Chapter 25: The Wedding
Nick, as it turned out, wasn't really capable of being part of a naked wedding, which was no surprise. He'd read the links and references to the literature that Tethys had assigned him, and reported that he really did feel differently about it now, on an intellectual level, but he was still too squeamish to actually witness it first hand. It was enough for him to just accept it and wish us well. He did ask to be kept in the loop, and to let him know if we opened a gift registry. That was something I hadn't thought about. It's not like we were youngsters just beginning our lives. We weren't in need of household items. Other pre-wedding traditions, such as a bridal shower or bachelor party were also of no interest to us. In most ways, Tethys and I being married was going to have little to no effect on the life we were already leading, the biggest change might well have been our income tax status. In her mind, the biggest advantage to being married was the possibly old-fashioned remnant value of her child being "legitimate." I didn't personally think that was an issue, but beyond that I simply liked the romantic notion of being her husband. The legal change was trivia, the emotional state was surprisingly enticing. The main practical consideration was for scheduling, if we were going to have a nude outdoor wedding, which we both wanted, it was going to have to wait until spring, when the weather was warm enough to support it. So we still had several months to plan, wait, and anticipate. My mother was ecstatic about our engagement, slightly less so about the wedding plans.
"I think it's wonderfully romantic. One of my girlfriends did that when we were young. It was fun. But I don't think I have it in me at my age. And you know your sisters and brothers would be traumatized at the idea. It's not something the kids could go to. Would you consider having a second one just for your side of the family? Not a real official ceremony, maybe just an observance celebration."
I told her Tethys and I would seriously consider it, and it did seem like a good compromise. Maybe her dad could even go to that one.
In the meantime, we were becoming aware of another development. Hera was spending a lot of time with Beth, finding a good long-term threesome relationship for her had become almost an obsession. She seemed to be taking it more seriously than Beth herself. She plowed through dating sites, digging up potential new encounters. But all that effort turned out to be irrelevant. The perfect partner for her had been there for more than a year, admiring her from afar, too shy and too unsure of his place, and of her secret desires, to reveal himself. It was our coworker, Mike. As far as we'd known, he was a complete dyed-in-the-wool nerd, a fan of fantasy and role playing games, although he was in pretty good shape too. We also knew he had a long-standing crush on Beth -- as well as Tethys. Beth had always been politely and sympathetically uninterested in him. She was looking for men who liked other men as well as herself, her deepest desire was to be shared between two or more men who were also sharing each other. We had no suspicion that Mike was anything other than a lonely, frustrated heterosexual, and she simply wasn't interested in that vibe.
Before meeting Beth, I had been fiercely protective of my privacy with my coworkers. None were aware of the non-monogamous life of Tethys, or later, the development of my own shared relationships. To their eyes, Tethys and I were an exclusive dating couple, and we gave every indication that we were nothing more. Beth had broken through that facade on her first day at work, completely by accident when I'd foolishly opened a text from Tethys in her presence, one that to the surprise of both of us featured a photograph of a naked black Sonia caressing the very large black cock of a naked Henri. After some weeks of paranoia, I'd finally become comfortable with the assurances of Beth that she was not going to accuse me of sexual harassment, coupled with a constant annoyance brought on by her intense curiosity about our lifestyle, a curiosity which was admittedly nonprofessional, but too real to ignore. Eventually, as she opened up more about her own life, the annoyance faded, and we gradually developed a sincere friendship. Tethys, Megan and Hera also got to know her, and they truly adored her.
In all this, I'd rarely given Mike a second thought, partly because he'd protected his privacy as closely as I had, but without any careless slip-ups. Also, knowing his attraction to Beth, and her lack of attraction to him, I was inclined to shield her from spending too much time with him alone, feeling that it could only lead to disappointment and discomfort for both of them, and interfere with the professional relationship that we needed for developing our new software system. However, the time and effort involved in that project required a lot of close involvement, which also required an element of personal trust. At one point, Mike got the impression that my relationship with Beth was crossing professional boundaries, and he began to worry that it was a threat to Tethys, who he also had a crush on. He couldn't bear the thought that I might hurt either of those women.
After Mike had confronted me, Beth and I agreed that we'd unfairly frozen him out of some of our lines of communication, and we began to include him more in our casual conversations. Beth also took an occasional lunch with Mike now, just the two of them, and, as lonely men tend to do with women they are attracted to, he gradually opened up more of his inner self to her. It was after a few of those that Beth came to see me, smiling and excited -- almost giddy, to use the clichΓ©.
"You can't tell this to anybody except Tethys and Hera and Megan," she began. "And especially not to anyone at work."
She was practically shivering with her anticipated reveal. "Mike is bisexual!"
"What???" the shock in my voice was genuine.
"Don't let him know you know!" she warned me sharply. "I feel like I'm betraying a confidence telling you this, but I think if you and the group know, it will actually benefit him. So let it benefit him without hurting his feelings, please!"
"I won't say anything, you know that. I'm just surprised, but I guess I shouldn't have expected to know. It's none of my business."
"Well, it's kind of your business now, and Hera's especially, since she's been trying to set me up with bisexual guys. I don't know if anything will come of this, but if it does, it's inevitable that you guys will know officially soon enough. I just want you to be comfortable in supporting whatever happens with us."
"Of course I'll support you," I assured her. "My policy against romantic entanglements at work was just my own personal choice, it's not something I'm opposed to across the board. I've always thought of them as dangerous in principle, but I have seen some that worked. You and Mike are both good, sensible people... well, at least Mike is sensible, so if it happens for you I think there's a good chance of it working out well."
"Thanks for the flattery," she quipped. "Just so you know, Mike has never had an experience with another man, so I guess it's more accurate to say he's bi-curious. You know how shy he is, he's never had the confidence or the courage to pursue one, and he says he's never had a guy proposition him, at least not in a way that he recognized."