Chapter 23: Old Friends and New Lovers, Part II

July 1982, Milford, Ohio

Joyce, Kara, and I sat quietly on the lower bench while the steam built in the sauna. I was really going to miss the easy access to a sauna when I went back to Chicago. IIT had a steam room that I could use, but they required towels and it wasn’t ever quiet. It also wasn’t co-ed.

“Joyce, I didn’t see Terry at your grandfather’s house yesterday,” I said after about five minutes of silence, other than the steam hissing and our breathing.

“He’s sort of upset with me.”

“I gathered that would be the case. Did you break up with him?”

“No, but he may have broken up with me. We talked, and I told him that he’d misunderstood and that I wasn’t intending to date him exclusively. Remember, I told you about James and Will, too. I made a date with Will, and Terry got upset.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” I said. “You slept with him and you took him to your grandfather’s house and introduced him as your boyfriend! What did you expect?”

“Oh, that’s rich coming from you!” she snapped.

“Hang on a second! I’m NOT criticizing you for making a date with Will. If you want to fuck his brains out and then the next night go out with James and do the same thing, that’s totally your business and I don’t care. But I’ve made the mistake of not recognizing what a girl thought about our relationship compared to what I thought. Think about what you did! Do you blame Terry for thinking you guys were a couple?”

She sighed, “But I never told him we were!”

“So? Five years ago, I didn’t tell Becky we were a couple, but she sure took it that way! And so did Anna when I was with her after my blow-up with Jennifer. I said and did things that led them to believe we were a couple when we weren’t. Heck, in Becky’s case, I told her in advance about Birgit and she STILL thought we were a couple. And that was when Birgit and I were committed to getting married as soon as we were old enough!”

“This is different!” Joyce insisted.

“Oh? Tell me why you think so?”

“Because I told him I was dating other guys.”

“Yes. Before you took him to your grandfather’s house! Did you go out with Will or James after that first time you took him there? Did you sleep with Will or James, or even date them, after you took Terry to your grandfather’s house?”

“No, but so what?”

“Now YOU are acting like a shithead! You want to have sex with me and Kara so badly that you’re blind to what you’ve done to Terry! The shoe’s on the other foot this time.”

“Steve, calm down a bit,” Kara said gently, putting her hand on my arm.

I took a couple of deep breaths, “Kara, I’m calm. Joyce is being just as dense as I used to be because she has her mind made up as to what she wants. I know what I’m talking about because I used to be like that. And Joyce, what exactly do you want out of this situation? A good fuck? You can get that elsewhere. Or is it that you want to be with Kara and she won’t be with you alone?” I asked bluntly.

“Steve!” Kara said. “What’s gotten into you?”

Joyce let out a long sigh, “Kara, it’s OK. He’s right.”

“About Terry? Or about me?” Kara asked, clearly confused.

“Both,” she said, looking down. “I’m sorry. I’ve made a mess of things. And to think, I used to give Steve a hard time when he did stuff like this!”

“You want to be with me?” Kara asked, incredulous. “But I can’t do that! I mean, I want to be with you and Steve, but I can’t have sex when Steve’s not there! I just can’t!”

Kara sounding pained, and I realized I had a brewing disaster of epic proportions on my hands. It reminded me of the Jennifer and Melanie situation from my Sophomore year and that had led to Melanie trying to kill herself and Jennifer needing therapy. I had no clue how to fix it, or even if I could fix it. What I couldn’t do was to let it progress to anything physical until everything was sorted out, one way or the other. And that was going to be a problem because Joyce and Kara wanted VERY different things. I realized, suddenly, that I had to play the role that Joyce had played for years.

“Kara,” I said gently, “I’m really concerned that this could go quite badly and ruin our relationships — yours with Joyce, mine with Joyce and, most frightening of all for me, ours. We’re treading on dangerous ground here, ground I’ve walked over myself. I’ve seen something like this go horribly wrong in the past, and I can’t let that happen.”

“What are you talking about?” Kara asked.

“You know that in the past there was a situation very much like this, with confusion all around. It came close to totally wrecking all of our relationships. I can’t give you details without violating confidences, but honestly, I don’t want to risk that kind of situation. It’s not worth it! You both can still explain away that one night as an experiment never to be repeated. Doing it again changes everything. And what you’re asking for, Joyce, changes it even more. There’s a big difference between a threesome, with some playing between you two and the two of you making love, whatever you might do together.

