Chapter 10

Marie and I got out of Dove’s car with varying degrees of excitement. Dove’s mind flashed down to zero on seeing Vickie’s cleavage in her mostly unzipped parka. I flicked my eyes at Dove. She smiled and resurrected her mind to a five. I took a deep breath, and swung the door open.

“What yourself,” I said, to Vickie, who was too close to the door. The minds of the street rushed in and my brain grew all sticky from the overwhelming explosion. It wasn’t like a classroom with a hundred brains. There might’ve been fifteen around me. It was still too much.

I could pick out Marie’s twelve. Vickie had a big flying ten. Ira, who was further back on the curb, was a cold one. There was Dove with her five, and I was just making guesses.

Brains didn’t come with faces.

I licked my lips and hugged Vickie. Marie closed the door of Dove’s car.

“Hey,” Marie said to Ira. “Looks like we’re stealing your girlfriend. You in for the orgy?”

“Orgy?” Vickie and Ira’s mind wobbled down. There were another eight out there, jumping out of the darkness.

“Hell yeah, your place? Lead the way!” Ira swatted Vickie on the bum.

“Yeah, I don’t know which dorm is Gerard and which is O’Brien,” Dove said.

“The further one of course,” Marie said, stepping into the crosswalk. Vickie untangled herself until my bare fingers were grabbed in her frosty mitt. I kept the “Ew ... Melty...” expression off my face. She bounced in her bright pink boots.

“How’s everything?” I asked. “You and Lynsey got in a fight?”

Gerard hall was right across the street, I could pick out Lynsey and Paula’s window pretty easily. They had curtains, there wasn’t some shadowy woman looking out at us, planning our demise.

“She said you didn’t get to fuck me,” Vickie’s mind dropped, and then two minds bolted upwards, a ten and a six. The other brains I had labelled as Ira, Dove, and Marie all stayed normal. “I told her she couldn’t stop us. You know how she is? You should dump her.”

“I don’t think he will,” Marie said, turning on her heels and walking backwards down the potentially icy sidewalk. I frowned. She raised an eyebrow but looked at Vickie. “He’s gonna play with your heart and Lynsey’s until you’re begging to share him.”

“Damn!” Ira said. “Boy dreams big.”

“Eugh...” Vickie said. Minds were rising and dropping in response to everything. I think Dove hit zero and recovered again. Ira was hotter maybe? Unless that was Marie. I pulled up my hoods and tried to drown the world out. All I did was focus myself on Marie’s chest and Ira’s butt. Seven and a nine. Different directions. Fifteen and I wasn’t sure which way was up. The rest of the minds out there were still buzzing.

“He~ey!” I raised my eyes, down the street, Paula was coming up with a few of her engineering friends. Dudes. Marie spun and waved.

“Paula! Join us! Party!” Marie was gleeful. I frowned. Running herd on five girls? I was hoping to get more practice with two. Marie and Dove. Dove had really predictable brains. Drop, try again. Drop, try again. Marie really made it visual on her face if I ever dropped her down at all.

No practice, championship game tonight.

“Party?!” one of Paula’s classmates said. “We’re going to the liquor store. Do you girls need anything?”

Marie clobbered Paula in a hug. Paula looked over at me. “She’s overselling it guys. It’s just gonna be these girls.”

“And that dude.”

“One of the girls!” Ira tilted her head and beamed. Eyes turned on her. I tried to laugh. Marie did not like that insinuation. Paula was laughing up a storm.

“Dude, try not to let them break you,” said liquor-store-offerer-dude. “If you need one of the boys to make it a real party. You got my number.”

“I’ll remember,” I said, joking.

Marie dropped straight to a three. Paula was giggling madly. Her a seven. Ira was straight up a ten.

“Da-amn!” Said one of the other guys. “I would’ve put him out of your league, buddy.”

Paula traded off some hugs and the guys continued on up the street. Our group snowballed down the street to the next dorm.

“I take it, Jordan’s going full fiddle on all our heartstrings?” Paula said. Her brain slowly decelerating as the boys left.

“Oh yeah,” Ira said, slipping her arm around Paula’s waist. Paula dropped another few digits. Marie grabbed Paula’s hand.

Lynsey’s roommate was practically a one now.

I grimaced as we reached the building. I pulled my fingers out of Vickie’s hands and blew on them to warm them up. Didn’t help too much. She bit her crooked lip and grinned at me. I pulled my hood down as we went inside.

