by Xan West
Ernest didn’t stir until Gideon came in and accidentally dropped his keys on the hardwood floor. He reached for the light, then found his glasses, which were mercifully just fine. Then he blinked up at Daddy and smiled, rubbing his own hair. His mouth tasted awful, so he made himself get out of bed, and went to brush his teeth, grabbing pajamas on the way. It felt much better to be in cozy clothes, and to have his mouth taste like mint. Gideon was already in bed by the time he got back, so he got in next to him, feeling small and vulnerable, and very glad for his Daddy to snuggle with just then. He was tremoring again, mind racing, but at least his feet could be still. Daddy held him tight, and soon he found that his eyes were heavy and his mind was shutting down. Then he sank back into sleep.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Nora was coming over, and he was nervous. He shouldn’t be nervous. There was no reason to be nervous. Judith’s idea that he had a crush on Nora was ridiculous and made no sense and he wasn’t going to think about it. If he was nervous, it wasn’t about seeing Nora. It was because they were planning for Daddy’s birthday and he wanted to do a really good job. That was why he kept rearranging the tea stuff he’d made using up the last of the flour. A treat before Pesach. Sure, he’d made a fuss. He liked fussing with food. And preparing tea sandwiches, scones and cake was fiddly and detailed and as much about presentation as anything else. It was one of his favorite things to do, fancy tea.
In Ernest’s kink community, sissy maids ruled the tea service arena. Their tea parties were legendary. He had learned tea service from the best, a chubby sissy maid named Marlene, who often hosted tea parties and was a regular at the Gender Fabulous Kink Munch that Ernest co-hosted. He found the ritual of afternoon tea so comforting, every bit of it. From the baking, to the cutting the crusts off the sandwiches, to arranging things on the beautiful serving tier Judith had gotten him for his birthday, to serving the actual tea. If he had his way, he would make tea for his friends at least once a month. Not as service, exactly, but to keep his skills up until he had a dominant who was into it. It wasn’t the kind of service Daddy wanted; it was too fiddly and fancy for him, and VJ didn’t like tea. Ernest had never gotten to do it as part of service, except when he was learning from Marlene and had gotten to serve her Mistress. And that was learning, it wasn’t the same as doing personal service for his dominant. Someday, perhaps. If he got together with a dominant who liked it.
Ernest had been up early getting everything ready, and now that it was, and he only had a few minutes before Nora arrived, he didn’t know what to do with himself. He had already cleaned everything and this was the last chametz in the house. Nora would take it with her when she left. He had his notes out, and was ready to talk with Nora. He had already prepped everything that could be prepped ahead for the chosen family seder on Tuesday. Tomorrow they were going to Gideon’s sister’s place for Pesach. He had already fussed with his hair for several minutes and changed his shirt three times, before going back to the same plain white T-shirt he’d started out with. He had nothing to do except wait. That was why he felt nervous. Waiting was hard.
When Ernest buzzed Nora in, his heart started racing. He took long slow breaths, counting, as he dug his feet into the floor. Even if he was nervous to see her, he didn’t want to be obvious about it. She was all flushed from the wind, and her dark curly hair was a beautiful floating tumble about her face.
Nora opened her arms to offer a hug, the first time she’d ever done that. He went into them. Her arms wrapped firm around him, his head tucked into her shoulder, and he buried his face in the dizzying mass of her curls. He felt as if he could get lost in her hair and he would love every second of it. Ernest had to push himself to focus, and pulled away from the marvelous hug to take her leather jacket. It was soft in his hands, and he really wanted to pet it, but he didn’t. Instead, he hung it up, and followed her down the long hall to the living room. Her gait was a lovely thing to listen to. Between her limp and the cane, it made this wonderfully uneven beat on the hardwood floor. He itched to write it down; it was just begging to be in a song.
