entrance.

There was a long coffee table In the center of the room, and on both sides was a big leather chair that looked comfy as all hell. One of the chairs was occupied, and against all the odds, it wasn’t Shizuka.

Nate looked closer at the stranger, seeing she was a relatively chubby girl roughly his age with ridiculously long, messy black hair trailing down her back and falling off the sides of her armrest. The girl was cute by his standards, and she wore a gray sweater with shoulder slits, a brown belt holding up a purple skirt, and thigh-highs of an even darker purple color. The screen of her phone was reflected in the massive circular glasses on her face, the girl scrolling endlessly through pages upon pages of text at blinding speed, totally indifferent to her surroundings.

Nate didn’t know what to say. This was Nicki’s friend, right? But… that would mean…

The girl hadn’t noticed him, so he squinted and looked even closer. A familiar face was visible under the shroud of kelplike bangs and beneath a layer of baby fat that wasn’t present the last time he’d seen her. His heart stopped. Nate lost his breath.

“Shizuka?” He asked in a hushed whisper.

The girl raised her head and turned her expressionless face directly at him, staring back with her vivid yet lethargic green eyes in utter silence. Uncertainty filled the air as she looked in his direction, but it was undeniably Shizuka. She changed more than Nate thought was possible of her. Gone was the rail-thin, flat-chested Japanese girl with the perfectly-trimmed bobbed haircut he crushed on in high school. In her place was a woman with a body that, in Nate’s humble opinion, put most others to shame, possessing meaty thighs, breasts even bigger than Nicki’s, and curves upon curves.

While it was somewhat shallow of Nate to have that as his initial reaction, focusing on her looks made it easier to combat the shock he was experiencing upon seeing Shizuka after so long. A thousand conflicting emotions emerged from his core just from looking at her. Nate was happy, and he was sad. Confused and hurt.

Bouncing between extremes every other second, her ceaseless staring didn’t help matters in the slightest. Shizuka's silence made him think they were on the verge of repeating senior year all over again and that she would stand up and make a run for it any second now.

“Nate,” Shizuka said, her voice so soft he practically had to strain his ears to hear her- same as ever. “Good afternoon.”

“…You too?” Nate forced himself to say back, but silence stretched on as soon as the words left his mouth. He didn’t know where to go from here or how to process any of what was happening. This was potentially the most awkward moment of his life, and Nate went through having his parents discover he wanted to become an erotica author, for Christ’s sake.

“There is a second chair. If you grow tired of standing, you may want to take advantage of this fact.” Shizuka turned her phone’s display off and gestured towards the other chair with her hand. The familiar, stilted way she spoke snapped him back to reality, grounding Nate in the moment.

“Don’t mind if I do,” Nate replied and did just that. Shizuka didn’t look away from him for even a second. She did so unblinkingly, giving him the impression of a curious reptile scanning the middle distance. “These are nice chairs, damn.”

“Yes. They are indeed of high quality.”

Silence again. Silence and staring.

This wasn’t working. Nate had nothing to say, and Shizuka wouldn’t steer the conversation, so he had to force things along however he could- even if things were a little blunt.

“If I’m being honest, I have no idea why this is happening.”

“Nicki didn’t tell you?”

“Didn’t tell me what? Be more specific, please.”

“I…” Shizuka paused briefly and blinked for the first time that he’d noticed. “I volunteered to have sex with you to help you improve as a writer, per Nicki’s theory of ‘writing what you know’. I thought I was clear on that matter and that she would have properly conveyed my interest.”

Nate had forgotten what true bluntness really felt like. For someone who spoke in such a quiet voice, Shizuka had a way of really beating you over the head with her words every now and again when you least expected it.

“Nicki made it sound like there wouldn’t be any sex and that this was much more of a, ‘we need to sit down and talk about our shit’ kind of thing.”

“I… don’t have ‘shit’ to talk about?” She tilted her head.

“Not being literal,” Nate rubbed his forehead. “I meant emotional baggage.”

Shizuka furrowed her brow and bit her lip. “Damn it. That one was so obvious, too. I really should have assumed it wasn’t literal.”

A hint of a smile played at Nate’s lips for the briefest of seconds. It was a little inappropriate, but he’d always enjoyed the rare moments Shizuka’s cold expression thawed from frustration at her lack of common sense and her frequent inability to pick up on social cues. It was scary how easy it was to slip back into old habits, so Nate forced the smile off his face.

