Chapter 89 - Unchaste Chapter 3

A few more days of research proved that I hadn't actually gone crazy, which was a relief.

Unfortunately, it seemed like the rest of the world had.

Between extensive internet research, discussions in anonymous chat boards, and the news—both televised and written—I had learned that apparently, society suddenly believed that women were the far more sexually aggressive sex, rather than men, which was certainly not the case a few days ago. Last I checked, men were usually the pursuers of relationships. We were constantly competing and showing off to try to impress women; chatting up girls at school, parties and bars to gain their interest, either to try and get laid or enter a relationship. Men also made up the vast majority of rapists, according to statistics, and were punished for it far more severely than women, from what I had seen and read.

Apparently, none of this was the case anymore.

I first started to understand what was going on when I first listened to the talking heads on news rant on and on about how rape was the worst thing that could happen to a man, and how lonely women would try to take advantage if inebriated young men at night clubs and on dates, whether by drugs, force or simply taking advantage of their inebriated state to force the man to get the woman pregnant, then leverage the responsibility onto the man, forcing them into a terrifying relationship with their rapists.

All of that had sounded like absolute horseshit to me, like something out of a bad fetish novel, but it did pique my interest, so I decided to research it further, starting by asking some questions on some internet message boards.

I didn't get very far there, admittedly, as people mostly thought I was trolling and just told me to fuck off. They complained that nobody wanted to hear my shitty fetish fantasy, and that I wasn't actually a real guy, just a blatantly catfishing lonely girl, desperate for internet attention.

I didn't learn too much, but their suspicion about my claims of being a man did match up to Phoenix's reaction when I told her the same thing, so that in itself was important information.

Social media was my next stop. I jumped around to various sites, scrolling through everything from pseudo-intellectual news, history and philosophy conversations debated by self-important armchair experts all the way down to shitty dance trends that people my age were more likely to waste their time watching. The biggest takeaways from the history discussions were that throughout a lot of history, women were the frontrunners of business, political and military society, and men often took up either less competitive craftsman jobs, such as leatherworking or construction, and were respected for their work in building great cities and providing many basic necessities, or even farming and homesteading, while women made up the majority of more competitive businesses, merchants' guilds and even militaries and mercenary groups.

There's no way that any of this is real.

I couldn't deny it any longer, though. The evidence had been all around me the entire time.

I was apparently in a different world.

Of course, just because I was in a different world didn't mean that I could just hand-wave the changes away. Something had to have caused such drastic changes—perhaps something farther back than recorded history could explain. A quick search as to why the sexes had such different societal roles gave me no real answers; these were simply the roles that both sexes had done since the dawn of time. Some of it was natural proclivity and personality, some of it was tradition and the structures of society, some of it was expertise and how the different jobs were taught and passed down throughout different societies the world over. History could not tell me the answer, therefore, since I couldn't find any big change concerning the sexes, other than the men's suffrage movement in the 1800s, so the changes had to be biological, somehow.

Perhaps I should have started there, but I never claimed to be the sharpest tool in the shed.

I searched some biology and anatomy sites aimlessly for a while, entering terms like "biological differences between men and women," but found nothing fruitful, initially. I kept up with my search, eventually moving to neurology, and while most of the research there went way over my head, one article did reference and link me to another paper that led to me to a humble dissertation on the effects of testosterone and estrogen in men and women.

This article was the clincher; it handed me basically every puzzle piece I was missing all at once, wrapped up in a neat little bow.

The difference between my old world and this one were how the hormones affected humans here: many of the effects of testosterone that I was familiar with were apparently produced by estrogen here, thus making women the sexual pursuers in this society, and men the pursued. Men were apparently now less competitive in this world—no longer in constant rivalry with one another, driven to succeed by the continued improvement of their peers. Women were much stronger here than in my old world, as well; still not quite to the level of men, but men were a little less strong here than in my world, from what a few physicality analyses and world records showed. Men seemed to still be the slightly stronger sex, but women's far higher competitiveness and pain tolerance apparently made them far more suited to tougher, riskier physical jobs, including hunting and military service.

That last part definitely rankled me a bit.

I had never particularly liked the fact that women were joining the military (perhaps it was sexist of me), but I hated the thought of subjecting women to the terrors of modern warfare. I was raised a little more traditionally, perhaps, but I didn't think women should ever have to deal with what had physically and mentally broken some of the most disciplined men—some of the most heavily trained soldiers—for the past century. It was bad enough for them; I didn't want to see women have to suffer the same.

I leaned back in my computer chair, sighing. Despite having read the differences in testosterone and estrogen, I didn't feel noticeably different, personally. I felt the same as I always had. I certainly hadn't gotten significantly weaker in the past few days. Of course, that did not mean that nothing had changed, and it could have just been that I could not notice a difference in swapping bodies, which meant I had to test my theory.

I got on the ground, into push-up position. Normally, I would stretch before doing push-ups, but the last time I had done spontaneous push-ups without any warm-up, I had been able to do about thirty-five proper, chest-to-the-ground push-ups before I collapsed. If I was weaker, I wouldn't be able to hit that number.

I got to work, making sure to constantly keep proper form, and while not warming up definitely hurt my performance, I was able to just barely eke out the thirty-fifth push-up before my arms gave out and I fell to the ground gracelessly, sweat beginning to build on my brow.

Does that mean my physical body was transported to this world? If only my consciousness transferred over, wouldn't I feel the same as guys in this world, since I have the same biological hardwiring that they do?

Unfortunately, I didn't have the answers. I could barely even comprehend the fact that the world I was in was no longer my own. I had to assume that I was in my normal body, though, since I hadn't performed any worse in this world than in my old one.

So did my body swap places with this world's Jason? Is he now in my world, or is he just gone? If he is off in my world, then he'll probably have a hell of a time figuring out what's going on, as well.

Honestly, I was pretty sure the only reason I wasn't freaking out was because it took me so damn long to figure out that anything was wrong in the first place.

All things considered; my situation could have been far worse. I hadn't been transported to some hell world where I was kept as a slave and beaten every time I spoke out of turn or anything like that. The world still seemed pretty similar to my old one. I could go out and live a normal life, still. I could still snowboard, play games, read, get a job, everything I could do in my old world. Hell, maybe I could compete in some kind of sport, and even go pro, since I was still in my old body. Women's sports weren't super popular back in my world, so I imagined men's sports weren't very popular here, but there was still probably some good money involved. I could even potentially make the Olympics if the difference in physical capability was significant enough. That said, I didn't know if dope testing would register a false positive due to the different biology of the men here, and that could raise a whole host of problems.

Maybe I could compete against women here, since the article said women here were nearly as physically capable as men, and generally way more competitive. Co-ed sports had to exist, right?

Well, professional sports and sanctioned competitions might not, but I can find a local volleyball or basketball game or something. Maybe my school has some options? Would it be odd for me to suddenly try to join a sports club at school?

Whatever. I could put that off until later. It wasn't important right now.

What was important, however, was trying to understand the consequences of such a significant biological change; history first among them. Since women were supposedly the frontrunners of business and politics in this world, it was possible that history was entirely unrecognizable to me now. Was George Washington still the founding father? Did Napoleon or Alexander the Great still conquer their respective parts of the world? Did Hitler ever rise to power? Was the world map even the same as I was used to anymore?

If history had changed so drastically, it was possible that the present political landscape was entirely different than what I was taught. Was the United States even the same? Was Europe, or Asia?

I'm so gonna fail my history class.

On the plus side, though, if women were indeed the sexual pursuers in this society (and that theory suddenly held a lot more weight, considering the reactions of the two girls I had fooled around with), it meant that men were the sexual gatekeepers. Women would have to put in the effort to impress guys, and all a guy would have to do was accept, allow themselves to be pampered and courted, then put out.

Which meant I now had easy access to nearly any girl I wanted, so long as I played my cards right.

Sure, I had to imagine that there were some new rules in play, but I always thought I was a decently quick learner. And all I had to do was to think about it from a woman's point of view. If a girl came onto me and just begged me for sex out of nowhere, for example, my first thought would be that she was probably trying to scam me somehow. Desperation only attracts vultures, and anyone with half a brain would be cautious about someone soliciting them for sex.

If I wanted to score, then, I couldn't just act like a slut. That would only get me weird looks. I'd have to flirt like a slut: subtly seduce my targets and be coyly receptive to their own advances, only pushing for more when I knew I had them right where I wanted.

And if I'm the gatekeeper, now, maybe I can really work this to my advantage.

I smiled to myself, still reading through message boards on relationship advice.

Going back to school is going to be very interesting.

Returning to school really drove home how different things were in this world. Boys gathered together in the latest winter fashion, showing off their new shoes and clothes to each other as they hugged and caught up with their friends, acting like they hadn't seen each other in months. The girls, on the other hand, fell into step with each other after a simple "hey," or some kind of handshake, fist-bump or very short hug (probably to avoid any sort of homosexual undertones—I had witnessed it with other guys back in my world), either sharing a comfortable silence with each other or talking about whatever major interest they shared that made them friends in the first place. Their clothing was much plainer, and it was clear that they didn't put nearly as much effort into their appearance as I was used to. Gone were the excessive makeup and carefully arranged outfits, and instead were plain hoodies, snow jackets, graphic tees, jeans and winter boots, most of which were either black or some neutral color, mainly to prevent accidental clashing. Comparatively, the guys' clothing was much more diverse, and generally in far brighter colors.

