bluedragonauthor

BTC 2.0: Chapter 25

Added 2024-05-30 02:28:21 +0000 UTC

-- CHAPTER 25: Confidante --

****

“I’m saying I wanna marry you.”

As her words hung in the air between us, Belle stared at me with wet eyes, looking absolutely crestfallen in the firm belief that what she so desperately wanted would never ever come true.

Her expression was that of a girl who wanted to believe all her dreams could still become reality despite what was happening in plain sight, like a third-grader who’d just snuck downstairs in the middle of the night on Christmas Eve hoping to see Santa, only to witness her parents setting out the presents before taking a bite of the cookies she’d left out, or a baseball fan who had just seen the potential game-winning homerun drop harmlessly into the opposing team’s centerfielder’s glove at the warning track off in the deepest reaches of the outfield for the final out in the bottom of the ninth of the World Series.

Sniffling as the tears started to roll down her cheeks, Belle turned to look away from me with her lips pursed into a tiny space the size of a penny, trying desperately not to lose her shit. In her Catholic schoolgirl outfit with the pigtails and black choker with the crucifix, she looked somehow even younger than she really was. And I found myself recalling quite distinctly the way she’d looked back in junior high the night she’d learned her mom had passed away.

Trying desperately to believe it wasn’t true.

I did the same thing now as I’d done back then. I collected my precious Annabelle in my arms, picked her up into my lap, and cuddled her much smaller body against my chest.

The dam burst, and Belle’s sniffles turned into full-blown sobs as she buried her face into the crook of my neck and bawled her pretty little heart out.

One minute passed…

And then two…

And then three…

Twice, she started to go quiet and calm down from her wracking sobs.

Twice, all she’d really done was hold her breath and tense herself up until she couldn’t hold her breath anymore, and then she’d break down into wracking sobs again.

Meanwhile, I held my Baby Belle in my arms and squeezed her, rocked her, and repeated over and over and over again, “I love you, Annabelle… I love you… I’ve loved you since we were little kids, and I’ll love you forever. I’ll always love you… Because you’re my Annabelle… You’ll be my Annabelle forever.”

I lost track of time after that. All I know is that I kept rocking her and hugging her and repeating to her how much I loved her and would always love her forever. And at some point she must’ve calmed down because she let out a deep sigh and then finally uncurled herself from the little ball in my lap.

She’d worn black mascara to enhance her “naughty little Catholic schoolgirl” look, but that mascara now left black streaks that ran down and mixed with the rose blush she’d put on her cheeks. My pajama shirt was pretty stained as well. The dark raccoon eyes made the electric fire in her pale-green irises all the brighter as she stared at me from inches away, making clear that she no longer felt despondent in abject misery, but rather felt the kind of stubborn defiance I’d seen in her before.

Her sudden shift in attitude reminded me of the time immediately after her attempted R-word, when she’d switched from being meekly apologetic to unapologetically righteous, insisting she hadn’t actually done anything wrong. And I immediately put my guard up.

“What happened to us?” Belle asked rather coldly, her tone bitter. “What happened to you and me?”

I blinked. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“That’s the point,” she stated accusingly. “You used to always know what I was talking about. You used to get me. But it’s clear right now that you have no idea what’s wrong.”

I sighed and gave Belle a stern look. “Actually, I’m pretty sure I know what’s wrong.”

“Oh, really…” she drawled doubtfully.

I took a deep breath and sighed again. “You still want to be my favorite. You’ve always wanted to be my favorite. You’re asking right now, ‘What happened to us?’ because you’re looking back at the way we were back in junior high: Matty and Annabelle, playing house and raising themselves because Mother was never around and your dad was too busy with work to supervise us. You’ve seen us puttering around the kitchen together on autopilot all these years and cuddling together on the couch with your head on my chest after school, and you imagined that was what our life together would be like after we got married and bought a house of our own. Hell, you probably even thought we might just take over your house when your dad retired and moved into a Miami Beach condo and we’d raise our family between the same four walls you’d grown up in.”

