Paranoia 4

"Mom! Stop! None of this means that I love Sam any less!"

And with those words to her mother on the phone, as she walked through the front door, Sam's fiancée brought him to the moment he had been wondering about for years as a general idea but for two weeks as a specific problem.

"Mom! Enough! I'm telling you because I'm always honest with you, but I'm not asking for your opinion or your approval. Besides, I know that you and Aunt Sally did the exact same thing to Dad and Uncle Rob."

Interesting, thought Sam, as his fiancée, Cindy, prattled on, still oblivious to his presence. The morals ran in the family. He had not stumbled onto this nugget of insight before. But, in retrospect, it should have been obvious.

"What? How? Simple. When you and Aunt Sally start drinking, you start talking and, boy, do you ever talk about interesting stuff. The three of us have known for years."

There was a pause, so he assumed her mother was talking again. Cindy's tone now was calm and reasonable.

"So, you understand exactly how I feel. It's the same with me. I just have to get it out of my system, and then I will be ready for the wedding. After that, I'll be a good girl," she told her mother.

Sam looked down at the college yearbook he held in his lap. In the picture in the middle of the page, Cindy was mugging for the camera. It was one of his favorites. It showed her sense of fun. But the thing that the photo made him recall was her acne. She had a bad case of cystic acne in their last year of school, their first year of dating. Really nasty, swollen nodes. The yearbook people retouched her photo, of course, to get rid of them, but they had missed one under the wing of her nose at the left nostril. Because of the lighting and the angle of the photo, that zit just looked like a shadow in the yearbook. But he remembered it well because he kept telling her that she was beautiful and sexy even though she had it and to leave it alone and stop squeezing it trying to pop it or it would scar, which of course she didn't and of course it did.

It was a small scar, and you had to look for it to see it, but it was there. Cindy never seemed to notice it herself, but it was Sam's go-to point of reference when he had some reason to try to determine which identical triplet sister he was talking to.

Why was it necessary even to be thinking of the need for distinguishing three stunningly beautiful, melt-your-popsicle-from-50-feet-away, blonde, triplet sisters, aside from the intellectual stimulation of seeing if it was possible? Simple. Paranoia.

Of course, even a paranoid can have real enemies, as the saying goes. And Sam had worse than enemies. He had three older brothers. They did not go in for beatings or physical abuse. No, they were more subtle. They went for the total mind-fuck. Growing up, when his parents were not around, nearly every activity involving his brothers resulted in a trap or a prank or a nasty practical joke that would infuriate him and amuse the hell out of them. And they were people who loved him and beat to a pulp anyone outside the family who messed with him. He learned the hard way that the appetizing chocolate cupcake offered with a smile could be laced with Colon Cleaner Hot Sauce. Or someone's booger. As a result, Sam had quickly realized the value of caution and to look every gift horse in the mouth. Or under the wing of the left side of the nose.

All of that was in the background though when he first met Cindy in the first week of senior year. He had seen her around before, but he had other friends, and so did she, so they had never met or talked. But they had an English seminar together in their last year and found themselves sitting next to each other in a group of eight other students plus the professor, so it was natural that they would get acquainted.

College had been a revelation before he met Cindy. He had never dated in high school. He was a serious student, and the weird politics of dating reminded him too much of dealing with his brothers, so he was never at ease enough to invest the time. College was a different story. There, he was dealing with girls whose sexuality was unleashed. The ones he met were usually pretty direct. If they wanted to screw someone else, they just told him, and they ended the relationship. Nice and straightforward. No hidden agenda. There were always more girls. He had begun to trust again. At least a little. Maybe the rest of the world was not like his brothers.

Things had started slowly with Cindy, but the relationship grew hot quickly. She was a complete pillow princess, so she was not very active during sex, but was very willing to allow him to do things to her, within limits, whenever he wanted, and appreciated his efforts. By Thanksgiving, they were serious enough that she dragged him home to meet her parents. That was when he also met her sisters.

