Six:
Kimberly left Emily in the shower with the promise of dry shorts and warm towels when she was finished. As she made her way to the basement, she considered the situation facing them. Emily needed to get her story out in the open, but Kim wondered if maybe Em should talk to Jason first. After all, he was the most in need of an explanation, her seduction notwithstanding. But, was Jason up to the conversation? He had to have seen what Tommy had; what must be going through his head right now?
I imagine the same things that went through my mind the first time I walked in on the guys, she mused, recalling her momentary fear that Tommy really did prefer Jason to her, among other things. At least I had fair warning that he was interested in having sex with Jason. Jason probably had no clue his wife was into other women.
Of course, Emily wasn't kidding when she said she owed her the truth. After all, Jason's wife had admitted to lusting after her the way Tommy lusted after Jason, and even if Kim hadn't caught her drift from her words, she couldn't ignore what had just happened in the living room.
I have just as much right to know what's going on as Jason....
Kim quashed her personal issues for the present. Emily needed unconditional support right now. Even without her actions on the couch, coming out was still an uncertain business. And Emily realized, albeit belatedly, that she had overstepped the bounds.
At the basement door, Kim paused. Part of her hoped not find their husbands downstairs... to delay the inevitable... but that never solved anything. Steeling herself for the confrontation, she opened the door and started down the stairs.
~*~
"I just wish I knew what was going on up there," Jason said, his words followed by the solid thud-thud-thud of his fists striking Tommy's punching bag. The confusion and pain in his tone were heart wrenching.
"Just be patient, bro," Tommy advised gently. "We'll find out what's going on as soon as the ladies are finished. I'm pretty sure Kim saw me; she'll come looking for us the first chance she gets."
As if on cue, the men heard the soft pad of footsteps on the stairs. Kim appeared moments later bearing a pair of wet shorts and towels to warm in the dryer.
Jason had a million questions on the tip of his tongue, but all he could manage to get out was a strangled, "Kim?"
With a kind smile, she crossed over to him and hugged him.
"It appears, Big Guy, that you and I have quite a bit in common when it comes to our spouses," she teased lightly, feeling the tension permeating his body.
"You mean Emily...?" Tommy began, quicker on the uptake than Jason for once.
"Uh huh."
"Emily what?" Jason demanded, unable to assemble the pieces to the puzzle.
"Emily really should be the one to tell you this, but I don't think she can yet. She's bi, Jason."
"Bi... bisexual... like Tommy?" he stammered.
"Yes, and like Tommy with you, she's had a thing for me."
"That explains a lot," Tommy mused, seeing a lot of his past actions in Emily's recent behavior.
"But... but... why didn't she tell me?" Jason asked numbly.
"Why don't you sit down, Jase," Tommy directed, noticing that his best friend's coloring suddenly didn't look so good.
"Why didn't she tell me?" Jason reiterated, looking with helpless anguish at both his friends. "Why did she let me think that she had something against homosexual sex... that she objected to me and Tommy being together?"
"I don't think she meant to do that," Kim answered. "I don't know the whole story yet, but I have the feeling that she wanted to confide in you but was too scared scared she might lose you."
"Sounds familiar," Tommy murmured, recalling his own reticence about telling his best friend his deepest, darkest secret.
"Emily did say that until today, the only person who knew was her friend Jen," Kim continued explaining.
"And we know something went very wrong between the two of them," Tommy concluded. "No wonder she's scared."
"Once I'm done down here, I'm going back upstairs to talk to Emily and see if she'll confide in me, but I think you should be there, too."
Giving Jason another consoling hug, Kim headed to the far side of the basement to take care of the laundry.
Jason was doing his best to get a grip on his runaway thoughts and emotions, but they slipped through his grasp, elusive as smoke. His wife was bisexual. She was into other women, and judging by what he'd witnessed, she had been with other women. But he'd absolutely no clue! Not even when he told her about being with Tommy. She'd been hurt and angry, but how could she have been when she'd already done something similar with Jen, no doubt?
