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Naomi
Online friends are weird.
I’ve known Selene for over a year. We message back and forth from sunup to sundown and a little further into the night, too. It’s weird when I don’t hear from her every day.
Selene is easily my best friend. She’s my soul twin.
But, despite still living in the same state, we’ve never met.
Texas is fucking huge y’all.
My excuses for why I can’t make the four-hour drive to visit my best friend have run out, though. So, I’ve spent the entire drive on this Saturday morning to some town outside Houston trying to keep from turning my ass around and going home. I would like to hide in my apartment by myself, studying for the first three-day weekend of the semester, like I always do.
There’s no way I’m missing such an important day for her, though. Selene would kill me, and she is nothing if not persistent. It’s how we became friends in the first place.
When I was finishing my master’s program, the pressure became so bad at one point, I came very near to harming myself in a permanent way. I’d been thinking about it that whole semester, but I was one semester from graduating with my degree. All I could think about, however, was how much easier things could be if I just stopped for a minute, stopped existing. It was around this time last year that I actually put together a plan. I was just waiting to do it.
There was one particularly low day where the world felt like it was collapsing. I had everything I needed. I had the supplies and the note all printed out. Nothing could stop me.
Nothing except the stupid reflex to reach for my phone anytime it chimed with a Discord notification.
A friend request and a one-word message.
OverTheMoon: Hey!
That’s all it took to divert months of planning.
MindFuckMaster: Hey.
Now we’re here, a year later, and I’m pulling up to some resort in small-town Texas to meet a semi-random woman for the first time. Of course I know her, I know everything about her, but knowing a person online versus in person could be two different things. I’m doing this all so I can be there to celebrate her engagement to a man I only know as a voice in the background of our near-daily calls.
My grandma is terrified I’m being catfished and Selene is actually an old man and serial killer, at that. Though I’m really not sure how you fake something like a video call. Plus, judging from the exterior of the resort I’m pulling up to, this is not some place you lure someone you’re going to murder.
The Playground Club and Resort.
A women-owned, women-run business outside of Columbus, Texas, catering to people in the swinger and BDSM lifestyles. One that my best friend of a year calls the home of her second family.
I’ve only spoken with Selene’s fiancé, Gunnar, a handful of times without Selene and all of those have been about her. So, it wasn’t entirely unusual when he called me to plan their engagement. Selene had been planting hints and suggestions for both of us for months. It was only a matter of time before he reached out to arrange everything for a proposal at the club, which I thought was a little odd at first.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to attend, but it would have been a dead giveaway if I was there anyway since Selene and I had yet to meet. What I wasn’t expecting was how adamant she would be about celebrating her engagement to her future husband at the club too.
But what my best friend wants, my best friend gets. Including my presence at a sex club.
Approaching the main building of the resort is entirely unexpected. The exterior looks like any other getaway in this area. It’s a gorgeous resort for sure, but it doesn’t scream “swingers’ resort” or “BDSM club” at all.
I put my car in park and reach for my purse but jump when I turn back to open my door and find a staff member already standing outside it.
“Ms. Hall. Welcome to The Playground,” says the man as I crack open my door.
“Hi . . . ” I say, a little shocked he knows who I am already.
“Ms. Selene is waiting inside for you. Please let us take care of your car and bags,” he explains, holding out his hand for my keys as I open the door farther.
“Oh. Okay.”
A high-pitched squeal comes from behind the man, and he’s barely taken two steps away from me when I’m tackled by a petite, curvy Puerto Rican woman.
“¡Oh, por Dios! ¡Estás aquí! Realmente estás aquí. Eres más alto de lo que esperaba. ¡Pero estás aquí!” Oh, my Goddess! You’re here! You’re taller than I expected. But you’re here! she rapid-fires.
