Chapter 18: Esquire. Incest?

Sunday morning arrived and Dave was up early given the night he had with Patti, and working on the breakfast-brunch he liked to serve to his Circle-mates. As people arrived from their various homes, he’d come out of the kitchen get their order and then return a few minutes later with the plate. He had help that morning from Patti and Emily.

One of the features of being the chef that he especially enjoyed was the peripheral arousal that he got from seeing who had spent the previous night with whom. Since he had an intimate relationship with all of the women, seeing whom they’d had sex with was like watching your wife with another man times twenty-five or thirty.

He watched his mother Elise arrive with Derek and Kat. Kat was carrying James who was alert and watchful of all the adults. He didn’t know the game but was certainly trying to figure out who the players were.

Dev arrived with Nancy and Holly, the latter carrying Zoe in a crazy sling in front of her that let him look around in all directions. As she was eating, he’d squirm around to see what food was passing over his head and into her mouth.

Ken arrived with the rest of Dave’s wives. He’d seen them starting to get up when he’d passed by the master bedroom in his house on the way to the core kitchen. Aaron arrived with Sasha, who’d flown down for a long weekend. Shelby had flown up to Ohio to keep Martin company over the weekend in a long-distance wife swap. She’d also taken their baby, Linda Jean, in a bit of an experiment to see how she’d do on an airplane.

Dave’s eyes especially rotated when he saw Dale and Susan arriving with another couple. Susan was carrying little Mark, and the woman in their company was also fawning over the baby. The foursome plus baby sat at one of the picnic tables under a large shade umbrella.

Dave went to their table to take orders. “Breakfast-brunch folks?”

Dale grinned, “Dave, I’d like to introduce you to Jason Riggs and his wife Robyn. They stayed with us last night.” Dave understood the coded words immediately.

David shook hands with the new couple and as he did he remembered the association with Jason. “Jason, nice to see you again, especially where you can see the fruits of some of your legal laboring.” He gestured around the homes and core. Jason had been the lawyer that put all the legal documents together to establish the Circle Cohousing Project. Susan had eventually gone to work for him as a paralegal. Now, it appeared, they had formed a new and deeper relationship with the couple. He’d never met Robyn, but knew she was also a lawyer who worked with her husband but more in the real estate and estate planning side of things.

Dave got their orders and raised an eyebrow at Dale. After he’d left, Dale came after him. He said loudly, “I forgot to order something.” Dave turned with his notepad and pen in hand.

Dale came up close. “Just so you know, yes, we had sex, and yes, they brought their clean STD certificates with them. We’re not dumb. We traded but stayed in the same bed and had a lot of fun. They’re kind of new to this. Jason has a pretty good idea about what’s going on in the Circle from when he put together the founding documents, but we kept a lid on most of it except for our own activities.”

Dave smiled and nodded, “Good man. Talk to you later.” He made some scratches on his notepad in case any of the others were watching.

About fifteen minutes later Dave delivered the orders for the two couples on a large tray. As he distributed the plates, he noted that some of the other women from the Circle were already topless as the morning sun got warmer on the first Sunday in November. He saw Robyn’s head spinning around from woman to woman, as the partial nudity became the norm.

As Dave placed Robyn’s plate in front of her, he said, “Don’t let peer pressure make you do something you don’t want to do. We have a culture that allows for a lot of nudity, but also resists peer pressure.”

Robyn smiled at him. “Thanks. I was thinking the opposite. I WANT to do that. I enjoy getting an ‘all-over’ tan. Susan had told me about this phenomenon, but to see it in play I find fascinating.”

Dave chuckled, “At least during the day, mostly, we separate nudity and sex. Without guests or young children around, the bikini bottoms would likely be absent.”

Robyn shucked off the blouse she wore, laying it on the seat beside her. Dave noted that she had beautiful C-cup breasts with dark areolas, his favorite, and well-pronounced nipples worthy of significant sucking. He found himself wishing he had sucking privileges. Instead he just nodded and smiled at her, and then headed back to the kitchen.

A few minutes later, Dave brought his own breakfast plate out of the kitchen. He looked around, and got a wave from Dale and Robyn to join them. After he sat and had taken a few bites of his breakfast, Robyn threw him a curve ball. “I’m surprised our paths haven’t crossed, either professionally with your work at the utility or with the rampant sex that takes place around here.” She gestured at the patio.

Dave gave a thoughtful response, “I’m not sure where we’d pass at the utility, and rampant implies something unwanted or unpleasant, which would surely be an incorrect adjective for the Circle.”

Robyn’s eyes flared. “Oh, sorry; you’re right. I should have said propagating sex, or even better proliferate sex.”

Dave teased, “Ah, now you have it, but what makes you think that such is the state around the Circle?”

Robyn laughed, “I have a number of data points. First, about three or four years ago when the Circle was created as a legal entity Jason came to understand what was going on between some of you at that time. He used the terms ‘an extended polyamorous family’ to describe you. I was fascinated and wanted to meet all of you.

“Second, I know from meeting, Shelby, your sister-in-law, last night that some man named Martin, who is a Circle member, is most likely the father of Linda Jean. A point that suggests there was some significant playing around, and verified further when separately your brother said that he might be the father of Sasha’s baby. Thus, they were playing around. He said everyone knew.

“Third, as Dale, Susan, Jason, and I all got interested in each other a week or so ago, they slid into the sex as easy as anything, whereas Jason and I were as nervous as a long-tailed cat in room full of rocking chairs. They didn’t have any qualms or hesitation; in fact, I took them to be old hands at multi-partner relationships.

