“Fair enough,” said Bruce, with a laugh. “Forever we thought we were the center of the universe, right? But then Copernicus comes along and says ‘Whoa, everybody!’”
“He said, ‘Whoa?’”
“I firmly believe he did.”
“Fair enough.”
“’Whoa, everybody, check it out! We aren’t the center, that is!’ and he stuck his finger out at Sol, the sun.”
Ryan flopped onto the couch next to the naked man pontificating about changing perceptions of the world. “I think you may be oversimplifying there.”
“That shift, that fundamental change in thinking, that’s a paradigm shift. That’s what it felt like for us, when we opened up.” He handed Ryan back his drink from the end table. “And from what you were saying there, it sounds like there might be some of that for you, too.”
“A paradigm shift,” repeated Ryan.
“It changes not just what and how you think, but who you are. Because there are these beliefs we have about how the world works and doesn’t. How monogamy works or doesn’t. How relationships…”
“We had some of those beliefs on Friday morning.”
Bruce’s grin in the flicker of the fire could’ve been intimidating, ominous, but all Ryan felt toward it was affection.
“Oh, c’mon,” said Bruce, waving a big hand in his direction. “Look, I just want you to know it’s okay, you know, to talk to me. ’Cuz you seem like the kind of guy who likes a good postmortem analysis. Like to talk. You know, about stuff. After you do it.”
Ryan nodded. Talk? Talk didn’t seem like a big enough word. Analyze, do that postmortem, perhaps. Obsess. He tried to let it just be a thing, a thing they’d done, a think they could maybe do again. But there came the fear, of course, the fear that pulling the thread could cause the entire tapestry to unravel. Any of the little possible threads. Since swinging was such an abstract, new concept, Bruce’s paradigm shift, how on earth could he tell the threads that could handle being tugged from those that couldn’t?
“Perhaps after you internally analyze, too,” said Bruce. “How about Paige?”
He wasn’t sure what about her. “Huh?”
“You like her.”
It wasn’t a question. Ryan didn’t know how to respond exactly. He wondered if now he was hanging from the thread, holding on tight, dangling over a pit. The fire flickered, and he said nothing.
“You don’t have to worry about telling me you like her,” said Bruce. “I mean, the way you get all bashful around her says that plenty. We don’t get embarrassed around people we don’t like, because who gives a fuck?”
Ryan couldn’t argue with that logic, but was still having trouble figuring out where this line of thought was going.
“So you can say, ‘I like her,’ or, ‘I loved fucking her.’”
The heat, the taste in his mouth. Was he about to get chastised? Had Bruce brought him down here because he’d been unhappy about something he’d seen? Maybe when Paige had Ryan spank her. Oh fuck, thought Ryan.
“Okay, Ryan,” said Bruce, pointing to his eyes, “Right here. Sorry I’m dragging this on. While I don’t get smarter when drinking or tired, I suppose I greatly increase my dramatic flair. What I’m trying to say is that I want to hear that stuff, if you’re willing to share. I like hearing that Paige is making other men happy, or horny, or content, or I suppose anxiety-ridden like you. I’m not jealous.”
Ryan let out the breath he’d been holding onto.
“The way I see it, if someone thinks that Paige is amazing, I mean, first of all, they’re just stating the truth, ’cuz she is. But more important, I know that it makes her feel good, and I’ll tell you, I live for that.” Bruce finished his drink and pointed the empty glass toward Ryan. “How about you, did you feel jealous? Seeing Jennifer with Paige? With me?”
Parsing the last handful of hours, Ryan realized that aside from a moment here and there, he hadn’t thought about being jealous. “When I watched you put the condom on,” he told Bruce, “I sort of braced myself for it, but… I think I thought more about the fact that I wasn’t jealous than I thought about being jealous.”
“A profound thought with fine execution, my friend. Jealousy can be the most difficult hump in this.”
“For me,” Paige told Jennifer, “it’s always about feeling left out. When I do feel jealous, which is pretty rare these days, it’s usually because I wish I was participating, but for whatever reason I didn’t bring myself into a situation. Bruce is the go-getter. He’s always talking to people. I tend to hang back a bit.”
“I don’t get that from you at all,” said Jennifer.
The two women lay on their sides, facing each other, running fingers lightly through each other’s hair and around their arms and legs.
“I put up a great game,” said Paige with a smile.
“Is it weird that I wasn’t jealous?” asked Jennifer, hoping that Paige would assuage the fear. “I mean, since it was our first time?”
“I don’t think it’s weird,” Paige responded, letting her palm rest on Jennifer’s cheek. “So many people let jealousy rule their lives. Some of us are lucky and we’ve managed to tune out the frequency almost entirely. I thought it was so sexy watching Bruce fuck you. Not just because I knew he enjoyed himself. But I knew he’d be taking care of you, too.”
“He did,” said Jennifer with a smile, reflecting on how, after a long and slow session, Bruce had crouched next to the bed and pulled her legs forward, to finish her off with his tongue several more times.
They snuggled for a while longer before joining the men downstairs. The foursome sat on opposite couches, Bruce and Paige on one, Ryan and Jennifer on the other. Holding their spouses, listening to the crackling fire and the sound of the wind outside, trying to bluster up a ferocious winter storm.
Bruce held up his mug to the room. “To Jennifer and Ryan,” he said.
Jennifer held up her own. “To Bruce and Paige.”
“New friends,” added Paige.
“To new friends,” Ryan agreed.
The mugs came together in the center, over the coffee table.
Later, after a sheepish acknowledgment of the clock drifting past four, they began the dances of coats being retrieved from floors and chairs, making sure everybody had everything.
“You’re not going to vanish now, are you, Lamberts?” asked Bruce as he pulled on his gloves.
“No,” said Ryan. “Hell, no.” He looked at Jennifer, who emphatically shook her head.
“Good,” said Bruce. “’Cuz you’re both sorta cool, and the two of us need all the cool points we can get.”
Just blowing smoke, Ryan thought. One of the defining characteristics of truly charismatic people was their ability to make those around them feel good about themselves, and Bruce and Paige were exceptional at it.
“Tomorrow let’s start the calendar dance,” said Paige.
Jennifer and Ryan looked at each other.
“To plan another date night?”
“Yes!” said Jennifer.
Very long hugs and kisses, then the Shepards disappeared into a world with a soft new coat of white on it.
Ryan and Jennifer watched out the window as they drove up the street. “Today is the day we change our lives,” said Ryan.
“Yesterday,” corrected Jennifer. “I think we just changed everything.”
They smiled at each other and kissed, descending into giggles as they sat on the stairs.
25
The calendar on Jennifer’s phone surprised her. She looked at it every day, sometimes multiple times per day, but somehow she’d missed the trend. Today’s date, February 3, had an all-day event marked with ♥, her notation to indicate that she and Ryan had sex that day, the symbol she’d used ever since she first started noting such things. Before the phone, it had been a small heart in red ink on the bottom right corner of the calendar page in her day planner.