Jacob needed to stop playing these damn drinking games, he really did because he felt the cosmic shift in his wife's energy when the dreaded card was read out of his hand. "What is..." His drunken smile dropped and he glanced at her like an idiot. "What is your body count?"

His silence made Steven give him a sympathetic smile. "If I admit mine, will you admit yours?"

Jasmin grabbed his hand and kissed it. "I'm not going to be mad or disgusted. Mines high too."

Jacob probably made a face of immense discomfort but he stilled his nerves. "I want to face this fear, I'm going to tell you guys and I want you to react exactly the way you want to react, okay?"

They nodded and he took another shot anyways. "Eight."

Adam gasped. "Liar!"

"87," He finished ruefully. "Not counting Oliver." Pleasantly enough saying that didn't upset him, he had his real parents now and nothing but time could take them. He was just thankful for any of Rebecca and Rivers time.

Connie bit her lip and giggled. "I... am... oddly kinda proud?"

Hazel just started clapping. "Honestly it makes so much sense that you're the Hot Topic and you fuck like a freight train."

"I mean... incredible stamina, he can perform multiple times in a day much less in one session, he's got no diseases, he tastes yummy, and he's fucking hot. And having a "high" body count is a moot point in most of society now so," Anna clasped her hands and looked down. "Thank you."

Jacob had to crack a smile through his blush. "Did you just thank Satan for me?!"

She nodded. "61, so we're on the track to being the biggest sluts in the polycule." Adam and Hazel smirked at each other and she frowned. "What?"

"We're just happy we got to lock you down is all," Hazel sighed cheerfully.

"She does wear our ring," Adam chuckled, then held up his other hand. "And uh, Jacob's right here, so as a polycule we're just kinda constantly winning."

Steven grunted, "I feel like mine is higher than that but I never kept count and was fucked up most of the time."

Hazel and Connie snuggled up to the now pink, annoyed, and jaded man. "Non consensual doesn't count."

He quirked a brow. "An interesting theory, so it would cut my number down like, a lot."

Jacob frowned deeply. "Body count as in how many people."

Steven choked on his spit. "Oh! Wow, no."

Jacob giggled and handed him the bottle. "No what?"

"No everything." He took a long drink and sighed his content as the pink disappeared. "Now it's yes everything."

Jacob flopped onto his back, unsurprised when three people sat on him. "But my body count is worse simply because of... her."

"With a capital, or just her pronoun?" Jasmin mumbled nervously. "Either way is fine, I just wanna know."

"Carol Brown was the girl who absolutely shattered me, and then I met you and I haven't thought of her in years. At least not enough for me to remember it." Jacob's eyes popped open to catch his wife wearing a tiny arrogant smile. "Don't ask me about—,"

"Tell us about Carol Brown!" The entire polycule cried as they surrounded him, drinking game forgotten.

He groaned and grabbed onto Steven's hand. "She was my Allison, but she wasn't super evil. We were young. She just... took a bus out of town."

Connie's face dropped. "She died?"

He shook his head slowly. "She took a bus out of town." The Brit could tell they were holding back questions so he chuckled painstakingly. "Make me a simple, airy track and I will sing you my relationship woes. I want to face the fear as hard as I can. But I am not ready to talk about Carol Brown. Not until I've reached the next chapter in my character arc. And only once, so if you miss it too bad."

Alex leaned down to kiss his nose, then his lips twice. "Okay, bet."

Adam got a look that said trouble. "How hard are you willing to face this fear?"

"Balls to the walls, look it dead in the eye, drowning in my past promiscuity," Jacob asserted strongly. "I've gotta get over it to be able to love myself I think. It's been bothering me again."

"Tempo?" Steven asked hopefully. "And is there a chance for a music video?" Adam leaned over to him and because of the close proximity, they fused to talk about it.

Jacob gave them a steady 4/4 beat, and Pluto stared at his chest like he could see his heart beating. "Interesting."

*

After asking Jacob seventeen more times how far he wanted this to go and getting the silliest, most extreme but also serious answers, Jasmin hit the launch button on the idea.

