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Rose hands the deck off to Dave for shuffling, his nimble hands ruffling the cards between his palms in a neat waterfall of printed cardstock. For a few long moments, only the sound of the card backs softly slapping each other can be heard in the room. Dave doesn't deal. He straightens the deck, neat and precise, before slipping the cards back over to Rose.
Rose doles out their cards, brisk and efficient, until three matching piles have stacked up. She places the remains of the deck in the center of the floor, flips over the top card to the three of hearts.
“This game of Mao has officially begun,” she intones, with all the officiousness of a funeral caller.
John reaches out, scoops his hand up from the pristine cream carpet. Rose and Dave may have gotten into their spooky sibling routine, may have broken out the small knowing smiles and matching looks, but a game is a game, and John is all about games. Especially new games!
He's going to kick their smug little butts.
“Penalty for touching cards,” Dave drawls, before John even gets a good look at his hand.
“What? But this is a card game, how am I supposed to play without touching my cards?” John protests.
Dave slips a card off the deck, slides it gleefully in John's direction.
“Penalty for excessive verbosity,” Rose declares, while John is still spluttering and staring down at his extra card. She plucks a second card off the deck and drops it with the first.
John looks up in time to see Rose fanning out her hand, black-painted smile widening over the tops of her cards. Despite the appearance of examining her hand, John knows she's looking at him, knows she's waiting. Only once Rose has her cards in hand does Dave grab up his set, and then they're both staring at him.
“You guys suck, are these really penalty cards?” John grumbles, reaching out to pick up his extras.
“Penalty for excessive verbosity,” Rose says again, and John swears it's smug. She tosses him another card.
He starts to open his mouth, but he's catching on and snaps it shut just as quick. The face he makes when he snatches up that third card is furious. He knew this was a game with no stated rules, knew he was supposed to learn by doing, can remember every one of Dave's flippant little “I can't tell you that”s when John asked about what they were going to play, but of course they had to go and be insufferable about it. Some friends!
John glances around for a second, wondering whose turn is in effect, when all that's happened so far is Rose and Dave rubbing his nose in his unfamiliarity with the game.
“Penalty for failing to thank the dealer,” Dave says.
He tosses John another card.
John stares down at it, and for a long moment, he thinks he'd really, really like to punch Dave in the face. He can't even tell Dave that this is stupid, Dave is so stupid, why do he and Rose have to be such awful winners when they haven't even won yet, because he's just proud enough that he won't violate the speaking rule, now that he's learned it. He grabs the card.
“Thanks Rose,” he says.
There's nothing grateful about his tone, all sullen sulking and festering resentment, as John straightens his steadily growing hand of cards.
“Penalty for failing to thank the dealer,” Rose says again, leaning forward as she slides John the next card. She folds her cards together, fanned against the floor where she's leaned against her palm, and doesn't move back.
“What? But I just thanked you, come on Rose, how many penalties are you going to give me?” John complains, throwing his cards down in front of him.
“Penalty for excessive verbosity,” Dave says. It's another card on his pile, another long moment while he stares at his friends in dismayed disbelief. “Penalty for failing to thank the dealer.”
Rose hands him that card, dropped primly on his messy stack, and as she draws her hand back her fingers crook into the subtlest little come-hither motion, and her eyebrows arch expectantly toward her hairline.
She stares at him, Dave stares at him, and John is about to call the game off never mind about his pride and about learning new things, not if Dave and Rose are going to be jerks, until the petal pink tip of Rose's tongue darts out, tracing along the cupids-bow shape of her parted lips.
John's face goes hot.
Rose plucks up one more card, tosses it in John's lap like a gauntlet being thrown.
“Penalty,” she says, weighty and expectant and he isn't mad any more, his heartbeat is speeding up and the pause there is too much, too long, they're teasing him and now he's the wrong kind of riled, “for failing. To thank the dealer.”
John leans forward, a moth drawn to a flame, and kisses Rose with his hand on her cheek and his heartbeat in his throat, and now he's grateful. Now he's firm and attentive and the “thank you” is explicit, though he pulls back before the soft reciprocation from Rose's mouth lures him into lingering.
“Penalty,” Dave says, “for failure to put on a decent show, what the fuck Rose, can't we get a little tongue?”
This time, Dave chucks his card in Rose's lap, hardly bothering to hide his grin. “Wait, hold up, that's not all. Penalty for failure to use tongue.” He tosses Rose another card. “Penalty for disappointing the audience.” A third card. “Penalty for delay in macking on John again, what's the hold up, is the price not steep enough yet?”
John laughs, too loud, not sure if he's amused or embarrassed. Even looking at Dave, he can see the exaggerated roll of Rose's eyes in his peripheral vision, can see her slender hand reaching out to catch him by the arm.
“Point of order,” Rose says, crisp and precise and she pushes her cards to the side with the edge of her free hand. “It seems a brief intermission may be necessary, all the more if Dave won't kindly shut the hell up.”
She pulls John down with both hands on his face, though he would have come to her with nothing more than a look to reel him in. It's for show, her proprietary touch and lingering attention, the way her mouth meets his in subtle force. John has kissed Rose before, always soft and delicate and exacting in her attentions, always refusing to do what John can do for her, thank you please. But now Dave is watching and she falls to obvious enthusiasm, teases him with the tip of her tongue until he kisses her more fully.
He's breathless, when she breaks away.
“Any more complaints from the peanut gallery?” she asks, with a composure that should drive John to embarrassment. “I believe we had a game to play, and at last check, I was coming increasingly to a disadvantage.”
“Don't bitch at me,” Dave says, unrepentant. “John's the one with a mountain of cards to unload.”
Rose shrugs, a smooth roll of her shoulder providing all the concession she'll allow to that point.
“End point of order,” Rose says, just as soon as Dave is opening his mouth. She shoots him a card. “Penalty for failure to thank John for the show.”
“You didn't even wait for me to do anything,” Dave complains, even as Rose's hand is again settling on the deck. “Fuck you, whatever, I'll take the penalty for talking, you tyrant. Fucking ruthless. You just want to even the playing field, don't tell me you're not competitive like that.”
He doesn't wait for her to goad him further.
“Come on, Egbert, all's fair in love and Mao and we're never gonna get to play unless Rose's voyeuristic ladylust is satisfied. Let's play tonsil hockey, what do you say?”
John laughs, and doesn't say anything at all. He doesn't put it past Rose to penalize him again simply because she can, and besides, the only reply that's merited is his mouth on Dave's, his grinning lips meeting Dave's grinning lips in a clumsy merger made inelegant by their laughter. It smooths out once Dave gets going, quick presses of his mouth to John's that are hard and fast and then suddenly there's tongue, suddenly there's Dave's knees on either side of John's hips and Dave's weight on his thighs and Dave's self-satisfied little smirk beaming down at him because Dave must have already pulled away, though it took John a moment to notice.
“Gimme my next penalty card, Lalonde, 'cause I think I'm gonna play from here and you can't stop me from talking. Let's go already, because you're going down.”
Dave shifts around on John's lap until he's facing the cards, helpfully hands John his excessively large pile before scooping up his own.
“Penalty for talking, penalty for talking, penalty for delay of game,” Rose rattles off, making herself sound bored even though she's smiling.
She picks up her own hand, tosses the queen of hearts into play, and offers no further complaint.
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