CYOA Page 129
Sep. 13th, 2013 03:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lumy12"Are you... downstairs?" you call to Zack.
"I'm trapped!"
Joel is right behind you now. "Shit... he's in the basement?"
"Is anyone with you?" you holler. You follow Joel and his flashlight...
"Just some creepy dead people! But I can't get out! The door won't open!" Punctuated by the doorknob rattling in vain.
You're so relieved it's not hunters or infected that he needs help with! "Didn't you check down there when you did your walk-through?" you ask Joel.
" 'Course."
"But you didn't get trapped."
"Door has a kickstand on it. Guess I should've just left it open. I didn't think he'd go down there, though, with it bein' closed..."
"That's my fault," you admit sheepishly. "I told him to explore the house. Thought he'd get bored just waiting for us to come in."
"It don' matter. We can let him out." Joel tugs on the doorknob... jiggles it... "Seems to be stuck. -Hold on, kid, we'll get you out, don't you worry."
"...It's not opening from the outside either?!"
"Did you lock it somehow?" asks Joel.
"No! I didn't even close it... it shut itself!"
"Is there a lil' button on the knob you can turn? Anythin' like that?"
"No!"
"Try pushin' the knob in an' turnin' it."
"...Not working!"
"Can you take it off the hinges?" you suggest to Joel.
"The hinges are on the inside. Don't have my tools anyhow. Stand back, son." He shoulders it a couple times, but it doesn't give.
"Don't hurt yourself," you warn him, putting a hand on his shoulder to get him to stop. You know he's tough and all, but you also know he's old (-no! middle-aged), and he does get back pain... like the kind old people seem to get...
"Oh -- I've got it." He pulls something off his belt and fiddles with the doorknob again.
"Is that one of your fucking shivs?" Why he prefers those over perfectly good knives, you'll never know.
"Shit. It ain't workin'."
"Let me try." But you can't get it with the shiv or your blade (you have to admit, shivs seem to work better on doors than knives do, for some reason... but you had to try). "Fucking thing. It really just doesn't wanna open! What do we do now?"
"Don't leave me down here!"
You chuckle. Does he really think we would do that? "Well, if we can't get you out, guess we're gonna have to," you tease him.
"What?? Nooooo!"
Joel gives you a look, like you said something wrong. "What? I was just teasing him," you say defensively. And he thought the you-can't-eat-our-stew thing was mean! "Of course we won't leave you, Zack! We'll sleep right outside the door, and in the--"
"You're going to sleep?!?!"
"Ellie, knock it off. Zack, relax. I'll think of somethin'."
"Just don't leave me alone!"
"We won't," Joel replies.
"Yeah, I was just being a dick," you add. "Um... can we just blow the door open? Or shoot it or something?"
"We could... but I don't think it's a real strong door. We prob'ly don't have to. Stay here." He leaves.
"You doing okay, Zack?" you ask the door.
"It's really creepy in here!"
"I bet. The dead people?"
"And spiders. Are they upstairs too?"
"Uh... haven't seen any yet." As long as they hang out in the corners and mind their own business, you can happily coexist with them.
"What if they're in our beds?"
"Then... we won't sleep in them. Joel already checked the place out, though, so I'm sure it's fine."
"Did he look in all the beds?"
"Not in them, I guess, but... I'm sure he would've seen if there were loads just wandering around, you know?" You chuckle as something occurs to you. "Hey, haven't you been sleeping outside all this time? You must've been sleeping with tons of bugs out here."
"Yeah, sometimes. I tried not to pick buggy spots. And definitely not spidery spots!"
Joel returns, wielding a... weapon of some kind. "Both of you -- move away from the door. ...Zack, go about halfway down the stairs, all right?"
When Zack indicates that he's moved away, Joel starts hacking at the door with the...
"Oh! You stuck a blade on that bat -- like you do for fights sometimes, huh!"
"Yep." And he's already busted a big hole. He pauses in his destruction. "Come on through, kid."
Zack quickly scampers through... and then Joel continues beating down the door for some reason.
"Here's your flashlight back." Zack hands it to you and you pull him into a quick hug, which you're not sure he wanted, but he tolerates it. "I bet those people died down there cuz they couldn't get out!"
"Joel got in before, though, so... maybe they were hiding down there. Or someone killed them and dumped them down there." Though you're not sure why someone would bother to do that. "Joel, what the fuck are you doing?"
"Door's a nuisance. Figured I'd get my money's worth." The door -- or what's left of it -- is open now, and he's busted it almost completely off its hinges.
