In the Warm and Cozy

'Would you like some coffee or tea, Mr. M?—I mean Mr. Masterson.' Janie rescues the still startled Lea, while she apologizes for shortening his name.

'Thank you, Janie. As your students will tell you, I often answer to Mr. M.' He says as Janie offers him a place on the couch to join them.

'I wanted to talk to all of you, especially Lea.' He adds as he smiles at Lea and Sally.

While they're waiting for coffee, Earnie brings toasted triangles with jam, Mr. M looks at Janie and Snooki, 'No cookies?'

'We wish! We haven't found an oven up here yet.' Snooki says.

'Ah, my bad, I can't have my instructors lack the tools they need. I'll give you a key to the practice room on the 4th floor; it has a fully equipped kitchen, we use it for extra space if class sizes are too large. You can refine your recipes and teaching plans and get a head start before school begins.'

Lea watches this exchange, waiting for what this Mr. M has to say about her future, She sighs remembering how she purposely avoided this now important man whom she remembers being told was her mother's friend. She's surprised how envious she is that Janie and Snooki will actually teach at the school, that Sally will be with them, and Earnie, too. Not that she wants to enroll or be a chef, but...no...like an unexpected hug, it comes to her, warming something chilly she keeps hidden. No, she just wants to belong.

'So, Lea,' Mr. Masterson says, settling into the couch, watching their rapt attention, their keen interest a testament to their support for Lea and Sally, he tells them about his phone call with Mrs. Ferguson, leaving out Maggie's comment about how the girls might need a chaperone, or at least some reinforcements, in the attic least they get carried away with what she euphemistically called 'youthful temptations.' He looks at each of them, as he tells them how he suggested that if Lea was interested he had a job for her and how she could join Sally in what Maggie called the 'girl's dormitory.'

He nods to Lea, and tells them what he told Mrs. Ferguson, the job's not a freebie, that he is really impressed with Lea's art work and had been thinking that a mural of chefs in action might be inspirational on some of the school's bare walls, especially downstairs on the walls along the entryway and the wide hallways leading to the auditorium, and if that works out, on some of the walls around second floor restaurant.

'Is that something you might want to do, Lea?'

Lea's eye's are shinning as she looks at her twin and gets a big grin, watches Janie and Snooki smiling, knowing somehow it's a package deal, that she will be welcomed. And finally she laughs when Earnie says, 'We'll be your models!'

'I'd love too!' Lea says, but hesitates, 'Aren't you taking a chance on an unknown artist like me.'

'The scale might be larger that you're use to...' And Lea is shocked when he adds, 'except for the ceiling of your bedroom.'

Mr. M explains that for years her mother has shown off your pictures and even invited him to look at the painting on the canopy bed and the starry night ceiling in her room.

'I hope you all will think of yourselves as a team, I like the idea of you being models along with some others I can think of. So, if you're willing, Lea, and don't mind staying with this rowdy crew—I assume you all can find another bed for the girl's dormitory as your mother called it—we could start out with a practice wall on the forth floor, a place to workout the color scheme and the scale of the murals.' Adds with a grin, 'And maybe a few preliminary sketches so I know what I'm getting into.'

'Come on Van Gogh!' Snooki says, pulling up the misty-eyed Lea, embracing her. Then they are all up laughing and hugging, welcoming the now crying girl home.

Smiling at their joy, Mr. Masterson watches the commotion from the couch, glad for Maggie's call, not worried much about the inevitable 'youthful temptations,' glad to have found a place where his adopted sister's children can prosper and be safe.

Chapter 8 Where Temptation Hides

'Any more pizza and you'll turn into a balloon.'

'More hot air?' Lea asks, not liking where this is going.

'Just the facts, ma'am.' Sally says.

'Yes, Mom!' Lea answers, more forcefully than she meant, giving more away than intended.

'How is Mother Maggie?' Sally says. 'Is she still worried about us...'

'I'm not your chaperon.' Lea replies, irritated. 'Ask Earnest. More pillow talk will coax out the details.' Lea adds, surprised Sally has the nerve to say a word about Lea's secret attraction to Sammy.

'Nothing from my own wandering Sis?' Lea persists.

'Bye-bye, don't do anything I wouldn't, slut.' Sally says and leaves. She ignores the pillow talk implication, she'll tell the girls how she managed to find herself in Earnest's bed later when it's quiet. Maybe tonight while they've all settled down and are done teasing her.

Meanwhile, Lea ignores her sister's dig, but takes the pizza comment to heart. Weight gain is hardly the issue she knows. Sally knows it, too, judging by the looks Lea gets every time Sammy the Pizza guy drops off a pie.