"Jason?" Tommy prompted, hi voice cutting across his friend's turbulent musings. "Coming out is never easy especially to those you love. You need their love and support so badly, and there's no worse hurt in the world than when those you love reject you."
"How would you know?" Jason snapped, his hurt and uncertainty giving his words a razor edge. "When you came out, everyone who mattered to you accepted your choice."
"True, I was one of the lucky ones," Tommy agreed, "but I still remember how scared I was... and I remember how much I hurt when Kim broke up with me, which had everything to do with my choices.
"I know you're still in shock and you're hurt Emily didn't confide in you, but you've been in this position before with me. Why should this be any different?"
"I wasn't married to you!"
"You were still shocked... and you were hurt that you didn't know me as well as you'd always thought. Yet, you set aside those feelings to give me the reassurance I needed that you were still my friend. And from that foundation of support, we dealt with all the awkward details.
"If you could do that for your best friend, surely you can do that for your wife. Emily needs you now more than ever, because I can almost guarantee that she's upstairs terrified that once you find out, she'll lose you."
"And I'm terrified that I'll lose her again."
"Which is why you need to hear what she has to say and listen with an open mind and heart."
The men turned as Kimberly added her thoughts to their conversation. She had finished with laundry and was ready to head upstairs again.
"Jason, Emily loves you so much that she buried this part of herself so deep... and I think what happened today was because she couldn't hold it in any longer. Please, be there for her."
Jason looked from one imploring face to the other. He had no intention of abandoning his wife, and he could see that his friends knew this. What they were asking of him was to be strong for both himself and Emily as he'd once been strong for Tommy.
"Will you guys be there, too?" he asked, not at all certain that he could be strong for himself, much less the both of them.
"Of course," the two chorused without hesitation.
"I don't think Emily knows you two were there," Kim interjected. "If she had, she'd be in worse shape than she is now. I'll get her talking, and you two just hang back and listen. You can come forward and let her know you're there whenever you're ready. All right?"
"O-okay," Jason agreed unsteadily.
"We'll join you shortly, Beautiful," Tommy assured her as she mounted the stairs to return to Emily.
"Wait, Kim!" Jason called out suddenly. When she regarded him questioningly, he seemed to falter. "I know you're not into other women, so why did you... with Emily...?"
Kim smiled kindly at him. "Because she's your wife and my friend. I couldn't turn my back on a friend any more than you could turn your back on Tommy when he needed you."
~*~
Upstairs in the bathroom, Emily stood under the pounding spray, but it did nothing to relax her. She could barely feel the heat of the water. Her insides were so tightly clenched she thought she might be ill.
I should be relieved, she mused. After all, she had wanted to get her secret out into the open, and she had wanted to do so in a way she wouldn't be able to hide or deny later.
Well, I certainly managed that!
She still couldn't believe that she had seduced Kimberly one of her husband's oldest friends... a woman she had known wasn't into other women. Thankfully, Kim hadn't rejected her advances
"...nothing that I wouldn't allow...." Kim's words echoed in Emily's mind, and Emily had a pretty good idea as to exactly why Kim hadn't fought her: Jason and Tommy. Perhaps, subconsciously, she had been counting on that reaction. It had certainly played a part in her deciding to come out to Kim in the first place, but now Emily wasn't so sure she could face Kimberly. As she had told Tommy not too long ago, it was still difficult to talk about.
You owe her the whole story, Emily chided herself, a truth which raised an even more scary prospect: she owed Jason the whole story. She knew Kim would urge her to talk to her husband. She knew she had to... wanted to. Keeping this from him was tearing her up inside. Her husband had trusted her with all his secrets; why couldn't she trust him with hers?
"You think your precious Jason is so great? Wait 'til he finds out you've been sleeping around with other women. Do you think he'll take you back knowing that?"