I was honestly astounded by how much had changed, and while some small outfit and color discrepancies might not sound like the biggest difference, fashion has always been at the core of any society's culture, and recognizing such a massive change in this world's culture suddenly had me feeling completely out of my depth. There were probably a lot of social rules and queues that I would end up completely missing, given how fundamentally deep these changes apparently ran. I just hoped I could stumble through social interactions without accidentally making too many faux pas.

It wasn't just the clothing, either: the girls' friend groups were unusually smaller, as well. Gone were the large cliques of six to ten girls that I was used to, all excitedly chattering and cooing over each other; they instead split into groups of two to five.

At least the school itself seemed the same. I had been a bit worried that the entire city would be unrecognizable to me, and while that could yet be the case for North and West Seattle, my neighborhood was still identical, from what I had seen thus far. I had also seen the American Flag flying high above my school entrance, as well, and with all fifty stars on it, so I could safely assume that the United States was still intact. A quick internet search told me that the first president was Martha Washington, though, so there were still going to be many more differences in history than I knew, and I was still probably screwed come history class.

"Jason!" a voice called out to me; one I recognized. I turned towards the sound, locking eyes with someone I thought I knew very well, and upon seeing him, I was gobsmacked. I nearly slapped myself after realizing that I failed to grasp that there would probably be differences in my own best friend.

Brandon Sullivan and I had met all the way back in middle school, at the very beginning of sixth grade. We hadn't initially gotten along, probably because of some wisecrack I had made at his expense, but we eventually bonded when I saw him reading one of my favorite fantasy books during a study hall not too long after that. Once I told him that that was one of my favorite books, and that I was currently reading its sequel, we started to bond over our shared taste in fantasy books, shows and video games. From then on, we were almost always hanging out together when we were at school, and we would often go over to each other's houses to play whatever video games we had on hand, whether it be Lord of the Rings, Dragon's Crown, Super Smash Bros, Burnout or any other games we could get our hands on, or we would just talk about what books we had recently read, giving each other recommendations and arguing with each other over what parts we liked or didn't like.

It wasn't a stretch to say that nobody knew Brandon like I did, other than maybe his family, but the Brandon in front of me was not the Brandon Sullivan that I knew.

Dressed in a fluffy pink sherpa jacket and black scarf, along with tight, form-fitting skinny jeans and comfy-looking fur-lined boots, Brandon looked like an entirely new person. The thick jacket wasn't exactly helping his figure, but he did look like he had lost quite a bit of weight compared to the one I knew, who was…kind of chubby, if I was being honest. What really surprised me, though, was the slightly longer hair, worn in a tousled bowl cut that might have looked at home on a pop star or young TV star from the early 2000s. The one from my world wore his in a buzz cut.

"Brandon?" I asked, some of my incredulousness unintentionally slipping into my voice as I greeted him. "Hey, how was the break?"

"What do you mean, 'how was the break?' I thought you were gonna come over and visit us for New Years'! You didn't even text me!" He retorted, waving his arms dramatically, clearly annoyed with me.

"Yeah, well, you never texted me, either," I responded as inoffensively as I could, scratching the back of my head casually. "You could have just said something. I was dealing with something important on New Years', but if you said something, I would've come over the day after."

"Oh," Brandon responded, the wind taken out of his sails. "Yeah, I guess I didn't think about that. Sorry." When he turned his head a little more towards the school, looking over at the crowd to see if everyone was heading to first period yet, the morning sunlight hit his face differently, and I noticed that he had something smudged on his face. Not wanting to be a dick, I pointed it out to him so he could wipe it off before school started.

"No problem, man. Hey, uh, you got something on the side of your cheek," I informed him, tapping my own cheek where I saw the odd smudge.

"Hm?" he responded, shooting me a questioning look, before wiping a bit of it off with his thumb, then looking at it.

Apparently, he recognized what it was, considering how annoyed his expression became after he saw it.

"Are you making fun of me?" he asked, glaring at me.

"Of course not. There was something there, wasn't it? What was it?" I asked sincerely, not realizing that I was just digging myself deeper.

"It's my makeup, asshole!" he jabbed his makeup-covered thumb at me, nearly poking me in the eye with it. I did get a good look at the matte powder covering his thumb, almost identical to his skin color.

I probably shouldn't have reacted, given I was trying to keep the fact that I was in a different world in mind, but I blinked at him and gave my best friend one of the most genuinely clueless looks I've ever given anyone.

"You wear makeup?"

Brandon no longer looked annoyed, but instead stared at me incredulously.

"Uh, duh? You think I'm gonna go to school with acne showing? No way," he responded. "I always wear makeup. How the hell did you forget? Did you hit your head or something?"

Hey, that could be a decent excuse.

"Yeah, actually. I got a concussion while snowboarding. Had to go to the doctor's for a follow-up visit on New Years'," I lied through my teeth. "I might've forgotten a few things here and there, so, uh, go easy on me."

"Seriously? Oh my God," he responded, shocked. "Are you okay?"

"I think so," I chuckled. "It happened like right after Christmas. Doctor said I've mostly recovered, but I'm supposed to go get another checkup if I continue to have memory problems, dizziness, anything else along those lines."

"Gotcha."

"What about you? Did you get the new Diamond Thrones book that came out?" I asked him, before realizing that I probably shouldn't have. I hadn't read that series since before I ended up in this world, so it was entirely possible that the series was very different to what I remembered.

That said, I hadn't read the new book either, so at least I'd have some plausible deniability if he started grilling me about it.

Brandon nodded excitably. "Yeah, I did! It was really good! The only parts I didn't like were the romance elements, though. I feel like Denise just doesn't know how to write men as far as how they actually act in relationships. Like, Ehlana has a whole contingent of chevaliers, and at least like half of them are ready to just jump into bed with her at the drop of a hat! Even Scarhawk! Like, he's her swordmaster! He would be my favorite character otherwise, but even he's flirting with her half the time! He's like, way older than her, too! Denise constantly forcing sexual tension into her book is literallyruining her best characters!" he ranted. "But yeah, other than that, the book was great."

I didn't remember how much older Scarhawk was than Ehlana, but I could kind of see where Brandon was coming from. A middle-aged guy with a young girl could definitely cause some reactions, especially in the modern age, but I was pretty sure that that kind of thing was pretty historically accurate. Young girls barely into puberty used to get married, whether to boys their age or to men quite older than them, often for family alliance purposes. In the modern age, though, that had fallen heavily out of fashion, and was looked down upon. Even I got weirded out over that kind of situation, admittedly.

However, I was also looking at it from a male from my old world's perspective. Flipping the sexes around in the scenario made it seem more like an average harem fantasy that most boys from my world would have enjoyed: a sole male having an entire regiment of hot bodyguards willing to sleep with him at a moment's notice, with the sexy older teacher character as the proverbial cherry on top. I could definitely imagine a trashy harem comic with that kind of plotline.

Regardless, I decided to play devil's advocate just to see his reaction.

"I mean, sure, the sexual tension does sound kinda weird, but they are in the military, right? Ehlana's leading a campaign in the new book, yeah?" I asked him. "If it is, then that's not entirely unrealistic. I haven't read it yet, but that's what the previous book seemed to be building up to."

"Yeah, it is," he confirmed. "Big war plot. They're at war with the Malloreans, who are using some demon-summoning magics to have their familiars fight for them, but there's a lot of nuances to it. They're also introducing—wait, that's probably a spoiler."

I nodded. "Yeah, don't tell me those. I'm still gonna read it. Anyway, point is, they're at war, probably often on the trail or out in the wilderness or whatever, and they're thrown into battle pretty regularly. That's an incredibly high-pressure situation. There's a good chance that they'll die there. Tensions are running high, adrenaline is pumping, so hormones are in full gear. You have a bunch of incredibly in-shape people all in close proximity that have to trust each other with their lives, fight off demons and travel around otherwise empty campaign trails, all while knowing every day could be their last. If they aren't stopping in many towns, none of 'em are gonna be all that concerned about propriety or inhibitions or anything like that. It's a lot like the Olympics, or band camp."

Brandon was looking at me like I had grown a second head.

"What?" I asked, a little defensive. I was pretty proud of myself for making those connections. I'm not usually very good at critical thinking.

I had a feeling I'd have to be if I wanted to pass my history class, let alone navigate my new society.

"You usually just tend to agree with me on stuff like this. I've never heard you give a speech that long, and especially not about…y'know…" he trailed off.

Even from our short conversation, I was already noticing a few differences in my best friend's personality. He was more reserved about sex, a bit more prudish, but I supposed that was to be expected, considering I never knew him to be a huge pervert, even back in my world. But despite said reservedness, this Brandon was a lot more excitable once he had become comfortable enough with whoever he was talking with. He talked and ranted and raved about his favorite subjects with an enthusiasm I hadn't seen from him since sixth or seventh grade. How much of that was the nature of this world's hormone effects, and how much was general societal culture or something different that happened to him growing up was beyond me, but the Brandon I knew never showed his excitement nearly as freely. He would show it genuinely, but he always showed it in either a relaxed or subdued manner. I don't think I've seen him really get excited about something since freshman year at the latest.

Maybe he thought playing it cool was how he was supposed to get girls? Could explain the differences, I guess.

