Chapter 18: Redefined Relationships. Thanksgiving Questions

I leaned down and whispered to Lisa, “Don’t get angry. Think. Who got hurt? Your sensibilities perhaps, but no one else.”

Lisa muttered, “But ... but ... it’s so wrong ... isn’t it?”

“Is it, or is it just social convention?”

“Isn’t incest illegal?”

I nodded and added, “So is having a love affair with a fifteen year old. Ash, and Chris for that matter, chose me. They each chose you too. Marcia and I choose you too.

Ashley cuddled up to her mother, their sexy breasts pushing together. “Mom, don’t get bent out of shape. I liked what we did, even though you didn’t know I was the one riding your tongue. I also thought you tasted really good. I’d like to do it again and again, for longer if you’ll let me.”

Lisa sat up, “I guess I have to admit you did too, but Ashley we can’t do this. I’m your mother.”

Ash said, “I’m redefining my relationship with you. I had a slightly obnoxious mother we used to know. We call her the Old Lisa, but she vanished in Erie, Pennsylvania, and other cities out that way. She was brash, rude, a true slut, a shitty mother, and did a lot of crazy things. I’ve fallen in love with the New Lisa who’s polite and starting to engage as a mother only those old tapes aren’t needed now since I’m grown and very smart. This New Lisa also had been trying to not do crazy things, well, until she fell in with this crowd. Maybe we corrupted you a little, but we don’t think you’ve reverted. I like you in the place we are now. I love you.”

Lisa nodded but still had a worried expression, “I like everybody here – a lot. I love your boyfriend and Deb and Doug. I love you too, but I have to get my head around that you want a physical relationship with me or I with you, and that you have something other than filial love for me. I’m not sure I can do that because I’ve been so socially conditioned.”

Ash leaned in and kissed Lisa, only it wasn’t a daughterly kiss; it was a kiss of love and passion. She said, “Let me love you. Christy loves you too, and Marcia. Don’t get hung up on the parts that don’t make sense to you or the social and legal constructs. No one is going to say anything to anybody, just the way we all protect our relationship with Jim.”

Lisa said, “But I don’t know how this would work.”

Ash took my hand and kissed it. “We don’t know how our foursome will work either – a thirty-four year old man with a thirty year old and two fifteen year old lovers, who collectively have three other lovers – Deb and Doug, and ... you. We are taking it one day at a time, but we have a longer commitment horizon. We know that in the long run this is exactly where we want to be. So far on this journey, it has all been wonderful, exciting, and very loving. I’m sure this is where I want to be for the rest of my life.

“You don’t have to throw in with us, Lisa. Marcia, Chris, and I overpower Jim some days with all our estrogen, and I’m sure he rues the day when one of us is a bad PMS day,” she giggled.

Lisa said, “I guess you’ve gone all lesbian or something.”

“No. Lesbians can’t stand even the idea of being with a man, and I love Jim very much plus I’ve enjoyed my few times with Doug. I liked the experience of being with a different man. I guess you could consider me bisexual, but that sounds indiscriminate. I don’t know anybody else that I want to have sex with who isn’t in the room right now. I don’t see a pretty girl on campus and wonder what she’d taste like or whether she can eat pussy well. I don’t see hunky guys that I want to have fuck me. I guess I’m pretty particular.

“What I am saying is that I had a serious break up with my mother. It really started about three to five years ago. I guess I got smart enough and read enough to realize that you weren’t doing anything for me and hadn’t for years. I found food to eat sometimes and you were kind enough to leave me an allowance most of the time so I could get around. You didn’t care about my schooling or how well I was doing, or what I did in my spare time. I could have become the school slut and you wouldn’t have known or cared.

“Fortunately, I found Christy. She and I bootstrapped ourselves into being really great students. She cared about me and so did her mom and dad. We skipped grades and then skipped into college. You were vaguely aware of what was going on. I gave up on you, and paid minimum homage to you only to keep the peace and keep child protective services from stepping in and messing up my life. I doubt the Old Lisa would have cared. I abandoned that Lisa in my head.

“And then this New Lisa showed up when we flew to Erie, Pennsylvania to rescue her from being a homeless whore. She was so different, that I felt sympathy for her and then I felt love, and then that love expanded to where I wanted to love you and have you love me not as mother-daughter, but as good friends and lovers in much the same way I feel about Christy and Marcia, and even Deb.”

Lisa started to cry midway through Ashley’s soliloquy. Ash hugged Lisa’s naked body to her own.

Ash said, “I’m sorry I teased you when you had the blindfold on. I couldn’t think of any other way to break the ice around what I wanted. I saw an opportunity and took it. I knew if I told you what I wanted that you’d shut me down and deny me. Lisa, I love you. Mom, I love you too.”

