Curious About Only You

Lana has been weird for days. Not bad-weird — the opposite, actually. She keeps finding reasons to be in the same room as you, keeps laughing a little too hard at your jokes, keeps sitting closer on the couch until her knee is pressed against yours like it's an accident. You've noticed. You're a man; you notice. Tonight she's on her bed in an oversized t-shirt and shorts, bare feet tucked under her, and she's been staring at you for ten minutes without saying a word. Finally she takes a breath. "Hey. Can I ask you something weird?"

"Weird how?" you ask, and she laughs, rubbing one foot with the other, not quite looking at you.

"Okay, so. You know I'm gay. Like, aggressively, professionally gay. I've had a girlfriend in this room. You've heard — okay, you've definitely heard." She's blushing now, which is new. Lana doesn't blush. Lana once described a date to you in detail that made you leave the apartment. "But lately I keep having this thought, and the thought is annoyingly specific." "What thought?"

She finally looks at you straight. "It's you. I'm not curious about men, plural. I'm curious about you. Singular. One man. This is so humiliating, don't laugh." You don't laugh. You sit up a little straighter, actually, because your body understands before your brain does.

"Why me?" you ask, moving from your desk chair to the edge of her bed, because the distance suddenly feels stupid. "God, okay — because you listen to me? Because you know exactly who I am and you've never once tried to convert me or whatever? Because you walked around in a towel last Tuesday and I thought about it for three days like a Victorian widow?"

She flops backward onto her pillow, groaning at the ceiling. "I keep thinking about your hands. I don't even like hands. Women have hands. Yours are just — loud, somehow."

You're sitting close enough now that you could touch her ankle. "Loud hands." "Shut up. This is very difficult for me, I'm being brave."

"Be braver," you say, and she props up on her elbows to look at you, sizing you up like she's about to argue a phone bill.

"Fine." She sits up, crosses the small space, and takes your hand — turns it over in both of hers like she's inspecting it. Her thumb drags slowly across your palm. "See, when a girl does this, I know exactly what it means. With you I have no idea what anything means. It's terrifying. It's also kind of the hottest thing I've felt in a year."

"Kind of?" She presses your palm flat against her own, fingers laced through yours. "Top three," she says. "And we haven't even done anything yet."

"Can I try something?" she asks. "Small. Beginner level." "Try whatever you want." She kisses you — quick, careful, a peck that pulls back fast like she touched a stove. Then she stares at you, evaluating. "Huh."

"Huh what?" "Nothing. Again." This one lasts. Her hand comes up to your jaw, and she makes a small sound into your mouth, surprised at herself, and when she breaks away she's breathing differently. "Okay. Okay, that's — yeah. I get it now. I get the whole industry."

"So how far does this curiosity go?" you ask, and she grins — finally, the real Lana grin, the filthy one.

"Full scientific inquiry. I've thought about it. I want to know what you feel like. What you taste like. What you sound like when it's my fault." She pulls her t-shirt over her head in one motion, no ceremony, and her small breasts are bare and she watches your face the whole time. "There it is. That look. Girls never look at me like I'm a question they need to answer."

"You're not a question anymore," you say, pulling your own shirt off. "You're a whole assignment." She laughs, delighted, and pulls you down onto the bed.

She's under you, shorts gone, and she's breathing hard while your mouth travels down her stomach. "Okay, update — women have never made me this wet this fast, and I'm including the ex who did that thing with the — oh, *fuck*," she gasps, because your tongue finds her clit.

She's loud immediately, no shyness left, one hand fisting your hair. "Yeah — right there — okay, so THIS is what all my straight friends were so annoying about —" Her hips buck up against your mouth. "Don't stop, don't you dare stop, I'll revoke your roommate privileges —" She comes with a curse mangled into your name, thighs clamped around your head, shaking.

She pushes you onto your back, panting, eyes wild. "My turn. I want to see it. I've seen dicks in, like, an academic context. This one's mine."

She wraps her hand around your cock, studies it with genuine fascination for exactly three seconds before her mouth takes over — sloppy, enthusiastic, unapologetically greedy. "I figured I'd be bad at this," she says, coming up for air, stroking you. "Turns out I'm a natural. I'm annoyed about how much I love this."

"Second," you manage. "Shut up, you love it." She goes back down, and you groan, and she hums in satisfaction like she just won something.

"Inside me," she says against your ear, climbing up your body. "I want the full report. All of it."

You press into her and she goes silent for the first time all night — mouth open, eyes wide, adjusting. "Oh my god," she breathes. "That's — you're — okay. Okay, move." You move. She meets every thrust, filthy and funny to the end: "Harder — I'm not made of glass — *yes*, like that —" Her nails dig into your back. "I can't believe I wasted years — don't tell anyone I said that — fuck, don't stop—"

She comes again, clinging to you, and you follow, buried deep, her name in her ear.

Afterward she's sprawled across your chest, drawing lazy circles on your skin, thoroughly pleased with herself. "So," she says. "Peer review. Conclusion: I'm not straight. I'm not even really curious anymore." She looks up at you, hair wrecked, grin wicked. "I'm just yours. One-man sexual orientation. Congratulations, it's a very exclusive club and you're the only member." "The only member," you confirm, and she laughs into your neck.

She kicks the blanket over both of you and settles in like she has no plans to move until morning. Outside, the city hums. Your roommate — your lesbian roommate, who was never going to want a man, never mind want *you* — is asleep on your chest within minutes, one leg thrown over yours, keeping you exactly where she wants you. You lie there replaying it: her being brave, her being greedy, her being hers. All that weird behavior this week finally makes sense.