He counted his steps, trying to get more grounded on the way. When he got there, she was settling into the couch by the window and taking off her boots. He picked up his notebook and started noting down the beat before he lost it. She looked at him curiously, raising a brow.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I just got this idea for a song, and didn’t want to lose it.”
“Oh, I get that. I’m the same way with fiction. Is it an idea you want to share?”
“Oh. Um. I don’t often share things in idea form, but I guess…”
“No pressure.”
He smiled at her. “Thanks. I actually had this idea based on the sound of you walking down the hall. It was a beautiful rhythm, and I wanted to put it into a song.”
“You want to make my limp into a song?”
“Um. Yes? Well, the sound of your walk on the wood, in particular, because the wood answers back, creaks in response. I’m sorry, is there something upsetting about that? I don’t have to, of course. It’s your walk. If you’re uncomfortable with it…”
“It’s okay, Ernest. I was just surprised, is all. Nobody ever called anything about my limp beautiful in a way that didn’t creep me out before. It took me a moment to process it.”
“Oh! You mean people…” Ernest blinked, not having thought about that before.
“Fetishize my disability without my consent? Oh yeah. My fatness too, of course. And my bisexuality. Sometimes all three at once, for the hat trick.”
“Yikes.”
“You said it. You must get that, too, about being fat, and being trans?”
“Um. Well. Yeah, I have. I got the fat fetishizing stuff more when I was read as a woman. The trans stuff usually isn’t as obvious right away, it comes out more with people I’m dating or playing with. Which is one of the reasons I mostly stick to trans and non-binary play partners and dates.”
Ernest was very aware that he hadn’t stated that as absolutely as he usually did, that he had left wiggle room, used the word mostly. It had just tumbled out that way. Should he clarify? Or leave it alone? He couldn’t figure out what to do, felt all flustered. This conversation had gone to places that he hadn’t expected.
“Yeah I get that. I mostly stick to other fat and disabled play partners and dates, myself. Though there are exceptions, like Gideon.” She smiled as she said Gideon’s name.
Wait, did that mean that she didn’t know about Gideon’s depression? Or maybe that she didn’t think of depression as a disability? How could he find out what she meant?
“I get what you mean about wanting disabled partners; there are some things that are just easier for me when I’m with someone else who’s also dealing with mental illness. Things I don’t need to explain.”
“Yes, exactly.” She nodded. “It helps to be able to say I’m triggered, or I’m flaring, and they have a sense of that, even if their mental illness looks different.”
Oh good. Maybe she just meant that Gideon wasn’t fat, and that’s what she was referring to earlier. Or maybe Gideon hadn’t told her about his depression. Ernest needed to respect that, if that was the case. Though after nine months, he would hope trust was there. But, on the other hand, Gideon did keep things pretty close to his chest. Ernest needed to ask him if he had told her, because otherwise he might totally blurt it out accidentally. Oh, he had gotten distracted and lost his end of the conversation, hadn’t he? What had she said?
“Yep. It’s good not to have to explain so much,” he said softly, smiling at her.
“So, Ernest…when you write the song, will you play it for me?”
“Um. If you want?”
“Oh, I want.”
“Then I will. It’s not right for the musical I’m working on with Judith. I’m not sure what it’s right for yet, but not that. I don’t even have a melody for it yet. But I will. I can tell it’s jumped ahead of my current projects and will keep tuggin
g at me until I write it.” Wow he was talking fast. He should ask her a question. “Does it work like that for you?”
“Yes, definitely. Sometimes a story won’t leave me alone until I work on it.”
“It’s kind of like polyamory. I’m often dating several projects at once.”
She laughed. Oh her laugh was mesmerizing, all throaty and a bit nasal and almost like a scale, going up…and coming back down. He had to put her laugh in the song too. He made a quick note and set his notebook down; twice was enough and more notes would be rude, he thought.
“Yeah, it is kind of like each project is its own relationship, and needs my attention, along with my partners. I bet it’s even moreso with collaborations. Is Judith like another partner, too?”