Six minds. Seven. Too many. Seven. and Six.

I frowned, tilting my head as the elevator doors closed behind us.

“Six brains?” I said aloud.

“What?” Marie asked. “Yeah, there are six of us.”

I counted again. “Five of you.”

“What about your brain?” Ira asked. The elevator door opened. We stepped out onto the fourth floor. Swept away again. This time of night, not a school night, there were dozens coming and going. I was shocked and woozy. Ira and Vickie reinforced my right side.

“Too much to drink, guy?” Someone cheered me on. I raised up my left hand and threw up the horns. My right fingers were still a little numb. Marie opened the door to her room.

She had a real single. My missing roommate gave me a second bed and space. A singlet was somehow smaller than half a double. The bed was up above the writing desk, I’d need to go up on my tiptoes to get my chin on the mattress.

“Who needs a heart jumpstart?” Marie said, climbing her ladder and bouncing on the mattress.

Paula raised her hand. But that wasn’t right. If she was the one, there were still a two and a four to account for. I found Dove and stared her in the eyes. The four dropped to zero and resurfaced as a three.

“What?” I said. “Someone else is double braining right now?”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Marie asked. She was probably the eleven.

“Like Kitty. Crazy.” I said. Broken. I looked at Ira. I pulled my hoods up and marched her up against the wall, laying my forehead on hers and pulling my hoods forward so we were caught together.

Just a seven. The buzz around me was nearly quiet, compared to her. I yanked her up to a twelve. She gasped and melted on wet noodle knees.

“Not the lesbian,” I said, turning around. I had pulled her up by a seven. There were changes in the room, but nothing as big as a five point jump. I grabbed Vickie, ripped off her mittens, and grabbed her neck. She giggled and pulled her parka’s hood up to cover the eave of my own. We disappeared in our shared lightless world. I felt the warmth of her breath. Her lips an inch away. I might’ve given in, until her wet sneakers squeaked on the floor.

Two minds. One a two, the other a nine. Unlike Kitty they spun in the same direction. I frowned.

I had run her pretty hot when I had fucked her with Ira. Above fifteen felt hazardous. Kitty was dangerous to herself and others. I stepped back and frowned at Vickie.

I staggered backwards.

“Does that work?” Paula asked. “I didn’t even feel him at all like with Ira.”

“He didn’t play with my heart,” Vickie said. She shot me a frustrated glare. She was the seven and the two? It wasn’t like Kitty, I couldn’t play one off of the other. If I pushed her low brain up to a ten, her other mind would be flying at a more dangerous fifteen.

I didn’t wanna risk that.

“It works better with walls between us,” I said. “Some of your brains leak through the hoods.”

“Cool! Fix Paula,” Marie said. “I’m gonna go grab some coffee and snacks and stuff. You guys are coming with me.”

“Sure,” Dove said.

“Definitely,” Ira agreed. “Really get Paula going. I’ve never had a redhead.”

That tanked Paula. She slumped her shoulders and glared at me.

“It’s gonna be fun,” Vickie said. “I fucked Ira once when I was sad, and once with Jordan. It’s much better with Jordan.”

“Yeah, I’d hope so,” Paula said. I closed the door behind the other four. She looked at me. “I find women deeply unattractive.”

“You were OK with the Lynsey thing the other day,” I said.

She poked herself in the temple. “You were up in here. I’ve felt that much in love once, in grade eight, and I knew I was the side girl for this grade eleven friend of my brothers.”

“Well, you know you’re not my main girl now,” I said. “It sounds like you got hurt last time.”

“I got hurt because I tried to take him from his girlfriend,” Paula said, shrugging. “Now, I know I’ll be happy as one of your side girls.”

“I could have multiple main girls,” I said.

“Yeah,” Paula said. “Can I be a sidepiece? What if I find my one true love, y’know?”

“What if I get jealous and keep you from him?” I said.

“Could that happen?” She raised her hand to stop me from answering her. “Right, let’s make zero plans. OK? We’ve got, what? Three more years of undergrad. Then life will take us in different directions. I’m totally OK being harem concubine number thirteen until then.”

“It’s not thirteen,” I said. “Lynsey, Vickie, Marie, Kitty–”

“I don’t need to know the number,” she shook her head. “You took Ira, if she’s not around the group sex will be all about you. I can stomach Ira for good sex and finally getting along with chicks. You can keep the crazy out, yeah?”