Belle blinked in surprise and sat up a little straighter in my lap. Her mouth gaped open, but no actual words came out.

“That was your dream,” I confirmed. “It was our dream.”

Belle’s expression turned crestfallen again as she mumbled, “But it’s not your dream anymore.”

I exhaled slowly and stroked her spine. “Things never turn out exactly the way we planned.”

“You don’t want to marry me: simple as that.”

“I’m a nineteen-year-old college freshman. I’m not ready to marry anyone.”

“But if someone put a gun to your head and forced you to choose someone to marry tomorrow, you wouldn’t choose me.”

“I’m not going to play hypothetical games about people with guns that have no bearing on the current situation.”

“But you wouldn’t choose me,” Belle muttered bitterly. “Not with better options like Sam and Neevie around. You like me better as a lifelong ‘little sister’ who has pledged herself to be yours and only yours for the rest of her life without the bonds of matrimony. C’mon, Matty: admit it. You want to keep me by your side for the rest of our lives, but not at the expense of losing one of the others. So you keep me in your back pocket as the ‘little sister’ sure thing while you focus your romantic pursuit on one of the taller, prettier bombshell babes. You need to keep that carrot available, the possibility of eventually becoming your lawfully wedded wife, in order to keep having them bend over and invite you to sodomize the shit outta them at your slightest whim. And if you ever made me your favorite again, you’d risk losing them.”

“B…”

“You’re never gonna marry me. Even though -I- want to marry you.

“It’s not that I don’t--”

“You know I can’t live without you. Mari warned you I’d turn suicidal if I couldn’t be next to you. Maybe she’s right. You’ve been by my side for as long as I can remember. I’m serious: my very first memories from the time I was like… three… were of playing on the living room floor with you. My entire universe has always had you in it, and I refuse to continue living on Planet Earth without you!”

I blinked and pulled my head back, somewhat alarmed at the almost manic desperation in Belle’s voice. “If you’re really serious about being suicidal, we need to start taking steps to get you professional help like now.”

Belle pursed her lips and huffed, looking away from me. “Okay that came out a little more unhinged than I’d intended.”

“Unhinged, but true?”

“I wouldn’t…” she paused and took a deep breath, looking defensive. “I’m not suicidal. I wouldn’t actually kill myself or anything. But I very much can’t imagine my world without you in it. You’re my anchor. You’re my home. Given a choice between moving away from you and trying to find a lifelong partnership with someone else, or remaining by your side as your horny ‘little sister’ only too eager to slurp your creampies out of other hot babes… I choose ‘little sister’.”

“Even though deep down you still want to marry me.”

Belle sighed, that crestfallen expression returning to her face. “It’s still my dream.”

“That dream could still come true,” I pointed out. “I’m a long ways off from getting married.”

Belle’s eyes narrowed. “Is that your plan? To string me along for the next decade or so, remaining unmarried so I can cling to my impossible dream while you romance other girls?”

“B…”

“Doesn’t matter. It could never happen the way I imagined anyways,” Belle muttered while shaking her head. “It’s not just you and me in my dad’s house anymore. This is The BTC now, and you’ve got four other girls in your life I have to compete with.”

“‘Compete with’?” I queried, narrowing my eyes. “Whatever happened to, ‘This is The BTC: We share without jealousy or greed’?”

“We’re girls. Everything’s a competition, even when we say it isn’t,” Belle stated flatly. “We ALL get jealous. We ALL get greedy. We ARE best friends though, which means we DO feel guilty for getting jealous and greedy. And even now I’m feeling guilty for wanting so desperately to marry you when I know I shouldn’t.”

“It’s not that you shouldn’t,” I disagreed. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting to marry me. Sam’s said she wants to marry me someday. Neevie’s said the same thing. Do you get upset with either of them for wanting that?”

“Neither of them has pledged to be your ‘little sister’ and not compete with them for the title.”

