You, Me & Her

by Tanya Chris

  “Not if I’m driving.”

  “Like I said earlier, I can drive.”

  “Better yet,” Sherry said. “Come home with us. We have tequila at our place. And privacy.” She ran one hand down the side of my face. Her fingers lingered under my chin, keeping my head turned towards her.

  “Um.” Even without her hand on my chin, I’d have had a hard time looking away from those full lips turned upward in a sultry smile of promise, but I couldn’t ignore the larger body hulking over us.

  Sherry laughed, a deep melodic sound that belonged somewhere darker and more intimate. “Joshua hasn’t told you that he and I have an open marriage yet, has he?”

  “Not explicitly.” I’d been getting the idea that it was a possibility, or at least I’d been hoping it was a possibility.

  “Why not?” She turned her head up to her husband.

  “I was exercising a reasonable degree of caution. Nate and I have to work together for the next two months.”

  That was my concern too. It was bad enough having one co-star pissed at me.

  “You brought him here though. What was your game plan?”

  “Not this.”

  “Sorry, babe.” She tugged at his shirt and he leaned down and kissed her, their lips lining up perfectly.

  “C’est la vie,” he said as he straightened up. “You win some, you lose some. So what’s the deal? You guys want another one or are we heading out?”

  I looked between them, trying to read the dynamic, not sure what I was being offered and whether or not it would be OK to accept it. On the one hand, Sherry was hot and eager and I hadn’t gotten laid in nearly a week. On the other hand, Joshua.

  “I think you two need to talk without me here,” she said finally, interrupting the argument my head was having with my dick. “I’m going to go grab my stuff.” She stood up and put her hands on her husband’s shoulders, pressing him into the seat she’d just vacated, then leaned over and whispered something into his ear. Joshua twitched his head in an annoyed acknowledgement of whatever she’d said.

  “Sherry and I have an open marriage,” he stated flatly when she’d left us alone. He twirled one of the shot glasses on the table, his eyes firmly fixed on it. “It’s OK for her to sleep with other people.”

  “Doesn’t mean it’s OK for her to sleep with me.”

  “No, not if you don’t want her to.” His gaze jerked up to my face in surprise. “I was under the impression you did.”

  “Of course I do. She’s sexy, she’s fun. She smells nice.”

  “I know, right? Like sex and chocolate chip cookies.”

  “Like sex with chocolate chip cookies.”

  Joshua smiled. It was his first genuine smile in the last half hour and it made me smile back to see it.

  “Sounds sticky,” he said. “And sweet.”

  “Sticky and sweet. What sex ought to be.”

  “I buy it for her—that perfume she wears. It doesn’t smell like that out of the bottle, only on her. It’s some kind of chemical reaction with her skin.”

  “Her skin though.” A vision of her skin spread out naked before me filled my mind.

  “Yeah.” But the enthusiasm had dropped from Joshua’s voice. His eyes and hand returned to the shot glass.

  “So, much as I’d like to,” I said, manning up to reality, “I think I’d better not.”

  “Why’s that? Does it bug you that she’s married?”

  “No, but I think it bugs you.”

  “It really doesn’t. We’ve been doing this our whole relationship. You’re not breaking any new ground here, Nate. You’re just another guy she’s going to fuck—no offense. Sherry and I have this all worked out and, honestly, we don’t need you to mediate it. If she wants you, that’s her call. It’s not about me.”

  “It’s about you and me.”

  “What about you and me? What you-and-me is there even?”

  “I don’t know. This—” I gestured around the bar and then more closely at the two of us seated next to each other “—what did all this mean then? What were we doing here together?”

  When Joshua looked up at me, I knew I wasn’t imagining that he was hurting. It was all over his face for that first moment of eye contact. Then, quickly, there was nothing on his face at all. He shrugged and turned his head away from me, over his shoulder, as though checking for Sherry.

  “What I’m trying to say,” I said, “is that I’d rather be your friend than have sex with Sherry.”

  “That’s what you’re afraid of? That if you and she fuck, we won’t be friends?”

  I nodded.

