I look like yes and these chickens like yuck

With Mary and Holly both getting some much-needed rest and Nick not ready to trust Nola’s cooking given her usual demeanor, Nick headed down to the Banquet Hall to see if anyone else was up. He needed to catch up a bit on what had happened yesterday, not to mention what had happened at Gina’s party; apparently, the girls had all gotten boons of some kind.

Knowing Dakota, chaos was very likely to ensue.

Part of him was honestly glad that Vivian had gone back to her room to seek out Octavia; it would be kind of awkward to run into her at dinner.

Less awkward? Walking into the room and seeing Kim stuffing her face with pastries.

The slender girl froze in place, and her eyes bulged in surprise. Her lips and chin were covered in frosting and her cheeks were stuffed full. She flinched at the sight of him, and for a second Nick thought she was going to ****.

“Kim?” He approached her cautiously, confused why she was reacting like that. She’d never looked so startled to see him before.

The short-haired girl didn’t say anything because her mouth was full. Then she started to rapidly fan her face with her hand, and began to make a gagging noise. Nick immediately sprung into action, thinking she was ****. Although having no idea how to administer life-saving techniques he dashed across the room anyway, getting to her as fast as possible.

By the time he did, though, she had **** her food down her throat, and let out a long sigh of relief. “Haaah… ugh… ow…” Kim slumped over the table and wiped her face off with a napkin before sinking down into a chair, her face hot with embarrassment. Nick was feeling a little uncomfortable himself, walking in on something like that.

“So, uh… you good?”

The blushing girl couldn’t even look at him. “It’s not what you think,” she mumbled, covering her face. “Please just let me die of shame, would you? That would be great…”

Nick was pretty sure she was joking; but with Kim’s dark sense of humor it was hard to tell. So he laughed and sat down across from her. “Wouldn’t it have been easier to just let yourself **** then?” He asked.

Kim narrowed her eyes and stuck out her tongue. “Very funny,” she sneered. “For the record, you startled me! I’m usually WAY better about, um… keeping stuff… in my… mouth… and… swallowing it…” Her face got redder and redder as she realized what she was saying. Each word came out worse than the last. “…Please say something now, don’t let me keep talking.”

Well, Nick was actually enjoying this a bit. But he decided to spare her the embarrassment. “Don’t worry, I’ll pretend like I didn’t see anything. But only if you tell me what’s going on, why the sudden carbo-loading?”

“Ooh, look at you, Mr. Big Words,” Kim sneered. “…Sorry. Dunno where that came from.” She let out a tired sigh and slumped a little further down into her seat. “Temptation is a bitch, if you want to know why.”

No, Nick still didn’t get it.

Seeing the dumb look on Nick’s face actually made Kim a little irritated. She pinched her lips together in a frown. “My room is full of candy,” she reminded him. “Every night I go to sleep to the smell of sweets. Wake up to the smell of sweets. And my dreams, guess what they’re about?”

Nick had a couple guesses. “Um… sweets?”

“Yeah, I’m working in a chocolate factory wrapping candy bars, it’s ****,” Kim groaned, rubbing her stomach.

“Well, at least you get to sing, right? And watch fat kids drown?”

Kim picked up a chocolate chip that had fallen off of one of the pastries, and flicked it at his head.

“Very funny. Look, my point is that I’ve been working super hard to stay in shape, right?” She stood up and gestured to her svelte frame. Her skimpy school uniform was just a little short on her figure, leaving just a tiny peak between the bottom of her shirt and the top of her skirt. Just to prove her point, Kim reached down and pulled it up to show off her trim belly. “But… since staying in that room I’ve been having… cravings.”

Nick remembered what the inside of that candy room looked like. He couldn’t really blame Kim for feeling that way. She lowered her shirt and sat back down, looking glum.

“Since I can’t actually eat any of the sweets in there without, well… …I don’t even know what would happen if I did,” Kim admitted with a sigh, shaking her head. “But I don’t want to find out. So I snuck down here really early since Gina always wakes up late, and…”

“Stuffed your face with sugar?” Nick finished for her.

