bloodyrockgod | otherways

"And when I'm done I'll get a job and a place for us to live and . . . yeah. Stuff. Grown-up stuff."

She smirks a little and quirks an eyebrow.

"Sounds like we need to have a grown-up talk soon, then."

"Grown-up talk?" He squirms. "Not sure I like the sound of that."

"You don't like talking about sex?"

"I like doing it more." He tickles her belly lightly.

She giggles and squirms.

"Ah, but with great sex comes great responsibility."

He sighs and looks at her through his eyelashes. "You want me to wear a condom, is what you're saying."

"That's what we'd have to talk about. There are lots of options."

She kisses him again.

"You wanna do this now and get it over with?"

Charlie nods. "It's not going to be that long a conversation, as far as I can see. I'm Catholic but I'm also a child of my times, so we use protection." He shrugs. "That's fine. That's the way things are. If I'd thought we'd be having sex today I'd've brought something, but you and the bells kinda tooke me by surprise."

She giggles again.

"I like to be spontaneous. Come on. Let's get some tea."

She stands and finds a t-shirt and jeans and hops down onto the dresser.

He watches her move for a moment, then sighs and gets out of the hammock to gather up his clothes.

She grins up at him from the floor.

"Oh, come on, Charlie. It's not that bad. Not like I'm taking your wisdom teeth out or something.

"I'm coming . . ." He tucks in his shirt and pulls on his trainers, and hops down into the bedroom.

She tugs him into the kitchen, pours tea from the urn for them both, gets honey and whatnot and takes them to a back booth.

"So...what is important to you in your religion?"

"Respect for life," Charlie says and starts putting his tea together. "Doing the right thing for the right reason."

She smiles and swirls honey into her tea.

"Well, we line up there. Paganism is much the same."

She takes a sip.

"Oh. And I don't believe in abortion. I'm pro-choice, but I won't do it. So, what do we do if we get pregnant?"

Charlie's face does several things, and then he swallows hard and says, "We get married and raise the kid. My parents weren't much older than us when they got married."

She raises an eyebrow.

"You wouldn't want to put the baby up for adoption? My mother had me early too, and my Grandmother helped her, but I know it was hard."

He stirs his tea, and then shakes his head. "I've been independent for almost two years. Me and my brother, sure, but not dependent on anybody else. I can take care of you."

She nods and smiles.

"All right. We'll keep the baby. But I'm really not ready to have one yet. I'd like to use birth-control for a few years."

"Okay." He slurps his tea. "And I'll start carrying condoms in my guitar case so I'll always have some. And whatever you want to use . . . I don't know what you'd want to use. But, whatever--" He nods. "'s fine. I don't know much about the girl's side of it."

"You want to use condoms rather than other things? I'm going to ask Bethany to take me in for a check-up. I need one anyway, and they'll tell me what my best options are."

She sips her tea too.

"Also, have you been tested, and how many partners have you had?"

Charlie nearly chokes on his tea.

"Um . . . do you really want to know how many?"

"Um, yeah, I really do. It's kinda important to my safety."

He sighs. "Okay. But--" he holds up a finger, "I want to make it perfectly clear that I have always used a condom if there was, like, contact. Okay?"

He clears his throat. "Twenty-eight."

His ears are scarlet.

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