Using the Hall Pass
By Cal Bishop
Author's Note
This is my first foray into the Loving Wives category. I'm not sure how many stories there will be with these characters or where it'll go, but I am sure it won't be a BTB story. If that's what you're looking for, I recommend you look elsewhere.
All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Scenarios depicted here are intended to be fun fantasy, but may be illegal, immoral, and/or dangerous if actually attempted in real life. All characters in sexual situations are over 18.
Using the Hall Pass
Tracy always told everyone that she and Robbie never had any fights, but that wasn't true. When she thought about it, she could remember one fight. But in some situations it was too embarrassing to tell anyone about, and in others it was just too confusing.
"I can't believe you want to fuck someone else!" She yelled. Dinner plates were on the table with leftovers growing cold on them and glasses half-empty; after-dinner conversation had gone in a direction she hadn't expected.
Neither did Robbie, apparently. He threw his hands up and stepped back from the table. "I didn't say I wanted to fuck someone else, I said I wanted a threesome! I mean, I asked what you'd think about a threesome! That's all!"
"Yeah, right! Sure!" she said sarcastically. "You expect me to believe you were asking something like that without knowing what answer you wanted?"
He rubbed his forehead and rolled his eyes. "Okay, yes, I'd like to try something like that. And if it results in me having sex with the third person, that might be nice. But that's it!"
He shrugged theatrically, opening his arms to all the possibilities she could imagine. "If it results in you having sex with the third person, that might also be nice! And if it's just the two of us making out with a third person and then they leave before we get it on, that might also be nice! I'm open to possibilities!"
She wanted to keep arguing, but paused when she realized he was serious, as crazy and stupid as it sounded. He filled the silence. "I know your last relationship, that Jaime guy, wasn't great. You haven't given me many details, which is fine, but I gather he was kind of pushy about personal stuff. That's not what I'm doing. Really, I was, am, just asking. If the answer is no, that's fine."
"Thank you for being so understanding," Tracy said stiffly. "The answer is no. And this isn't just about my ex. I'm not interested in women like that, and I don't like the idea of... seeing you with another woman, even if I'm there."
He raised an eyebrow. "I never said it had to be another woman. If you want a threesome with me and another guy, I'm open to the idea."
She looked at him even more skeptically than before. "So, you want to, what, share me with one of your bros?" she asked. "Haven't high-fived a guy over a chick's back since college, huh?"
He took a deep breath and shook his head. "I'm really sorry if you think I was just trying to get permission to have sex with another woman," he muttered. "Give me one minute." He walked around her to the bookshelf and heaved up the box full of study materials from when they were getting ready for the GMAT. He pulled a blank note card out of a stack bound with a rubber band, took out a pen, hunched over the table, and started writing.
Tracy frowned, curious. She couldn't see what he was writing around the box and his body.
When he finished writing whatever he was writing, he paused for a moment, studying it. Eventually he straightened out and handed it to her with a flourish.
She read it with a frown. Across the top, it said, "HALL PASS." Below it in the best handwriting she had ever seen from Robbie, it said, "The bearer of this pass is entitled to one session of sex with the person of their choice with no consequences from the giver of this pass. Expiration date: December 1, 2045. Date redeemed: ________"
"What does this mean?" she asked, holding it at arm's length.
He shrugged as if it should be obvious. "I'd like it if we experimented with other people in bed. Got a little adventurous. You've made it clear that you don't want me touching another woman. Fair enough, you know, it's a normal request. So I'm saying you can experiment first. If it goes well, then we can talk about what else we might like to experiment with."
"2045? You think we'll be together that long?"
He shrugged and gave her a theatrically roguish smile. "If we are, and if you still haven't used this by then, I must be doing something right!"
"It doesn't say anything about love on it, or any other feelings," she said, hoping to shock him to his senses. They hadn't used that word about each other so far.
