“Green pieces of paper?”
“Or silver coins.” She yawned. “Or plastic cards.”
“But they don't have stories about threesomes like you do.”
“Oh, I'm sure if you ask around enough someone will.” She scooped the coffee with a slightly shaking hand. Could you have a tiramisu hangover? Jesus, Dylan had used a lot of rum in that delightfully scrumptious dessert. Pressing a few buttons, she got the coffee going and plopped down in a kitchen chair.
“You're here to interrogate me, aren't you?” she said, resigned.
“So whassup?” Josie stretched the word out in an annoying mimic of an old beer commercial's frog actors. “You a little sore today? That Dylan might be short but I'll bet he has a di**ck the size of a coke can.”
“Ewwww!” Close, she thought. But she'd never tell Josie that!
“I just crossed over my own line.” Josie held out her palms in a surrender gesture. “Sorry. TMI. I blame caffeine deficiency.”
“Blame your genetics. Your mom's way worse. Remember how she announced to everyone in the marching band our freshman year that you needed to use non-chlorinated tampons because you couldn't bear to experience another rash – and then had pictures to warn other girls away from – ”
Josie shuddered and interrupted loudly. “No, yo mama.”
“No, yo mama!” Were they really back in seventh grade? Yeesh.
“I don't have a mama. She died that day.”
Laura chuckled. “You wish she'd died that day, because three years later when we graduated, there she was at commencement, under the bleachers, banging the band director.”
“She likes a little pomp with her circumstance.”
“She made it clear to the whole auditorium how much she liked his wand.”
“Topic change!” Josie shouted, leaping for the coffee maker.
“Her crescendo, too, was – ”
“Oh, my God, stop!”
“Oh, dear. Am I going too far?” Laura said facetiously, playing it up. “Have I crossed a decency boundary? Have I made you uncomfortable talking about sex?”
“My mother's sex – ”
“I wouldn't want to force you to talk about anything so prurient. That would be being a bad friend, now, wouldn't it?” Josie finally got the hint.
"Was it weird? Being with two guys like that? I mean, and not sleeping with them?"
Laura rubbed her eyes. Why was Josie getting on her last nerve lately? She was still angry with her for pouring everything out to Mike and Dylan. Why not make her walk around naked with a sign that said "Ask Me Anything"? If your best friend couldn't keep your secrets, who could? That night at Jeddy's had been one of the most stressful and surreal in her entire life, warlock balls and all. When she'd learned, later, what Josie had told the guys, after Dylan blurted it all out in a tiramisu-induced haze, she'd come home and nearly killed Josie.
The morning coffee routine was getting old. What wasn't getting old, though, was this developing relationship between her and the guys. The guys. Even that was surreal and weird. Ah, hell – nothing about this threesome wasn't bizarre, so she was getting tired of labeling it all as outside the mainstream. It just was. No getting around that. An internal argument deep within her raged on, one part telling her this was madness and a stronger, more settled part humming along nicely, ignoring the part that screamed "freak!"
Speaking of freaks, Josie was saying something through sips of java. "If you kiss one of them, do you have to kiss the other?"
"Huh?" Laura poured herself a cup. Might as well benefit from the fruits of her labor. That, and she needed the jolt. Yet another uncomfortable conversation with Josie, though she had to admit that the girl definitely helped sometimes, making her think about things she hadn't considered. Like this?
"Does it have to be 50/50? If you sleep with one, do you have to sleep with the other? Or is it always a threesome? Is there always double, well – you know?"
Freak! "You actually sit around contemplating these things, Josie? Seriously?"
She had the decency to pinken a bit. "Who doesn't?"
"Most of the rest of the world." Sip. If she didn't fill her mouth with something it would soon be full of words she'd regret saying. Please. This was devolving quickly into voyeurism. Laura was surprised by how annoyed she was becoming. Josie was always inquisitive. It was just who she was, and as aggravating as she could be at times, it had never troubled Laura this much.