"Oh, this is clever..." She mused, staring down at her ring. "I think marrying him made me conceited because I actually can't see this going wrong."

Adam dropped all of Jacob's yearbooks on the counter that night when Jacob went to his parent's house. "He marked every girl and guy he dated or fucked with a sticky note, he's a fearless little shit."

Hazel wrote down the names that were easy to set up with rhymes, it was kind of important to write songs with. "Okay, so far I'm just gonna read off the ones I wrote down: Loretta, Joan, Jen, Jan, Liza. Felicity, Emily, Fran, Bruce, and I put that in there because Bruce is transmasc and it'll fit trust me, Flo, MiMi, Brittany, Paula, Persephone, Stella, Stephanie, Mona, Tiffany, and I ended with Carol Brown because this could be the next song that never ends." He grinned and nodded his humor. "I fucking love that guy."

He caught Adam blushing as he double marked the sticky notes with the names Hazel read off. "Whatcha blushing so hard about?"

"Mains getting along extra well lately," He muttered shyly, burying his nose in the work so hard he could be confused for Connie. "It's free depression cure for a few hours."

*

Steven listened back to the track and shook his head in wonder. "You guys are incredible."

"Oh, shut up," Anna giggled to his surprise. "We wouldn't even be a band without your magic."

Steven grabbed her and pinned her up on the wall eye level to his head. "No with that attitude, and no with my magic being the cause of your talent. My magic doesn't work if I don't have some sort of chemistry with who I'm singing with, or if the people I'm singing with can't sing." She blushed hard and he pulled her down to sit on his hip while he worked. "And let it be known that you guys have activated my gem by yourselves on multiple occasions, so quit acting like you're not the next era of human evolution. If the Diamonds heard, they'd issue Era 17, we'd skip Era 4-16."

They stared at him in shock before Anna muttered, "I've never activated your gem."

He stopped working and turned to her. "Okay, stand right there, but don't have any contact with me." She obediently stood and he tossed his head around as he thought. "Think about Stella really hard." He grabbed Connie's hand and kissed it, before he turned to Anna and poked her.

They fused into Stella and she gasped. "You cheated!"

Steven chuckled when they unfused and flipped a few notes to hit higher rather than lower. "I poked you. Fusion requires synchronization."

*

Jacob was excited in a kind of stupid way. "You guys aren't gonna give me any hints about where I'm singing?"

"Nope," Alex laughed. "Stop asking. You look terrified."

"That's the second stage of excitement, after this is shock," He proclaimed, then leaning over to his wife. "I love you~."

Jasmin kissed his cheek over and over. "You're so lovey dovey recently. Are you cheating on me?"

The entire car burst out laughing and Steven pulled a green silken handkerchief out of the center console. "You've gotta put this on, we're almost there. You can stop the music video and us boys will take the beating if it's too much."

Jacob unbuckled his seatbelt, tripped, then got back up to ignore the laughter and smother Steven's with a kiss. "Shut up."

He was blindfolded rather quickly and they hadn't been driving long, so he took it in stride and assumed it was a park they'd closed off. The sun was warm against his skin, the breeze was nice, he could hear birds and bugs and bees.

But the energy he could feel was monumental. The camera crews and whatnot must already be there with him, he could feel their presence was massive.

Jasmin walked him over to the podium and guided him up. "God, green is so your color. I wanna dry hump you in the park right now."

He chuckled and felt around for her face. "Come here, let's do that literally right now."

"It wouldn't be polite in present company." She undid his blindfold and held his head. "Keep your eyes on the cameras and the boys until we tell you to, everything is already ready. And be yourself, don't be nervous, you're a big boy now okay?" A cocky and adoring smile made him smile back. "I have you for life and I will kill any bitch that so much as looks at you too long. I don't care if they're just walking their dog."

Jacob laughed heartily and kissed her with vigor. "Alright, Mine. I'm great at masking so even if I panic, I'll be fine."

Adam shot him a thumbs up and Jasmin disappeared behind him. "I'm ready to fight my trauma now!" He whooped and his best friends and lovely partners laughed at his goofiness in full swing. "My wife says I'm a big boy now."

