“Shit.” My pulse races so fast that the hut is beginning to go dark, in spite of the fact that it’s basically one big window now. “Are they looking for me?"
“I don't know. There are two men, both carrying these little…machines. One of them is aiming his at the sky, like he's testing the light. The other one’s just kind of looking around." He sips from his spoon. "They don't seem to be in any hurry, but they're not coming this way either."
"Shit,” I mumble. “We have to get rid of them."
Lohr gives me a strange look, and I hope neither of the zoo employees saw that. ”They come and go on their own schedule, Syrie, and they don't give a shit what I think about that. But I have an idea." He sets his spoon on the table, then he settles onto the bed next to me, and again I hope that if anyone looks this way, all they can see of me is a lump of fur in his bed.
Lohr reclines with one arm folded beneath his head, then, to my astonishment, he takes his dick in his free hand and begins to stroke it.
“What the hell are you doing?” I whisper, still staring through the lifted edge of the fur flap.
“Getting rid of them."
“By jacking off? How the hell is that going to get rid of them?" I demand in a fierce whisper.
“Just give it a second." He turns his head again to look at something I can’t see. Then he starts stroking faster.
“What is happening?” There are two men outside who nearly saw us in flagrante delicto, and his solution to that is to finish the act on his own?
“One of the guards is looking at me, so I’m forcing him into an uncomfortable intimacy.”
“Which means?”
“I can't control where they look, but I can control what they see. Which is why I don’t wear clothes,” he reminds me. “And if this bastard just has to look into my home right now, what he's going to see is me shooting my seed all over the place while I make direct, intimate eye contact with him.”
“Oh my god. You’re playing a masturbatory game of chicken!” I’m not sure whether to praise his creativity, applaud his audacity, or burst into tears at my own frustration. This isn’t right. He shouldn’t have to humiliate himself just to get people to stop staring at him in his own home.
Still, it's pretty damn funny.
“I don't know what that means,” Lohr grunts, still stroking a cock that, oddly, seems to be reluctant to rise to the occasion, for the first time since I met him.
“Chicken is a game we play to see who will flinch first,” I explain. “Or, you know, look away, or back down, or whatever. Whoever looks away first is called a chicken.”
"And this chicken can be slaughtered for food?"
"No, that's a different kind of chicken. My point is that you're playing a game of chicken with that man."
“Yes, that’s exactly what I’m doing," he says through clenched teeth. “But his attention is having an undesired effect.” Lohr unfolds the arm beneath his head and subtly slides his hand beneath the flap of fur I’m hiding under.
“What the hell are you doing?” I demand in a whisper as he runs his hand slowly up the curve of my hip. “Lohr! Stop! Someone’s going to see!”
“I just need…a little…help,” he grunts as his hand dips between my thighs. I groan as his finger brushes my clit, and I try not to move. Then, suddenly, Lohr’s hand goes still. "It worked. He looked away."
"Are they leaving?"
“Not yet, but they're not looking at us anymore. Based on what you've told me about human cocks, I'm certain he was intimidated by the fearsome size and attractive shape of mine.”
I snort. "Yes, I'm sure that's it." It has nothing to do with any doubts about his own sexuality he'd have been forced to confront if he'd held Lohr’s gaze while he finished. "But hey, if they're not leaving yet, you should keep going. You know in case they turn around again." And also because he's never let me watch him touch himself before, and it's so damn hot.
"You think I should?"
"Definitely. Here." I slowly, subtly spread my legs to give him better access, without drawing attention to myself. "You can touch me if you need to. I mean not for my benefit, but if it helps you."
"Thank you. You're very thoughtful, Syrie.”
I swallow laugh and concentrate on holding still while he strokes himself in one hand and me with his other. He makes soft little grunts with every thrust into his hand, and I'm fascinated by the fluttery tightening motions he makes. I've never seen a human man jack off like that. They're pretty much hard and fast strokers, but Lohr seems to be mimicking the spasms of a vagina during orgasm. Which makes sense, considering that he needs to feel a woman come before he can finish.
This is a fascinating anatomical difference.
"They're getting back in their vehicle," he says.
I groan when his hand falls still between my legs. “Great. But you should probably still finish. I mean, you're so close.”
He huffs. "How can you tell?"
"You're always close. But this time, so I'm I."
"You are dripping wet," he observes. Then, suddenly he throws back the flap of fur, and I squeal as I am abruptly exposed to the room. "It's okay. They're gone. Do I have your consent to mount you, and finish the proper way?"
"Hell no." I sit up and glance around to verify that the employees are gone, and when I see that the walls are becoming opaque again, I throw one leg over his hips and straddle him, facing his feet.
“Syrie, you're backwards.”
“That's why they call this the reverse cowgirl." I lift myself and position his length the way I want it, then I slowly sink onto him. “Oh my god, you feel good. No matter how we do this. It's like you were meant to be right…here.”
"I was,” he growls as his hands find my hips.
“This isn't going to take long,” I warn him. "Hold on tight."