“Uh...” I said, thinking of Kitty and Vickie. Oh god, I had Dove up that high earlier. Marie too. Lynsey? I forget. Shit. Did I leave cracks in the foundation? “I’m still learning.”

“Right,” she said. “Not concubines, lab rats.”

“Rats aren’t really sexy,” I said, frowning.

“Most animals aren’t, I hope,” Paula said, she sounded guarded and worried, but her crooked smirk said she was teasing. She had ramped steadily up since the girls left. She was a solid seven now and I hadn’t touched her brain. I licked my lips.

“You like me,” I said. “Just straight up like me.”

“Well, yeah,” she said. “You can carry a conversation and you’ve got man-boob muscles.” she reached on my chest and squeezed the parka. I frowned.

“Pecs?”

“Ri~ight!” she giggled. “I was gonna say deltoids. I didn’t know the right word, but I knew the one my brain was giving me was wrong.”

“How did I not notice girls liked me?” I said. Thinking of Kitty. Thinking of Vickie. Thinking of Lynsey.

“You were fucked up by your girlfriend back home last semester,” Paula shrugged. “And no one liked Quentin. So, anyone willing to go over your room before he dropped out, would’ve had their dander up and their pussy Sahara dry.”

“Really? He seemed like a good dude to me.” I was glad I had the room to myself, and Quentin had never been a friend like Fox had been. But he’d been OK, I thought.

“He ever corner you and force you to turn him down for three dates and a blowjob before he backed off?”

“No...”

“Ira has,” Paula said.

“It wasn’t like she hides the fact she’s gay,” I said.

“Quentin didn’t believe women could be all the way lesbians,” Paula shrugged. She tapped her head again. “You gonna fix me?”

She was spinning at a nine now. She still pushed higher, but she wasn’t accelerating enough to break into the double digits.

“I don’t know if I have to,” I said. “You’re at the point where’d you’d be down for anal.”

“That’s not really special for me,” she shrugged. “So long as there’s lube and you’re not a complete asshole.”

“I should text Marie for lube–”

Paula opened Marie’s desk and pulled out all kinds of sexual paraphernalia. “Marie’s got us all covered. She’s excited. She can’t wait until she gets her own apartment out of dorms. All of the engineering school parties are going to have her play hostess.”

“She plays hostess with rubbers and grease?” I frowned.

“She does now,” Paula said. “Or she will if you can run me up enough that one look at Vickie’s tits isn’t going to turn my pussy off. Get in my brain.”

“Not your heart?”

“You’re not making sure my blood is pumping,” she rolled her eyes.

“Thank you!” I said, grinning, throwing my hands up. She laughed. She was at a ten now. She frowned, dropping to an eight.

“Do it!”

“Does it feel good?” I said, grabbing her brain and pulling it harder. I dragged her up a thirteen and then backed off. Her smile went from flirty to braindead bimbo. She laughed and started stripping.

“You’re still wearing all of that...” She gestured at me from jacket to shoes.

“Right, the others?”

No dip.

“It’ll be easier to keep my spirits up if my pussy’s sore,” she said, beaming. She pulled her sweater off and kicked off her socks. She scrambled up the ladder onto Marie’s bed. Paula was tall, so she was hunched over, sitting on the mattress as she unhooked her bra. I rushed up after her and got a foot in my face.

“Clothes on the floor,” she said, pushing me down.

“You never answered,” I said, grinning at her small pokie tits. She accordioned her stomach as she dragged her jeans off and dropped them to the floor. “Does the brain-fondling feel good?”

“No,” she said.

I stopped dead. My belt unbuckled but my jeans still zipped and buttoned.

“It doesn’t feel bad. It feels like when you’re sitting on a really comfy chair, but you’ve been doing it for hours, so your brain has kinda fazed out how much you used to like it.”

“Huh...” I said. “So you don’t notice it?”

“No, you do, but it just feels ... You know what? Shut up! I’m naked. You’re still wearing your socks and boxers. You’re totally focused on the wrong th–”

The door swung inwards. Paula shrieked, though her brain jumped up in speed as she covered her tits with Marie’s pillow. Vickie squealed as she was tossed into me.

“Paula, get out here!” Marie said. “Fix that one quick, Jordan. I want to get this party going and ... stop it ... Ira!” Her voice climbed playfully with the sound of lips on neck.