Chapter Text
The HMS Pogue rocked, gentle, over the marsh water. All around them, hidden in the tall grass, the cicadas and the frogs joined in a loud chorus, grateful for the rains that had accosted the Banks for the past week. Looking up at the clear night sky, though, the Pogues could find no trace of them. Yet their familiar smell still lingered.
Over the noise of the bugs and the gentle lapping of water against the hull, the sound of Kie's end-of-summer mix filled the occasional silences between bursts of conversation and drunken laughter. She was very meticulous in its crafting, optimizing the song-to-song flow to achieve maximum nostalgia. Most summers, the Pogues only made it through the first half-hour before the beers kicked in and Kie's efforts all went to waste. And later, when their brains were sufficiently soaked in alcohol, they came back to it, belting out whatever gems Kie had skilfully hidden at the end.
Right about then, the Pogues were at the midway point between paying attention and screaming the wrong words at the top of their lungs. Kie liked this moment best. They were all a little tipsy, more inclined to laugh at objectively unfunny jokes. They were passing around one of JJ's miracle joints, half-listening to him talk over one of Pope's stories, half nodding along to the quiet sounds of an Arlo Parks song.
Pope was saying, "... Because you told me that she told you she liked me—"
"I said both, not Pope," JJ clarified, earning himself a giggle from John B.
Pope continued like he hadn't heard him, "—and so I was about to shoot my shot with her, y'know, sitting by the fire—"
"By the keg," JJ corrected.
"—and, like, I'm feeling great! I think, oh, I've got this one in the bag! She's leaning in all sexy—"
"I think she was about to hurl."
"And just as I was about to go in for it, who do you think shows up, huh?" He incorporated a little and managed to slosh a good deal of beer onto his shirt in the process, "Kie, who do you think shows up? I'll give you three guesses,” he slurred, putting up four fingers.
Kie, who had witnessed the whole thing, rubbed a hand on her forehead in embarrassment and laughed, "Jesus Christ, Pope."
JJ jumped to his feet, spread his arms out and yelled, "Close enough!"
Betrayed, Pope looked at Kie with his mouth agape for a second before reaching for JJ's shirt and tugging him down. JJ, beer bottle to his lips, went down hard and fast, landed on his ass next to Pope, and wailed when the bottle knocked against his teeth. Beer spilled again. Voices groaned and screamed and laughed, drowned the night in their sounds of friendship. John B doubled over in hysterics while JJ checked to see if any of his teeth were actually broken. Pope slapped him for having sat on his foot.
Kie laughed delightedly, looking fondly at the three idiots she had the misfortune of calling friends. Warmth pooled at the bottom of her stomach and spread to the tips of her fingers—a mixture of alcohol, weed, and disgusting, all-consuming love.
"Wait—and then what happened?" John B asked. He was the only one who hadn't witnessed the encounter, too busy macking on a ginger Touron, for a change.
"This asshole," Pope gave JJ a forceful shove, "shows up out of nowhere and starts flirting with her."
Kie's eyes rolled to the back of her head at the same time John B muttered a disbelieving, "Typical.”
With a fist stuffed in his mouth, front teeth clutched between his thumb and index, JJ spoke something that sounded like a protest.
Kie kicked him and then passed him the blunt. In a second, all teeth-related ailments suddenly vanished from his mind. He took an eager drag before speaking again.
"I said—she liked us both."
"SO YOU SUGGEST A THREESOME?"
There was a split second of silence as Pope's words settled. Then, a chorus of noise: John B's booming laughter, the beginning of JJ's argument, and a cacophony of choking sounds from Kiara, followed by a strangled question.
"What?"
Under the scrutiny of her frown, Pope ducked his head in embarrassment. But JJ, ever the flirt, saw the opportunity and ran with it.
"Jealous, Carrera?" He asked in that stupidly familiar manner, which always left room for doubt. It made it hard—if not impossible—to tell whether he was kidding or not.
Kie went with the safe choice.
She leaned over to him and snatched the joint back, all the while glowering at him.
"Oh, yes," she said humorlessly. "I'm turning green just thinking about it."
Despite the sarcasm, JJ's grin only grew wider.
"Did you do it?" John B asked, raising a near-empty bottle to his lips.
"Nah, Pope chickened out," JJ replied, his eyes still on Kiara.
"WHAT?" Pope screeched, several octaves over his usual tone, "What would I even do in a threesome?!"
John B smiled, "I can think of a few things."
"Don't encourage him," Kie reprimanded, passing him the joint.
"Bro." JJ grabbed Pope by the shoulders, "We could have had it all."