“That’s especially true when Kara’s mind is made up about exactly how far she’s willing to go. And I know her thinking about sex, of any kind, if I’m not with her. Ask her about that, Joyce. It’s a non-starter. If that’s what you want, you’re going to be very disappointed. If you’re including me so that she’ll do what you want, then I don’t want any part of this.

“I’m also very concerned that you might be thinking that something long-term could come out of this somehow, and I don’t think that’s true. When Kara moves to Chicago, we’ll be exclusive. And that means anything that might start now has to end. Period. I’m sorry if you changed things with Terry so that you could do this, but I didn’t want it to happen. You know my rules, and you know what happened when Melanie broke up with Pete so she could sleep with me when I was a Sophomore.”

“What happened?” Kara asked.

“I refused! I had told her that if she and Pete broke up, there was no way I’d do anything with her for at least three months. My point being that if she just wanted to screw, it wasn’t going to happen. She broke up with Pete and pretty much three months to the day she showed up and demanded I have sex with her. I refused. The whole thing was way more complicated and again, I can’t violate her confidence to give you the details. In the end, she ended up back with Pete and now they’re engaged. I’ll be blunt here, if I think Joyce broke up with or changed her relationship with Terry just so I’d have sex with her, I’ll refuse. And I think that’s what happened.”

There was an uncomfortable silence for a minute before Joyce spoke.

“You and your damned rule!” Joyce huffed. “If you didn’t have that rule, everything would be fine!”

“Says the woman who insisted that I keep that rule when I was thinking of abandoning it,” I said softly.

She looked away, and didn’t respond. I could tell her why, too.

“Joyce,” I continued, “would it be fine if I had sex with Melanie?”

I waited for her to answer, hoping that an uncomfortable silence would help her to see my point.

“No, it wouldn’t,” she said, exasperated. “You know, I hate it when you’re right!”

“It does happen from time to time,” I chuckled.

“In all seriousness, it’s way more often than not these days, Steve. You aren’t the same shithead you were even a year and a half ago. So where does this leave us?”

“As friends,” I said. “You and me. You and Kara. Anything beyond that is just too dangerous to all of us at this point, at least if I’m involved. I can’t be a hypocrite, though. So whatever happens between the two of you is between the two of you. Tell me if you wish, or don’t. But I can’t be part of it.”

Everyone was silent for the rest of the time in the sauna, and then we each showered individually. We went back to my room to get dressed.

Joyce finished quickly and straightened up, “I’ll go home now so you two don’t have to drag me along.”

“What?!” Kara exclaimed, taking a step towards her. “No!”

I was closer, and held her elbow as she’d started to turn, “You’re not going anywhere without us.”

“I’m making a mess of things!” she said, tears starting to form in her eyes.

“Don’t start with the drama,” I said. “That’s my job!”

At least that got a laugh from her, and she swatted my arm with a nod.

“You’re not going anywhere without us,” I said. “Kara and I are here to have a good time with you, and just because we have conflicting ideas about what’s going on doesn’t mean we can’t otherwise have a good time together!”

“He’s right!” Kara said, coming to stand right next to her.

For a moment, we looked expectantly at Joyce until she took a deep breath and smiled again.

“OK, OK! I’ll be OK! It’s just that I’m so conflicted by all this!”

“We all are,” I said. “Now, let’s go downstairs.”

We finished dressing and went to the basement together.

“So, what are we doing tonight?” Kara asked.

“Dinner, for sure. We could see a movie. There are two at Showcase I want to see — Blade Runner and The Wrath of Khan.”

“The Star Trek movie? I’d like to see that one,” Joyce said.

“Sure, whatever movie you two want to see is fine,” Kara said.

We decided on TGI Friday’s for dinner because it was close to the Showcase Cinemas. We had a nice meal and all three of us enjoyed the movie. My only problem was that at first I kept seeing Ricardo Montalban as Mr. Roarke from Fantasy Island! And that was despite knowing he had played the same role in the original Star Trek TV show back in the 60s. Eventually, I managed to put that out of my mind and see him as Khan. I felt the movie was far better than the first Star Trek movie and looked forward to more.

