A cool, crisp, fall night had descended as I arrived at my friend Ron’s house. I knocked on the door of his ranch-style house in Fall Creek, the suburban town in which we had both grown up. I’d since moved away, deciding to make a new start after college while Ron stayed in town and worked for his father’s construction company. We stayed in touch of course, a phone call now and then, some emails, but we hadn’t hung out like we used to for a long time. When I decided to come back to Fall Creek for a weekend, we quickly arranged to get a few drinks.

The door opened and there he was, six-foot-one - an inch taller than I am - and a few pounds heavier. Ron had the burly physique that comes with being a younger man in the construction game. His hair was cut short and dark brown, his arms and neck tanned from what I could see. The man had spent a good amount of time working in the sun. I was a blond with blue eyes, six feet tall and a former baseball player in high school. I’d stayed in shape mainly by playing in rec leagues.

“Mike! Good to see you, man! Have any trouble finding the place?” he asked.

“Not at all, I remembered this neighborhood from when I lived around here,” I replied.

Ron nodded. “It’s all right, man. It’s a good start, anyway. I’m renting it for now,” he said. It looked exactly like a younger, unmarried man’s apartment should look like. The TV was outsized, the furniture all faced it and looked older but in decent shape. There were sports posters up on the wall, along with a framed version of that famous photograph of construction workers eating their lunch sitting out a beam that looked like it was impossibly high over New York City.

“Let me get my jacket and we’ll head out,” he said, grabbing one from off the back of his couch. “Liz is going to be joining us. You don’t mind, do you?” he asked.

“Oh, no. Not at all, be cool to meet her,” I said. Liz was the girl he’d been dating for the last few months. She had earned several mentions in our phone conversations lately, which is an honor not often bestowed on Ron’s dates. He hadn’t been particularly focused on romantic commitment. This girl seemed to have taken up a little more space in his life and I was curious to be introduced. “Where are we headed?”

“There’s a new place called Dunbar’s. It’s in that new part of downtown that’s been renovated.”

“You were in on a lot of that, weren’t you?”

“A lot of it, yeah. I did some of the work on the building next door, in fact. This place is good. Pretty big, live music on weekends, DJs sometimes.”

I raised my eyebrows. “You’re going to a place with DJs? I never imagined you as a dance floor kind of guy.”

“Aw, shit. I’m not. But Liz likes it there. It’s not the dark, beer-joint places we usually hang out in. She says it’s more sophisticated.”

I nod. “Well, sounds fine to me. Want me to drive?”

“I know where it is, let me. We’ll take my pickup. She’ll meet us there since she said she had a couple of things to do before going to her place to get ready.”

I shrugged as we headed out to his truck. We chatted easily about work, about football season and we filled each other in about our parents as we made our way downtown. He found a good parking spot and he even insisted on paying the cover to get in. That got another eyebrow raise from me.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Cover charge,” he said with a shake of his head. I laughed a little and followed him in.

He scanned the room for LIz but didn’t see her. “Not quite here yet,” he said. We each got a beer from the bar and found a table. “So what about you? Any women in your life?” he asked.

I told him about the girl I’d been dating, a cute redhead named Katie whom I met at a rec league game over the summer. “She came to the game with a friend of hers, who was dating one of the guys on the other team that night. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Almost turned an easy ground ball into a hit for those guys because I wasn’t paying attention. Those short shorts, man...” I joked. It also happened to be true.

“Oh man, don’t I know it? So what? You got her number after the game?”

“Sure did. We went out that weekend for the first time. She was fun right away. She had her hand on my crotch in the car before we were even out of the parking lot of the theater.” I grinned.

“Love it! So is the saying true? Red on the head... ?” he asked, taking a long drink of his beer.

“ ... Fire in the bed? I’m happy to report it is. She rides me like a champ and has a pretty talented mouth, too.” I didn’t hesitate to tell Ron this. We’d always been pretty open about things. I was his first call back when he lost his virginity in high school and he was anxious to tell someone - anyone - about it and I was happy for him, and I was even a little turned on listening to it.

