Chapter 17: Joe

This Saturday night was very different; Julian and Larissa were at their family home, and Steph and Xander were there with Rachel. But no Jaiden and Asha; instead, they were joined for dinner by Ruby and Pete, Layna and Joseph, and Amelia and Ross. Sophie and James were taking their chance to meet the ‘new guys’, and they were straight up about it when they sat down to dinner, which Larissa had made with Sophie, while James and Julian did the BBQ, and Steph and Xander acted as hosts.

Once they had said grace and everyone was eating, Sophie said, “Thanks for coming, girls, with your new guys. We wanted to meet all of you, since you girls are all so special to us.”

They smiled, and there was good small talk for a little while. James and Sophie gently led the discussion, finding out about the guys – where they met the girls, their families and jobs and so forth. Steph and Larissa kept distracting them so it wasn’t too direct. One obvious subject that kept coming up was the Youtube channel, since Layna, Julian and Steph all worked on it now. Steph had a been having a really good week by her standards; as well as the whole vote video, which had thoroughly gone viral, she’d sassed a random commenter who’d been critical of one of their videos, and the commenter had flamed her back, and then one of the fans had pointed out that the commenter had astroturf links to an oil company, so Steph had sassed the oil company directly on Twitter, and that had generated hundreds of follow up tweets which she watched with amusement.

Eventually, Ross asked Layna whether the attention she was getting from the Youtube channel was a challenge for her. “Yes,” she said, “it sure is. I was fine to show off my body to help us get attention, as long as the message is right, and I’m still fine in principle, but it’s sure made it hard in my personal life.” She described some of the things that had happened. “But I’ve also made really great friendships, especially with Steph, Ruby and Larissa. And Larissa understands what it feels like!”

Oh, said, Ross, how? To his surprise, nearly everyone around the table laughed at that. Steph said to Amelia, “So you introduced him to Larissa, but never said anything?”

Amelia shrugged. “I never thought about it. It’s just Larissa, right?” The others laughed. “Ross, you don’t recognise Larissa from TV?” No. “She was on TV a lot a couple of months ago.” No, still looking blank. So was Joseph, Larissa noticed. “In her underwear?” Just confused now, and much laughter from around the table. “Did you see the clip of a vet rescue woman saving a young girl from a flood?” Yeah, he did see that. Oh, suddenly he realised, and there was more laughter.

Larissa smiled at him. And then at Joseph. “Yeah, so that was me. So yeah, Layna and me, showing off our abs and our bum for all to see on Youtube. But don’t feel bad – I’m fine you didn’t realise it was me. It’s good. And you probably haven’t seen their channel, though it’s getting much more widely known in the last couple of months. Hers is for a good cause! Anyway, we’ve held each other and commiserated about it, and you know, in the end, life goes on.”

Joseph said, “Wow, just wow. That was awesome. I was amazed when I saw that.”

Steph said, “Well, one of the really cool things about being friends with Larissa is that you can watch the whole thing with commentary from her. Interested?” Well, of course!

So they moved out to the lounge room, and James set the raw video up to show on the big screen, and Larissa went through her standard commentary, and let them ask questions as she went. At the end, she talked a little bit about the media reaction, and then told them about her corporate speaking, and doing it at schools.

Ross said, “Isn’t that a problem for you, that everyone sees you like that?”

Steph laughed, and told Ross what Larissa said to her and Asha, the first time they watched it.

“Tied up?” said Joseph. “What’s that about?”

Larissa laughed. “Oh, Julian and I tie each other up and play games sometimes. All the girls here have seen one or both of us tied up, in our underwear or naked.”

Surprise from both Ross and Joseph, as she expected. Of course, both Steph and Larissa were paying particular attention to Ross’s response. “Wow,” Joseph said, “Layna, when did you see that?”

Layna laughed, and said that might be a story for another night.

“So you guys are into bondage and pain?” Joseph asked.

“Oh, no, not at all.” Larissa said, “Never any pain, period. And it’s hardly bondage, really. The most we’ve usually done is tie our hands behind our back. Or just tie our hands together – that’s called hand-fasting.”

“Yes,” Ruby said, “and that blew my mind.” She told the guys about Jaiden and Asha’s promises, handfasted together, for their first time. “So totally different to my first time,” she said.

“Well,” Layna said in a dramatic voice, “talking about first times, I have an announcement to make.”

Well, now she had their total attention.