This was going to be awesome.

Steven blew him a kiss and then the rest of the boys did too. Jacob just had to make a big show of swooning and fanning himself. He was feeding off the energy of so many people and he felt alive for whatever was to come as the track started officially. He'd sung it multiple times with his wife and girlfriends on the backing vocals, and he was absolutely certain he had it down.

He just had to be prepared for what he imagined to be the giant screen behind him showing every one of his ex girlfriend's or boyfriend's school pictures. Or maybe even their most recent ones.

"Loretta, broke my heart in a letter
She told me she was leaving and her life would be better
Joan, broke it off after the phone," They made a face at that and he resisted the urge to snort. "After the tone, she left me alone.
Jen said she'd never ever see me again
When she saw me again, she said it again," Yeah, she had every right to. He'd been drunk and high off his ass when he snagged her from her boyfriend for a quickie, and after she said she'd never do it again, he got her one more time and then she actually stopped seeing him. "Jan, met another man.
Liza got amnesia just forgot who I am
Felicity said there was no electricity," True.
"Emily, no chemistry.
Fran, ran
Bruce turned out to be a man," Bruce was also his first experience with a transmasc partner.
"Flo had to go, I couldn't go with the flow
Carol Brown just took a bus out of town..."

He sent a cheesy heart to the boys and they grinned. "But I'm hoping that you'll stick around."

Connie, Jasmin and Anna started backing him up and he longed to see them being silly and roasting him in public for fun. "He doesn't cook or clean
He's not good boyfriend material."

He shrugged amiably. It was a fact that he had to learn how to cook, and he never cleaned when he lived in Britain or first moved to America save for his body. "But we can eat cereal."

"You'll lose interest fast,
His relationships never last."

He laughed his joy through his line, "Shut up girlfriends from the past."

"He says he'll do one thing
And then he goes and does another thing."

His ADHD was untreatable! And he was way better about it now! "Ugh, who organized all my ex girlfriends into a choir, and got them to sing?"

Adam signaled to turn and he slammed a hand over his mouth to muffle his squeak as an actual choir of his actual ex girlfriends (like fifty) vocalized like angels. It was almost involuntary his mystified and mildly horrified smile as he sang, "Ooo, shut up.
Shut up girlfriends from the past."

Jacob couldn't believe it. The most important ones save for a few were there, the ones he remembered the easiest if he absolutely had to. He'd marked them with stars, and just to be a spiteful little shit, he pointed them out as he sang. "MiMi, will no longer see me
Brittany," He glanced back to the boys. "Brittany bit me." Their jaws dropped and Adam started laughing.
"Paula, and Persephone, Stella, and Stephanie
There must be fifty ways that lovers have left me." They waved either laughing or shyly and he couldn't help but chuckle.

This was working.

"Carol Brown just took a bus out of town..." He was unsurprised that there was a giant empty spot, they made it obvious on purpose she hadn't come. It hurt, and then it stung, and then he moved on as soon as the next line came from his mouth.

He hopped down with the wireless mic to his three life partners right in the middle of them all. "Love is a delicate thing,
It could just float away on the breeze,"

As expected, his exes all turned to his currents sarcastically. "He said the same thing to me."

"How can we ever know if I'm the right person in this world?" He asked earnestly only to be shot down hard enough to make him laugh.

Paula looked especially tickled. "He means he looks at other girls."

Jacob dismissed it with a hand through the air as if that were ridiculous. "Love is a mystery, it does not follow rules."

The choir disagreed heavily. "This guy is a fool.
He'll always be a boy,
He's a man who never grew up."

He burst into a bigger smile before he even rolled his eyes and tossed a teasing middle finger up. "I thought I told you to shut up!" They started sounding like a choir of angels again and he realized his girls were leading each section: mezzo sopranos were with Connie, sopranos were with Jasmin, and altos were with Anna. It was adorable but he had more shit to talk first.

