Tales of the Firebirds

Kyell Gold

Introduction

Spending a decade in the Out of Position world inevitably led to me thinking about things that might have happened off the stage of the novels, first to the main characters Lee and Dev, and later to a number of the side characters. Many of the stories in this collection were published elsewhere; some were written just to explore certain characters, and one was written to round out the collection about a character who won a Twitter poll.

If you haven’t read any of the OOP books, you can still enjoy this collection, and if you do enjoy it, you know where to go next.

The stories are presented in more or less chronological order of when they took place in the world. Read on, and enjoy!

-Kyell, June 2018

1

Off the Cuff (Lee)

This story has appeared on my website, but never in print. I wrote it as part of a challenge to write stories about characters in sexy situations with police, and as I’d thought a lot about Lee and Brian’s college days prior to Out of Position but never actually written about them, I thought this would be a good chance to see Lee as part of his social group before his romance took him out of it.

They were all sitting around Kitteridge’s, the sophomores and juniors and the new freshmen, and the air reeked of coffee and activism. Lee and Brian had done this ritual the year before when they’d joined Forester Lesbians and Gays and now sat a little closer to the head of the table. The seniors gave the official speeches about how much FLAG hoped to make a difference, but Lee and Brian, precocious sophomores, had researched recent headlines for examples of the discrimination they were fighting against. Misha, the arctic fox senior and secretary of FLAG, had read out the list with grave meaning as well as he could with his light voice and frequent misreading of words.

That had been a couple hours ago, and the group was now well into the “getting to know you” portion of the evening. It would’ve been easier with alcohol, but Kitteridge’s had a strict policy about that and besides, all the frosh were underage, and technically the sophomores and most of the juniors were too, for all that counted at Forester.

But in Kitteridge’s, it counted, and so the ten of them sat around a table in the back, claws tapping along the worn wood or scraping already-etched letters deeper, tails flicking about as uneven chair legs clunked back and forth.

The frosh were a good group this year. Last year there had been twelve newbies, eight of whom had joined; of those, only Lee, Brian, and Liz the badger still sat around the table. The president of FLAG, an otter named Ryan, had just finished a story about a publicly straight fox on his high school’s baseball team who’d let Ryan fuck him more than once, and the vice president, a large stallion named Kosh, had said, “Well, sure, that makes sense. All foxes just want to be fucked anyway.”

All heads turned toward Lee and Misha, the two foxes at the table, who happened to be sitting side by side. “Hey,” Misha said mildly. “That’s a stereotype.”

“Yeah,” Lee said. “Lots of foxes are tops.”

“Just not either of you,” Ryan said, grinning.

Misha looked down and Lee flattened his ears. Ryan and Kosh had crossed a line in talking about personal habits, which happened a lot, actually. Keith, a polar bear who was one of the new recruits, broke the uneasy silence. “I thought we were fighting stereotypes.”

“That’s different,” Kosh said. “Anyway, the foxes know I’m just kiddin’ around. It’s just cause Misha’s famous for it, and Lee’s following right in his, uh, footsteps.”

“Hey,” Ryan said, “someone’s got to bottom if someone’s gonna top.”

All the frosh were looking at them, and so Lee said, “I’ve topped. When motivated properly.”

The attention shifted from Misha to focus totally on him. “I smell a story,” said Liz. “Oh, wait, that’s just fox musk.” She waved a paw in front of her nose.

“Surprised you can smell it through the thick badger smell on your overalls,” Lee said sweetly. “But yes, if you are all interested in hearing a story, I’ll be delighted to regale you.”

“A story of a top fox.” Kosh leaned forward, and the faint whiff of alcohol, which perhaps only a fox or wolf would have been able to smell, hinted that he might have been enhancing his coffee under the table.

“A story of a top fox,” Lee agreed, and spread his paws.

This was late last summer when I was down in Aventira with my father. The Dragons were playing a preseason game and he’d gotten tickets, so we went down to make a day of it.

He went to sleep early, but I was still wide awake, so I went out to walk around. I’d brought my pride jacket and had looked up a couple gay bars, and since I was eighteen and legal, I thought I’d see if I could meet a cute guy to make the night more interesting. It was warm enough for me to leave my t-shirt in the room and just wear the jacket over my fur, hanging open.

