Aaaand I managed to make things worse.

"Honey, she didn't know..." I began, intending to try to smooth things over.

"YES, she DOES, Brent." Kaila snarled, pushing back. "Seriously, you can't... you can't fix everything just by apologizing! Take her, Get her the hell out of here, and I don't... you know what, seriously, if you two want to fuck while you're out, have FUN. Whatever it takes to get you to stop you drooling over your sister's tits whenever she flashes them at you."

"Well, you know you could always..." I began, trying the same tactic that she had just used on me.

"That one SAILED, Brent." Kaila looked at me sharply. "I'm... I'm not in the mood right now. I'm Angry with you. And now you're going to demand that we spend money that we DON'T have to..."

"I won't pay the fucking FINE!" I said, louder than I intended. "Ok... ok... I'm... I'm getting angry here."

"Yeah." Kaila breathed deeply. "I'm... I'm VERY angry too."

"Pause?" I asked, calmly, giving our emotional "Safe word". It was a little thing we'd worked out early when I had moved in with her. We could all get mad. If we felt that we were getting to the point where we could no longer speak to each other, we agreed that we'd separate for a while. Keep things together, stay calm. The last thing we wanted to do was make decisions while we were angry. Then, when we'd had some time to breathe and gain perspective we'd talk about it. Have it out, whatever IT was, then have incredibly passionate Make-up Sex. At least that had been the pattern every other time we'd had to use it.

"Pause." She nodded. "Oh yeah. We're pausing."

"Charlotte and I will go. We will NOT pay the fine. I will NOT make you deal with any of this." I spoke calmly, glancing over at Charlotte, who was busily pulling on some semblance of clothing. The nearest item in reach seemed to be her extremely skimpy bathing suit top, and the second my Hawaiian shirt.

"Ok. Fine. Helen, I... I don't know if I'm going to be very good company right now." Kaila remarked, glancing at the woman who now sat on the bed concerned.

"Ok... you're mad. I can deal with that. I've dealt with that shit a lot." Helen nodded. She handed a pair of shorts to Charlotte, who pulled them on quickly, not even bothering with panties, I noticed. "I'll hear it out, and I'll tell you why you're right and the guy we're in love with totally needs to apol..." She broke off her speech with a start. "I... Charlotte, I..."

"We need some time too, babe." Charlotte nodded. "I get it. I mean... oh yeah, I GET it... but I need some time to think about this. Yesterday got kinda crazy for me."

There was a quiet in the room, the only sound being me and Charlotte pulling on the last of the nearest clothing we could find. It only took a moment more for us to attach our shoes, the feeling of unease in the room growing. With a last look around the room I walked to the door,

"I love you Kaila." I looked back at my wife. Yes, I was still mad at her, but I loved her.

"I love you too, Brent." Kaila nodded after a moment, a flash of real love still there, but mixed with rage. "I want to ... we paused."

I nodded my head and opened the front door, stepping out into the foggy morning.