"But you didn't pay for anything. And now you're going to let the spiders up here. Zack said there were spiders."
Joel snorts. "Don't you think they would've come underneath the door if they wanted to?"
"Oh. Right. Ha." You push by him just because you're curious as fuck now and just want to check out the creepfest down there. "Thanks, now I can't lock myself in down here!"
The corpses are too far gone to know if they were infected or not, or to guess as to how they died. You count... six of them. The spiders are actually creepier! "Whoa... Joel, did you see this fucking big-ass spider down here? I swear it's as big as my hand!" That's only a slight exaggeration.
"Think I saw that one, yeah."
"Do you think it's been eating the bodies?"
"Spiders don't eat people." Joel is watching you from the top of the stairs now, the door completely busted.
"Well, it's been eating something. Fuck." You head back up the stairs. "Now I'm gonna have nightmares."
"Me, too," says Zack, although he's giggling a little at your theatrics.
"You want me to kill it?" Joel offers. "Seems a bit rude, considerin' we invaded their home, but if it'll help you sleep..."
"Um... you're right, that would be rude. I'll just sleep in your bed, and you can kill it if it comes anywhere near us, okay?"
If you were shining the light on his face, you're sure he would be giving you a Look for that. "How 'bout we all sleep in our own beds--"
"Zack, do you wanna sleep in Joel's bed, too? It could be like a family thing. -Yes, I know you're not family, but we're road trip family. It's an honorary thing. You won't have any nightmares with Joel right there, trust me. He like... scares them out of your brain before they can happen. What do you say?"
"...Are you serious?" asks Zack, and you think he sounds interested...
"No," Joel answers. "She ain't serious."
"Yes I am!"
"Also? This ain't a road trip. No car -- or some kind of vehicle -- no road trip."
"Well, we're following a road, aren't we? At least part of the time."
"That don't make it a road trip. And everyone sleeps in their own bed. This house has four of 'em."
Given the fight you had earlier, and Joel saying you don't respect him... maybe you should just drop this. But... it's for our own good! You'll thank me for this later, Joel! "We're taking a vote. Everyone who wants to sleep in the same bed, raise your hand." You raise your hand and look at Zack expectantly. He's smiling, but looking between you and Joel like he doesn't know what to do. You take his hand with your flashlight hand and raise it up high, shooting the light to the ceiling. "Two against one! We win!"
"Why do you want us all to sleep in the same bed so bad?" asks Joel. He's wavering -- you can tell!
"Because. It'll be fun." You lower Zack's hand, as it's served its purpose. "And it's safer if we're all together, don't you think? And -- there's dead bodies and spiders in the basement."
Joel chuckles. "I don't follow you on that last one."
"That makes the house creepy as fuck, which makes it harder to sleep in -- at least if we're by ourselves, don't you agree? Zack -- do you agree?"
"I guess," he says, still sounding all tentative about it.
"Do you want to sleep all by yourself in a cold bed, listening to--"
"Oh, now the bed is cold?" Joel interjects.
"--Yes, of course, cuz you're very warm and we're not? -- what was I saying... oh! Yes -- listening to the weird house noises that--"
"It's summer," Joel interrupts again. "Maybe bein' warm ain't such a good thing."
"It's still cold at night."
"This? This ain't cold. Even for you. You didn' need your jacket tonight."
"I did, I just... forgot about it. No, wait -- it's cuz we had a fire and fires are hot."
"...Fires are hot, yes."
"Are you making fun of me?" you huff at him.
"Maybe a little."
Zack giggles. "You guys are funny."
"Joel's too serious to be funny," you tell Zack. "It's all me."
"No, it's both of you," he insists. "Together."
"I guess. He's not funny on his own, though."
"I don' know about you," Joel says -- to you, you think? -- "but I'm hungry an' I'm gonna go eat."
"See? That wasn't very funny," you stage-whisper to Zack. Joel is just ignoring the whole thing.
You follow him out, and you're not surprised that Zack doesn't want to stay by himself in the house now; he's right on your heels.
You sigh inwardly. Alone time with Joel is going to be scarce.
* * * * * *
It's not exactly alone time, but it's close enough: the three of you are in the master bed, and you're sure now that you're the only one awake. You're in the middle. Zack is on your left, Joel on your right. You roll to the right.
I should let him sleep... but you shove the guilty thought aside. You're only going to bother him for a minute. You nuzzle his neck... find his ear...
"What're you..."
"Ssshh," you whisper, dusting his earlobe with your lips.