He grinned. “Good for you, man. Considering all those times we were damn near useless trying to get girls...” he joked and we clinked our beers together.

“Thankfully things are better now,” I said, remembering our high school dry spells.

“Much better ... in fact, there’s my girl now ... he said, sliding out of the booth. The door was behind me so I had to turn myself in the booth to see. Ron walked toward the door, holding his hand up to the bouncer and pulling her cover charge out of his pocket. Finally I got a look at who we’d been waiting for.

Ron walked up and kissed a beautiful brunette woman, who looked younger than us and whose ID got a more thorough going-over than ours had. She wore a short, black skirt that showed off tanned, shapely legs. Comparing her to Ron’s 6-1 frame, I guessed she was around 5-6. When she turned sideways to go to the bar, I saw an outstanding little butt on her, nice and fit with some shape to it, and what had to be D cup breasts. My buddy Ron had found himself a real looker, and I smiled and held the table while he ordered her a vodka soda from the bar.

They walked up and I got out of the booth to greet her. I stuck out a hand but she passed right by that and hugged me, pressing her large breasts against my chest.

“Mike! I’ve heard so much about you!” she exclaimed.

“Really? How cool, it’s good to finally meet you, Liz,” I said. “Ron’s been telling me about you as well.”

“Uh oh, anything I need to be concerned about?” she asked with an amused look on her face.

“No, no. I just expected white light and the sound of an angels’ choir...” I began to joke.

“Oh please!” she laughed as Ron chuckled. “Nice of you to say that but it’s hardly necessary.”

“I have to say it is. You have no idea what mountains need moved to get Ron to pay cover at a place with a DJ,” I say. Ron just took a drink and gave a bemused look that said he knew I was right.

We made smalltalk for a while. LIz’s red blouse had a low neckline and I couldn’t help but notice how her tanned cleavage jiggled when she would move her arms, which she did often as she talked. She was animated, personable and laughed easily. Another round of drinks went by as we loosened up. Liz worked at a clothing store, and she put her personal skills to good use there, selling skirts, dresses and lingerie to women looking to add spice to their wardrobes. She also seemed curious about a lot of topics, and when I mentioned I suggested a good biography for him to read, he told me he enjoyed it and passed it along to her too.

“He’s told me you recommended some good books to him and some TV series that don’t include a gunfight every five minutes,” she said.

Ron shook his head. “What is this, a roast? You two are ganging up on me already with the DJ and books. You make it sound like I’m some caveman.”

“Ron, you’re a man’s man, that’s what we’re saying,” I explained. “You like things rugged and we both respect that. No other guy I’d rather have my back”

She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Absolutely. I like that part of you a lot - a whole lot, but I think there’s a lot more depth in there that hasn’t been brought out yet.”

“You think he’s deeper than people give him credit for too?” I asked her.

“Most definitely, so I think between the two of us we can open up some new doors for him,” she said. Ron seemed to take all that in stride as he leaned over and kissed her.

“Just let me keep my truck and my big TV.” he added.

The small talk continued to flow easily as I sat across from the couple. As we talked and joked, I felt a knee bump against mine. The first time I moved it and thought nothing of it, then I felt it bump against me again. A second time I moved it, only this time it touched my knee much lighter and stayed there. I looked at her and she seemed to be looking right at me. I decided to leave it there and continue the conversation.

“So Ron told me you have a girlfriend?” she said to me. I gave her the summary of Katie without the guy-talk sexual details.

“She sounds great! I bet she is gorgeous, too!” she said, and I felt a nudge on my knee again.

Soon the noise in the room overwhelmed our talk. The DJ’s set had begun and the volume went up so high there wasn’t much to do in the booth but listen and work on our drinks. Liz’s leg stayed against mine. Does she think that’s Ron’s knee? I thought to myself. She seemed to have a hand on his leg as well.