“Huh, I do really think of her that way, but I can’t tell if I would if she wasn’t also family and my housemate and my best friend. Not a romantic partner, but a partner all the same. A platonic one. Not to mention that she’s Gideon’s ex, so we’re a kind of metamour too.”
“Oh, right. He had told me that she was his ex, but I’d forgotten. That is a kind of metamour, I guess. I wonder if there’s another name for it. Y’know Ernest…I’ve never actually been close to a metamour before, where we have our own relationship. You are the first metamour who actually wanted to have our own connection.”
“Oh. Did you not want that, Nora? I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.” Ernest had been friendly towards her, but had given Gideon and Nora space to gel a bit before hanging out with them as a couple, and even longer before approaching Nora and trying to make one on one plans. He’d thought he had moved pretty slow in trying to build this with her, but perhaps she’d felt obligated?
“Oh, no. You misunderstand. I do want that with you. I like that we have our own relationship, that’s only ours. I just…I never had that before. I mostly had metamours who saw me as a threat, or competition, or just didn’t seem interested. I guess, I wanted you to know I was new at this. Like, just being metamours who hang out away from our shared partner and are kinda like friends, that part is new.”
Oh, not obligated, just not experienced. Well, that kind of explained some things. Like why she had seemed so uncomfortable that first time. Maybe because she expected him to treat her as a threat. It had taken a long time to get her to make a second plan with him. Maybe because she didn’t get what he was trying to do, what kind of relationship he had been trying to build? It had seemed to flow after that. He’d thought they were doing pretty well, these last three months especially, since they had established twice a month Sunday afternoon hangouts over food, trying each other’s favorite restaurants. They’d really developed their own groove, their own connection separate from Gideon. But he’d had no clue that she had never done this kind of metamour relationship before. Now he was wondering if she knew how precious his Sunday afternoons were, and what it meant that he’d devoted this many of them to her. He should have been more clear with her, from the beginning. He was going to need to think on the right words to say, to be clear with her.
“It’s kinda like friends, kinda like family, kinda its own thing,” he said. “At least that’s how I think of it.”
“Yeah,” she said softly, smiling at him. “That part is new, and I care about it. The idea of these layers of relationship being possible, like what you have with Judith, never occurred to me.”
“Oh. That makes sense. It can be what we want it to be. There’s not like, rules, or anything. Judith and I are very different from the metamour relationship I have with Irene, for example.”
“Irene?”
Oy, what had they been talking about? There was so much they’d left out, still. They’d gotten into this groove of talking about jobs and food and movies and books, and writing…and hadn’t shared some basic information. For all he knew, she had partners he had no clue about.
“Irene is VJ’s girl. VJ is someone I do service for on more a scene-like basis, instead of the ongoing thing I have with Gideon. Ze’s great; I think you two might like each other.”
“I know a VJ, from the queer kink group, Leather And Power? Ze is Puerto Rican, kinda tall, thin, genderqueer, a dominant. Is that your VJ?”
“Yes, that’s VJ, Ze’s active in LAP.” Ernest smiled.
“So what makes it different with Irene?”
“Well, I sometimes do service while they’re playing together as a couple, help VJ pack for weekends with her, go to kink events with them both together where we each have a role, that kind of thing. It creates a different kind of intimacy.”
Nora nodded. Ernest continued, “Plus, we cook together, which is its own way to build connection. We’ve been teaching each other our favorite family recipes; last month she taught me how to make kimchi. Well, one kind of it, anyway. We’re on a pickling kick at the moment. It’s something Jewish and Korean food have in common.” He smiled, thinking about how he was going to teach Irene how to make full sour dill pickles next month.
“Will Irene be at the seder this week?”
“No, she and VJ can’t make it this time. They will both be at Daddy’s birthday party, probably, so you’ll get to meet Irene there.”
She smiled, and said, “I’m interested to see what your relationship looks like with them, and with Judith.”