“So tell Sam and Neevie the truth. Tell them that you still dream of marrying me someday.”

“I can’t do that!”

“Why not? It’s the truth, isn’t it?”

“Because that’ll make the competition even worse. Do YOU want all of us smiling to each other’s faces while secretly undermining the others’ chances of ultimately winning your heart?”

I made a face at that question, but turned it around on her. “Is THAT what you’ve been doing all this time? Smiling to Sam’s and Neevie’s faces… even Lily’s… while secretly undermining them so you might ultimately win my heart?”

“No, of course not.”

“Intro to Psychology.” I tapped the tip of my nose.

“Matty, I’m serious.”

“So am I. You’ve gotta admit, out of everyone in The BTC, you’re the one who’s displayed the most two-faced nature.”

“You still don’t trust me.”

“Trust comes with honesty B. You just told me that there’s jealousy and greed lurking within The BTC. And while I believe you when you say the other girls sometimes feel the same, you’re the one that puts a lid on those feelings and denies them right up until the moment they boil over.”

I gestured at her ruined makeup as demonstration.

“This thing we’re doing? The five of us? It works best if we’re up front with our feelings. They say sunlight is the best disinfectant, and if you really want to marry me, you need to be honest about that with the other girls. At the least, I think it’s time you stopped pretending you’d be alright with being my eternal ‘little sister’ and admitted you want to be a girlfriend just as much as anyone else, if not THE Head Girlfriend.”

Belle waved dismissively. “I don’t give two shits about the title. Neevie’s welcome to it. All I ever wanted was your love.”

“You have my love. It’s my trust we’re still working on. And that starts with being completely honest with me.”

“You want honesty? Fine. Here’s the honest truth: I’m a pint-sized little pixie standing next to tall, big-titted, more beautiful Amazons who can take your big dick up their asses without any lube. Even Lily can just sit her cunt down on your monster without breaking a sweat. I’m an insecure teenage girl whose mom died, whose dad spent all his time working, and whose only sense of normalcy came from my best friend who’s now gone - who by the way ALSO had a body-built-for-sex that could outdo anything I was capable of - and the boy-next-door-slash-big-brother-slash-lover who was always there for me whenever I needed him, always gave me a hug whenever I needed him, and always listened to every word I ever wanted to say to him while letting me pillow my head on his chest.”

I didn’t have to ask where Belle was able to breathe in all that, because she actually stopped and huffed and puffed for a second, with her pale-green eyes flaring bright and her jaw set in determination.

“The only thing that kept me going was my dream of Happily Ever After with the boy-next-door who would continue to love me forever, would take care of me and protect me and give the kind of intact nuclear family that I never got to have. Now as I got older, I started thinking that maybe my dream was nothing more than the wishful thinking of a lost little girl who felt like she’d been orphaned at a young age. When I saw that the boy whom I’d expected to be my One True Love, my ‘Ride or Die’, start falling in love with the taller, bustier, more beautiful Amazons I couldn’t compete with, I thought that maybe my ultimate destiny could be with someone else. And I even thought that if I could rather conveniently fall in love with another girl, I could find the kind of lifelong partnership I needed while simultaneously sharing my undying love with you.”

“But you couldn’t.”

The shine in Belle’s eyes dulled, and she shook her head while swallowing thickly. “I couldn’t.”

“Just because you looked at your relationship with Lily and decided you weren’t built to love her that way?”

Belle shook her head again. “Examining my relationship with Lily was the trigger, not the root problem. The root problem is that the man I love is in love with other girls. The paradox is that those other girls he’s in love with are the same best friends I grew up with - the friends who’ve always had my back, always supported me, and were the role model idols I always looked up to. It means that it would be impossible for me to ever truly betray them by trying to take you away from them. So even though in the deepest depths of my heart I know I want to marry you… I’ll settle for whatever I can get. If that means being your lifelong ‘little sister’, then so be it. I’ll take it. Better than not being in your life.”

