“Mom.”

Not ten minutes. The girls were sitting in the big armchair in the formerly quiet book corner, in a lazy late-afternoon sun. Ellen was trying to coax a feel of Tracy’s nipples without getting scolded, which involved straddling her girlfriend’s lap and grinding as much as she dared and being very heavy and insistent with her tongue, which always made Tracy hot. It was working like a charm back in her bedroom, where they’d started, until Joyce started puttering around back there making everybody self-conscious. And now out here, and Tracy was just getting going again.

“So much for ‘straightening up’ I guess,” Tracy muttered. Ellen sighed. She ducked her head to look behind her towards the big couch. Joyce sat in a corner of it with her back to them, oblivious seemingly to everything but the television. From what Ellen could see she’d changed into one of her ever-expanding collection of nudie lingerie things before coming out.

“Maaam-UH!” Ellen grunted into Tracy’s shoulder. The racket from the tv bumped down a notch. “Weren’t you supposedly in back tidying the bedrooms?”

However Joyce answered, it was directed at the screen. Ellen couldn’t make her out.  “Mother would you turn that thing down please I’m trying to talk,” Ellen yelled.

The TV muted, and Joyce craned around in her seat to meet her daughter’s eyes. “I said this one’s girl-girl honey, you oughta like it.” Her expression was all pie-eyed innocence. On the screen behind her a trio of silent anime-costumed camgirls continued at their job of lubricating a big purple dildo together.

“I wasn’t commenting about the porn actually, Mother,” Ellen said. She shook her head disbelievingly at Tracy. “But yeah ok, while we’re at it, isn’t it a little early yet? Jesus.”

Joyce’s eyes went even wider. “It’s homework honey,” she said. “Daddy sent me a link.”

Daddy, Ellen scoffed to herself. Tracy, wearing a devilish expression, mouthed the word homework at her and made her middle finger into a corkscrew. Ellen groaned. It was awkward enough having to listen to Joyce’s “homework” from the bedroom next door practically every night. “And there’s literally no place else you can do it,” she snapped. “Right here, right now, right in front of us.”

Joyce blushed and made a small whimper of protest. For the first time a shadow of self-consciousness passed over her face. She watched her hands as if she hadn’t noticed before what they were up to. “He said for me to get out here and wait for him and edge myself stupid,” she pouted. “I’m bein a good girl.”

“What you mean he’s coming? Now? Tonight?” Ellen exchanged a can you believe this shit look with her girlfriend. She threw out her hands in exasperation. “Couldn’t a led with that.”

Joyce’s stricken expression had smoothed and emptied. “He sent me a link,” she said reverently. She kept sneaking glances back at the screen, where the anime girls were play-fighting a game of who-gets-the-strapon. You could almost see her forgetting there was anything else to pay attention to. “Useless,” Ellen growled under her breath. A moment later the TV broke out in a renewed chorus of girly-girl squeals, and Joyce was gone again.

“Guess we better get ready,” Tracy said, with a superior glint in her eye. Ellen, her vibe in tatters, gave up and pushed herself heavily out of the armchair. She kept Tracy interposed between her and the couch on their way out of the room, so she wouldn’t be tempted to gawk at her mom fingering herself. She couldn’t help but hear Joyce’s high-pitched whines though, or how closely they mimicked the sluts onscreen.

“Is there such a word as cock-brained?” Tracy asked. “Because she is like, she is the most cock-brained slut on the planet. He had to have fucked her.” It was a running debate.

They’d only seen LG once since Indian takeout, a day or two after, and by now that was a couple weeks ago. He came by school again. It seemed to Ellen that he was being nostalgic. They went back to that same alcove they first got acquainted in, the girls climbed up in each other’s laps like before and made out—so much better at it now, they cracked jokes about how bad they’d been—and when he took his phone out to shoot some video they got obligingly naughty for him, tickling each other, pulling up each others’ skirts, just a little sexy horseplay. He seemed like he needed cheering up. She remembered the pang of conscience she got while they were goofing around, that he’d picked her and Tracy to have this party with and her mom had lost out.

It felt like a goodbye to her. Although he’d also said next time a few times, like maybe next time I’ll have you put on one of your shows. Tracy said it was fine, she should stop being dramatic. So Ellen didn’t really know what to think.

“Waddaya think?” Tracy asked. She turned this way and that in the mirror, checking out her ass inside a pair of white short-shorts so thin and so tight you could almost see bush. She was trying to get a good angle on them with her phone. “Panties yes? or don’t bother?” Ellen didn’t think you could even fit panties under there.

