Barbecue

The house was empty. Silent. The laundry flapped on the line outside the kitchen window, white sheets catching the afternoon sun.

I set the groceries on the counter. Didn’t bother putting them away. Lucky was still inside me, still silent, and my body was a live wire of frustrated arousal.

The sofa. I collapsed onto it, my slip already hiked up around my waist, and reached down to find the tail. Pulled. Lucky slid out, the egg glistening, the tail limp between my fingers. I set it on the coffee table and my hand found my clit immediately.

No finesse. No teasing. Just pressure and speed and the desperate need to finish what he’d started.

The orgasm built fast and crashed hard. My back arched off the cushion. My mouth opened on a cry that filled the empty living room.

When my vision cleared, I stared at the ceiling.

The newly painted ceiling. Jamal’s work. White as a fresh start.

I started laughing. Or maybe crying. The sound was somewhere in between.

I composed myself eventually. Washed my hands. Washed Lucky. Put away the groceries and then, on an impulse I didn’t fully understand, went upstairs.

The bodysuit was still in its bag, tucked in the back of my closet. Matte black fabric, cutout between the legs, the material sleek and cool against my skin when I pulled it on. I stood in front of the mirror. It hugged every curve. Left nothing to the imagination - and everything. The cutout showed my neatly shaved pussy. I felt sexy.

The plug was next. Blue gem, small but substantial, the silicone cool even through the lube. I bent over the bed, reached back, and pressed it in slowly. The stretch was familiar now. The weight, once it settled, was grounding.

Over the bodysuit, I pulled on jeans and a loose sweater. Normal clothes. Normal mom clothes. Nothing to suggest what lay beneath.

By the time the kids got home, I had dinner prepped and my face arranged into something that resembled composure.

By the time Simon walked through the door at 5:15, the table was set and the plug was a secret weight inside me and my husband had no idea that his wife was wearing the lingerie he’d bought her, that she’d spent the day with a vibrator inside her, that she’d masturbated on the sofa still slick from the grocery store edging.

He kissed my forehead.

“How was your day?”

“Fine,” I said. “Productive. I went shopping. You never guess ... when I was checking for tomatoes, you hit the button ... I couldn't concentrate any longer ... my legs like jelly ... to the cashier ... out in the car ... and just when I was about to feel my release, it stopped ...”

"Oops ... sorry ... I didn't mean to ..."

My phone rang at 5:30. Linda.

I stepped into the hallway to answer.

“How’s it going?”

Her voice was bright, cheerful, utterly normal. No hint that she knew what had happened Wednesday. No indication that Jamal had told her anything - which meant he’d kept his promise. The relief that washed through me was almost physical.

“Waiting for the kids and Simon,” I said. “Same as always. You?”

“Bored. Restless.” A pause. “Listen. What about a barbecue in your garden Saturday? Yours is way bigger than anything I could do at my place. Well, technically I don’t even have a garden, so.”

“Here?”

“Yes. We grill things. Drink things. Let the kids run around while the adults pretend to be civilized.” She laughed. “I’ll bring some ProSeco ... and I’ll bring Jamal,” she added, as if it were an afterthought.

Jamal. In my house. In my garden. Standing where he’d stood before - painting, sweating, catching me when I fell. Jamal, who’d fucked me on the kitchen floor and the living room carpet and in my marital bed. Jamal, who’d looked me in the eye and promised to tell no one.

Could I face him? Could I sit across a picnic table from him while Simon grilled burgers and Linda laughed and the kids played tag ... and pretend nothing had happened? My throat had gone dry.

“Renée? You still there?”

“I’m here.” I swallowed. “Okay. Yes. Saturday works.”

“Perfect. What time?”

“We’ll say four? Give the kids time to swim first.”

“Four it is. I’ll tell Jamal.” A pause. “Everything okay? You sound weird.”

“I’m fine,” I said. The lie came easier now. “Just tired. Long day.”

“Okay. Well. Saturday. Can’t wait.” And she was gone.

I stood in the hallway, phone pressed to my chest, staring at nothing. The kids were playing outside in our garden.

Dinner smells drifted from the kitchen. Simon’s voice called something to the kids, and they laughed, and the sound of my family filled the house like music.

I smoothed my sweater down over the bodysuit, felt the plug shift inside me, and walked back into the kitchen.

Simon stood behind me. "Renée, let me finish what I started ... kids will be outside for a while ..."

He opened my jeans and pushed it down ... he saw the mesh of the bodysuit and gasped ... "Oh wow, that's calling for attention!"

I turned my back against him. When I bowed over the kitchen counter, he saw the blue gem between my cheeks.

Simon got his cock out in an instance and shoved it deep into my wet pussy.

I looked out the window and saw our children playing while being fucked from behind.

"Yes, fuck me , fuck me deep ... I need it ... fuck me ...!"

I felt the plug bouncing against Simon's cock - intensifying the arousal.

It didn't take long for both of us to cum ...

With a loud moan we both came ... when Simon retracted, his seed dripped out running down over the suit ...

"That was good ... really good ... though now I have to wash this beautiful suit ... I didn't expect it would turn you on in such a manner ..."