"Eh, maybe. I'm just saying the situation sounds at least somewhat realistic. At the very least, it's enough that I could probably suspend my disbelief," I shrugged.

He chuckled. "Maybe that concussion changed you after all."

I lost a bit of my smile at that. "Maybe."

"Well, we gotta get to class soon," Brandon changed the subject, checking his phone. "See you at lunch?"

I grinned back at him. "Maybe."

"Alright," he laughed. "See you then."

Brandon headed off to one of the back entrances of the main building, where his first period presumably was. I quickly lost him in the throng of students and was suddenly on my own once again, standing still in a river of high schoolers flowing past me, still trying to acclimate to all the blatant differences between my old world and this one that were being thrown in my face. Though, if I got lost delving into all the blatant differences I could see, I'd probably miss some of the more subtle ones.

One of those more subtle differences was presumably gender employment rate. Out of all the adults I had seen in the school building, only one or two were women. Presumably, most of the men around were teachers and other faculty, but it was still odd seeing so few women in a school.

Wait. Does that mean my teachers will be different? Most of my teachers were women, but with how few I've seen today, I don't know if any of them will still be around.

Sighing to myself, I readjusted the backpack hanging off my shoulder. All my books for today were already in my backpack, so I pushed all thoughts of my teachers to the back of my mind and headed off to first period after quickly checking my schedule sheet, just to make sure that my first period class had not suddenly changed between worlds.

Well, hopefully, I don't get called on anytime soon. That would be embarrassing.

There was no assigned seating in any of my classes, but no one got confronted me about sitting in my usual spot, so I had to assume where I sat had not changed. Most of the class had since filtered in, chatting between themselves as they waited for first period to begin. I took a moment to quickly survey them, looking over each of them haphazardly and trying to note down any differences between them and the ones from my old world, and I was surprised to realize how little I honestly knew about my classmates. I had never thought of myself as incredibly anti-social, and I had definitely had a few conversations with many of them, but I honestly couldn't remember much of anything about any of them.

Hell, I could barely remember their names.

Maybe getting thrown through dimensions messed with my head more than I thought.

A tall, thin man I didn't recognize walked through the door, quieting the class to a whisper. He didn't seem particularly in-shape, though his deep tan suggested he got quite a bit of sun, and his dyed-blonde hair looked to have a fair bit of product in it. He was wearing a robin-blue shirt that was lacking a tie, which I initially thought was unusual, considering that it was dress code for male teachers back in my world, but I didn't know enough to draw any conclusions from that, nor from the way his shirt revealed a tiny bit more skin than I was used to seeing from a man wearing an oxford button-up.

The clothing fits him decently, but the materials look cheap. He's not fat, but also not exactly in-shape. Maybe he was at one point. Not too much makeup, so probably not too concerned with looking his best, but hair product suggests a minimum standard of professionalism he has to meet. Does he—yep. Ring on his finger. Two, actually. Presumably engagement and wedding? I guess guys are the ones that get proposed to, here. He's definitely not concerned with looking his best, then: there's no need for him to impress anyone, he just has to look good enough to not make his boss mad.

It's amazing what kind of things you notice once you start to actually pay attention to people.

Just as I had feared, though, the teacher—who was currently taking roll call—was someone I had never seen before. I was willing to bet the same about all my other teachers, other than perhaps our P.E. teacher, since we had two of those: one for the boys, one for the girls. Regardless, it meant I would have to learn all my teacher's names all over again, which would be a pain, though not unmanageable. My real worry was how differently their lesson plan was to the ones I learned back in first semester in my old world. If they were all that different, I could be screwed come finals.

Speaking of screwing….

After all the research I had performed, I was fairly confident that the sexes' sexual values had been reversed nearly one-to-one (maybe not quite, but pretty close), but I still wanted to test out that theory, just to make sure. There were quite a few girls in this class, outnumbering the guys by a slight margin, and a lot of them were rather pretty—by my old world's standards, at least. Acne was still an issue for many of them, made more obvious since most of them didn't wear makeup, but nonetheless, they had generally pleasing faces, were in decent shape, kept clean and didn't dress like they were five. If everything worked out as I hoped, then I would have quite the bevy of babes to pick and choose from.

Unfortunately, there were a few factors preventing me from just going up to any one of them and asking them if they wanted to fuck. The first one was reputation. High school boys back in my world would absolutely brag to all their friends if they got laid, even if it wasn't with anyone attractive. Locker room talk would spread, I knew from experience, and if they couldn't keep their lips sealed about who they fucked, or someone else figured out who they were with, that person was immediately outed as someone who put out, and the whole school would know by the next day. Some people would approach them, hoping for an easy lay, and others would shun them as a slut. It was also possible that they could face serious repercussions, either with the school or their parents, but both parties would know about it within a week. I couldn't afford that kind of attention, unfortunately. Maybe if the school didn't have anything to say about it, I would've been willing to risk it, but as it was, the faculty generally frowned upon such open relations, last I checked.

I also had no clue how my parents would react. I think they knew I wasn't a virgin, since I had had a relationship with a girl for over a year, but that didn't mean that they would want me turning into a complete slut. Especially not if men were expected to be the gatekeepers, rather than the keymasters.

I'm pretty sure that's like the only thing from Ghostbusters that stuck with me.

Regardless, my parents had always been a little overprotective of me, since I was an only child. I couldn't imagine that they were any less overprotective of me in this world, where men were seen as the more sexually vulnerable sex.

The other issue was, of course, logistics. Where and whenwere always a problem, especially when neither party really had their own place. My parents were home more often than not, especially lately, and they rarely ever worked late, so inviting girls over to my room was risky. I had to assume it was the same for most of my classmates. The best options, then, were motels (ones that didn't require ID), which could get expensive fast; car sex, which was cramped and uncomfortable; or finding some kind of secluded love spot where we wouldn't be walked in on. I supposed that public sex could also be exciting, but that carried some serious risk to it, obviously. I certainly couldn't rely on it with any regularity.

Thus, I needed to pick and choose my targets carefully. Someone down for some easy sex (most of the class, probably, but I was looking for someone who probably didn't get too much attention, that way they would be more compliant with my demands as long as I gave them attention and affection), who wouldn't immediately brag about it to their friends, and who had parents that didn't pay much attention to them, or just weren't home very often. Unfortunately, it would take time scouting the class, and I did have to pay at least some attention, otherwise I'd get lambasted by the teacher.

I looked around at my classmates, trying to remember anything I could about them while I pretended to take notes on the lesson. I couldn't remember all that much about any of them, but luckily, some basic demeanor and apparel observations helped fill in the blanks. I nixed anyone wearing a letterman, as well as any girl that looked especially fit. Both types likely worked out or played a sport, if not both, which would make them more confident, and thus more likely to brag about having gotten laid—and more likely to be believed if they did brag. I appreciated a nice Amazon as much as the next guy, but I had to think of them as overconfident football meatheads for this scenario, as demeaning as it sounded. The stereotype carried a lot of negative connotations, but I wasn't willing to risk searching for an exception in case one did exist here. Besides, just because someone was smart didn't mean their ego couldn't get in the way, especially where sex was concerned.

I also ignored anyone that seemed to be…struggling, financially. I had nothing against them, but it would be far too likely that they would not have a room to themselves, or one far enough from their parents' room that they wouldn't catch us while we were fucking. The logistics were just too problematic.

Unconfident, out of shape but not overly ugly, and with well-off parents? Shit, I'm seriously limiting my criteria here.

Only one group of people typically fit those criteria.

Looks like I'll be scouting out the nerds.

There were a fair few, from what I could see. A lot of more nerdy hobbies had become more mainstream in the past five to ten years, so it was a lot more common to see people wearing the latest comic book or video game fad on their shirt or discussing some niche subject or point of contention amongst themselves than it was back when I was in elementary school. Things had started to change by the time I was in fifth grade, but getting caught being a fan of some weird comic or video game was still a one-way ticket to unpopularity back then. So, either viewpoints on nerd culture had come far enough into the mainstream that they were now able to share their hobbies without fear of being dumped into the unpopular bucket, or they were already in the bucket, but no longer cared about what others thought of them and were able to share their interests without a care in the world.

Regardless, I definitely appreciated the variety.

I analyzed my slew of candidates as discretely as I could, one at a time, making sure that no one caught me staring at the girls throughout the class period. Most of them failed my criteria in one way or another, though none of them by poor looks. In fact, most of them looked fairly attractive, at least by my standards. Many of them were still fairly in-shape, or at least tried to keep themselves from becoming too fat; most of them likely to one-up each other trying to impress the guys in my school. The issue was that many of them were too self-confident, which could lead to arrogance in the right circumstances. Arrogance would then lead to blabbering about it, circling back to my original issue.

And a guy coming onto them strong, asking to fuck on day one of meeting would certainly qualify as "the right circumstances."

After nixing a good portion of the class, I noticed a girl with dark brown, almost black hair wearing a long-sleeved shirt across the classroom, right near the exit. I couldn't quite see her eye color from this distance, but her pale, lightly freckled skin suggested a more sheltered, indoors-oriented lifestyle (since her hands would've been more tanned if she was a more outdoorsy type). She seemed a bit on the shorter side, though it was difficult to tell, sitting down as she was. She was facing the front of the class, so I couldn't see the full design on her shirt, but her slouched, withdrawn posture and tired expression told me a fair bit.

