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“Hale wants to date a woman he met today but I met a woman, too, and now we’re fighting over who to date.” The words came out before he could stop them. He sounded like a five-year-old fighting over a toy with his brother.
Jake was quiet for a moment.
“I’m sorry.” This was why he didn’t talk things out. Because most of his problems were stupid and caused by himself.
“No,” Jake said over the line. “Don’t be sorry. So Hale changed the rules on you and you’re having a problem with it. Did you fight with him?”
There was one problem with that question. “We don’t have rules.”
Jake chuckled. “Of course you do. Every relationship has rules, especially ones like ours. We have to. We have to have rules and roles, and even when we don’t think they’re there we have boundaries we don’t want our partner to cross.”
“But I don’t,” Van argued. “Or at least I didn’t think I did. I haven’t consciously made decisions for us. It just happened.”
“Hale has always been okay with deferring to you. I’m going to admit that I did this a lot with Adam. He had more opinions than I did, stronger opinions about things I didn’t care about,” Jake admitted. “It was easy to let Adam make a lot of the decisions because it didn’t matter to me. The big stuff, I would put my foot down and Adam understood.”
“So you were always a D/s couple, and you were the indulgent top.” This was a fun thing to tease his brother about.
“You spent too much time with Big Tag.” Jake’s tone had gone distinctly disgruntled. “But there is some truth in what you’re saying, and turn it around on yourself, little bro, because you and Hale are so much like me and Adam. And when I say that I don’t mean you’re me. Hale is very much like me and you’re Adam. Hale’s foot came down for the first time, and you need to figure out why and if you can handle it.”
“I’m not the submissive one.” He hadn’t even thought in those terms until he’d spent time with his brother. He didn’t do the whole lifestyle thing like Jake and Adam and their wife, Serena, but he’d learned a few things. There were aspects of D/s that worked and explained non-sexual relationships, too. He couldn’t use the word normal. He wasn’t sure normal was a thing.
“Neither am I. Honestly, neither is Adam. He floats in a middle ground that works for all of us. Hale’s the same. He doesn’t have to be in control twenty-four seven. He doesn’t mind giving you the right to make decisions he feels are more important to you than to him. But now he’s found something he does care about, and you fight him on it.”
Put like that it made him sound like an asshole. “I’ve always found our women. I wish he would give this a try. I think he’ll be crazy about her.”
“And he’s actually into someone else. Why should he give up the woman he wants to date?” Jake asked. “Why not let him have this one?”
How could he explain this to his brother? He barely understood it himself. “Because I think she’s special. Because I felt some connection I’ve never felt before, and I want to explore that before she leaves.”
“So she’s a tourist?” Jake asked.
Van had an excellent counterpoint. “Yes, but so is his woman.”
“All right. Let me see if I have this right. You are both willing to have a major conflict over two women who won’t be around a couple of weeks from now,” Jake said. “Have you met his woman?”
“No, and he hasn’t met mine.”
“Maybe you should,” Jake offered. “Why don’t you meet her, let him meet yours, and then talk about it. Or spend the next week seeing the woman you want and letting Hale do the same. You’ll figure out quickly if you’re at a breaking point. I’m worried because it sounds like you are, and you need to get ready for that if it’s going to happen. You’ve been with Hale for a long time.”
He didn’t want to be at a breaking point. He didn’t want to imagine his life without Hale. “If I give in, do you think we’ll be okay? You’re right. She’s only here for a little while. I don’t want to lose my friend over what will inevitably be a short fling.”
“It doesn’t have to be.”
He didn’t see how. “I’m going to Dallas sometime this year. She’s in North Carolina.”
“And there are planes. There are opportunities there and Dallas. If you like this woman, see what happens,” Jake said. “Or like I said. Meet Hale’s woman. Hell, if you haven’t met her, how do you know it’s not the same woman? You’re in Bliss. I joke about the weirdness of the locals, but that place attracts strange events. That would be funny if you’re both fighting and she’s the same woman.”