"Hmm, you telling me about the vibrator in the store and then being such a beauty in a pleasant packing, I think no one could withstand you."

I smiled and kissed him. Then went upstairs, undressed the bodysuit, put on my jeans and a shirt and was down again.

"Hey, Linda called ... she invited herself to a Barbecue at us on Saturday ... she and Jamal will be over at four. That okay with you?"

"Oh yes, brillant idea ... I'll ask Cassie and Mark to join in with their kids ..."

"Yeah, that's perfect. You do the shopping? ... six adults and four kids ... !"

---

The doorbell rang at eleven minutes past four.

I was breathless from romping around with the children. Sprawled on a towel near the inflatable pool Simon had set up for the kids, my sundress sticking to my back in the afternoon heat. The children shrieked and splashed, their energy an endless renewable resource, while I lay there like a woman who'd run a marathon she hadn't trained for.

Simon had been manning the grill since three-thirty. Charcoal smoke drifted across the garden, that smell of summer and meat and something primordial. His T-shirt was already sweat-stained between the shoulder blades. When the doorbell chimed, he caught my eye and I waved him toward the house.

Cassie Hendry burst onto the terrace like a sunflower. Yellow sundress, sandals, that messy bun that made her look effortlessly put-together. Mark followed with their two kids, a six-pack of craft beer dangling from one hand.

Their kids exploded into the garden like they'd been waiting their whole lives for this exact moment. Emma Hendry and our daughter immediately formed an alliance. The boys vanished behind the maple tree. Cassie settled into the lawn chair beside me with a sigh that seemed to come from somewhere deep in her spine.

"Thank god for this," she said. "I was about to lose my mind."

"Saturday afternoon energy?"

"Saturday afternoon insanity." She tipped her head back, eyes closed against the sun. "Mark's been working late all week. I've been counting down the hours until bedtime since Wednesday."

The doorbell rang again.

My heart stopped. Then started again, louder. Too loud. Surely Cassie could hear it, that thud-thud-thud beneath my ribs, the sudden dampness of my palms.

Simon opened the door. Linda's laugh floated through the house and out the open windows, bright and unmistakable. Then a deeper voice - Jamal's voice - and my stomach dropped into my feet.

They emerged onto the terrace. Linda in white linen shorts and a sleeveless blouse, her blonde ponytail swinging, her face already flushed with pleasure. Jamal behind her. Tall. Lean. That dark honey skin, the sharp jaw, the way his T-shirt clung to his chest and shoulders.

I stood. Smiled. Kept my eyes somewhere in the vicinity of Linda's face.

"Renée!" She hugged me, her body warm and damp from the drive. "This is going to be so fun. Thank you for having us."

"Of course." My voice sounded normal. I was almost proud.

Jamal stepped forward. His eyes met mine - just for a heartbeat, just for the briefest flicker of recognition - and then he looked past me toward the garden. "Great setup. Need any help with the grill?"

Simon clapped his shoulder. "Come on. I'll put you to work."

They walked off together. Two men. One who'd been my husband for nine years. One who'd been inside me for two hours. Standing at the same grill, laughing about something, the smoke curling around them like a benediction.

I sat back down. Crossed my legs. Uncrossed them.

Linda had already claimed the chair on my other side. "This is lovely. Really. Your garden is so much bigger than I remembered."

Cassie leaned forward. "Linda, right? I've heard so much about you. The legendary gym partner."

"Legendary?" Linda laughed. "What has she been saying?"

"Only that you're the reason she can still walk after leg day."

The conversation flowed around me like water around a stone. I was present - I nodded, I smiled, I contributed the occasional sentence about the weather or the kids or the grill - but underneath, my pulse raced and didn't slow. Every time I glanced toward the men, I saw Jamal. Every time I saw Jamal, I felt his hands on my hips. His cock inside me. The mirror on the wardrobe. The shower tiles. The drop cloth.

I excused myself to check on the kids.

They were fine. Of course they were fine. I just needed to move my body, to shake off the memory that clung to my skin like humidity.

The meat was ready at five-thirty.

Steaks and sausages and corn on the cob, charred and glistening. Linda and Cassie helped me carry bowls of potato salad and coleslaw and three different kinds of sauce from the kitchen to the picnic table. The kids abandoned the pool and descended like locusts, grabbing plates, arguing over who got the biggest sausage.

Simon sat beside me with his plate. His thigh pressed against mine - familiar, comfortable, the weight of nine years - and I leaned into him for a moment before he stood again. "Gotta check the coal. More corn coming."

Jamal took his place.

The bench shifted under his weight. His leg - bare below his cargo shorts - rested against my bare leg, skin on skin, and I flinched like I'd been burned. Retracted. Pressed my knees together under the table.

He didn't look at me. Didn't acknowledge the contact or its withdrawal. Just reached for the potato salad and said something to Cassie about the weather, about the humidity, about how the paint on the living room ceiling had dried perfectly.

Linda answered from across the table. "He's so talented. All that handyman stuff. You should see what he did at my place."

"I can imagine," Cassie said, and something in her tone made Linda blush.

My entire awareness had narrowed to the space between our bodies - that inch of air where his leg had been, the phantom heat of it, the way my thigh still tingled.