The nearest bar was still a bus ride away, so I hopped on. Don’t know if you’ve ever been on an Aventira bus in summer at eleven at night, but if you’ve got a working nose, I don’t recommend it. I’m pretty sure the raccoon next to me was pissing his pants during the ride.

(A general chorus of “Ew” and “Not hot!” greeted this part of the story.)

All right, so I got to where the bar was, and dismounted the bus much like a longtime resident of Aventira, with all the swagger of an eighteen-year-old who thinks everyone wants him.

(“You’re still exactly that,” Brian pointed out. “Only nineteen.”)

(“Do you want me to get to the end of the story or not?” Lee asked.)

Anyway, the bus had dropped me off a block away from the neon glow of The Jack of Diamonds, so I walked out into the street, again like a longtime resident. And when I got to the other side, this otter accosted me. “Where do you think you’re going, there?” he asked.

I hadn’t noticed his dark blue uniform until he stepped up close to me, and that made me reconsider my first remark. As if it weren’t obvious where the kid with the pink triangles all over his jacket was headed, twenty feet from a bar with rainbow flags and the same triangles hanging out front. Still, he was a cop, and so I pointed to the bar. “There.”

“And what’s wrong with our crosswalks, I must know? Have a phobia of them, do we?”

I didn’t quite know what to say to that. “I was in a hurry, sorry,” I said.

“Jaywalking’s a crime, you know.”

Now I was starting to see what was going on. The “cop” was staking out the gay club, using jaywalking as a pretext to proposition people. So I gave him a good long look over. I like otters, you know…

(“We do?”)

(“You do now.”)

…and he was just a little shorter than me, with a nice physique. He pulled off the cop costume pretty well. Broader shoulders than I usually see on otters, thick tail, and a handsome enough face. I did want to see the inside of the club, but I also know enough not to let an opportunity slide by.

“I’m so sorry, officer,” I said, and gave him a good coy look. “Do you need to punish me in that club there?”

“No,” he said, “I need to write you a ticket.”

“Ah-ha.” I looked around. “In your car? Or in a private room somewhere?”

“Well, not necessarily, but…” He looked at me directly then, and his eyes were very dark. “Do you want to go somewhere private? Sure, I think I know a place.”

It was my first completely anonymous hookup, and my heart was pounding. But I thought about how completely lovely it would be and what a wonderful story it would make—don’t roll your eyes—and so I flicked my ears and said, “I think we should go somewhere private. I’ve been very bad, jaywalking like that.”

“Yes, well.” He seemed unprepared for someone to play along quite so thoroughly and willingly. I worried for a bit that I was doing it wrong, but he was leading me around the corner, so I couldn’t have been that far off.

The street we turned onto had a little more life to it than the one sustained only by the poor gay bar: a pool hall, an all-night diner, and two small hotels. But to my surprise, he led me to a pizza place where a plump red fox read a newspaper behind the counter and a short weasel scampered around behind it with trays of pizza dough. The whole place smelled of cooking dough and tomato sauce: heavenly, in other words.

I wondered if this was some kind of Aventira ritual: pizza before sex. But the cop just waved to the fox and said, “Hi, Dolan. Two slices in about twenty minutes, can you?”

“Sure,” the fox said, and looked at me. “What you want on yours?”

I turned to the otter and said, “Why don’t you pick the topping?”

(“You did not say that,” Ryan interjected, but was shushed by the rest of the listeners.)

“Two pepperoni, then.” And he led me past the kitchen, reluctantly, because I was getting a little hungry, and into a narrow back hallway.

“The restroom?” I said as he held the door open. It smelled okay, though, clean enough. Better than the bus, at any rate.

“It’s quite private, and Dolan’s not busy this time of night. Besides, they’ve got supplies.”

I didn’t quite understand what he meant until he locked the door and reached up to a little dispenser next to it. Three thunks of quarters hit my ears and then a little packet dropped down out of the machine.

The otter tore the plastic open and tossed me the condom. “There you are, lad,” he said, and started to undo his pants.

Well. I just held the thing and said, “You want me to put this on you?”

He looked up from his belt and tilted his head. “That wouldn’t do me much good when you’re inside me, would it now?”

“Whoa,” I said.

His eyebrows rose. “Did you or did you not say that I could pick the topping?”

“Well, yes, but…” My ears were going every which way. “I’m not—I mean, I don’t really—I haven’t—”

“Now, don’t tell me that pretty little equipment of yours isn’t working,” the guy said, “because those pants you’re wearing don’t do much to hide your state of mind, you know.”