A waitress came up to us, short, brunette and cute with a stud in her nose, asking if we wanted another round. Ron ordered one and asked for a round of tequila shots. I felt a buzz in my head already, and it wasn’t just the loud dance music pulsating from the speakers. A round of shots and I might be on the drunk side.

She leaned in to say something to him. Cupping an ear or yelling were about the only two options for communication at this point. Ron smiled at her and glanced over at me. He gave a small gasp, like he didn’t want to give anything away and looked down, which was when I realized her hand might not have been on his leg after all.

Not wanting him to be self-conscious, I shifted my gaze toward the dance floor and people-watched. From the corner of my eye I saw him give her a kiss again on the lips, this time lingering there a little longer.

Seconds later, our waitress returned with three shots of tequila with lime and a salt packet. “Awesome!” said LIz as the waitress passed out the shots, along with yet another couple of beers and a vodka soda.

We all toasted the evening and drank the shots. Liz shook her head and smiled. “That’s what we needed to get this party started,” she said. Just then, the song changed, blending from one to the other on the beat. Her eyes lit up and she almost shot out of the booth. “Gotta dance! Be back!” she said, heading straight for the dance floor.

I laughed and looked back at Ron. “She knows I’m not a dancer!” he yelled over the music.

I nodded. “She’s a bundle of energy, isn’t she?”

Ron nodded even bigger, an exaggerated one. “You have no idea!”

I wish I could find out, I thought to myself.

We looked toward the dance floor and there she was, swaying to the music, hips shaking that firm ass in a mesmerizing rhythm, her cleavage bouncing in an inviting way. Yes, the alcohol was running through me, but you didn’t need to be drunk to be hot for Liz, you just needed to have eyes.

She danced with a group of girls that had come out together, she even danced with a guy or two along the way. At one point she even turned around and grinded on a guy behind her, his hand on her hip. She opened her mouth wide and covered it with her hand in a mock bashful type of gesture as she looked at us. I felt my cock stirring in my jeans, but she was my friend’s girl so I tried to rein it in.

“She’s a keeper, bud!” I said to him over the noise. He held up his bottle and I held up mine for a toast.

He stayed quiet for another minute before he tapped me on my arm. “Mike. Gotta talk to you about something!”

“Okay!”

“Liz and I were talking ... she’s really fun, and she’s really hot, right? I mean, you think she is?”

I looked over at her on the dance floor again. It was tough not to.

“Of course!”

He leaned in closer so he could avoid yelling so loud. “Thing is ... we were talking...” he said again.

“It’s all good, bud, what’s up?”

He took a breath. “She told me her fantasy was two guys.”

I looked back at him. “Really? Well, that’s a fairly common one, I think.” I said, not sure really what else to say.

“What I’m saying is ... I really like her. I’d like to make that happen for her ... and I was thinking ... who better than you?”

I blinked a few times. Was he really asking me if I were interested in joining them in bed? Ron and I had talked about sex with girls plenty of times before, but actually having a threesome? That would be new for us.

Since I didn’t say anything right away, he continued. “Look, we’ve known each other forever, you aren’t going to go around telling everyone, and she seems to like you. I thought she would and she does.”

“So you had this in mind from the beginning of coming out?” I asked him.

Ron shrugged and nodded.

I thought about it for a few more seconds. I took my beer and swallowed down about a quarter of it. I set it down and smiled at him. “What the hell, I’m in.”

He broke into a smile just as Liz returned to the table.

“You looked great out there!” I said to her.

“Thank you! You should have joined me!”

“I think Mike’s going to join us in other ways ... that is if you’re up for it,” said Ron, his arm around her once she scooted into the booth.

“Wait, what? Really? Really?“ she almost squealed. She looked at me and I just smiled back.

“Shall we?” asked Ron, nodding with his head toward the door.

“Oh God yes!” said Liz.