As soon as he took ahold of her elbow it was OK.

Near midnight. An empty suburban street in front of a silent house. Adele remembered the place vaguely from the other night, but she wasn’t working now. There was no earthly reason for her to be there. And just as she started wondering where the hell is my car even out of nowhere the guy appears.

It wasn’t like she suddenly got reconciled to things. His hand on her arm felt clammy and he gave off creep vibes and she was not at all comfortable having him this close to her, but the raw gut fear that grabbed her that first second was just gone, like it never was. Like he’d slapped a lid over it. It had to have been something he was making happen, Adele thought. The whole grabbing the elbow thing. She didn’t try to shake him loose though. Because it was OK. She knew her situation wasn't great but it was OK. She wasn’t going to scream or faint or try to run away or do anything dramatic like that. He had control of her. How didn't matter. She hated when people said it is what it is but it was. He’d make her do stuff, it wouldn’t really be her doing it, and by morning probably it’d all be fine again. Simple. Why make a fuss.

She’d been gazing down, away from him. Some instinct of self-preservation that said don’t look into his eyes. But that just seemed stupid now. They were normal, just a normal dude’s normal brown eyes, like they could possibly have been anything else. He smirked at her as if he knew what was going on in her head.

“I have a sort of knack for getting people to follow my lead,” he said.

Adele wondered if he was going to be this smug about it the whole time. This is a little different than me “following your lead,” pal, she thought at him. But there wasn’t any fire in her to tell him off. He brought his hand to her face and she flinched for an instant, afraid he might have read something in her eyes. All he did though was chuckle and stroke his fingers lightly down her cheek.

She shivered at it, but she was still OK. Abruptly he turned away from her and headed down the walk back to the house. Adele stood watching after him for a moment with her hands on her hips, shaking her head. That door better not be locked when I get there, motherfucker, she thought. It wasn’t though. Anyway if it had been she’d have probably just stood there and knocked.

The house was big and mostly dark, and it felt empty. Echoey. Adele went where there was light showing, a living room or something past the front stairs, which had stuff in it but the sort of stuff that only made a place look emptier. Tacked-up blackout curtains for drapes. Big TV on the wall, an Ikea-type couch and table, a couple overstuffed armchairs. Game console. Two bored-looking girls were on the couch, one blonde one brunette, playing some sort of car-racing thing. Both of them naked. One girl, the brunette, nodded her head in Adele’s direction. “Hey,” she said.

Adele glanced over at the dude, wondering how extra girls changed the equation. He’d wandered over near the windows and was standing there absorbed in something with his phone. Adele tried to catch his eye. “Should I …” she asked, gesturing toward the couch. She didn’t feel remotely like undressing in front of them all but there wasn’t any point being a stick-in-the-mud about it. Solidarity or whatever. He looked at her blankly for a beat, then shook his head yes and flashed her a thumbs-up. Still fixated on his phone he opened a door at the farther end of the room and walked out.

She only had on shorts and a t-shirt, so there wasn’t really any thought required. She got a slightly queasy feeling hooking her fingers into her panties but when they were gone it felt kind of cool, them all being naked together. The blonde glanced at the sad little pile on the floor. “Won’t be wearing those anymore,” she said wryly. The brunette, eyes glued to the game, told her “Pick em up, he doesn’t like messes.”

Adele dropped the clothes on the nearest armchair. The brunette looked narrowly at her. “You eighteen at least?” she asked. “I just look young,” Adele said, nodding. The blonde took her hand off the controller long enough to flash her own thumbs-up.

“Sit,” the brunette said, patting the empty space on the couch next to her. Adele pushed the clothes to the back of the armchair seat and flopped down there instead.

The blonde, on the far end of the couch, glanced around the brunette over towards Adele. “You’re gonna have to shave that you know.”

“Yeah,” the brunette said in the direction of Adele’s crotch. “He’s got a thing against bush. Not right away though, wait'll he tells you. He’ll want to supervise.”

Adele didn’t know what to do with the shaving thing, so she ignored it. The girls played their game in silence for a couple of minutes, till the round ended. It felt a bit like hanging out in someone’s house you didn’t really know waiting for a friend to score drugs, Adele thought. Same combination of aimlessness and tension. The blonde put her controller down. “Hey, are you pizza delibery?” she asked Adele.

Adele said “What?” and the brunette snorted and said “You said ‘delibery.’” “Did not,” the blonde huffed. “Delibery. Deliber— Fuck.”

“You say it,” the brunette ordered Adele, and she did. “Delivery.”

