I tried working from home one day, but that was a bad idea in itself. With my personal laptop right there, wearing sweatpants, that post-it note with the Orc porn website and my vibrator a mere room away, well. I got very little done.
I think I watched that video I’d clicked on at work, the one with the claiming ritual, at least a dozen times. It did something different for me, made the fever feel not like burning up, but warm and cozy. Like I was lying in a sunbeam and soaking it up, instead of sweating in a summer-hot car.
In the claiming ritual video it looked like, in the most polite of terms, there was a somewhat intense penetration and exchange of body fluids. There was some kind of oil involved, made of some unspecified herbs mashed up until they were liquid. It moved like oil but looked like ink in the bottle. It was shinier than anything else when it was used, from where it was used like lube and where it was swirled in shapes and spread along the skin.
And there was a lot of spreading.
At first I insisted to myself that I was rewatching how this whole mating ritual thing was done so that I could assure myself I hadn’t done anything similar with Khent that time in my office.
Of course, that excuse wore out when I realized I pretty much had the video memorized.
I kind of wanted to call Khent and ask questions. Were the herbs or oil used in the ritual the sticking point of the whole mating thing? Also like, how was his day going?
Then again, I couldn’t really do that without making things weird again, realistically.
I mean, it wasn’t just the Blood Fever making me want to talk to Khent. We were in the same boat, I didn’t have anyone else to complain about how being constantly, unendingly horny was wreaking havoc on my sleep schedule. Or how it made my legs weirdly sore from how they were constantly tensing up. I mean, what kind of guy doesn’t email you after he mate-bonds with you? Even though he technically already did.
So nature, and uh, Unhinged Janice, She Who Destroys Computers, find a way.
I did not succeed in melting my computer, not even after running every program I had on the computer at the same time for an hour or so. But the screen started flickering just after I opened a few hefty spreadsheets, and when I came back to it after lunch, the screen wouldn’t turn on. I had my excuse to call the IT Department.
“Try turning it off and on again,” he says over the phone.
Since I’m back in my office, whenever he speaks, I squeeze my knees together and shift my hips in my chair. Above the desk line at least, I’m pretending the sound of his voice hasn’t wet my panties instantly. I brought more underwear to work, because at least I’m now ready for this. I also brought a little cooler full of ice packs, so that I could make it through meetings without trying to hump my chair.
“No, no don't give me that, I’m not restarting it again,” I pull off my glasses and put the end of the temple between my teeth.
“Did you already try restarting?”
“...No,” I mumble a bit sheepishly. I push the receiver away from my face as I grumble, “That's what the IT guys say to trick you into forgetting what the actual problem was.”
“Humor me,” he says, his voice pure patience. His voice is soothing mental itches I didn’t know I had. It’s deep and complex and I don’t think I’ve ever listened this closely just to the sound of someone’s voice before.
Blood Fever is one hell of a drug.
I harrumph as loudly as possible into the receiver so that there's no mistaking my displeasure. I've been onto these IT guys and their quick fix solutions that give you the runaround.
“It’s still doing the thing,” I snap, perhaps a little too triumphantly, when the screen flickers through the start up.
Khent hums a little on the other end of the line, a note of amusement. “That’s not a good thing.”
“Well. I guess that means it’s just broken, right?” I twirl the office desk phone’s chunky wire cord around my finger a moment, and stop myself just before I offer to bring the laptop down to IT myself.
As good as the plan cooked up by my nethers sounds right now, it would be entirely counterproductive. I just wanted to chat for some solidarity or something. Not to announce my impending arrival so we could find a storage closet to get to know each other in.
“There’s something else we can try,” Khent offers after a few moments, and it does take me a second to remember what he means about my computer. Not like, positions or locations.
I put him on speaker phone, just to get the intimate hush of his voice out of my ear.
“Alright, what do I do?”
“Turn it off.”
“AGAIN?”
“And then unplug the laptop.”
I grumble and do as he says, wondering if this is all the IT guys do every day. “Ok.”