Jen's parting shot still haunted her after all these years. It was the reason she refused to let Jason tell her about his three-way with Kim and Tommy: if he didn't reveal his past, she didn't have to reveal hers. And it was the reason she kept silent even when Jason confessed to wanting to sleep with Tommy again.
However, by keeping quiet for so long, she had done Jason a disservice and had given Jen the ultimate victory over her.
"Emily?"
The troubled blonde jumped at the sound of Kim's call.
"I've got the towels," her hostess continued.
"Come in," she gulped, fumbling with the bar of soap. Her hands were shaking so badly she couldn't hang onto the slippery cake.
"I've also brought you a robe," came the voice beyond the curtain. "I've put your wet things in the dryer. Whenever you're ready, come to the bedroom. We can talk there."
"A-all right," Emily stammered.
"Don't worry; everything's going to be all right. You'll see," Kim assured her once again.
"I hope so," Emily whispered, more to herself than to her friend.
~*~
Five minutes later, Emily tentatively poked her head into the Olivers' bedroom. She was strangely relieved that Kimberly wasn't there eyeing the doorway expectantly. It made her feel less like she was entering an interrogation chamber. She came in and took a seat on the edge of the neatly made bed, and she had to offer an ironic chuckle over the tableau for their conversation
She didn't have to wait long. She'd scarcely made herself comfortable when Tommy's wife returned with a pitcher and two glasses.
"It's only water, but I thought it might help," Kim said pleasantly.
Emily's mouth suddenly went dry, and she found herself staring at the pattern in the carpet. She could not make herself meet Kim's eyes.
As for the brunette, she understood her companion's anxiety and wished she could alleviate it somehow. It was obvious that Emily didn't know how to begin, but while she wasn't sure she should prompt Emily for fearing of seeming like she was pressuring her just sitting here was getting nowhere.
"Did you always know you were bi or at least attracted to other girls?" Kim asked. "When you asked about how Tommy dealt with his sexuality, was it like that for you?"
"No," Emily said with a little laugh. "I was pretty much oblivious. I checked out cute guys, like any of the other girls, but my response always seemed more subdued. Like I never really drooled over the latest teen heart throb. I was drawn to girls, too, but I didn't realize it was a sexual attraction. I can remember my cousin Jeremy showing me his dad's Playboy collection; I was fascinated by the pictures, but at the same time, his sister Carrie's Playgirls made me kind of uncomfortable. I just didn't know why."
"When did you realize ?" Kim queried.
"After I was out of high school not long before I broke up with Jason. It wasn't a conclusion I'd come to on my own, either. It was Jen who figured it out."
"You're best friend?"
"Yeah, Jennifer Masters. We'd known each other forever," Emily related with a sad sigh. "Growing up, we were inseparable. There wasn't anything we didn't do together no secret we didn't share.
"Jen was an absolute knock out. She was an early bloomer with a figure all the guys drooled over and all the girls envied. Big blue eyes long, shiny, chestnut colored hair that was so soft She always loved to have me help her with her hair, and I always liked playing with it ." Emily smiled sheepishly and shrugged her shoulders. "Anyway, she was the source of many a wet dream at my old school. Pretty, popular, she had her pick of any guy she wanted, but she only dated casually. She was content to hang with me and the rest of the girls.
"Then, the summer after our sophomore year, her parents divorced and she and her mom moved out of state. We were both devastated, but we swore to keep in touch. All that following year, we were faithful correspondents. Then, my family moved to Angel Grove.
"By the start of our senior year, our letters had become sporadic. I'd started hanging out with Eddie's gang by Christmas, Jen had stopped writing all together. I didn't hear from her again for almost two years."
"During your separation from Jen, did you ever find yourself attracted to another girl?" Kim wondered.
"Yes one." There was an uncomfortable pause as Emily tried to figure out how to proceed. "The thing is, I didn't recognize that it was a sexual attraction, but I was as drawn to you as I was to Jen."
"Oh," was all Kim could think to say.
