#del.fic

Baran knows what size surgical glove Trinity wears halfway through their first shift together. She doesn't mean to learn, isn't paying attention with any sort of purpose, but her brain stores the information anyway. Like it's preparing her. Like part of her already knows where this will end. She doesn't even know she knows until months later, when she's the closest to the boxes on the wall, when she passes off a pair to Trinity without a second thought. Without the resident even having asked.

She tries to remember learning, tries to remember Trinity telling her. Realizes she can't. Realizes that Trinity's glove size is just one line on the long list of things Baran has learned about her without noticing. Second year resident, patient advocate, probably dyslexic, fierce friend, and a million likes and dislikes (Red Bull and coffee, respectively). An endless catalogue of information she didn't have any right to have stored so completely.

It was the kind of list a person kept when they were dating someone.

It was the kind of list she had started keeping about Yolanda, in August, when the surgeon had asked her out for coffee.

Yolanda's list started with her coffee order (flat white) and ended with what she sounded like when she came on Baran's tongue (a high pitched and breathy "fuck"). There was plenty of information in between. The list was long.

Baran worries that Trinity's list is longer.

She sits on the knowledge for weeks. She doesn't know what she is supposed to do with it. She's with Yolanda. She likes Yolanda. She knows a lot of things about a lot of people and it does not have to mean anything that she has somehow come to learn a lot about Trinity.

Except that she keeps noticing things. Keeps learning. The way Trinity's hair slips out of its pony as the day drags on. What her laugh sounds like when she's truly let her guard down. The exact right words of praise to say to get her cheeks to flush, just a little.

It's December when Baran realizes that Yolanda might still be learning some of these things about Trinity, too. She knows about their history, knows that Yolanda has seen parts of Trinity that Baran never will. Maybe she had just expected the surgeon to stop learning things, sometime between July and August. But Baran realizes Yolanda hasn't and Baran realizes that she doesn't mind.

It's December and the three of them have just spend the last hour working a trauma together and then the patient had been wheeled upstairs to the ICU and everyone else had cleared the room. It's December and Trinity is standing between Yolanda and Baran, and really had just done such a remarkable job with the patient. So Baran tells her so. And so does Yolanda.

It's December and Baran Al-Hashimi and Yolanda Garcia call Trinity Santos a good doctor in unison. When they trip over themselves, over each other, to compliment her skills. Trinity flushes and leaves the room. And what Baran adds to her list is the look on Yolanda's face when she realizes what they both want.

i’m gonna be so real i’m writing this at 1:30am after driving for 13 hours i have no time to edit and no idea if this will be coherent :)

In hindsight, Baran should have seen this coming. Should have known last night, when Trinity kept deferring to Yolanda instead of her, that they were up to something. Baran had had her face buried between Trinity’s thighs, and still, her girlfriend had asked Daddy if she could come. Nevermind that Yolanda was just leaning against the headboard, watching. Nevermind that the evening to that point had played out exactly as Baran planned, that they were both exactly where she wanted them to be.

Last night, Baran had written it off as Trinity being a little bratty. As her having missed Yolanda after a week where work schedules had conspired against them. Now, though, she sees the deference for what it really is. Because it’s been almost a full 24 hours and Trinity still hasn’t let up— all “what do you want, Daddy?” and “what can I do, Daddy?” and Daddy, Daddy, Daddy until she makes her fatal mistake. And asks Baran if she wants to “be a good girl for Daddy” as they all make out on the couch. The look on Yolanda’s face tells Baran all that she needs to know.

It’s not like she hasn’t submitted to Yolanda before. She has, plenty of times. But she’s always been the one to ask for it. Always been the one to put it on the table. The mind games make sense, Trinity’s failed attempt at dragging her down with her makes sense. They’ve been working on it, but direct communication has never really been Yolanda’s style. And anyway, Baran doesn’t know what her answer would have been if Yolanda had simply asked for control. Now that she hasn’t though, now that she’s roped Trinity into trying to get what she wants, Baran only has one choice. Carefully plotted revenge.

She plays along long enough. Plays her part as Yolanda moves the three of them from the couch to the bedroom. Pretends to swallow a gasp when Yolanda pulls out the harness, pretends to reverently drop to her knees to help her partner put it on. Yolanda is distracted kissing Trinity when Baran slips the harness on herself instead.

Things slip out of Yolanda’s control quickly after that.

Trinity, for her part in it all, ends up in the chair in the corner with explicit instruction from Baran not to touch, as she watches Yolanda’s downfall unfold in front of her.

Yolanda Garcia sleeps like a rock. She always has, she probably always will. It infuriates her girlfriends to no end, that she can simply say "goodnight," pull them close to her chest, close her eyes, and drop right off to sleep. She hardly ever moves until her alarm goes off in the morning.

Trinity and Baran do not have the same ability. Baran became a light sleeper in parenthood, first in the newborn stage, and then again in the early days after her divorce, suddenly the only parent there to respond to a screaming baby. And Trinity, well, just doesn't sleep. Or, if she does, she wakes at the slightest movement.

So when Baran wakes inhumanely early on a morning they all have off together, Trinity is right behind her. She tucks herself tighter into Baran's chest, abandoning Yolanda's arm curled around her hips. It only makes sense for Baran to start kissing her softly. To start letting her hands roam, to make her way into Trinity’s shorts.

Trinity has always gotten worked up quickly. It’s one of Baran’s favorite things about her, especially now, especially this morning. While she’s been driving Trinity increasingly higher and higher, she’s also been watching Yolanda, just over Trinity’s shoulder. The surgeon hasn’t moved an inch, just as asleep as she was when they turned the lights out hours ago. There’s a thought working its way into Baran’s brain, an idea Yolanda had brought up (blushing) at their last ‘family meeting.’

Baran has Trinity right on the edge when she solidifies the thought. When she decides this might as well be the morning they follow through. The youngest of them is writhing against Baran’s fingers, voice breathless as she begs, “please, you make me feel so good, please.”

“Don’t you think she deserves to feel good, too?” Baran asks after Trinity has come, nodding her head in Yolanda’s direction. “She doesn’t even know what she just missed out on. Don’t you think we should make it up to her?” Trinity’s eyes darken. She hasn’t forgotten Yolanda’s request either, it seems.

It takes a few minutes to adjust their positioning, moving slow and deliberately, purposefully quiet, though Baran knows it would take far more to wake their partner. Eventually, she gets the strap settled on her hips, gets herself positioned between Yolanda’s legs. Trinity curls into Yolanda’s side, head resting on her same pillow, looking down her slowly rising and falling chest as Baran begins to move.

And when Yolanda finally does wake up, several minutes after Baran first thrusts in, Trinity is there to kiss her. To stroke her hands gently over Yolanda’s face, to drop her lips to Yolanda’s ear and whisper,

Yolanda is a runner. Gets up religiously every morning an hour and a half before her shift and squeezes in at least a few miles, before heading back home to shower and make breakfast.