Yes, Sammy's offbeat jokes bring a smile, but her/his bright smile and infectious laugh are the main event. As for the awkward pronouns, she'll have to wait and see about the lingering smiles and flirting banter, see past hesitation, where craving like a flower blooming, is in its fullness...or maybe the craving is just it—the mystery of the he/she girl, her differences their own beguiling promise.

Snooki comes up behind Lea and snuggles against her back, as natural as a child might hug her friend, and says, "Sammy's cute why don't you invite her to a sleepover."

'Because, you twit, I'm afraid of a girl whose pronoun is hard to say. It's good for you to causally say 'her' like it's nothing, but it's probably a big deal to her/him.' She thinks, careful not to show even a hint of irritation, as she leans into the Snooki's hug. Silently, she's brimming, like a pressure cooker ready to explode.

'You're almost as bad girlfriend!' Turning, Lea whispers hoarsely, but goes on louder, 'hugging me the way you know I like and that damn Janie—your sweetheart—grinning her Mona Lisa smile, blessing all these...what...easy peasy, come and play with me touches, like pricks of desire,' and stares at Snooki, shocked at her own too-revealing outburst.

Then she adds, all in, 'But god don't, girl, don't ever stop.'

Janie, on the big rocking chair across the room, stares at them, admiring their embrace, like an oh-so-pretty picture, in person before her. And just as Lea said, smiles her sweet unbidden smile at their beauty, at the flow of things, at the feelings she senses, like minnows swimming every which way, alive, abundant in the big ocean of them together, shivery sweet among them, a force unto themselves.

Janie goes to the girls, still in each other others arms, staring at each other, shocked into silence by Lea's outburst.—Stalled, Janie thinks, in the throes of what was just supposed to be one of the many casual hugs they've all come to expect, even crave.

So she kisses Lea and kisses Snooki, giggling, inserting herself between their uncertainty, kissing and kissing, surrounding them like a playful sprite, just like they did to Sally when the elevator stalled and she was afraid.

Snooki knows what Janie's doing, knows what love intends.

Lea is crying. She wants to run away, to hide her head, but can't stop the kisses, can't stop the sweetness, can't stop, she sighs, the love those tears represent.

They curl up on their bed and hold the girl, muttering encouragement...you can just ask her what she wants to be called, you can just talk to her, look at us, we tell you all our secrets, Janie knows Snooki likes you, can't keep her hands off you, knows you're jealous of Sally somehow sleeping in Earnie's bed, knows you sometimes look at Janie like she's a tasty morsel, you bad girl, we love you, we do, we can't help ourselves, stroking, playfully stroking Lea, who feels oddly like the family dog, unwavering in both loyalty and need.

Chapter 9 Sleeping With Earnest

As dawn colors the sleepy gray of her surroundings, Sally finds herself under a strange blue sheet, snuggly warm on a too-comfortable bed, against the warmth of another body. She muses, half asleep...not Lea or Snooki or Janie's, all of whom have snuggled next to her warmth, her body an invitation too sweet to resist.

Maybe it's Sammy, remembering a dream of him with Lea, but no, this warm body is someone she knows, someone she's smelled before, someone like...her eyes squeeze shut...Earnest!

'Oh my! Oh no! She feels an involuntary flush, I can hear their teasing, their catcalls now. I just wanted to warm some milk from the frig. Why did I need warm milk? Am I a child, couldn't I wait 'til morning? She scolds herself and eases out of bed, rolling to the edge like a misguided ninja, wanting to escape her folly.

A hand on her shoulder gently nudges her back. Earnie whispers, 'Good morning, Sally, did you know you snore like a purring lion? After you woke me by almost sitting on me, I fell back asleep listening to that purr.' With familiar good humor, he explains, 'You were sleep walking, holding an empty glass as you turned away from the microwave. I tried to wake you but instead you walked toward my voice and stumbled onto the bed.'

Innocent enough, Sally muses, as she leans back down still half asleep, back to the intriguing comfort of the soft bed and the warm Earnest. Close but not too close, she hopes... Let them tease!

Eyes closing and a comely smile forming, Sally whispers back to her newfound bedmate, 'Just be a gentleman, Earnest...don't tell tales...you can snuggle, take off the chill...' and shuts her eyes in dreams, as though to disavow the temptation she's enabled.

A hour later, they wake to other bodies slipping in beside them, prompted, if not invited, by the shock of seeing Sally and Earnie pressed together, a thin blue sheet the only thing separating their curves.

