Chapter 40

MELODY GOT TO THE STUDIO with the boys right at one o’clock. They were excited to have an afternoon working with Tony and Meddy. Melody’s loom was set up on one side of the studio now and she was doing an intricate, loosely-woven hanging.

“I’m still not sure this is going to work,” she said as she sat down at the loom. “I think I’m actually going to have to stretch it on a frame when it’s done in order to display it.”

“I think it’s beautiful,” I said. “You are a constant reminder to me to get out of my shell and not be so focused on one kind of art that I look down on or ignore any other.”

“Is that a danger?” she laughed.

“Really? Yeah.” I was serious. “Think about Rhapsody Suite. Bowers focused on my painting and Kate’s charcoal. But you and Sandra and Amy rounded it out in such a way that it included all kinds of art. None of your contributions are inferior to Kate’s or mine. But it felt like your work was discounted. And think about all the musicians, sculptors, potters, jewelry makers, dress designers, actors, set designers ... Can we ever have a truly have comprehensive view of the arts?”

“At least you recognize that there are other arts and you are open to them, unlike some people I know.”

“Have you talked to your dad lately?” I asked.

“Yeah. We talk every couple weeks. It’s always about mundane things, though. How’s the weather? Am I studying hard? Who’s his latest client? He seems so distant. It never used to be like that,” she said.

“Feel free to remind me not to act that way when I reach my mid-life crisis,” I said.

“We’re going to be there one day,” she said thoughtfully. “I don’t mean you’ll walk out on us and turn into my father. But we’re going to get old together, aren’t we? We’re going to be together for thirty years.”

“And then some, I hope, my love.” I leaned over her at the loom and kissed her. It’s funny. I could talk to Melody with the boys happily painting alongside me while I sketched in the picture of the Singhs on the three foot by five-foot canvas that I’d stretched. My zone was expanding.

“Look Tony! See what I made?” Drew was covered from head to toe in finger paints. There was almost as much on his paper.

“Wow! Look at all that color,” I said as I started mopping him up with a wet cloth. “Tell me about it.”

We’d all gone through our reviews of each other’s work when the buzzer on our door sounded. I figured we must have a door-to-door solicitor showing up at this hour on a Saturday afternoon. I opened the side door and saw a huge delivery truck backed up to our garage door.

“We’ve got a delivery for Ice Queen Sportswear at this address,” the driver said doubtfully. “Is this right?”

“Wow! Yes, this is Ice Queen. Let me open the door.” I raised the garage door and the guy opened the back of the truck. Of course, we didn’t have a forklift, so moving the pallet was out of the question, but he gamely tossed me the boxes that only weighed about thirty pounds each. Twelve boxes. Melody signed for the delivery after checking the bill of lading against the delivery and verifying that we had everything. I’d have never thought to do that. In twenty minutes he was gone and we were opening the first box of sportswear under our own new label.

“We need to call Lissa,” I said.

“Um ... huh-uh,” Melody responded. “It’s exciting and we want to share it, but it’s going to be just as exciting at eight o’clock as at four o’clock, and I really don’t want to interrupt anything. Just let me find one that’s my size and I’ll put it on. Then when we get home we’ll see how long it takes her and Kate to notice. I’m guessing they’ll have their eyes glued so tightly on each other that it will take an hour before they see what I’m wearing! Except they’re so wrinkled. Ooo.”

We found the box of green outfits and Melody unceremoniously stripped and put on the new clothes. It was nothing the boys hadn’t seen before. The outfit looked great, even if it was wrinkled.

About five-thirty, we finally left the studio and headed for Red Robin for dinner. We can get good food there for a reasonable price. By the time we were done, the boys were getting antsy to get home and even though it was only six-thirty, we decided we had to go. I sent a text to Lissa and Kate warning them, but didn’t hear back.

“You go in first,” Melody said. “I’ll delay the boys a minute while you go warn them we’re here.” I entered the house from the garage.

“Kate? Lissa? Are you home, lovers?”

“Tony?” The voice came from the living room. I went in and stopped dead in my tracks.

Lissa was sitting in my big recliner and Kate was curled up in her lap. Both girls were naked. At first, it looked like they were just making out, but I saw Lissa’s hand buried in Kate’s pussy and Kate’s hand covering Lissa’s left tit.

“Sorry, lovers,” I said. “The boys really wanted to come home. I just came in to warn you.”