He’d made them tell the story of how they got to be friends, too, which was also on the “goodbye” side of things. Like, it didn’t seem in character otherwise. But maybe Joyce had been snitching them out to him again and he was just curious. He did seem to know already about their runway era, or at least he homed right in on it. Fourteen, fashion-brained little vintage chicks—the only ones either of them knew—they used to do thrift-store raids and plan out looks together and cart stuff to each others’ houses to model. It was very cringe and they outgrew it fast enough, but it was also fun and bonding and secretly Ellen still missed that time. LG said it was a shame they stopped, he said there was nothing cuter than when cute girls got flirty with each other and played dressup.

So in a way it was his doing. Ellen was a pack rat—she said, Tracy said hoarder—and this whole last week they’d been rummaging through her boxes, trying things on, reminding themselves of their old finds. They hadn’t actually decided on another show, not decided decided, but they kind of had. Anyway they were primed for it now, even on short notice. They’d been circling a lot around ‘80s themes, and LG was old and that was something old people liked, and so now every spangly or shiny or tight thing they could turn up was piled on Ellen’s bed to be inspected.

Four years and a graduation on from the last time they’d done this, on Ellen at least everything was tight. “None of it works,” she said to the pile. Tracy turned around to look, not just pantyless but braless, her halter top making perfect little silver pouffs above her nipples. In spite of the sequined miniskirt she’d found and what it did for her legs, Ellen felt like a frump. “None of these even fit.” Tracy made a sad face at her and went over to one of the pulled-out drawers in Ellen’s chifferobe.

“Here.” A filmy black something sailed across the room. “Madonna shirt.” A crop top, mesh, not a close mesh. Ellen shrugged it on and went to the mirror.

It sat off the shoulder, and she busied herself plucking at it, fussing it this way and that over her bra straps, shaking her head. Tracy, still by the dresser, put on a pair of star-shaped glasses she found and mugged with them at Ellen, but couldn’t get a rise out of her. “It doesn’t go,” Ellen finally said. Tracy shrugged. “Change the bra,” she said. “Or take it off.”

“Tracy.” Ellen gave her her disapproving-est side-eye. “It’s just us,” Tracy said, coming to the mirror. She parked in back of Ellen and without a word started undoing her bra clasp.

When she felt it release Ellen lost all power of movement. She watched herself follow in numb cooperation as Tracy pulled her arms from the straps, a doll undressing. The bra fell away and in the mirror Ellen’s gaze locked with Tracy’s, a million miles away behind her cheap plastic lenses. “Disco,” Tracy murmured, and slid her hands up her girlfriend’s belly and under the mesh of her all but seethrough blouse.

A hush descended. They stayed there for a long moment, promising each other with their eyes that it wasn’t happening, it was a moment out of time. Tracy kneaded at her breasts, Ellen swaying in a daze against her partner’s indolent rhythm. It wasn’t happening, their eyes said, and it would never stop.

They kept there till they heard a scratching come at the door, and Joyce in a breathy, excited little-girl’s voice calling out from the other side to them Daddy’s home.

Ellen found herself on the floor, staring down the hall towards the back of the house. It was dark down there. It was dark in the living room too, but not as much. She craved the dark. The dark was warmth and concealment. There were fuck noises coming from the dark, and she wanted to be near them, wanted to wrap herself up in the creaks and the moans and let them coax her to sleep.

She heard her stomach growl, and tried to remember eating. All she really could remember was lights, a mad prismatic glitter of lights; and her and Tracy dancing together nonstop in a crush of bodies and the relentless oontz-oontz-oontz of the club. There hadn’t been any bodies, or any club. Even when they believed it they didn’t believe it. They closed their eyes and he said let yourselves be there and when they opened them again they were. Like he’d made magic. Ellen tried it for herself, let yourself be there she whispered with her eyes shut, but whatever the trick was she didn’t have it.

Tracy was in the dark. Ellen remembered because she was on all fours crawling back there now to find her. Maybe the trick needed both of them. At the edge of the living room she had to pause for a minute, because her skirt was bunched below her thighs and it was annoying her. It was the only thing she still had on but these fishnet stockings she didn’t remember getting into. On the hardwood they kind of bit at her knees. Once she kicked the skirt off and reached the hall carpet the going was easier.