He found Mona and shook his head. "Mona! You said that you were in a coma!" She shrugged her embarrassment, but then again that was early high school. He pointed out Tiffany and she flushed. "Tiffany,
You said that you had an epiphany!" Oddly enough this was fun, and non binding. He felt no attraction to these women, nor any regret. He smiled at his girls. "Would you like a little cereal?"

One question plagued his mind so much he was thankful he was singing it. The only other woman who would be able to find these people was... "Who organized this choir of ex girlfriends?
Was it you Carol Brown?!
Was it you Carol Brown?"

Every bodily function stopped as the empty spot was revealed to not be empty anymore, she'd been crouching.

Curly dark brown hair, brown sarcastic eyes, a full body and a kind of fire he'd fallen madly in love with looked him right in the face. "Carol Brown just took a bus out of town..."

Jacob sighed, and he felt a part of him age with the action.

He couldn't help it; his eyes moved from hers to his women and his ache to hold them had him motioning for them to come to him. "But I'm hoping that you'll stick around."

Jasmin practically turned into a football player the way she shoved her way past everyone to race into his arms, and the other girls were no better.

Now he was surrounded in love and he could perceive nothing else. It got even better when the boys joined him to openly adore him. "Stick around," He pleaded with them, a small and worried smile on his face as a fear of them not staying plagued him. "Just stick around."

The hug tightened and he grinned like an idiot, achieving yet another Pansexual Panic of a blush. He was positive he was so red it was a record for him, and from the concerned raise of Connie's eyebrows, it was. His ex girlfriend choir cheered so loudly the mic squealed a split second before he shut it off.

"Ugh, I'm so jealous of you I hate it," Steven giggled against his cheek.

Jacob almost shit his pants and burst his lungs with how hard he laughed. "What? This?!"

"If an entire choir of my ex girlfriends showed up, the resulting explosion would take out half of the US, if not the planet. The Diamonds would be pissed and any survivors would die." Steven gave him a broad smile. "I'm so proud of you."

"And he's our boyfriend," Anna sighed dreamily. "We just get to keep him. He comes home with us and we can sleep in his bed or give him head whenever we want to."

Jacob blushed and returned his eyes to the choir. "How do we... dismiss them?"
He was only asking because Carol Brown was making a beeline for them all. "Oh my god I'm not ready for— Hey, Carol!"

She belly laughed and turned to Jasmin. "Jazz! Hey, girl!"

To Jacob's horror, Jasmin hugged her tight. "Good to see you again, C."

The nicknames.

The hug.

The kiss on the cheek.

Oh stars. He almost fainted right there. Hazel leaned against him from behind casually because his knees buckled.

Carol and Jasmin looked at his face before bursting out laughing and high fiving. "Oh, that was fucking awesome! He looks horrified about that, poor baby," Carol said through her wicked giggles. "Don't be so quiet, Jacob. Speak up."

He sighed ruefully. This was the actual fear-facing he realized. Red faced for a different reason now, he forced himself to make eye contact with her. "Hello, Carol. How do you do?"

She gave him a sympathetic smile. "I know it doesn't change things, but I'm sorry."

Jacob's eyebrows raised and he laughed. "You kind of fucked up my already fucked up life, Carol. You almost broke me." The rest turned to stare at him but he wasn't backing down, even if he had to give those hurt brown eyes a smile. "It was good character development." He nodded to his people. "Do you want introductions?"

Carols eyes went to Steven first. "That's Steven fucking Universe, man! I'm so mad at you!"

Steven had to wonder when Jacob had met this obviously American woman. There had been a period before he met Jasmin and after he moved away from the UK that he had casually left out but if Steven did the math, Jacob would've been about to turn 22 when he was at Nova, so that left a year and a half blank.

He decided to ask not now and sighed heavily. "Not voluntarily Steven Universe. And not only Steven, some people call me Pink Diamond still." Connie stomped on his foot and he yelped, "But please just call me Steven! I'm still one of you."

Carol smiled as Jacob pointed out Hazel. "Hazel. Giant boyfriend number two, he's the Daddy of the group. And our drummer, bass vocalist and story teller rapper breed. He gives amazing hugs and kisses."

