“So you’ve probably hooked up with around fifteen hundred people.”
I considered it. “I would put the number closer to two thousand, but yeah. Somewhere around there.”
Peyton took a deep drink from his beer, then turned the bottle upside down, gulping from it a couple more times. “Wow,” he said, then chuckled. “Jet, that’s a hell of a lot of people.”
I laughed, relieved. This reaction was fine. Great, even. He wasn’t awkward or grossed out or superior. He was just taking it for what it was.
Accepting me for who I was, and that felt pretty damn nice.
“It is a lot of people,” I agreed. “But I don’t regret almost any of them.”
“Almost?”
I grinned and held his eye long enough that he squirmed a little, which pleased me. “Not everyone is as charming as you are, Peyton.”
“You bring out a certain side of me.”
There was an urge in me to lean across the couch and take him right there. Enough of the flirting and building up steam—I was ready to go. But when he opened his mouth slightly, I felt that he was going to say something else.
“Are you still seeing, uh, three people a week?”
The question caught me off guard. In fact, I’d cooled it for the most part since moving to Pittsburgh. The night I’d hooked up with Peyton was the night I’d finally hit my breaking point and felt I just needed to get laid, scratching an itch after a couple months of solitude.
“No,” I answered honestly. “I’ve just seen you, these past weeks.”
Peyton looked relieved. “Oh, cool. Should we be exclusive with each other, then? While we’re doing this?”
I took a deep, deep breath. “Peyton—”
“It’s okay if not!” he added quickly, reassuringly. “I understand.”
“No, it’s not that.” I rubbed my hand over my face. “I’ve been trying to cool it with the hookups, so yes, we can just keep it simple and not see other people for a while. It’s just that…” I trailed off and laughed. “Peyton, this is the first time in my life I’ve done anything that even resembles monogamy.”
“Ha!” Peyton laughed, then lifted his beer. “Thank god. Finally, something where I have more experience than you. Disastrous experience, mainly, but still experience.”
“It counts.”
It was funny that this should feel like a big deal. We weren’t getting engaged or moving in together. But Peyton wasn’t like all the strangers I’d met for a night or two of quick, dirty relief. Just being with him, sitting together and talking, that alone was satisfying to me.
Except I wasn’t about to forget why we were here in the first place. “Speaking of my prolific experience,” I told him and leaned forward. “Any idea about where you want to start exploring? We’ve learned that you love licking my ass and enjoy sucking cock in alleyways. What’s next?”
Peyton bit down on his lip, causing his beard to scrunch around his mouth. “You make us sound filthy.”
“We are.”
He pushed his leg out and our feet brushed together. “Any advice on figuring out what I want to try? How did you go about exploring, when you were first active?”
“Well, back then I was young and stupid, and often pretty drunk, too,” I answered honestly. “By the time I got my head on straight, I had figured out what I was into. But I still switched it up a lot. Half the fun of touring was in the variety.” I tried to think of a way to explain that didn’t make me sound like I had no standards. “Whatever my partners were into, I tended to go along for the ride. Sorry, though, that doesn’t really answer your question.”
Peyton scrunched his face. “I tried googling for inspiration. You can imagine what that was like.”
I laughed. “God. Please don’t bring the advice of online strangers into this.”
“There’s just so much,” he frowned. “I don’t think I like pain, although honestly, how in the hell are you supposed to figure that out? And I suppose some things seemed fun but not exactly sexy, like roleplaying and these people who were into tickling, I think? The point is, though, it all just feels abstract. Like I’m reading about someone else’s dreams or something.”
He was overthinking things. I had the opposite problem, but I could still see clearly that Peyton was getting wrapped up in his own thoughts, which was usually a death sentence for anything sexy.
I stood, then leaned forward and pressed my finger to his forehead. “Wait here.”