However, the biggest piece of information I had gleaned off of her was her shoes.

She was wearing some special edition sneakers, its stark-white base splashed with bright reds and blues and an intricate pattern across the leather and mesh bindings. Given how cold it was outside, the fact that she was wearing sneakers rather than boots told me that she most likely drove here, and thus didn't have to walk nearly as far as those who took the bus. She also probably wanted to show these shoes off, since she was wearing them on the first day back from break so they were likely a Christmas present. I didn't see any specific logo on the shoes, so they probably weren't some flagship designer model, but from what I had seen in my parents' business, shoes that ostentatious and unique were often a movie tie-in of some sort, which meant that they were two things: limited edition and expensive.

Bingo.

Unfortunately, if her parents were rich, as I had surmised, she might be suspicious about someone coming onto her so quickly. Her parents probably warned her about gold diggers, which could be why she seemed so antisocial. It was probably hard for her to tell who honestly wanted to be her friend and who was just trying to use her.

With that in mind, I formed a plan and waited patiently for my moment to move in. Given her demeanor, I was betting that she would be out the door as soon as the teacher dismissed us, which would make catching her tricky, since I was on the opposite end of the room. I wouldn't be able to talk to her if I just waited around, so after a few moments, I tore a small scrap of paper out of my notebook, wrote a small message asking to meet by the music building adjacent to the main building during lunch. It wasn't exactly the most enclosed area, but no one was ever by the music building other than during band class and for after school lessons, so I figured it would be private enough, while giving the girl a chance to walk away if she felt uncomfortable or suspicious.

I made sure to phrase the note as a question, and I drew a little smiley face in the corner so that it would hopefully seem a little more friendly and less potentially suspicious or threatening. I supposed it was possible that she would think it even more suspicious, but I figured if she didn't trust it, then she just wouldn't show up, and I would find a girl from one of my other classes. I waited a few more minutes, staring down the clock before I decided the time was right. Raising my hand, I asked the teacher if I could use the restroom, since he had pretty much finished his lecture, and there were still a few more minutes until the bell rang. He acquiesced, a little disgruntled, but I didn't really care. I stood up, my small scrap of paper pressed against my slightly cupped palm, giving the illusion that I wasn't holding anything—a technique that Brandon and I had learned back in middle school to pass secret messages to each other (not that any of the messages we had passed were actually important, but being sneaky was both fun and cool at the time, before either of us had cell phones), and passed by the girl's desk as I reached for the door, putting my plan into action.

I released the note with a forward swing of my arm, trying to make it look like part the natural swing of my arm as I tossed the little slip of paper at her desk. I don't think it looked all that natural to anyone paying any actual attention to me, but no one was, so it got the job done. The note didn't quite reach her desk, but I had tossed it just far enough to flutter down into her lap, rather than onto the floor beside her, so I called it a success. I saw that she noticed it out of the corner of her eye as I passed her, and I made sure to open the big, plywood door slowly enough that she would get a good look at me before I left the classroom and was out of her line of sight.

Walking to the bathroom, I congratulated myself silently. Everything had gone about as well as I could have hoped. Now, I just had to wait for lunch.

The rest of my classes passed by in a blur, and before I knew it, the lunch bell was already ringing. Luckily, my other classes were statistics and chemistry, both subjects I was decent at, and it seemed that neither of them had changed at all in this world, from what could tell, so I wasn't worried about either of those classes.

I bought a quick lunch from the cafeteria: some chicken strips, a slice of pizza and a small salad, before I wolfed it down as fast as I could, washed my hands and face in the nearby bathroom, then headed over to the music building once I looked decently presentable. As I rounded the corner, I saw that the girl was already there, leaning against the wall by the door as she stared down at her phone, completely unaware of her surroundings. It was possible that she had eaten faster than me, but she seemed completely unaware of her surroundings, so I was betting that she had skipped lunch and had been here the whole time.

I was also definitely not above taking advantage of that lack of awareness.

Making sure that my steps were as quiet as possible, I walked over to her, waiting until I was as close as I could get without her noticing me, before springing my trap.

"You know you could've eaten before you came here, right?"

She yelped, nearly dropping her phone in surprise. I tried to keep a friendly smile on my face, but it was really hard not to laugh, and I'm pretty sure she noticed that. I probably looked like a dumbass with a shit-eating grin leaning on the door next to her—like a little brother who had just pulled off a stupid prank that was only funny to him. It probably wasn't the greatest first impression I could have made, and it proved that I still had the sense of humor of a ten-year-old, but what was done was done, so I just had to own it and salvage the situation some other way.

The girl puffed up a bit, looking like she was about to yell, at me, so I quickly held my hands in surrender, chuckling lightly. "Sorry, sorry, I couldn't resist. You looked really cute, so I just wanted to see what you looked like when I surprised you."

She crossed her arms and leaned back against the wall, ineffectively trying to look unruffled, cell phone still held tightly in her hand as she looked away from me, pouting all the while. I doubt that she would have called it a pout, trying to salvage her bruised ego as she was, but that was how it came across, with how obviously embarrassed she looked. I would have called her cute again, but that would more likely be taken as making fun of her, as opposed to flirting with her.

I probably needed to hold back on the flirting right out of the gate. I was coming on way too fast for her comfort. She obviously wasn't used to guys being so forward. If I'd wanted to have any sort of conversation with her, I'd have to connect with her on something she could relate to.

"I like your shoes," I told her. She blinked at me owlishly, probably unsure of where I was going with this. "I think I've seen them before. They're a limited run, right? A movie tie-in or something?"

She nodded, slowly becoming more interested in what I had to say. "Oh. Yeah, uh, they are. They're the Captain America special edition. Only like two hundred were made, I think. Have you seen the movie?"

I shrugged, shaking my head. "I haven't. Or, I don't remember if I have, at least. I got a bad concussion over winter break. Doctors said that's pretty bad for my memory," I shrugged helplessly, trying to play it off as a what-can-you-do sort of gesture, hoping that she would buy it. I had already given the same cover story to Brandon, so I would have to stick with it, now. I felt a little bad for lying to her, but I needed some kind of excuse for any behavior that could be seen as weird, and a concussion and amnesia was a lot more believable than getting dumped in a parallel universe. "Regardless, most of my interests have been books and videogames. Sci-fi, high fantasy, urban fantasy, stuff like that."

She blinked, looking taken aback. "I see. So, uh, how'd you get a concussion?"

"Snowboarding."

Her brow furrowed. "Were you not wearing a helmet?"

"I was. That's probably why I'm still alive."

"Jeez," she sympathized.

"Yeah, so I've, uh, forgotten quite a bit. Most of my classmates, pretty much all my teachers, most of what we taught last semester, just the little things," I listed out jokingly. "My grades will probably end up tanking because of it, unfortunately."

"So, did you call me because you remembered me?" she asked, curiosity written all over her face. She seemed to be trying to get a bead on me; trying to figure out what exactly I wanted from her. It almost reminded me of myself back when I was approached by Mabel: distrustful, but still willing to hear the other party out.

"Nope. I don't really remember anyone in English, to be honest. But you seem fairly trustworthy, so I figured I'd introduce myself," I told her, holding out my hand. "Jason Everett. I kinda recognized your shoes because my parents work in the fashion industry. I get news from them about special clothes and hot new brands and stuff. I think they mentioned it to me at some point."

"Ah, okay," she replied, taking my outstretched hand and shaking it. "I'm Claire. Uh, Claire Westerly. Nice to meet you. I think we've talked before, but…" she trailed off, looking unsure.

"Yeah, concussion. Sorry. I don't remember anyone from school, other than Brandon, but he's been my best friend for ages."

Claire blinked owlishly—a move that drew my attention to her eyelashes. It didn't look like she used fake ones, with lined up with my observation that girls didn't really wear makeup in this world, but her lashes were naturally very long. I imagined her counterpart back in my world was making a lot of her female classmates very jealous. I had heard the kind of gossip some of those girls got up to, and sometimes it was hard to tell whether they were awed by their classmates or plotting their assassination.

"Even the teachers?" she asked incredulously.

"Especially the teachers," I chuckled. "If I didn't know I had amnesia, I would've sworn I've never seen 'em before."

"Jeez," she responded sympathetically. "What about the subjects? Did you forget what they taught, too? Or just the teachers themselves?"

I shrugged. "I'm pretty sure my math and science fundamentals are fine, but I'm probably gonna fail history, I'm not gonna lie."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah," I nodded, looking away for a second, trying to seem like I was embarrassed about it, rather than trying to worm myself into her good graces. I was still worried that coming on too strong might make her suspicious. Better to make it seem like it was her idea. "I'm just hoping it doesn't mean I have to take the class again if I do. My grades have been pretty good so far, from what my parents told me, so I really don't wanna fail right at the finish line and have to repeat a year. That'd destroy my GPA. I might have to get a personal tutor, honestly."

There. The bait had been set. I didn't know what her grades were, but given she was a nerd with well-off parents, she probably had pretty high marks. Whether they were because she was naturally smart or because her parents pressured her to maintain them was anyone's guess, though. Regardless, if she was interested, she'd probably try to make me an offer.

Which was exactly what I was hoping for.

"Really?" Claire asked curiously. "Got anyone in mind?"