When Baran, and then eventually Trinity, too, had started sleeping over more regularly, she fell out of the habit for awhile. Waking up with their warm bodies wrapped around her was much more preferable to the cold winter air waiting for her outside the walls of her apartment. But summer comes, and the sun rises earlier, and she has always had a hard time staying in bed when it's light out.

Things are more settled between them now, too. More domestic in a way that Yolanda never thought she would be. Baran and Trinity know their way around her apartment, move through it like it is their home, too. It doesn't make her skin itch to think about leaving them in her home without her.

So she starts setting her alarm again, a little earlier than she used to, and cuts her runs just a little shorter, because if she's up early enough and runs fast enough, she's home before they're even awake.

Which is why it's so surprising, on this warm June morning eight months into their relationship, to step back through her front door and hear voices coming from the bedroom. Or rather, Trinity's voice, begging. For what, Yolanda doesn't know. She can just make out an almost pathetic string of "please, please, please" coming from behind the closed door as she hangs her keys on the hook and toes out of her sneakers before heading in the direction of the sound.

Trinity is laying almost exactly where Yolanda had left her an hour ago, right in the middle of her bed, hair mussed with sleep and oversized sleep shirt tangled around her middle. She's shifted from her side to her back, hands gripping tightly to the headboard just above her.

What's really changed is Baran.

Baran, usually so put together, even in sleep, looks wrecked now. Her hair is falling out of its bun, her pajamas have been tossed to some forgotten corner of the room. Yolanda can see the barest hints of sweat dripping down her neck. She's on her knees, straddling one of Trinity's thighs, hands braced on either side of Trinity's head, grinding rapidly into the girl beneath her.

"Oh thank god," Trinity whines when she sees Yolanda. "She told me I couldn't touch her until you got home."

"Is that right?" Yolanda hums, leaning against the door frame.

Baran just laughs at that, and doesn't stop moving her hips.

"Please," Trinity cries again, pulling against the headboard and rolling her hips to better meet Baran's downward motion. The movement causes Baran to gasp, and her eyes seek out Yolanda's, an unasked question floating between them.

beep beep beep

The loud blare of the alarm clock filters into Baran’s consciousness, just barely pulling her towards wakefulness before a loud thwack turns it off. She’s about to drift back off, back into the dream she had been having, details fuzzy but full of warmth and sun. Maybe Trinity had been there, or Yolanda, maybe it was ice cream… she never finds out, because instead she’s being pulled closer to the other body in her bed, her face is being peppered with kisses, making her impossibly warmer and infuriatingly more awake.

“Love,” her companion whispers, dropping one more kiss on the center of Baran’s forehead before flopping back down next to her.

“I’m awake,” Baran groans, rubbing a hand over her face, glancing at the alarm clock with bleary eyes. 5:17 shines back at her, mocking. The room around her is much less sunny than her dream, the pre-dawn light only just beginning to come in through the open windows. She sits up, is about to swing her legs over the edge of the bed, when an arm tightens around her waist, and a head buries itself against the small of her back.

“Don’t get up,” Trinity mumbles into her shirt. Baran just laughs softly, twists in the other woman’s arms until they’re laying face to face, Trinity’s eyes shut tight against the morning. It’s her turn to repay the wake-up favor, as she gently places kisses across Trinity’s forehead, her cheeks, her nose, working her way slowly down to her lips. Trinity sighs appreciatively when she reaches her destination, lips parting almost immediately to deepen the kiss. Baran brings a hand up to gently cup Trinity’s jaw as the younger woman’s hands wind their way around Baran’s back under her shirt. Hands that tighten frantically when she feels Baran begin to pull away. “No fair.” Trinity’s eyes finally blink open.

“No fair?” Baran smirks, trying, and failing, to sit back up.

“You started something without intending to finish it.” One of Trinity’s hands slips around to Baran’s front, fingers lightly tracing over her stomach.

“I started something?” She raises an eyebrow. “If I remember right, you woke me up by kissing me.”

“Yeah, and I was planning to follow through,” Trinity says, surging forward to capture Baran’s lips again, moving to trail kisses behind her ear and down her neck after a moment.

“I have to go,” Baran laughs despite herself, one hand winding into Trinity’s hair in a half-hearted attempt to stop her.

“Skip pilates,” Trinity murmurs against her collarbone, biting gently. “Stay here with me.”

“Love, I have to go.” Baran really does pull away now, pulling Trinity off by her hair. Her resolve slips a little when she sees her girlfriend’s face, though. Lips swollen, pupils blown, looking thoroughly wrecked already.

“Please,” Trinity whispers, and, with a wicked glint in her eye, pulls Baran’s hand to her, slips it under her pajama shorts, into her underwear, into the wet heat there. “Skip pilates.” Baran loosens her grip in her hair, and Trinity drops her head back to her neck, biting and licking and doing her best to not leave any marks.

“Fine,” Baran concedes, smiling. Trinity releases her hold on Baran’s wrist, but Baran keeps her hand where it had been placed, two fingers swiping widely over Trinity’s clit, revelling in the gasps that slip out against her skin. She stays there, continues on, driving Trinity higher and higher, closer and closer, until she has her right on the edge and– stops. Chuckles when that results in a frustrated whine. Brings her wet fingers to Trinity’s lips, traces lightly over the bottom one before pushing gently inside. “If I’m going to skip, then you’re going to make it worth my while. Sound fair?” Trinity nods emphatically, Baran’s fingers pulling out with a loud pop. “Then get to it.” Baran quirks an eyebrow as she pushes her girlfriend’s head down.

In the end, they both barely make it to work on time, and only because Baran concedes on their ‘no carpooling,’ rule. Yolanda is waiting for them near Baran’s usual parking spot on the top level of the garage. “Cutting it a little close, you two,” she says, smiling, as she pulls Trinity into a hug, the younger woman melting against her.

“Yes, well, someone convinced me to skip my workout this morning.” Baran passes the pair, pausing briefly to place her hand on Yolanda’s shoulder, thumb stroking gently along her neck. “How was the night shift?”

Yolanda just sighed heavily, in a way that communicated it had been perhaps a little more than normal. “Walsh owes me for picking that one up,” she says, shaking her head, clearing the memories. “You two better get going.” And like that the moment is gone. She’s dropping a quick kiss on Trinity’s waiting lips and pushing away, heading over to her own car. “Have a good day,” she adds just before shutting the door.

“I hate night shift,” Trinity mumbles once she’s gone.