“No, but—”

He reached behind him and pulled a pair of wristcuffs from his pocket. “I can remove the choice if that makes it easier for you.”

The guy really got into his roleplay—or else it wasn’t roleplay. I wasn’t sure what to think, then; I just held the condom and stared. “Right,” he said, and snap! He had a cuff around one of my wrists. Quick and easy, like he’d done it many times before. “Over here,” he said, and pulled me down to the floor, lifting my arm above my head. He threaded the other cuff behind a pipe that ran down the wall and said, “Now give me your other arm.”

I raised it and he snapped the cuff around it. So there I was, sitting on the floor, and when he started unsnapping my pants, for the first time it occurred to me that he might just take my clothes and leave me cuffed to the bathroom. The fox had seen me come in with him, sure, but also they knew each other and maybe he took a cut of whatever this guy could steal. Of course, he couldn’t get my jacket off now that he’d bound me, but who would want a ratty denim jacket anyway?

Not that I had much; probably had a twenty in my pocket and my credit card with a two thousand dollar limit on it, so…anyway, this wouldn’t be a very good story if it ended with me broke, half-naked, and unfulfilled on the floor of an Aventira bathroom…

(“I disagree,” Liz said.)

…so I will skip ahead to where the otter was neatly folding my pants and putting them on top of the back of the toilet, and then looking down at me. The tile floor was cold through my summer coat and probably not very hygienic, but I was mostly sitting on my tail and the cold was not foremost on my mind.

“I see you’re ready for action despite your words,” he said, and took the condom from my fingers that were still holding it. That brought his groin level with my nose, and I could smell that he was just as ready as I was, if not more.

He looked down and grinned. With one paw, he ruffled my ears, and with the other, he dropped his pants so my eyes could confirm what my nose had told me, and when I turned my muzzle toward his groin, he said, “Oh, aye, you can have a taste if you like.”

It was right there, and so of course I stuck my tongue out to give it a taste, and then I tasted it a little more, as you do, and then he pushed his hips forward and I got a much better taste.

You know, I would’ve been happy just sucking on that for a while and then maybe getting a reciprocal or even just a paw, but the otter—the cop—didn’t let it get that far. He pulled back, panting, so I knew I’d been doing something right, and then he let his eyes drift down my slender white-furred chest, down my stomach, to where I was all ready except for the condom.

“I suppose I’ll have to help you with this,” he said, and I rattled the cuffs to let him know that yes, I could not put a condom on myself with my feet. So he knelt down, and his paws were soft and smooth, and I watched them work up and down, getting to know me. They explored lower, too, nudging my legs apart, and I thought he might be reconsidering who was going to be on top, but then he just cupped my balls and said, “Lovely,” and ripped open the condom package.

The way he held me and rolled the condom down, I knew he’d done this before, many times. He even made sure to get the ring over the knot, which wasn’t very big yet, but was certainly getting there. It’s important to do that with canids, or else the condom can come off really easily. Not everyone knows that.

Then he squirted out some of the lube from the tiny tube the vending machine had spit out next to the condom, and smeared it over me, and rubbed what was left back up under that thick tail of his. Then he lifted one knee over my midsection and dropped his weight on top of me, and I got another good view of what I’d just had in my muzzle.

But of course, he had other things on his mind, keeping hold of me as he positioned himself and then lowered himself down, and, well, then I was topping from the bottom. I brought my knees up to support him and he settled his tail between them, and then he pushed his hips down and gasped, and he was—

(“One of the mounted police?” Brian asked with a smirk.)

Bad puns aside, he was certainly having a good ride and enjoying himself. I pulled the cuffs against the pipe, but all that did was make a nice banging sound to go along with the actual banging on the floor. The otter was heavier than he looked, all muscle and a bit of a gut that his uniform did a good job hiding, but he kept his weight back and I didn’t have any trouble pushing my hips up to meet his. I mean, I felt like I should do at least a little of the work, since he’d gone to all the trouble of the cuffs and the condom and all.

He didn’t seem to mind much what I did. Those big thighs pushed him up and down, and sometimes he landed a bit heavy, but if I didn’t think about it then all I felt was the pressure sliding up and down and my knot getting bigger. He took care of himself with a paw, both of mine being still well restrained, but he took his time.

