"Oh please," Camila said, not dissuaded for a moment."You didn't come in here looking for a fuck. There are gay bars for that. You came in here on a Tuesday morning looking to get hammered. And that's fine enough for an old retired goat like Jim, but you're young, attractive and a day away from being shipped out. So there's a reason behind it,"
"Maybe," Lauren said, "but I don't see how crying about it is going to help,"
"Ugh, you're such a guy." Camila rolled her eyes. "Talking things over with girlfriends can help, you know?"
"Girlfriend?" Lauren raised her eyes with a joking smile,
"Shut up, you know what I mean," Camila said. "You never know what problems I can help with. And I refuse to let you leave here feeling like you do."
"Well, let's see," Lauren said, to her surprise. She began feeling all of the emotions she'd been suppressing all week bubble up to the surface. She felt as though she needed to get them out before she began to actually cry, when she started talking, Lauren felt the words just spill out of her in a rush.
"I've had to live the last five years of my life terrified that someone would find out I'm gay or else I'd be discharged and not able to do the one thing I've ever been good at. Then, that bullshit ends and I get to come home and spend two carefree weeks in the arms of my girlfriend who I can finally be open with and it turns out she dumps me and was probably cheating on me. I ended up spending most of my leave moving my stuff out of her place.
"I'm about to go overseas for twelve months more. Which means another year of hard work and getting hassled by any douchebag with a hard-on. When that ends, I now have nothing much in the way of money, a job or a home to come back to.
Lauren paused to take a sip of her beer.
"And to top it all off, I haven't had sex in a year. An actual, solid year," Lauren said as a capper.
Her words hung in the air for a brief second before Camila broke the silence.
"Shit," Camila said in sympathy, "that sucks,"
"Yeah, tell me about it." Lauren nodded
The words held in the air for a second. Lauren saw Camila look to the picture above the bar. The one of her and her uncle and then saw a brief smile flash on Camila's face.
"That's not right." Camila said defiantly. "Not for you and especially not today,"
Lauren shrugged. She knew a lot of other vets had it worse than she did, even on today and she was already regretting her bout of self-pity.
"But there's nothing there we can't fix."
"Oh?" Lauren said with disbelief. "How are you going to fix all of that?"
"Because I'm Superwoman, bitch," Camila said with a roll of her eyes. "We can't do anything about the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" bullshit but, and while that was an embarrassment that must have sucked in a way I don't know, at least that's over, right?"
"I guess." Lauren nodded
"And there's not much to do about your bitch of an ex, but we all have shitty exes, right? And we get over them?"
"True," Lauren had to admit this. Just being around Camila, someone else Lauren had wanted to fuck, had eased a lot of the heartbreak from Lucy.
"Now I can't give you money because that would mean breaking my lucrative trust fund," Camila said sarcastically. "And I can't really give you a place to live because it's a one bedroom apartment upstairs, but you're welcome to couch surf there when you get back until you find a job."
Lauren smiled at the offer. Not the logistics of it, Lauren didn't really see how it would work, but she appreciated the sentiment of it at least.
"And yeah, the economy sucks and stuff, but I know a few people around who might need a good hand and you're smart and capable so we'll get you on your feet," Camila continued. Now she really did sound confident.
"Fair enough." Lauren nodded. As far as pep talks went, it wasn't a bad one. Lauren did like the idea of coming back and hanging out with Camila.
"Which leads us back to your deployment and the sex thing," Camila said. "And I can solve that."
Lauren felt her heart skip another beat. She didn't know exactly what Camila was offering here or if it were more flirting and Lauren had been drawn in before, so she did her best to play it cool.
"Oh yeah? You know any girls on call?" Lauren said, doing her best to look nonchalant.
"No," Camila said, leaning in towards her, "but we are going to fuck. Twice."
Lauren looked into those brown eyes and tried to catch the lump in her throat. For a second Lauren thought she'd imagined it but the look on Camila's face told her otherwise. Camila had said it with conviction and seemed entirely serious. Still, it was a confusing offer.
"Twice?" Lauren asked, unsure of the meaning, not that it sounded bad to her.
"Yes, once tonight and then once again when you get back." Camila said. Her voice was determined and only slightly, Lauren thought, quivering with nerves.
"But you're straight," Lauren said, still not believing the offer being made.
"Yeah, well, I am, let's make no mistake about that," Lauren said firmly. "That's why only twice. Once tonight and once when you get back. To give you a proper send-off and give you something worthwhile to come home to."
Lauren chuckled. It was a sweet offer and, looking at the way Camila was breathing heavily, Lauren again felt a swell of sexual desire well up in her. This is what she'd wanted so bad since she'd first laid eyes on Camila and now it was being offered up to her. Still, Lauren felt the need to continue to question the offer of sex with a gorgeous woman like it was a used car.
"So, a pity fuck?" Lauren said, trying to not sound overly keen on the idea. She knew she could go into a gay bar and find a hot young thing and fuck her into whatever state she wanted. She didn't like the idea of being a charity case.
Camila shook her head. "I'm thinking of it as a patriotic duty fuck," she said, keeping her eyes locked on. "It's not right that you go over and sacrifice so much and have so little to show for it. I can't fix all your problems, but I'm more than willing to indulge my moderate curiosity to solve this one."
Lauren laughed, and tried to look away, but found herself trapped by Camila's eyes. "So what, we go upstairs and have a quick, awkward roll in the hay?" Lauren asked.
Camila caught her eyes with a look of smoldering, fierce intensity as she leaned towards her. "I don't fuck half-way," she said, her voice again dropping to its low, sultry whisper. "If I'm only going to have lesbian sex twice in my life, it's going to be back-scratching, screaming, make-it-so-you-can't-feel-your-legs-for-a-week lesbian sex."
Lauren let the words hang there for a second. There were no longer concerns on her part about the offer. She was only mildly concerned about whether or not she'd be able to stand without her hard-on being obvious.
"Look at me," Camila said, taking a step backwards and letting Lauren's eyes again trail over the mind-blowing curves that Camila had on terrific display. "Now unless I'm wrong, you've been looking at me all week like you wanted to tear my clothes off and fuck me until I screamed,"
"Maybe," Lauren shrugged, hoping to appear non-committal.
"Right," Camila said with a smirk, "so now that I'm saying you can, are you going to? Or are you actually going to sit there and spend some more time worrying whether or not we'd be doing it for the right reasons?"