Kim nodded grimly. “I’m worried that if I keep eating like this I’m gonna get chubby,” she admitted, blushing a little. “You don’t… think that, right?”

Nick remembered the nice view she’d just gave him. He looked at the fidgeting girl in front of him, and wondered how she could even think that way.

“Trust me, Kim, I think you’re worrying over nothing,” Nick assured her. “I don’t think even Dani would chew you out for sneaking a few danishes here and there.”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Kim sighed in relief. “The last thing I’d want is for you to think I’m some kind of pig!” She snorted out a laugh that Nick could tell was trying to mask a couple insecurities. He winced when he heard it.

“Kim, you’re fine. We’ve talked about stuff like this before, remember?” He pressed her. “It’s okay to do what you want. I’m certainly not going to think any less of you. And even if you did gain a couple pounds here and there, so what? Before you know it, we’re all going to be old and wrinkly and saggy and then it’s not gonna matter at all.”

Kim crossed her arms over her chest. “Gee,” she said, her voice oozing with sarcasm. “You just know how to sweet talk all the girls, don’t you?”

Nick gave her a rueful smile and shrugged. “Okay, yeah, maybe that wasn’t the best way to put it,” he admitted.

“No, gee, really?”

“Kim, that’s enough, you’ve made your point, mercy, please,” he begged, earning another giggle from the lively girl. That was good. Kim’s smiles were always beautiful, but they were at their best when they carried genuine cheer.

“So, um… I would really like it, if we stopped talking about my cravings, please?” Kim begged him, scratching her cheek. She smiled sheepishly. “Not a lot of girls like to be reminded about their appetites.”

Nick didn’t see a problem with it himself, but far be it for him to argue with the lady in question. He nodded. “Sure, what do you want to talk about?”

“How did your date with Miss ‘My Other Car Is Made of Platinum’ go?” Kim asked, not even trying to hide the bitchy tone of her voice.

Nick tensed. Great. Of course she would have to ask about Vivian.

“…I really don’t want to talk about it,” he said firmly.

Kim flinched. She hadn’t expected a reaction like that. Oof. That bad, huh? Great, way to go, me. Way to kill the mood.

She needed to find some way to change the subject, fast. “Uh… …Oh! You might not have heard about this, but did you know, we all got boons from Gina’s party?”

“Yeah, I heard about that,” Nick said, glad to be off that topic. “Apparently, Nola is working for Mary now, as her **** or something.”

Kim smirked. “Ye-p,” she hummed, popping her lips. “If you ask me, that’s just about the funniest thing ever.”

“What about you?” Nick asked, leaning forward. “What boon did you get? You know, if it’s not too embarrassing,” he added. “I wouldn’t want to pressure a blushing damsel like yourself into revealing anything untoward.”

Gee, where was a chocolate chip when Kim needed one? She laughed and rolled her eyes. “No, you doof,” she scoffed. “My boon was-” Her words caught in her throat when she realized that telling Nick about her boon would immediately result in him asking if she’d used it, and then she’d have to tell him about the bounty she’d already claimed.

“Uuhhhaaaaaaaahhhhhgguuuhhhh…” Kim made a bunch of weird sounds with her throat that she tried to link together into a cohesive word, but failed miserably.

Nick almost laughed. “…So…”

“It’s not embarrassing!” The embarrassed girl exclaimed in embarrassment, holding her hand up in front of his face and practically jumping over the table. Her cheeks were burning. “It’s not! It’s just… private! For now!”

Well Nick had no interest in torturing her, so he decided not to press any further and just nodded. “Well, okay then.”

She realizes I could just ask someone else, right? He thought. Not that he would, of course.

Kim sank back into her seat, mentally beating herself up. I can’t believe I just did that! He can just ask someone else, you idiot!

“…Okay, I’ll tell you,” she mumbled, wishing she didn’t have to. “I got… a head start on collecting bounties.”