I admit, I enjoyed it. I hadn’t had much practice, but straining against the cuffs gave everything a more urgent sense, and being buried deep inside the guy like that was getting me excited quickly. My knot had gotten big enough that it didn’t go in easily, so he was pressing back against it, and the more he pressed, the more I squirmed and pushed, and we got it in. Then he pulled off it again, and I almost just finished right there…

(“You don’t need to go into detail,” one of the frosh said, and was quickly shushed.)

…but a moment later we were pressing again, and this time I knew it was going in to stay. You know how—well, you non-canids don’t, of course, but it becomes this focal point of pressure, like it wants to expand even more but your skin is restraining it, and when he worked himself back and I pushed up and I finally got locked inside him, well, all that pressure released. I’m sure you all know how that goes.

And then he wasn’t shy about releasing his own pressure, and he did it all over my soft white fur, too. I didn’t much care, though it smelled, because I was sagged back against the wall panting.

We stayed like that for a minute or so, and he put a big paw on my chest like he needed to brace himself to hold me down. “I don’t think you can get up,” I said, but he just laughed and worked his hips, and with a slick tugging he actually did come free.

While I watched, he pulled the condom off me, cleaned himself up, and pulled his pants up. My post-coital bliss was fading into worry again that this guy was going to rob me and leave me cuffed in the bathroom, especially because whenever I said, “You are going to let me go, right?” he just laughed and said I should be patient.

But when he was all ready, he reached around behind me with a key and unlocked the cuffs. “Can’t leave these behind,” he said, and winked. “They come out of my pay.”

I rubbed my wrists as he slipped the cuffs back into his pocket. “Thanks,” I said.

“Have a slice when you get out,” he said. “It’s on me. And one tip for you.” He looked quite serious. “Don’t follow strange fellows into bathrooms.”

“I followed you in,” I said.

“That’s why I waited ‘til after to warn you.” He winked again, opened the door, and left.

I hurried to re-lock it, very conscious of my lower half’s nakedness, and got cleaned up myself, which took a little longer because fox fur isn’t as stain-guarded as otter fur.

(Ryan just glowered, but Kosh snickered.)

And when I walked out finally, there was a slice of delicious deep dish pizza with pepperoni waiting on the counter. The fox there grinned at me and I bought a soda so I could leave him a tip, and that is how this fox was taught to top.

The gathering had broken up, leaving empty coffee cups, crumbs on small plates, and Lee, Brian, Liz, and Misha. Liz and Brian took the opportunity to grill Lee about the story.

“You never told me about that trip to Aventira,” Brian said. “I would’ve gone with you.”

“Yes, and met my father. There’s a reason I hid my pride jacket in my luggage, you know.”

“Cops can’t just leave their beat like that.” Liz’s eyes were narrowed. “And they can’t cuff people just for no reason.”

“It wasn’t for no reason, Liz,” Lee said, “or weren’t you listening to that part?”

“And he didn’t seem very eager at first, but then he had a whole routine worked out with the bathroom?”

The fox gave an exaggerated shrug. “I just lived it. I can’t explain it.”

“You tell a good story,” she admitted, “but what if some of those newbies believed it?”

“What if it was true?” Lee perked his ears.

Brian looked past Lee to Misha. “What do you think?” he asked the arctic fox.

“I think it was a pretty hot story.” Misha swished his long tail. “But you left out a lot of details.”

“Boys.” Liz shook her head. “If you’re going to ask him to tell it again, I’m going home. It’s past midnight.”

“I’m not that tired,” Misha said.

Lee gave the other fox a smile. “Want to go over to the diner and get some pie?”

“Oh ho,” Brian said. “Now I get it. That’s why you told that story.”

Lee circled his coffee cup on the wood table, brown fingers holding the white ceramic cup. “I’ve no idea what you mean.”

Misha reached down to pat Lee’s thigh. “Pie sounds great.”

Brian rolled his eyes and stood up. “I’ll walk you home, Liz. Let’s let these two have their ‘pie’.”

Liz got up, and so did Lee and Misha. The ferret at the counter gave them a weary look as they passed her on the way out the door, and followed them with the key in her paw.

“Closed the place down again,” Brian said, his breath appearing lightly white in the air as he spoke. Autumn had brought a chill to Forester and the trees were just turning colors, but everything looked pale yellow and blue in the light of the moon and sodium lamps. Even Lee’s red fur looked an unnatural orange, while everyone else’s stark black and white remained more or less the same.

