Things We Tried on -

We were never as obsessed with photos as some swingers are -- God, Archie and I have met couples who seemed to get more of a thrill from looking at what they'd done than actually doing it.

I remember one couple telling us, "Honestly, the best part is watching the footage afterward. That's the real high."

Archie and I exchanged a look, the kind where no words were needed. There was something distant in that approach -- something detached. As if they weren't really living the moment, just staging it for the memory, for the replay. It struck me as a little... hollow. A little dark.

We weren't like that. At least, we didn't think we were. For us, the camera was a game, a flirtation. A way to capture the fire in the moment, not replace it. A souvenir, not the main event. I'd laugh as Archie fumbled with the settings, trying to find the perfect angle, his fingers brushing my skin, heightening everything. Later, when the frenzy passed, we'd scroll through the photos together -- laughing, admiring, remembering. Each image a window into a moment of raw, electric pleasure.

"God, there's something intoxicating about it," I murmured once, our heads together over the screen. "Seeing us like that... it's like we're not even ourselves. Like we become something else in those moments."

Archie leaned in, warm breath brushing my ear. "It's unreal, isn't it? You think you know your own body. Your own face. But then you see it like that... and it's like meeting a stranger. A stranger who's having the time of their life."

I bit my lip. "Yeah. Takes a minute to get used to."

It's strange, really. The first time you see yourself like that -- laid bare, exposed, caught -- there's a shock to it. But you adjust. You learn to surrender to the rawness, the vulnerability. To see it as part of the dance. A necessary risk.

But then... there was Barbara.

It wasn't even a wild photo. Nothing extreme. Just a soft image -- her hand gently cupping my breast, both of us smiling, not even looking at the camera. It could have belonged in one of those artsy, soft-focus books. Innocent. But it hit differently. It felt heavier. Charged.

I remember the moment I first saw it. Just a photo on the screen. But something inside me shifted.

Barbara was smiling. Her hand was warm, possessive. And the way we leaned into each other, oblivious to everything else -- it was... intimate. More than just sexy. More than just a game.

"Isn't that...?" I began, my voice barely above a whisper.

Archie, lounging nearby, glanced over. "Yeah, I noticed that too," he said, too casually. But his eyes lingered. "You two look... close."

I ran my fingertip along the edge of the image. "It's different with her. With Ken, with you -- it's playful. But Barbara... I don't know. It feels deeper."

He studied me, something unreadable flashing across his face before softening. "You're not the only one who's noticed. There's a... connection. Something more than just the game."

I kept scrolling, slowly, like the longer I looked, the deeper I fell. "It's just a picture," I whispered. "But it feels almost too intimate. And that's... strange."

"It is," Archie agreed, his voice low, thick. "But maybe that's part of the thrill. The deeper you go, the more tangled it gets."

I nodded, but a knot was forming in my chest. That particular kind of thrill I felt with Barbara -- it wasn't just about lust. It was something more unsettling. More compelling. A tension I wasn't ready to face. Not fully.

I never really talked to Archie about it -- not in depth. And even now, I don't bring it up much. If he were here, he'd tease me about it. Make a joke, ask something sarcastic like, "Why do you keep going back to girls if it freaks you out so much?"

It always feels off when he does that. Like he's brushing something too big aside. That's not like him -- Archie isn't a shallow man. So when he gets flippant, I wonder if he's hiding something, too. Some discomfort. Some unspoken fear. I try not to probe. I'm not sure I want to know.

We've both gone too deep before.

There were times when our marriage felt like it might crack apart under the weight of all the questions. All the self-examination. Those were the worst times -- when everything we did and felt came under scrutiny, and nothing felt safe.

"I think we're overthinking this," I told him once, massaging my temples after a particularly intense conversation. "We're looking for problems that aren't there."

He stared at the floor. "Maybe we're just trying to understand what went wrong. So we can fix it."

I sank back against the couch. "Yeah, but sometimes digging too deep just makes it worse. Sometimes there's no bottom -- just more darkness."

He was quiet. "I guess I'm not as comfortable letting things lie as you are."

"I get it," I said. "But I've been there. Trying to analyze everything, make sense of every emotion -- it can break you. I've tried to end it, Archie. Twice."

He looked up, startled. "What? When?"