Baran and Trinity begin walking in, the distance between them growing, slowly becoming more professional the closer they get to the doors. By the time they’re in the elevator, there’s a perfectly appropriate three feet between them, Trinity slumped against the wall. She looked so tired, and lonely, and… completely like herself, like her work self. The version of her that had to maintain professional boundaries, that was a damn good doctor, who could laugh and joke with her patients, all while staying two steps ahead, careful not to say too much, give too much of herself away. As a pediatric fellow, Trinity saw mostly children in the ED now, but there were always parents, always coworkers. Everyone knew about Dr. Santos and Dr. Garcia, or if they didn’t, it wasn’t hard to figure out– casual jabs at one another, seeking each other out for support or encouragement after tough cases, lunch in the breakroom on slower days. Those stolen moments buoyed her, made all the horribleness around them bearable. Shifts without Yolanda wore her out, wore her down, even if it was just Yolanda’s day off. Being on opposite shifts from her was worse. No stolen time during the day, and no time to forget it all together at night.

Baran’s hand twitches at her side, wanting to reach out, to cross the elevator, to do something to ease the tension in her partner’s shoulders. She wants to let herself be a substitute, knows that a “good catch Dr. Santos,” or a “do you need anything Dr. Santos” does help, but also knows that all of the calculation that comes with those moments doesn’t make them nearly as effective. Knows that sometimes the moment of mental math, wondering if she has touched Trinity more than she’s touched anyone else this shift, makes the touch not worth it in the first place.

Trinity catches her staring, and Baran gives in, taking a step towards her, hand outstretched– the elevator dings and the doors slide open. The sounds and smells and the chaos of the emergency room slip in to join them. Trinity lets her hip brush Baran’s hand as she leaves. -----------

The shift begins to pass in much the same way. Baran keeps finding herself with almost-moments with Trinity, when the fellow is charting or leaves an exam room at the same time. And always, just as she’s about to say something, or place a comforting hand on her elbow, or really anything, something or someone interrupts her. It’s starting to drive her crazy, and a frustrated look must cross her face, because sometime around noon, Trinity is catching her eye and cocking her head toward the supply closet.

It’s quieter in there, and a little cooler, and Baran lets herself stand a little closer to Trinity. She hums happily as the younger woman’s hands slip inside her jacket and around her hips.

“Are you doing okay?” Trinity asks gently, seeking Baran’s eyes.

“Me?” Baran raises an eyebrow. “I’ve been trying all day to get a moment to ask you the same thing.”

“Oh,” Trinity starts. She’s about to say more when the door swings open and Jesse comes in, heading for the chest tubes. Baran steps back automatically, rolling her eyes a little.

“Thank you Dr. Santos,” Baran says, dropping back into a more professional tone. Trinity just nods and then she is gone.

It’s hours before she even gets a chance at another moment. Trinity is charting near the central nurses’s station, wrapping up what must be close to her last notes of the shift. Baran is leaning against the counter nearby, debating whether or not she could quietly ask about dinner plans now, when she is again interrupted.

“All right, Dr. Al,” Abbot barks, clapping his hands together as he slides up next to Baran, leaning on the counter. “I think you’re really gonna like this one.”

“Oh, no, not again.” Baran rolls her eyes, not bothering to look up from the tablet in her hands. “I’ve told you before, I’m perfec-”

“Ah ah ah, not so fast,” Abbot interrupts, “you haven’t even let me tell you about her.”

“Her?” Baran can’t help herself, she does look up at that. Abbot had been playing this game with her for weeks now, having convinced himself that his primary purpose in life must be finding Baran a partner to settle down with. Until now, it had all been men, mostly guys he knew from SWAT work, or from his Army days.

“See, I knew that would get you! Yes, her.” His eyes sparkle with laughter. “You know, if your problem with all my previous proposals was that they’re men, you could have just said so.”

“That’s not, uh,” she all but whispers, fighting to find the right thing to say, to get herself out of this without giving away too much. Over Abbot’s shoulder, she can see Trinity freeze, listening.

“Really, Al. Next you’re gonna tell me you’re in a relationship,” he sighs and finally picks up his own tablet, appearing to be ready to move on to his actual job. “You’re not, right?”

Baran isn’t looking at him at all when she says, tight lipped, “No, I’m not.” Trinity slams her dictaphone down and walks away. -----------

They don’t get a chance to talk about it for three days. Yolanda had picked up a whole week of night shifts from Walsh, and it was Baran’s two-night stretch with Jasper at home. Usually that would mean Trinity and Yolanda sleeping at their place, usually they would manage one dinner all together, usually they would text and call Baran near constantly. But this week was not usual. Because Yolanda was on nights and Trinity decided Dennis needed a roommate again. Instead of coming back to Baran’s place after work, Trinity had cited some personal crisis happening with the younger doctor, driven home with him, and promptly shut off her phone. The texts and calls in the following few days had been sporadic. Moments to catch Trinity at work even more so. She hadn’t even seen Yolanda since that morning in the parking garage.

So by Friday, when she and Trinity have spent all day saving people from a massive multi-car pileup on the freeway, and Yolanda has spent all day flipping her sleep schedule, and Jasper has gone back to his dad’s (which is routine but never easier), Baran is fried. Running on fumes, she picks up Thai food from their favorite place and drives to Yolanda and Trinity’s apartment. Just assumes they’ll be there. No one had texted her to make a plan. She’s tired, and emotionally drained, and lonely, and she doesn’t know what she was expecting when she walks into the apartment, but it certainly wasn’t this. Wasn’t Yolanda sitting on the couch with a crying Trinity next to her, head in her lap.

“I was just about to call you,” Yolanda says when she sees Baran, focused eyes following as Baran drops her bag and keys by the door, brings the food to the kitchen, and comes to join the pair on the couch. Baran curls into Yolanda’s side, rests her head on her shoulder. “Seems like we have some talking to do.” Yolanda inclines her head slightly toward Trinity.

“This is about me?” Baran asks incredulously as she pulls back and sits up straighter, one hand coming to rest gently in Trinity’s hair.

“No,” Trinity says at the same moment Yolanda rolls her eyes and says “Yes.”

“No,” Trinity tries again, fixing Yolanda with a look that says don’t speak for me. She sits up. “It’s about all of this. Us.”

Yolanda sighs like she’s bracing for impact, so Baran tries to enter softly. She takes Trinity’s hand. “Love, what brought this on?” she asks softly.

“Abbot,” Trinity replies.

“Abbot?” Yolanda asks, surprised. Baran drops Trinity’s hand, scoots a little farther away on the couch.

“Yes. Did you know–” Trinity starts and turns to Yolanda. “That Dr. Abbot has been trying to set our girlfriend up on dates for weeks now?”

“It has not been weeks–”

“Weeks,” Trinity interrupts. “And on Wednesday, Abbot got the bright idea that actually Baran might be gay so he started pitching this poor woman and Baran actually seemed a little bit interested.”

“Is that true?” Yolanda turns to her, eyes wide.

“I was not interested.” Baran fights the urge to roll her eyes. “I was never going to take him up on his offer– no matter the gender.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Trinity asserts.

“Well if it doesn’t matter, then what’s the problem?” Baran is trying to see the issue here, she really is. But she’s been practically ghosted for three days. She’s tired. And Trinity has apparently been ruminating on what Baran thought was a fairly inconsequential conversation with a coworker. She feels like a feral dog backed into a corner.