“Dude,” the brunette crowed, “you can’t say ‘delibery’ right. Wait.” The blonde’s face lit up. “Neither can you!” she said, punctuating it with a slug on the brunette’s arm. The brunette winced and seemed to deflate.

“It’s one of his games, he likes to fuck up how we say things,” she said to Adele, half-apologetically.

“I’m not, um,” Adele stammered, “I don’t have any pizza. To bring.” It was awkward avoiding saying deliver. “Last time,” the blonde said. “The other night I mean.”

“Yeah, that was good pizza,” the brunette added.

“Oh the other night,” Adele said. “Late. Yeah.” Three-pie order. Good tip. Was it the same guy? Had to have been. Weird she couldn’t remember him. Weird to think the girls had been there that night too.

“Yeah, he said you’d be showing up. DoorDash,” the brunette said, pointing to herself, and gesturing to the blonde, “Instacart.” “Dude likes his delibery girls,” the blonde snickered.

“Delibery girls,” the brunette repeated, heavily sarcastic. “Oh fuck off,” said the blonde. Her game controller was resting on her belly and she moved it absently onto the couch. “You sound so fucking stupid when you say it like that,” the brunette said. They were staring hard into each others’ eyes. The brunette licked her lips. “You sound so fucking brainwashed,” she said, and then her tongue was down the blonde’s throat.

Adele decided she wasn’t comfortable in the armchair and slid off onto the floor, arranging herself into a half-assed lotus. It was sort of weird and embarrassing to be watching two naked chicks she’d just met making out heavily right in front of her, and anyway from the floor she felt like she could see the TV better. Maybe they’d throw her a controller when they came up for air. She didn’t really play much but at least it’d be something to do.

But then all they did was go back to their game. That was the thing about tagging along on a drug buy: it was theoretically crime-adjacent but mostly all you were was bored. Adele stayed quiet and followed the race. She had no idea where in the big empty house the guy had gone to, or if he was even still there. She almost wished he was back just to break the monotony.

“Yo, pizza.” They’d paused the game, and the blonde was leaning towards her across her friend’s legs. She had a wicked glint in her eye. “You gay yet?”

“Jesus, Cart,” the brunette said, swatting the blonde on the back of the head. “She didn’t even get here an hour ago. We’re not gay,” she told Adele firmly. “She’s not hitting on you.”

“Hit on whoever I want,” the blonde pouted, rubbing her hair. She shot the brunette a mocking look and told Adele, “We’re not gay, we’re just extremely into pussy lately.”

Adele didn’t care if they were gay. It suited them actually. Still, you couldn’t just turn a girl like that, she scoffed to herself. What was she supposed to get gay from, watching them play video games? Adele had never hung out naked with lesbian gamer chicks before, and yeah it was a little unusual, but she was pretty sure it’d take more than that to make her go over the fence. In fact she was beginning to wonder if the dude had any idea in mind for her at all.

She cleared her throat. “So, um, how long you guys been here?” she asked.

The two of them shared a look. “So, pizza was which night?” the brunette said. “Like, was that the end of the second day or the third?” “Asking me dude, you were here before I was” the blonde said, and then for a minute or two they bickered fruitlessly between them about when they’d eaten what and how much time it was since which of them had been taken.

When Adele said how long she hadn’t been thinking days. Her heart sank. “And nobody’s missed you yet,” she broke in. Immediately she regretted phrasing it like that.

The couch girls didn’t seem to take any implication from it. “He took our phones,” Cart said. She had herself wrapped up in her half-reclined partner’s arms, snuggling her cheek against DoorDash’s breasts. “He fakes the odd check-in,” the brunette added, sounding blasé, “we like, text excuses to people or whatever, whatever he tells us,— really though it’s been pretty quiet.”

He had her phone too, Adele realized. In her bag. Which she’d handed over as soon as he walked up to her, without him saying a word. Didn’t even notice herself doing it. Now if she wanted to leave she’d have to ask for it back. Guess I’m here for the duration, she told herself.

Still, at least she knew. And what did it really amount to, when you thought of it? She’d have to hang out with the delibery girls for a couple days. So what? She didn’t have anything going on. Pick up some gaming chops. The stay didn’t seem to be doing Cart or Dash any harm.

Cart poked her head up. “We quit our jobs!” she said brightly. She made it sound like an accomplishment. “Lot less distractions that way. You know, from pussy,” she added wickedly. Dash only sighed and looked wistful.