“So, what… you’re here to have sex with me, and we’re just not going to touch on senior year?”

Another crack in her facade as the flat line of her lips twitched into a frown. “We can touch on whatever you’d like to touch on, but yes. I intended to give myself to you if you’d have me.”

Nate gulped but didn’t allow himself to even think about that right now. “And how did you imagine this would go down? Was I just supposed to whip it out in a public library? Hell, don’t you work here, for that matter?”

“I do, but we only get a handful of visitors on any given day- Friday often being the least busy day of all. I finished most of my tasks hours ago. As far as sex goes, I assumed that would be how you wanted it, yes. That’s how it always goes in your stories, after all…” Shizuka tilted her head and stared, her long bangs falling to the side of her round face. “You feature exhibitionism in a staggering percentage of your bibliography- but when it comes to your stories featuring librarians, of which there are ten- the inclusion of a scene depicting sexual intercourse in a public library is one hundred percent guaranteed.”

“That’s…” Nate looked away, knowing it couldn’t be disputed. Someone had done their homework. Ironic since she always had to copy his after forgetting to do her own. “Hardly relevant.”

“It isn’t? I assumed all those stories were inspired by your fantasies about me.”

“You might have inspired some of them, sure,” Nate admitted off-handedly to keep himself from thinking too long about what she was saying. “But they’re just stories.”

“Hm. To think I used to be so ignorant as to your desires.”

“You were ignorant of more than just my desires, Shizuka.”

“Yes,” she blankly agreed. “I was.”

Nate felt bad after he said his last comment. It came out with a lot more bite than was intended.

“It’s a shame I couldn’t access your bibliography back then. If I could go back in time and give myself a copy of everything you’ve ever written, I would do so in an instant. Maybe that would’ve helped me better understand you… maybe it would’ve even helped me understand myself, too? Hard to tell.”

“I can’t speak on that last bit, but I thought I made my feelings as easy for you to understand as I possibly could have.”

“A fair point,” Shizuka adjusted her glasses. “Your confession and subsequent text messages over the months that followed indeed gave me more insight into the mind of my best friend than I knew what to do with.”

“Shit…” Nate felt like a dagger had just been shoved and summarily twisted in his heart. “About that. There’s nothing I regret more than sending you those nasty-”

“Every last word you sent came from a place of pain- a place I know all too well. Your messages may have hurt, but I’m not so oblivious as to believe I didn’t ‘deserve’ it to some degree. It doesn’t matter anymore. Time passed, and you luckily learned to vent your frustrations toward me in a much healthier manner than angry text messages- by occasionally inserting characters modeled after me into your writing for your self-insert protagonists to have sex with.”

From anyone else, that would’ve sounded like biting sarcasm laced with venom. Nate knew her better than that. “You know most people wouldn’t consider that a healthy alternative, right? And they certainly wouldn’t want to meet up with someone who regularly writes sexual fantasies about them.”

“Your reasoning is flawed, and you’re not taking two crucial factors into account.”

“And those would be?”

“Firstly, that I’m neurodivergent and am therefore not like ‘most people’.”

“Trust me, that hadn’t slipped my mind.” Nate stifled a laugh that he felt guilty about immediately after expressing it.

”Hm,” Shizuka hummed, utterly indifferent. “Fair. The other thing you aren’t considering is that perhaps you aren’t the only one living vicariously through your stories, Nate. Your readers do, too. Just as you found a form of therapy by writing out everything you wished you could’ve done to me, I found comfort through self-insertion. Each book was like peering into an alternate reality where I wasn’t quite so flawed and where things worked out for the better. Happy endings all around. Granted, there were almost always a number of other girls in the mix, but that’s exciting in its own way.”

The degree to which Shizuka had read his stories shouldn’t have surprised Nate, but it did. She always consumed any media set before her with a voracious appetite and a near-perfect recollection. Shizuka could recite every line from Fullmetal Alchemist or Inuyasha, but she had trouble with basic things like tying her shoes- that was just the kind of person she was. There were also her shallow standards regarding the entertainment she enjoyed to consider, which explained why she liked his work so much, but even so… it really did sound like she’d been helped by his writing.