“Even if that means living a life less than completely fulfilled.”

Belle shrugged, looking more bitter about it than anything else as she muttered, “You wanted honesty. That’s the honest truth.”

“The truth is heartbreaking.”

Belle snorted. “You wanna know an even worse truth?”

I blinked. “What’s that?”

“My position is not unique. Sam, Neevie, maybe even Lily and Eva: we ALL want the same thing.”

Belle shook her head sadly, and for a moment, it looked like she almost pitied me.

“The truth IS heartbreaking,” she finished. “And in the end, you’re gonna have to break somebody’s heart.”

****

Belle went into the bathroom to clean herself up and reapply her makeup while I went into my room to change into school clothes. Belle also changed into regular clothes instead of her slutty Catholic schoolgirl getup, and we walked hand-in-hand onto campus.

When it was time to separate, she still gave me a sweet kiss, but it was a kiss of tragic longing rather than koala-bear sexual heat. I went off to my class and she went off to hers.

Mondays and Wednesdays, I always ate lunch off of Hearst Ave. with Naimh. Friday lunchtimes had recently been gaming + food time with Eva. But Tuesdays and Thursdays, I usually ate alone because my morning class ran through a normal lunchtime. Today was no different, and given that I was feeling in the mood for some comfort food, I stopped by Bongo Burger to pick up a “Persian Burger” sandwich.

There were no available seats inside the store, so I went back out onto the street and walked a hundred yards to the next street intersection, opting to just sit down on the stairs of the Garden Court apartments to eat my sandwich.

I was halfway through my meal when a familiar voice asked curiously, “Matty?”

Skylar stood on the sidewalk, dressed in a gray suit and smiling down at me with one hand on the strap of her shoulder bag.

“Hey--” I began instinctively before clamping my lips together since I still had food in my mouth. I swallowed quickly, pursed my lips, and belatedly used my napkin to wipe a glob of tahini sauce off my lower lip before giving her an apologetic look and stating more clearly, “Hey, Skylar. Good to see you.”

She furrowed her eyebrows and gave me a quizzical look. “Not your typical lunch spot, is it? Are you in a hurry to rush off somewhere?”

“Ah, no rush; my next class is in about an hour.” I shrugged and added, “Most days, I’d simply walk back to campus with my lunch and find a shady spot to sit down and eat. But today I was too hungry to wait.”

“I see. Well, you know my flat is right down the way and far more comfortable than where you’re sitting. Come on then. Spit-spot!” She waved her arm and started backing up, clearly gesturing for me to follow her.

I blinked and stood up, throwing my bag strap over one shoulder while hurriedly tucking my sandwich into its wrap. The beautiful blonde took two steps backwards while I gathered up my things, flashed me a winning smile, and then spun around to face forward and walked down the sidewalk in front of me. Although Skylar wasn’t dressed for maximum sex appeal, no outfit could completely hide her curves. And the way her bubble butt filled out the back of her skirt, I immediately thought of the song lyrics, // I hate to see you go / but I love to watch you walk away.

That’s when Skylar glanced back at me over her shoulder and caught my gaze fixated on her ass. I jerked my head up to look her in the eyes, but she smirked and shook her head.

Busted.

I knew I’d built my reputation with Skylar on NOT ogling her like a piece of meat, so I mentally chastised myself for doing so. But if she minded me staring at her ass, she didn’t show it.

Instead, Skylar flashed me that winning smile again that told me she was in a good mood, and as I caught up to walk alongside her, we engaged in idle chit-chat the whole way to her apartment. I asked her about her classes. She asked about mine. She said she was familiar with Professor Colquitt of my Archaeology of the Roman World class (to fulfill my Historical Studies breadth requirement) and advised me to never let him know I was an Engineering student. Rumor was that the man had been rejected from admission to an Engineering program in his youth and wound up learning Architecture instead, and forever held a personal grudge against anyone affiliated with Engineering.