  “I wouldn’t go all Deb on you, you know, not even if you did piss me off, which, by the way, you fucking Sherry won’t piss me off.”

  “Can we do any better than not-pissed-off?”

  Joshua laughed shortly. He ran his hand over his close-cropped hair, then tilted his head to look at me out of the corner of his eye. “Yeah, I think we can do a lot better than that. If I seem a little off, I promise it’s got nothing to do with you and Sherry. You’re in the clear to sleep with her. Come on back to the house with us.”

  “It wouldn’t be better if I took her to my place?”

  “Nah, you’re fine at ours. We’ve got two bedrooms for exactly this purpose, and—not that I don’t trust you, because I probably do—but when she’s with a new guy, the macho protector in me likes to know where she is.”

  “A manly man without jealousy issues,” I marveled. “It’s bizarre but refreshing.”

  “Hey, openness swings both ways. If I want to fuck around, I have to give her the freedom to fuck around. Not that I ever had a chance of keeping her on lockdown. You’ll see.”

  “So while I’m in bed with your wife, what are you doing?”

  “I don’t think I’ve got the motivation to go out looking for someone else tonight, so I’ll probably hang out in the spare room—watch a movie, get a good night’s sleep. Don’t feel like you have to rush off after, like it’s one and done. Stick around and enjoy round two. Or three. I don’t know what kind of stamina you’ve got.”

  “I wouldn’t want to wear her out.” I smirked, falling into the comfortable pattern we’d established of competitive banter

  “What, you think you’re going to ruin her for me?” Joshua rolled his eyes. “Sweet pea, the second you’re out the door, she’ll be all over me, begging me to take care of all those needs you couldn’t meet.”

  “You obviously don’t know me very well.”

  “I know her very well. You’re not going to use her up.”

  “That sounds like a challenge.”

  He laughed, tipping his eyes up to the sky and rocking back in his chair. “I like you, Nate. You know why? Because you’re exactly like me. So, you’re coming back with us, right? If you say no, Sherry’s going to think I fucked this up for her somehow.”

  I spotted Sherry weaving her way through the tables towards us, her guitar case slung over her shoulder. She smiled widely as she walked, dancing with expectant enthusiasm like she was skipping through a spring meadow, not dodging handsy drunks. I nodded at Joshua without taking my eyes off her.

  “Little piece of advice,” he said as we both stood up to greet her. “Don’t drink any more tequila. You’ve got a long night ahead of you.”

  Chapter 6

  Their place was all Sherry—colorful and vibrant, yes, but also seductively intimate. Puddles of light picked out a leopard-skin-covered throw cushion here or a sarong-draped Papasan chair there, everything soft but energetic.

  “That’s mine.” Joshua gestured at the gigantic television that dominated one wall. “The rest is hers.”

  I crossed over to the flat panel screen to browse through the stacks of DVDs surrounding it. “We have a lot of the same taste.”

  “We already knew that.” He leaned in the pass-through to the kitchen with his arms folded against his chest. “Do you want to put a movie in?”

  “We definitely do not.” S
herry returned from the kitchen with a bottle of tequila and two shot glasses, which she plunked down on the coffee table. “I’m thinking music and mood lighting. And less you.” She went to her husband, and kissed him. “You’ll make Nate nervous, flexing at him like that.”

  Joshua’s posture definitely emphasized his biceps. He wasn’t scowling, exactly, but his features were only millimeters away from scowling positions.

  I didn’t expect him to turn jealous-husband on me all of a sudden, but I was nervous. On the drive over, I’d suffered a loss of confidence. I’d felt an immediate connection with Sherry in the bar, but when she climbed into her husband’s low-slung muscle car, leaving me to follow them back alone, I began to question that connection. My sexual dynamic centered on knowing the women I engaged with—on being able to read them and wanting to please them. I couldn’t just click it on.

  Right at that moment, watching a movie with Joshua sounded less stressful than trying to please a woman I’d only met an hour ago, one who’d been represented as having high expectations. Bantering with Joshua was one thing. Living up to the hype was another.

  “I think you’re the one making him nervous,” Joshua observed. His eyes found me where I sat cross-legged in front of the television flipping through movies so I had something to do with my hands.