“Worth it.” Misha flicked his tail against Lee’s, and everyone saw it.

“All right.” Brian put a paw on Liz’s shoulder. “See you two later.”

Misha smiled at Lee as they headed off in the opposite direction. “It really was a pretty hot story,” he said. “Do you like wristcuffs?”

Lee’s ears stayed up. He breathed on his paws and rubbed them together. “Maybe as a sometimes treat.”

“And topping?” Misha reached over and took one of Lee’s paws in his own.

“Mmm. I could get used to it.”

The arctic fox grinned, and kept hold of the chocolate-brown paw, swinging it between them as they walked on down the street. “Did you tell that story just for me?”

Lee flicked his tail over Misha’s as they rounded the corner and the diner came into view, three blocks down. “If we’re going to be spending more time together,” he said, “you’ll have to learn not to ask me why I do things if you’re happy with how they came out.”

Misha didn’t say anything, and Lee looked sideways at the arctic fox as they walked under a yellow street light. Misha’s eyes were golden bright and then faded to shadow as they walked out of the light. “Are we going to spend more time together?” Lee asked.

“Well,” Misha said slowly, “let’s see how the pie goes.”

They crossed the street in silence, and then Lee said, “You know, you can get pie with whipped cream or ice cream, or even cheese.”

Misha’s small ears flicked over. “Is that so?”

“Uh-huh.” Lee squeezed Misha’s paw. “But I’ll let you choose the topping.”

“Oh God.” Misha pulled his paw away. “If we’re going to spend more time together, you’ll have to stop the bad puns.” But his tail was wagging, and he couldn’t keep the grin off his muzzle.

The diner glowed brightly before them, the smells of greasy burgers and fruit pies joining the low murmur of all the conversation inside. “I guess we’ll both have a lot to work on,” Lee said with a smile, and held the door as Misha walked inside.

2

The Wallet Story (Dev)

This story also explores life prior to the bulk of the OOP series, this time for Dev. I wrote it because I’d grown interested in the concept of a “shaggy dog” story, which is a kind of story that claims to be about one thing as an excuse for telling a completely different story. Dev’s friend Charm seemed to be the ideal candidate to tell a sexy shaggy dog story, and so he did. This story originally appeared in Heat, issue #8.

I started the week as a third-string cornerback for the Hilltown Dragons. Four days ago, I got traded to the Chevali Firebirds. Ah, the life of a professional football player. I got assigned the kicker as a roommate on the road—he's a big stallion whose real name I've already forgotten, because everyone calls him Charm. When he found out I'm a rookie at the age of 23, he started calling me “Gramps," because he's been in the league two years and he's only 21. Seems like a fun guy, though.

It's weird being on a new team, because all the guys have their own cliques already. You can latch on with the guys you play with—in my case, the defense—but even though you practice with them, you don't automatically get to hang out afterward. Not that I had many great friends in Hilltown, either. The Dragons were 2-8 when I left, and that kind of losing atmosphere makes it tough to enjoy yourself.

The Firebirds are 3-7 when I arrive, which isn't too much different. The first game I'm there for is a home game, which we lose. We're going on the road for next week's game. I'm expecting the same kind of black funk that was in the Dragons' locker room, but this team seems more upbeat, nobody more than Charm. He takes me over before the game and introduces me to the only tiger starting for the team, Fisher Kingston. Well, hell, what football-loving tiger doesn't know Fisher Kingston? He seems like a real down-to-earth guy. He sure doesn't wear his two championship rings around. I wonder if he'd let me see them.

The only other guy I talk to much is Jeff Cameron, a cheetah who came over with me in the trade. Like me, he plays defense; unlike me, he starts. He's got a big attitude issue, which is why he was traded. Me, I'm just a throw-in because the Firebirds are thin at corner.

So me, Jeff, Fisher, and a couple of the other felines on defense are hanging out in the locker room after practice on Monday. It still feels stiff and awkward. Charm is there, too, going through his locker. He bangs a fist on it, making us all look over.

“Dammit,” he says. “I lost my wallet.”

Jeff mutters, “Horses,” so low that only I hear it.

I want to be helpful, since he's gonna be my roommate and all. “Where did you have it last?” I ask.

Fisher and the other guys sigh. One of them, a leopard, stretches. “Get comfy,” Fisher says.