"Not at the moment." I gave her a faint smile. "Why? Do you know someone that tutors history? I'll take any help I can get, at this point."

"Uh, not exactly…" she said hesitantly, shuffling around a bit, trying to hide her embarrassment. It didn't really work, and it just made her seem even more awkward, but I found it incredibly cute. "So, uh, I haven't really tutored anyone before, but I do have a ninety-six in history, so…."

"Are you offering?" I asked her with the most genuinely friendly smile I could muster.

Her eyes snapped up to meet mine, and she tried to muster up a smile, projecting as much fake confidence as she could. "Uh, yeah! Y'know, if you wanted."

"Absolutely," I told her seriously, grabbing her hand with mine, trying my best to sincerely convey my gratitude. "You have no idea how much this'll help me, seriously. You're a lifesaver, Claire."

Blood rushed to her face. Her eyes were wide open, just staring at me. She stood shock-still, like her brain had just forcibly rebooted. I could see the similarities between girls here and the guys from my world now: I had seen a couple of boys back in my world have a similar reaction when one of the girls in their class had hugged them. They had looked like they had lost the ability to think for a good minute. Seeing the same reaction on a girl was incredibly satisfying; knowing that she found me attractive was a heady sensation, and a major boost to my ego.

I thought about hugging her, just to see what would happen, but I was honestly worried she might pass out or something.

"Yeah," she eventually managed to squeak out. "No problem."

I gave her another smile, and she returned it, though far less confidently.

"So, what's your schedule look like? I'm probably free most days, I'm not in any sports or clubs this semester." I paused. "At least, not that I remember."

"Yeah, you should probably double-check that," she giggled. I wondered briefly if giggling was considered masculine or feminine in this world, but I quickly put it out of my mind. It was a question for later; I still had to hammer out a schedule.

"Eh, if I am, I'll just drop 'em. I was never really into team sports, and I can't remember what any of them even are, so I'll just assume homework's the only thing on my schedule."

"I usually get most of my homework done in study hall. I'm not in any clubs or anything, so I'm free every day except Sunday," she told me.

"Cool. Does today work?" I asked her.

Claire blinked, surprised. "Uh, yeah, I guess. If you want to? You can, like, just come over after school, I guess."

Wow, she needs to work on her confidence. 

I suppose I can't really complain, though. It's cute watching her be shy and awkward, and I'm definitely benefitting from it.

"Sounds great!" I told her, giving her another grateful smile. "Three thirty sound good? That should give you some time to clean up anything you don't want me seeing," I teased.

"Hey! I don't have anything like that!" she protested heatedly, though its effect was severely diminished by the fierce blush that bloomed on her face.

"Mhm," I agreed teasingly, purposefully making it sound like I didn't believe her. "Sure, sure. I'll be there at three thirty anyway, just in case."

"Seriously, I don't!"

I laughed. She was honestly way too much fun to tease.

Is this how girls in my world always feel around guys? I'm surprised that they don't do it more often. These reactions are priceless.

Maybe some did; I wouldn't know. But I felt that the ones who weren't were really missing out.

"Whatever," she huffed. "What's your number? I'll text you my address."

I smiled. Maybe she had a bit of backbone, after all. Though, it might have been because she was able to use the tutoring offer as an excuse. I probably would have done something similar in her situation. I rattled off my phone number, and she quickly sent me a text message with her name, followed up by her address.

"Thanks," I told her. "I'll see you there. Oh, and, uh, what about payment?"

Claire blinked. "Payment?"

"Yeah, payment. I can't ask for you to tutor me for free, right? That's, like, at least an hour of your time."

I was testing her, admittedly. School policy was that if a student was tutoring another student, as long as they logged the hours and it was signed by both parties, could be submitted for extra credit in that class. It was reviewed by the teachers, of course, just to make sure that nobody was trying to sneak some extra, but rarely was extra credit fraud ever attempted, and it was pretty much always caught.

Claire blinked, looking away with a mildly embarrassed expression as she tucked some of her hair behind her pink-tinted ear. "Uh…I haven't really thought about it, to be honest. Did you, uh, have something in mind?"

I kept my smile friendly, keeping myself from breaking out into a victorious grin. "Eh, I'm sure we can work that out later. I'll see you then?"

She nodded, probably more vigorously than she intended to, her eyes shining with unbridled excitement as she tried her best to keep her expression casual. She failed, of course, but I found that cute, too. "Yeah, see you then. Text me if anything changes!"

"Alright," I told her, giving her a small wave as I turned away. "You should probably start heading back. Lunch is gonna end soon."

"Okay. So long!"

As I walked away, I texted my mom that I would be over at Brandon's house this afternoon—something I did often, so she would most likely believe me. My parents never really checked in with them anymore, since we had been hanging out with each other for so long.

The bell rang, interrupting my thoughts. I slipped my phone back into my pocket and headed towards my third and last class of the day: calculus. Classes at my school ran for two hours each, as opposed to the one-hour classes most schools had, supposedly to prepare the students for college. Personally, I didn't mind it, and it meant that we had less homework to deal with on a daily basis. Plus, it really worked out to my advantage today, since I didn't have history until tomorrow, which would give me some time to re-learn the basics before I made a complete fool of myself in class. Claire's offer to tutor me really was invaluable. I did certainly intend to just sleep with her, but if she could help me catch up on my history knowledge, then I would really have to do something nice for her, because she would be saving my ass from a failing grade.

I walked into class and sat down, already staring at the clock.

Only two more hours. Then the fun begins.

About fifteen minutes after plugging Claire's address into my GPS app, I arrived at an imposingly large two-story stone-and-painted-wood exterior home that I wouldn't quite call a mansion, but it had to be worth at least seven figures, considering the size of the property it sat on. The home stood at the end of a large cul-de-sac, with a very long, imposing three-car driveway that allowed the property to not have to deal with being scrunched up against their neighbors' similarly large homes and command a much larger swath of real estate. Their driveway was almost a small, private road of its own.

I stopped my car in the street, just at the edge of the driveway, pulled out my phone and texted Claire.

[You]: Just got here. Do I pull up into the driveway, or just park in the street?

[Claire]: Pull in2 the driveway

[You]: Alright. Your parents won't have issues with that?

[Claire]: Theyre nvr back b4 like 7 on weekdays lol

[You]: Okay.

Satisfied with that answer—and the knowledge that we wouldn't be interrupted while I was visiting—I drove up the driveway and parked right outside the garage.

Stepping out of the car, I noticed that no security cameras were visible, which seemed kind of odd for a home as ostentatious as this. Most houses in any upper-middle-class suburb have some sort of security system these days, so it was odd to not notice one on the house with a bigger yard than the rest of the street combined.

Then again, maybe they did. For all I knew, they had gotten some super high-tech system that was camouflaged so that outsiders couldn't spot it. They certainly seemed to have enough money to afford something like that. Regardless, if Claire wasn't worried, then I probably shouldn't be, either.

She was waiting for me by the time I walked up to the front door, staring at her phone as she leaned on the open doorframe. She glanced up when I got closer and gave me a small smile, waving me in without a word and closing the front door behind me. The door was a heavy, ornate hardwood-and-glass piece befitting the price of the house. I had to imagine their furniture was all of similar quality.

I was right, of course.

"Nice place," I complimented, glancing around at the plush furniture and expensive décor. The home was an open-floor plan with hardwood floors covered by large, soft rugs. The walls were a stark white, mostly, but a couple walls here and there were painted aquamarine to provide some much-needed contrast. The whole place was tied together by two large, needlessly lavish chandeliers. I had to assume it was professionally furnished—it all looked far too expensive and too precise to just be a passion project.

"Thanks," Claire responded halfheartedly. I supposed that living in a place like this long enough would warp anyone's perception of how impressive it was. That, or she really just didn't like the place. I couldn't imagine why she would, though.

"Come on, let's head upstairs. I've got everything set up in the loft."

I followed her up without a word. The upstairs, I noted, seemed much homier and more lived-in, in contrast to the professionally designed and spotless rooms downstairs. It just felt so much more comfortable. The single couch was soft and plush, but it didn't look like some sort of sleek designer chic, instead like a favored, well-used couch of someone who probably spent a little too much time in front of their TV. Said TV was large, and rested on a nice, dark center console, its cubbies lined with video games. The coffee table between the couch and TV, while a bit scratched up, was still perfectly serviceable, and lined with a few history textbooks and a couple of spiral-bound notebooks, as well as a silver laptop and a package of mechanical pencils.

All in all, I might've changed a few things here and there, but I thought it was a great man-cave.

Woman-cave. Whatever.

"Looks like you're all set," I remarked, taking a pillow from the couch and setting it on the ground, using it as a makeshift seat coffee table. "You don't mind if I sit on the pillows, do you?"

I probably should have asked that before I took it and sat on it, but oh, well.

"No, no, it's fine," she responded, following my example and sitting on the other pillow. "Sit wherever you want."

"Cool. Down to business, then," I said, picking up one of the notebooks. "I'll probably misremember a ton and sound really stupid, but most of that's probably the concussion."

"I'll try to go easy on you, then," she smiled at me.

"Please do," I pleaded jokingly, and we quickly dove into the first textbook.