“The problem,” Trinity huffs, “is that you couldn’t even tell him you’re in a relationship.”

“Of course I couldn’t tell him I’m in a relationship,” she practically shouts. The feral dog barks. “HR doesn’t even know I’m in a relationship. Can you imagine the shit–”

“I’m not saying you had to tell him you’re dating us. I’m just saying you could have told him you’re dating someone.” Trinity is breathing hard. There’s a moment of quiet, heavy with all that’s been said and all that’s about to be.

Baran has pushed herself to the far end of the couch, knees tucked up to her chest, arms wrapped tightly around herself. “I couldn’t,” she says quietly. Dog in the corner, too visible, people too close.

“Why not?” Trinity asks.

“I just,” Baran says, simply, “couldn’t.” She shrugs a little. They’ve had this conversation before. She doesn’t know why Trinity is expecting something different.

Trinity reels back, renewed frustration surging through her, opens her mouth to speak before Yolanda cuts her off with a look. Yolanda turns to face Baran more fully then, her shoulders creating a semblance of a barrier between Baran and Trinity. “No, actually, B, why not?” Yolanda asks. “Why can’t our coworkers know you’re dating someone?”

“Because…” she, or maybe the feral dog, tries for deflection. “That always comes with follow up questions. People find out you’re dating someone and then it’s all ‘who’s the lucky guy,’ and ‘oh how come we never hear about him?’ or even worse, ‘how come we haven’t met him yet?’ I just… I’m already lying enough. I don’t want to lie like that, too.”

“That’s just–” Trinity starts, but is silenced when Yolanda raises a hand to stop her.

“Baby,” Yolanda says, reaching a hand out to rest gently on Baran’s knee. “Do people at work not know you’re gay?”

“What?” Trinity and Baran ask in unison.

“All of those examples about your hypothetical fake partner were men. Do people not know you’re gay?”

Baran can’t take the eye contact Yolanda levels at her. Can’t take Trinity’s gaze just over the surgeon’s shoulder, either. She feels raw, exposed, too known. Too seen. “Not in so many words,” she says into her lap, tucking her face away, trying to create just a little bit more distance.

“Baran,” Yolanda sighs, weaving her fingers into the hair at the top of Baran’s head, moving back and forth soothingly until she picks herself back up to look at them both.

“That conversation with Abbot was truly the first time it’s come up,” she explains. “I don’t like bringing my personal life into work with me, you know that.”

“That’s not true,” Trinity says.

“What’s not true?”

“You talk about your personal life all the time.” Trinity’s frustration, or maybe anger, is back. “You talk about Jasper, you talk about pilates, hell, you talk about your ex-husband! You just don’t talk about us.”

“That’s because no one knows about us.” Baran hugs her legs tighter.

“And why is that?”

“Because they can’t know about us,” Baran seethes. They’ve been over this a thousand times.

“Can’t they?” Trinity is not going to drop it.

“Trinity,” Yolanda sighs, hand still firm on Baran’s knee, thumb tracing ceaseless circles against her jeans.

“No, let me finish,” Trinity gets up from the couch then, begins pacing around the living room. “Why can’t people know about us? What is there for HR to pick apart, really? I understand it would have been an issue two years ago, but now? We’re three consenting adults who have all consented to be in relationships with each other. I’m not your subordinate anymore, not really. Yola certainly isn’t. You’ve proven that you don’t play favorites, in fact, you probably talk to me less than other doctors because of our relationship. So why can’t people know?”

“Because Jasper doesn’t know,” she says. It’s not the whole truth, she doesn’t think. But she feels too exposed right now to examine the other parts. Has to settle for what she knows.

“Great!” Trinity throws up her hands. “Our coworkers don’t know Jasper, so no one will tell him.”

“McKay knows Jasper,” Yolanda points out.

“McKay knows how to keep a secret,” Trinity says. She looks back at Baran expectantly.

“I’m not ready to tell Jasper,” Baran says. That had been a rule since day one. Don’t tell Jasper his mom has two girlfriends. Trinity and Yolanda had agreed immediately.

“I’m not asking you to tell him.” Trinity comes closer now, drops to her knees in front of the couch so they’re eye to eye. “But why can’t you tell other people?”

Baran looks at her for a long time. Why can’t she tell other people? What was she so afraid of, really? Two and a half years ago, her biggest fear would have been people finding out about her seizures. But that ship had well and truly sailed, and there were moments– brief ones– where Baran found herself almost grateful for it. The ED functioned better with two attendings. In some ways it had opened her up enough to find this space with Trinity and Yolanda. Her co-parenting relationship with David was better. It had been hard to be honest, but eventually she recognized the weight that had come off her shoulders. Realized she could breathe deeper.

For a moment she lets herself believe that being open about her love life might bring the same relief too. Wonders what it might be like to have no secrets at all.

She can’t picture that version of herself, not really. For as long as she can remember, she’s always had something to hide. Or conceal. To not let others see.

The feral dog in her chest whines. It doesn’t know how to be loved.

“I’m not ready,” Baran answers for it.

“Jesus Christ, Baran,” Trinity heaves, standing back up. “I feel like I’m back in the fucking closet.”

“Trinity!” Yolanda’s cry is sharper now.

The dog finds its bark, and Baran finds herself standing to face Trinity. “Back in the closet? Back in the closet?” She shouts, waves her hands at the room around them. “Yeah, the apartment you share with your girlfriend sure looks like a really cramped closet.”

“Okay,” Yolanda says, standing up to put herself between the two. It doesn’t matter though, Baran is already backing away and gathering her things. “I think we’ve found our way into a bigger thing that needs to be talked out.”

“You two go ahead and talk all you want,” Baran says, putting on her shoes. “I’m going home.”

“Don’t leave,” Trinity begs. “There’s still more we need to–”

Baran doesn’t sleep. Which isn’t surprising, even if she wishes it were different. Honestly, she can’t remember the last time she was the only person sleeping in this house– between Jasper’s nights with her and her sleepovers with Yolanda and Trinity, she’s never alone at night. It’s the quiet, she tells herself when sleep proves itself hard to come by. The quiet, not the fight. And had it even been a fight? Or had it been Trinity having a conversation they had had before? Baran had just reasserted her position. She tells herself it was good that she left, that Trinity and Yolanda had needed time to talk about things without her there. Tells herself she was right. Ignores the ache in her chest that begs her to consider she might not be. When telling herself things becomes useless, and the ache grows too strong, she gives up on sleeping in her bed. Makes a cup of tea and gets comfortable on the couch, a documentary she thinks she’s probably seen before on the TV.

She’s still on the couch when Yolanda comes the next morning. Flat on her stomach, tea half-empty and cold on the coffee table, screensaver bouncing around the TV. She stirs at the sound of the front door unlocking, brain coming back to consciousness enough to register her alarm system chirping before it's disarmed. Realizes who that means, and buries her face in the couch cushions beneath her.

