Lingus by Mariana Zapata
Nikki squealed like a pig, and started hopping around like a cracked-out rabbit. She was acting more like our friend Zoey than herself, but it was too funny to ruin my fun by laughing at her and making her self-conscious. I made a note in my brain to do things like this in order to get the same reaction out of her more often.
She spotted the tall, blonde mop of curly hair coming down the walkway first. The man was easily six four, if not taller, and built like a linebacker. Personally, I was more of a fan of soccer players' bodies, with their lean muscles, but who the hell gave a crap when hotness incarnate was right there. He was wearing a t-shirt that was a size too small, accentuating the broad, thick muscles of his chest, arms, and back. What surprised me was the big, goofy smile on his face while he made his way up to the booth.
"I'm gonna go over there, okay?" I told Nikki, but by the glazed-over look in her eye, I knew I could tell her I was born a hermaphrodite and she wouldn't bat an eyelash. I stepped out of line, and went to stand closer to the empty booth on the opposite side. The girls in line were going insane. Who knew Calum Burro was the heartthrob of older, horny women?
He sat down, started signing autographs, and talked to his fans, all with a big smile plastered on his dimpled face. Nicole's eyes were frozen to his body. I laughed at the intensity of her glare. I was leaning my butt against the empty table behind me, my ankle crossed over my other foot, when I felt that familiar creep of fabric going up my ass. My eyes were still so glued to the pure happiness radiating from my best friend that I didn't even feel my traitorous hand reaching behind me to pull out my wedgie until it was too late.
"Digging for gold?" the person I didn't see standing next to me, asked.
In a perfect world, I would have turned around and come face to face with a snot-nosed, middle-aged man in desperate need of Proactiv. Oh, how I wished then that my life was based in a perfect world, so my embarrassment would have been apparent, but ultimately, who cared? My ideal Peeping Tom would have been notorious for digging for gold in his nose and ass. I could live with that.
Unfortunately, this wasn't a perfect world. In the real world, I peed on myself sometimes when I sneezed and got tickled, I usually farted when I first woke up, and I'd also heard my dad and mom doing the dirty tango in third grade. I swung my head around to look at the witness to my wedgie pulling, when I came face to chest with a very tall guy. I had to look up, and then farther up, up, and up to find the prettiest emerald eyes I'd ever seen looking right at me. They were so bright, they reminded me of the Bright Light toy I had as a kid that lit up the colored pegs magically. Those eyes were set into the most perfectly created face of all time, all high cheekbones, chiseled jaw, and full, pink lips.
Those pouty lips morphed into an amused smirk. "Did you find a golden nugget?" the rich, velvet voice asked me.
"Uh..." My fingers were still pinching the material of my godforsaken yoga panties out of my butt crack, and my face felt like there was a wildfire going on beneath my cheeks. And cue the word vomit. "I wish."
Oh my God. What was wrong with me? The words slipped out of my mouth at the same time that I finished pulling out my wedgie, because I had already gotten caught, so why stop? I was firmly aware that a normal person would have denied picking at their underwear, but there I was going along with it.
The guy laughed, a deep, throaty sound that should be illegal in fifty states, and his eyes sparkled from underneath the rim of a worn-in, green baseball cap that hid his hair. His face was really way too pretty, so it was weird how disarming his smile made me feel. He eyed my flaming blush, and then gave me a convincingly bashful smile. "I'm sorry, that was rude of me," he apologized. "I tend to say stupid shit all the time."
"It's okay. I say and do stupid shit all the time, too." I tried to say as evenly as I could, but I was a humiliated mess. It's one thing to pull out a wedgie in front of Nikki, Zoey, or Josh, my other closest friend, but a hot, complete stranger? There was no doubt in my mind that God was laughing at me right then.
His entire frame, what seemed to be around six foot two or six foot three, turned toward me, with a narrow waist and broad shoulders that blocked any view from his other side. I could tell he was muscular underneath the black hoodie he had on, but his gaze was so intense that I forgot for a second where we were. "Are you here for an autograph?" he asked, with a raise of a dark eyebrow.
"What? No! I'm waiting for my friend," I said, pointing at the five foot ten blonde in line. I felt embarrassed for some reason that he assumed I was standing in line for an autograph from a porn star, but really, we were both at a porn convention, so neither one of us had room to judge the other. "Are you here for an autograph?"
What the fuck was wrong with me, I wondered. I wished there was a version of Pepto Bismol for verbal diarrhea, because I'd invest in it. My awkward social skills weren't a problem when I was around people I knew. They were well aware of the fact that I spouted shit out of my mouth without thinking quite often.
He laughed again, this time a little louder, but quieted down after a second, looking at the growing line in front of us like he was worried about someone catching him laughing. "No, I'm waiting for my friend, too," he said, with a big smile, perfect white teeth displayed.