"Twice," I repeated, voice trembling. "And I can still feel it -- the weight of those moments. When you go that deep into yourself, everything starts to feel dirty. Wrong. You think you're searching for truth, but really, you're just bleeding yourself dry."

His voice cracked. "I didn't know it was that bad."

"It was," I whispered. "And I won't go back there. We don't have to pretend everything's fine. But we can't peel everything apart just to see what's inside. Some things are meant to stay whole."

He nodded slowly, pain in his eyes. "I just don't want us to fall apart."

"I don't either," I said. "But sometimes, staying together means not pulling at every thread. Some threads hold us together. You unravel the wrong one, and everything goes."

Which brings me back to Barbara. Looking back, what scared me most wasn't what we did -- it was how deep it went. How entwined we became. Archie and I never got that close to another couple again. Not like we did with Ken and Barbara. And I think I understand why now.

"If you get too close to another couple," Archie once said, "you stop craving variety."

And variety is a huge part of swinging. The newness, the unpredictability. If you get too attached, it defeats the purpose.

But with Barbara and Ken, it wasn't just attachment -- it was entanglement. A depth of connection that made everything else blur. It's hard enough to stay close to one person. Being emotionally married to two? That's a dangerous game.

"I thought it was the thrill of variety that kept us going," Archie said once, lying beside me. "But with them... I don't know. It got complicated."

I remembered the dinners, the conversations that ran deep into the night, the comfort of their presence. And beneath it all -- something heavier. Something neither of us could name.

"It's not just variety," I said quietly. "It was the closeness. We let ourselves go too far. And now... I can't unfeel it."

Archie turned toward me, concern shadowing his features. "Are you saying we crossed a line?"

I hesitated. "Not exactly. Not in the way you mean. But with Barbara..."

My voice softened, unsure. "There's something different. Something between women that doesn't play by the same rules. A kind of bond that slips under logic. And it scares me. Like I've opened a door I don't know how to close."

He was silent for a long moment. Finally, he said, "I get it. You and Barbara had something intense. But it didn't break us. We're still here."

I looked at him, heart aching with tenderness and the quiet dread of knowing too much. "That's just it, Archie. What we had with her... how deep it went... it didn't break us. But it could have."

I wasn't trying to avoid sex. What unsettled me wasn't the act -- it was the relationship. The closeness. The intimacy. The weight of entanglement that grows roots while you're not looking.

Barbara and I were already too close before she ever touched me. Looking back, I see it clearly now -- a subtle current in our friendship, slow and steady, like a warm river I never quite admitted I was floating down. There had always been a quiet pull. A shimmer beneath the surface.

She'd had experience. She knew herself well enough to recognize something in me -- a potential, maybe. A hunger I hadn't yet named.

And swapping -- it's supposed to stir up those undercurrents. That's part of the allure, isn't it?

The silent fantasy of offering your partner a surrogate version of yourself. Letting another woman play at being you, and in doing so, discovering who you are.

But in our case, it wasn't clean. First the friendship. Then the sex. Then the swapping. The roles bled together. One melted into the next.

She was always around. You went to the office, into the world. You saw new faces, broke the rhythm of domestic repetition. But Barbara and I -- we stayed. In the same rooms, the same kitchens, watching the light change through the same windows.

Children are a joy, yes. But they don't talk -- not the way you and I do. Not the way she did. And housework? Unless you're compulsive -- and I'm clearly not -- it doesn't take all day.

So she was there. Every afternoon. Coffee in her hand, stories on her lips. And sometimes... love. It was too much. Too many kinds of intimacy layered on top of each other. She became everything at once: A friend. A mother figure. A daughter. A sister. A lover. A co-wife. My husband's mistress. My lover's wife.

And me -- hers. It got confusing.

There were days I couldn't remember where one version of us ended and the next began. Days when I looked into her eyes and saw my own reflection -- not metaphorically, but truly, like she was becoming some mirror I stepped into.

And I'm not sure I ever stepped back out.

I really don't like making love on weekday afternoons. Just the two of us. No men around. It felt like cheating -- real cheating. Like adultery. And swinging is not supposed to feel like that.

It bothered me. And it felt good.

