Chapter 304

“Alright, ladies,” Becca said, raising her voice a bit to cut through the chatter. Seven women in one of the cabins was already a cramped space, but add in the fact that Cattie had moved all of her stuff in and Wanda had ended up with some of her stuff in the room as well and there was limited space. “Ami and Robbie have moved the other boat, and she should have him wearing the headphones now, so let’s get this meeting started.”

“I move to officially name us the Pussy Pack,” Cassidy said, putting up her hand. That got some new laughs and Cattie gave her a soft shove on the arm.

Becca rolled her eyes but couldn’t help but smile a little. “I think Robbie might actually die of cringing if we were to do that,” she said. “So how about we keep it in our back pocket?” The giggles faded and Becca sat down on the bottom corner of the bed, joining the rest of the ladies and closing the circle. “So, I just want to say, I’m not trying to take charge here or anything. I’ve just been thinking about this a lot and there’s stuff we all need to figure out.”

“Oh, come on, Becca,” Zenya said, shaking her head with a knowing smirk. “We all know you’re an organiser.”

“OK, but I don’t want anyone looking at me like I’m in charge,” Becca said. “Seriously, ladies. Whatever comes out of this, I’m not the boss or anything. On the trip, sure, I organised it. But in this room, in this group? If anyone is the ‘leader’ it needs to be Cassidy.”

Cassidy blushed a little as all eyes turned on her. “I guess that’s fair,” she said. “But, tonight, you’re the one with the plan, Becca. So feel free to lead the meeting.”

“Thank you,” Becca said, trying to give her an encouraging smile because she knew what the first step of the whole thing needed to be. “So, as I’ve been thinking about things, I think the first step to figuring out what we’re doing is making sure everyone understands where everyone else is at. And I think that means we start with you, Cass.”

Cassidy took a breath and let it out heavily before nodding. “That makes sense,” she said. “Um ... God, where do I start? OK. Just at the very start. I think you ladies know everything, but just in case- So, Robbie and I started dating late in high school, and I knew from the start that he was the only guy for me. We were friends already since grade school but the day I asked him out and he said yes I knew I loved him. From his perspective, everything was really smooth. We graduated and went to college together. The thing is, at the same time, I was-” Her breath hitched in her throat, and she had to cough a clear it as her eyes watered and she tried to keep her emotions in check. “I ended up cheating on Robbie with other girls. Like, a lot. He had no idea it was going on. Our classmates, yeah, but also like ... adults. A few teachers, some ladies we knew from the neighbourhood and around town. I think I was addicted to the rush of hooking up with someone new more than actually having sex, but I was absolutely fucking awful up through a couple years of college. Then I hit a wall, and I’ll tell you the story some other time if any of you wants to hear it but it’s not important right now, and I realised how screwed up I was and how terrible a person I was being. I stopped cold turkey, but the guilt chewed at me like crazy and I dropped out of school as I developed depression.”

All of the ladies were listening, and Cassidy could see the variety of their reactions. Some of them knew more details than others - Cattie and Terra the most, then Wanda. The others only knew the general stuff, and she could see compassion and disgust and frustration and all sorts of emotions flickering across their faces as she told her story. The one silver lining she found to hold on to was that no one was looking interested or turned on or anything by it - that was the sort of red flag that would have set alarm bells off in her mind that someone in that room didn’t belong.