"True, but it does say 'one session'," he pointed out. "If you care about someone else more than me, then we're over whether you have a hall pass or not. If you have an emotional affair, but stop and tell me about it before more than one, you know, session, then we may be able to deal with it. On the other hand if you have sex with other guys 5 times before we talk about it, that's a problem for us whether you love him or me or neither of us."
"I'm not using this," she said, too confused to be mad.
"That's your choice," he said smoothly. "I'm just saying, if you want to, you have the option."
Tracy tucked the pass in her old dog-eared copy of Dragonriders of Pern, just because it was handy and she wanted to get the confusing notecard out of sight. "Anyways, don't be silly, you're all the man I need," she said, forcing herself to smile at them, at the situation.
He smiled at her awkwardly. "Thanks. You too," he said. "I mean... I'm sorry I gave you the impression that you weren't enough woman for me."
They hugged and discussed cleaning up the leftovers.
Over the following month, neither of them brought up any kind of sexual "experiment." Tracy figured Robbie wanted her to speak up about it first and decided she could be more stubborn than him.
Time continued to pass. Over the following year they became more comfortable with the "love" word. The year after that, they got engaged. The year after that, married. The year after that, they pooled their savings and made a down payment on a house and moved out of their tiny, old, not-up-to-code apartment. Just two months later, Tracy took a pregnancy test and it came back positive.
* * *
Another wild Monday night
, Robbie thought with chagrin as he crept downstairs, being careful not to step on the third squeaky step, just in case it would wake up Izzy or Chris. At 4 and 6, bedtimes were getting better, but still definitely not easy.
He poked his head into the living room to speak to Tracy. "I think they're down. I'm thinking about dessert. You want anything from the kitchen while I'm up?"
"You could bring over the cookie jar," she said after a moment's thought.
He nodded, and did a double take and grinned, admiring her pose.
I'm a lucky man
, he thought. Normally when it was his turn to put the children to bed, he'd come down to find her in a t-shirt and shorts or sweatpants, her phone in her hand, waiting for him to discuss what they'd stream on TV. But that night she was still in the sun dress she had worn to the office that day and had her legs folded under her, just a little cleavage showing, comfortable but poised.
She was still in the same pose when he returned. "So what do you want to watch?" he asked as he handed her the cookie jar.
"Actually, I wanted to talk first, if you don't mind," she said as she put the cookie jar on the coffee table.
"Uh oh!" He joked.
She smiled politely at that but didn't laugh. She took a deep breath before speaking. "Do you remember, back when we were in the apartment, when you gave me a hall pass?"
"Yes," he answered.
"What would you say if I used it? Hypothetically?"
He arched an eyebrow and thought carefully before speaking. "Hypothetically... if you did the thing I gave you permission to do... because you thought it would be fun and, you know, feel good, and if it did... then I'd be glad," he said. She kept waiting, so he continued, "And I'd probably be curious, and think it was hot and want to talk about trying other things like that, but that depends on details."
"Really," she said, sounding fascinated. "I could have had sex with another man, and you wouldn't be jealous or mad, you'd be happy about it?"
"I did give you the pass," he pointed out. "There's no one to be mad at besides myself. Hypothetically."
"Right," she said, looking lost in thought for a second. Then their faces were drawn together and they kissed.
She broke the kiss. "And you said you'd be curious about how it went, hypothetically," she said, her face still just inches from his. "You'd really like to hear the details? You'd like to hear about me... with another man? About me sucking another man's dick? Maybe more?"
Robbie's heart raced. He chuckled and hoped it didn't sound nervous. "First, I think I want to ask if this is hypothetical or not," he said. He put his arm around her and pulled her in for a kiss. He broke it quickly and continued talking, their faces still inches apart. "Are we talking about something you might do, or something you're going to do, or something you did?"
She smiled and blushed. She stood up nimbly and picked up her purse from where it was lying on the table. She took out the notecard and handed it to him.
It wasn't too worn. He supposed it had spent most of the past nine years in a book. But there was a rip almost all the way through the card, and a date was written on the "Date Redeemed" line in Tracy's handwriting.
