"I think I love him," she said, looking at me with sad eyes and the sweetest face I'd ever seen. An apology was in her soft voice and she smiled.
"You think?" I said, my heart breaking with an tremendous thud.
"I love him," she corrected. "I didn't want to, but it happened. I still love you. I don't want to hurt you. Could you share?"
"I guess I'll have to," I said. "Do we trade off, or each get a body part?" I joked, not knowing if I could stand the hurt of the punch line.
"I don't know," she said, her sad eyes saying she neither understood or had the answer. "You used to say you'd like to see me with another man," she said, giving my words back to me so I could choke on them. "I don't know how it works, but some people make it work. I guess we'll just have to see."
My wife was telling me she was in love with my best friend, and to make it worse, she also loved me and didn't want our life together to end. What a dilemma. What a shock. I could get pissed and stomp out of her life, or I could kiss her and share her sex, her body, and her life. I had absolutely no idea what I was about to do, although I did know I didn't want to lose the part of her I could lose if I handled things poorly.
"I guess the three of us have to get together and talk it out," I said. "What a conversation that's going to be." We sat and looked at one another for a few minutes without speaking, then we hugged and even cried. "Whatever I get of you, I don't want to lose," I said. "I'll do whatever I have to do to keep even part of you," I told her, wiping my tears with my wrist.
I'm not going to tell you our three-way talk between Jake and Claire and me was easy, after all he was not only gaining a woman to love and have sex with, he was also gaining a husband to share her with. Claire told Jake we wanted to talk, although I didn't know if she'd told him what the nature of the talk was. I had no idea whether or not he had any knowledge of what was in the air, that she wanted to tell him she was in love with him and wanted the two of us to share her. "What's going on?" he asked with a shrug.
"Claire has something to tell you," I said, laying the ground work, trying to get things started.
"We've talked about it," she said, looking over at me. "He knows how I feel." He nodded and waited for her to go on.
"Ah, sure, I guess he would," I said, realizing she had already talked to him, understanding that things were already moving ahead. "So, I guess you've talked and have come to some decision." They both nodded. "So I'm just here to hear what's going to happen," She reached over and took my hand and nodded.
"Do you think you could share? I mean would you be all right with that, the two of you?" Speaking to both of us, her voice was soft and unsure. "A lot of people do," she said. "Even some societies are structured that way, two men, one woman., or one man, many women."
"So would you fuck both of us, alternating from one to the other?" I said, trying to go for funny and hold my anger in check but failing.
"I would spend time with both of you," she said. "I love you both."