Nate didn’t know how to take that. It was flattering- any author dreamed that their writing would have a significant impact on the life of another- but this situation was confusing as all hell. If Shizuka felt like this, then the biggest question of all was… why did things turn out the way that they did?

“Alright, if it’s not weird for you that I did all that, then I guess we can just move past it for now…” Nate thought it was a weird topic to put a pin in and brush to the side, but compared to how she could’ve taken it, this was vastly preferable to a restraining order. “Can you guess what I want to ask you next, Shizuka?”

“I don’t like open-ended questions. I could think of thousands of things you might want to ask me, and all of them would be valid in their own right.”

“Try and narrow it down to the one you think is most likely.”

“You probably want to know why I acted like I did after you confessed and asked me to prom.” Shizuka assumed clinically.

“Pretty good guess, yeah,” Nate scratched the back of his head. “Hard to really move forward from here if you don’t tell me what was up with the thing that killed our friendship.”

“I… never meant to kill our friendship. Intentionally or otherwise.” A glimmer of tension appeared on Shizuka’s face. “I was in total shock.”

“For two whole months?” Nate asked incredulously, but when he looked closer at the person he was talking to, he remembered how likely it was for that to be the case.

“Can we, ah… perhaps… work up to this topic?” Shizuka dabbed her sleeve on her forehead, wiping up a trickle of sweat. “I realize its importance, but… you understand full well how I act under pressure.”

Dissatisfaction worked its way through Nate’s system. He knew he couldn’t expect many forthright answers from Shizuka but was hoping for some all the same. Talking about sensitive issues with her was like a minefield, one he was overly familiar with navigating. He could get her to open up. He just needed time.

“Sure,” he sighed, trying not to look frustrated as much as he could help it. If he couldn’t dive straight into the important issues, Nate figured he would seek answers to questions less serious. “So, how did you end up reading my stories, anyway?”

“I found out that you were a writer through Nicki.” Shizuka stated. She already looked relieved over the change in topic, though Nate thought he saw some guilt mixed in with her otherwise tranquil expression.

“Figures. I guess this is the part where I ask how you and Nicki know each other?”

Shizuka looked at him funny. “We went to the same high school? There were even a few classes the three of us took together simultaneously, such as creative writing with Miss Keller. Surely you remember?”

Nate didn’t know whether to laugh or be exasperated. “I meant how did you two end up becoming friends.”

“Oh. Yes, that would make more sense for you to ask.” Shizuka rubbed her chin and nodded. “As the head librarian here is a longtime friend of mine, she offered me a job here not long after graduation. I entered the workforce once I was mentally well enough to accept the offer. Nicki first showed up two and a half years ago, wanting to check out how large our manga collection was.”

Shizuka looked around at her immediate surroundings. “As you can see, the answer is ‘fairly’. She then came by several times a week to read. Every time she visited, she would assail me with questions on the series I’ve read, ask me for recommendations that might match her tastes, and eventually, she would have long, drawn-out discussions with me on various topics- some of them not even relating to anime or manga. Then she started hanging out with me after work once I overcame my fear of riding on her scooter. I had hardly so much as blinked before her name mysteriously manifested itself in my phone’s contacts list.”

Nate was forced to smile at that despite everything else. “Yeah, that certainly sounds like Nicki…”

Shizuka briefly smiled and nodded in agreement. “A year and a half ago, she happened to be reading your latest release in the chair you find yourself seated in. I had just finished sorting some returns and sat down to chat with her. I found it puzzling that she would be reading something on her phone instead of off the shelf, and when I asked Nicki about it, she brought you up and showed me your work.”

“Then I assume you read all my releases in a single sitting?” Nate raised a brow, knowing her all too well.

“Rabbit holes are my greatest weakness,” Shizuka sighed. “Once I stumble upon one, there’s no getting back out. I didn’t read everything all at once, though. Nicki was kind enough to share your fanfiction with me, so there was a significant backlog to work through.”

“God damn it, Nicki…” Nate sighed and felt some heat build in his cheeks.

“There’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Shizuka tried her best to comfort him, but her soft voice sounded as flat as ever. “I had fun reading the perverse retelling of things you enjoy.”

“I’m not ashamed of writing all that junk, but it’s still embarrassing to casually talk about… and hearing you liked it isn’t exactly the highest praise.”