When we arrived at her apartment, Skylar fit her key to the lock, braced her foot against the base, and then put her right shoulder into the door to get it unstuck and open up. These old apartments were notorious for that sort of thing. When we went inside, she pointed me to the small two-person dining table and excused herself to go change into something more comfortable. I finished another quarter of my sandwich by the time she emerged, clad in simple sweatpants and a baggy t-shirt. I couldn’t help but chuckle.

Skylar immediately frowned as she walked into her apartment’s small kitchen. “Something funny?”

I still had food in my mouth, and before I could reply I accidentally started choking. My eyes bulged out and I had to hammer my own chest with my right fist, trying desperately to dislodge the piece of meat that had gotten unfortunately lodged in my esophagus while simultaneously keeping my lips pinched together so that I didn’t accidentally spit food all over Skylar’s table.

I was… mostly… successful. I only had to wipe up a little bit of “Persian Burger” off of Skylar’s table.

“No… no…” I insisted, still coughing a bit. I flushed pink, feeling like an idiot and recognizing once and for all that any possible attraction Skylar could have for me would’ve been completely wiped away by the sight of me spitting up little bits of meat all over her table.

From the almost condescending smirk on Skylar’s face, I knew it was true.

But once I’d finally caught my breath, I managed to explain, “You probably don’t know this, but Sam’s famous in our group for wearing suits to school - just like you, actually. And as soon as she gets home, she changes out of the suits into… well… sweatpants and a t-shirt.”

“Just like me, apparently,” Skylar drawled while gesturing at her own attire. While I’d been coughing, she’d collected two glasses of ice water and set them both down on the dining table. Her eyebrow arched as she slid mine in front of me, and she remarked curiously, “There are apparently quite a few similarities between your Head Girlfriend and myself.”

I involuntarily winced and shrugged.

“What was that look?” Skylar queried as she sat down in the other chair and canted her head to the side, clearly not expecting that reaction from me.

“Ah, I was reacting to the ‘Head Girlfriend’ title. Neevie’s actually Head Girlfriend now. It’s a bit of a long story.”

Skylar’s expression turned to one of alarm. “Did you and Sam break up?”

“What? No, no, not at all,” I stammered as my ears turned pink before rubbing my forehead. “Sam’s still my girlfriend. She’s just no longer ‘Head Girlfriend’, which I realize to someone outside our circle must sound pretty weird. It’s ahhh… Well, it’s complicated.”

“Quite a lot of your life seems pretty complicated.”

“You have no idea.”

“Well, I think I have some idear,” she countered with a smile. “Most men have a hard enough time trying to keep one girlfriend happy, let alone five.”

“It’s only four, actually.”

Skylar’s eyes narrowed as she looked up and to the right, her expression thoughtful before she sat up straight and returned her gaze to me, guessing, “So you and Eva still aren’t banging or anything?”

I immediately winced and looked away, trying to figure out how to answer that.

“So you are banging,” Skylar concluded knowingly before I could actually reply.

“It’s complicated. But still, I only have four girlfriends,” I insisted.

Skylar chuckled and gave me a rueful grin while shaking her head. “Matty, Matty, Matty… Okay, four. How are things going with you and your four girlfriends?”

As thoughts of this morning’s difficult conversation with Belle came to mind, I involuntarily winced again, and Skylar didn’t miss it.

“Trouble in paradise?” she ventured.

I took a deep breath, held it, and pursed my lips for a moment before letting out a long exhalation, unsure of how much I really wanted to say to Skylar about my myriad romantic relationships.

Recognizing my hesitation, Skylar stated gently, “I won’t pressure you if you don’t want to talk about it. I’m not part of your inner circle of friends, and I know you try to protect the personal information of the girls you’re with. Believe me: I appreciate that about you.”

I nodded. “Thanks for understanding.”