“Good morning,” Yolanda says as she sits on the edge of the couch next to Baran, a hand coming to rub gently up and down her back.

“Morning.” Baran rolls to her side, curls a little around Yolanda to give her more room to sit. There are bags under her eyes, and they seem a little puffier than normal. If Yolanda is carrying signs of last night on her face, then Baran supposes she must look even worse. “What are you doing here?”

“I wasn’t sure if storming out last night meant you also cancelled our run,” Yolanda says. “Thought I better come over and check. I brought coffee.” She nods to two cups on the table.

“Coffee?” Baran raises an eyebrow. Coffee, any caffeine really, was a rare indulgence for her.

“I didn’t sleep very well last night,” Yolanda brings her hand to Baran’s face, thumb tracing gently over one of her eyebrows. “Figured you didn’t either.”

Baran shakes her head and leans into the touch. “Trinity?” she asks, a ball of guilt settling in her chest.

“She’s sleeping now,” Yolanda says simply. “How are you doing?” The look she gives Baran when she asks is so loving, so open, that Baran almost turns away.

“I should be asking you that,” she says instead.

“Maybe, but I asked first.”

Baran turns her face to place a kiss against Yolanda’s palm. In truth, she doesn’t really know how she is. Her position hadn’t changed, she believed everything she had said the night before. But the way she had said things, well. There was a lot to atone for in the cold light of the morning. Baran shrugs. Kisses her hand again.

“Great, go get dressed.” Yolanda stands from the couch, reaching out her hands to help Baran up. “If we’re not gonna talk, we’re gonna run.”

Baran can’t come up with a good reason to say no, so she doesn’t. Just accepts Yolanda’s hands and stands up. Goes upstairs to her room to fish out something suitable to run in. Listens to Yolanda busy herself in the kitchen, unloading the dishwasher. She doesn’t let herself think too long about the warm feeling that gives her.

---------------------

Trinity is there when they get home. She’s sitting on the front steps, though she’s clearly already been inside; a glass of water from Baran’s kitchen is on the steps beside her. Baran stops in front of her while Yolanda continues inside, dropping a hand briefly on Trinity’s head as she goes. Wordlessly, Trinity offers up the glass. Watches intently as Baran drinks it all.

The run had been hard. She and Yolanda almost always ran on their days off together, the same 5-mile loop through her neighborhood and along the river. Usually the pace was easy, more about moving their bodies and spending time together than anything else, easy to keep up conversation. Baran hadn’t known what to say today, though, and clearly Yolanda hadn’t either. And so they had pushed each other, pacing faster and faster until they were done. Baran thinks it's probably the fastest she’s ever run five miles.

She doesn’t think it’s made her feel better, just different. Like some of the guilt and shame that’s been sitting in her chest since last night has synthesized into more concrete thought. Into things she probably has to say. She doesn’t think she knows how, yet.

Trinity stands up and puts her hand out for the glass when it’s done. Baran parts her lips to speak, but Trinity kisses her before she can. And, well, Baran’s lips were already open, so it’s not hard for her to reach out and drag her tongue along Trinity’s lower lip. Not hard to slip inside her mouth when her lips part, too. Baran fights against the part of her brain that is incessantly reminding her that they are outside where her neighbors can see. She just pushes her lips harder against Trinity. It lasts just a second longer, with Trinity’s free hand resting on Baran’s hip, before the younger woman is pulling away. “Go shower,” Trinity says with a small smile, and steps away fully.

Baran wants to ask her to come with, but she’s still not entirely sure where they stand after last night, and so for the second time today, she finds herself alone in her room at the direction of one of her girlfriends. It feels lonelier than it had earlier this morning. Maybe because now they’re both here, downstairs, even after she had stormed out on them. She feels off balance.

The hot water only runs over her for a few seconds before she realizes it’s not going to ground her in the way she needs. So she goes through the barest minimum of steps, leaves her hair pulled up in a bun and unwashed, grabs the first t-shirt and pair of denim shorts she sees when she opens her closet. Returns back downstairs twenty minutes later, determined.

They’re both on her couch, curled together in almost a mirror of last night. Trinity is upright this time, hand stroking idly along Yolanda’s bare arms, the surgeon’s head resting on her shoulder. The sitcom on the TV gets switched off when Baran enters the room. Two sets of eyes turn to her expectantly as Baran crosses to stand in front of them. She hesitates for a second before slowly sinking to her knees, ankles complaining as she sits all the way back on her feet, one hand coming to rest on each of their legs.

“I’m sorry,” she says, making eye contact with Trinity. Then turns to Yolanda. “I’m sorry,” she repeats. Yolanda nods, still tucked close to Trinity.

“I’m sorry, too,” Trinity says as she reaches up to tuck a stray curl behind Baran’s ear. Leaves her hand resting on her cheek. There’s a long pause, heavy silence as the three of them sit with this step towards reconciliation. The energy is closer to their baseline than it’s been in days. Not fully, but closer. “I don’t really wanna talk about it now,” Trinity says after a long moment.

Baran nods, swallows the words that had been on the tip of her tongue. “What do you want, love?” she asks instead.

Trinity thinks for only a second. “I want to turn my brain off,” she says, voice lower than it had been a moment ago.

It’s a request Trinity has made countless times before. One that usually leaves heat pooling immediately in Baran’s stomach, overwhelms her with need. Today it just strikes panic. They’ve said they’re sorry, but Baran feels too vulnerable, too raw, too undeserving of Trinity’s submission. She needs to atone, to give, not take. Baran’s eyes go wide, and she seeks out Yolanda, prays the other woman will see that she can’t take from Trinity. Not right now, not yet.

To her credit, Yolanda picks up on it immediately. “And what do you want?” she asks, hand coming up to cup Baran’s other cheek.

Baran feels heat rush to her face, bracketed as it is in both of her girlfriends’ hands. “I want to turn my brain off, too,” she says, dipping her chin a little, looking up at Yolanda and Trinity through her lashes. “Want to make it up to both of you.”

Above her, Trinity gasps. Turns her head quickly to look at Yolanda, making sure the woman will comply with the request. Gets to watch the moment her eyes darken. This is not new, but it is rare. Baran Al-Hashimi, dedicated mother, exacting attending physician, and singularly focused partner, does not give up control. She demands excellence from everyone she meets, takes broken systems and controls what she can to fix what she can. She has high standards for everyone— for no one more than herself. She does not bend.

She will bend today.

Yolanda nods once, and drops her hand, sitting up straighter as the weight of what’s being given to her settles in. “Go wait on the bed,” she says to Trinity. “We’ll be there soon.” Trinity goes without another word, barely contained excitement playing across her face. 

“Come here,” Yolanda directs once she’s gone. Baran’s knees protest as she stands, and Yolanda holds both hands out to help her, gently pulling the older woman down to straddle her lap. “Are you sure?”