He had not seen them before because their father had insisted that they all go to different colleges, to spread the wealth, as he said. Based on what Sam now knew, he wondered whether their father was trying to limit the potential for identical triplet games with boyfriends.

Sam knew, of course, that Cindy had sisters but not that they were the same age or even identical. She was always mysterious when he asked and changed the subject. Maybe the shock of seeing them all together for the first time was some kind of family test of suitability. At that Thanksgiving, he realized that what he had previously assumed to be a whole bunch of shameless self-absorbed selfies on the wall of her apartment could actually be pictures of her sisters. On the other hand, she was a twenty-something year-old girl, so they could have been selfies, too. There was no way to tell, not with the resolution of the photos.

When Sam met the other two girls, he surprised them by not freaking out like they were a circus act, like a lot of the other guys they had dated had apparently done. The reason was simple. In grade school, Sam's best friend had identical twin sisters, so he was used to the idea, although back then, he had not yet hit puberty so he never thought of banging them. He had, however, learned how to tell apart his friend's sisters, so it was a comparatively easy job to do the same thing with the triplets, although he never let on that he had strategies to crack the code. It did not seem prudent. He had learned with his brothers that he had a lot better chance of payback, if necessary, if he seemed more clueless than he actually was.

What nearly did throw Sam for a loop, although he covered it, was meeting their Aunt Sally and realizing that she and the girls' mother were identical twin sisters. What were the odds? Identical twin sisters, one of whom has identical triplet daughters. It should have made the news. Aunt Sally's kids, however, looked nothing alike. Sam thought that fact a bit odd then but did not dwell on it. Now, it seemed more ominous.

Once Sam got the hang of it, it got easier to tell the three girls apart. Abigail, the oldest by several minutes, was the least physically active of the three, so her face was just a smidgeon fatter than the other two. When they were having their periods and retaining water, the difference faded. Bonny, the middle one, had a very faint freckle below her right eye. And Cindy, the youngest, had her acne scar. Cindy also had more of a runner's body with slightly smaller breasts and well-developed calf muscles. And a small mole on her lower back above her right butt cheek as well as another freckle to the left of her belly button. He had not been able to do a similarly detailed examination of Abby's or Bonny's naked or near-naked bodies. He had seen them a couple of times in bikinis by the family pool—matching, of course—but circumstances did not permit the time necessary to do the required careful analysis. Not without getting slapped.

But they seemed to think that they all looked exactly the same. At least they played it that way. Maybe they assumed everyone else was too stupid to figure it out. Maybe the people they usually met actually were too stupid to figure it out. Of course, they were pretty blondes with nice breasts, so giggling and jiggling overrode a lot of male intellectual firepower and probably stopped any further inquiries.

So, when Abby was pretending to be Cindy on a dinner date with Sam once, and she asked him why he was studying her face so carefully, he did not say that he had immediately noticed that the acne scar was missing as soon as they got into bright enough light. He also did not say that he could see that the skin around her eyes was slightly puffy. Instead, he told her it was because she was so beautiful that he could not help but be drawn in completely by every inch of her face into the deep pools of her blue eyes. She bought that and blushed nearly purple, which was something that Cindy never did either, and something else that he did not point out to Abby.

And when Bonny took her turn to pretend to be Cindy and asked Sam at lunch one day why he was gazing at her hands so intently, he did not tell her it was because he had already seen the Bonny freckle below her eye and was now taking the opportunity to do some amateur palmistry to compare the major and minor lines on her hands to those of Cindy's hands so he would have some other points of reference for future use. Turned out that she had an extra line going on a slant to the left index finger that the others did not, so the exercise was worth it. Instead, he told her that his love for her was so strong that he could not bear to look into her eyes because he was afraid that he would cry and she would think he was a wimp. She was the one who started crying instead—one of the other points he noted because neither Abby nor Cindy was so weepy—and tried to kiss him deeply, although he turned away from the kiss to hold her tightly and whisper into her ears that everything would be okay.