“At the same time, if there’s anything you DO want to talk about, I’m a willing listener who’s a bit more experienced than you and could perhaps give you some advice.” Skylar smiled. “Plus, you already know I can keep a secret, and sometimes it’s nice to have a confidante you can depend on outside of your inner circle of friends - especially if it’s a topic you’d have difficulty discussing directly with them.”

I mused on that for a moment, and for some reason found myself reminded of Mother. Skylar didn’t look anything like her, of course, except perhaps for her cup size and penchant for business suits. But for all of my disapproval over Mother’s style of parenting throughout my life, I had to admit that I missed the unexpectedly beneficial advice she’d imparted to help me navigate my various romantic relationships during that last year of high school. The topic presently on my mind was certainly NOT a topic I could discuss directly with my girlfriends, at least not yet. And I actually wouldn’t have minded Mother’s advice right about now.

Taking another deep breath, I considered what I’d feel comfortable sharing with Skylar before speaking. Ultimately, while I didn’t think it would be appropriate to give away the girls’ private information, I figured I was at liberty to talk about myself.

“I had a pretty intense conversation with Belle this morning that made me stop and think about where things are ultimately going with these different relationships,” I finally began.

Skylar had been sipping her ice water while patiently waiting me out, but she now set the glass down on the table. “Intense in what way?”

“Belle told me she wants to marry me.”

Skylar blinked. “Exactly how old are you? Eighteen? Nineteen? A bit young to be thinking about marriage. Don’t you think you should consider finishing university before all that?”

“Oh, for sure,” I agreed. “Before this morning, I’d honestly never given the subject much serious thought. And in all fairness, Belle didn’t say she wanted to marry me now or anything like that. Just that… someday… she wanted to be my wife.”

“Ah. I think I see the dilemma.”

“You do?”

“As you said: before this morning, you’d never given the subject much serious thought. But now Belle’s brought up the subject, and you’ve stopped to ask yourself: if it really came down to it, would you be able to choose just one of them?”

I nodded. “Pretty much.”

“Have Sam or Neevie – or even Lily – ever suggested eventually marrying you?”

I took a deep breath. “Sam mentioned it once - right before we all came to Berkeley, actually. She said I was the love of her life and that she was going to marry me someday.”

“And how did that make you feel when she said it?”

I paused to think about that, searching back into memory. “She immediately followed that up by clarifying she didn’t mean right away or anything. If I recall correctly, I told her I wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved or disappointed.”

“Because you both liked the idea but didn’t feel ready for it.”

“Neither of us was ready for that. We were teenagers who’d been together for less than a year. We’ve still been together for less than a year. And now Sam’s not even my Head Girlfriend anymore and it’s all so… so…”

“Complicated?” Skylar finished for me with a smirk.

I sighed. “Belle’s feeling angsty and maybe even a little depressed because she believes she’s third in line for my feelings behind Sam and Neevie.”

“Is she third in line behind Sam and Neevie?”

“No. Absolutely not. For one thing: I’ve never tried to rank the girls in my life.”

“Says the man who apparently has a quote, ‘Head Girlfriend’.”

I pursed my lips. “It’s a little more complicated than that. Each of the girls in my life is special and unique in their own ways. Sam being Head Girlfriend originally, and with Neevie having that role now, actually has more to do with leading The BTC than having romantic priority with me.”

“So you’re saying Sam didn’t have romantic priority with you when she was Head Girlfriend? Because it certainly seemed to me that she did when I joined you all on the beach trip. And Neevie certainly seemed to believe Sam had priority, given the discussions she and I had together.”

“Okay fine, she did. I love all my girls, but Sam was the one I truly ‘fell in love with’ at the time,” I stated, miming the air quotes with my fingers. “But she’s crazy busy now and we mutually agreed to take a step back on the whole ‘romantic priority’ thing. Neevie is the one the girls look to for decision-making right now, and Neevie’s the one who honestly spends the most time with me as well.”

“So now Belle feels like she’s third in line.”

I sighed. “As Belle put it, ‘We’re girls. Everything’s a competition, even when we say it isn’t.’”