"During our second year at AGU, Jen came to see me. I almost didn't believe it was her at first; she had changed so much!" Emily hugged her arms across her chest. "She had shaved her head all that beautiful hair, gone! Body piercings, tattoos she looked more like one of Eddie's crowd than I ever did. And it wasn't just a physical change; she'd changed inside, too. She was harder colder as if something terrible had happened to take all the joy out of her.
"When I asked, she said that the old Jen had been a lie that it had been an act to hide her true self. That's when she told me that she was a lesbian and her friend Maggie had helped her find the real Jennifer Masters.
"I was stunned, but at the same time, I wasn't. It somehow made sense of the little oddities in our relationship that I'd never given much thought. Conversations touches Jen was always big on physical contact and I remember how she'd snuggle closed whenever we had sleepovers at each other's houses. Then there was the way she'd watch me whenever we changed clothes in the same room.
"It didn't bother me that she was a lesbian. I wasn't hurt or betrayed that she had just told me because she hadn't known all along. I was happy that she'd found herself.
"Then, Jen floored me by asking if I was a lesbian, too. She reminded me about my reaction to my uncle's Playboys and about how I liked it when she rubbed my back or played with my hair. I almost gave her a resounding 'no,' after all, I was really attracted to Jason, but I began to think about my reactions to you.
"Ultimately, I told her I wasn't sure. That's when she suggested that I do something to find out. Jen asked me to come with her, to be her lover and see how I liked it. I told her about being with Jason, but she talked me over to her way of thinking. She always could," Emily admitted, her tone tinged with guilt and sadness.
"You mean that's why you broke up with me? So you could be your best friend's lover?" Jason interjected, all his old hurt coloring his tone. He and Tommy had been hanging back in the doorway since Kim returned with the water.
"Jase ." Tommy chided softly. It wouldn't help the situation if his best friend lost his cool.
"Jason!" Emily yelped in surprise, tears coming to her eyes. She wanted to die from utter mortification, and she flashed Kim a look of accusation.
"I'm sorry, Emily," Kim said gently, taking the distraught woman's hands. "I didn't break your confidence; the guys came in and saw us while we were on couch. I thought it too cruel to just leave Jason hanging."
"Oh God!" At Kim's words, Emily buried her face in her hands and sobbed.
"Em ." Jason began consolingly as he hurried to his wife's side. Kim moved over so her could take his place next to Emily. He wrapped his wife in his arms and held her as she cried.
"Come on, hon shh it's going to be all right shh ." he soothed.
At last, Emily looked up, her expression incredulous. "Y-you mean you don't hate me?" she hiccupped.
"Of course not."
"You're not going to leave me?"
"After everything you've found out about me and Tommy, how could you even think that I do such a thing just because you're bi?"
"But Jen said ." Emily began, lost in the confusing swirl of emotions rushing through her.
"Why don't you finish your story," Tommy prompted, also having come forward to be by his wife's side. "You left Jason to find out with Jen if you were a lesbian or not. What happened next?"
"For a while, things were great. It was just like Jen suspected: I was most definitely into women. Jen was a great lover, but as a partner, she was very possessive. She became very jealous if I formed even a platonic friendship with anyone other than the people she approved," Emily resumed, gaining strength and confidence from her husband's unwavering presence at her side.
"While her possessiveness bothered me a bit, it was her narrow mindedness that really ate me up. You see, after the initial rush of the freedom of being able to act on my feelings for other women, I realized that I still had feelings for Jason. Strong feelings. When I tried to ask Jen about why that was, she totally lost it. I'd never seen her so angry. She didn't want to hear anything about men in general or Jason in particular. She forbade me to speak about it."
"I wonder if she'd been really hurt by a guy raped or something to make her hate all men so," Kim mused. "You did say she was at least ambivalent towards the guys in high school."
"And just because you're gay doesn't mean you automatically hate the other sex," Tommy added.
"You're probably right," Emily replied. "She would never talk about what happened to her at the time she stopped writing.