Unfortunately, I was right. A lot of developments were luckily fairly similar to my world, so things like the southern U.S. states only industrializing after Air Conditioning was invented, and the development of important industrial and military advancements such as crucible forging and firearms were largely the same, as was the creation of America, but often, the people leading the events were very different, and that would sometimes cause things to be played out in a slightly different fashion, or sometimes even wildly different fashions. For example, Virginia was on the Union's side of the Civil War rather than the Confederate. Adolf Hitler never rose to power due to Germany's clinging to Prussian tradition, even after the Prussian empire temporarily collapsed after they were stuck with the financial blame in the aftermath of World War I. Instead, a bastard daughter of Queen Victoria Louise I was found and the Kaiserreich rose to power once more, after the Weimar Republic essentially ran Prussia into the ground, both economically and socially. Most of their Jews were exiled en masse due to their part in managing the Weimar Republic and ended up in Russia, where they had become a moderately successful bourgeoise in a pre-Communist Russia, until the revolution hit and a Bolshevik general by the name of Natalia Dreykov ended up taking power, becoming a very Stalin-like figure. It seemed that this world's history traveled alongside a somewhat similar path to my own, but many of the important figures were very different, which affected historical events to varying degrees, with some changes similar or identical to my own, and others wildly different.

Marylin Monroe was apparently a former president, for example.

I had kept my mouth shut while she taught and actively avoided mentioning anything I knew from my world, since my very wrong answers would have come off as extremely weird to Claire, even despite my claims of having had a concussion. A head wound wouldn't just make me believe a bunch of inaccurate information, after all. Regardless, by the end of the two-hour study session, I felt we had made great headway, and I would at least be able to have a conversation about recent history without sounding like a complete idiot.

It did feel like Claire was taking pity on me at times, though.

"That's probably good for today," I told her. "I don't think I'll be able to retain any more than this today, and you look pretty wiped."

"Oh, alright," she responded distantly, leaning back against the base of the couch, trying to use the motion to take another peek at me without me noticing. I did notice, obviously, just as I noticed nearly every other time that she had been looking at me over the past couple of hours. I had honestly expected her to try to pull the classic stretch-to-put-my-arm-around-your-shoulder move, but she either wasn't confident enough to attempt it, or she still thought of this relationship as mostly professional, and was trying to keep herself to a more "respectable" standard rather than attempting to get closer to me, even if she wished to.

And I was betting she did, if her blatant staring was any indication.

Well, if she won't make any moves, I guess I'll have to.

I performed a large stretch of my own, bringing my arms up and reaching high into the air, making sure to lean forward a bit so that I was showing a good amount of skin. The low-cut V-neck I was wearing was apparently far more enticing than I had originally thought. It wasn't nearly as ridiculous as some of the halter tops and plunge-neck shirts I had seen a couple of my male classmates wearing, but it got the job done as long as purposefully flaunted a bit.

It worked like a charm. Claire was practically drooling as she stared at my chest, making zero attempt to hide her gaze.

"So," I began with a bit of a grunt as I finished my stretch. "Payment, right? You figured out a rate or something?"

Claire startled a bit, coming back to reality with a surprised blink. "Hm-what? Oh, uh, no, sorry, I never figured out anything about payment or anything like that. It's-it's fine, though, promise!" she backtracked, waving her hands in an effort to appease me. "You don't need to pay me or anything! I really enjoy tutoring you, so don't, feel like you have to pay me back for it!"

I snorted blithely. "Come on, Claire. You're really helping me out here. You deserve something, at least. If you don't want money, is there something else I can do to make it up to you?" I asked, trying to sound coy, leaning forward just enough for my shirt collar to dip and show off a little more skin than normal. Claire knew my eyes were on her, so she tried to keep her eyes level with mine, but she couldn't resist the temptation, and her eyes dipped down to my shirt collar for a bit. She caught herself, and quickly brought her eyes back up to meet mine, and I gave her a teasing smirk to let her know she was busted.

Her blush was still very cute.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to," she squeaked out, looking away.

"I don't mind," I told her, inching closer. "If you want, maybethis could be your reward…."

Claire visibly swallowed, unsure of what to do. She seemed caught in analysis paralysis, trying to figure out if this was real or just a practical joke. Worst case, it could be some kind of blackmail scheme or something. Either way, it was obvious she was conflicted.

"You know, you could stand to be more assertive," I said playfully. "Guys usually appreciate that in a girl."

She cleared her throat a bit and leaned away from me, looking miserable, now. Obviously, she had determined it was the latter. "You're just messing with me," she croaked out, voice cracking a bit. "Please, stop."

Well, now I feel bad.

I sighed, dropping the teasing tone. "Claire," I said, far more seriously. She still was leaning away from me, refusing to meet my eyes. "Claire, look at me."

Claire glanced back towards me, lowering her defenses slightly. I ruthlessly took advantage of that, wrapping my hands around her neck and lower back, pulling her towards me and closing the distance between our lips. I gave her a gentle, affectionate kiss, careful not to use tongue while she had frozen up, only licking the bottom of her lip after she had started hesitantly reciprocating. Her eyes eventually closed, and her mouth opened enough for me to slip my tongue in and start dancing with hers. I took the lead, practically moving her tongue around with mine, teaching her the ways she could use her tongue as we made out like they were the steps to a waltz. She was a quick learner, too, apparently. Before long, she was battling against my tongue, trying to press it back into my mouth and explore it with her own. I put up a bit of token resistance, but quickly yielded and allowed her to take the lead at her place.

Eventually, she broke the kiss, and we stared into each other's eyes for a few seconds, saying nothing. I could see the conflicting emotions and uncertainty still obviously displayed on her face, but she didn't seem to think I was only there to tease her anymore, so I counted it as a win.

"Claire. I'm not teasing you. I'm not messing with you. I really do want this. I have a few conditions, but none of them involve money or making you do any weird shit. Okay?" I asked her. She just nodded dumbly, eyes a little glazed. I realized I might've taken her first kiss, now that I had thought about it. Reclusive introverts didn't tend to have a ton of relationship experience by nature.

"The biggest condition I have is that I want this kept secret. You can't tell anyone that we're doing this. The history tutoring part is fine, but you can't tell anyone we're sleeping together. I really don't need to deal with that kind of thing slipping out at school. People will start to assume I'm a slut, and it could get the faculty involved, or it could get the other students to start pestering me about it, and I don't want that kind of attention. So, you blab, and I'm not speaking to you again, ever. Alright?"

Claire nodded again, looking a bit more sober, now.

"I need you to say it."

"I won't tell anyone, I promise."

"Good," I sighed. "People will probably guess that you got laid—it tends to be kind of obvious—but even if they guess, you can't tell them that I was the one that you did it with." She nodded again. "The main other thing, besides the history tutoring, is that I need someone I can trust on my side. Word about my concussion will probably spread, and some girls might use that to try and take advantage of me. I remember having a steady relationship a couple years back, but I'm pretty that ended at least a year ago. I don't quite remember, though, and I don't remember if I've dated anyone else since. I doubt I did, but I need your help making sure that no one tries to take advantage of that and say that I'm their boyfriend, and I've just forgotten that we were dating. If they do, can I come to you and check whether or not they're lying to me?"

"Uh, yeah, I can do that," Claire confirmed a bit hesitantly, a slightly puzzled expression on her face. "We haven't talked much before, but I haven't seen you talking to any other girls, so I think you're still single."

I smiled, satisfied with my cover story. Hopefully that bit of extra detail would make it more believable, but I would need to talk to Brandon and feed him the same story to make sure no one found any holes in my story. Not only would it blow up in my face if they did, branding me as entirely untrustworthy, but it would raise questions as to why I was really acting the way I was, and why I had forgotten most of the basic history lessons that nearly everyone knew; questions I obviously did not want to answer.

"Good. Now, then…" I trailed off, stripping off my shirt by the hem, the way I had seen women do it in porn. Claire's eyes became ridiculously wide as I pulled my shirt over my head and dropped it carelessly onto the couch, giving her a lustful grin. "You mind showing me your room?"

Before I knew it, Claire had practically dragged me to her room, pushed me down onto her bed and was furiously making out with me, her hands running up and down my torso like she was trying to commit the feeling of every muscle in my body to memory. I let her, of course. It was hot seeing someone normally so shy just absolutely lose control of themselves and take the lead. She was making out with me more enthusiastically than anyone I had been with, including my ex. Claire's tongue was a hungry demon, pushing against my own tongue, as well as my teeth and the roof of my mouth, tasting my saliva enthusiastically, as if I was the sweetest thing she had ever tasted. She was obviously inexperienced, but her enthusiasm more than made up for it.

It was a hell of an ego boost; I have to admit.

Claire eventually broke the kiss, breathing heavily as she stared into my eyes. I smiled back at her.

"Told you it was hot when the girl takes the lead."

Her confidence redoubled, Claire shuffled down the length of the bed, unbuttoning my jeans and pulling both my pants and underwear off of my legs. My rock-hard dick sprang upward, finally freed from its bindings. The cool air on my shaft was refreshing, but not as refreshing as the look of debauched wonder that Claire was giving it.

"Holy shit," she whispered.

I chuckled. "Yeah, I'd normally suggest foreplay, but I'm betting we're both way past the need for that."

Claire swallowed lustily; eyes still glued to my cock. "Yeah, uh-huh."