“Hm,” Shizuka considered. “I suppose. You did always find it puzzling whenever I found entertainment in things you were unable to.”

“You liked the eighty straight episodes of filler in Naruto.”

“I thought many episodes gave opportunities for the expanded cast of characters to shine in a way that Kishimoto was unable to accomplish due to the harsh restrictions of writing a weekly manga series.” Shizuka cocked her head and blinked.

“You thought the Tokyo Ghoul anime was a solid adaptation.”

“It was interesting to see a condensed take that went in its own direction.”

“You liked Berserk 2016.” Nate narrowed his eyes.

Shizuka shifted around in her seat uncomfortably. She had no excuses for that one- just a sheepish nod. “I don’t see how my low threshold for entertainment affects my genuine enthusiasm and interest in your writing, Nate. I’ve followed you religiously since Nicki introduced me to that side of you, and I’m better off for it.”

Nate was starting to feel something dangerous coming on. He felt things were on the verge of snapping right back into place like they did with Nicki- that they were close to regaining what they once had. Nostalgia was blinding him, and it scared him that he didn’t mind as much as he thought he should have.

It was good to talk to Shizuka. Good to hear her voice, tease her for the same old things, and be in the same room as her. He’d missed this, and he’d missed her. But Nate didn’t want things to just realign and continue as they used to. He tried to keep up an emotional shield, but it was becoming increasingly difficult the longer the conversation stretched on.

Especially when she caught him by surprise. “Would you like to know what my favorite story of yours happens to be?”

Nate looked at her curiously. Because she had such low standards, Shizuka didn’t have any definitive favorites regarding most media. She liked everything more or less the same, and occasions where something stood out to her were rare.

“I guess so…” he proceeded with caution. “Which one?”

“The Quiet Confession.”

Of course it was.

He felt like an idiot for not having guessed as such, but he was tense and on the edge of his seat, so Nate felt he had a pretty good excuse for missing such an obvious answer. Nate grimaced and lowered his head. It didn’t help that he tried to block that one from his memory at every chance.

“Are you embarrassed again?”

“Hard not to be,” Nate sighed. “That was one of my first releases-”

“Your fourth short story, to be precise.”

“Yeah, right. But it’s not just that I’m critical of how it’s aged, it’s more that out of all the stories I wrote based off of you, The Quiet Confession is…”

“The least fictional?”

“To a point…”

The Quiet Confession was more or less an actual retelling of his four years of friendship with Shizuka, including all the little bits along the way that made him fall for her. The names might’ve been changed, but their history wasn’t.

There was the time Shizuka lost her glasses after some asshat bumped into her on the stairs, where Nate stayed after school for hours and hours helping her look for them. It was the first time she let him touch her, and she initiated a hug he would never forget.

A more memorable example was when Shizuka was afraid to go home since she'd have to show her parents her abysmal algebra test. Nate convinced her to walk around town with him instead, delaying the inevitable for a little longer. They visited a public park, got snacks at a convenience store, and wandered until their feet hurt. Nate summoned the courage to ask for her cellphone number by the end of their excursion- a request accepted with little fanfare.

Shizuka later texted him that she got in trouble for not being home right away on top of her algebra score, but she also stressed that it was worth it and that she liked spending time with him. Back then, something so simple was enough to give him butterflies in his stomach, and Nate stared at those words on his screen for hours, just thinking about her.

If an event defined his feelings for Shizuka, it was included in The Quiet Confession in some way, shape, or form. The only thing excluded was how their story ended, which was substituted for the cringiest, most embarrassing wish-fulfillment ending a shitty erotic author of his skill level could’ve cooked up. He envisioned Shizuka accepting his confession, and they went on to lose their virginities together on prom night in such a sickly-sweet manner that it made Nate queasy to think back on it.

The contrast between the fairy tale ending he crafted for himself and the way he actually did end up losing his V-card was hilarious in retrospect, but there was nothing about that book Nate was proud of. However, Nate still put it up for sale because he wasted too much time on it, and the sunken cost fallacy’s stranglehold on him was strong.

It was also the sole piece he’d ever written where there was only a singular love interest- truly a black stain on the legacy of haremlit author Max Masters.

“It was a nice story. I liked it a lot, even if it leaves me feeling depressed by the end of it.”

“Depressed because it didn’t actually happen?”

