rawr xD

“Jeez,” Gem sighs, adjusting where she’s flopped on her couch as Etho starts to crowd over her. “More?”

His hands are insistent when they ruck up her shirt just enough to touch the skin of her waist, his mouth finding her throat.

He hums, not an answer, and Gem automatically spreads her legs to let him push closer.

“I only just cleaned up,” she complains, and Etho drags his teeth across her skin. “Again.”

“So stop cleaning up,” he murmurs, making Gem snort.

“How many more times are you gonna do this?”

She's been trying not to think about the fact that Etho will be heading home soon, back to his own corner of Canada. She kind of hopes he plans to fuck her as many times as physically possible before that happens.

One of Etho’s hands shoves at her skirt and it doesn't take him long to find out she never bothered to put on panties after her shower.

He leans back enough to meet her gaze, lifting one brow, and Gem bites her lip around a smile, wordlessly reaching down to pull her skirt out of the way, showing off where she's already starting to get wet at just the thought of him.

Etho exhales roughly, scrambling for his belt, seeming frantic to get it unbuckled.

“God,” she mutters. “It's like you think I'm running out of time.”

Etho's hands falter as he stares down at her with clear confusion in his expression.

“I'm only thirty,” she says. “My eggs aren't gonna shrivel up tomorrow.”

Gem's delighted by the noise of shock Etho lets out, and he freezes, one hand on the inside of her thigh.

“What?” he asks, voice weak and slightly higher pitched.

“So you're not trying to knock me up?” she asks. “Could've fooled me.”

“That's not — you — ”

His frown deepens and she knows he's trying to put two and two together, trying to reconcile what she's saying and how it could possibly be true when she crawled over him in bed that morning to grab and take her birth control pill.

She sees the exact moment it hits and he swallows, still watching her.

“Is that what you want?” he asks quietly, like he's scared to say it any louder. “For your birthday.”

Gem shrugs as casually as she can, even as she aches for some kind of touch between her legs.

“You can try,” she tells him, and Etho's grip on her leg tightens. “I’ll leave the mess there as long as you like.”

Etho’s grip tightens again — enough that she knows she’ll bruise — and she lets out a soft laugh.

“What do you think?” she asks.

Which is how Gem finds herself on the floor beside the couch, skirt rucked up out of the way as Etho shoves into her from behind.

He’s rougher than she expects, hands clutching at her waist as he drives into her, and Gem stretches out her arms to rest her cheek against the inside of her elbow.

She aches every time he pushes in as deep as he can get, just a little too big for her to take comfortably, and she can’t stop the moans that keep escaping from her — little ah ah ahs with every thrust.

“How many loads do you think it’ll take to work?” she gets out, voice muffled by her own arm, and Etho doesn’t slow down. “Thirty?”

She likes the thought of him trying that many times, of him wringing himself dry just to keep her filled.

“Or do you think it already has?”

That makes Etho worse.

He lets out a weak noise, hands scrabbling at Gem’s sides, like he’s trying to pull her further onto his cock, and Gem arches her back just a little more to encourage him deeper.

He’s desperate and Gem smiles even as she feels herself getting closer to the edge.

“More,” she begs, and she knows both of their knees are going to be ruined by the rug they’re on.

She reaches out, bracing herself against the coffee table as he picks up speed, their bodies loud with how wet Gem is, and she knows she’s only going to get wetter.

“Come inside me,” she begs. “Push it deep.”

One of Etho’s hands slides around to her stomach, pressing tightly as though imagining what they could do together, what it would be like for Gem to actually be pregnant.

“This time,” Etho exhales. “This time.”

It sounds like a plea to the universe, and the trembling in his voice has her clenching and shaking beneath him as she comes, not even needing to touch herself. It’s enough just to think about Etho wanting it, of him trying his hardest to knock her up.

He groans, like the feeling of her tightening around him is too much, and he barely lasts a handful more thrusts before he gives Gem what she wants, coming and thrusting just enough to nudge it up against the tender spot inside her.

“God,” Gem sighs, basking in the weight of him over her, how he reaches for her face, turning her just enough to be able to find her mouth for a kiss.

“Don’t move,” he tells her when they finally break for air, and his hands are tight on her waist when he pulls out. “Stay right there.”

Gem doesn’t plan on moving at all. She keeps her hips up even as she sags further against the arm below her head.

His hand smooths up the back of her thigh, and Gem gets the impression that he’s staring at the mess he’s made of her.

“We should’ve tried that sooner,” she sighs, and Etho makes a quiet noise.