“Ruby told me about what Jaiden and Asha did back when she and I first talked about what we did with Xander and Steph. And when I heard about it, I thought it sounded great. And tonight, I’m giving my v-card to Joseph, so we’d like to do that too.”

Wow! Drawn the by magnitude of this announcement Larissa jumped up, pulled Layna up for a hug. She was so pleased that she drew Layna into a little dance of celebration. Quickly, Ruby joined them, and then the rest of the family and friends came and shared a hug with Layna.

Once everyone was sitting back down, Larissa said, “We’re all so thrilled for you Layna. Joseph, I’m thrilled for you too, but I suppose you probably weren’t expecting quite that reaction?”

He laughed. “Actually, I pretty much was. Layna told me she was going to do this earlier today, and we talked about it, and she said you’d all be happy and excited like that. And I’m really pleased for her that she has a home like this where she can be comfortable enough to be herself this way, because that’s not easy to find for her.” He turned and kissed her, and then said, “I’m so amazingly lucky that I get to be her special guy.”

Sophie smiled at him. “We think you’re lucky too. So, that means you want to make promises in front of all us?” Layna nodded, smiling. “We’re lucky too, so lucky you felt that you could do that! Thanks. Do you want to be handfasted, like Jaiden and Asha were?” Layna and Joseph looked at each other: sure. “And do you want to go off and do the deed straight away like they did?” Layna was caught by surprise at this. Sophie smiled at her. “Of course you’re welcome to do that; we have an empty bed tonight, and I actually made it this afternoon, and you can use it as much as you like. You know you’re always welcome here, deeply welcome. But if you want to go somewhere else, of course you should. Maybe you want to go home?”

Layna shrugged. “Mum and Dad know that I’m finally going to cross the line, and they like Joseph and approve, but they didn’t want to get involved like that. But won’t there be like, a mess because it’s the first time?”

Sophie smiled. “Maybe. We wouldn’t mind at all if there was, what an honour that would be. But it’s actually pretty unusual, specially with girls being more active compared to a hundred years ago. I didn’t have any, and Steph said she didn’t.” Steph nodded, smiling. “Larissa?”

“Yeah, well, there was quite a bit of blood, but since I was raped and it wasn’t gentle, I think that was why.” Sophie’s face fell as she started answering that, so Larissa said, “That’s OK. It’s mostly far in the past for me.”

Layna had jumped up and dived into Larissa’s arms. “Oh, Larissa, I’m so sorry, I had no idea. That’s so awful. Oh, so much makes sense now.” She held Larissa tight.

Larissa smiled at her. “No reason you’d know, and it’s not the sort of thing either of us go around telling random people is it?”

Layna looked at her in surprise. “You could tell?”

Oh. Whoops. Larissa kissed her and said very quietly. “Yes, love, I saw. I’m sorry I mentioned it. But have you told Joseph?” Layna shook her head. Larissa kissed her again, and said just to her, “I understand, truly I do, but I think you should. If he’s the guy you trust to be your real first, he’s the one you can trust to know.” She glanced at Joseph.

Layna gave her a long look. She shook her head. “You tell him, please. I just can’t,” and she buried her head into Larissa’s shoulder. Larissa sighed. She poked Julian and indicated for him to move. Then she beckoned Joseph over, and indicated for him to sit next to them, in a group hug with Larissa and Layna. Then she spoke quietly, but enough for the whole family to hear. “Joseph, Layna asked me tell you. I’m just guessing, and she knows that, so that means that what happened to her was very traumatic. So I guess that when she was ... a young teen maybe?” Layna nodded. “Someone her family trusted, but not her parent. So an uncle or a cousin?” Layna nodded again. “he undressed Layna or something, and he made her make him come. With her hands?” Layna shook her head. “With your mouth.” She nodded violently. “But I think that it didn’t go further or happen again.” Layna nodded. “And your father ... stopped it?”

A very quiet voice said, “No, but I told him and he made sure it could never happen again.”

She could see just Sophie’s face, and the sadness on it. She looked at Joseph’s face and saw that his anger was out of control. “Joseph, no! Julian...”

Joseph was suddenly plucked off them. Larissa held Layna tight. “Love, hearing that about their lover is one of the most difficult things a guy can ever hear, and they might lose their temper seriously. Joseph just did. He’s not angry with you, he’s angry with who did this, but you can’t deal with his temper. Julian will bring him back in a few minutes when he can love you.”