“Yes,” Shizuka did her best to look him right in the eyes. “If someone told me I could rewrite the past however I wanted, I would quickly run out of ink.”

Nate took a deep breath and met her gaze. “I think you’ve made your regret pretty obvious, but the question now is, where does that leave us? You didn’t want to hurt me, but how am I supposed to accept that you ghosted me and ran away every time I tried to talk to you? I could have moved on if you’d just rejected me, or told me you didn’t want to date, or-”

“I couldn’t have rejected you.” Shizuka insisted with surprising seriousness.

“But you couldn’t accept my feelings, either?”

“I… I needed time, Nate. A lot of time. My brain gets all scrambly sometimes the more I think about things- you know this. I seize up. I have panic attacks. When you confessed to me, it was like…” Shizuka seized up and rubbed her forehead as she relived the experience right there before his eyes. “Everything I thought I knew about myself shattered right then and there, and I was left to pick up the pieces on my own. If only I had more time, then-”

Nate frowned and broke off eye contact. He didn’t like feeling that he was the unreasonable one in this situation. It was a bitter pill to swallow, and he couldn’t easily do so without throwing out some token resistance.

“You had two months.”

“It wasn’t enough.”

“You could’ve called me when you were ready to talk, or-”

“Texted you?” Shizuka stared. “I tried. Several times… and every time I opened our chat with the intention to make things right, guess what was waiting for me?”

Nate’s heart sank in his chest. He knew better than to suggest maybe Shizuka shouldn’t have looked at his texts- the way she was, Shizuka likely read them over obsessively whenever she opened up their chat history. It was getting difficult to breathe, and Nate’s hand was shaky.

“It’s not your fault.” She tried to console him. “Not intentionally. I’m just… stupid. My brain doesn’t do what I tell it to, especially regarding emotions… but…”

Nate forced himself to look back at her. “But?”

“I’ve had more than enough time to process my emotions and figure out what I want to do, Nate. Things are different now. I can fix us.”

He answered with silence to try and get a reaction out of her, but the look on her face screamed she meant every word of it. There was conviction in her tired eyes- more fire than he’d ever seen.

“And what makes you think it’s not too late?”

“You’re here. I’m here. Isn’t that enough?”

“I have a girlfriend.” Nate looked away.

“One who has granted you her explicit permission to pursue whatever relationship with me you wish to in addition to the one you already have.”

“I could still choose that this isn’t worth the hassle and move on.”

“You could, but you’re not going to. You’re sitting there and talking with me as you try to figure out what you want out of this.”

Nate didn’t have an argument. Shizuka was right, and the longer he sat there, the more uncertain he became. She was planting enough seeds of doubt to grow a whole damn forest, and the temptation to follow along with her desires was strong.

“The real irony of it is that our roles have been reversed. Now you're the one with cold feet.”

“It’s not as simple as cold feet...” Nate sighed, slumping in his chair.

“Then what’s the problem? Do you…” Shizuka stuttered, her lip trembling as she tripped over her words. “Do you hate me, Nate? I… I would understand if you did, so please tell me if that’s the reason this can’t work. The sooner I know, the better.”

“I’ve never hated you,” the words left Nate’s mouth faster than he realized what he was saying. It took him a second to realize it was because the suggestion offended him. “Never. Things would’ve been so much damn simpler if I could’ve brought myself to hate you, but never in the last four years have I ever felt so low as to think anything but the world of you!”

Shizuka was silent as she registered his emotional outburst. The silence lasted on and on until she broke it by muttering a simple question. “Even now?”

She only hit him with two simple words, yet so much was riding on his response to them. Sometimes Nate hated the fact that he was honest to a fault.

“Even now...”

Shizuka smiled, and it was the biggest one he’d ever seen from her. God, she looked beautiful. It accentuated the roundness of her face, giving the young Japanese girl a near otherworldly glow. “Then let me make up for lost time, Nate. Let me show you how much you stand to gain for having carried that flame for so long.”

“I… don’t know if that’s a good idea,” Nate sighed, taking his gaze away from her smile despite how much it warmed his heart. “I think we should maybe pace this out. I’m still coming to terms with my feelings, and this conversation is taking a lot out of me.”

Her smile turned to a dull frown. “Did you not want to have sex with me today, then?”