She quickly removed her sweatpants and panties, wriggling her lower body awkwardly as she shimmied her clothes off, refusing to glance away from my stiff dick even once. Clambering back up to my hips, she sat down on me, grinding her clit on my shaft, apparently still a bit hesitant to go all the way right away.

I was about to ask what was wrong, but before I could, she shuddered out, "You-you're on…birth control, r-right?"

I blinked. "They make birth control for guys?" I asked before I could stop myself.

Shit. Way to look smart.

"I mean, no, I'm not, but I can just pull out if we don't have any," I backtracked, hoping I didn't just inadvertently ruin the mood. She stopped grinding on me, which I immediately took as a bad sign.

"No, I have some. Let me run and get it," she told me, rolling off the bed and quickly running out of the room. "Don't go soft in the meantime!" she yelled, already out of my line of sight.

"Make sure you come back shirtless, then!" I called back.

It only took about a minute or two for Claire to come back with a small pill bottle in hand—entirely nude, inner thighs still visibly dripping with arousal. She crawled back into bed, handing me the bottle as her other hand started slowly stroking me off. I took a quick look at the brand and active ingredients—pharmacy store brand, the generic version, which was usually the smart choice, and the active ingredient was some chemical that I had never heard of and certainly couldn't pronounce.

I glanced back at her. "How long does this stuff last? And what are the side effects? Mood swings, hormonal imbalances, sudden death, anything like that?"

"Uh, I think it just kills all sperm for twenty-four hours. No side-effects that I've heard of, but it only stops pregnancy, not STDs. You're clean, right?" She asked.

"Yeah. Only ever slept with my ex, and we were both virgins at the time," I confirmed. She made an expression of distaste, like she really didn't want to hear about my past experiences, and I let the topic drop. "You're a virgin, right?"

Claire nodded reluctantly, not happy to admit that she was. I grinned at her before quickly downing one of the pills, as per the instructions on the label. "Then I'm happy I get to take your first time." I leaned up into her ear, bringing her head a little closer to mine.

"Get ready, tiger," I whispered huskily, before adjusting my hips and pressing my lower head into her vulva. I couldn't quite slip in, since I couldn't really see what I was doing, but she reached back and grabbed my dick, lined it up with her lower entrance and sank down on it, steadily lowering herself until our hips met and I was completely buried inside her.

She shuddered breathily as she took me inside her, eyes half-lidded, very obviously trying to hold back a moan. We sat there for a moment, entirely still, just drinking in the moment as her soft, soaking-wet flesh convulsed gently around my cock. I smiled up at her.

"Congrats on losing your virginity," I told her.

She let out a noise that was half-grunt, half-moan, and started grinding herself back and forth, moving her hips slightly up and down, but mostly just using my pubic mound as a surface to grind her clit on as she shifted the angle of my penis back and forth inside her. I nearly chuckled, but I held back, mainly for her sake. It was obvious that she had no real experience and was just doing what felt best to her; she clearly didn't know much about actually having sex.

That's why I was there to correct her, though.

"Claire, moving up and down feels better for the guy. Grinding is mostly just for the girl's pleasure, hon," I informed her gently, trying not to sound condescending or insulting. She looked a little embarrassed, but nodded anyway, shifting her legs a bit to support her weight better before beginning to ride me properly.

Immediately, I could feel the difference. Pleasure coursed up my body as she rode me up and down. The head and shaft of my cock could feel every bump and fold in her warm pussy, each one a unique experience. I used what leverage I had to help Claire keep up the rhythm, lightly thrusting in time with her while also adjusting the angle of the thrusts so that the head of my dick would grind and slide against her upper wall, causing her to twitch and shiver and moan in increasingly entertaining ways as she bounced enthusiastically on my cock. Occasionally, the twitch would be large enough that one of her legs would give out for a second and she would have to readjust and regain her balance before continuing to fuck me.

"Mm, I love it, keep it up," I moaned out a little exaggeratedly, mostly because I figured she'd like to hear me enjoying what she was doing to me. I wanted the same thing, after all. "You don't have to hold back your voice, Claire. Just let it all out, baby."

She didn't, sadly. She was still just breathing those ragged breaths, proving how good she was feeling, despite her reluctance to show it willingly. Given how erratic her rhythm had become and how ridiculously wet she was, I could tell she was on the edge, trying to hold out just a bit longer, possibly so I could cum with her. I wasn't close to cumming at all, so her efforts were somewhat in vain, but were still very sexy. However, I wanted to see her lose control and just fucking cum.

Soon enough, Claire began to lose a bit of steam and could no longer remain upright. She leaned forward, bracing herself on my pecs so her legs wouldn't have to do all the work. Her pace slowed, partially because she was becoming exhausted and partially because she was still trying to further delay her orgasm. I, however, was tired of her not cumming, and quickly seized control. I grabbed her ass with one hand, sinking my fingers into her pliant flesh, while my other reached up and gripped the back of her neck for more leverage. I slammed upwards into her at a rapid, frantic pace, and her eyes immediately became hazy and unfocused. She inadvertently let out a breathy moan, no longer able to hold her voice back. I could feel her tipping over the edge, her pussy practically vibrating with anticipation, so I kept up my pace, making sure to thrust aggressively and deeply as I pulled her down into a searing kiss, my tongue entwining with hers.

She came hard.

Her back arched sharply, and all of her muscles suddenly locked up. A choked scream was practically ripped from her vocal cords as her fingernails dug deep, crescent-shaped trenches into my chest. A veritable flood of her juices soaked both my cock and both of our crotches as her pussy convulsed rapidly, her walls tightening and releasing in a seemingly reflexive pattern, trying to milk me for all I was worth. I kept my dick buried inside her as deeply as I could, grinding the head of my cock on the entrance to her cervix while she rode out her climax, trying to make this orgasm the best one she'd ever had.

After what felt like minutes, it finally subsided, and Claire collapsed bonelessly on top of me, panting heavily. Her arms curled around me gently, bringing me into a loose hug as she snuggled into my chest, my erect penis still inside her. I brought my arms around her, reciprocating the embrace and flexed my dick, both to see how she would react and remind her that I wasn't quite done.

"Mmn," she mewled pitifully, as if disappointed or discontent. She tried to push herself up, but was only able to bring herself up partway, before she just gave up and let herself flop back down on my chest, which had me a little worried for a second.

"What's wrong?" I asked, concerned. I scooted back towards the headboard a bit, using it as leverage to push myself up into a slightly more upright position and gently pulled her head up off of my chest so that I could look her in the eyes. "Are you okay?"

Claire looked away, an embarrassed expression on her face. I would assume she was blushing, but given her face was already all red from exertion, it was impossible to tell.

"I…I didn't make you cum," she hesitantly admitted, sounding incredibly disappointed in herself. "Sorry."

I supposed it made sense that it was a point of pride for a girl to be able to make a guy cum, and while her physical stamina could use some work, she was doing really well for someone who just lost their virginity. I admittedly didn't know too much on vaginal muscle control, but I was pretty sure I would've been able to cum if she kept up her original pace and was able to power through her own orgasm.

"That's fine, Claire," I waved her off, laughing a bit. "We can just go another round, can't we?"

"…I don't think my legs can take much more," she confessed, as if she was just giving up and calling it there. Was the concept of the guy being on top entirely foreign to her? I blinked at her incredulously, but then remembered that since most guys in this world weren't super sexually active, and that increased physical exertion could pull blood away from the penis to help oxygenate the muscles that needed it, I could see how she could think that the guy being on top wasn't something that realistically happened all that often, if at all.

She was probably wrong, still, since men could absolutely still keep an erection up while doing the fucking (unless the male biology in this world had changed to the point that they couldn't, but I was pretty sure that wasn't the case), but whatever. There were probably a lot of bullshit myths about sex in this world, just as there were in mine.

"Again, that's perfectly fine," I told her, scooping her up and flipping her around so that her back was to the bed, her head resting on the small stack of pillows that she had piled up. "I like being on top."

"Oh," she breathed out, eyes widening in both disbelief and anticipation.

"You can handle this much, right? You'll probably cum again before I can finish, but I'm not gonna stop for it. That cool?" I asked her, slowly pulling my dick back until only the tip remained inside her. Claire nodded like her life depended on it, and I gave her a mischievous grin.

"Good," I said, leaning down to whisper in her ear. "Because I'm going to ruin you for other men."

I gripped her hips firmly and drove myself completely inside her with a single, powerful stroke. The force of it rocked her entire body, and she let out a loud, sharp squeak of pleasure as I rammed my dick deep inside her. Her legs kicked out involuntarily and her hips shuddered as I began to fuck her with deep, forceful strokes. I kept it at a somewhat sedate pace, not just mindlessly fucking her as frantically as I could, but instead keeping just enough control so that I could still adjust my angles of entrance and grind my cock against her most sensitive points while still keeping my thrusts powerful enough for her to really feel me fucking her throughout her entire nervous system. I wanted her to feel me fucking her down to her fingers and toes.

It didn't take long before she came again, flooding the bed with her juices as she threw her head back and squealed in pleasure, her hands grabbing onto my upper arms like a lifeline as her hips bucked and shook involuntarily. Every breath that came out of her mouth was now a delirious moan, and her eyes had become entirely glassy and unfocused as she rode out the throes of her orgasm. All the while, I kept up my pace, continuing to forcefully fuck her while her sopping pussy tried to clench around my dick like a vice, but was too slippery to properly keep it held down in place. It did slow down my thrusts a bit, but with how forcefully her pussy was pushing back against me whenever I thrusted into her, I could tell the pleasure had only intensified for her, despite the slightly uneven tempo of our fucking.