Layna nodded, shaking, and held her tight. They could hear Joseph howl elsewhere in the house. After a minute, she said, “How did you know?”

“About Joseph? Or about you?” Both. “I know how angry Julian was when I told him about me, even though he had a fair idea what was coming, and he had training in how to listen. There’s still a dent in his car, and he did that at least thirty minutes later. He told me how he thought later; I had no idea at the time. Joseph didn’t know, was caught by surprise, and I saw it in his face. But Julian was already coming to him, he knew. As for knowing about you? You’re beautiful, yes, the most beautiful person I’ve ever met. And you’re also compassionate, gentle, smart, considerate, when so few beautiful people don’t care to be. But you still don’t have a guy you trust? So I knew. But the details? When you happily made Liam come, but you got me to make you come because you didn’t want your first guy to make you come to be there? Very odd combination that suggested some details to me. Anyway, I’m not the only one who knew.”

James, Sophie, Steph and Xander all said, “We knew.”

Layna looked up in surprise. She smiled at Larissa and then the others. “And I tried so hard to hide it!”

Larissa nodded. “That’ll be how we knew, though I never talked with them about it. And we loved you more for it. I mean, my family already know me and love me more for it. So of course they did.”

At this point, Joseph came back in the room, and sat next to them. Larissa lifted Layna into Joseph’s lap, and they cried together for a few minutes. Larissa smiled at Julian and went and held him tight. After a few minutes, Joseph and Layna started talking very quietly. Sophie went and put her arms around them and said, “Let me show you that room, and you can talk in there. We’ll be here whenever you’re ready.” She led them out of the room.

When they were gone, Larissa said to Julian, “Thanks for plucking him up. He’s going to be OK?”

Julian nodded. “Yeah, I’m glad the training paid off. I let him punch me. He was seriously angry. But he settled quickly, and then he was ready to love her. I’ll need to spend more time with him later, but I think he’ll be OK. He really cares for her. I told him to say I said that.”

“You let him hit you?”

“Oh yes, I had the punching pad.”

Sophie came back. “Larissa, you really are a magician. I do think you did the right thing.”

Larissa smiled at her. “Thanks. I think it was right, but it was hard to feel that way.” Then she happened to glance at Amelia. Hmm, she needed some love. She went and sat next to her and hugged her. “Are you OK? That was a bit dramatic there.”

Amelia laughed a little. “Sure was. It was a bit hard to keep track of it all too. What happened between her and Steph and Xander, and between you and Julian and her?”

Ahh. “Well, we hadn’t told you about that. We kind of thought you weren’t ready for those stories.” She looked up at Steph and Julian. “We have to now?” They nodded. She turned back to Ross and said, “Well, I don’t know if Amelia has told you much, but we’re a bit wild and crazy. Probably, when you hear the stories you’ll think we’re a lot wild, but we do have carefully maintained boundaries. Ruby, are you OK if we talk about this?”

“Sure. I’ve told Pete about them.”

So between them all, they told Amelia and Ross about the underwear party, at least the relevant bits, and then about Steph’s birth plan, and how Ruby and Layna helped with that. Larissa could see that the idea of Julian tied up seriously affected Amelia. When they were finished, Amelia said, “Wow. I got a sense of your birth thing from Mum, Steph. She was really upset about it. At least now I know why. I understand those photos better now. And I understand why you’re so serious about Layna being at home in your hearts here. And Ruby. I think it’s pretty cool how Ruby and Layna helped you out. Ruby, it was good for you? How did that work?”

Ruby smiled at her and explained her story – how Larissa peeled her off Taman, and then helped her until she found Pete, and how the loving with Steph and Xander really helped her. Amelia asked her about her early dating experiences, and it turned out that they’d had similar experiences, they’d just responded totally differently. Yeah, for Amelia that helped. She was giving them all hugs when Joseph and Layna came back in the room.

First they headed for Larissa, and wrapped her up in a big hug. All they said to her was “Thanks.” Then they did the same to Julian. Once they’d done that, they stood in front of everyone.

Layna said, “Well, I kind of imagined that I’d have nice hair and make up when we made our promises. But, well, not so much.” Larissa smiled at her. She’d certainly made a mess of her make up. “But we think it’s better this way. Real, and so loved. Thank you all. I’m so glad that we crossed that line, because I just didn’t know how to. And turns out I wasn’t the only one.”