Baran wants to shy away from the eye contact being leveled at her, their faces only a few inches apart now. But she knows this check in is important, knows Yolanda won’t do anything unless she’s sure. “I am,” Baran nods. “I want to make it up to her. And to you.”

“You don’t have to,” Yolanda says. “We’ve forgiven you. I won’t punish you for last night. If you want the control, we’re both happy to give it.”

“I don’t want it,” she asserts. “It’s not about punishment it’s–” she cuts herself off, choosing her next words carefully. “You both give so much to me. Not just this…” she gestures between them, grabs Yolanda’s hands from where they’ve settled against her thighs. “But in so many ways. All the time. And now Trinity wants to turn her brain off, wants to give even more, and I just. I can’t take it from her. Not right now. I need to give, too. Need to show you both how much I love you. Please let me,” she begs.

“Okay,” Yolanda says.

“Okay?”

“Okay. But if the giving starts to feel like too much, if you need to come back to yourself, promise me you’ll ripcord out of there.”

“I promise,” Baran says. “The same goes for you, you know. It can get intense for me sometimes, with both of you. Just say the word and we’ll–”

“I will,” Yolanda cuts her off, bringing her hand up to cup Baran’s jaw. “Are you ready?”

Baran nods, and the grip on her jaw turns firm as Yolanda raises an eyebrow. Heat surges through Baran’s body, her limbs and head feeling almost weightless as everything concentrates in her center. “Yes,” she sighs out, nodding again. It’s not enough of an answer for Yolanda, who tightens her grip further still and rests her thumb on Baran’s bottom lip. She knows what the surgeon is waiting for, knows she’s on the precipice of giving in fully. She takes in a shaky breath and lets it happen. “Yes, Daddy,” she exhales.

“Good,” Yolanda says, “let’s go.” She’s moving before Baran has a chance to react, standing and letting the older woman fall clumsily off her lap. She waits impatiently by the bottom of the stairs as Baran finds her feet, and directs her up the stairs first, one hand on either side of her hips.

The sight that greets them when they reach the bedroom takes Baran’s breath away. Trinity is sprawled in the center of the bed, completely naked. Eyes shut tight, one hand is tugging hard at her nipple while the other rubs furious circles between her legs. Judging by the flush creeping up her neck, she’s close. Yolanda stops a few feet from the end of the bed and pulls Baran’s back flush to her front. One arm wraps around her waist while the other loops over her shoulder, pressing into Baran’s sternum. They stand there for a moment longer watching Trinity work herself up even more. Baran’s body hums with energy, wanting to jump on the bed, replace Trinity’s hands with her own. There’s sweat pooled at the base of Trinity’s throat between her collar bones, and the need to lick it is so overwhelming that for a second Baran forgets and goes to take a step forward. Yolanda’s hold on her tightens, pulling her back as she tsks disapprovingly.

“Baby,” Yolanda says, and Trinity’s eyes snap open. Her flush turns a darker shade of red, but she doesn’t stop. “Did I say you could do that?”

“You didn’t say I couldn’t,” Trinity gasps. “You guys were taking a really long time.”

“Hmm, I don’t think it was that long,” Yolanda hums. “Do you think it was that long, B?”

“No, Daddy,” Baran sighs. Her vision is fuzzy around the edges, she needs to get to Trinity.

“You need to stop now,” Yolanda says.

“Make me.” Baran feels Yolanda’s arms twitch against her, feels the huff of breath pushed out of her nose as Trinity says it.

Yolanda drops her lips to Baran’s neck, kisses once, open-mouthed just behind her ear, before releasing her grip. “Go on,” she says, pushing Baran towards the bed. Baran moves without thinking, relief flooding through her as she sits on the bed just above Trinity’s head. She grabs each of Trinity’s wrists, smiling when she’s met with no resistance, and pulls them into her lap. She leans over Trinity, is about to finally drag her tongue down the younger woman’s neck when Yolanda speaks. “Stop,” she directs. “Wait for me. No touching. Am I clear?”

“Yes, Daddy,” Baran says immediately, eyes locked on Trinity’s.

“You’re not who I’m worried about, baby,” Yolanda laughs.

“Yes, Daddy,” Trinity whines a moment later. She whines again when Yolanda leaves for Baran’s walk-in closet without saying the expected ‘good girl.’ 

It feels like forever and no time at all that they’re stuck like that. Trinity’s hands, wrists held together loosely by one of Baran’s hands, twitch every so often in her lap. Both of them are breathing shallowly. The look in Trinity’s eyes is one she’s familiar with, pupils blown wide, unfocused, almost glassy with desire, waiting for her next instruction. Baran has brought that look out of her countless times. She wonders if Trinity recognizes what she can see, or if Baran’s face is different, somehow, in this new dynamic.

An eternity later, or immediately, Yolanda is returning, having traded her clothes for the little box of supplies that Baran keeps tucked in the back of her closet. She drops the box unceremoniously on the nightstand and comes to stand between where Trinity’s legs hang off the edge of the mattress. “Look at me,” she instructs, and both pairs of eyes snap to her face. “Are you going to listen now, baby?” Yolanda asks, fixing Trinity with a hard stare.

“Yes, Daddy,” Trinity nods emphatically. “I’m so sor–” she’s cut off by Yolanda holding two fingers up.

“Save it,” Yolanda says. Baran feels drunk, watching with hooded eyes as Yolanda places her fingers against Trinity’s center, circling her clit once, twice, before dipping lower. She pushes in, Trinity’s moan almost covering the obscene squelch from her soaked folds, wrists straining against Baran’s grip. Yolanda withdraws as quickly as she went in, fingers coming away glistening, a string of fluid hanging between her fingers as she separates them slightly. Trinity whines at the loss of contact.

If Baran thought the need to lick up Trinity’s sweat had been bad, this was ten times worse. Most of her conscious thoughts are gone, replaced instead with pure primal want. Her lips part and she sucks in a shaky breath, about to speak, to beg, when Yolanda’s gaze shifts to her, silencing her. Yolanda must see the need plain on her face, because she brings her fingers to Baran’s mouth, pushing past her lips without preamble. Baran moans, the heady taste of Trinity on Yolanda’s skin overwhelming her. She sucks like her life depends on it, wraps her tongue around and between Yolanda’s fingers until she’s sure she’s got it all. Too soon, Yolanda is withdrawing her fingers to wrap around Baran’s jaw instead, guiding her to rest higher up on her knees, drawing her in for a kiss.

It’s sloppy, and delicious, all teeth and tongues and spit, and Baran almost forgets Trinity is there, releasing her hold on the younger woman to instead clutch at Yolanda’s hips, her arms, her hair. Anywhere she can reach. The kiss ends when Yolanda pulls back with a gasp, looking down sharply at the woman below them. Baran lets her gaze follow, and sees that with her hands free, Trinity has taken the opportunity to grab at Yolanda’s thigh, fingers aimed up at her center. “Hands to yourself,” Yolanda snaps. Trinity whines, but listens, tucking her hands under her own lower back to contain them.