No -- no, that wasn't the motivation. Of course not. I'm not that kind of person. At least... I don't think I am. That's something other people might not understand. Or maybe no one would. That someone can be a full-on swinger without being driven primarily by physical pleasure.

Of course you want it -- that sweet, happy little tickle. Thank God you never outgrow that. But if it were only about pleasure, you wouldn't need different people. Or different roles. Or different games. Hell, if that were it, you could just use a candle in the bathroom.

No -- it was the closeness. That's what we needed. That woman-to-woman closeness you simply can't get from a man -- not really, not completely. There's a quality to it. A depth.

When I tried to talk about this with Archie -- I don't anymore -- he didn't understand. I don't think he wants to understand.

Some days, I'm not sure I understand either.

We gave each other something, Barbara and I. Reassurance. Comfort. We learned to use each other's bodies like medicine. Headache? Take aspirin. Tension? Take that little blue pill. Depression? Go down on the girl next door.

And it worked -- it did. But it also created this echo, this guilt pattern, and a few days later you're low again. And the cure is obvious. And suddenly you're caught in a cycle that makes you wonder: Am I basically a lesbian?

Sometimes... I have insane thoughts. There were days I couldn't remember where one version of us ended and the next began.

Days when I looked into her eyes and saw my own reflection -- not metaphorically, but truly, like she was becoming some mirror I stepped into. And I'm not sure I ever stepped back out.

Sometimes it hits me in small ways.

I'll be slicing fruit for the kids, and suddenly I remember her laugh -- not just the sound, but the rhythm of it, how it made me laugh too, how it filled the kitchen like sunlight.

I'll glance at the couch and remember her bare foot curling beneath her as she told a story that got far too intimate far too fast. But I didn't stop her.

I leaned in. And then there was the night it all changed. The first time. The quiet click of something shifting.

It was late. The kids were asleep. Archie was out of town. She'd stayed after dinner to help me clean up -- just a glass of wine, a bit of music, leftover dessert we didn't need but ate anyway.

We were talking about marriage -- not ours, not hers. Just... the idea of it. The shape of it. She said something like, "It's strange, isn't it? How we promise forever without even knowing what parts of ourselves will wake up in ten years."

And then she touched my wrist. Just a touch -- feather-light, meaningless, maybe. But I felt it like heat.

I should've said something. Changed the subject. But instead I laughed. Tilted my head just a little too close. Said, "Well... if they wake up, they must want something."

And the silence that followed -- That thrilling, dangerous silence -- It was like standing on a high ledge with the wind tugging at your dress.

She didn't kiss me. Not that night. But I dreamed about it. Vividly. Repeatedly. And when she finally did kiss me -- weeks later, on a Thursday afternoon -- it felt like the dream had simply decided to happen in waking life.

After that, everything unraveled so slowly, so sweetly, we didn't even realize we were tangled until we were breathless and blinking in the dark.

"Do you remember that weekend by the lake?" I asked softly, not quite looking at Archie.

Archie nodded, cautious already. He knew the tone.

"We said it was for the kids," I went on, "but it wasn't. Not really. It was for us -- the four of us -- playing house. Pretending the board games after bedtime were for fun. Pretending we didn't already know how the night would end."

Archie didn't answer. Just sat very still.

"You were in the kitchen," I said, smiling faintly. "Mixing drinks. Ken had stepped out for a smoke. The kids were finally asleep."

Archie's jaw twitched.

"Barbara and I were sitting on the edge of the bed," I continued, the memory thickening as I spoke. "There was this moment -- so small you might miss it -- when she looked at me and tilted her head. She said..."

I closed my eyes, letting her voice drift in.

"You're always so careful," she whispered. "Ever wonder what it would feel like to just... fall?"

"And then her hand," I said quietly, "was on my thigh."

Archie shifted in his seat.

"I laughed," I admitted, "but not because it was funny. It was shock. Pure, cellular shock. Like my body had been waiting and just needed permission."

"I knew you'd be soft," she'd said, smiling like she knew the end of the story already. "I just didn't expect you to melt."

It hadn't been planned. There was no secret signal. It just happened.

"One second I was there, barely engaged, listening to the lake outside the window... and the next -- "

I glanced at Archie. "I got wet."

He blinked slowly. His mouth opened a little, but I kept talking.