I glanced around the room. All of us had glassy eyes over the emotional coupling going on between Ash and Lisa. I’d guessed this might be coming based on a few words Ash had said after our sexy get together about five weeks earlier. The whole situation fell into place.

I made some tea for everybody, and after enjoying the break, Deb and Doug snuck off to the guest room with Marcia close behind them.

Christy pulled Lisa’s naked body to a standing position and walked with her arm around her into my bedroom. She lay her down on our new bed. Ashley in all her naked glory scooted in behind her and wrapped her in her arms and kissed her several times.

Christy and I washed up and got in my king-size bed.

When I was in high school and college, I’d experimented with the amount of sleep I needed to function well. I’d discovered that six hours was optimum, leaving me rested and yet eager to face the new day without feeling groggy or fading in the afternoon for lack of sleep. Accordingly, I awoke to my own internal alarm clock on Sunday morning at eight a.m., six hours after we’d turned out the light.

I crept out of bed, grabbed some sweats, and then left the bedroom. The house was very still. I remember thinking of that line from The Christmas Story – ‘not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.’ I went into the kitchen and made some coffee, and had bagel and cream cheese. I looked longingly at the pool, but I’d closed it up for the season. I noted that the morning temperature was thirty-nine degrees. I wouldn’t swim in it again until May unless April offered some surprising warmth.

I thought about the small drama that had unfolded the night before just before we all went to bed. I guess there were several of them. First, Lisa had sex with Deb several different ways after having avoided female-female coupling to that point in her life. This was a first for her, and probably a stretch all by itself, were it not for what happened next. Ashley had then taken advantage of her mother being blindfolded to initiate several different kinds of sapphic sex with her. She then explained to Lisa that she wanted a sexual relationship with her – a loving relationship that involved sex. Lisa looked numb when we put her to bed.

The next person to appear was Lisa wearing one of my long t-shirts. She gave me a little wave and got herself a cup of coffee and then came into the living room where I sat. She stood in front of me and said, “Will you please hold me? Just cuddle me?”

I held my arms open to her and she sat in my lap. There wasn’t anything explicitly sexual about our being together even though I could feel her lithe and naked body under her thin shirt. I knew she just needed some reassurance and someone to hold her close. She laid her head on my chest for a few minutes. Nothing was said for almost ten minutes. I kissed the top of Lisa’s head a few times.

Lisa finally said, “What would you do if you were me?”

I knew the full import of her question, and the larger picture of what she was asking.

I replied, “What do you want out of life? You’ve changed. What does the New Lisa really want?”

Lisa was quiet for a while. She then said, “I want someone around all the time who’ll hold me like this, who’ll treat me like a lady, who’ll love me, and who I can comfortably grow old with. I want family around and a broader sense of love and belonging. I never want to fear for my life again or have to scramble as I did to stay alive. I want to help take care of my grandkids eventually, and pour out oodles of love on a spouse and ... Ashley.” She started to cry, “Ashley held me all night long. She was so loving.” She sobbed out, “I love her like I never did before. She kept kissing me all night long; she was so loving.”

“Sounds pretty good to me, and pretty predictable. She loves you. We all love you, Lisa.”

Lisa sighed, “Oh, God, I don’t want to revert to being a real slut. That was terrible, and I really didn’t like myself.”

“Could you love yourself and love Ashley the way she talked about last night?”

After another thinking period, Lisa said, “I’m not sure. I’d have to try it, I guess, and see whether I could adapt.”

“Put a toe in the water,” I repeated softly. I thought to myself about what I wanted. I wanted Ashley AND Lisa to be happy – to find a good place they could define together that worked for all of us.

Lisa nodded. “Yeah. Do you think I’m nuts, or that Ash is crazy, or that both of us are bonkers? I don’t want to do anything that screws up your relationship with her – or any of the others.”

“No, I don’t think your crazy. Do you think I’m crazy for loving two fifteen year olds and Marcia?” I didn’t mention that I was also getting very affectionate feelings for her. I hoped she could tell. I gave her a gentle kiss.

“Of course not. I gave you my blessing after I figured out what was going on. You’re so caring. I find it amazing that a guy has as much love to give as you do. You ooze out such affection for the three of them. I don’t want to hurt your relationships at all.”

“You won’t. I think we’re pretty strong, and we talk about sensitive subjects like this. I suspect Ash will come to me and-or Christy or Marcia with similar questions and want to talk about your relationship. Part of last night seemed pretty sudden, for instance, I felt that was the first time you’d done anything sexual with a woman – and I’m talking about Deb not Ashley.”

Lisa nodded. “It was, although I’ve done a little touching and stuff when I was having a wild night with a couple just to get a guy heated up enough to do both of us. Last night was different and new. To tell the truth, I liked it. I hope Deb felt OK with what happened.”