Josie shot her a wary look. "I just...no, I don't sit around dredging up embarrassing questions to ask you, Laura." Her tone of voice conveyed hurt feelings. "But it's natural, I think, to wonder. Most threesomes are one-night-stand kind of deals. What you have is so out of the realm of normal that it makes me think. Philosophize and stuff, about what it means for the long haul."
Aha. And that was it. That was why this bothered Laura so much.
Because, damn it, Josie was right.
"What you're doing, Laura, is fascinating to watch from the outside. Plus, yeah, I am demented. So sometimes my mind just...goes there. And I found myself wondering what it felt like, eating dinner with two guys, snuggling on the couch with two guys, wanting affection – but not sex – and having to, what? Pick? Kiss both? Cuddle in a sandwich?"
That made Laura laugh. "I thought it would be weird, too. It kind of was, at first. Mike made a big spectacle of making sure I knew they didn't expect sex. I knew what he was doing. He really was just trying to be nice and to help me relax." She let out a puff of air. "And it was good and kind and all that, but it pissed me off. I still don't know what they were thinking, hiding the truth about their relationship from me."
"They're not gay." Josie started to unpeel a banana from Laura's fruit bowl.
Laura did a double-take. "Did anyone ever think they were?"
Through a mouthful of banana, Josie sputtered, "Ah, c'mon, Laura. Two guys with one girl? Gay, gay, gay."
"Not gay!" Holy smokes, not even close to gay. Laura knew gay. Gay men, that is. Her high school boyfriend her senior year had turned out to be gay. He'd come out when they were juniors in college, home at Thanksgiving and hanging out in a piano bar with a group of friends. Ding! A million little questions had been answered with one big answer. What other hot-blooded seventeen-year-old teenager wanted to cuddle and kiss all the time instead of banging wherever they could get a shred of privacy? Or knew all the words to the disco songs? Or liked to go clothes shopping with her?
And eyed the same guys Laura surreptitiously checked out as they had wandered the mall?
Her gaydar wasn't pinging with Mike and Dylan. No way. it was just...complicated. That's all.
Why was it always complicated?
Josie swallowed hard, trying to clear her mouth. "I know that. I asked."
"You asked?" Laura's turn to sputter.
"They closed right up. That Dylan is one scary dude when he's being cold. Mike, too – but Dylan was worse. I felt like the ice king had just cast a spell over the booth."
"You asked them that at Jeddy's? Jesus, Josie. You have some – "
"Balls. Yeah. I know. I had to ask, though. If you're just some bed toy for them, then I'm not letting anyone do that to my best friend, because that is some fucked up mental shit right there. If two gay guys are just out trawling for a chick they can bang to get off their jollies, it won't be you."
Laura started peeling a clementine. "I'm touched." She frowned. "I guess. In your own extremely convoluted way, you mean well."
"And, by the way, no foursomes. Dylan shut that one down." The orange wedge in Laura's mouth went flying across the room, landing in the sink as she did a spit take.
"You asked about a foursome?"
Josie winked. "I was just testing them."
"Oh, my God." No wonder Dylan had made a funny face when Josie's name had come up last night. Mike's arched eyebrows without a smile had made her wonder as well. What in the ever-loving hell did they think of her best friend? And how did this reflect on how they viewed her? The night had been nice. Just nice. And just nice was exactly what she'd needed after far too many nights of surprise, shock, passion and boundary pushes. Breaks. Annihilations.
Having a few boundaries in place where affection, banter, food and fun were all that were expected of the night had been refreshing.
And now Josie...
She wagged a finger in Josie's face. "No more foursome tests. Or jokes. Or – ewww." She shuddered. "And no more going behind my back to tell them how I feel."
"Someone has to."
"Has to what?"
"Tell them how you feel. And frankly, if you won't do it, I will."
Laura plunked her elbows on the table and rested her chin in her hands. "Why? Who appointed you the keeper of my feelings?"
"Ryan."
Jolt. "You don't see me sabotaging your relationships!"
"I'm not sabotaging anything, Laura! I'm saving your relationship. S. relationships. Well, it's one, but with two guys. Where is Miss Manners' Plural Guide to Threesomes?"
This was getting out of hand. "To answer your original question, no. I don't have to kiss one and then the other. I asked."