After the movie, we headed back to Milford and after hugging both Kara and me, Joyce got in her car and headed home. I could tell that she wasn’t happy, but the consequences of doing what she wanted were not things I wanted to contemplate. Kara and I went inside and went up to bed. We lay naked together, touching but not cuddling.

“You were pretty harsh with Joyce,” Kara said quietly.

“Do you think what I said was wrong in any way?” I asked.

She was silent for a moment.

“No, I suppose not. I was just surprised at how adamant you were about not doing it in the end. I still have trouble understanding how you come up with those limits without something to guide you.”

“Like the Bible? You know I think it has good advice in some areas, and bad advice in others. In the end, I think Joyce, you, and I would all be hurt if we’d done what you two wanted in our current situation. And that’s how the limit is applied, Honey. Would it have felt good? Of course! Would I have loved to fuck you both silly? No doubt about it! Would it have been a huge turn-on to see you two making out and stuff? Absolutely! And then, everything would have gone straight to hell. In the past, I might not have cared about that, though I would have cared about the fact that Joyce and Terry were a couple, or at least he thought they were. I know it’s confusing, but I’m pretty sure I just averted a major disaster.”

“But you had sex with Sofia! You broke your rule with her.”

“I did. For the second time, in fact. But that die was cast three years ago when I elected to set aside the rule for my very best friend in Sweden.”

“So you would set it aside for Bethany?”

“Never. Because of who Bethany is and what it would do to her. She’s a great friend, but she’s not Sofia.”

“I’m still confused about how you make these decisions.”

I chuckled, “So am I! I struggle a lot! I anguish over some decisions, and if I’m really conflicted, then I don’t do the thing I was thinking about. And I don’t think I ever told you the story about Lotta, Mikael’s girlfriend in Sweden.”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“She and I would hang out together in the stands of the ice rink while her boyfriend and Katt skated. When Mikael and Katt decided to leave, Lotta was extremely upset. I talked to her and tried to comfort her the best I could. On the day that Katt and Mikael flew to the US, Lotta and I went to the airport with them — me with Katt and her family, and she with Mikael and his family. Mikael asked me to make sure she arrived home safely. When I took her to her house, she hugged me, gave me a sexy kiss and invited me in to have sex. I turned her down because I realized that it was for revenge — she wanted to get back at Mikael by giving me her virginity and get back at Katt for taking Mikael to the US. I wanted to have sex with her badly — she was young, beautiful, had a great body, and really, really wanted to screw. Do you think I did the right thing the way I resolved that conflict in my mind?”

“Yes, of course.”

“And you know about Michelle Bateman, and Tracey, and even Stephanie. All girls I was, and to a point still am, conflicted about. So I don’t do anything about it because I don’t want to hurt anyone — you, me, or them, or in the case of Michelle, anyone that Michelle has insulted.”

“But how do you decide when whatever it is might hurt someone either way, like tonight?”

“That’s an easy one. I’d much rather have Joyce upset with me than destroy all of our relationships.”

“You really think that would happen?”

“The last time I had a situation like this, it led to an attempted suicide and both girls in therapy.”

“True, and it does explain why you are so careful! I thought every guy’s dream was to have two girls at once!”

“Kara, Honey, I’ve done that several times, and even three girls at once. The first time with multiple girls was when I was a Freshman.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Kara said, sounding a bit exasperated.

“Honey, forget all that stuff. It’s in the past. You don’t have to bring Joyce to bed with us for me. I’ve told you that. If you want to do it for you, that’s one thing. But I don’t think you really do.”

“I don’t know what I want,” Kara sighed.

“All the more reason not to do anything that you might regret. When you’re sure, and I mean really sure, then we’ll do it. I won’t ever tell you ‘no’, so long as we don’t violate my rule and we aren’t setting someone up to get hurt.”

“You’re a good man, Steve. Would you make love to me before we go to sleep?”

I pulled her to me and we made love before falling asleep in each other’s’ arms.

On Tuesday when we woke up, Kara showered while I dressed and then I dropped her at her house to eat with her mom while I went to swim and eat breakfast with my sister. My dad joined us for breakfast and let me know that he had an initial offer to buy our business. It included hiring Krista and retaining me as a consultant for a year. More importantly, it was about ten percent above the value my dad and the accountant had felt we could get for the company.