Pope tried to shake off his grasp, "N-no! One of us would have had to..." his voice went very quiet, "You know."
Something devilish lit up JJ's eyes. "What?" He wondered innocently, leaning back.
"You know."
"No, I'm not sure I do."
"Oh, you mean..." John B chided, a definite suggestiveness to the wiggle of his brows.
"Yes!" Pope yelped, then seemed to remark again on his excitement over the subject matter.
"Ooooh," JJ said, "You mean one of us would have had to pack the trunk?"
"Use the back door?" John B suggested.
"Gotten a full ride to Brown University?"
"Nudged the fudge?"
With each disgusting suggestion they exchanged, Pope's face crumpled further; regretting—as was usually the case—having said anything at all.
Kie, halfway between being amused and abhorred, scrunched her nose to keep down the smile that was fighting its way to her lips.
"You guys are gross," she added after a swig of beer.
"I love you, man, but I don't think we're at the stage in our relationship where I'd hand over the goodies," JJ told Pope with a wink.
"Then: Why. Suggest. A threesome?!" Exasperation bled from Pope's voice, not an unusual sound after years of being friends with JJ.
"Don't be a prude, bro. There's lots of ways. It doesn't always have to involve you sticking your dong somewhere." JJ brushed his hair out of his eyes.
"That's weirdly enlightened coming from you, JJ," Kie said, not even bothering to hide the pleasant surprise from her tone.
It wasn't a common occurrence that she and JJ would find themselves on the same side of an argument—out of all four Pogues, the two of them seemed most often at odds with one another—, so she liked to acknowledge it when they did agree on something.
JJ puffed out his chest proudly, a remarkably honest smile on his lips as he tipped the brim of an invisible hat in her direction.
"Wait, so you're telling me you eat girls out?" Pope asked, seemingly past the point of being embarrassed by the matter at hand.
Three pairs of eyes landed on him, all with different looks to them. John B seemed entertained by the question; Kie, slightly aghast. JJ, though, was confused.
"You don't?" He asked earnestly.
"I mean..." Pope began, "I have... Once."
"ONCE?!" JJ and Kie asked in horrified unison. Their eyes met for a brief second, but the meaning behind it was too intricate to even attempt to untangle.
John B snorted.
“What do you mean once, bro?” JJ was more than shocked, he seemed almost offended.
"I just..." Pope looked at John B for help, "I don't know! It doesn't really—come up."
"Dude!" Kie said, disbelieving. "If they don't ask, you have to bring it up."
"What—? Why?!"
"Pope, listen to me," JJ suddenly spoke, almost sober. He ran a hand through his hair and crouched beside Pope, taking him by the shoulders, "Sex is sacred. Holy. An act of intimacy performed before God and Nature."
"That explains the Dune Sex," John B insinuated under his breath.
JJ made to kick him, "You. Shut up." Turning back to Pope, he resumed his lesson, "Sex is supposed to be one of the greatest pleasures of life, ya dingus. A pact between equals. If you're not doing the absolute most for the person you're fucking, then what even is the point?"
John B looked at Kie, eyebrows almost at his hairline. He was impressed and almost weirded out by how intelligent the speech had sounded. Kie, in turn, was... well, surprised, for one, but that wasn't all. There was something else she couldn't quite put her finger on.
"Besides, you don't want to be the little bitch that doesn't make girls come, right?" JJ finished with a patronizing pat to Pope's head.
"There he is," John B. smiled.
Once JJ had retaken his spot on the front passenger seat, Kie cut in with a softer touch.
"Look, Pope, girls like it when you ask. They like it even more when you follow through. It's not... compulsory, per se, but you might find yourself actually enjoying it."
The ghost of understanding dawned on Pope's features, his lips parting to give way to a belated, "ooooh."
"Oh, so Kie you do listen to," JJ accused Pope, mock offended.
She smiled broadly, "Jealous, Maybank?"
"Jealous, Maybank?" JJ parroted, all huffs and puffs, like a little kid.
Kiara cooed and leaned over to pinch JJ's reddening cheek, but she had put all her weight on his knee, and when he jerked away, flustered by the gesture, her grip slipped and she fell, face-first, on his lap.
In an instant, the tables had turned on her: even though she scrambled back to her place, so quick it almost didn't count, JJ's expression had already turned smug. It was now her place to feel warmth crawling up her neck. Embarrassment twisted her gut.
JJ leaned back, hands laced at the nape of his neck. Tongue-in-fucking-cheek.
"Well, that's very forward of you, Ms Carrera," he said.
"Fuck off, JJ."