“She’s not wrong.” Skylar’s face darkened for a moment, and she glanced away into the distance. But she recovered quickly and returned her gaze to me. “But as you said: none of you are ready for marriage yet. Assuming you’ll wait until after graduation, that’s at least four years. A lot can happen over the next four years.”

“Exactly,” I agreed. “I can’t say that Belle’s third in line, because I can’t honestly say who is first or second in line. None of the girls are any closer or farther away from marrying me because I’ve never actually tried to plot out my relationships that far into the future. We’ve all been ‘official’ for less than a year. We’re still less than three months into our first year of college. Marriage? Family? Kids? I can’t even fathom that stuff. I’ve got my hands full enough with E10.”

Skylar chuckled. “If it makes you feel any better, you’re doing just fine with E10. Easy A in the class, for sure. So that’s one less thing to worry about, eh?”

“I suppose. But even if I can somehow reassure Belle that she isn’t third in line for marriage, I know she still feels like she’s third place in my heart. And that’s something I’ve got to figure out how to fix.”

“Is she third place in your heart?”

I shook my head firmly. “Like I said: I don’t rank them. It would be like trying to rank colors of the rainbow.”

“People talk about their favorite color all the time,” Skylar pointed out.

“Bad analogy.” I took a deep breath and reconsidered, ultimately saying, “It would be like… like trying to rank your favorite color versus your favorite food versus your favorite movie versus your favorite sport. They’re ALL your favorites in different ways that can’t be compared against each other.”

Skylar nodded slowly. “I like that analogy.”

“I told you that Belle and I grew up together. She’s been more like a little sister to me, albeit a little sister who’s not related to me and with whom I’m physically intimate. In that way, she’s had a uniquely special place in my heart that stands apart from being 'one of my girlfriends’. Nobody else can claim that kind of relationship with me, so in that sense she’s ranked one-out-of-one.”

“Have you told her this?”

“Absolutely. She’s my little Annabelle: always has been, always will be. I truly believe that no matter what, she and I will be a special part of each other’s lives for the rest of our lives. Arguably, she’s first place in my heart, because she’s the one I have the deepest feelings for - the one I truly can’t live without. I’ve loved Belle since we were kids, and even though she and I aren’t related, given my absent father and my distant mother, Belle is pretty much the closest thing to family I’ve got.”

“That’s real ace.” Skylar sighed. “Speaking as someone who likewise doesn’t have the greatest relationship with my parents either, I can appreciate the importance of feeling that close to someone - feeling like they’re ‘family’.”

“That’s what Belle has always been to me: family. But now she talks about wanting to marry me and… and I…”

“You’re having a hard time thinking of marrying your ‘little sister’?” Skylar mimed the air quotes.

“When I stop to imagine the mother of my children and my partner for life… yeah… I have a hard time seeing Belle in that role. I’ll be honest, I had a really hard time sexualizing her back when we first started getting intimate. Truth be told, I might never have crossed the line at all if she hadn’t been so insistent. I’d thought that as ‘siblings’, our relationship could last forever - unlike a romantic boyfriend/girlfriend relationship where we could eventually break up. At least, that seemed to be the plan, but now she seems to want to be an official girlfriend again.”

“Because she sees Sam and Neevie – and now Lily – as official girlfriends, and she feels left on the outside looking in?”

“As far as I’m concerned, she’s always had both titles. In public she’s always told other people that she’s my girlfriend, while in private she’s been somewhat less clear. But right now she’s got it in her head that as long as I think of her as a ‘little sister’ instead of a ‘girlfriend’, she’ll never be in consideration to be my wife one day.”

“That makes sense, actually.”

“So you see my dilemma. It’s complicated.”

Skylar nodded, pursed her lips, and then cocked her head to the side. “What about your relationships with each of the others? Are they equally as complicated?”

I shook my head. “Nah. Not like this thing with Belle.”