  “Am I?” She came over and sat in front of me, mirroring my posture. Her scent reached out to me, drawing me closer. “I’m very forward,” she said in her melodic voice, “but there’s no hurry.”

  “A woman with confidence is a beautiful thing. I’m not complaining.”

  She leaned into me and I swayed unconsciously closer to her until our heads were only inches apart. Her mouth closed the distance. The soft stickiness of lip gloss caressed my lips. Without touching each other anywhere else, we kissed, our lips clinging with urgent suction, our mouths opening wider bit by bit until our tongues slipped through to meet in the middle. I wrapped my hand in the dense tangle of her hair and increased the pressure of mouth to mouth.

  The DVDs I’d been holding tumbled to the floor as I shifted forward, disappearing into the kiss. There was nothing else in the world but this kiss—the delicate lips soft beneath mine, the silky spring of her curls in my hand, that scent of musky vanilla spilling off the warm skin of her neck.

  Without breaking the kiss, I lifted her and turned her so that she lay on her back. As I stretched myself out alongside her, my eyes flickered up to where I’d last seen Joshua. The doorway was empty.

  As easy as that, Sherry and I were alone. As easy as that, I was absorbed.

  ~~~

  “We’ll have to do that again.” Sherry stretched her dimpled thighs out along the rug, spreading her legs wide as if to air out the space between them. “But I can give you some time to recover.”

  “Maybe a drink.” I sat up against the couch and ran a hand through my hair to get it out of my eyes.

  “A man after my own heart.” She grabbed for the tequila bottle.

  “I was thinking water. I’m never going to make it through another round if you feed me tequila.”

  “Then let’s not feed you tequila.” Sherry jumped up with a grin. She reached her hand down and pulled me up after her. “How about a bed for round two?”

  “Round two? That only counted as one round?”

  “Count however you like, blue eyes. I don’t keep a spreadsheet.” She pushed me through the doorway and down a hall into a bedroom. When I’d collapsed onto the bed, she leaned over and kissed my forehead. “I’ll get you some water. Don’t fall asleep.”

  Despite the warning, my eyes grew heavy as soon as I had a pillow beneath my head. It had been very good, the sex, for two people who barely knew each other. Sherry knew her way around a dick and wasn’t shy about explaining what she needed from me either. If all women were so forthright, it’d make my job a lot easier. Then again, it would make me a lot less special since my secret technique was paying attention.

  I jolted back into consciousness when cold liquid hit my stomach. Sherry chased the tequila she’d poured into my navel across my abdomen with her tongue.

  “The game is to catch it all before it hits the sheets,” she said when she’d slurped me clean. “I hate wet sheets, which is why I don’t mind condoms.” She plunked down next to me on the bed, the tequila bottle in hand. “I’ve heard women complain that condoms feel weird but, you know, I honestly can’t tell the difference. Not that I’ve had a lot of experience bareback, not since I got old enough to be a whole lot less stupid.”

  I pulled myself up against the headboard and grabbed the bottle of water she’d brought for me. “You and Joshua use condoms?”

  “We have to, under the circumstances. It’s probably not ideal for him, but like I said, I actually prefer it. Less mess on the sheets, less mess inside me. Semen’s got a way of hiding out inside of you until you’re in the grocery store checkout line or pressing down on a foot pedal mid-number. Then whoosh.” She ran a hand down her bare leg.

  “I’ve never had unprotected sex. I was old enough to not be stupid before I started.”

  “Never been in a committed relationship?”

  “Not even as committed as yours.”

  “Don’t think we’re not committed. This is full-on commitment, me and Joshua. I don’t ever intend to be without him.”

  Lucky Joshua. I suppressed the pang of jealousy that struck me. “I didn’t mean it that way. I think what you guys have is beautiful.”

  She curled into me, her knees overlapping my thighs, one hand wrapped around the bottle, the other stroking my stomach. Her breasts pressed soft and springy against me.

  “Just don’t get any ideas because I’m here with you right now, not him. This is just sex.”

  “Just sex,” I echoed. The pang hit me again.

