"So is it just the porn sir, or anything else?" The older woman ringing him up asked. She held Wes's gaze as she slowly reached up to pull another book from the top of the tall stack of books Wes had dropped on the counter, scanning it before sticking it on a bag to repeat the process. "Maybe a book with words in it?"
Wes leaned back a little on his heels, his lips curled in disgust. "Are you allowed to ask me that?" He asked, the clerk not looking amused in the least. He looked around to pin down another worker with a wildly bemused look. "Is she allowed to ask me that?!" He asked the other worker loudly. He turned back to the stack of book to stab a finger onto the stack of books. "I'm an artist. These are art books. Get your shit together, Martha." He said after a glance at her name tag, "As someone that works with all sorts of books, you think you would know the difference between porn and art books." He said slowly in a hard tone, "Me thinketh you should better yourself for the sake of your profession and learn the dif-fer-ence." He said slowly.
The clerk, if possible, looked even less amused.
Wes looked to where Jackson was standing next to him with an insulted look before he looked back to the clerk, watching her with wide eyes as she continued. He stepped up to the counter then.
"It's people like you that make people like me scared to come to bookstores like this and buy what they need." He hissed, "This is why bookstores are dying!" Wes said loudly. When the woman got to the books he had come here for specifically she paused, frowning at them. She looked to him with a look far less judgemental and far more distrusting.
Wes face blanked. "Ironically, that one is the one I'm going to wank off to." He said coolly, giving her a wolfish smile. She scowled and him and finished scanning his books with a more aggressive touch before Jackson held out a shiny black card to pay with. Wes grabbed his fabric bags and started out the door before Jackson caught up and took them for him. Before he left he flagged down someone he thought might be a manager and loudly proclaimed that he was rudely treated by the attendant and vowed to not return.
Wes marched to the truck then, Jackson on his heel.
Once they were in the truck, Wes in the front passenger seat and Jackson behind the wheel, Jackson turned in his seat to look at him. "Are you really an artist?" Jackson asked lightly.
Wes snorted. "No." He said and he opened one of his books to eye a black and white photo of a naked woman balancing an apple on her head, "I just feel more fancy jerking off to art books that skin mags. Like I'm a pervy photographer or some shit and this is my own private collection of conquests."
Jackson was quiet at that, starting up the car to drive back to Wes's apartment. When they were parked, he looked back to Wes. "Why did you make a scene back there?"
"That wasn't a scene." Wes said flatly as he snapped closed his book and slid it back in the bag he had gotten it from, "You want a scene, I'll make a fucking scene. I do it all the time." He looked to Jackson and pointed a finger at him. "Let that be a warning to you - the horse you are hitching your kart to is a crazy Karen who does shit just to watch people squirm. It thrills me." He said with a dramatic eye roll.
Jackson didn't react, but Wes didn't need him to.
Wes grabbed his bags and got out of the car, and after a few steps Jackson was on his heel again, following him closely as he went up the stairs.
"Why don't you ever take the elevator?" Jackson asked curiously as they got to Wes's level.
"I drink way too much booze, that's why. You don't get a rock hard body like this from taking elevators, man." Wes deadpanned. "Any way, you got to be heading back to the base soon?"
"I have another hour or so." Jackson said quickly as the came to Wes's door.
Wes nodded as he handed Jackson the bags, then reaching into his jacket to try and find his keys. "So...I'm going to do a little reading tonight, and then, uh...we'll...you know, we'll start talking about...how we're going to go about doing this tomorrow morning." He opened the door in and moved to let Jackson in first, then going in after him to turn and close the door. "I got the day off tomorrow so...we'll have time to try and figure this out." He frowned and shrugged o his jacket, motioning for Jackson to handed Jackson one of the thinner books. "You read that and I'll read this and we'll...go from there."
Jackson nodded firmly, and Wes recognized a look of excitement and anticipation on his face.
They went into the living room and after Wes dumped his 'art books' in his bedroom, he brought the three books relevant to their problem to the living room to read with Jackson. Surprisingly enough - or maybe not, Jackson knew a lot more than Wes did on the whole thing.