“You can see me and Judith at the seder of course. Have you really not seen me and Judith before?”
“Not in a while. I’m interested. Especially because, as you say, this metamour thing can look lots of different ways, have different layers to it. I want to consider possibilities.”
Ernest blinked. He was pretty sure she was saying something underneath those words. Allistic people did that a lot, and they usually did that thing with their voices she was doing when they did. But he had no clue what was underneath her words. He could only guess that she maybe wanted to change something. If that was true, why had she said she liked it? Allistic people were so confusing.
“Okay. If it’s not working the way it is, or you want to change anything, we can talk about it. I want you to be comfortable.”
“Ernest, you look worried.”
“I have a hard time figuring out what you are saying, Nora. I want you to feel good about our relationship, want it to work for you. You said you liked it, but you also talked about possibilities, which makes me think you want things to change. I’m confused and feel like I’m missing something. I hope that’s not too blunt?”
“I told you, I like blunt.”
Oh, right. She had said that, at the cupcake place. He nodded.
“Honestly, Ernest, I am not sure what I want. I do really like our connection the way it is. It’s important to me, not to lose it.”
“But why would you lose it?”
“Hopefully, I wouldn’t. I’m sorry. I’m being confusing. I need to think about what you just told me, and stop talking about this right now, if that’s okay? Can we just focus on the tea, and the planning?”
“Of course,” Ernest said, feeling lost and sad and a bit frustrated. “What sort of tea would you like?” He handed her the list of available tea that he had hand-lettered that morning (no, that was not too much), and counted to ten as she considered before picking Earl Grey. Grey like her hanky. Like the sky this afternoon. Like he felt inside.
He concentrated on filling the kettle, measuring the tea for them both, getting out the milk pitcher, setting everything except the tea pot on the tray just so as he waited for the water to boil. He washed his hands while he waited, imagining his churning feelings getting washed away by the water. That helped. By the time the water had boiled and he had poured it into the pot, he had found a measure of calm.
He would think about this later. Right now, he would concentrate on serving the tea, and take all the pleasure he could from that. He asked how she took it, made sure to put the milk in first, then the tea, and then the Splenda she requested. He explained what each of the sandwiches were. He had made three kinds: tuna, cucumber, and cheddar-appl
e. He thought he had made everything small enough that she could try each thing, including the scones and the cake, and he was interested to note that she went for the tuna first but removed the top, took the cheddar out of two sandwiches to eat it plain, and made yummy noises over the cucumber sandwich.
She noticed him looking at her plate, and said, “Oh I’m sure it’s all wonderful as is, I just need to watch my protein to carbs ratio if I am going to try both a scone and a bit of cake. I just couldn’t resist the cucumber because they are my fave.”
“So next time, open faced sandwiches are better?”
She gave him the biggest grin. “There will be a next time?”
“Well. I mean. This is one of my favorite things to do. So if you like it. Um. Yes, I would like there to be a next time.”
“How did you learn to do this?”
“From my friend Marlene who comes to the Gender Fabulous Kink Munch I co-host. She’s a sissy maid, and she throws tea parties, teaches tea service. It’s her scone recipe, and she made the jam you’re eating, actually.” He loved bragging about Marlene. She was awesome.
“Oh wow, it did taste homemade. Scones with clotted cream and jam…yum.”
“I did mention that I need this out of the house, right? And you said you didn’t keep kosher for Pesach. So I was planning to pack whatever’s leftover to take with you, if that’s okay?”
“Oh! I’m not sure I can carry it all.”
“If you’d like, I could go with you and carry it for you, so you didn’t need to.”
“Well aren’t you chivalrous. Yes, Ernest. I would like that, assuming you aren’t allergic to cats.”
He was blushing. He was sure he was blushing. “I’m not allergic. And it would be my pleasure. I’ll be happy thinking that you’re enjoying this food I made.”
“Ernest, you are so sweet to me. So, you learned to do this for service?”