  “Good sex, though. For a guy who got a late start, you seem to have caught up. How old were you?”

  “Eighteen. I had absolutely no game in high school. You know, you’re probably the youngest woman I’ve ever slept with? The woman I lost my virginity to was thirteen years older than me—a friend of my sister’s who seduced me at my high school graduation party.”

  “And taught you everything you know?”

  “That’s the cliché, but no. I would look things up online and then practice them on her, always trying to pretend I knew more than I did, and she humored me. Mistakes were made.”

  Some of the moves I’d attempted—the ways in which I’d attempted them—were cringe-worthy in retrospect, like the oral sex technique an online guru had claimed was the basis of ‘the Seinfeld swirl (As Seen On TV).’ Or the awkward and painful attempt at anal sex. I really should have read more background information before diving into that area, like the part about talking to her first. Irene didn’t go along with me that time.

  “Then one day I got something right—probably completely by accident—and I noticed the difference between her faking it and her liking it.”

  “She hadn’t told you the difference?”

  “No.”

  “Women,” Sherry said. “We’re fucked up. It matters more to us whether you like us than whether we like you.”

  “And you’re an exception?” I put my empty water bottle down on the end table and brought my cold fingertips to one of her nipples, relishing the instant pucker in response.

  “No, but having Joshua helps. I have a safe base to expand from. If you don’t like me—” she shrugged. “He does.”

  “I do like you.” I nuzzled into her hair, burrowing into the warm, wild fragrance. “Even though I barely know you. Talk to me about your singing. Did I tell you how good you were tonight?”

  “Briefly. You can lay it on a little thicker if you want.”

  “Your voice is like iron drenched in molasses. All of you is like that. You feel soft, but you’re not.”

  “You know me better than you think.”

  “Are you going to pursue a music career professionally? Shouldn’t you be in
the City?”

  Sherry handed me the tequila bottle and I put it down next to my water bottle on the nightstand. “I don’t know. In New York there’d be more venues. I might be able to target my audience better. Like, that wasn’t my target audience tonight. That was a fun night and a few hundred bucks.”

  I nodded, letting my eyes droop shut as I listened to her talk.

  “It’s not like an agent is going to discover me at Billy’s, but I’ve got a following here in Connecticut. If I tweet I’m playing a venue, people show up. In New York, I’d be just one more one more, if you know what I mean.” She stopped for a moment. “I could be content with what I’m doing. It’s Joshua who should go to New York.”

  After only two rehearsals of only one show, I already knew that was true. “Why doesn’t he?”

  “Why don’t you?”

  “Who says I’m as good as Joshua?”

  “He does.”

  I smiled at the second-hand compliment. “Joshua doesn’t seem like the type to run away from a challenge,” I said, ducking the question of why I didn’t go to New York myself.

  “I tell him all the time we should go, but he’s afraid we couldn’t support ourselves there. He’s got completely non-traditional views of the whole man/woman dynamic except then he burdens himself with conventional expectations. I don’t have to cook or clean, but he has to pay the bills, or at least make sure they’re getting paid. If I ever hit it big, I think he’d be OK with being a kept man.” Sherry grinned up at me.

  “I’d adore being a kept man. It’s my only ambition. When you hit it big, do you want to keep two men?”

  “Always good to have a spare. OK, your turn. Tell me about the show.”

  “Joshua must’ve told you plenty already.”

  “Joshua told me all about Iago. I know almost nothing about Othello.”

  “Ah, the ugly stepsister technique.” I laughed at the expression on her face, then leaned down and kissed her. Nope, not ready for the next round yet. “OK, let’s say you’re Cinderella and I’m the ugly stepsister. From your point of view, the wicked stepfamily was keeping you down until you escaped and met your Prince. Happily ever after ensues. But from my point of view, my mom remarries this guy with an annoyingly beautiful daughter who upstages me at every turn. I finally get the chance to get all dressed up and go to a ball for a shot at winning the Prince’s heart and who shows up to steal my thunder and my Prince? Fucking Cinderella again. For me, Cinderella is a tragedy.”