Welcome to Gaia! ::

The water had been turned off the very moment Otto flung his door open. Her head was covered in a towel, rubbing the water out of her hair as he opened, and shut his fridge. The towel dropped to the floor the moment the can was opened, and her soft, bare footsteps took her to the living room - passing right by the kitchen, and his turned back - while he drank.

She didn't see him. He didn't see her. Fate had timed their movements just right to keep them ignorant, until a very nude, very comfortable Maebe slunk down onto the couch again, settled in to make herself comfortable, and picked up the remote of the television.

The click would not give her away. The blaring music from the half-finished movie, would.

Maebe heard the spit, and it had her freezing in surprise. She waited for the perpetrator to show himself, so she could throw the remote at him and kick him in the balls while he was surprised. The remote looked ready to be flung, but never left her hand, because Otto's face was certainly on the short list of acceptable people to be in the room at that moment.

And then she realized, as she watched his face turn red with embarrassment, that he was staring at her naked body lying on his couch. That realization brought the biggest, grinchiest smile to curl up on her face.

"You must be having a dream." She informed him, setting the remote down. "Otto, you're so dirty, dreaming about me here, like this. Here, specifically. Just like last time." She reached her hand out to him. "Come here, it's okay. It's just a dream, right?"

Her hand fell, and her face registered as exaggerated disappointment. "Damn. You could have lied to yourself. You could have pretended you were gullible enough to believe me. You could have had me three times before you finally admitted it was real. Think of all the opportunities lost."

Maebe finally stood, when he turned away - as there was no point to her sitting there if he wasn't going to look. She didn't recognize that he was trying to respect her, because she didn't remember what respect was. "I'm here because I missed you. Isn't that obvious?" She lied sweetly through her teeth, even as she exited the room, and went to grab a sheet from Cami's bed. Cami's, not Otto's.

She wrapped her body in pastel blue and purple polka dots, and let the majority of it drag behind her as she returned to stand in front of him. His burning face was his best feature, and she reached up to brush her fingers across his scarred face. Secretly, she was disappointed. He was still so beautiful.

Otto should have been easier to destroy than this.

"Did you miss me?"

Otto would have attained some very strong points in her book, if she believed what he said for one second. But the way he talked to her / about her on twitter, and the way Cami had mistaken her for somebody special in his life, were working against him. She brushed it all off as complete bullshit, and gave him no credit for his efforts.

"I don't believe you." She didn't need to tell him that, and she almost regretted it as soon as she'd said it - because it didn't matter whether she believed him or not. It wasn't something he needed to know. She pursed her lips, and then returned to the couch, still wrapped in Cami's sheets. Apparently, she didn't feel like listening to his demands at that particular moment. If he'd phrased them differently, perhaps ripped them off of her forcefully, she might have been more interested in what he had to say.

But she knew better.

"They feel like they belong to me." She told him, as her legs rubbed against the sheets suggestively. "They look like they belong to me. And I'm pretty sure they smell like me. Unless she's washed them since last night." Maebe pulled them up against her face, and inhaled deeply. Whether or not she washed them didn't matter, because they smelled like Maebe's body now, anyway.

Vanilla and pear. "Mmm, yeah. still me."

"You're right." Otto's reaction sent waves of glee rolling up and down her spine. It was easy to ignore the why behind how she felt, because it felt too good. And that was the name of the game, wasn't it? Pleasure. As long as she felt good, everything was worth it.

But it wasn't good enough.

She stood up, returned to him, and wrapped her arms loosely around his waist. This pulled the sheets around him, as well, offering a warm and comforting reminder that Cami was not what she was claiming. "No one will ever belong to me, Otto. That's how this works. I don't want someone to belong to me. But things... things can belong to me. Things like these sheets, for example. Or the right to sleep in them. Or your couch, maybe." She pressed her hand against his lips before he could argue. "Maybe just the memories that still live against those pillows, if not the couch itself."

She put her hands back down, snuggling more against the sheets, than him. "The point is, I wasn't claiming her. Or you, if you're ever wondering that. I was claiming the right to be here. That's all."

Her smile lifted gently, as she looked straight into his eyes. "You like her a lot, don't you?" She couldn't blame him. "How long has it been since you've had a real friend?"

Something flashed in Maebe's eyes. It wasn't quite anger, but it was probably the first real emotion Otto had ever seen her exhibit. "I slept with Cami - " And it was important to specify what she'd done, because she was not getting 'close' to anyone by any standards - "Because she is beautiful. And willing. And soft, and hard, and sweet. I slept with her because she tasted good on my tongue, and the way she cried out my name sounded like music. I did not get with her because I like your room."

She'd been ruffled. She pulled her arms tighter, because Maebe did not run away when she felt threatened, she just fought harder. And soon enough, Maebe was returning back to the gentle, knowing emptiness that suited her pale features more.

"I like her too. Don't snap at her, like you do to me, even if you're in a bad mood and don't mean it. Okay? If you're angry and need someone to yell at, come find me. I love your anger." She pushed herself up on her tiptoes - not because she needed to get higher, but because it put her closer to his face, until she could breathe against his lips. "That's another thing I'd claim any day of the week, if you'd let me."

She wanted to laugh in his face, but something about the tone of his voice made her feel heavy and drunk. She let it pass with nothing more than a distracted chuckle. "You. You think you have control over your anger, suddenly. You think that you're not going to snap the moment you get scared. What could possibly give you that idea? Did you become a buddhist? Or maybe a vegan? Do you meditate? Maybe pilates." Her hands squeezed the sides of his body playfully. "Is it pilates? It feels like pilates."

She was having more trouble staying serious, now. The heady, intoxicated feeling was getting away from her. "I say you don't have control. I say you're balling it all up inside of you, which just means you're more dangerous. You're going to push it all down, down, until you're ready to explode, and you're going to do it on the wrong person." It didn't even have to be Cami. Otto must have other people he cared about - he was Otto. He was beautiful.

Her stomach churned.

"I say you do need me. And maybe, just maybe, I want to be needed." Was that a lie? Her perfect mask made it impossible to tell. "You remember how good it was, don't you, Otto? How easy it was for me to find every single button to push. I remember them." Her fingers traveled up his back, and his neck, losing themselves in his hair. "Even the really, really ******** up ones. I say you need this as bad as I do. As bad as she did. And if I'm wrong, you can tell me so." Her head tilted to kiss the crook of his neck. "Afterwards."