And I really meant it! This wasn’t just me molesting his sister, the bitch who tormented me in school for so long, and thereby getting a little payback on both of them. This was an actual problem with most self-defense courses offered nowadays.
That made sense to him. He was bound to know what I just told him from his football training already, so he relented and I could instruct Ava and Mia on how to do “the shrimp”. By the time they had the movement down, our hour was up and the first people from the firm started filing into the gym. We packed up and drove back to the Miller house. During the drive, Jack was still trying to question my methods, but I noticed the backseat was unusually quiet. Looking in the rearview mirror, I saw Mia regard me with thoughtful and, whenever she noticed me watching, shy looks. Ava seemed to take great interest in her friend’s unusual behavior.
After we arrived at Mia’s home, and all of us had made their way inside, I located whoever was currently assigned watchduty and answered Nora’s and Mr. Miller’s questions about how the training went. As I turned to leave, however, Mia called out to me.
“Tim! When’s ... when do you come by next?” The highly unusual uncertainty in her voice, as well as her fidgeting fingers, weren’t lost on anyone in the room. “I mean ... for the training. You said we’d have to do it regularly, but Monday is our last Cheer practice and Christmas break starts Tuesday.”
Damn! So much to me not having to stand in the gym’s hallway for three hours!
“Well, how about the same time tomorrow?” I said, and she immediately had an eager smile on her face, while her eyes almost sparkled. That wasn’t lost on Nora as well, who suddenly developed a smirk while examining her daughter’s behavior. “Normally I train every day after the office closes. But you have your social calendars, so that won’t do. I would like to get you two up to speed quickly, though. Maybe you and Ava could sit together on Monday, see if we can cram one or two sessions into your week’s schedule?”
“Yes!” she proclaimed, sounding quite pleased with my answer, while bouncing on her feet. “We’ll do that. See you tomorrow then!” she said, before leaving the room while waving us goodbye, and leaped up the stairs out of sight.
I blinked after her for a moment, before shrugging my shoulders and moving towards the door.
I knew I wasn’t exactly experienced with girls, so I also knew that I was probably just imagining things. There was no way she would actually look forward to training with me. She was just looking forward to training, period. Despite me being around her so much now, and despite me identifying her potential stalker, we still barely knew each other. Sure, we had a few honest conversations over the last few days, giving each other a rather intimate insight into each other’s personalities, and her mother had apparently also worked on her to get her a changed perspective. But that couldn’t possibly be enough to make us grow that close. At least, not that I thought.
Back in the car, I noticed that it was almost dinnertime. Following my plan to discourage Ava’s submissiveness outside the bedroom, I opted to include her in the evening planning.
“So, hungry?” I asked, as I pulled out of the driveway.
“God, Yes!”
“Any cravings? Wishes? Ideas?” I followed up, causing her to look at me with even greater uncertainty than I had seen in Mia just before.
“No ... whatever you want is fine.”
“Come on, no after work out rituals?”
“Maybe one.” she said after a moment of hesitation. For some reason she was furiously blushing while saying it, which confused me. My inquiring and expectant stare caused her to look at her hands and mumble something.
“What? Sorry, I didn’t catch that.” I said, smirking about what it could be that got her so shy. She took a breath to steady herself.
“Logan said ... after working out, I need a ... a protein injection.”
She had started out in a normal voice, but her volume had steadily declined as she continued on. Realizing what she was talking about, I just sat in the driver’s seat and stared at her dumbfounded, before I couldn’t hold it anymore and loudly burst out.
“HOLY SHIT that’s cringy! Logan - the great charmer Logan - said that? ‘Protein injection’!?” she nodded sheepishly. “Oh. My. God. I can’t believe someone would actually say that while not shooting porn!”
I couldn’t help it, I just laughed. Loudly. It had been a long time since I actually, happily, and heartily laughed. Even that Thanksgiving, when Logan’s secret pornshoots were exposed, it was a quite bitter laugh. And that situation with Nora in my closet was rather short lived. This, right now, I thoroughly enjoyed so much I contemplated stopping the car. Luckily, Ava knew I wasn’t making fun of her, and after a moment even joined in. When we had calmed down again, she spoke up.
“I was never the type who comes out of the gym and feels like I need to reward myself for working out or something. So, I really don’t have any cravings right now.”
“How abou ... wait! I remember this part from Tess!” I called out and she looked at me in surprise. “I ask what you want to eat, you say it doesn’t matter. But when I start suggesting things, you tell me you’re not in the mood for it until I finally suggest something that piques your interest. So, let’s do it alphabetically. How about Albanian?”
She blinked at me for a moment and suddenly started laughing.
“Are you seriously giving your sister the girlfriend-treatment?” She didn’t sound playful, or mocking. I could have been imagining it, but I thought she sounded almost intrigued.
“Well, you live with me, spend your entire day with me, sleep in my bed with me ... It was bound to happen at some point.” I shot back.
“Fine. But I’m actually really not in the mood for Albanian food.” she giggled.
“Who would’ve thought!”
An hour later, we arrived in my apartment with a bag of Mexican Quesadillas, though I couldn’t tell if she actually had an appetite for them, or just grew tired of teasing me. I immediately spotted the parcel in front of my door. I told Ava to go clean herself up before we eat, so I would have a chance to sort through its contents undisturbed.
On my way to my bedroom, I grabbed a Ziplock bag from the kitchen, placed the parcel on my desk, and was happy to discover that it contained everything I ordered. I quickly transferred the right amount of fake birth control pills into the Ziplock bag and stored it in my nightstand. I wasn’t sure when I would get the chance to use them, but I would just have to steer her in the right direction so they’d be nearby when the time came. Then I placed the toys and the KY in my desk drawer.
Back on the sofa, after using the opportunity to slip into some sweatpants myself, we both started consuming our dinner in front of the TV. I let her choose the movie, quickly learning that ‘Pitch Perfect’ is NOT my kind of film. Ava obviously thought differently, and, immediately after finishing her dinner, snuggled up into my right side while being totally absorbed into the movie. Her doing so struck me as weird, but I didn’t want to tell her off. I wanted her to do things like that out of her own volition. I wanted to avoid telling her what to do, when it wasn’t about sex, as much as possible. And, if I was being honest with myself, I kind of enjoyed being so close to a feminine body again.
It didn’t take long for this to evolve further, though, and that did somewhat irritate me. A few minutes after she had snuggled up into me, she grabbed my right arm I had placed on the backrest, and draped it over herself before rubbing her face against my chest like she was trying to create a hollow in a pillow. Another few minutes later, she wrapped both of her arms around the one she had draped over herself, and let out a content sigh. A few minutes after that, she repositioned herself so her torso was effectively lying on top of mine.