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Sam smiled. "Sorry about that. I was just thinking about something that happened this weekend." Briefly, she explained what had happened at the club, gratified when she saw Flo's lips thin in righteous annoyance on her behalf.
"I know they were off base, but it got me wondering. You're my friend, you'll be honest with me. Do you think this is an Oh my god, two guys are sharing me and isn't it fabulous while it lasts kind of thing?"
Flo pursed her lips. "Have you ever thought about Neanderthals?"
"Are you comparing the guys at the club to them?"
"No. I suspect Neanderthals were more polite. Anyway, I wonder what it was like to be cavemen, at a time long before social groups started forming, with rules and structure and implied expectations of behavior. What if the norm for committed relationships had been a threesome, instead of just two people? Then couples would face the questions you're asking yourself now. Well, everyone else chooses two people to love, but I only have this one person. Will it last? What if she or he decides they want a third at some point? How will society look at us as just a two-person family?"
"You're saying I'm worrying too much about it." Sam took another bite of her sandwich. "But it's even more than that. Geoff and Chris seem fine with it now, but what do I do if one of them ever finds someone else and it leaves just two of us? I love them both, so separately, it should still work the same, right? People have been doing fine with the idea of one-on-one forever. But it doesn't feel that way to me. I feel like if one of us died after all three of us were together forever, then the two left would still be together. That's a whole different thing. But if it's a matter of one of them walking away, it would be the end of it all. Like, hey, we are three people in love and I'm not settling for anything less."
"Nothing in life is guaranteed. You don't know what will happen until you get to it. But I can tell you what I do know. As with any relationship, if you want it bad enough, then you have to be willing to work your ass off for it, not just when it suits you, but every day. You also can't assume that every time Geoff mentions a handsome guy at work or Chris notices a pretty girl walking down the street, or one of them is in a bad mood, or if you fight about bills or who does what chore, that things are coming unraveled."
"We won't ever be able to be married. All of us."
"Being married on paper is a wonderful reinforcement of what's already in your hearts. A lack of paper doesn't change that. Enjoy the hell out of being with the people you love. Because the one thing we all know is none of us are given that gift forever."
The shadow that crossed Flo's eyes reminded Sam that she'd loved and lost before. She'd had to divorce an alcoholic husband who, when he cleaned up a decade later, had reconciled with Flo. He'd died two years after that. Sam nudged her friend, drawing her away from dark memories. "So are you going to the Carnival in the Round this weekend?"
"Have to go to my damn nephew's wedding," Flo grumbled. "It's a marriage doomed to failure, but I have to attend and pretend that opportunistic bitch won't wreck his life. I'll probably gain twenty pounds keeping my mouth occupied with hors d'oeuvres and wedding cake."
"Ouch." Sam winced. "We'll do extra walking when you get back. Damn, though. I hate that you're going to miss Madison's event."
"I have a feeling she'll be having another one. She's already reached her goal of two hundred and fifty attendees and had to turn another hundred or so away." Flo touched Sam's hand. "Which, circling back to the original point, says people are more open to exploring their desires and tolerating new ways of looking at them than ever before. I think people are learning Hey, even if that's not my thing, it's okay if it's their thing, as long as wrongful harm isn't being done. And as long as they're not shoving it in my face and saying I have to throw a party in honor of their form of freakiness." Flo arched a brow. "So I assume you're going?"
"Yes. We are. I even have something beautiful and crazy to wear to it." Sam thought of the mask and corset and imagined Chris in the pants Geoff had gotten for him. She wondered what Geoff would be wearing. "If you could go, who would you have brought? You know, to celebrate your own form of freakiness?"
"Hmm. He's a fifty-four-year-old Russian with eyes like a winter forest. He looks like a cross between a grungy biker and a wealthy mobster. He likes kissing my feet and calling me Mistress with this glint in his eyes that makes me want to tie him up and have my way with him. Since he likes that idea, too, it's win-win."
Sam's eyes widened and she scooted closer. "Why have I not heard about him before? When you talk about him, your eyes twinkle and you blush a little."
"I certainly do not," Flo said with mock horror. Sam poked at her with a potato chip and she fended her off. "Do not annoy me, subling."
"Is that anything like duckling? You just made that up."
"I did, but it fits."
"Don't get off topic. Tell me the first cool thing he did to attract your cold Domme heart. Details."
"You're a menace," Flo informed her, but her lips quivered, telling Sam she was going to relent and offer a couple of choice morsels of information. "The first time I was in a session with him, he put me up against a wall, my feet dangling six inches above the floor, and said, 'Are you afraid of me?'"
"No way. Did you kick him in the balls?"
"It's not about physical force." Flo sniffed. "Though it's intriguing how often a physically dominant man will test you that way. I told him no in a tone that would have frozen off your eyelashes, and to put me down. He looked down at his hands and said, 'You have tiny waist. Like bird. Mockingbird, mean and sleek at once.' Which is ridiculous, as I have an average-sized waist, but apparently he's been used to bigger women. He put me down, bent and kissed my feet to ask for forgiveness. But I think he introduced himself to me that way to prove how much stronger he was, that he could do anything he wanted to me. He knew that would excite me . . . but he also wanted to see if I'd know that wasn't what he wanted to do. He wanted me to do anything I wanted to him."
Sam blinked. Flo looked almost . . . dreamy. "When did you meet him?"
"Not long ago. About a month or so. I meet a lot of people when I go to the parties. He's different, though. We've been out a few times on regular dates. You've been busy. I didn't want to distract you."
"You wanted to keep him all to yourself for a while, you mean. Enjoy the feeling and not make too much of it in case it was a fling."
Flo broke off a piece of her pita, chewed. "Yes. Maybe. I'll introduce you to him sometime if you like. His name is Kirill." Her brown eyes twinkled. "It's of Greek origin, and means master or lord."
"No way."
"Yes way. But see what I mean?" Flo lifted a shoulder. "Nothing is set in stone; nothing is so predictable that it's impossible to imagine it another way. You want to be in love with two men from now until you're all old and gray, then do it. Don't worry about anything other than how you feel about one another."
"I do worry about some of that. And even though a lot of stuff is resolved, I admit sometimes I still worry about Chris when it comes to the Dom/sub stuff."
