"Have you done this before?"

Lana's voice quivered. Shadows hid dormitory starkness, stole everything but the drape of her hair against pale skin and her liquid gaze -- steady, deliberate as always.

Scarf coming loose with a tug -- brush of silk around her neck, whisper and flutter -- Mia smiled. "No. I've thought about it, though."

She let implication hang, let it itch at Lana's cool logic -- thought of whom? The mattress dipped under Mia's knees; and she leaned forward -- found Lana, angles of shoulder and parted lips, and they kissed again. The hesistence was gone; the clumsiness dwindled away, tongues caressed. How strange that it felt so natural to press books aside with a knee, to straddle Lana's lap and relax, run fingers up her neck and feel her breath shiver warm.

A slow shift under her as Lana straightened and laid hands on Mia's small of back. Satisfaction spread plush as their breasts met, different from any simple hug. "Thought about it," Lana said -- considering frown crept into the words, "Everyone thinks about it, to some degree."

Palms slid upward on Mia's back and fingertips sought her spine to trace it, a raking of coals.

"That's true."

She spoke against jawline, nudging no harder than breath. Lana arched invitation and she took it, tasted the muted savoury of her skin and Lana's sigh hummed low. Touch left Mia's back, and laced into her hair to stroke.

"Then, you--" Fingers caught on tangles-- an instant of hot yank before they spidered free. "You've been planning."

Stroking touch through Mia's hair, down her shoulder blade and up again, soothing ebb and flow -- she murmured a considering note.

"Not like that." Semantics, their dance of words. Mia opened collar buttons, two muted pops against the quiet. "I just...need to know."

Lana paused: a gale's lull, a storm's eye. The same tense moment Mia always waited out, the same anticipating ache.

"You ..." Lana's touch faltered, trailed a circle, "You felt it too, debate class?"

A tilt of head and Mia's lips brushed the delicate curve of throat's base, sensed its pulse. "Second semester?"

"First." A wet stirring as Lana swallowed, and palms' warmth mapped Mia's sides, "That informed consent debate. I still had points, I wasn't through."

That moment stood immortal; the opponent's blazing blue eyes and a need to argue, to claw and fight on, prove her wrong. Smiling, Mia thumbed more buttons.

"I remember."

"And--" Lana's touch rose to cup her breast, warm press and curious squeeze, the heady thrill of a thumb grazing nipple, "There was something there, I knew it. Something ... I don't know what."

Mia knew that enigmatic thing, the one purring encouragement, low and summer-hot. Her heart fluttered -- dizzying, a contentment to drown in -- and she was moving on faith again, hands sliding over skin and under cotton.

"I know what you mean," she said.

Sudden distance took them -- a moment to squirm free of clothing, to tug sleeves and pop the hook-and-eye latches in shoulders' valleys, to hear the mutters of clothing dropped aside. And then Lana's fingers laced behind Mia's neck, tugged invitation to follow her recline and feel the soft welcome of breasts and lips and tongue. Their skin met, warm, glorious.

"Then," Lana breathed against her mouth, "What is this?"

Imagine -- her friend and rival and equal laid flushed beneath her, Mia's hair spilling over them both. The glances and the equals' drive and every passing thought: all crystallized, there and then, one vulnerable moment. Mia chewed her lip. She knew already; she thought anyway.

"Whatever you'd like it to be."

"I..."

Quiet then, with Lana's rise and fall of breath beneath Mia and a languid brush of lips, the gentle friction of skin together and fingertips still tracing curves.

"I don't know what I want," Lana breathed, tilting her hips and their bodies suddenly fit together, flush and soft and satisfying, "Just you, Mia."

"Attraction." She placed a steadying elbow, felt trapped hair's tug under it and moved to free it, and pressed closer, warmer. "This would be a wonderful way to deal with it."

The press became a slow grind, Lana's shivering gasp and a flurry of sparks. The darkness faded; the world was touch and breath and skin-salt. Zippers to ply, and another moment of distance before their skirts rustled away and they fit together a shade better, their hips halves of a whole. No barriers now -- no armour.

A small sound fell from Lana's throat -- she rocked, electricity arcing higher. "It's letting off tension, then?" Hands splayed to starbursts on Mia's back. "Nothing more?"

The debate class memory hummed response, redoubled and felt all the more familiar. This was no different. Mia wanted concepts to shape, advantage to press, underbelly against her teeth.

"Maybe." Hipbone's rise under her palm, smooth column of thigh -- she hadn't imagined those shapes so thoroughly and stroked them once more to be sure. "Or a meeting of minds."

"Highly intellectual discourse."

A jolt of pause -- Mia's fingertips stilled over soft heat, and they both smiled, chuckled low against each others' mouths. Intellectual enough, of course, to savour irony.

"No," Lana wondered, "It's..."

Touch pulled Mia's small of back, drew her close and she let the world swim exquisite, sank fingers in wet. "It's trusting each other."

A slow gasp, and Lana's hips rolled to meet her, pressed welcome. The same as Mia's own body yet different in angle and presence, skin pressed sweat-slick together, breath shuddering full.

"Trusting--" and an instant's pause, a flash of ice-burning canniness, "Enough to--"

Touch glided up Mia's shoulder blades, over collarbone and breasts' rise, moving with the rhythm and the rock of weight. Hot pulse filled her, throbbed low and guided her stroking fingers, made each nerve sing. "Try new things," she said, "And ..."

Words dissolved, meaningless -- quiet showed the message so much clearer, quiet in the tense-drawn grip around Mia's neck, the sliding rhythm of two bodies, the buried spot that set off trembling. Mia pressed, drank in the keening sound nearly bitten back, put her nose to chin's underside -- she breathed Lana's scent, murmured warm by her ear.

"It's just you, Lana."

It was much later that Mia got her answer, while the incredible cooled, while heartbeats slowed and fingers combed her hair thoughtful, idle.

"Just us." A thrum of voice within Lana's chest; Mia knew soft eyes' gleam without looking. "I'm glad."

Mia smiled -- no different from usual.