Babe

"Practice," Jennifer said slowly, pensively, as if the word were new to her, as if she had never heard it used that way before.

I stayed quiet. The silence stretched between us on the couch while the laptop sat forgotten across her thighs. This was a bigger push than anything I had tried so far. The app had been clear enough: progress had slowed because the commands stayed too safe. Escalation was the only way forward. Still, sitting there watching her process the instruction left my pulse knocking hard against my ribs. If the influence snapped now, everything I had built could start to unravel.

"Practice..." she repeated, tasting the sound. Her brow furrowed. Green eyes dropped to the middle distance while she thought it through. A strand of brown hair slipped forward and brushed the frame of her glasses. Even in the oversized hoodie and baggy sweatpants the long line of her body remained obvious, the soft rise of her chest with each breath, the way her knees angled toward me without her seeming to notice.

If this failed it would be a real setback. She might start resisting the smaller commands again, or I would have to backtrack and find some slower route. Either way, I had played it safe long enough. Jennifer no longer looked at me like something stuck to the bottom of her shoe. The old hostility had thinned into something warmer and more open. The moment felt right for a larger swing.

"Practice..." she said a third time, more confidently now. Her eyes lifted. A small smile formed at the corners of her mouth and a faint nod followed.

"Practice," she said, no hesitation left in the word. "Of course you'll need to practice. I don't know why I thought you'd be able to figure this stuff out without it."

I had not realized I was holding my breath until it left me in a long, quiet exhale. It worked. The command had landed cleanly.

"Since you don't know how to have a girlfriend, I guess I'll have to show you everything," she continued, smiling as she echoed the earlier instruction almost word for word. "And we'll just have to practice until you get it right."

"You'd do that for me?"

"Of course, silly!" The laugh that followed was light and genuine, the kind that used to be reserved for Marcus alone. "I love spending time with you. It will give us a good chance to get closer. Besides, we already spend so much time together here alone. It'll give us a project to work on."

The easy affection in her voice sent a slow heat crawling up the back of my neck. A week ago the idea of her volunteering to spend the afternoon teaching me how to be with a woman would have been pure fantasy. Now she sat inches away, laptop still balanced on her legs, looking at me like the whole idea made perfect sense.

"Good idea, Jennifer," I said, careful to let her feel ownership of the plan. "What do you think we should do first?"

"Well, first thing we're going to do, babe," she said, putting clear weight on the last word, "is get more comfortable talking to each other. We need pet names. For when we're alone, that is. Let's not let Marcus know we're doing this. I don't want it to get weird."

The casual way she called me babe landed harder than I expected. My throat tightened for a second. I kept my face neutral.

"Totally," I agreed. "No need for him to know. I'm not sure he'd get what we're trying to do."

She set the laptop aside on the coffee table and turned more fully toward me on the couch. One knee drew up so that the soft fabric of her sweatpants brushed against my thigh. The contact was light, almost accidental, yet she made no move to pull away.

"So what am I going to call you?" she asked, tilting her head. Afternoon light caught the edge of her glasses and turned one lens briefly bright. "I already like babe for you. It feels right. What about me?"

I let myself look at her properly while I considered it. The messy fall of her hair, the faint colour still sitting high on her cheeks from earlier, the way her mouth stayed soft instead of pressed into the old thin line of irritation. Honey felt natural. Soft. Something I could say without forcing it.

"Honey," I said. "Or hon, when it's quicker."

Her smile widened. "Honey. I like that. Okay, babe. Honey it is."

She reached out and rested her hand on my forearm, fingers warm through the sleeve of my shirt. The touch stayed there, casual and possessive at the same time, while she kept talking.

"We should start at the beginning," she said. "Since you need to see everything. We need to practice wooing each other. Impressing each other. Sure, I'm comfortable with you now, living with you, but if this was a first date, what would it be like?"

She glanced at the clock on the wall. The numbers showed we still had hours before Marcus was due home. Plenty of time.

"We've got the whole afternoon," she continued, giving my arm a light squeeze. "We can really have some fun with this. I'm going to go get changed into something a little nicer. You should do the same. Meet me back in the living room in a few minutes and we'll see where things go. Sound good, babe?"

The repeated pet name and the steady pressure of her hand made it harder to think in straight lines. Heat had settled low in my stomach and was climbing. Part of me still understood exactly what I was doing, how carefully I had steered her to this point with the app. Another part of me was starting to lose track of the difference between the influence and the way she looked at me now, open and willing and close enough to touch.

"Sounds perfect, honey," I said.

Jennifer gave my arm one last squeeze, then stood. The hoodie shifted as she moved, briefly outlining the curve of her waist before the fabric fell loose again. She paused in the doorway to the hallway and looked back over her shoulder, glasses slightly slipped, hair still messy, that new soft smile still in place.

"Don't take too long, babe," she said. "We've got practicing to do."

Then she disappeared toward her bedroom, leaving me alone on the couch with the quiet apartment and the hard, insistent pulse of want that had been building all afternoon. The app had gotten me this far. Whatever happened next would be the real test of how deep the control already ran, and how much further I was willing to push it while Marcus was still safely out of the house.