It made sense, though. While Wes could just forget about the whole key thing and live a pretty normal life, someone like Jackson knew they would for sure need one at some point, so he figured it made sense they'd prepare for it. It kind of made Wes feel like an asshole, how little he knew, but he figured it was good for Jackson to know exactly how little fucks he usually gave things.
And Jackson didn't seem bothered in the least.
If anything, he just seemed excited.
Eager.
Jackson practically vibrated on the couch next to Wes, sitting shoulder to shoulder with him, pointing out important things for Wes to highlight.
When the time came for Jackson to leave for base, Wes was all geared up to study throughout the night- He had all the material he would need, and now just needed to put in the hours.
But as soon as Jackson left and he no longer had someone leaning over his shoulder...
Well.
Wes lost all motivation.
He just felt very...blah. He couldn't focus on it. That pretty much summed up why he barely graduated high school and nearly every exam he'd ever taken. He just wasn't a good student. He was more of a 'learn through experience kind of guy'.
So he figured he would give himself an hour to fuck around, get his excess energy out, and then he'd be able to focus.
He pulled out his phone and checked his dating app to see he had a couple matches - the city was never in short supply of hot, horny women. Whenever he got nostalgic and homesick, it was the wide pool of potential partners that kept him from really considering returning home. Molehill had it's perks - family, familiarity - but there were, like, two hot chicks. One was gay apparently, and the other was the untouchable Stacey Kimble, who everyone wanted and no one could have...cuz she married at sixteen and was a good, loyal woman.
But damn.
If Wes had one wish he could get granted, it was to get into Stacey Kimble's impossibly tight pants.
She had the most amazing breasts, and Wes was a huge tits man. Always had been, pretty much from day one. It was his one real weakness - a girl could have a clown mask on and he'd still be game if she had good tits. Fact. the face and ass were just a bonus.
But Stacey Kimble had it all. Even the personality that she could tolerate more of his bullshit that others were willing to.
Of course, the narrow window when they were both single at sixteen, he had crabs thanks to his ex, and while she had found it hilarious and even said she's text him when it cleared up, by the time that happened she was dating her future husband, so.
The stars never aligned there, but a guy could hope.
After a bit of scrolling, he connected with a girl who sent him a full blown nude as well as her address, her only condition being he brought vodka which as luck would have it, Jackson bought for him the day before when they were at the store.
Goggle maps told him it was about a forty walk, but Wes cleared it in about fifteen minutes by sprinting like crazy - it'd been almost a month since he had gotten properly laid, and he refused to go throughout the night without.
He was lonely.
He was always...
So fucking lonely.
His lovely lady's apartment building was considerably nicer than his own, sat across from a little park instead of a liquor store, and even required a key code to get past the main entrance. He sent her a text and got buzzed in. Her apartment was on the second floor, and when he knocked, she answered in a silk robe that was open enough in the front to get him plenty excited.
Her gaze dropped to the bottle he was carrying and she reached down to take it from him before she hooked her finger into the collar of his white shirt and pulled him and his stupid grin forward into the apartment.
There wasn't going to be much talking, but there rarely was.
While she opened the bottle and carried it to the kitchen to add it to her already half full blender, he hastily stripped out of his t-shirt and startled to undo the zipper on his slacks.
"Nice place!" He called to her as he climbed out of his pants, "Very...pink." He said lamely, eying all the pink touches. It looked like the dollhouse that had been made for his sister and then since passed around to all of his nieces.
"Thanks!" she called back, "I broke up with my loser ex a couple of months ago and he wouldn't let me do any decorating, so when I got this place, I figured I'd make it as girly as I wanted!" She said as she carried in her drink sipping on it as she jerked her head toward the hall. "Hope you like it handsfree." She said with a wink.
He grinned, intrigued. "I like it all different sorts of ways, baby." He purred before he started down the hallway.
