>>304970
Your first thought on waking up is "Ow, my head hurts."
Your second is "This isn't my bedroom ceiling."
The events of the previous night come flooding back to you and the only question on your mind becomes "Where did Marcia go?"
You sit up on the couch and glance around the living room. She's not there. She cleaned up the food though. You stand up and walk over to the window and check the driveway. Your car's gone.
Fair enough.
You chug about a gallon of water and try to find where you drunkenly left your smartphone last night. After some cushion spelunking, you manage to find it and check for calls and messages.
No missed calls. Text from Marcia. "Shopping for shit we ran out of last night."
You plant yourself on the couch and open up Google on the phone. You look up whether mutants are actually sterile. It's apparently a popular search, according to the autocomplete. They absolutely are infertile. The feeling is bittersweet. On the one hand, she wasn't just blowing smoke at you last night in an attempt to get knocked up. Then again, you were totally DTF and she's the one who pumped the brakes. And on the other hand, poor Marcia. Surely, there's a way to reverse it? We have the technology to engineer giant mutant soldiers, surely we can, well, undo it. That, too, is a popular search. There's a way to reverse it. It's prohibitively expensive and no insurance covers it. According to insurance companies, the mutants are significantly more robust and healthy than regular humans, and to reverse their mutations would once-again expose them to health troubles and lowered quality of life.
Going down this rabbit hole reveals to you exactly why Marcia was retired early. The super-soldier bubble has popped, and the soldiers returning are being treated like scum, worse than regular veterans. They've formed a movement and have rallied enough support from the public to create drastic social change. Currently, the ball is up in the air whether Tricare will be forced cover the reversal therapy or the military will simply stop producing mutants and wash their hands of the whole affair. In the meantime, they've retired their current mutants and froze any applicants to the program. It seems pretty clear to all involved that the whole program will just be swept under the rug. All the applicants signed waivers, so the government legally owes them nothing.
Marcia opens the door. You nearly drop your phone in surprise.
"You're jumpy," she comments, hoisting all of the grocery bags with her brawny arms as she uses the remaining two to handle closing and locking the door.
You chuckle sheepishly. She walks past to the kitchen and starts putting stuff away. You quickly close all the browser windows on your phone and clear your throat.
"So, uh, about last night…"
"How many times have you had to say that?" she snickers.
"Well, uh, none."
"You're a virgin?" she leans into the kitchen doorway to look at you.
"Well, yeah…"
"Loser!" she cackles derisively and disappears around the corner with a crackle of grocery bags.
Your face flushes. "Well, fuck you! How many men have you slept with?!"
"None. But it's ok, because I'm a girl."
You can't argue with her. Also, you're kinda happy to hear that.
"You certainly didn't act like a virgin last night. Your hands were all over the place," she adds.
"I was drunk…" you sputter. "And that's not the point I wanted to talk about."
"It's fine. I just needed to get it off my chest," she assures you as she steps back into the living room and sits on the couch. "You're probably not interested, and that's fine, don't feel all guilty about it. You don't owe me anything, if anything, I owe you for letting me live here for a while. I'm just not the kinda girl who can go for long without speaking her mind."
"Well, I mean…" you begin.
"I feel better already just finally letting it all out," she interrupts. "I needed to vent, and you let me. Thanks for that much, and thanks for not making it awkward or anything. We can go back to just being normal friends. No baggage."
"For fuck's sake, I'm not trying to turn you down!" you blurt out. "If you just let me finish…"
She flinches, like she did last night when you touched her cheek. You open your mouth to speak but can't think of anything to say that hasn't already been said by the context. You find yourself unable to meet her elated gaze. You look at your feet and try to ignore how hot your ears feel.
"So, I mean," you finally manage to say. "We can give it a shot. We're already living together, so…"
"We skipped a few steps, yeah," she laughs nervously.
"What do we do first? Go to a movie?" you cringe at your own words.
"We've been friends since we were kids, what's seeing a movie going to do? We already know we have the same taste."
"I know, that was a dumb suggestion."
"There's really only a few things we don't know we're compatible with…"
You swallow. "I guess let's try those then…"