Nate looked back at her, shocked at how casually she could ask such a thing. Between all the tension and heavy emotions, he almost forgot how she kickstarted this entire discussion. “Are you really pushing for that after everything we discussed, Shizuka? Seriously?”

“You did it with Nicki the same day you and she reconnected.” She pointed out.

“Putting aside the fact that she had a whole scheme to make sure that happened, there wasn’t a hint of baggage between Nicki and me. That was a totally different situation than… this.”

Shizuka nervously swallowed. Was she losing him? She’d already deviated from the plan too much, and she was terrified that if he left, he might change his mind once he’d had more time to think about their circumstances. There was no way she could let that happen. Not after how far she’s come.

Not after hearing definitively proof that he still loved her.

“You’re not thinking this through, Nate. The sooner we do this, the better.”

“I don’t think that’s the case.”

“But it is. Not only will it be good for us, it’ll be good for you. I read your newest short story. Saving a Pair of Bitchy Maids. Nicki was right, you know. Having sex made you a much better writer, so think of how much better you’ll get after you’ve had another feather in your cap.”

“Nicki isn’t a feather in my cap,” Nate said firmly. “And you wouldn’t be, either.”

“I wasn’t being literal.”

While still somewhat offended at her poor choice of words, he had to give her a soft chuckle for reversing that one on him. Shizuka took that as a sign to push on. “Think about it, Nate. You’ve fantasized about having sex with me in a public library so often that you still can’t get the scenario out of your head, even after writing ten books on the subject. I’m offering to give you that as an apology- to give you a chance to act out everything you’ve ever fantasized about doing to me.”

“T-That…” Nate was finding it challenging to breathe again, and blood was starting to flow to the area Nicki had warned him about. The one he wasn’t supposed to listen to. “Is really not something you and I should rush into.” He forced himself to say.

“But you want to do it, right?” She took his long silence as confirmation. “Good, because I don’t think you understand how serious I am about this. How much I prepped myself to do whatever it took for you to forgive me.”

“I’m… I’m not going to magically forgive you if we have sex, Shizuka.”

“Not right away,” she agreed. “But it would be a start, wouldn’t it?”

Nate’s brain said no, it wouldn’t, and it would damage their chances of healing by skipping a bunch of steps- and that wasn’t even getting into how bad of an idea public sex in a library was or how his years of sexual hang-ups towards her might cause him to act regrettably.

His heart told him to express his love but also to firmly establish boundaries and explain why he wasn’t comfortable taking that plunge yet while still insisting he was okay with exploring their newly rekindled relationship as it developed.

Lastly, his dick pointed out how Shizuka was more beautiful now than ever before, how he still loved her, and that she was offering him the world.

The third guy made the most compelling argument, but the first and the second guys forced Nate to remember Nicki’s promise, and he made an honest attempt to resist because of their efforts.

“I don’t know what it would be, but I don’t think it would be good. I have too many repressed feelings and sexual hang-ups toward you for us to just jump right into sex. I don’t trust myself not to get overly excited, and I might hurt you, especially since you’re…”

“A virgin?” Shizuka asked without hesitation. “Yes, I am, and I came to work today with the intention of not returning home as one. I don’t believe you understand the entirety of what I’m prepared to do for you, Nate. When I said you could do anything, I meant it. You don’t have to worry about hurting me. You have an endless amount of frustrations with me, and you now have the opportunity to vent them with my body. What more could you ask for?”

“Shizuka…” Nate ran his hand across his forehead. His eyes darted back and forth, and he started to sweat.

Sensing his willpower waver in the face of temptation, Shizuka upped the ante. She stood up from her chair and walked in front of Nate. With a blank face betrayed only by a slight blush, Shizuka pinched the bottom of her skirt in both hands and lifted. Thick, meaty thighs chubby enough for there not to be a gap were revealed to him, followed by a dark, tight pair of panties whose sides were sheer and whose center was topped with a black bow.

Nate’s eyes widened at the display- her chubby lower lips creating a delicious cameltoe only inches away from his face. He never dreamed he’d see Shizuka’s panties one day, let alone in such close proximity. It was like living out a childhood fantasy, though he remained well aware of the monkey’s paw scenario he found himself in.

“Touch me, Nate…” Shizuka whispered. “I want you to see how serious I am. Rub me, lick me, verify my virginity, anything you desire.”