“Can you ... give us ... thirty more seconds?” Kate gasped.

“Sure,” I said. Kate mashed her lips against Lissa again and I backed out of the room and into the garage. They weren’t going to be using the thirty seconds to run and get dressed. As I reached the garage door, I heard a familiar high-pitched whine coming from the living room.

“Okay?” Melody asked.

“Not quite yet,” I said. “Guys? I need your opinion on something I’ve been thinking of before we go into the house. Come on around the outside to the back yard.”

I managed to keep them occupied outside for nearly five minutes talking about Parkour before they charged up the back steps to the deck. A glance through the French doors affirmed that at least we didn’t have a naked mom and girlfriend in the living room anymore.

We walked in and Lissa came down the hall from the bedroom to meet the boys. She was dressed in a hastily donned track suit. The boys descended on her and both started talking at once. Lissa glanced up.

“Melody, maybe you should go ... Never mind. Tony, go wake Kate up in the bedroom. Melody! What are you wearing?”

Kate was stretched out beautifully naked on top of the bed and still moaning. I approached quietly and leaned over to place a soft kiss on her lips. Her arms reflexively closed around my neck and pulled me down to her in a passionate kiss.

“Oh,” she whispered when she finally opened her eyes. “You aren’t the lover I went to sleep with. Are you my wake-up lover?”

“I guess I could be,” I laughed. “Don’t tell me Lissa knocked you out with an orgasm again.”

“She teased me for an hour!” Kate said. “And then you came in and I thought she wouldn’t finish. But—oh, god!—did she finish!”

“Well, you haven’t been out long. Let’s get some clothes on you and you can go out to see what all the shouting is about.”

“I wasn’t completely out this time. I just didn’t want to open my eyes. Lissa carried me in here. Oh Tony, I’m so in love with you.” It took a moment for me to process that, but I finally figured out she meant with all of us. I found her a pair of shorts and a t-shirt and together we went back to join the others.

“Look at this, Kate!” Lissa squealed. “Look, look! The first Ice Queen Sportswear outfit. It’s here!”

“Ice Queen my ass,” Kate laughed. “You are the hottest...” she looked over and saw the boys, still excitedly jumping around Melody. “Hot,” she concluded.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Too bad Icy Hot is already a taken brand name!”

Kate and Lissa were so exhausted from their day that they tumbled into bed and were sound asleep as soon as they were dry from the bath. I grinned at Melody and the two of us ended our day much as we started it—quietly making love in the shower.

“So Kate kidnapped you last Monday and had her way. We abandoned Lissa to her today. Or her to Lissa as it seems to have worked out. When’s my turn?” I asked as I lathered up Melody’s hair and rinsed the shampoo off.

“Next Sunday.”

“Hmm? Why then?”

“Because Lissa and I will be on our way to Minneapolis. You need to look at your Daytimer again.”

“Oh man. It’s time already! I wish you didn’t have to go early, or that I didn’t have to go later.”

“Believe me; you don’t want to be with us that first day we’re there. Did you see the condition of those outfits?”

“They looked fine to me.”

“They’re a mess. They washed the fabric, sewed the outfits, and shipped them. Lissa and I have a hundred shirts and a hundred skorts to iron. We’ll be standing against matching ironing boards with soap operas on TV complaining about men who don’t do housework.”

“Hey! I do housework,” I defended myself.

“It’s a cliché, darling. If we’re going to spend the day bent over hot irons, we’re going to eat bonbons and have our hair in curlers, too.”

“You’re going to spend time bent over each other, too, I bet,” I laughed. Melody showed me what that position might look like and I happily took my part in bending over her.

“Sex Monday night. Tease on Tuesday. That’s the rule. Play your hearts out on Wednesday through Sunday and don’t be too exhausted to fuck like bunnies Sunday night before we all explode!”

“Speaking of which...”

“Go ahead, darling. I want to feel you. Explode.”

I had to isolate myself the rest of the weekend in order to get all the reading done I needed for the next week. I wasn’t able to help with the move-in for Tent City. I had to prep for my first Anatomy exam. That was the reason I couldn’t travel with Melody and Lissa on Sunday. Doctor Dennis rescheduled the exam for earlier in the week so I could take it before I left on Tuesday morning.

With Melody, Kate, and me all in school, Lissa ended up with the job of packing all the outfits in smaller boxes and shipping them to Minneapolis to be held at our hotel.