Page 82 of Rafferty's Rules
‘Why not? A Gaytime is hard to have on your own.’ A suitable statement in this context, but also the confectionary’s slogan.Camp, I know.
‘Australia is a strange, strange country,’ she mutters, opening the packaging and peeling back a corner. ‘Nuts?’ Her suspicious gaze cuts to me.
‘Can’t have a Gaytime without nuts.’
‘I’m not sure that’s true,’ she says, taking a bite. ‘Oh, chocolate! But you don’t like chocolate.’
‘Correct.’
‘So you’ve never had Gaytime?’
‘That would be telling,’ I reply with a wink. ‘Golden or otherwise.’
We eat lollies and chat, and when silence falls, it’s comfortable. My childhood home isn’t too far from the city, but it’s also not so close that I’d find Mum rocking up at my front door at wine o’ clock every day.Those couple of hours distance suit me fine.The back of my car is littered with cotton undies, hastily grabbed from the washing machine this morning, now apparently air-drying. The day is clear and fine, and I have a girl wearing shorts curled up in the seat of my car. She’s pretty, and pretty awesome, and she laughs at my jokes and generally makes me feel like a fucking rock star.
Life is good.
Even if I am fucking stupid for heading home early.
More time there = more time to run intoher.But Lissa and her virginal wisdom were right, now that we’re rooting, no one is going to doubt that we’re dating.
‘Keep your eyes on the road,’ she admonishes as my gaze slides her way again. ‘I’d like to get there in one piece, thank you very much.’
‘I’m really clever,’ I reply with a sly wink. ‘I can multitask.’
‘Oh, I know you can. But when you look at me like that... ’
As her teeth graze her bottom lip my dick perks up.
‘When I look at you like what?’ My voice seems to have dropped an octave as we play this dangerous game. It’s broad daylight, and we’re on the highway. There aren’t exactly many places we can pull over for a little privacy.
‘Like you’re trying to melt the clothes off my body.’ I throw back my head with a deep laugh. ‘And then there’s the things you say, like the things you said yesterday.’ She ducks her head and begins toying with the edge of her T-shirt. ‘I keep thinking,what else does he want to do to me? Andwill I let him?’
‘You’ll let me,’ I assert.
‘That’s what I’m afraid of.’
‘You’re not frightened, bite-size. You’re persistent. Fearless.’
‘And hella inexperienced.’
‘You know what the antidote to that is. Exposure.’
‘Oh, no. You have that villainous look in your eyes again, and I’mnottaking my clothes off—not in the broad daylighton ahighway.’
‘What happened to the give no fucks girl who walked around my house in her bra the first day I met her?’
‘She was faking it,’ she protests with a disbelieving giggle. ‘And technically, we’d already slept together.’
‘Nah, I slept with a randy octopus that night. Not a timid girl.’
‘I didn’t say I was timid,’ she replies, a little indignantly. ‘I said I was inexperienced.’
‘And likeI said, exposure is the way to solve that.’
‘I think I’ve beenexposedplenty these last few days. Not complaining, by the way.’
‘It just so happens,’ I reply, lifting arse cheek from the seat to pull a folded sheet of paper out the back pocket of my shorts. ‘That I have upon my person a copy of a certain set of rules.’