Gem feels guilty the second she slides her hand down the front of her sweats, fingers edging into her underwear. Not that it stops her.

She knows it’s wrong, knows it’ll bite her in the ass one day soon.

But there’s a new photo in the Hermit Discord server, something Etho sent that morning, and she’s done nothing but think about it since.

It’s an innocuous photo of a mug — one that looks straight out of the eighties, a chip in the rim, the pattern and shape of it hinting that it might be handmade. But that’s not what has her grazing her index finger across her clit, her breath rushing out of her all at once.

Etho’s hand is in the photo.

The first thing that proves he exists, that he’s real flesh and blood.

It’s made Gem feel insane all day, her thoughts scattered, chaotic. She hasn’t felt like herself.

In the photo, Etho’s hand is broad, enough that the mug he’s holding looks small. Or maybe it is — maybe whoever made the mug wanted something more their size.

But Gem likes imagining an Etho who’s so much bigger than her.

She knows he’s six foot two, knows he’s talked about keeping his body fit. She has no idea if that’s changed over the years since she started watching his content, but it’s what she’s pictures in her mind when she thinks about him. When she tips her head back, breathing hard as she touches herself.

She thinks about him being tall, his shoulders being broad. She thinks about him being strong — enough to lift her and set her on the edge of his desk, adding her to his ridiculous setup.

In the photo, his fingers seem long, his knuckles thick, so she thinks about those too.

She dips two of her own fingers into herself, not surprised that she’s already dripping wet. She’s been thinking about touching herself for hours. Battling with her indecision, until she’d finally broken down.

She thinks about those hands on her — guiding her knees apart, one slipping up under her skirt to rub his thumb across the gusset of her panties.

He’d immediately be able to feel the dampness, the heat of her.

Gem lets out a quiet moan, hips shifting in her chair.

He’d probably only give her one finger to begin with, something to warm her up. Not that she’d need it. She’d take anything he wanted.

She lets herself think about an Etho who’s more decisive, who would shove two fingers into her and check her expression to see how she reacts.

She thinks about his gaze dropping down to watch himself touch her. Maybe he’d be rougher, to try to force noises from her. Maybe he’d curl his fingers and fuck them into her so hard, she’d have to hold onto his forearm, or his shoulders, or the desk beneath her.

She clenches down around her own fingers, grinding the meat of her hand against her clit, and she can imagine it’s him so clearly in her mind.

She spreads her legs, imagining him easing his way between her knees, kissing gently at her throat, along the edge of her jaw, still shoving his fingers deep.

She’s only ever known him to be PG, but she wonders if he’d make an exception with her in person. If he’d press his mouth near her ear and talk about how wet she is, how tight she is around his knuckles, how he wants to feel her come, how he’s going to make her come.

Gem wants to shut her eyes, pleasure ramping up, her thighs starting to tremble, but she wants to keep looking at the photo. She wants it in the forefront of her mind as she falls apart.

She’s so close, her hand moving faster, and she almost startles when her computer dings with a new Discord notification.

In the corner of her open window, she sees she’s got a new DM from Etho himself, and she drags in a breath, groaning at how illicit it feels. There’s so much guilt filling her chest, but she can’t stop.

It’s worse knowing that he’s right there at his computer. That he’s just a message away.

She shifts her gaze back to the photo and thinks about him exhaling quietly

Come for me, Gem, she imagines him murmuring, and Gem slips over the edge with a desperate moan.

It’s a sharp orgasm, quick and punchy, and she keeps her fingers inside herself as she rides the high.

It takes a long moment for her to catch her breath, to blink away the fuzziness of pleasure in her brain, but it’s pure masochism that has her lifting her clean hand and clicking on Etho’s DM.

She’s just too curious for her own good.

Did you see my pic? his message asks and a laugh escapes Gem before she can stop it.

I saw it, she confirms, slowly pecking at the keys with one finger. Nice pattern.

Horrifyingly, Etho must still be at his computer, because it shows him typing in return.

It goes all the way around, he replies, and after a moment, a new image appears.

The angle is different in this one, but it’s the same mug — just showing off more of it.

And also more of his hand.

Gem pauses, gaze locked onto his fingers, and it feels like ice water drips down her back.

There’s a silver band around his finger — a wedding ring.

The two cocktails before Etho even arrives are a mistake. Which she only realizes when Etho slides into the booth across from her.

She blinks heavily and he glances down at her empty glasses.

“Starting without me?” he asks, voice so achingly familiar that Gem's chest tightens.