A hand to cups Sally's breast, another lands on Earnie's butt as they're awash with other bodies, giggling, snuggling and stroking, their hands playfully roaming in search of mischief.

Sally sees the tuff of blond hair as Snooki's lips kiss her neck. A lick! And then close to her ear, another lick, Damn be careful girl!

Caught! She giggles helplessly. Caught between a kiss and something a little too hard against my bottom... What canoodling with boys will get you.

Meanwhile, Earnie, wakes to the hands taking liberty with his body, not quit but temptingly close to the erection he's trying to hide as much for Sally's sake as his own.

Just natural, tho unexpected, nothing to see here folks, just move along...geez! As he rolls away from Sally onto his belly.

Janie laughs, 'Something to hide, Earnest? Fully sheathed, I mean clothed, I hope?'

Before Earnie can claim his innocence, he feels the full sensuous press of Lea along the length of his body. She strokes his hair and nibbles his earlobe, and whispers, 'Sister's share, twins devour! Better be careful!' And pauses, before another whisper, lips smiling against his ear, 'I'm jealous!'

Lea advances her playful assault by squirming into Earnest's tempting glutes, groin to curve, as she smirks, 'Guess you're not going anywhere soon, Senior Stud.'

Sally swats at Lea, 'Move girl!'

'Am I invading your turf, Miss Slut?'

'No, you're embarrassing Earnest.'

'You mean the big E?' Lea teases. 'Is that an accurate assessment?'

The blush deepens on Earnie's cheek, Janie shares a look with Snooki. Together they move to separate the twins by rolling Lea off Earnie onto the next most convenient spot—Janie's arms. Janie hugs Lea, telling her, 'You can pick on me for a change...'

'Hear that, Snook? Janie says I can pick on your lover.'

'What are friends for, if they can't share.' Snooki says, smiling, looking at the twinkle in Lea's eyes, as she adds, 'Anyway it's my turn to temp your boyfriend.' And rolls herself from Sally's side to wedge herself into the widening seam between between Sally and Earnest.

Earnie groans, 'Geez,' but stays on his belly, and of necessity scoots to the right into the tangle of bodies that is Janie and Lea.

Lea, on top of Janie, slides up and down, seeing if she can tickle their nipples together. Grinning, she tells them she has the reach. 'I can kiss either of you with a turn of my head.'

Snooki looks past Earnie's reddened earlobes to Lea grinning at the chance to tease her tormentors, as she says, 'Lips to lips!' and kisses Janie. Next, she kisses Earnie, leaning on his back to angle her face to match the turn of his head. Trapped! He looks at the besieged Janie, pressing his lips to avoid Lea's attack.

Lea narrates, 'Just an affectionate kiss, my lips like a love bird fluttering between Jane to Earnest...' And laughs, 'with many more to follow.'

And so begins the promised kissing—some short, just a playful peck, some long and lingering, some bold, the tip of the tongue insinuating, and some with a lunge across Earnie onto the vicariously parted lips of Snooki.

Sally's propped on her elbow, the better to watches her sister's antics. When Lea kisses Snooki, Sally can't help but lean into Snooki, whose wet, shinning lips, still parted, welcome hers with an amused smile.

Catching her breath, Snooki winks at Janie, 'Attack of the Tempting Twins!'

'As long as they keep their clothes on.' Janie says. And tugs at Lea's loose night gown, pulling it past her naked butt.

'Good idea, sweetie!' Snooki says and pats Lea's ass, her hand lingering for a squeeze.

'Oh!' Lea says, her lips hovering over Earnie's, eye's narrowing, as Janie rubs Lea's back, comforting as much as teasing, 'Pretty, pretty butt! Better cover you up before we can't stop ourselves.' Then pinches a plump cheek and pulls the nighty down.

Snooki pushes hair from Lea's downturned face, checking on her friend.

'Don't you dare hide!' Lea says and brushes Janie's hair from Earnie's face where he's burrowed to deflect her assault.

She flicks her tongue demurely. Down she goes. Her kiss as French and tantalizing as that wisp of tongue. Thinks Earnie when he can breathe.

Leaning over Earnie, Lea turns to Snooki, 'Next on the kissing train!' And kisses her again, tongue to tongue, pulling up Snooki's night gown until rides high on her chest, baring a finely round, perky breast.

Collapsing back onto Earnie, Lea frees her hand ready for more mischief. This time its Sally's turn as Lea pulls her sister's hand onto the round of Snooki's belly.

No, no, no! Sally stares at Lea willing her not to go too far.

Sally's traitor hand stays put, doesn't slip away from that warm belly as she knows it should. Their mutual attention is singularly upon it, as Lea takes Miss Hand and guides it downward, down low into the wet hairs of Snooki's pussy, where their entwined fingers remain firmly in place to the chagrin of a shocked Sally.