Fourth, for now, is that last night after we’d spent the night making love, I felt restless and so I took a walk around Dale and Susan’s house. I looked out the window, and could look down on the patio. Several people were there, naked, and trying to fuck each other’s brains out. Moreover, I saw them switch around several times. It was very erotic and even emotional, but not in a negative way. They clearly loved each other with great passion from the way they all acted.”

Dave nodded, “Oh, I can see the lawyer training coming out in the presentation of your chain of evidence. Really, all you had to do was ask. Yes, we are ‘proliferate’ love makers and we are all ‘proliferators’ of the nth degree. There is, as you observed, significant caring and love behind what you sensed or saw. I venture to say that instead of fucking last night, you made love, whether you were aware of it or not.”

“I was,” Robyn said softly.

Jason leaned in, “We’ve developed significant feelings for Susan, and subsequently for Dale. Those feelings brought us to a decision point, and we jointly decided that we would take our feelings to a new level.”

Dave said, “I kind of figured. That being the case, you can perhaps understand the inter-relationships between all of us in the Circle. We have each been through that process with each other.”

Robyn’s eyes flared. “You really do have sex with each other?”

Dave shook his head, “We make love, and I grant that to some that is a subtle distinction not worthy of consideration.”

“So, you let your wife be with other men?” Robyn asked with a tone of disbelief in her voice.

Dave laughed, “Oh, that leading question is rife with mistakes and moral judgments at the same time. First, I don’t have a wife; I have WIVES – four of them to be precise. Second, they are not my possessions, so I don’t ‘LET’ them do anything; they do anything they please. Third, they are just as apt to be with other women as with the other men in the Circle, especially since we have an imbalance in the population of our small enclave tilted towards the women. Your question is all off kilter to ask in this environment. A better question to satisfy your curiosity would be ‘Do they make love with the other men and women in the Circle?’ and the answer is yes.”

Dave smiled benignly at Robyn who was digesting everything he’d just said.

Dave spoke before she could, “The Circle doesn’t put a moral judgment on sex. If you ask, we’ll tell you that consenting adults can do whatever they want about sex. Beyond that though, we seek a deeper intimacy than just the sex with the people we love. This is why we’re all out here this morning, regardless of where we spent the night. We like to be together and to talk to each other. We think each other are interesting and fun.

“We seem to have a never-ending stream of interesting situations come up: everything from someone that wants to join the Circle to one of our members being a billionaire to another being the heroic pilot that saved over a hundred passengers in his seriously damaged commercial aircraft. We have a lot to talk about. About half a dozen of us are pilots of varying skill levels with more coming along behind us. Several are great videographers. Many of us are professional executives. Another is one of the best developers in the four-state area. I could keep going. The bottomline is that we like and love each other. The sex is only part of the equation, although many people overplay the importance of the subject.”

Robyn said softly, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for that to sound judgmental or disapproving. To the contrary, I am very much in agreement with you. Forgive my teasing as an inappropriate taunt.”

Dave chuckled, “Oh, we tease each other all the time, very often in sexual ways. You’re forgiven.”

A couple of women passed by Dave’s chair even though it was out of the way. He got kisses from Bobbie, Maddy, and Ashley. Ash even dipped to lower one of her bare breasts to Dave’s mouth so he could take a short suck on her sexy nipple. She had a naughty expression but then swooned as he did her bidding, and then was gone with a girlish giggle that echoed around the patio.

Dave said, “See what I mean.”

“She’s cute, but not very old.”

“Just eighteen. She’s Erin’s sister. Erin is the girl in the green monokini. She’s also Megan’s daughter. Megan is the flaming red head on the other side of the pool making out with Dev – he’s Wendy’s husband, and Paul is her husband.” At that moment as Robyn turned, Megan was pushing her tongue down Dev’s throat as the two of them frantically made out. Dave guessed that she hadn’t gotten her necessary fourth round of sex the night before.

Robyn said, “Wow. Her mother doesn’t look that much older.”

Dave stated, “Neither do you, and yet I heard you say that you had a teenage boy. How’d that work with law school?”

Robyn laughed with obvious sarcasm, “Not well. Fortunately, my mother lived nearby and could care for Danny when I had classes or intense study sessions. Danny was born when I was nineteen. Jason was there, too; and between them, they got me through the same time he did. We passed the bar together.”

“Is Danny ‘enlightened’ about sex?” Dave teased.

“We think so. Jason and I have both schooled him on the various facets of relationships and the roles sex can play. He just finished his freshman year, but he seems so much more mature than we were at that age. How do you define ‘enlightenment’?”

“I guess I brought that question on myself. First, you embrace the statement I just made: ‘consenting adults can do whatever they want about sex’. In considering that, you understand consent, and that consent to one thing ‘sexual’ is not necessarily consent to do all things sexual. Embracing the statement makes you tolerant of others and their viewpoints about sex and sexuality, even when they’re far from what you believe. Further, you realize that the word ‘adult’ really means someone with an adult mindset; the term is independent of age or legislation. You would know that a consenting adult could not be some sweet young thing who is bombed out of her mind on booze or drugs that would let you do anything to her, and may even be pleading for you to do so. I guess I’d add to that short discourse that one would school their offspring with age-appropriate education about sex, aiming for a complete understanding of all the nuances by about age twelve, and the ability extrapolate the implications of doing something sexual.”