Making it down the whole length of the hall exhausted her though, and next to the door to the darkened master bedroom Ellen turned and collapsed, legs akimbo, back propped against the wall. It was quiet. She wasn’t hearing the fuck noises anymore. Not far away from her someone was panting softly, a repeated guttural huh-huh-huh. By the time she worked out what it was Tracy had left off masturbating and climbed on top of her. She started humping Ellen’s thigh, panting that same huh-huh-huh into Ellen’s ear, and her short-shorts were soaked. The dampness chafed against Ellen’s skin. She imagined cupping Tracy’s ass to make her go harder but felt too weak to lift her arms from the floor.

Tracy took rough hold of Ellen’s breast and started mauling it. Ellen closed her eyes. She saw Tracy dancing, the silver tents of her nipples flashing on and off at Ellen like they were ads for nipples, neon signs repeating lick me. Rainbow fireflies swarmed through the air, brightening and dimming as the music went.

Her own nipples were tingling like mad. Had she really asked LG if he’d like them better pierced? Did he say anything? She remembered him calling her “a fat-titty whore just like your Mom” and wondered if that had anything to do with it. Maybe he meant she should talk it over with Joyce. Maybe they could get theirs both done, like a mother-daughter thing. She imagined her and Joyce lifting their blouses to him simultaneously to show off the new metal in their tits.

Ellen heard someone open the bedroom door, and she sensed a bulk overhead stumbling, or doing a pirouette to avoid stumbling, around her stretched-out legs. She heard LG say “shit” in a sort of neutral way and then a sharp snort of laughter.

The flash hit like a slap. Tracy whinged at the light and buried her face into Ellen’s neck. He moved around to the other side and took another. Ellen didn’t think to shield her eyes, but at least this one she wasn’t looking straight into.

“Here for the afterparty?” he chuckled. He stepped across Ellen and went back into the bedroom. The TV flipped on, not loud but the suddenness was jolting. A weak, fickle light leaked out into the hall. From the hectic sound of their squeals the anime girls were well into the ass-fucking portion of the program. Ellen remembered it going on a loop in the background while they were dancing.

He came out again, a dark occlusion in Ellen’s still blotchy sight. Within the room her mom called out something wordless, a low, animal noise of complaint. LG reached down and grabbed Tracy by the hair, pulling her head back to make her look up. Tracy’s mouth hung open and she seemed barely conscious. “Alright starlet, showtime,” he told her. “Get on in there, get naked.” “Okay Daddy,” Tracy said. Loud and slurred, like she was drunk. With a light sideways yank he tossed her off her perch on Ellen’s thigh, she keeled over and as soon as her hands hit the floor she was crawling. The tails of the untied halter top dangled beneath her like braids.

I guess we’re all calling him Daddy, Ellen thought.

He had a coat on, and was patting around it trying to find something. Ellen heard keys jingle. She scooched herself down the wall a bit and got onto her elbows, so her rack would look fuller.

He noticed the movement and glanced down at her. “You like showing off your tits,” he said. Ellen’s tits gave an answering shimmy. “I like showing off my tits Daddy,” she said in a hot whisper. She looked down her torso, surprised to see that her hand had got inside her hose and was busy working her clit. Slut, Ellen said to herself. That made her giggle, and she grinned up at him. “My pussy too, huh Daddy,” she told him, and gasped when her fingers gave her an encouraging pinch.

“Practice makes perfect,” he said absently. He found what he was looking for and pulled his hand out. All Ellen could see in the dim was, it wasn’t the phone, and she felt deflated. She was all set! She was sure she wouldn’t flinch this time. She liked showing off her tits. She wanted to tell him but then he surprised her, launching whatever the thing was on a trajectory down to her belly. It landed right above the hem of her fishnets: a red paper capsule with a white stick on the end. Ellen started to drool.

“All three a you now,” he said. “Make sure you lick it all gone.”

She picked up the tootsie pop and rolled the stick between her thumb and her fingers, thinking how it’d be if she unwrapped it and maybe teased her hole with it for a bit before she went in. Get it all smeary with her juice. He’d want pictures of that. She looked up to ask but he’d turned away already, and was starting towards the front. Maybe next time, Ellen told herself.

Inside the bedroom Joyce was squealing in counterpoint with the camgirls. Ellen struggled to a sitting position and pitched forward to look in. Just past the threshold, bathed in TV light, Tracy lay on her back on the floor, pawing stuporously at her shorts trying to work them off her ass. Ellen knew she should go help, but for the longest time she stayed as she was, slumped over from the wall, staring at the pop in her hand, listening to Daddy’s steps recede. Not till she heard the front door shut, and the deadbolt turn, did Ellen remember the candy was a present, and she had to go share.