“Please,” Trinity begs, chest heaving.

“Feeling left out?” Yolanda raises an eyebrow. Trinity just nods and whines again. “Don’t worry, we’ll share.” Then Yolanda’s mouth is on Baran’s again, impossibly wetter than before, pushing spit past Baran’s lips before pulling back again, the hand on her jaw pushing up on her chin to close her mouth. It snakes around to grip the hair at the base of her skull and she directs Baran’s head to hover over Trinity’s face. Yolanda’s other hand has come up to grab Trinity’s jaw and force her mouth open. The hand in Baran’s hair tightens and she knows what’s expected of her, letting the spit in her mouth pool behind her lips and slip out, dropping heavily onto Trinity’s waiting tongue. “Good girl,” Yolanda says when Trinity closes her mouth and swallows. Trinity lets out a sob.

Yolanda steps back then, tilts her head as she takes in the scene before her. Trinity is still flat on her back, hands tucked underneath her, slick glistening between her thighs. Meanwhile, Baran still has all her clothes on, hands fisted in the hem of her shorts, kneeling near Trinity’s head, a stray string of spit hanging from her lip. They look wrecked already, tracking Yolanda’s movements as she opens the box on the nightstand and pulls out the already-prepared harness inside with hazy, love-drunk eyes. She laughs. She’s hardly even touched them. “You,” she taps Trinity’s leg gently, “lay against the pillows. And you,” she directs, turning to Baran. “Need to get undressed.”

Baran nearly falls off the bed in her haste to get off of it, grateful to have something to do. Yolanda catches her elbow, steadying her and helping her untangle her foot from where it got caught in the comforter. She meets Baran’s gaze for a moment, pretenses and roles dropped, eyebrows raised in a silent check-in. Baran just nods, reassuring. She can’t imagine being anywhere else, doing anything else right now. Everything that’s happened so far, everything she expects to happen still, sets her bones alight with its rightness.

By the time her clothes are off and tossed to some random corner of her bedroom, Trinity is pressed back into the pillows and Yolanda is tightening the straps of the harness around her hips. “Now here’s how this is gonna go,” Yolanda says low in Baran’s ear, pulling Baran to her, back to front, the dildo between Yolanda’s legs pressing firmly against her hip. “I’m going to fuck you, and you’re going down on her,” Yolanda inclines her head toward the bed. Baran chokes down a moan. “And all Trinity has to do is keep her hands to herself,” Yolanda says a little louder, so Trinity can hear.

“No, please Daddy, please let me,” Trinity begs. “I promise I’ll be good, just let me touch.”

“You already had a chance to be good,” Yolanda says. “And you didn’t take it. So now you’ll keep your hands to yourself. Am I clear?”

Trinity chokes on another cry, but dutifully tucks her hands back away as she lets out a broken “yes, Daddy.”

“Are you ready, love?” Yolanda says into Baran’s ear, leaning down to pepper kisses on the side of her face, teeth lightly scraping over her earlobe as Baran nods. “Good girl,” Yolanda chuckles quietly. And oh, Baran hadn’t realized what hearing that would do to her. Praise was always Trinity’s thing, the youngest of the three blooming under the slightest compliment. She’s heard Yolanda say it countless times, but never at her. Hearing it now, Baran melts. Her thoughts become even more of a haze. She wants to be good, she needs to be good, for Yolanda, for both of them. They deserve it, her goodness. She has to give it to them.

Yolanda helps her move to the bed, laying her down between Trinity’s legs, placing a pillow under her hips, hands running all over, stroking her back, her legs, her hips. When Yolanda’s fingers knead Baran’s inner thighs, she jumps, and her head falls from where it had been resting on Trinity’s thigh to her center. Above her, Trinity gasps, and while Baran supposes some part of her had been waiting for Yolanda to say she could start, she can’t wait any longer. Pulling Trinity’s legs over her shoulders, she dives in with a focus usually reserved for Trauma rooms.

Baran is so lost in it– in the whines falling from Trinity’s mouth, in the way her legs shiver and jump around her head, in the way she’s getting impossibly wetter, slick and spit coating Baran’s face, running down her neck– that she almost misses Yolanda get on the bed behind her. Her brain doesn’t really even catch up to what’s happening until there’s hands back on her thighs, pulling her legs farther apart before the head of Yolanda’s strap is pressing against her entrance. She moans into Trinity, but is determined not to lose focus as Yolanda pushes in deeper, the stretch burning her from the inside out. Yolanda gives her a moment to adjust but eventually begins to pick up the pace, and Baran moves her tongue from where it’s been drawing careful tight circles over Trinity’s clit to push inside of her instead, matching Yolanda’s thrusts into her. Trinity’s earlier activities had worked her up plenty, and once two of Baran’s fingers replace her tongue on her clit, she’s coming hard, walls fluttering and pushing against the tongue inside her.

The sounds that fall out of Trinity’s mouth as she comes are music, and Baran would do anything to hear them again. So she does. Or rather, she doesn’t stop, continuing to lick and suck as Trinity rides through her orgasm, never breaking pace, never pulling back. “Please, please, please, Daddy,” Trinity is begging above her, voice breaking. Baran thinks she might be crying. She isn’t going to raise her head to check, though, pushes down the rising tension in her own center in favor of sucking hard on Trinity’s clit. She’s worried Yolanda will give in to Trinity’s demands and pull her off, and that is not something Baran is willing to let happen. At least not until the younger woman comes again. “Please, just let me touch her,” Trinity cries. Oh.

“Go ahead, babygirl,” Yolanda grits out between thrusts. And then Trinity’s hands are in Baran’s hair, slipping between her bun and her scalp, pulling her head closer to Trinity’s center, adjusting the angle in a way that has Trinity moaning even louder.

With Trinity’s hands in her hair, the arms Baran has wrapped around her thighs feel less necessary for support, so she releases one, letting her hand move towards Trinity’s chest– it’s stopped before she reaches her destination. Yolanda’s hand on her wrist drags Baran’s arm the opposite direction, helping her to position it instead between Baran’s legs before gripping her hips again. She whines into Trinity’s clit and the hands in her hair tighten. Even in her hazy state, Baran understands the surgeon’s intention, understands that Yolanda knows she can’t get off without some added stimulation, but she’s not ready. She’s not coming until Trinity does at least one more time, maybe two.

So she leaves her hand still, which apparently wasn’t an acceptable thing to do, because Yolanda is smacking lightly against her backside– not enough to hurt, but enough to get her attention. “Come on, B,” Yolanda says. “Are you going to help, or do I have to do all the work myself?”

She wasn’t going to answer, that would be interrupting the task at hand, but Trinity’s hands in her hair pull her head up long enough that she can get out a quick “Not yet.” Before diving back in.

“Baby,” Yolanda says from behind her and Baran isn’t really sure who she’s talking to, but she also isn’t really sure that she cares. “Don’t let her help you unless she’s also helping herself.”