After her second orgasm started to wind down, I slowed my pace a little bit so that Claire wouldn't feel too overstimulated. It took her a minute, but she eventually calmed down a bit, still moaning wantonly, but no longer sounding like she had lost the ability to think. After a few deep breaths to collect herself, she wrapped her arms around my neck, pulling me down into a deep, passionate French kiss while she crossed her legs behind me, making sure I couldn't pull out of her. I battled her tongue for about a minute, then broke the kiss and glanced back at her legs, indicating that I had noticed what she had done. She whined, sounding a bit embarrassed, but I just grinned back at her teasingly before ramping up the tempo of my thrusts yet again, sending her right back into the throes of pleasure once more.

I continued moaning, more for her continued pleasure than anything, just letting my vocal cords vibrate a bit whenever I exhaled heavily, keeping deep, even breaths as I continued to speed up, growing ever closer to my orgasm. Whenever I wasn't feeling so heavily exerted, I would whisper sweet nothings and small bits of dirty talk into Claire's ear; nothing incredibly creative, admittedly, but even the most basic breathless moans and generic statements about how she felt amazing and that I wanted to cum inside her so badly were driving her fucking wild. Claire was rocking her hips back against mine in time with my thrusts, looking like she desperately needed to get me to cum before she reached her own climax without me yet again. I found that incredibly hot, and it only further drove me to try and reach my own climax.

I redoubled my pace as our moans both became increasingly louder, our flesh slapping together animalistically as I pounded away at her sloshing pussy. I was inwardly glad that her parents weren't home, because if they were, they would have heard both of us very clearly, even with her door closed. I quickly shoved the thought out of my mind as I could feel my impending orgasm begin to build up in the base of my pelvis; my entire body grew hotter and hotter as pressure began to rise at the very base of my dick. I was completely over trying to hold back, even for Claire's sake—I needed to push myself over the edge and cum.

Claire, too, was having the time of her life, moaning and chanting my name lewdly as she ground herself desperately against my cockhead, neurotically trying to get me to cum inside her like she had never wanted anything more in her entire life as her pussy juices continued to ruin her bedsheets, and most likely the mattress below it as well. However, I hadn't noticed her losing control, slipping up on our rhythm or spasming erratically, meaning she wasn't quite on the edge yet, and I was about to blow my load any second now. I didn't want to leave her blue-balled at the halfway point, so I needed to get her off quickly before I hit orgasm.

Luckily, I had just the solution.

I slowed down my pace only slightly, just enough for me to reposition my arms and adjust my balance, bringing my left arm above her head to use as support while my right arm snaked down her body, trailing sensually from her lips to the curve of her full breasts, stopping to grope her tits a little, before continuing down her soft stomach and across her pubic mound, resting my palm on her mons pubis as I slid my thumb down to her clit, still thrusting aggressively into her all the while. I began to rub small circles on her clit with the pad of my thumb, massaging it back and forth as I fucked her, and she started howling in pleasure. Claire weakly tried to grab at my hand and pull it away from her love button, but I kept it there firmly, pleasuring her clit to ensure she was brought right up to the edge alongside me.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, wait, stop, stop! I'm cumming! I'm cumming!" she chanted desperately, her voice climbing in a beautiful crescendo until her climax hit and she screamed out in pleasure, her legs locking up behind me as her whole body vibrated vigorously and her pussy clenched around my dick hard, trying to wring the cum out of me by force as another splash of her juices flooded her vagina. Rather than trying to fuck her through her orgasm once more, I instead slammedmy cock as deep inside of her as I could, completely hilting myself, and came inside her with an animalistic growl, shooting a heavy torrent of my seed into her core.

"I'm cumming, too," I growled into her ear, admittedly playing up the growl a bit for effect, but I was honestly cumming harder than I ever had in my life. I had slept with my ex a fair amount, but none of those times felt like what I was experiencing now. If a normal orgasm was like reaching the top of a mountain, this felt like I had just been launched into the sky in a fighter jet. My seed poured out into her womb for what seemed like an eternity as I continued to hold Claire down and bite at her neck, feeling like I was starting to lose control of my baser instincts. Claire howled and moaned and squealed in ecstasy, probably loud enough that the neighbors would have heard us had we been at my house.

Eventually, both of us wound down, and I collapsed bonelessly beside her, feeling entirely spent, both of us completely soaked in our sweat and fluids. I pulled my flagging dick out of her with a wet shlop and adjusted my position so that I could curl up next to her and cuddle with her properly, and she snuggled into my chest without complaint, looking completely exhausted, but also like she was the happiest girl in the world, which was another huge ego boost for me. I don't think I had ever made anyone that happy in my entire life. She didn't even seem to care about the state of the bed we were lying in, which was a horrible mess, to say the least.

The bedsheet had been practically soaked through with all the love juice Claire had leaked, though I had contributed a pretty significant amount as well, given how much I had sweat and cum right along with her. I was pretty sure that my semen was already starting to drip out of her pussy, assuming I had actually cum as much as I felt like I had. She was gonna have to spend a good while cleaning herself up in the shower after I left.

Glancing down at her body, sweat-coated and completely tuckered out, I ended up starting to fantasize about her cleaning off in the shower, and almost immediately, my dick started to swell up again.

…Shit.

I was going to try to extricate myself from her and head home while she was still out of it, since my parents did still expect me to be home by dinner, but my hardening cock poked against her thigh, and she immediately looked down, staring right at it like she had to process just what the hell she was seeing, before glancing back up at me, eyes shockingly wide.

"You can go again?" she whispered incredulously, as if that was completely unheard of. For all I knew, it might, but I didn't think it was absolutely impossible. Prostitutes had to exist in this world, right? Male ones? I imagined if they did, they would be able to take on multiple clients a day, otherwise they'd have a difficult time making ends meet.

Whatever. I would research it later.

"I could," I whispered back, slowly untangling myself from her. "And I would absolutely love to, but I have to be back home in time for dinner. My parents don't like it when I'm out too late, especially when I have school the next day."

Her expression fell, eyes dimming. "Okay," she whined like a kicked puppy.

Guilt welled up inside my chest. "Hey, don't worry," I told her, stroking her cheek with my thumb. "I'm not gonna just disappear on you. I'll definitely be coming back," I smiled down at her. "Just don't tell anyone about this."

Claire nodded rapidly, clearly motivated by my previous threat of cutting her off now that I had proven myself in bed. I broke into a full-on grin, then kissed her one last time before I slipped out of her bed, threw my clothes on haphazardly and shut the door to her room behind me. I packed up my schoolbooks and notepad into my backpack, headed downstairs and quickly ducked into their kitchen to steal a can of sparkling water from their fridge and then left, leaving the door unlocked as I texted Claire a quick reminder to lock her front door and that I would see her soon.

Driving home, I felt a sense of levity in my chest. I hadn't even kissed a girl since my last (and only) girlfriend, and we hadn't been together for at least a year, now. After so long without it, the joy of romance and sex had become unfamiliar to me, and now it had all come rushing back, combined with the powerful knowledge that I was incredibly desirable. It was an amazing feeling. I didn't know if I had felt so good in my entire life before. Suddenly, I had gone from decently okay—above middle-of-the-pack, but generally a little antisocial, and not willing to put up with a lot of the bullshit that a lot of the girls at school back in my old world wanted to put me through—to the top of the chain, as far as relationship prospects went.

 Or I would, once the rumors about me started circulating.

I didn't expect my little secret rendezvous to be kept forever—even if Claire never said anything, I wasn't going to hide the fact that she was tutoring me, and she would probably be walking around with a limp tomorrow and staring at me all throughout the week. I knew that people would notice and start to suspect something, but by making sure she didn't tell anyone, I had much more deniability, so I could reasonably reject anyone I didn't like without them blowing up and spreading unsavory rumors about me, true or otherwise.

Nonetheless, that feeling of power and control—the knowledge that I could have most of the girls at my school begging to sleep with me, willing to bend over backwards for me as long as I put out in the end. If I cast my net even wider, going to parties, bars, clubs, even bookstores and other common public hangouts, I could have even more girls twisted around my finger, all desperate to get together with me.

I had to force myself to step back and think about this logically, though. Despite the fact that I was now a very hot commodity, I couldn't let my new ego run around unchecked. I had seen women back in my world pull some hot guys, think they were above everybody and turn into complete bitches, destroying their friendships and ruining their social life because they suddenly thought they were better than everybody. I did not want that happening to me, and if that meant having to constantly keep my pride in check, that was fine with me. No matter how hot someone was, if they had a rotten personality, no one would want to be around them.

I sighed, sinking back into the comfortable, plush vinyl seat, re-centering myself and reminding myself to not grow arrogant. Being a slut could have serious consequences, especially if the wrong person caught feelings, so I would have to continue to be careful about who I slept with, but I couldn't deny that the whole thing was incredibly enticing. I would make further plans tonight and do some more observing at school over the course of the next few days, and maybe fuck Claire some more as I waited to see what kind of rumors would spread.

I couldn't stop the wild grin from slowly spreading across my face.

This world's gonna be a lot of fun.