"Not just aroused. Drenched. Flooded. That heat that swells from deep inside and pulls every thought out of your head like it's been replaced by pure want."

"You okay?" she'd asked then, her thumb brushing my knee like it belonged there.

"I started breathing faster," I told Archie. "Short, shallow breaths. The kind you try to disguise when you're somewhere public. Somewhere wrong. She noticed, of course. She always did."

She grinned, then winked. "It's starting, isn't it?"

And then --

"The kids called us. One of them knocked on the wall. It snapped me out of it just enough. I stood up -- shaky, confused, soaked. I remember walking out of the bedroom like I'd been caught doing something I didn't understand yet. My legs barely worked."

"Everything okay?" you asked me in the hallway, handing me a drink.

I think I said yes. I think I smiled. But I remember how warm the glass felt in my hand, how cold my lips were.

"And later that night," I said, finally meeting his gaze, "we all ended up in the same bed anyway."

Archie looked at me carefully, like he didn't know whether to apologize or reminisce.

"I'm not blaming anyone," I whispered. "I just can't forget the moment before it even started. That moment when I realized... I wanted it. That something in me had already said yes."

You asked me once if I remembered the details. I lied and said no.

But I do. Every detail.

Barbara came to me later that night. Quiet, barefoot, her steps soft against the creaky wooden floor. The kids were asleep, and you men were still talking on the porch, pretending the lake was enough to hold their attention.

I was sitting on the bed in one of your shirts, pretending to read.

"Is this okay?" she asked, already closing the door behind her.

I didn't answer. I didn't have to.

She crossed the room like she already knew where this would go. There was no hurry in her steps. Just gravity. Like the air between us had thickened and was slowly pulling her in. "I've thought about this," she said softly, kneeling on the edge of the bed. "Not just tonight. Longer than I should admit."

Her hand brushed my ankle, featherlight. I felt my toes curl before I could stop them. "You have no idea how beautiful you are when you pretend not to want something," she whispered. "But I know. I see it. I feel it."

She leaned in -- so slowly I thought I imagined it -- and kissed my shoulder through the thin fabric of your shirt.

That's when I stopped pretending. My breath caught. She felt it. And then her hand slid up my thigh again -- higher this time, and confident. She wasn't asking anymore. She was remembering.

"You're already wet," she whispered, surprised but pleased. "Good."

I tried to say something -- something clever, maybe, or safe -- but nothing came. Just a sigh. A surrender.

She pulled the shirt open, not impatient, not greedy -- just certain. And when her mouth found my breast, I forgot to be afraid. Everything blurred. Her fingers traced circles low on my stomach, lower still, and I arched toward her without meaning to.

"Shh," she breathed, "let it happen."

And I did. I let go.

I let her explore me like I was a new country she'd always suspected was there, just out of sight. Her lips, her fingers, her rhythm -- it all made sense. It was surreal, yes, but not dreamlike in the way dreams usually are. It was vivid. Hyper-real. Like my body had been asleep for years and was only now waking up.

Outside, the screen door creaked. Ken laughed. Your voice floated through the window, saying something about the stars. I remember thinking, They have no idea. Or maybe they do.

And still, Barbara didn't stop.

She whispered things to me -- things I'll never repeat. Not because they were dirty, but because they were true. Too true. They cracked something open inside me.

I came in her arms that night. Quietly, with a long, broken moan. My legs shaking. My heart lost. And she kissed my lips after, tasting me there. "You're mine now," she said softly. "Whether you want to be or not."

And I believed her.

Barbara and I lay tangled on the bed, her head resting lightly on my stomach. I was still trembling. The night had shifted -- thickened, slowed. Time felt malleable, like warm wax.

The room was dim, save for the glow of a low bedside lamp. My skin still buzzed from her touch. My pulse echoed in strange places -- wrists, hips, tongue.

"Do you think they knew?" I asked her, voice barely audible.

She smiled without lifting her head. "Not yet. But they will." There was no guilt. No apology. Only certainty.

And then -- the soft knock.

Three short taps. Familiar.

Barbara sat up, brushing hair from her eyes. I didn't move. I couldn't.

The door opened, just a crack. Your silhouette stood there, framed by shadow and moonlight. You looked at us. Saw us.