We shower afterwards. It was messier than I thought it would be, but in a good way. I’m not really sure what I expected, since it was my first time. Lin is running her fingers along my back in the most pleasant way as the warm water rains down on both of us.
“Was that good for you?” she asks.
“Amazing. Best fireworks of the night.”
“No regrets?”
“None,” I say, turning and putting my arms around her. “You are the most amazing woman on Earth and I want to be with you forever.”
“Good,” she says. “Then you can keep this one.”
Wait, what? I look at her with blank incomprehension. What is she talking about?
“This is actually our third time,” she says gently.
“That can’t be right.” I couldn’t forget something like this, could I?
“The first test run of my software did not go quite so smoothly. We had a couple of, um, bugs to work out.”
“Oh, no. Please tell me that I didn’t—”
“No. No! Nothing like that. False positives for prohibited activities mostly. It kind of ruined things for you when you kept having to start and stop and start again. Then you got cold and we had to…” she trails off. “No. Nevermind. Don’t ask about that one anymore. I was given full editorial rights and I’m exercising them. This was your first time, and it was marvelous for you.”
Well, this explains the missing time in my log. “You know that’s a dangerous game, messing with my memory.” Part of me wants to be mad at her, but she’s wet and naked and beautiful and has her arms around me with her fingers running up and down my back again. With that combination, I think it’s literally impossible for me to harbor any negative feelings at all towards her, even if she robbed me of my first couple of intimate experiences.
“I know it’s dangerous. I remember you said that it led to your suicide attempt. Or at least contributed to it. But this was different,” she says, looking up at me with sincere eyes. “I wanted it to be good for you the first time. And you did say I had full editorial discretion.”
I look back through my logs and see that she’s right. I did sign up for this. “OK. But no more edits, alright?”
Instead of answering, she pulls my head down for a kiss. It’s nice. She’s so hot.
“I know you said not to ask about the first time,” I say once we disengage, “but I’m curious about what went wrong the second time.”
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“That was on Monday, when we worked so late going through that big batch of tips the CTTF sent you. We were both so completely exhausted that we collapsed on your bed and fell asleep. We rolled into each other in the middle of the night which woke us up and then you wanted to try and I didn’t mind and the code I wrote for you worked better that time, but it all just didn’t go quite as well as I hoped. I didn’t want you to remember our first time like that either.”
“So you erased that one too.”
“I think most of the problem with that time was that it was so late that you had forgotten too much. You barely had any of your memories. I mean, you could hardly remember who I was. That made me feel not quite right. Like I had somehow taken advantage of you.”
“Well, I hereby grant you permission from now until forever to have your way with me no matter how late it is or how little I remember.”
“I wasn’t even going to tell you. You said that you didn’t want me to. But it feels a little wrong not to since you asked, so I’m telling you about it now. It only seems fair. And it’s all fine now since you’ve had a good official first time.”
“Yeah, I did. But let’s really not mess with my memory any more. Even if it seems like a good idea at the time.”
“I promise I won’t unless you specifically give me permission. But I won’t stop you if you do it on your own and I won’t say no if you want me to.”
“Good enough. Thanks.”
She turns the water off and we towel each other dry.
“So we should probably talk about how to handle waking up next to me.”
“Oh, you have recommendations?”
“More like disclaimers. I might not know who you are when I first wake up. Please don’t take offense. It’s not about you. I barely know who I am when I wake up.”
“I knew that part.”
“Knowing about it and dealing with it when it’s early and you’re groggy are two different things,” I say. “So just be patient with me.”
“I will,” she assures me, smiling like she’s amused as she pulls me towards the bed.
“Usually my alert to read my life back in is what wakes me up. I have some failsafes if I wake up on my own before it goes off, like a warning that dangles in front of my vision as soon as I open my eyes after I’ve slept. If all goes well, and I wake up first, you won’t notice anything. But if you wake up first, and I seem out of it, just give me some time to get current before you expect anything from me. If I keep acting weird, just tell me to do my reading.”
“OK,” she says, with that amused smile again. Does she know something I don’t?
“It’s really not funny,” I protest, getting comfortable in the covers.
“Well, not for you,” she says, snuggling up against me. “But I’m planning a whole lifetime of mischief that hinges on this.”
I can’t help laughing at the naughty twinkle in her eyes. I really am stupidly crazy for her. “Maybe we better wipe this one down and try one more first time.”
“Don’t you dare.” She gives my arm a squeeze. “You did well, but you’ve got learning to do and you’re not going to do it if you still think you’re a virgin.”
“Fair enough. I don’t claim to be an expert at this.”
“Good,” she says. “I’ll send you a few articles I found that might be informative. I think you’ll like some of the exercises they recommend.”
“Oh, really?”
“If you’re up for it, we could try some of them now,” she says, her eyes gleaming.
“I could be persuaded to stay up a little longer,” I say, reaching over to her. “Do I still have Alpha access?”
It turns out I do. And we do. And it’s even better the second time, or the fourth, or whatever it is.