"He's asleep," Joel murmurs sleepily.
"Yep."
"...That don' mean we can--"
You turn his face toward yours. "I know. I just want a goodnight kiss."
"Mmhmm." He sounds skeptical (for good reason, of course).
"Really!" You kiss him softly. "Don't wanna wake him up..."
"An' if he wakes up while we're kissin'?"
"...then we stop?"
"Just... freeze. With our lips together." He demonstrates.
You try to turn it into a real kiss, but he's being stubborn -- and now you have to stifle a giggle. "Yeah. See, you're good at it. Not like he can see anything."
"There's enough light in here... to see enough. To see how close we are."
"Well... I rolled into you in my sleep. No biggie."
"An' then we just... accident'ly started kissin'."
"Exactly."
Joel sighs. "One good kiss -- that's it. You need to get some sleep, too."
"Why do you think I did this?"
"Did what -- wake me up for a kiss?"
"No -- us sleeping together. It was for you, actually. To help you sleep."
"...by wakin' me up."
"Well -- sorry about that -- but you can go right back to sleep, okay? -- I knew you wouldn't agree to sleep in the same bed as me with Zack in the house, so I thought... I could just turn it into a fun thing for the three of us to do together. With the real goal being... us sleeping together."
"We can't do any--"
"I know! I know. I mean sleep. Cuz we're spoiled now. Both of us. Right? I'm definitely spoiled... I'm used to sleeping with you every night, and I can't fall asleep without you."
"Bullshit. When I come home from late patrol, you sleep just fine on your own."
"That doesn't count."
He chuckles softly. "Why don't it count? It's you, fallin' asleep without me."
"But usually I'm still awake," you remind him. Or you just do the patrol with him. "If I fall asleep, it's cuz I have no choice. But here... it would be torture, knowing you're sleeping in the next room, sooooo far away."
"Torture."
"Yes!"
"This here ain't torture too?"
"No..."
"I think it is. You're right next to me... I wanna touch you... kiss you... take your clothes off..." He says this so softly you can barely hear him! Even though Zack's nice deep sleep-breathing continues to reinforce his obliviousness to your naughtiness.
"That's what you call sweet torture," you remind him. "Add fuck my brains out to your list. Oh, and it's not taking clothes off, but I undid my jeans... see..." You pull his hand to your waist to show him... slide it down a little so he can feel your open zipper...
He groans quietly and withdraws his hand. "Torture. Without the sweet."
You pout (he won't see it, but maybe it will leak into your voice?). "I'm not the one saying you can't do any of that stuff. That's on you. But if you want, I'll just take my goodnight kiss and go sleep in a different bed."
"Good. Thank you."
...He's bluffing, right? He must be. "Okay... good night, Joel..." You hover by his lips.
"Good night, baby girl." He leans into you, kisses you gently... lingeringly... and when you part your lips, his tongue slides through them smoothly. You enjoy a nice, slow, sensual, sweet-but-hot goodnight kiss. Joel is the one who breaks it, with a contented little sigh. He strokes your cheek with his thumb. "Love you."
You're all warm'n'tingly inside now. And he said it first, awww~ "I love you, too -- does that mean I get to stay?"
"Only if you scoot over a little. Stay next to me. Not... half on top of me."
You oblige. "You weren't really going to kick me out, were you? Cuz... I think Zack might wonder why he's waking up in bed with just you."
"Yes, that's the only reason I decided you should stay."
"Aha. Okay then, be a dick."
"You make it too easy. Now will you let me go back to sleep?"
"Fine. ...And you're welcome."
It takes him a moment, but then he does say, "Thank you." It's a little backwards thing you do sometimes when you feel he should be grateful to you for something and he has yet to express it.
"...for?" you prompt him, in case the response was automatic. Like muscle memory.
"For... arrangin' this whole thing."
"That's better."
"Even though it's more for you than for me."
"It's for us."
"Mm."
You lay close enough to him that your arms are touching, and you decide you really will let Joel go back to sleep now. You're pretty tired yourself... it shouldn't take you long to fall asleep. Joel's breathing will lull you... maybe Zack's will, too...
...and Joel's heartbeat, after he falls asleep and I can lay my head on his chest...
You probably should stop thinking about that sexy kiss, though. Sweet torture indeed! But it sure beats sleeping by yourself.
If you'd like to start another adventure, return to page 1.
Carlos
Date: 2021-01-20 06:38 am (UTC)RE: Carlos
Date: 2021-01-20 01:45 pm (UTC)