He takes me literally, but that's okay. It feels good actually, his grip on my hips. It's that possessive, controlling bit of him rising to the top. I can work with that.
I rock forward a couple of times, slowly at first. But I'm already close from his attentions under the covers, and I can't wait. So I ride him hard, my hands clutching his thighs, and before long he's guiding my movements with his grip on my hips, grinding me against him, thrusting up into me. I love the little growls and snarls that he doesn't seem to know he's making.
“Syrie,” he moans, begging me to take my release. It's a game we play pretty often, because he isn't used to delayed gratification and he can't come until I do. Usually I have fun making him wait. Keeping him right on the edge while my orgasm builds slowly. But this time… “Almost there," I assure him through clenched teeth. “Almost…” I buck harder, and pleasure erupts through me, drawing a low moan from deep in my throat.
Lohr groans as my body clenches around him. His grip on my hips tightens, and he shoves himself deep inside me. I feel his release, a hot rush of fluid that pushes me deeper into orgasm. I ride it out, my eyes closed, my head thrown back, until suddenly his hold on my hips changes. His hands go hard, holding me still.
"Don't move little mouse,” he warns. I groan. I could have ridden that release a little longer. I think I could have ridden it forever. But now, suddenly I'm stuck in this position, facing away from him.
“I didn't quite think this one through," I admit, turning carefully to look at him over my shoulder.
"It's okay. If you hold still this won't take long. Tell me about this reverse cowgirl.” He does this often. He asks me questions to distract me while we wait for his barbs to relax. “Why do they call it a cowgirl? Do these girls resemble cows the way I resemble your lion?"
I laugh. "No, they—"
"Do they ride cows? I understand those are four-legged animals kept for slaughter."
"No, cowgirls ride horses. Well, and cowboys. I don't know why they're called cowgirls, but usually when a girl is on top, the position is called some kind of ‘cowgirl’—”
"Humans have so many sexual positions that th
ey're named?"
I laugh again. "Yes, we like to name things. And humans have been writing books on this particular subject for many hundreds of years.”
“I would like to read one of these books. But I can't read. My people have no written language.”
"Well then, you're in luck. That particular genre produces books full of pictures."
“How very helpful.”
“How are we doing down there?” I ask.
"Well, it turns out that this position is quite stimulating.” He runs one warm hand down my spine. “And you're not sitting very still."
"I'm sitting perfectly still," I insist. And suddenly my gaze is drawn to the walls around us. They're still opaque, but that could change at any moment. Without warning. And if that employee vehicle comes by again while I'm stuck like this… “Oh shit, this is bad."
I need to get up. I need to get dressed, or at least cover myself. I—
But I can’t move. This entire hut could become one big literal window into Chesca Montgomery’s inter-species sex life, and there is nothing I can do about it.
"What's bad?" He begins to purr, a sound I know is intended to comfort me. “What's wrong?"
“What if they come back? What if those employees come back, and your habitat becomes transparent again, and I'm stuck like this?” My heart is racing. I can't seem to make it slow down. “I can't… Lohr, I can't… This is so fucked up. This is a private moment. It shouldn't be subject to observation.”
The purring stops. His hand falls away from my back, and he goes completely still beneath me. “Did you think, just because you were here, that the walls would not transition? They’ve only remained solid so far because it’s the slow season. The maintenance period, as you call it.”
"No. I didn't think that, it's just—" I don't know how to finish that sentence. I don't know what I thought. The truth is that I hadn't thought much about it at all. I mean, I've always known what these habitats were like, but I've never seen it from this perspective. As one of the zoo exhibits.
Which, basically, makes me an asshole.
Lohr’s takes me by the hips again. He lifts me without warning and sets me on the bed, his barbs obviously having relaxed. Because nothing we’re talking about now is arousing.
I stare around his habitat with fresh eyes while I pull one of his furs around me. “Your windows and doors don't lock,” I note for the first time.
"No, they don't. And I don't think anyone has tried to make a lock in my lifetime. But my brother says people did try, a long time ago and that every effort was stomped out by the guards. Mahr is older than I am, and he remembers more of what my parents taught us.”
He doesn't want to talk about his parents. I know, because I've asked about them before, only to be politely shut down. So this time I don't press the issue.
"If there're no locks, then your privacy isn't in jeopardy only from employees and tour groups. Anyone could walk into your home at any time. Just like Evah did. Which means anyone could have walked in on us at any point since I got here.”
“Or at any point before that. This did not start with your arrival, Syrie.”
“I know, that's not what I—"
His expression softens. "But none of that is your fault."
"Not mine specifically," I acknowledge. "This was all established long before I was born. But people like me… We let this happen. We let it keep happening."
He pulls me into his lap and brushes hair back from my forehead so he can leave a kiss there. "There's nothing you can do about any of this. And I don't want you to worry about people walking in on us. People from my community, anyway. No one ever comes here, except Evah and sometimes my brother; when I need to trade with someone else—usually Rehna—I go to them.”
“Who’s Rehna?”
“A friend. Her family took my brother and me in, after our parents died.”