I laughed, “I’m sure she did. She looked very happy. You gave her quite a few orgasms.”

Lisa chuckled, “And she gave me a few.”

“Why don’t you see whether you can start to think about Ashley the same way you think about Deb, at least as far as the sex is concerned? Maybe that’s a starting place. There are other places to start too.

“You could hang out with us more often instead of being alone all the time in Westborough. I can’t offer a permanent solution right now that sounds like the way I did with Marcia, but we love the New Lisa. I love the new Lisa. You’re easy to take, helpful, and it’d give you time to interact in new ways with Ashley – with all of us.”

Lisa moved away from me but stayed in my lap. She studied me. She warned, “But I know I’d fall in love with you ... more than I already have.”

“I’m not sure how much I can divide my attention, but I can guarantee some. It’s hard enough with the three of them now – Ash, Chris, and Mar, yet you deserve something good and that worries me as an option; maybe I should take it off the table. What do you want in a man?”

Lisa took my face in both her hands, kissed me tenderly, and whispered, “Someone like you.”

“Someone who can’t commit to only one woman, because that’s who I am now?”

She nodded, “Yeah, that is a problem. I’m pretty sure the New Lisa wants a one-woman man, although after all that’s gone on I might be willing to give up on that stricture. I need to think about all this.” I gave Lisa a very tender kiss that I hoped signaled the new love I had for her.

I heard Deb and Doug talking as they came down the hall. Lisa and I stood up, and moved back to the kitchen to work on breakfast for the rest of the extended family.

About four weeks later, I hosted an extended family Thanksgiving feast at my house. The weather was gray and crisp, and we’d had enough freezing nights that the ground was crunchy to walk on. We filled the house with Christy and her parents Margaret and Lenz; Ashley and her mother Lisa; Marcia and her parents Michael and Grace; Deb and Doug, whose parents were either in Florida or California; and me whose parents refused to leave the west coast of Florida and who had always preferred my sister to me in any case.

Lisa had temporarily moved in with us the previous weekend at my request, and when she wasn’t working at the university was working side-by-side with Ash, Chris, and Marcia preparing pies and side dishes for the rest of us to feast on. We had a twenty-five pound turkey that barely fit in my large oven. I figured we’d have leftovers until Valentine’s Day. The cooking started about four a.m. on Thanksgiving morning and then the turkey cook (me) went back to bed for two more hours after starting the bird in the oven.

Our guests started to arrive around noon, and we had some heavy hors d’oeuvres to tide us over until around four p.m. when the bird would supposedly be done. I’d been basting the beast every half hour. Many other side dishes started cooking about noon as well.

I got to thinking about Thanksgiving, and all day long I kept counting my blessings, starting with Ash, Chris, Marcia, and more recently Lisa. I included Deb and many others too. Doug had become a good friend as well.

We had some kind of sexual division that reminded me of a junior high school dance once everyone was in the house. The men migrated into the living room where I had a never-ending stream of football games playing on the TV. It wasn’t that I was a huge fan, but I did understand most of the rules of the game and found occasional enjoyment from watching a game. I think the other men had similar inclinations.

I was sitting between Lenz and Michael on the sofa. Doug occupied the one padded chair. Michael caught me off guard, “Jim, how do you see the future playing out with you and Marcia ... and the other girls?” I’d never had this kind of discussion with Marcia’s father; I had just assumed that he was cool with our living arrangements and that Marcia has smoothed over everything with her parents. Were we unconventional? Yes, but I didn’t realize that there was trouble in River City.

I felt Lenz lean forward to hear my answer. Doug had glanced over, but rigidly went back to the football game, wisely keeping distance from suspected danger.

I responded, “I guess you can tell that I am not wed to the idea of monogamy and exclusivity. However, I am deeply committed to Marcia, Ashley, and Christy. I love them and they love me; we are very vocal about what we feel about each other. We are harmoniously living together; a cross word or some kind of drama is very rare. I attribute that to the maturity of the three women I live with, and the loving environment we strive to maintain for each other. In the long-term I hope that we can be more open about our feelings for each other, and even about our polyamorous family, although I don’t intend to flaunt it in public.”

Michael pushed, “Will you marry one of the girls and stop your relationship with the other two?”

“Marriage, maybe, but I won’t end any of the relationships. That’s up to them. For legal reasons, I might marry one of them, but they are equals and co-wives in my mind. We’ve talked about it and tabled the issue until Chris and Ash are at least eighteen.”

“What about children?”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“We’ve talked about it and agree we want some. Marcia might logically be the first to become pregnant because she’s the oldest. I’ve told her that whenever she feels ready, I am too, but we would also consult Ash and Chris and need their buy-in. Such a thing is an important family decision. We are a family unit.”

Michael looked perturbed at my answer.