I wipe my sticky fingers on my pants. “So…if you don’t have a mate, does that mean you’ve never had sex?”
Again with that curious look and pause as though he’s wondering if the translator is whispering in his ear correctly. “I have had pleasure with other warriors.”
That makes sense. There are plenty of women in the colony doing much the same. People want sex, and sometimes sleeping with the opposite sex brings drama. Aldit is right. I don’t want to be one of many. As some guys liked to remind everyone, we aren’t on Earth anymore, so the old dating rules don’t apply, meaning they could do what they wanted and expected the women they were dating to deal with it.
I punched the last one in the mouth.
And spent a day in the brig for it.
I don’t regret it at all.
That was six months ago, well before we landed.
He starts walking, following the stream again. “You have no mate…you have sex with other women in the colony?”
“Yes, and also men.”
He turns to stare at me. Oh shit, is he pissed? Will he abandon me? I can’t exist on furry cucumbers. Why did I think I could make it back to the colony on my own?
Well, that hadn’t been my plan. I wanted to meet up with the security team, the ones his brothers probably killed. Given that the security team was shooting, it’s a fair assessment that some of his brothers might be dead, too.
“You have no children?”
“No, the colony controls when I have them and with who.”
“How?”
“Birth control?”
He tilts his head as if not understanding, so I explain. “Medicine that stops it from happening.”
Aldit is frowning. “And why do they tell you when?”
“Because they don’t want us having babies while we’re setting up. Or too many babies at once. Your tribe doesn’t have that?” And if the fourth sons are sent away, what happens to the fifth? I can’t imagine even having that many children. “Do you have sisters?”
“Two, my mother is very lucky. My brothers were popular. All the women wanted to choose them because they have sisters.”
“But you were still sent away.”
He nods. “I was fourth. That is how it is.” He doesn’t seem troubled by that at all. “What is sex like with a man?”
It’s a little too easy to imagine him getting intimate with one of the other warriors. Stripping off… “You’ve done that, so you know.”
He laughs as he walks. “As if you were mating…as if we were to mate.”
“Ah.” Now I understand what he’s asking, and I’m not sure what to tell him.
“Did you like it?” he presses.
“Yes.” Did I love any of them? At the time I thought I did, looking back I didn’t. All I wanted was someone to call mine, so I wasn’t floating about on my own the way I had all through my childhood.
“And your human men have a meq?”
It’s my turn to stare at him with no understanding. What the fuck is a meq? “Meq?”
He pulls out a furry cucumber and holds it in front of his crotch.
“Meq…mine is not furry, or this skinny,” he says as though that is important.