They really were cute together though, Adele thought. A real cute energy. You could see how somebody might want to keep them around for it, they had entertainment value. Cart with that tangy little mouth, and it looked it too,— kissing her would be like biting into a Granny Smith. Adele felt her own mouth wanting it and shook her head; she wasn’t falling down that rabbit hole. “So, you guys have just been—“ She balked at where the question seemed to be going, but couldn’t think of another. “I mean, for however long you’ve …“

“Yep, gaming ordering in and fucking, pretty much,” Dash said. “Not him,” the blonde added. “No,” Dash hurried to agree, “no we don’t fuck him. He likes us fucking though. Or you know, making out, whatever.”

“I’m not sure he’s even into sex,” Cart confided after a pause.

“Titty massage,” the brunette countered. “And we have blown him a few times,” she told Adele. “Call those blowjobs,” Cart said to Dash. “Have you ever even had his dick all the way in your mouth? We make out and he just sort of works himself in between there until he nuts.” She looked at Adele like she wanted a ruling. The brunette shrugged the question off.

Adele wondered if they’d go back to playing soon. When they did she was gonna turn the room light off. It was too bright. She thought of how their skin would look in the dark with just the glow from the screen playing over them. She’d sit there on the floor like a little mouse, nobody noticing, just watching all the ways the game made their pretty tits jiggle. “You guys must be getting real good at racing by now, huh,” she said.

Dash scoffed. “It’s not about the games,” she said. Cart sat up and looked at Adele like she thought the girl was slow. “Dude,” she said, gesturing towards the TV, “how else do you think he brainwashes us?”

“AHHHHH—“ the brunette made a game-buzzer noise. “What?” Cart said, in wide-eyed dismay, “No!” and her shoulders slumped. Dash was shaking her head. “You lose, pal!” she said, throwing a quick look Adele’s way. “You know the rules, pay up.” The blonde was blushing furiously, the redness extending over her chest. “Excuse me,” she said to Adele, not meeting her eyes, and then sprawled herself forward onto the floor between Dash’s legs.

“First one to use the b-word in front of you has to eat the other one out,” the brunette told Adele. She cooed at whatever Cart’s tongue was doing and put a hand on top of the blonde’s head. “Which is a hard game, because we fucking love to talk about brainwashing.”

“I think you said it first,” Adele told her meekly.

“Yeah, well she didn’t call it,” Dash said. “Hear that?” she asked, grabbing a hunk of Cart’s hair and shaking her with it. The blonde moaned. “Gotta call it next time bitch!” Dash closed her eyes and tilted her head back and rode her pussy harder against her friend’s face.

The brunette sighed heavily after a while and opened her eyes again, and when she looked back down at Adele she gave out an “uh-oh” in an exaggerated singsong, and tapped Cart urgently a couple of times on the back of her head. “Check it out,” she said, and the blonde, her eyes vague and her lipstick smeared, lifted herself off of Dash’s pussy. She grinned wide and wolfishly at Adele’s lap. “Aww yeah, Pizza in the house!” Cart said.

Adele looked down and saw she was fingering herself. She wasn’t stopping either, which surprised her. She’d never masturbated in front of anyone before. She was surprised embarrassment didn’t stop her. It felt awfully sexy though, not being able to stop. That part of it was even hotter than being watched. Adele locked eyes with Dash and got up onto her knees and slid a second finger in, deep as she could, she was so wet it was easy, she ran her tongue over her lips all lewd and never once looked away. It scarcely even felt like playacting. If she had to want this then she might as well goddamn want it. She’d taken improv. She knew about commitment. Never let your scene partners down.

“Come on Peetz,” Dash said, laughing and leering at her and rubbing the couch cushion next to her with her palm, “come sit up here with the big girls.” Cart scuttled over to get between her legs. Once Adele was on the couch she automatically tried to put her fingers back in, but Dash caught her hand instead and carried it to her mouth and started licking.

The first touch of Cart’s tongue splitting her pussy convinced Adele that any time she’d spent not getting eaten out by girls in her life had been wasted. She wanted to grind herself against the blonde’s mouth like Dash had but she was wary of moving, for fear it was all some kind of dream. She was about to give in anyway, then she felt something cold bump up against her ear and it startled her.

“Shhh,” Dash whispered. She held up a pair of earbuds. “Just a little white noise,” she said. “Helps with focus.” She fit one of the buds in Adele’s farther ear, while she pressed a wet, lingering kiss on the near one. “We’re gonna have soo much fun together, Pizza,” she crooned, and then Adele’s head filled up with fuzz.

She sensed movement after a bit, and opened her eyes. Dude had come back. He was standing there in front of them like a goober with his dick in his hand, because of course he was. He likes his delibery girls, she thought, giggling to herself. She wasn’t sure if you pronounced it delibery or delibery, and it made her feel hilariously stupid that she couldn’t tell the difference.