Trinity pulls her off again, and Baran stops herself from letting out a frustrated whine. “Please,” she says instead, trying to fall back down, stopped this time by Trinity’s grip on her head.

“No one’s trying to stop you,” Yolanda sounds a little out of breath; she hasn’t stopped thrusting into Baran through their conversation. “You know what you have to do.” Baran does whine then, but she starts to move her fingers against her clit, making sure her arm moves enough that Trinity can see it. Moans out something that might be thanks when her mouth is allowed to return to Trinity.

It’s harder to focus like this, the heat coiling low in her stomach becoming harder to ignore, but she does her best anyway. The growing uncoordination of her movements as her body gives over to feeling– Yolanda’s grip on her hips, her own fingers against her clit, the strap thrusting in over and over– doesn’t seem to matter much to Trinity, if the fluttering hands in her hair and the increasing pitch of her moans are anything to go by. A few more minutes of this and Trinity will come again and then Baran will let herself fully give in to the sensations between her legs and then–

She’s ripped away again, Yolanda gripping her by both shoulders and pulling her all the way back onto her knees, pressing Baran’s back to her front. “Please,” Baran whines, trying desperately to reach back down to Trinity, now infuriatingly out of reach.

“Baby, you stopped the second Trin let go,” Yolanda chides in her ear. She’s stopped thrusting entirely now, focused instead on keeping Baran upright against her even as the older woman struggles to lay back down.

“No I didn’t, I was,” Baran says, trying to think back. “Okay I wasn’t moving, but I could still feel.” It feels like a miracle she’s able to string the sentence together. “Please, just. Just one more, then we can focus on me. Promise.” She struggles in Yolanda’s grip again, but doesn’t get anywhere. Below her, Trinity has taken Yolanda’s permission to touch to heart, and has replaced Baran’s mouth with her hands.

“Hmm, seems like you’ve forgotten who you put in charge,” Yolanda teases, thrusting her hips once, sending a shockwave through Baran. “I thought you were going to be good?”

“I was, I am, fuck,” Baran whines, lost. She can see Trinity getting closer without her, and it’s not fair, she needs to be down there, needs to feel her fall apart on her tongue. “Please, Daddy, just let me give her one more.”

“Sorry baby, but it’s your turn now,” Yolanda says, not sounding sorry at all. “If Trinity wants another one she can give it to herself.” She begins to move again, keeping Baran clutched to her chest, one hand moving against her clit. Baran moans in frustration, hands reaching out futilely for Trinity for just a moment longer before giving over to the sensation of Yolanda in and on her. The new position has the head of Yolanda’s strap hitting just right inside of her, and Baran finds herself reaching around behind her to grab at Yolanda in a desperate attempt to steady herself.

Baran might give in to her new circumstances, but she doesn’t give up, instead doing her best to talk her girlfriend to orgasm if she can’t touch her. An almost unintelligible string of “good girl,” and “that’s it,” and “keep going,” falling from her lips until finally, finally, a perfectly timed “come for me,” sends Trinity careening over the edge. Baran laughs breathily, and Yolanda sucks a hickey into her neck, and then Baran falls apart, too.

A moment later Yolanda pulls out, and Baran collapses down onto the bed next to Trinity, rolling over to place a kiss on her hip before turning to look at Yolanda above them. Even as the aftershocks of her orgasm still ripple through her, Baran feels a wave of new desire as she looks at her. Her girlfriend has sweat dripping down her neck in a few places, the curls at her hairline frizzing slightly with the added moisture. Her eyes are almost all pupil, and her lower lip is between her teeth as she as one hand subconsciously rests loosely around the base of her strap. Baran thinks it might be the best she’s ever seen her look. Trinity reaches up lazily, not sitting up enough to actually reach Yolanda, but enough to easily grab her arm when she does get close enough on her way down to the bed.

A fair bit of shuffling and giggles later, and the three lay side by side, Yolanda in the middle, arms wrapped around her girls. “I should have known you wouldn’t totally listen,” Yolanda says, pulling away from the kiss Baran wrapped her up in.

“Sorry,” Baran says, kissing down her neck, tongue darting out to taste the sweat drying on her skin.

“I’m not,” Trinity adds from where her head is resting on Yolanda’s chest, fingers tracing random patterns across the flat expanse of Yolanda’s stomach. Her comment pulls a full-bodied laugh from both of her companions.

“Yes well,” Yolanda says when she’s caught her breath. “You’ve had two orgasms. I’ve had none.”

“Sorry,” Baran says again, biting gently at Yolanda’s earlobe, eliciting a gasp from the younger woman. “We’ll make it up to you, Daddy.” She looks down Yolanda’s more rapidly rising and falling chest to where Trinity has picked up her head in interest.

“Yeah, Daddy,” Trinity says, moving up to kiss Yolanda deeply for a moment. “Let us take care of you.”

“I don’t–” Yolanda tries to start, but is quieted by Trinity kissing her again. Baran only lets it go on for a minute before she snakes her hand into Trinity’s hair, pulling her up to kiss her instead. “Wait, what about me?” Yolanda asks frustratedly.

“Sorry,” Baran repeats yet again, giggling slightly this time as she pulls off of Trinity’s mouth. One look at the wicked glint in Trinity’s eyes and she knows they’re on the same page. They move in tandem, Trinity settling between Yolanda’s legs, hooking her fingers around the straps of the harness as Baran settles back on her knees, one hand coming to rest on Yolanda’s truly soaked center. “All this for us, Daddy?” She teases.

“If you two don’t touch me right now, we’re never doing this again,” Yolanda groans.

“Yes, Daddy,” Trinity says with a mock salute, which makes Baran laugh and Yolanda rolls her hips in frustration. They take pity on her then, Baran sliding her thumb under the base of the strap to rest on Yolanda’s clit while she slips two fingers inside. At the same time, Trinity opens her mouth wide and sinks down onto Yolanda’s strap. The motion pushes it down onto Baran’s thumb, which pushes against Yolanda’s clit, and the sound that comes out of Yolanda’s mouth is downright sinful. Baran lets Trinity set the pace after that, timing her thrusts into Yolanda with the bobs and twists of the youngest woman’s mouth and hand on the strap.

From her position on her knees near Yolanda’s hip, Baran has a perfect view of it all. The way Trinity loses herself in the task at hand, the way Yolanda’s hands grip the sheets beneath her as she fights the urge to grab Trinity’s head. Baran grabs Yolanda’s nearest hand in her own unoccupied one, steadying her as she falls apart around her fingers.

When Yolanda’s abdomen has stopped jumping with aftershocks, Trinity moves back up to her previous position in Yolanda’s arms, trailing lazy kisses along her collarbone before collapsing entirely. Baran lets herself stay back where she is for a moment longer, looking at her partners, letting the love and admiration she has for them wash over her in place of the desire that had been present a few minutes before. With striking clarity, she knows she would do anything to keep them.

The thought doesn’t scare her as much as it once might have.