Jeff and I glance at each other. Charm's leaning against his locker with a big grin. “Well,” he says, “lessee. I know I had it yesterday after the game, because I took that leopard over to Kelly's and bought her a couple Cosmos. Now lemme think here. I set my wallet down on the bar after I paid, and I was chattin' her up. She was way into me, too. Her tail kept grabbin' my leg.”

The leopard's tail curls around himself. Charm doesn't notice, or doesn't pay attention. “But I was keepin' my hand on the wallet, even when she got up nice an' close and put her claws up under my shirt. Did you guys see her?” The guys shake their heads, and I do too. “She only came up to here.” He holds one massive arm just below his pecs. “But she had this great voice, all low and sexy, and she smelled like a garden.”

“Like a fresh-mowed lawn?” Fisher says.

Charm ignores him. He taps a finger on his long muzzle, and it's clear now even to me that he's only pretending to think. “So she starts askin' me all these things about like do I have a girlfriend and what do I like to do. And then she like, licks her lips, and she leans in and says...” He puts on his best impression of a husky female voice. “I've got a very talented tongue.”

Fisher and the leopard are grinning. Jeff looks kind of uncomfortable. I'm trying to look interested because they all still think I'm straight. “She did not say that,” I say.

Charm pounds his chest. “Cross my heart. So I ask if she wants to go to the back room. Hey, Gramps, you know Kelly's has a back room, right?” I shake my head. “Sure, right behind the phones in the hallway. They keep kegs in there but he don't mind if you use it for fifteen minutes once in a while.”

“Lotsa bars have a storage room, Charm,” another cheetah, a starting wideout, says dryly.

“Door locks from the inside.” Charm grins. “So I show her the back room, y'know how it goes, and she musta had somewhere to be, 'cause she gets right down to business. I'm ready for her, too, so pretty soon I'm sittin' back on a keg and she's just suckin' away, pretty little spotty head bobbin' up and down.” He gives a sly glance at the leopard, who doesn't react. His tail's still tightly around his own hips, but a couple of the other tails in the room have stopped curling lazily as their owners get more into the story.

“So you left your wallet in the bar?” Even Jeff is kind of getting into it. I'm not surprised; I mean, I haven't had straight sex in a couple years and I'm still getting into it.

“Nah,” Charm says, “cause I remember I was sittin' on it funny and I stopped her to push my pants all the way down. Gives her paws somethin' to do, too, that way.” He winks and cups his balls.

“Well, where'd you go when you finished with her?”

“Oh, I didn't just finish with her.” Charm licks his lips. “Good thing that back room is loud. A/C was goin' the whole time. She took it slow. Had me kickin' a couple of those kegs. Was about fifteen minutes before I grabbed her shoulders, held her there,” he mimes this, “and let 'er rip.” He looks around. “She swallowed like a pro, too.”

“Did she charge like a pro?” The other cheetah, a temperamental wideout, sounds sarcastic, but his grin is surprisingly sincere.

“I ain't ever paid for it, and buyin' drinks don't count.” Charm leans back against his locker.

“So,” I say finally, “did you leave your wallet at Kelly's?”

“Well,” he says, so quick I know he was waiting for someone to ask, “I don't think so. I mean, she took off pretty quick to clean up, and I sat there a while just chillin'. It was that good. She wasn't lyin' about her tongue. Some gals, y'know, just drop their mouth down and don't got no imagination. But this one...she licked in all the right places, used her paws real good. I give her an A-plus.”

Now I'm fidgeting some, because my boyfriend is pretty good with his tongue too, and Charm's making me think of him. So I try to focus on his story instead. Even though I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in the room. “But pretty soon I pulled my pants up, and I'm sure I had my wallet after that 'cause I was buyin' drinks for this coyote,” he cups his hands a foot in front of his chest, “who was just too much to pass up.”

“Is anything not too much for you to pass up?” A dry voice comes from behind me. I turn and see one of the veterans of the defense, a coyote linebacker named Gerrard Marvell. He’s an All-Pro and probably the best player on this team.

Charm pretends to think about that, too. “I mean, she was really too much,” he squeezes his imaginary chest, “to pass up. Coach.” He winks at Gerrard, who is not, as far as I know, a coach.

“Bet they weren't real,” Jeff says. His tail, which had stopped during the blow job description, is flicking again.

