chicating

Kay woke up parched, wondering where she was, and oddly transfixed by a cobweb catching the late-morning light from its resting place hanging from Terry Quinn’s ceiling. Although she was no domestic goddess herself, she tsked a bit about that. Irregular as they tended to be, she had enough cleaning jags that she really felt there was no excuse for that.

She had the beginnings of a headache and some throbbing from the use of muscles she’d forgotten that she had—although things in that department were still good with Munch overall, they had settled into a pattern where they weren’t trying tons of new things, and it showed now as she was feeling stretched, literally.
.
She was also huddled quite close to a sleeping Quinn, who, as she thought about getting up, mumbled something and came in even closer. However much they had both felt like lone wolves at the bar, it appeared they were both no longer used to sleeping alone…however much she might prize the occasional weeknight when Munch stayed behind in New York to handle casework and left her with the remote, a little quiet, and a big bed all to herself.

She had also liked the feeling of Quinn next to her, which was personally satisfying if not the thought of a guilty girlfriend(woman friend? Eh, everything she tried to come up with to describe what they were seemed either foolish or old-fashioned to her ears) shaking off both her pique and the realization that she had picked a really stupid fight.
Possibly for no reason, though, the pictures in her brain of the inciting incident were blurred by emotion, hormones and, you know, the tide of beer, both foreign and domestic, that she first tippled than slurped. Even so, Munch was maddening, so it wasn’t quite for no reason, she was sure about that.So, how had she given in so easily, and then slept so well with someone else? Besides draining half the beer in the District? Seriously, when she glanced at the paper or half-listened to the news in the next day or so, she’d expect to hear or read about shortages. But one thing she braced for from her young woman’s adventures that wasn’t present(aside from the fact that the beer was more expensive) was shame. She turned it around in her head enough that Quinn awakened…his gaze affectionate and green, but just ever-so-slightly unfocused.
She hated to hear some kid’s voice in her head, but wow, he was still cute. On the other hand, beer goggles would be easier to laugh off and shove into some part of her brain that felt like an overflowing chest of drawers from all the unwanted thoughts she kept stuffing back in it. Terry Quinn’s six feet whatever and those clear green eyes wouldn’t fit in there. Damn.“Kay! You’re still here.”
“Do you, like, need me not to be? Are you married or something…without some kind of…understanding or whatever. Because I could pee and throw my clothes on in ten minutes flat…if I could trouble you for some water first. It’s been a while, but I’ve actually timed it.” Better to sound like a slut than all- thumbs Katie Howard who led when she slow-danced.
“No wives. No understandings.”