Making Up and Making Friends

“Hold on,” Tim said, “please just let me say my piece.”

She didn’t turn to run, nor did she argue. Instead she stood, staring, waiting for Tim to continue.

The problem was that Tim didn’t know what to say!

Hadn’t he just been through this? Hadn’t he had to navigate this whole thing with Rhian? That had worked out well for him, progressing from his professor wanting to break up with him to her bringing him home for two nights of amazing sex.

This was different, though. Yes, Tim needed to confess that he was also seeing his professor, but that wasn’t what Vanessa was upset about, at least not yet. No, right then Vanessa was upset because she couldn’t handle Nancy and Tim having sex with each order within earshot. Vanessa was jealous.

And he didn’t blame her. Not that Tim thought of himself as some sort of hottie, despite how women treated him. Rather Tim believed that any woman he was dating would have a hard time hearing what Nancy and he had done together the previous night.

And to top it all off, Vanessa had the added guilt of being Nancy’s mother. She was caught in a rough spot: either stay with Tim and fight for all of his affection, becoming the woman that she had hoped to protect her daughter from, or break up with Tim and lose what she really wanted, risking becoming jealous and bitter of her daughter. A part of him wishes that he hadn’t put her in that predicament. A part of him knew, though, that he would have done it again in a hot second.

He knew what he wanted. He knew exactly what he wanted.

“I want you,” he began, “that hasn’t changed, not one bit. But I haven’t been honest with you. You’re not the only woman in my life.”

“I know, Nancy, that’s the problem I was…”

“No,” he cut her off, “I’m also dating my professor, Doctor Rhian Morgan.”

Vanessa’s eyebrows shot up and her lips got tight. Tim saw, for the first time, her angry face. He remembered how well things had gone when he had been straightforward and direct with Rhian. Maybe it would work again.

“Don’t make a big deal of it,” he said, “she and I were together before you and I went on our first date. In a way, it was Nancy’s idea.”

“Nancy’s idea? She wanted…”

“Yes, she wanted me to go out with her,” he continued, “and I want you to want the same thing. I’m so sorry that we hurt you last night. I honestly hadn’t considered how you would feel when Nancy and I were, um, you know, but I don’t want to hurt you. Neither of us do. But what you are saying, that you want to break up, I don’t want that either.”

“What are you saying?”

“Stay with me. Be with me. Be my girlfriend, or my lover, or whatever. That’s what I want. But if it’s going to work, you’re going to have to find a way to be okay with me being with other women, especially Nancy.”

There, he said it. He had put himself out there. Tim realized how it sounded. He came off far more selfish, far more perverted than he had realized he was, but there was no helping it. He knew what he wanted, and he could hardly resist going for it.

Vanessa’s face was screwed into an expression of deep concentration, wrestling with what he had said. Of course she was going to reject him. Any woman self respecting woman would. He was asking her to change something fundamental about her emotional needs! The gall!

Looking down, he realized that his left hand had crept up and was playing with his neckline, teasing his cleavage for Vanessa. Even in tense situations like this he couldn’t stop himself from showing off his transformed body.

“What do you say?” He asked, “Will you give me a shot?”

There was a moment of silence, then she spoke.

“Okay,” she consented.

Only the voice didn’t just come from Vanessa’s mouth. It also came from behind him.

Turning, Tim found himself looking into the brown eyes of a young woman he had never seen in a jogging outfit. She had a dopey look on her face.

“Girlfriend? Lover? Whatever?” She said, stepping closer to Tim, “I’m in.”

Then she wrapped her arms around him and pressed her lips against his.