The easily influenced pervert raised his hand. The smell was getting to him. It was different than Nicki’s, but he knew that scent in the air for what it was. Arousal. Shizuka wanted this. Nate wanted it, too, and it was as if the pheromones in the air made it harder for him to continue putting up a fight.

Maybe he was overthinking things, and it wouldn’t be so bad if he gave Shizuka what she wanted…?

“If I do this,” Nate said, already drawing closer with his right hand. “We're going to cross a line, and I don’t know what will happen to us when we're on the other side.”

“Cross it, then. Let’s find out. Together.”

With a weakened will, Nate crossed the line. He outstretched his index and middle fingers, inserting them between her thighs so they brushed against the underside of Shizuka’s panties. His lingering resistance almost melted away entirely when he felt how astonishingly soft her skin was.

Nate looked up to see Shizuka staring down at him, impassive save for the hint of a smile on her lips. “Still think this is a bad idea?”

“Yes, absolutely.”

“You’re doing it anyway.”

“Also yes.”

“You can stop at any time.”

“Giving me an out now, of all times?”

“Only because I’m confident you won’t make use of it.”

Nate hated how true that was and how well she knew him. “Let’s get one thing straight. The only reason I cracked is because I have Nicki’s permission to do this, okay?”

“So I had nothing to do with it at all? It took a lot of courage to stand up in front of you like this, you know… mn…” Shizuka closed her eyes. She started subtly following the motion of Nate’s fingers with her hips, moving in tune with him as he slid in and out of her crevice. “That makes me sad to hear… and here I thought I’d seduced you with my… mn- my charms…”

“W-Well, I…” Nate masked his nervousness by speeding up. “Fine. It’s not like I would be doing this if it wasn’t you, and your charms might’ve had something to do with it. There. Are you happy now? Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“No,” Shizuka bucked into him even harder as he curled his fingers, clawing at her entrance from outside her panties. “I want the truth.”

“That was the truth…”

“Then yes, Nate… I am quite happy.”

Feeling frustrated by the surge of romantic and sexual emotions welling up within him, Nate kept going at her and watching as she hovered in front of him, letting out a surprised gasp every few seconds as he used every trick he’d learned with Nicki in the last week out on his old crush. Not all of it transferred over, but enough of it did so that he could leave Shizuka visibly satisfied while learning the ins and outs of what she liked.

“And to think you used to be so nervous about being touched…” Nate commented.

“Never with you. Not after the first time we hugged.” She reminded him. “And I’ve been dreaming of you touching me like this since I first read your books… n-no… longer than that, even…”

“I’ve barely even started yet…” Nate pointed out. There was a trace of excitement in his words.

“Well, don’t hold back on my account. I’m an adult, Nate. I… I don’t need to be treated like a child, babied, or looked after…” Shizuka gulped. “Treat me like you would treat any other woman.”

“You’re not just any other woman, dummy. That’s why I’m doing this!” His declaration came with a sudden change in routine. Nate slid her panties off to the side with his free hand and slipped his fingers between her lips.

Shizuka was pleasantly plump down there, meaning her lips were round and covered most of her labia. Wisps of black pubic hair at the top of her clitoral hood fanned out into a respectable bush. Surprisingly, it wasn’t as wild and untamed as the rest of her hair, making Nate wonder if she’d trimmed it just for him. Shizuka was getting increasingly wet with every stroke, so his fingers moistened as he thrust along the exterior of her virgin pussy.

“How… um… how is it?” Shizuka asked. Her voice was trembling, as were her thighs. “Is my... my pussy… appealing to you?”

Nate spared a moment to look up at her with a funny smile on his face. He almost said something sarcastic, but then it hit him that she was genuinely nervous and wanted to be assured he found her attractive. “Yeah,” Nate admitted with a sigh. “You’re beautiful, Shizuka, and even cuter down here than I always thought you’d be.”

She sighed from a combination of pleasure and eased anxieties. “I-I can shave more if you want me to… I’d never really done it until last night, so… um… it’s not great…”

So she did trim for him. Despite the situation, that made Nategrin. He was truthfully very picky about pubic hair- sometimes liking it and sometimes not, depending on the girl- but it was never a dealbreaker and not something he cared about enough to ever insist on. Nicki’s perfectly waxed pussy was cute, and Shizuka’s bushy black triangle was just as good in his book.