"At any rate, my feelings and questions wouldn't go away, so I turned to Maggie Jen's first lover. She's the one who explained I was most likely bisexual and that it sounded like I was still in love with Jason.
"That left me in a horrible spot. I knew I had to resolve my feelings for Jason, but I knew Jen would go ballistic if I told her that.
"I was right. We had an ugly fight. She accused me of using her, betraying her, and all sorts of hurtful things. She spewed all kinds of hateful things about Jason. I didn't want to hurt her, but I couldn't be the person she wanted me to be. She didn't want a friends/lover, she wanted a lover with dog-like devotion and obedience.
"In the end, I told her I was going back to try and work things out with Jason," Emily squeezed her husband's hand. "It was a terrifying prospect. After all, I'd lied to you and dumped you. I had no guarantees I was so afraid you wouldn't take me back ."
"Is that why you never told me all this?" Jason wondered.
Emily nodded. "That and Jen said some things that put the fear of God and you in me. Basically, she said you'd never take me back if you knew I'd slept with another woman."
"But you know now that I'd never do that, right?"
"I do." She reached up to touch his cheek. "If only I'd have let you tell me about Tommy being bi and the three-way you guys had ."
"What was it that bothered you about me and Jason being together since it wasn't moral objections to homosexuality?" Tommy asked.
"Envy," Emily confessed. "It was just so unfair that Jason could tell me he wanted to have sex with you and I couldn't tell him about myself. It wasn't fair that you guys could indulge but I couldn't."
"If you had told me, hon, we could have worked something out," Jason assured her.
"I know, but it was just so hard after hiding it for so long."
"Ain't that the truth," Tommy said with a wry chuckle.
"Was the fact that you were attracted to me the reason you've kept me at arm's length?" Kimberly questioned.
"Yes," Emily admitted. "At first it was because I didn't know why I was so drawn to you and I didn't want to risk being hurt. Then once I knew what it really was, I kept my distance so you wouldn't find out. Sometimes, it was so difficult being around you, feeling the way I felt and knowing nothing would ever come of it."
Kim gave her hand a squeeze.
"Plus, you didn't want anything to happen to destroy your hopes and fantasies," Tommy pointed out. In response to Emily's quizzical gaze, he elaborated, "If Kim never said the words 'I'm not interested' you could still hold onto your secret dreams and hope that maybe just maybe someday ."
"Exactly," Emily concurred.
This latest revelation drew all eyes to Kimberly, as if everyone was waiting for her to say the words that would put an end to the blonde's hopes and dreams. Instead, she said, "Tommy, now that we've heard Emily's story, why don't we give her and Jason some privacy. They still have a lot to work out."
"Sure," Tommy agreed, more than a little puzzled by her retreat. Normally, Kim faced things head on and talked out things honestly until all the issues were addressed, but there were still some loose ends from the revelations of the afternoon.
"Thanks, Kim," Emily murmured gratefully.
"Guys, I don't know what to say," Jason began, the depths of his gratitude shining in his eyes.
"You don't have to say anything," Kim assured him, giving him a peck on the cheek. "Just work things out and be happy."
"We will," he promised her. Tommy offered him a pat on the shoulder in passing as the couple made their way out the bedroom door.
"Shouldn't we be the ones to leave?" Emily queried. "After all, this is their bedroom."
"They want us to stay put until we're sure we have everything straightened out. Trust me on this one," Jason said.
"O-okay."
For a moment, neither one could think of how to proceed to the next step. The story had been told, the truth revealed, but there were still more questions to be asked and answered.
"Will everything be all right between us?" Emily finally burst out with a note of desperation. "This won't break us apart, will? Things will just like they always were, won't they?
"But things can't be like they always were," Jason insisted.
"Why not?"
"Because we're not the same people we were before this happened. Fundamentally, we are, but we're not the same person the other perceived us to be. We've both been hiding things, in essence living lies. We thought we knew each other, but really, we didn't."