I wanted to ask him which slut in line was his friend but I didn't. I also wondered silently to myself why such a good-looking male specimen was at a porn convention. This guy didn't need porn to get off, he could easily just flash that perfect face at any girl. I was sure they'd flock to him like he was a bitch in heat and they, the girls, were the male dogs looking to mount. We just looked at each other for a moment, not saying a word, before I nodded and turned back to look for Nicole, who was next in line to get an autograph from the inspiration of the majority of her masturbatory dreams. She grinned then, looking slightly like a lunatic. The girl talking to Calum started walking away, and I saw Nikki's face transform from her crazed look into the confident, assured Nicole that I knew and loved. Oh shit.
She leaned over the table to talk to him, voluptuous ass on display for everyone in line to see. A second later, Calum stood up and walked around the table while Nikki started tugging down the back of her jeans.
"What is she doing?" the stranger whispered, leaning to the right, making it so that he was closer to me.
"She wants him to sign her ass," I snorted, watching Calum drop to a knee so her butt was in his face. The girls in line were going ballistic, and I had a sudden fear there was going to be a riot.
He was up a minute later, grinning like a goof, and Nicole looked up at him saying who knows what, until his face turned bright red. She then slipped something into his back pocket, her hand lingering on his ass longer than necessary. She turned and sauntered toward me, her hazel eyes locking on each of the women in line, like she dared them to say something to her. Fortunately, none of them had a death wish, so no one said anything to her.
The guy next to me chuckled. "Well, I'll be damned, she made Calum blush."
I wanted to ask him why he thought that was funny, but Nikki was in my face a split second later, smirking. "What did you tell him?" I asked her.
"I told him I wanted to look for his g-spot with my tongue."
Even the guy that was standing next to me laughed at Nicole's admission.
"Well, I bet he's never heard that one before," she scoffed, a big smile on her face while her eyes flickered between looking at me and the perfect face just to my left. "Ready to go?"
I nodded at her, taking a step forward to walk around the line, but I stopped and turned back around. The big green orbs were burning a hole into me, but his face was so calm it seemed like an oxymoron, so I didn't know what to think. I settled for just giving him a little wave. He gave me a crooked, soft grin and waved at me too before I filed out behind Nikki.
"Who was that?" she asked me when we were a couple of booths down.
"Some guy who caught me pulling my underwear out of my crack."
She made a little humming
Nikki was an attorney who practiced family law. She had the memory of an elephant, and could remember each and every one of her clients' names along with their faces, and could recite the most obscure things from memory. For example, when we went to Washington D.C. a few years back, she randomly began reciting the Gettysburg Address in its entirety. I wouldn't be surprised if he did look familiar to her. She remembered absolutely everything.
"He was pretty cute," she offered, elbowing me in the rib.
I snickered, elbowing her back. "Cuter than—"
"Are you blind? Hell no! That guy isn't my type, you know what kind of men I like."
"Men with dicks, I know!" I snorted, and she laughed in response.
"You're such a bitch, Kat," she said between laughs. We both knew she tended to like the huge muscular-type build. Frankly, I'd be afraid to get squished by the weight, but she was pretty much a giant of a woman and lean, like an Amazon, so I guessed her body build could handle that much man.
Our conversation was forgotten when she spotted the booth that Zoey was at a few feet away, down our row. There were so many people crowded around the corner where the tables were stationed, that a tiny feeling of claustrophobia filled my senses for a second before Nikki pulled on my arm and dragged me around the mass of people.
There was a girl with long, black hair standing around a pole wearing what looked like clear platform shoes on steroids, tossing her hair one way and shaking her ass the other way. I wanted to ask her if she stole her skirt from her six-year-old niece, because it wasn't covering up anything. The hot pink scrap of nylon called a shirt had less fabric than my bathing suit tops.
I guessed I could safely assume that this was another porn star.
"That's Dakota Amber," Nicole confirmed in my ear. "She wants to be the new anal queen of porn."
Well, hello there. That would explain the huge mass of men crowded around her, all chattering like excited little frogs.
"NIKKI! KATHERINE ALBA BERGER!" a shrill voice screamed out from the edge of the crowd, and sure enough, people turned to look at the source of the voice.
Fuck me.
Of course, the one person in existence who insisted on calling me by my entire name every time she saw me, would continue to do so at the convention that I was trying my best to be as inconspicuous as possible. After eight years of screaming out my full name when we first saw each other, this was the first time that I'd dreaded it. Thin arms wrapped around my neck as she clung to me, all ninety something pounds wrapped around me like a spider monkey.
The crowd of people who were following the trail of the loud voice locked their gazes on the three of us, and then nodded in appreciation at our spectacle.
Zoey Quinn or Zoey Star, as she was known to her fans, was one of the most popular porn stars out.
She was famous because she only did girl-on-girl scenes.
She jumped up and down while also giving me kisses on both cheeks, like she always did, but usually in private, not in front of a ton of fucking people. At a porn convention.
I asked the sweet Lord Jesus to bless me with the power of invisibility, at least for a few minutes.
Chapter 4
"I've missed you both so much!" Zoey gushed against my neck before dropping her hold and giving Nicole the same treatment.