'Wet?' Lea asks.

'It should be.' Janie says and pushes up Lea's nighty again. This time she snakes her own hand between the round of Earnie's ass and cups the sopping wet Lea.

'Wet!' She says echoing Lea.

Instead of all the frisky things she wants to do to them both, Lea sighs as caution offers a telltale inkling: Too close! Too close for comfort, too close not to burrow into the sweet, into what she wants, into... Fingers still, refusing the urge to probe, not wanting to go too far, to not upset the balance of...everything, of her friends, not lovers, but 'snugglers,' as she affectionately thinks of them.

Snooki's night gown is ruffled up over her breast, its nipple hard like a beacon, a lighthouse of desire illuminating their secrets. Lea retreats, takes Sally's wet fingers and weds them to Janie's. With a wink, she pulls those slippery hands across that achy breast to kiss them, even lick them. Then she presses them to Snooki's lips, where they too are licked, each pout of lips on enveloping finger, a sizzle of desire on the nipple now resting against Sally's cheek.

Sally, the good sister, giggles in relief, bestows a goodbye kiss on that nipple, and tugs Lea's nighty down, 'Thanks for not going too far, Sis.' She adds smacking her ass hard.

Sitting up a bit as best she can like a soldier on a battlefield, this one of bodies tangled in desire, a dazed Snooki strokes Lea's back. Smiling sweetly at Janie and Sally—true love and temptation—she sums up their predicament, 'We wouldn't know how to act if we have to shyly avert our eyes every time we have a sexy thought.'

'Yeah!' Says Earnie, 'None of us would walk straight.'

'Some of us are already straight, Earnest! Should we do a bed check?' Smirks Janie, glad to deflect.

And so come tickles every which way, content to forego kisses for play, like puppies upon each other, eager for their fun. After a while, exhausted, they lay together contentedly on the big bed, shoulder to shoulder, looking up at the high white ceiling.

'You could paint this ceiling, Lea.' Earnie says. 'A tableau of bodies snuggling, with the pout of your shapely ass barely covered.'

'Something to draw the eye.' Mutters Snooki, holding Lea's hand. After their play, the tableau finds the three of the girls indeed snuggled together, with the frisky Lea agreeably subdued in their center between Janie and Snooki whose heads are pillowed on her shoulder.

Earnest is again with Sally by his side, albeit unwittingly. After she returned from the bathroom, Lea commented, 'We kept a space for you, Sis, by your lover.'

'Thanks!' Sally replies, going with it, the tension of their discovery swept away by Lea's shenanigans. And so she kisses Earnie on the cheek. 'Good morning, sweetheart, it's nice to have company.'

'Why sleep alone in the cold, when this giant bed with it's firm mattress is just across the hall.' Sally continues, that take-no-prisoners smile they've come to recognize in her voice. 'After Lea and her dildo are done playing, and Snooki and Janie are done moaning. Wouldn't it be nice if they join us, dear? Especially, if they don't bother to wash, come as you are—or as you did.'

She ends her invitation with a smirk and looks innocently over Earnest at her friends.

Janie, closest to her provocative roommate, takes up the challenge, and turns to rub herself languidly over Earnest as she reaches for Sally. Instead of shying away, Sally rests her head on Earnest's chest, and let's Janie stroke her, running her hand from the top of her head to the round of shoulder, once, twice and then, oh-oh, on to her rump which she greets with a slap.

'Earnest, are you a party to this invitation? I don't see how you'd get a wink of sleep.' Janie says, eyes batting. 'Remember what happens when those warmed up pheromones go wafting around your head from randy girls, oh so eager for—opps, I mean to join you—in bed.'

'Jeez,' Earnie laughs, 'Can't we be friends without too many benefits.'

And adds, surprising them all, himself included, 'Come as you are. My bed is your bed. Snuggle all you want, but nooo fucking.' He exaggerating the sing-song 'No' like its an invitation.

'Yes! Yes! Yes!' They giggle, the word 'fucking' like a shot of caffeine. 'We'll try our very best to mind our manners.' Someone adds, he thinks it's Snooki, as they straddle him and ply him with kisses until those kisses shift and lips upon lips parade before his amused eyes as his friends toy with each other, close but not too close, back to the simmer, but not the boil.

Lea has the last word. She squishes past Janie to lick Earnie's cheek ending in a dainty kiss on the tip of his nose, 'Just stirring up the pheromones Earnest, that way you'll know whose body presses against you in the dark of the night.'