"I never meant to " Emily interjected tearfully, obviously still worried that her world was going to come crumbling down.
"I know," he answered, holding her close and smoothing down her curls. "But this doesn't have to destroy our relationship."
"It doesn't?" Emily asked hopefully.
"The only way this will come between us is if we let it. I love you, Em, and I meant it when I said 'in good times and in bad' during our wedding vows."
"Oh, Jason!" Emily exclaimed with a sob of relief and joy as she threw her arms around her husband's neck. Jason met her, claiming her mouth in a fierce kiss.
All the uncertainties of the past hour and those of the future melted away under the passionate onslaught.
~*~
While their friends worked out their problems, the Olivers headed downstairs. At the bottom of the steps, Tommy automatically headed for the living room, but Kimberly hesitated. Turning to as her a question, Tommy discovered she hadn't followed. He then spotted her lingering by the stairs, a look of apprehension in her eyes. Without missing a beat, he changed direction and ushered Kim into the kitchen. Like a sleepwalker, she allowed herself to be guided into a chair.
"Kim?" he prompted gently. She looked so lost . "Do you want to talk about it?"
"I don't know," she mumbled distantly as if in shock.
"I know you have to be thrown for a loop, but that's okay," he said comfortingly as he sat down next to her. "This was probably a bigger shock for you than it was for me and Jason finding you two like that."
"That's an understatement," she muttered. She worried her lower lip between her teeth as she tried to collect her thoughts. "I know why I did what I did, but I don't know how I feel about it."
"When we talked about 'what ifs', you said could have sex with another woman if she was a close friend," he reminded her.
"But that was then when it wasn't real!" she exclaimed. "I mean I was so sure I could but now . How would you feel if someone you knew all of a sudden came up to you and said 'I think you're sexy as hell and I want to jump your bones?'"
"I can't really say, but I imagine Jason knows, considering I practically did the same thing to him," Tommy replied. "Maybe you should talk to him.
"I couldn't!" Kim protested. "He needs to be there for Emily right now. With everything she has to deal with, she doesn't need to feel like she's destroyed our friendship."
"Has she?" Tommy asked softly.
"Of course not!" Kim asserted without having to pause and consider.
"I didn't think she had, but I had to ask. I understand your concern for Emily, but I don't want you to hide or deny what you're feeling. Your confusion is as valid as anything Emily's going through."
"I just need some time to sort it all out."
"I know, Beautiful. Take all the time you need; you know we're here for you."
"Thanks, Tommy." She offered him a lopsided smile that never quite reached her eyes. Quietly, she slid out of her chair and into Tommy's lap.
"Hold me," she whispered, and clung to him as if she'd never let him go.
And he held her, stroking her hair, rubbing her back, not saying a word. Kim allowed herself to be soothed by the beat of his heart, by the comfortingly familiar scent of him, and by the warmth and strength of his arms all around her. She seemed suspended in time by the security of Tommy's love for her. However, reality never seemed to fade out of her consciousness.
"Tommy?" she ventured timidly.
"Hmm?"
"How do you feel about all this?"
"What do you mean? Am I shocked? Angry? Supportive ?"
"What do you think about seeing me and Emily together after the surprise had worn off," she clarified.
"Well all noble sentiments and concerns aside, the base animal in me was wanting to bury myself in you and fuck you until we were exhausted. Is that what you were getting at?"
"Uh, yeah," Kim gulped, his blunt honesty catching her off guard. "We really affected you like that?"
"If Jason hadn't been so wigged out, I'd have been tempted to join you."
Which was pretty much a mirror image of how she felt about Tommy and Jason.
"What was it like for you?" Tommy asked, turning the tables on her. "Did it feel as incredible as it looked?"
There was a long pause before Kim replied in the smallest of voices, "Yes, it did."
"Do you think it's something you'd ever want to do again?"
"I... don't know."
Chapter: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7
E-mail: kittiec@starpower.net