The men closest to us were staring with their eyes glazed over, much like I imagined a brain-eating zombie's gaze to be when it caught sight of a living, breathing human. I could only imagine what in the hell was going through their minds, and it made me feel really fucking uncomfortable. All they needed to do was go a little slack-jawed and start making droning noises from deep inside their cavities to complete their Dawn of the Dead impersonations.
"Did you get to see your future husband?" she asked Nikki, who had an arm draped around our much shorter friend. Where Nicole was freakishly tall, I was freakishly average, and Zoey freakishly small. My brown hair and brown eyes only added to my average status in comparison to my blonde and raven-haired friends.
I told Zoey once she could pass for a middle-school aged boy, and she laughed her ass off. I really wasn't joking, but I think she thought I was. Zoey was the epitome of petite. Everything about her was doll-like, with her short, vibrant black hair, almond-shaped eyes, tiny boobies, and delicate facial features all packed into a small frame courtesy of her half Japanese ancestry.
I wanted to put her in my pocket and take her everywhere with me.
Nicole started telling Zoey all about our escapade at Calum's booth, but my attention span was practically nonexistent. I found myself looking around the mass of people that were creating a half circle surrounding the booth where the future anal queen was blowing kisses as she dropped her ass to the floor like a seasoned stripper.
"I'm gonna go pee," I poked Nikki in the back, and she just waved me off.
"I'll wait for you here," she said.
Shouldering my way through the crowd, I tried to venture in the direction where I thought the restrooms were. It amazed me how many people were here. Miami had some major pervs, I had to say. Myself included, of course. A couple of minutes later, I took a sharp left only to find that I was back right where I started.
"Need a tour guide?" a familiar, silky voice asked from behind me.
I turned around to find the same green eyes from earlier peering at me in amusement. "I'm looking for the restroom."
He tilted his head in the direction I had gone earlier, a soft smile crowding the corner of his full lips. "C'mon, I'll show you where it's at before you pee on yourself."
"Thanks," I told him, giving him a smile.
My new friend shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his slim-fitting, worn in jeans. I noticed that he put his hoodie up and over his baseball cap, so only his face was exposed beneath the black cotton. He smirked. "Are you having fun?"
An unladylike scoff escaped my throat. I blushed furiously, keeping my eyes glued to the floor while I followed him around a left turn. "Well, it's an experience, you know?"
He just laughed as he nodded, like he completely understood what I was talking about. "That's a polite way of putting it. Did you come out of curiosity or...?"
"You can put it like that," I said, with another smile, looking far up at him. His pretty, sparkly eyes flitted between the floor and me. "I keep expecting to see my Grandma here, or something though. It's weird."
I really didn't know why I told him that. It might have been because he seemed to be trying to blend in, like me, by wearing that cap and hoodie, or maybe not. It was his smile, probably, that did it. I was normally pretty quiet by nature. It took me six classes to talk to Josh for the first time, and he was the second most outgoing person I knew besides Zoey.
"I saw my aunt at one of these once a couple of years ago. I think we both wanted the ground to swallow us whole," he admitted to me with his clear, deep voice.
"I heard my parents having sex once. I was traumatized for life," I offered him, like a moron. If I could have punched myself right then without looking like a demented fool, I would have.
He grimaced, but chuckled. "Did you say anything to them afterward?"
"Are you insane?" I snorted.
"Well," he shrugged his broad shoulders up. "If you're stuck being traumatized forever, they should too. Don't you think?"
As stupid as it sounded, I realized he had a point. "I guess," I said before my bastard brain made me relive the memory of that fateful night. Ughhh. I had just come down the stairs to get a glass of water when I happened to walk by their room and heard noises that would haunt me for the rest of my life. The shudder that rumbled through my body was ridiculous, but he chuckled.
After taking another left turn, I realized we were actually just two booths down from where we'd started our walk, and I looked back and forth down the row before settling my gaze on his face. He gave me that cute bashful s
He was too fucking cute for his own good, and I wanted to know why he was being so nice. "Okay, Magellan."
He held his hand out to me, with its long, limber fingers, for me to shake. I found myself grasping his large, warm hand without a second thought. "It's Tristan actually, you little gold digger." he said, with a wink.
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I laughed like a crazy person the entire time I was in the restroom. The lady that came out of the stall next to mine, wearing a dominatrix outfit, looked at me like I had two heads. I was so thoroughly amused, I didn't give a shit.
A gold digger.
I snorted while I rinsed off my hands, then dried them. This guy, Tristan, was too cute for his own good, it didn't help that he seemed to feel comfortable enough around me to crack jokes about me. It took Nicole months to start whipping out lines about my bladder control or hair when it resembled a rat's nest. Should I be offended? Probably, but if Andrew Wood, my all time favorite porn star, made fun of me, I would laugh and smile. If he said I was a man, I'd go with it. Tristan felt like an old friend, and I liked it. I felt more comfortable around him than I probably should have, but oh fucking well.