“Oh, they were real,” Charm laughs. “Listen, so I buy her a Port City Iced Tea, right, and she tells me she knows this other exclusive club where we can go. There's dancing and they make an awesome Zombie. Well, hey, I love me a Zombie, right? So we hang out for about an hour and then I say can we walk or should we take a cab, and she says let's walk, I need to change.”

“Into what?” Jeff says.

“That's what I say,” Charm says. “She looks awesome, y'know, got on this dress down to here, really brings out her hips. But...gals, what'cha gonna do? She wants to change, she can change. So I settle up—see, I know I had my wallet then. I remember her patting my ass on the way out and gigglin'.”

“Did she pick your pocket maybe?” The other cheetah is grinning.

“Nah, wallet was in the other side of my pants. I just remember thinkin' I was glad she got that side because she got a good feel of my ass that way.

“Anyway, she takes me down a few blocks and says this is her apartment and she just wants to change, and do I want to wait down here or come up?” He grins around at us. “She's got a real nice apartment. Small, but nice. Big couch in the living room, silk sheets on the bed.”

I shake my head. “You went right to her bedroom?”

“Course not! I wait in the living room. I got manners.” A couple of the guys snicker at this. “Only she goes in the bedroom and then says she wants me to come tell her which dress looks better on her. So I walk in. And she's standin' there holdin' up this pretty blue thing, and I say it looks good, and then she swaps it out for this shiny pink one. And I notice as she switches the dresses that she ain't wearin' nothin' underneath. No shit. Nothin' at all.”

He makes us wait. I lean back against my locker, just enjoying the story now. Fisher finally says, “So which dress did you pick?”

We all laugh. Charm says, “The pink one. But not right away. I told her I thought what looked best on her was me. And she says, well, get over here and let me try you on. So...” He stretches his arms above his head and grins, “I drop my pants and get on the bed with her. She starts out with her muzzle, and maybe she ain't quite as good as the leopard, but man, she knows how to lick it. I get my hands on those tits and push her down, and I'm fucking hard as a rock now. She moans, cause I'm pretty good with tits, y'know, and then I get on top and start givin' it to her.”

He rocks his hips forward and back. All the tails in the room have gone still again. “We're takin' our time with it, goin' slow.” He pauses to look at Jeff. “You know the ladies like it slow, right, Speedy?”

“Oh, I know,” Jeff says. “I got no trouble with the ladies.” He talks casually, but he's leaning forward pretty intently.

“Good, good.” Charm looks at the other cheetah. “Cause speed ain't always good. So anyway, I'm workin' in, workin' in, gettin' right in there, and she's good an' tight, and those tits, they're awesome. She pretty much knows when I'm gonna finish, cause I lean in and say, here it comes, honey, and so she starts thrustin' her hips up at me, wiggling 'round all crazy, and pantin'.

“When I shoot my load, I make a little noise, cause you gotta let 'em know how good it is or they feel like you don't appreciate 'em. But I don't think she's even payin' attention. She's makin' some noise herself, and it just gets louder and louder. You know how like you'll be hearin' a train come from far away and you think it's close, but it just keeps gettin' louder?” He looks around the room. “Yeah. Like that.”

He pretends to look around behind him. “So I don't even hear her roommate come in.”

“Ah, no way!” the wideout cheetah yells. I'm trying not to laugh, Jeff is just staring, and Fisher and the leopard are grinning like they're at a funny movie. A funny porn movie, I guess. “She's got a roommate?”

“And only one bed.” Charm winks broadly.

“So,” the cheetah says, “the roommate stole your wallet?”

“Hell, no,” Charm says. “The first thing I know is I see this big tigress and she says, what the hell is going on?”

“You're makin' this up.” Jeff says it flatly, but his ears are twitching.

I just grin. Of course Charm's making it up, but it's great, he's really into it. I can tell that the other guys have heard the story before, or something like it. So I say, “Shit, what did you do?”

He gives me a big smile, just for a second. “What can I do? I'm balls-deep in her roommate, and that coyote's still howlin' away. So I say, what's it look like? And she says, looks like fun. Right there in front of me, she starts unzippin' her dress.”

He mimes that, too, though his huge arms can't quite reach all the way around his back. “I tell her, give me five minutes to recharge my batteries here. Meanwhile, her roommate's panting and still moanin', cause I'm still playin' with her tits. I just can't let go. The tigress has to drag me off the bed, and she tells her roommate to just chill, we'll be back soon.