“Holy shit,” she says before she can stop herself, and the laugh Etho lets out is as breathy as it always sounds online.

“Hi,” she adds belatedly and Etho’s smile softens.

“Hi, Gem,” he replies, and Gem really can’t believe it.

She’s been a mess of nerves for days, weeks, leading up to this moment, and she thinks the drinks were the only things keeping her from sprinting back to the safety of her hotel.

“I didn’t know if you’d show,” she admits, tongue loosened from alcohol and Etho watches her quietly.

He nudges at one of her empty glasses, not looking up.

“You flew all this way.”

She did. But he’d been the one to suggest it and Gem wasn’t going to miss the opportunity.

She nudges his foot under the table, and he finally meets her gaze again.

“You need to catch up,” she tells him with a grin, and she thinks she might be in love with how crooked his smile is when he grins back at her.

She can’t help but feel like she’s going to make a few more bad life choices by the end of the night, but when he nudges her foot in return, she wonders if maybe he will too.

*

Gem loves being right, but what she loves even more is the way Etho pins her against the inside of his front door, his hands hot on her waist as he kisses her.

He tastes like the beer he’d been drinking and the truffle fries they’d shared — an attempt to fight the amount of alcohol they’d had, though it hadn’t worked.

She gets one hand up the back of his shirt, arching against him as he pulls her even closer.

“Gem,” he groans, and she likes the way her name sounds when he says it like that.

“Was this your plan?” she asks, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth before drawing back to meet his eyes. “Lure me out to the middle of nowhere, get me drunk, and see if I’d go home with you?”

“Kind of,” Etho jokes and Gem laughs brightly in surprise at his drunken honesty.

“How about you finish the job,” she tells him, and she likes getting to see his eyes darken, likes how his grip tightens on her.

They don’t make it upstairs.

Gem trips four steps up, dropping heavily, and Etho doesn’t try to help her up.

Instead, he follows her down, getting her onto her back as his mouth finds hers again, his hands tugging at her jeans, like he’s not going to bother trying to get her into his bed.

She feels untethered, turned on by his desperation, and she lifts her hips to help him as he eases her pants down.

“You gonna fuck me right here?” she asks, watching him toss her jeans down to the bottom of the stairs, and it doesn’t quite feel real.

“I could,” he agrees, and Gem thinks she really likes the drunk version of Etho.

He kisses her again, one hand slipping under her to grope at her ass, and she wonders how long he’s been wanting to do that. She wishes she had more for him to grab, but he doesn’t seem upset.

Instead, he shifts, easing her to the side as he sits on the stair next to her, his hands tugging at his belt and his own pants.

Gem swallows, feeling dizzy, and she has no idea if it’s the alcohol or because of how much she wants him.

He’s actually going to fuck her on the stairs and Gem lifts up, just enough to pull her underwear down and off.

Etho spares her a glance, his face flushed, gaze dropping shamelessly between her legs as he undresses himself just enough to be functional.

Gem pounces before he can move, nudging him back as she climbs into his lap.

“Is this what you imagined?” she asks, reaching between his legs to stroke him, and she quickly learns that whiskey dick isn’t a thing for him.

“I thought you’d do something unexpected,” he admits, which is fair.

“Does this count?”

All Etho seems to be able to do is nod, because she eases the tip of him inside her and starts to sink down.

“These stairs are gonna bruise you up,” she grunts, still taking inch after inch, and she knows her knees and shins are going to be all kinds of colors later, the hardwood unforgiving.

He nods in understanding, hands clutching at her hips when she finally settles on top of him.

“Don’t care,” he exhales and Gem has to kiss him, rolling her hips, just to see how it feels.

He groans into her mouth, like he never imagined she’d feel so good, and he uses his grip on her to shift her, greedy for more.

She leans into him, letting him move her the way he wants, her limbs getting weaker as her pleasure grows.

Sitting at an angle in his lap keeps him so deep it makes her ache, and it has no right feeling as good as it does. They're drunk, it's their first time together — it should be a disaster.

But it’s definitely not.

“Fuck,” she exhales as he pushes up into her with a series of thrusts that leaves her breathless, and she blindly reaches to the side, clutching at the banister for purchase, lifting herself enough to ride him the way she wants.

“Gem,” he grunts and Gem curls her free arm around his shoulders, ducking her head down close to his.

“Later, you’re gonna take me upstairs and fuck me the way I deserve,” she tells him, and she’s instantly obsessed with the noise he makes.

He shoves up into her, lifting most of her weight with his hips, and she’s helpless.

“Oh god,” she whines, rolling against him the best she can to get pressure on her clit.