“A head start?” Nick asked.

Kim bit her lip and nodded. Her face still felt a little hot. “You know, the Bounty Board, up in the lounge? Basically, before Dakota goes to post anything up there, she’s going to run it by me first. And if I want the bounty, I can have first dibs.”

“Wow, and you get that for the rest of the round?” Nick thought that was a pretty good edge for the diligent girl to have. He knew how hard Kim worked, and what she could do when she put her mind to something. “That sounds really useful.”

“Yeah,” Kim nodded. “But you can’t ask what bounty I’m working on right now. You can’t. So don’t even try.”

“Right, I… I won’t,” Nick said, sensing this was the reason for her earlier outburst. Of course, even as he said that, he just felt curious now. After all, what could embarrass a girl who had enlarged her breasts to the size of beanbag chairs on their last date?

Maybe he was better off not knowing.

“Anyway,” Kim said, leaning back in her chair and relaxing a bit, now that she wasn’t under pressure, “if you want to know what boons the other girls got, I can give you the rundown.”

“Rose got WHAT?” Nick nearly fell out of his chair. He stared in open-mouthed shock at Kim as she nodded sincerely, the serious look in her eyes showing that she wasn’t just playing around with him right now.

“Yeah, she got… a pregnancy control button, or something,” Kim said, rubbing her temples. “I don’t remember what it was called, but basically it means she can choose whether or not she gets pregnant. You know, when you… …Inside her.”

Of all the boons Kim had described, this last one really took the cake. Sure there were some interesting ones like Carly’s watch and Sylvia’s redo button, but this one…

“I-I guess… that could be a good thing?” Nick stammered, trying to wrap his head around why Dakota would give out a boon like that. “You know, a way to ensure you don’t get pregnant… that’s pretty good.”

Kim stared at him and her lips pinched into an amused smirk. “…Gee, tell us how you really feel,” she teased.

“Huh!?” Nick looked at her in confusion.

“I mean, come on, Nick,” Kim giggled, leaning forward and resting her chin in her hands. “Is a girl choosing to not get pregnant really a good thing in your book?”

Nick froze as he felt Kim’s foot brushing up against his leg. Her hazel eyes sparkled in amusement and she wiggled her eyebrows, flashing a knowing grin.

“You and I both know that when it comes to you, I think you’d be a lot more interested in using it the other way…”

“O-okay, that’s enough of that,” Nick said, scooting back in his chair and pulling away from the teasing tomboy. “I didn’t-! That… …Kim!”

Kim nearly rolled out of her seat in laughter. “Yep, that’s what I thought!” She cackled, feeling vindicated by Nick’s flustered reaction. “You’re imagining it, aren’t you? Good old Rose swelling up to the size of a house!”

“No!” Nick lied through his teeth, his face heating up. “Only because YOU put that image in my head by telling me about it! And even if I was… that’s… it’s completely out of the question, you know that as well as I do!”

His statement had an immediate effect on Kim. She sat up and looked at him, a little surprised, like she hadn’t expected a sincere response like that one from Nick.

“Really? Out of the question?” She asked, like she couldn’t believe it. “And yet we’ve got Mary, who’s probably going to be showing any day now? Out of the question, huh…”

Nick winced. “That… Mary and I… it was different.”

“Because Dakota held her down and made you do it?” Kim probably shouldn’t have been pressing so hard on this, but the question burned a hole in her mind. “From where I was sitting, you didn’t seem to be raising any objections.”

“No, not because of that,” Nick said, waving aside those concerns. “Mary and I, we wanted to, it’s just… it was different!”

“Oh, then because you got married?” Kim frowned. “Well… I know better than anyone that just because you get married, that never stopped anyone from being a bad father.”

Nick gave her a wounded look. “You think I…?”

“NO!” Kim’s eyes widened and she quickly shook her head. “No, that… sorry, I was just, um, airing my own… issues… uh…”

In her mind, Kim created the mental image of a duplicate of herself, threw the copy down onto the floor, and began pummeling her with everything she had. Stupid! Stupid!

