I had no clue what to do. Or where to go. And as the sun set, the late April-weather turned cooler. My thin long-sleeve yellow blouse suddenly seemed like a really bad idea.
After shivering for another thirty minutes, I decided that I couldn’t run from this forever. Maybe my relationship with Will was over, but it’s a little harder to avoid your family. I pulled out my phone that had continued to buzz. I sent Mom a text of where to come get me and to come alone. Making my way back up the road as the sun disappeared from view for the last time that evening, I waited until Mom pulled over. I hopped into the car and was a little grateful that she had put the heat on.
She drove for a few minutes in silence before I couldn’t take it much longer. “Tell me how you met him. Tell me…tell me everything.”
I saw her look my way for a couple of seconds before she asked, “Are you sure you want to know?”
“No,” I replied. “But I need to. Otherwise, I’ll never be able to move on. Give me the whole damn story.”
She pulled over in the parking lot of the old K-Mart. It was empty now. Looking forward, she started her story.
“Let me start off by saying that I trust that everything I tell you stays between you, me, and your father. Not a word to Sam and please don’t tell anyone else.” I told her that she had my word. “One day, I hope that you are in a relationship long enough to understand that no matter how much you love someone and wish to spend the rest of your life with them, that underneath the exterior of an amazing relationship, there are cracks. Most of these cracks won’t lead to anything too serious, but all of them make the foundation a little weaker. You can either ignore them and hope they go away or try to fix them. Your father and I have always tried to fix the cracks. It’s not always easy and we don’t always fix them so much as we plaster over them, but the effort we put into our marriage is why we’ve stayed together while other couples failed.”
“About ten years ago, we became aware of a crack. Our sex life was beginning to…become unsatisfying. I know that nobody wants to hear that about their parents because nobody wants to imagine their parents as sexual creatures, but your father and I like to have sex with one another.”
“I know,” I said in a low voice. “You’re not always quiet about it.”
“Nor do I want to be sometimes. Your father had sex with two other women before we got together. He was the first man I had ever had sex with and up until about ten years ago, he was the only man I ever had sex with. Just to be clear, our sex life had evolved from those first few years when we knew almost nothing about sex besides that it felt good. We had tried new positions and…new sex acts.” She made a noise out of frustration and turned to me. “Listen – there’s no way I can talk about this without being very frank about it so I hope that you will forgive the language your mother will use.”
“I’m 24,” I replied. “You’re not going to shock me into therapy because you guys like to get a little nasty in the bedroom.”
“Fair enough, sweetie. So, like I said, we tried new things. We found out that I like anal. He found out that he, too, liked to test the waters anally. We watched porn together, had sex in public places, and he particularly enjoyed what we called a ‘Highway 29 Release.’ That’s when I’d blow your father while he drove. Occasionally, we’d get honks as truckers saw me going down on your father. It was fun and it added excitement to our sex life. We tried roleplaying, we’d sext one another while at work, and really…we just kept trying to push for something new and invigorating.”
“Mom, can you get to Will?”
She frowned at me. “I’m getting there. Just please let me provide context. After a particular long stretch where we kind of didn’t know what else to do to change things up, we started to get frustrated with one another. And one night, I pointed out that he had been the only other person I had ever been with. I didn’t mean to hurt his feelings and I wanted him to know I wasn’t looking to cheat on him or I was bored with him, but I couldn’t shake these fantasies about what it would be like to be with someone else. Truth is I had long wanted threesomes, foursomes, and more. It really excited me.”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“So, we talked it out. Watched porn with threesomes and more. Your dad was a little hesitant so I suggested a compromise. I knew that his ultimate fantasy was a threesome with another woman. Honestly, it had become one of mine, too. I told him that let’s have a threesome with another woman and then we’ll have a threesome with another man. He was still a little iffy so I put on a scene with two girls going down on one guy. At the same time, I gave him a blowjob. After he came, he agreed. And if you ever need to convince a man to do anything, that’s a secret that’s going to work 99% of the time.
“This was back when you would go onto Craig’s List for this sort of thing. We eventually met Lana. After a few weeks of trading emails and pictures and talking on the phone, we decided to meet up at a local hotel. Your sister watched you while we went out for a ‘date night.’ But we didn’t go out to eat. We had sex with Lana.”
Looking her way, I asked, “we?”
She chuckled. “Yes, we. Like I said, I was interested, too. Lana is a beautiful woman and very sexual. We’d meet up a few more times – including once without your father, though I took pictures and video for him.”