“You’re fine. Seriously. Now stop acting so cute, or this will get even harder on me than it already is.”

Shizuka didn’t understand what Nate found cute, which severely distressed her as she wanted to use it to its fullest. Was it her nervousness he found cute? The fact that she’d shaved for him? Both?

Probably both, she realized. She knew from Nate's books that he had a sadistic streak- especially towards all the librarians he’d written about…

“I’m not trying to be cute. I’m… ahhh… I’m just saying that I shaved everywhere for you…” Shizuka admitted with a soft whisper, hoping the fact would excite him.

He looked up at her as his fingers traced her clit in a smooth, circular motion. “Were you seriously planning to get fully naked in front of me today? Here? At your job?”

“N-No… I just did it because Nicki said it would be a good idea for the future, and… and my vigorous internet research validated her claims that most American men preferred their women shave regularly… but… if you wanted to strip me here…” the blush coloring her face had evolved into a deep shade of crimson. “T-Then that would be another story. You’re supposed to vent all of your- mn, your frustrations out on me… so if shaming me in such a way would please you, I… I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to make this work.”

The awkward librarian bit her lip and muffled a sharp whine. Shizuka drew attention to something Nate had forgotten about amid all the tension- that they were doing this in a public space. Anyone who came back here to look for some manga would see them the second they entered the closed-off section, and there was always a chance Shizuka’s boss might wake up and go looking for her employee…

God, this was as stupid as it was hot.

Dopamine surged through Nate’s body as Shizuka’s meek, submissive behavior and startling words fired him up more and more. This would be dangerous if she kept checking so many of his boxes, just as he feared. His excitement was already getting the best of him, and he wanted to keep messing with her and try new things despite their surroundings.

Nate curled his middle finger and positioned it at her entrance. Shizuka gasped again but looked down at him and gave Nate a brisk nod of approval. She didn’t tell him to be gentle, but he only intended to perform a slight prod, anyway.

His finger slid inside with a light touch, only getting less than an inch deep before he verified Shizuka’s virginity. It wasn’t enough to get a real impression of her pussy, but it was insanely hot, and the sloppy, slack-jawed look on her face was priceless.

“Nate…” Shizuka whimpered. “I’ve never felt s-so good… it's almost scary...”

“Not getting second thoughts, are you?”

“No, absolutely not… quite the opposite, in fact… ah… and you…?”

Nate thought about how he felt about all this now that he’d been feeling her up for a few minutes, but his brain didn't have much control and had taken a backseat to his enormous libido. This wasn’t the right time, it wasn’t the right place, but it was happening, and he had no one but himself to blame.

“I can’t stop now. Not after how far you’ve pushed me.” Nate tried not to imagine the sheer pain of the blue balls he’d get if he went home now, even if he felt that might’ve been what he deserved.

“Mn…?” Shizuka moaned her approval but became disappointed when Nate withdrew his finger.

Before she could ask him why he’d stopped, he suddenly stood up and rotated the leather chair to face the corner, not the entrance. Nate then grabbed Shizuka by her exposed shoulders, turned her around, and pulled her back with him as he sat down so she was seated atop his lap. She gasped from how fast it had all happened but didn’t protest.

Nate could feel the weight of her ass pushing down on his strained cock, which was just terrific. He shuddered from the bliss but ignored it as he wrapped his arms around Shizuka’s waist. His neck craned forward, and he gave one last warning in a lowered voice.

“I’m going to get serious from here on out.”

“I should certainly hope so.”

“I don’t think you realize what that means.”

“I’ve seen your sex tape, Nate. I know what it means. I’m not expecting you to be gentle- I think it’s naive to believe you even could be in this situation. You have eight years of tension to work through, while I have eight years of regret. Only by venting these feelings can the two of us move on to wherever our relationship goes next.”

It was a poor argument.

Part of Nate even recognized it as such when Shizuka said it, but he didn’t care. He would later, but not right now. Right now, it was justification. An excuse- and maybe that was all he wanted from this little meetup all along.

Shizuka prodded him into action by grinding her ass down on his obvious erection. It was the final straw, and Nate untucked Shizuka’s sweater from her skirt, sliding both hands inside to firmly grasp her big breasts for the first time.