In neither switcheroo case did he try to bang or kiss either Abby or Bonny, except for a peck on the cheek, and neither did they go after him. He excused himself in both cases by adopting a brooding, conflicted Heathcliff-in-Wuthering-Heights mood and saying he needed to be alone with his feelings. They ate that drivel up. They must have reported positively because when he saw the real Cindy after each chaste switch, she fucked him senseless. Thinking back on it now, those were pretty much the only times she had ever initiated anything instead of letting him do all the work. Not that he was really complaining. He liked giving her orgasms, and she loved getting them. It was just that she never really got active unless it was to finish him off.

Sam did not know what the story was. Were they testing him? Were they trying to swap for giggles? This was a classic chocolate-cupcake-with-colon-cleanser-hot-sauce-filling setup. It would have been one thing if Cindy had asked him openly whether he wanted to have a go with either or both sisters while she watched or participated, or even while she went out for a walk until they were done, but she never made that invitation.

He had let the switching slide without comment. He was not sure what they were up to, but it had seemed harmless. At the time.

As he thought, he frowned. The damned thing with that hot-sauce cupcake was that his brothers did it to him twice. The second time, they swore they were sorry and were making it up to him with a real cupcake. Surprise! They were lying. Just like Charlie Brown with Lucy and the football.

All three brothers got grounded for that prank, but he was the one who had the shits all night. But he learned. He always thought twice now. He might have missed some opportunities along the way, like triplet swapping, but at least he did not have to worry about getting diarrhea or feeling like he needed to vomit.

"Yes, Mom, I understand," Cindy said, bringing Sam's attention back to her call. "Yes, I know there is a lot to do, and we only have two weeks. We've got it covered. All next week is getting everything out of the house and into storage so we'll be ready to move into the new house after the honeymoon. The following week is getting everything ready for the wedding."

Sam felt like shouting that maybe they needed to reconsider the wedding date, like rescheduling it for never, but decided that things needed to play themselves out so he did not look like the asshole here. Or as much of an asshole.

"Mom, don't worry about it. The girls have both agreed. It will be fine. You'll see. Trust me. OK. Love you, too. Love to Dad. Bye."

Sam heard her hang up and put down the phone. Then, he heard her walk away to the shower in the master bedroom, start the water, and close the door. He waited a moment until the sound of the water changed to indicate someone had entered the shower, and he finally stood up. His legs were cramped from sitting. He had not expected to be sitting for such a long time, but she had come home earlier than he expected, so he had been stuck with where he was sitting.

She had not seen him because he had been sitting behind a wall of boxes that held all his books. It was like a fort, which was ironic considering that when he was a kid and wanted peace and quiet, he had withdrawn into a fortress of reading. Now, the boxes of books were his fort, standing strong to protect him. Of course, they were piled in a corner of the living room because books were not nearly as central to Cindy's life as to his, but he had thought before that was one of the compromises that getting married would involve. Probably time to re-think that idea.

Sam looked around the living room. Nearly all his stuff was already packed, except for some clothes, and the stuff on his desk. He was not big into furniture, except for the desk. And the recliner that Cindy hated and said would have to go in the basement of the new place because it did not match anything. And the Ikea table he had for the television and had had for years. With that stuff, he could have added a mattress that he could just throw on the floor and be set. But that décor did not match Cindy's interior decorating vision for the new house. Maybe time to rethink that, too.

For her part, Cindy had packed virtually nothing while Sam was basically ready to go. When he pointed that out, she said that all he had to do was show up at the church and say the magic words. The bride was the one who had to do everything. Sam thought it doubtful he would be able to do either of his assigned tasks now.

But Cindy's plan was that, next week, when she finally got her act together, after fucking her sisters' boyfriends apparently, the movers would come in, pack what was still there and haul everything away to storage until they got back from the honeymoon and were ready to move into the new house. Which needed to be remodeled because of course. In the meantime, before the wedding, Sam would be bunking with Abby's boyfriend, Tony, while Cindy would move back with her parents while everything got finalized for the wedding.