“She pulls me to the bathroom, where they got this big shower, turns the water on, and first thing she does is get her paws all over my cock. Soaps it up real good, strokin' up and down. I'm holdin' her sides, and I tell you guys, if I hadn't just busted a nut, I'da come all over her right there. But even my boys need a few to catch their breath. So once I'm clean, I kneel down and start cleanin' her out like a cat does. Big licks right up there between her legs.”

He sticks his tongue out for emphasis. I take advantage of the break to say, “Oh, I bet while you were in the shower with her, her roommate stole your wallet.”

“You'd think!” He shakes his head sadly. “Stupid of me to leave my clothes lyin' out there with a chick I barely know. But hey, that's my weakness. Can't resist a nice pair of tits, or a naked chick with soapy paws. Specially a cat. You guys can keep your claws in. Well, mostly.”

Jeff scowls back at Charm's grin, hiding his blunt claws. The other cheetah doesn't seem as annoyed by the remark. “Anyway,” Charm goes on, “nah, that ain't where I lost my wallet. I was in the shower a while, 'cause the tongue ain't my strong point. I like it, and she liked it okay, but she didn't start yowlin' until I was all ready again, and then I just picked her up and fucked her good an' hard against the wall, water runnin' over us an' everything.”

The leopard and cheetah are grinning; Gerrard looks like he’s in the waiting room at the doctor’s office. Jeff is, I think, slowly catching on. Fisher's still attentive, his tail lashing again. I wonder if he's thinking of his wife. I think I remember that he's married. I wonder if he thinks I'm thinking about a tigress. I cast back in my head to remember one, in case they ask me about a name, and come up with only a high school girl I dated a couple times.

Meanwhile, Charm's giving us a couple more details about his third fuck of the night: her legs wrapped around his hips, clawmarks on his shoulder, which he shows off. And it does confuse Jeff when there are actual clawmarks there, a neat line of three scars in Charm's short fur. I can tell they're not a tiger's, because I know what my clawmarks look like, but I guess Jeff wouldn't necessarily know that.

“Then,” he says, “we finish up, and her roommate gets in again to clean up. We clean each other off real good, soaping all the parts that mighta got dirty,” he waggles his eyebrows, “and then they get dressed again. Coyote-girl puts on her pink dress, Tigress puts on some sparkly white thing, and I just get back into my jeans and leather jacket.”

“Good thing you weren't wearing your 'Two Girls Short' t-shirt,” the wideout says.

Charm waves him off. “Just 'cause you never got laid in that...Anyway, Tigress tags along to the club with us. I know I had my wallet then 'cause I bought us fast food on the way.”

“You sure know how to show a gal a good time,” Fisher says.

“They picked it,” Charm says. “They said Fat Tony's has great salads.”

No girl I know ever voluntarily went to a Fat Tony's. But it's Charm's story. I lean back and listen as he talks about this club, called “The Spot.” It's so exclusive, he says, it's not listed anywhere. “You gotta know where to go. Coyote-girl, she's a model, works for one of them fashion mags, and she takes us to this warehouse. They move the club every month, tear it down and set it up again. There's a guy, he does movie lights for Hollywood, he comes and sets up the lights once a month. And the music is insane.”

“Like, who was the DJ?” Jeff is now pretty sure he knows it's a story.

Charm grins. “DJs line up to play this club. Y'know the guy Emerald Jones hired to play her birthday party?”

“Yeah?”

The stallion makes a cut-off motion, a sweep with the flat of his hand. “Couldn't get in.”

Jeff goes from wide-eyed awe to disbelief to skeptical curiosity. “But—”

“I dunno the name of the guy who was there,” Charm says. “I lost Coyote-girl pretty fast. But I start dancin' with this cheetah, just spinnin' and jumpin', 'til I'm outta breath. She's barely winded. Turns out she was an Olympic hurdler. Reserve. Never quite made the team.”

He claps a hand to his back pocket as he's miming the dances, at which point the other cheetah says, “Oh, so your wallet fell out while you were dancing.”

“Maybe!” Charm pretends to think about that. “I dunno, 'cause I made out with the hurdler for like an hour. We quit dancin' and she had her tongue in my mouth pretty quick. I didn't even buy her a drink.”

The leopard, who's been pretty quiet up to now, speaks up with a quiet drawl. “I thought you said athletes didn't have good tits.”