Hazel pressed both of his hands on his cheeks and Anna gasped, "Oh my god, I see it! Hazels blushing so hard it's visible!" He laughed and then she blanched. "Omigosh is that racist?!"

He picked her up and laughed. "No babygirl, it's just factual."

Jacob pinched Anna's cheek. "This is our Anna, she's our manic pixie dream girl. Probably the most consistently adorable creature on the planet and so sweet it's stupid unfair. She belongs to Hazel and Adam."

He couldn't help his grin at Connie. "This is Connie, the scariest woman on the planet save for one other." Her jaw dropped and he grabbed her hand to kiss it through his laughter. "She's royalty because she's married to Steven, but she's cuddly and sweet and could be considered the Classy Mom Girlfriend if you don't know her like we do."

Carol giggled at Connie's playful grumble and stuck out her hand to shake. "A pleasure. He doesn't call you Mommy, does he?"

Jacob watched Connie's polite smile turn into a pout. "He won't let me top him. But I'm..." Her eyes skimmed over the grass as memories played behind them. "I'm more than okay with that."

Jacob choked on a laugh. "Okay, slow down there. Over here is my Alex, a trophy husband I've acquired. He's the gay tsundere of the group, and I love him so. He pretends to hate my wife but they're best friends. He pretends to hate me too but he sleeps with my wife and I."

Alex wrinkled his nose in distain for Carol. He was extremely jealous. "Charmed."

Adam tried to back away during Alex's introduction but Hazel grabbed the back of his shirt like a kitten and presented him to Jacob. "This is my other Trophy Husband, Adam. He's my boy crush, and our token goth boy. He Daddies everyone, but he's "secretly" very loving. He and Alex have my ring as well." To be an asshole he smirked at Adam. "Do you even know where it is amongst your collection?"

Adam wiggled out of Hazels grip and stared him down with loving eyes. "Come on, Jack, baby. Don't make me Daddy you in front of this kind woman." His hands found his face to pinch his cheeks.

Carol gasped her delight at Jacob's heavy flush. "There's a long ass story behind that... I haven't seen him blush that hard since—,"

Jacob shushed her frantically and covered his wife's ears. "Nuh uh, Carol. Don't you start."

Adam moved himself into the background again. "Gonna help with clean up."

Jacob presented his Jasmin with a huge smile. "And this is my eternal, Jasmin. We had a rocky start but I was absolutely certain she was meant to be mine, so I changed and made it so. Ugh, she's so pretty," He finished with a murmur because her hair looked brown in the sunlight and she was looking up at him with those soft cheeks he wanted to kiss so badly. 

"Hey, I had to change too," She told Carol. "Also, not to make this weird but babe, do you have a type?"

He made a face. "I can't help it?"

After a bit more of an idle chat and strangely enough an exchange of numbers, Jacob excused them and he climbed into the bands van to groan, "Thank the stars that's over."

Adam's brows tented in concern. "Was it too much?"

"No, I meant the body count thing," He exclaimed passionately. "It's fading already, I can feel it..." Jasmin sat and he buried his face between her legs. "Ugh, Heaven."

"Hmm?" Jasmin seemed rather pleased with herself as she rubbed on his head. "What's up?"

"Sing me."

Steven adjusted the mirror and scowled. "Don't make fun of me! That's not fair!"

"Steven got territorial," Connie supplied over his whine.

"Now he has to sing me too," Jacob mumbled. "If you got jealous, you have to sing me."

They all sang him lullabies the whole way home, and Adam carried him through the door with a smug little smile. "Mood revived."

Hazel poked his cheek. "You weren't shy, you were just jealous, huh?"

"I'm actually a very jealous person outside of this polycule when people hit on my pack. I just don't make it your guys' problem," He revealed as they crashed on the couch.

Anna kissed Jacob's freckled cheek and sighed happily. "I'm glad Carol Brown took a bus out of town."

"Same, even though it nearly broke me," Jacob mumbled. "I'm so happy I have you guys. Now I want all of you guys clinging to me, I don't care how sweaty I get."

Steven pouted. "But I'm the base!"

"Vetoed."

He chuckled and they made it work, the man was somehow more spacious than he looked.