That was the plan. But what was it that the boxer Mike Tyson had said? "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth."

Sam looked at his watch. He had a bit of time before Abby and Bonny arrived. They were supposed to be coming over with takeout food to talk about the wedding, after which "Bonny," but really Cindy, would leave the house to spend the weekend with Bonny's boyfriend Bob, while Abby and Bonny/"Cindy" would have a sisterly sleepover, which meant Sam would not be getting any sex. Then, Cindy in the guise of Abby would spend Saturday night with Abby's boyfriend. Thus, Bob and Tony would each think that he had spent one night with his own girlfriend while Sam would think that he was with Cindy the whole weekend. Clever, as long as it was not possible to tell identical triplets apart. Or unless they were too dumb to exercise reasonable operational security. Which they were.

Two weeks earlier, Sam had met Bob and Tony for drinks while the girls were doing something about the wedding. Hard to say what. Hair, or flowers, or doilies, or something similar. The purported purpose of the meeting was so the guys could plan Sam's bachelor party, which took about five minutes. Tony insisted that the bachelor party would have three key elements: (1) going to a strip club, (2) getting puking drunk, and (3) not getting arrested. The simplicity of the plan had an integrity that readily led to consensus. Thus, the conversation turned to other topics.

The talk then inevitably led to how great it would be if the sisters agreed to swap so they each got to bang all three of them, preferably in the same room so they could all watch. In the course of the discussion, Sam rapidly realized that neither Bob nor Tony could tell the girls apart. Their clues were all wrong. This was obviously how the triplets got away with this crap.

Bob said that Bonny had a certain unique way she pursed her lips when she was stressed. Tony said Abby kind of stuck her tongue out a little when she was thinking. Both were wrong. Sam knew that all three behaved the same way although Bonny and Abby each did their supposed behaviors a little more than the other two. Thus, Sam knew these tells were indicators but could not be relied on by themselves to tell the difference between the girls. Apparently, after spotting their clues, Bob and Tony looked no further—confirmation bias at its worst.

Rather than confess his knowledge to the boys and screw up his comparative advantage, however, Sam just told Bob and Tony that all three sisters looked the same to him.

Bob and Tony then both talked about the then upcoming sleepover weekend at Sam's place and how each of them would have one night with their girlfriends so that they did not mind sharing them platonically with Sam on the off nights. Sam had felt his stomach drop at that moment. When Cindy had discussed her plans, it had been made absolutely clear to him that only one sister would be at their house: Abby. Bonny was supposed to be with Bob all weekend because his parents were coming to town.

Sam had then asked about the visit of Bob's parents and learned that they had re-scheduled the visit because of some home repair issue. So much for Bonny hanging out with Bob's folks.

The only way any of this made any sense to Sam was if the girl who was absent was house-hopping over two consecutive nights. And the only reason one of them would be house-hopping before Cindy's wedding, with two decoys at Sam's house, would be that the house-hopper was Cindy. Thus, the old triplet-swap that Sam had been wondering about in the two and a half or so years since senior year Thanksgiving looked like it was finally going to take place. But the way it was set up, only Cindy, Bob, and Tony would be having any fun. Sam, Abby, and Bonny would be at home working on seating arrangements for the reception with sex out of the question because Sam and "Cindy" could not make that kind of noise when one of the sisters was staying over. Not really much of a swap.

After dithering over what to do for several days after the Boys' Night Out, Sam had decided he needed more information. After all, without data, it was guessing not analysis. After some Internet shopping with packages delivered to his office, Sam was finally able to act. He placed several voice-activated recorders around the house camouflaged in all the chaos of bits and pieces being gathered for the move: one in each of the two bedrooms, one in the living room, one in the dining room, and finally one in the kitchen. He skipped the partially finished basement where he had his office. None of the girls ever went there. The great thing about the recorders was that they were wifi-enabled. He could either livestream them to his computer or phone, or download them on the fly.