She tightens around him, her whole body trembling as she comes, and she’s almost certain she’s going to find bruises on her waist later, too.

He keeps making breathy little sounds, adjusting her the way he needs to follow her over the edge, and she feels it when he does.

His whole body tenses, grip tightening to the point of pain, before his cock flexes inside her.

“Etho,” she moans, belatedly realizing they probably should have used a condom, but it’s too late now.

He nudges up into her a handful more times, riding the high, and Gem clutches at him, face pressed against his throat as she pants for breath.

“Fuck,” she gets out, and he grunts like he agrees completely.

“I’m going to need a moment,” he tells her, as though half expecting her to immediately start trying to shoo him upstairs, but Gem couldn’t even if she wanted to.

She’s too drunk, too fucked out, too comfortable staying exactly where she is. Though now she knows how strong Etho is, she might just wait and see if he’ll eventually carry her instead.

It takes Gem longer than it should to realize she’s being followed.

She blames it on being somewhere unfamiliar, somewhere close enough to her hotel to feel relatively safe, but the footsteps get louder, gaining on her.

“Hey, sweetheart,” the man drawls, crowding so close that Gem startles sideways a step. “Can I ask you something real quick?”

“I’m sorry,” Gem answers automatically, “I can’t stop.”

She tries to move around him, knowing to keep her tone neutral, to make herself as ignorable as possible, but the man puts an arm out, blocking her path.

“It’ll only take a second, I promise.”

Gem panics, glancing around him for any sign of help.

She doesn’t hold much hope — in a best case scenario, she’d spot Skizz or Impulse and they’d be able to whisk her away, back to their hotel. But there’s no one she recognizes, just a man at the end of the block, tapping at his phone.

It’s a risk, but it’s still better than being stuck with a man who casually slides his hand around her — a clear attempt to try to grab her ass.

“I’m meeting my boyfriend,” she tells the stranger, gesturing with one hand as she moves out of his reach. “He’s just over there.”

It’s apparently enough to disarm him, because he turns to look, giving Gem the out she’s been looking for.

She dodges around him, breaking into a jog as she heads in the direction of the man she’d seen.

He’s tall enough to hopefully be intimidating to anyone else, and she just has to hope that the odds of running into two sleazebags in a row are low.

“Hey!” she calls out, forcing a smile onto her face. “Where have you been?”

The man looks up, freezing for a moment before he glances over his shoulder, as though expecting her to be talking to someone else. When he looks back at her, his expression is uncertain, maybe a little terrified, which Gem thinks is fair since she’s a strange woman currently running at him.

But without thinking, she shoves her way into his space, one arm wrapping around his waist as she tucks her face against his shoulder.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispers as quickly as she can. “Can you play along? I don’t know this guy. I’m just trying to get back to my hotel.”

She has no idea if it’s going to work, if the guy is going to shake her off and tell her to deal with it herself.

But after a beat, his hand comes up, resting securely in the middle of her back as he holds her close.

“Thank you,” she exhales, almost wanting to cry with relief as the man squeezes her gently, and she can’t believe a stranger on the street can make her feel so safe without a word.

She carefully draws back, catching the man’s eyes, and he stares down at her as though he has no idea what to do.

“You don’t have to walk me all the way back, but can you stay with me for a bit? Until he leaves?”

Carefully, the man nods, turning her in his hold. He keeps his arm around her, hand resting politely on her waist, and she finds herself clutching at his jacket as they start to head back in the direction she’d been going.

The creep doesn’t follow, apparently losing interest now Gem has company, but he calls her a bitch as a parting gift.

“I’m so sorry,” Gem says again, starting to shake from the adrenaline, and the man doesn’t reply, but his grip on her tightens.

“This isn’t how I thought my night would go,” she says after a moment before laughing. “Probably not how you thought your night would go either.”

“Definitely not,” the man finally says, and Gem hesitates, almost tripping on the sidewalk as she turns to stare at him.

There's something about his voice that has her on edge.

He doesn’t react, but he also doesn’t blink, as though fully aware that he’s being watched.

She takes in his appearance — his dark hair and heavy brow, his mouth that seems a little too tense — and for just a second, he glances over at her.

He looks caught.

“I'm sorry,” he says abruptly, and Gem's whole body tenses. “I cant — I didn't want it to be this way.”

“Oh my god,” Gem whispers, and she still can't seem to loosen her grip on the man, even as the realization hits. “Etho?”

He stares down at her, his dark eyes too expressive for their own good because he doesn't even need to answer for her to know.

