Page 47 of Learning to Change

Did that mean he’d have let us go out with cum-covered dicks to other places?

What were the limits on that?

How was I even supposed to figure out the questions for that?

Joel was cute but he was exhausting sometimes.

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How was he so exhausting?

And confusing.

It was board games, not personality quizzes or premarital counseling.

“Are you sure you’re comfortable with that? It’s got a lot of pieces.” Joel was looking at me with a serious concerned expression as he slowly asked the confusing question.

I thought that meant I should slide the magic game back on the shelf, but as I carefully did that, he sighed.

For fuck’s sake.

Even the old lady who’d been looking at the Trivial Pursuit game for the last five minutes just to be able to eavesdrop better seemed confused with the new turn.

I didn’t blame her for watching the circus, though…I’d have probably done the same thing if the situation was reversed.

Taking a deep breath and ignoring the way Joel was shaking his head like our conversation had taken a turn for the worst, I looked over at Tate. “I don’t understand what’s going on and I’m getting overwhelmed.”

Our nosy neighbor started nodding, which made me feel better in a weird sort of way. “I’m communicating that, though.”

Yes, communication was important.

“That means I’m doing a good job of something because half the sentences Joel says have the word communication in them.” His mother must’ve said that a lot growing up. “So I’m claiming good status even though I’m going to go wander around and look at TVs we can’t afford for a few minutes.”

Or maybe video games?

Hell, they had a book section…I could wander around there and look at stupid stuff I didn’t want to read.

Tate’s gaze was jumping between us and I almost felt bad for leaving him with Joel, but I was tired of being questioned like we were in a therapist’s office and I was doing everything wrong. “I can see why you’re frustrated.”

I hoped so, but I didn’t care at that point. We’d been trying to find a game for nearly twenty minutes and Joel’s questions were just getting more and more confusing.

“I think that’s a good idea.” Tate definitely seemed to understand dealing with Joel in situations like this was his job as the Dom in the household because he didn’t question the need to take over. “You go walk around and come back in just a couple of minutes. Okay?”

Nodding, I took another deep breath. “I think…I think this is a yellow for me.”

My new nosy friend paused and then started nodding again too, so I had a feeling her reading material was more interesting than I’d expected. “I’ll be right back.”

Joel looked confused but not angry as I turned and wandered away…not ran, just wandered. “Um, did he…was he…we can really safeword for relationship stuff and not just things like spankings?”

“Yes, dear.” Our watcher seemed to take that as the cue to step in. “Safewords are for anything in a special relationship like the one you have with your…your friends.”

Good fucking grief.

“Now, let’s figure out where this went wrong so we can explain it to your tall friend when he’s taken a few deep breathes.” Since our new nana had things under control, I just headed down a random toy aisle and over to the electronics.

We didn’t need a new TV because we hardly watched the one we had, but they were big and shiny and were a good distraction for a couple of minutes until the pounding in my head started to recede. The headache hadn’t gotten noticeable until we’d hit the Monopoly is a big commitment level in the crazy, but by the time that I’d walked away, my head was vibrating.

I was starting to really understand why I’d never thought of trying to do shit with Joel on my own.

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