Going shopping for clothes. With Nick in tow.

"Oh. My. God. I'm stuffed. I can't take a single step." Joy groans and leans back against me, rubbing her stomach. The tingling from that is just a little too pleasurable for her to do this in public, but I decide not to say anything. After all, that would kind of give away that we share some senses.

"Hey, it's not like you actually have to--fuck, sorry. That was insensitive." Yes, Nick has a habit to put his foot in the mouth. But lucky for him, he's a good guy, too. "Have Matt kick me or something."

Forget I said anything. He's an ass. Why do I hang out so much with him again?

"You heard him, Matt. Kick him for me!" Joy seems to enjoy the banter, at least. And with her batting her eyes at me from where her head rests on my shoulder...

"Ow! I didn't think you'd take me up on that!" Laughing, Nick rubs his shin where I lightly bumped my foot against it. Alright, maybe not that lightly. "Have mercy, please. Alright, now that I've been suitably punished: Got anything planned for today?"

"Uh, well, we kind of wanted to go shopping for clothes, get Joy some new threads, y'know?" I say, in the hopes that Nick would rather go back to his place and game or learn or whatever he does in his free time. But...

"Awesome, I'm in!" No such luck. That damn weirdo... "Going shopping with my best friend and his smoking hot girlfriend? Yes, please!"

"Sure, why not," Joy answers while I still wrack my brain for an excuse to shake Nick off. Whelp... now we have to get through an extended shopping trip with one of the smartest smartasses I know and hope he doesn't find out his best friend turned into a siamese twin over night.

"Aalrighty then, here we are!" Even though he invited himself on our trip, Nick puts on a showmaster impression as we enter one of the lower end clothing stores in the mall just off campus. It has a lot of cheap stores that prey on-- excuse me, target... that sounds sinister too... that offer their goods and services to college students with mid-sized or small wallets. "Everything a lady needs. From makeup over toiletry to clothes - upper- and underwear! And as I'm most assuredly not a pervert, I shall not ogle anyone in here. Much."

See, I know he's joking, and Joy probably suspects it, but Nick manages to get one hell of a stink-eye from the cashier within half a minute of entering the store. To his credit, he does look slightly embarassed and mouths a 'sorry' her way. Hey, he's an ass, not socially inept!

"Okay, now that we've got the ill-advised jokes out of the way, what do you want to check out first?" I adress Joy to fill the slightly awkward silence someone created.

"Let's see. I need..." To my mounting horror, Joy begins counting off her fingers. And keeps counting. And counting. "At least 10 bras, one or two--no wait: I also need about 15 panties, shirts and blouses of course - depending on how many I like, but at least 8, maybe a hat or two, a few scarves and/or bandanas, necklaces, bracelets, rings, and if we can get my ears pierced, some ear rings, too!"

And there goes my entire gaming budget for the rest of the year. I mean, what kind of guy would I be if I didn't give my girlfriend everything she needs? Alright, she only needs the clothing, but who doesn't like to dress up a little? I do have a smoking with a fitting vest that makes me look smoking hot, if you'll pardon the pun. And if Joy has something to dress up with, I'll have a super hot and stylish girlfriend. Who's attached to me at the hip, but whatever.

"That's quite a list. You lost everything you had in a housefire or something?" Leave it to Nick to make a quip that's just on the verge of being insulting.

"Something like that..." Joy replies before I can answer.

"I am. So sorry." As quick as Nick is to put his foot in his mouth, as quick is he to spit it back out again. "Aaanywhoo, want to get to the actual shopping?"

Joy actually can't wait and practically pulls me through the shop, even though I am the one wearing the pants in this relationship. Literally. But then again, Joy is wearing the metaphorical pants, and that's the thing that really matters. Nick offers to do penance by being Joy's pack mule and is soon disappearing under a heap of stuff - clothes, accessories, underwear... This is gonna be **** on my bank account. I probably can afford most of it without having to eat ramen for the rest of the month. Probably.

Of course, the shop has the usual 'three pieces only' policy at the dressing room. The good news: We can circumvent this by having Nick stand in front of the cubicle with the rest of the stuff. The bad news: We circumvent this by having Nick stand in front of the cubicle. This will require utmost care so he doesn't catch on. Or catch us. But first things first: After stepping into the cubicle with Joy's favored tops, we get rid of the straps that 'hold' Joy so she can try on the first one. But there's one thing I didn't take into account...

"Woah!" Smitten with the way she looks in a proper women's shirt - well-tailored, pastel turquoise with abstract, circular designs on the front - Joy stares at her reflection, then at mine, a huge smile spreading on her face. "This is... I love this! It looks awesome!"

And before I can react, Joy pushes herself off the mirror, twisting me around on the spot, and pokes her head and part of her torso out of the cubicle to grin at Nick.

"Look, Nick! The first shirt, and I look great in it!"

"So you do..." Nick sounds confused, and I know why - as far as he knows, Joy doesn't have legs. So why is she so high off the floor, now that I should have set her down? And I bet he's going to ask himself why I haven't left the cubicle to leave Joy to try on her clothes and shoot the shit with him. "But, uh... what..."

Before he can confirm that he's thinking what I think he's thinking, I pull Joy back into the cubicle and glare at her via the mirror. To her credit, she turns bright red as soon as she realizes what she just did. She opens and closes her mouth, eyes wide open, trying to think of something to say, something to do to salvage the situation, but neither of us can think of something.

So Nick recovers faster than us.