"You haven't traded with her that since I got here."
"No, I guess I haven't. I've been pretty busy with my houseguest."
"I'm keeping you from your work." How am I just now truly realizing that? "I'm keeping you from your life."
"You are being kept from your life as well."
“Yeah, I guess I am…” My gaze roves over his walls again. I can't seem to stop watching them. Waiting for them to transition again. Waiting to find myself watched like a fish in an aquarium.
I feel so…vulnerable. Like a fish in a bowl.
"You have to try to forget about it," Lohr says.
"How can I forget about it? I have no idea when it's going to happen. Or what I'll be doing when it happens. It makes me want to never take my clothes off again."
"Well, that would be a shame." He pulls me closer, one arm beneath me, until I'm curled up against him in the bed.
"I suppose you get used to it?"
He shrugs and my head bobs with the movement. "I don't really know how to answer that. It's been like this my entire life. My parents though… They remembered their life before this place."
"How old were they when they got here?"
"They were both taken as children, along with their entire families.”
Taken. I've never really thought of it like that, but that's exactly what it is. That's crystal clear now. Lohr and his people were all taken from their homes and transplanted here like clippings from my mother’s prize rose bush. They were just expected to grow, to flourish in spite of the fact that they're basically living under a microscope. An invasive, for-profit microscope.
A microscope my family owns.
13
Lohr
Syrie practically trembles against me. She's really shaken by transition of the walls. By the invasion of her privacy. I feel like I should understand what she's feeling, but the truth is that I can't truly understand the loss of something I never had. Still I can see that it's traumatized her.
“The first time I saw that happen—the transition—I was on the outside,” she tells me, whispering her confession into my chest, her breath a delicate warmth against my skin. “I thought it was amazing. It was like looking into a life-sized dollhouse.”
“Dolls,” I growl. Those are toys for children.
“I’m sorry. I was too young to truly comprehend this place.” She sits up and looks down at me, silently begging me to understand. “I just knew that everything was so different from my life—so fascinating—that none of it seemed real. I didn’t realize it was real, at first.”
But that doesn't make sense. "You said you aren't a customer."
"I'm not. I wasn't then either. I was here, just that once, for something…educational. When I was kid.”
I take her hand and squeeze it, marveling again over her blunt, square nails. They're so fragile that I could break one off without even trying. They can't possibly be any use to her for digging or defense. "We have no control over what happens to us as kids,” I tell her.
"I know, but I… Something went wrong while I was here. Something bad happened. I was attacked by some Fetoji, and after that I just assumed and that your people were…"
"That we're all animals? That we are all exactly where we should be?"
She doesn't answer, but I can see the truth in her eyes. I can also see the regret. “I'm sorry. I was just a kid, and—”
“Don't be. Until I met you, I assumed all humans were like the ones who put us here. The ones keeping us here. The ones watching us." I shrug. “I guess we've both learned something."
For a moment, it seems like she has more to say. But her mouth stays closed, and her gaze seems to lose focus. She's not ready to tell me whatever she's thinking. So I take a deep breath, and I tell her something.
“When we were little, my brother and I used to run alongside the glass bubbles, waving to the people inside them. To the humans. We were fascinated by them. By their strange clothes and hair. By their gadgets and accessories. We’d smile for the pictures. We’d even pose, because we could tell they liked that. Because they’d smile and
point. And laugh.
“We didn’t understand. We’d grown up that way, so for us, the whole thing was normal. I didn’t start to question who those people were until I was a little older. When I started to notice that my parents would tense up every time the walls of our home suddenly became transparent. That they’d continue whatever they were doing, but that their motions would become rigid and jerky. That they would stop talking and just kind of give each other this look.
“That’s when I started asking questions. I wanted to know who the people in the bubbles were. Why they dressed so strangely. I wanted to know where they lived and how they got here. And where they went, when their bubbles rolled off.”
Syrie brings her hands slowly up my arm, as if she's fascinated by the texture of my fuzz. “And what did your parents say?”
“My father said nothing. He would growl at just the mention of the watchers. I'm sure he knew the word ‘tourist’—he got the same language dump that we got—but he never used it. He would just growl, then head into the forest to hunt or fish. Anything, to get away from the prying eyes. But my mother was stuck at home, with us. She could only endure it.
“She told us that the people in the bubbles were harmless. That they just wanted to watch us, and that we should just go on about our business as if they weren’t there. And she started enforcing that rule. She stopped letting us run outside and gawk at them. Once we were old enough to ask questions about them, she decided we were old enough to start helping out more. So we got more chores, and we weren’t allowed to stop just because the house became transparent.
“We grew to hate the tour pods, because of that. Because they made my mother tense and they made my father disappear. And on the bad days—during the bad seasons—the tours never seemed to end. There were days when our house was transparent from sun up to sun down. People watched while we cooked and cleaned and ate. While we slept. While we bathed. Nothing was sacred, no moment off limits.”
"Oh my god," she whispers. "Your parents? While they were…intimate?"
The Lion and the Mouse Page 14