“Oh my god.”

“I was visiting Bdubs,” he says quickly. “He lives near here — I wasn't stalking — ”

He doesn't finish the thought and Gem finally finds the strength to let him go, slipping out from under his arm. He doesn't try to stop her, and for a long moment, they stare at each other.

“This has officially been the weirdest night of my life,” Gem admits, needing to deflect with humor before she loses her mind completely.

It feels bizarre for Etho to laugh. It feels disconnected from this guy — a stranger who's standing in front of her — when she recognizes it so clearly.

“The thing I'm most upset about is that I can never tell anyone about this.”

“You could tell Bdubs,” Etho suggests with a smile that pulls at Gem's insides.

“I could,” she agrees, “but he'll never let you live it down. EthosLab, the knight in shining armor.”

The realization hits his expression at the same time a flush spreads across his cheeks.

“That's not — ” he starts, floundering, and Gem grins.

“I dunno,” she says, “I kind of like it.”

He stares, wide eyed, like he never thought she'd have the same sense of humor as she does online, and she finds herself laughing.

“Don't worry, I won't hold it over you forever,” she jokes. “Only most of the time.”

He blows out a slow breath, seeming to finally take her in, exactly as she is.

Gem knows something’s wrong the second she wakes — her body feeling different, unnatural.

She blinks, opening her eyes to a ceiling that’s slanted, not at all the one she’s used to seeing, and when she drops her gaze a little lower, the walls are green, not the usual landlord special white.

She sits up, grunting, but even the noise that comes out of her doesn’t sound right.

The bed she’s in is smaller than her usual — maybe only a full rather than a queen — and the mattress is older, lumpier.

When she glances down, the hand she has clutching at the sheets is bigger, broader, and everything about it seems wrong. She has to still be asleep. There’s no way it’s reality.

But it feels nothing but real when she continues looking around. There are too many details in the room — she’s not sure her imagination works that well.

On the nightstand, there’s a lamp, a box of tissues, a New World Translation Bible, a phone that’s plugged in and charging. On the floor beside the bed, there’s a discarded pair of jeans, a t-shirt, a pair of socks. Across from her, there’s a door, slightly ajar, part of a sink visible, hinting that it’s a bathroom.

A bathroom probably means a mirror.

Gem drags herself from under the sheets, realizing abruptly that the only thing she’s wearing is a pair of boxers and the body she’s in is distinctly masculine. She has long legs, a broad chest with a smattering of hair across it, and arms with enough bulk for her to assume she must be strong.

She’s careful as she climbs out of bed, shuffling over to the bathroom and flicking on the light.

She’s not sure if she was expecting to recognize the reflection in the mirror, but she doesn’t. It’s a complete stranger that stares back at her. There’s nothing familiar about him and her stomach sinks.

It doesn’t help at all and she leaves without looking back, needing to find answers elsewhere.

The house she’s in seems quiet, giving the impression that she’s alone, but she still finds herself tiptoeing out of the bedroom and down the hallway.

It’s strange walking around in a body that’s bigger and taller than she’s used to, her center of gravity higher, making her feel off balance with every step.

The first door she opens reveals a bedroom, smaller than the one she’d been in, that mostly seems to be a storage area. There are a handful of rugs rolled up and propped against the back wall, along with a few nondescript cardboard boxes.

The second door she opens leads to a secondary bathroom and she doesn’t linger.

The next door is already open and she peers inside, almost ready to turn around when she sees it’s just an office.

But then she freezes.

There’s something about it that she can’t help but feel she recognizes.

She cautiously steps inside, a sense of dread filling her body as she stares at the chair, at the brown desk, at the tissue box that’s supporting a microphone.

“What the f— ” Gem starts, pausing at the voice that comes out of her.

There’s no way.

Without hesitation, she heads back in the direction of the bedroom, breathing picking up speed as she starts to panic.

She unplugs the phone on the nightstand, praying that there’s no pin on it as she turns on the screen.

She’s in luck — it opens with just a swipe of her thumb and she’s scrolling through the apps when it lights up with a new notification. It’s a DM on Discord. From herself.

Which is when she realizes that if she’s not in her own body, someone else might be.

Gem, the message says, closely followed by a second one. Are you there?

WTF is happening? she types back. Who is this???

After a moment, she gets a new notification of an incoming Discord call and she takes a breath as she swipes to answer.

“Gem?” her own voice asks and it’s so unnerving it sends a chill down her spine.

“Etho?” she asks in return, following her hunch, and there’s a pointed breath on the other end of the call.