His cell phone rang then and he froze, one foot in her bedroom door. It was his grandpa's ring tone. He rolled his eyes and sighed before he turned back around and hurried past her. "That's my grandpa!" He called to her as he found his pants, fishing out his phone. "He's old and shit, I never miss a call - get lubed up and we'll start this show!" He said over his shoulder at her retreating form. He picked up the phone. "Sup?"
"I wanted to see how it was going with you and Jackson - check-in and make sure you' two were getting alone."
"Yeah, yeah, everything is good - can I call you back later?"
"Actually, Portland and I are going to drive up to the lake tonight, so I'll be out of contact for a week. Just wanted to call and let you know that if you know you fuck this up, you'll receive such a long-lasting sentence to the bitch seat, even your children will have to sit there, possibly even your children's children." His Grandpa said kindly, Wes's face blanking. "Alrighty then, I'll let you get back to what you were doing."
The line went dead, but Wes kept the phone to his ear for a minute longer.
Slowly he pulled it away to stare at it, slack jaw. "Son of a bitch..."
Wes pulled his phone away to glare at it before he dropped it to the floor in disgust. He glanced down at where his boner had tented his boxers and pointed a finger at it. "Don't you fucking quit on me, you bastard." He growled. "Don't let him get in your head!"
He whipped around then and stomped to the bedroom to see the lady of the manor sipping on her drink, scrolling through her phone. "Ready?" She asked in a distracted tone, snapping a pic of herself.
What did his grandpa mean by fuck it up?
Did he seriously think he was going to fuck it up?
"Yes." Wes blurted out, dropping his boxers. She lifted her gaze to stare at his erection and then slowly lifted her gaze to met his. At her approving nod, he grinned. "I'm about to rock your world, baby." He said eagerly.
"Just don't spill my drink." She said flatly.
He frowned, but then she opened her robe to reveal the sun-kissed flesh underneath and it was game on. He climbed onto the bed and got on top of her, lowering himself to kiss her neck as he pressed himself up against her, a hand sliding up to grasp one of her breasts -
"If you could not do that, that'd be great." She said, pushing his hand off of her with her phone, "I just had them done."
Wes pulled back a little to stare down at her breasts. "Holy shit, that's good work." He breathed, looking between them. "I can't even tell, and I usually can!"
"Right?" She said happily, taking a sip of her drink, "So worth the money." She said with a nod, clicking her tongue then. "But they're really sensitive still and the doc said to be super careful with them, so just to be on the safe side, I don't want you touching them. I'd actually rather do this doggy style so..."
"You mean I can't even look at them?" He asked her with a frown.
"It'll just be better for me that way."
He frowned harder, his brows knitting as the erection he had pressed against her through his boxers quickly lost blood. After a few beats, he was completely soft.
Her face blanked. "Really?"
"Titty's are my thing." He said with a bit of a pout. Her eyes narrowed and she took a long drink from her glass. He held her gaze before he sighed hard and climbed off of her to sit on the bottom of the bed with a disappointed frown.
A long minute ticked by before there was a distinct ping on her phone that signaled she just messaged someone else on the dating app, his date loudly taking a sip from her drink.
He made a frustrated noise before he stood and dragged himself out of the room. He pulled on his pants and hung his shirt over his shoulder before putting on his shoes, his gaze on where the bottle of vodka was in the kitchen.
When his shoes were tied he went and got the bottle, carrying it out of the apartment before he closed the door behind himself. He sighed, standing in the doorway briefly before he started down the stairs, taking off the cap to the bottle as he left the building. He needed to get shit faced now if he was going to get a good night's sleep - he'd been sober all day, and because of that, his mind was way too open to the others in the city right now.
That was probably the one real thing he was looking forward to once he matched with Jackson - once he did the dive - if he did the dive - everyone else mind would be far, far less present for him. For most keys, everyone else mind was completely unaccessible, which he could only hope for.
But until then, he needed alcohol, and right now, he especially needed it, cuz God damn, his grandpa really knew how to get into his head.
He was so preoccupied trying to chug down his drink and keep from walking off the road and into traffic that he completely missed the fact that Jackson was sitting on the bench across the street, watching him.
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