“Kim?”

Nick’s tense voice snapped Kim back to reality like one of Ella’s rubber-bands, and the distracted girl blushed.

“Sorry… I… didn’t mean to suggest…” Kim sighed and rubbed her temples. “Remember, Nick, we talked about this before. Being more responsible, thinking through consequences… …Look, Mary is special, you know how she gets about babies and all that.”

“Believe me, I know,” Nick said, nodding.

“And I get it,” Kim continued. “You care about her, and you would definitely be there for your kids. Trust me, I’m not thinking about you at all when it comes to… that stuff.”

Well, it was nice to hear that Kim wasn’t mentally comparing him to her piece of shit biological father who abandoned his family. Nick should be so thankful.

“…But you also have to think about it a little, too,” she added. “I mean… look, we both know, you have your… interests.”

That was a nice way to word it, Nick thought. “Interests.” Yeah. It wasn’t his fault that he got aroused at the thought of getting women pregnant.

“It’s a logistical issue, though,” Kim continued. “I mean, Mary alone, the way she talks it’s like she wants to keep having kids until her body runs out of eggs, and I don’t know if you’ve done the math on this one, but that’s a lot of mouths to feed!”

“Yeah, I am WELL aware,” Nick assured her. This wasn’t the first time he’d had a conversation about this topic. It wasn’t even the first time he’d had a conversation about this topic with Kim!

“So if you’re planning on adding Rose to the mix, well…” Kim didn’t want to speak ill of the other woman, but she was having a tough time keeping her concerns off her face. And Nick could see them written quite clearly on her angular features.

He sighed. “So what, do you think I should just say no if one of the other women in my harem comes up to me and says they want me to get them pregnant?”

Kim raised her eyebrow. That was a very specific scenario he was imagining. “…That depends, are you even capable of saying no in that situation?”

“…YES!” Nick felt a little insulted, even though he could see where Kim was coming from.

“Then yes. Probably.” She shrugged. “I don’t know. Only thing I can tell you, Nick, is what I’ve already told you. Having kids without being prepared, not a good thing. Living proof. Right here.” She pointed fingers from both hands at herself and blew a burst of air out of her lips as she tilted her chair backwards.

Nick understood where Kim was coming from, he really did. But he also remembered the look of adoration on Rose’s face when she doted over those kids in the fantasy future she’d constructed on their last Dream Alley date.

Rose was putting everything she had into this. And while some of it was definitely spurred by her desperation to compete with Mary over every last thing she could, he also knew that a part of her genuinely did want to be a mother.

And now Kim was here telling him that she had a way of guaranteeing that could happen, today. On their planned date together.

Dakota had definitely arranged for this. He couldn’t see any reality where that WASN’T the case, honestly.

All while Nick was thinking about this, Kim was watching him closely. Judging his reactions and seeing just how he felt about the situation he found himself in.

Her heart went out to him, it really did.

“…Look, I’m gonna be real here,” Kim said, sitting up straight and leaning forward with her most “matter-of-fact” stare. “This situation, it’s twisted and awkward. Most people aren’t going to have to deal with circumstances like ours. And… that includes me.”

She sighed. “Do I want kids someday? I mean… probably? Maybe? For obvious reasons, I haven’t really had the freedom to consider it before I came to this island,” she reminded him. “But… yeah. It’s a big deal. So if you and Rose are ready for that, well… you’ve got the tools you need.”

Kim looked down blatantly at his pants, just to make sure there were no misunderstandings about what she meant.

Nick turned red.

“Kim-!”

“But one thing to keep in mind.” She snapped her gaze back up to him and looked him in the eyes. “This is Rose we’re talking about, here. Are you both confident that she’s prepared for the responsibility of becoming a mother? That’s what should be at the front of your mind when you’re making this decision,” she said firmly.

And out of everything she’d said, those words probably carried the most weight.