Skylar’s eyes narrowed. “Well you did say that Sam no longer being your Head Girlfriend was complicated.”

I sighed. “Sam’s still my girlfriend.”

Skylar gave me a skeptical look, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose and then leaning back in her chair, although she didn’t actually say anything.

I shook my head. “It’s fine. We’re fine. Sam and I both still love each other very much, and we both agreed this was for the best. I always knew what I was getting myself into with this relationship.”

Skylar arched her eyebrows. “Do you really believe that?”

“Of course,” I stated rather defensively.

She held her hands up and seemed ready to concede the point to me, but still remarked, “Your words say ‘of course’, but your tone says you’re still trying to convince yourself.”

“My relationship with Sam is fine,” I stated flatly, giving her a cold glare that stated I didn’t want to keep running around in circles on this one.

To her credit, Skylar shrugged and didn’t press me. Instead she took a sip of her ice water, set the glass back down on the table, and then said, “So in Sam’s absence, Neevie’s picking up the slack as your new Head Girlfriend, right?”

I winced at the term ‘slack’ but sighed and let it go. “Neevie’s been amazing. The other girls seem to love having her leading the way. Her number one priority is keeping the group in harmony and keeping the girls connected, like that group trip to Angel Island we invited you on.”

“I’m sorry,” Skylar apologized.

“It’s alright,” I told her with a shrug like it was no big deal. “And while I wouldn’t call it ‘slack’, Sam’s unavailability has led to more opportunities for me to have quality time with the girls. On Saturday when Sam didn’t come home, Neevie took me clubbing: just the two of us. The weekend before that we had a day-trip to the Oakland Zoo. And last week she spontaneously took me up to the Lawrence Hall of Science plaza just to watch the sunset.”

Skylar smiled. “You seem happy with how your relationship is growing.”

“I am. I really am.” I smiled as well. “Neevie and I have always had incredible chemistry, but now our relationship is becoming so much more.”

Skylar nodded. “So that just leaves one more girlfriend: Lily.”

I smiled again. “Lily’s the new girl, with all the fresh excitement that goes with having a new relationship. Her enthusiasm is infectious, and she’s got all the energy of a girl falling in love for the first time. Surely you remember the first time you fell in love.”

Skylar’s face clouded over so suddenly I thought one of those alien spaceships from Independence Day had suddenly appeared and blocked all the sunlight. Her eyes dimmed, her expression darkened, and I immediately found myself wishing I could take back my words.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No, no, it’s not your fault.” Skylar had gone pale, but as she took a deep breath, some of the color returned to her cheeks. Her pale blue eyes had also gone pale, almost gray, but the color seemed to return to them as well. “It’s a long story there. There’s no way you could’ve known.”

I leaned forward, set my elbows on the table, and clasped my hands together. “I’ve got some time to listen if you’d like to tell me about it.”

Skylar shook her head immediately, and I pursed my lips realizing that this subject would most likely end up piled atop all the other subjects concerning her personal life that I knew frighteningly little about. All of my instincts told me to let it go, that Skylar wouldn’t want me to press her any further, and I’d staked my reputation with her thus far on never pushing her to say any more than she was comfortable with.

And yet I sensed that some part of her deep inside wanted to talk to me about this stuff.

So rather than hold up my hands, say ‘I’m sorry’ like an honorary Canadian, and reassure her that I’d never push her beyond her comfort zone, I took a deep breath, rewound my memory, and said, “I won’t pressure you if you don’t want to talk about it. At the same time, you know I can keep a secret when necessary. I know you appreciate me protecting the personal information of the girls I’m with. So please know that I’m a willing listener who’s gone through quite a bit of relationship drama myself and could perhaps give you some advice.”

Skylar’s expression was a mix of defensiveness as well as amusement that I was turning her own words around on her.

I seized on that amusement and gave her a lopsided smirk. “You’ve offered to listen to my problems. It would be only fair for me to be willing to listen to yours. And sometimes it’s nice to have a confidante you can depend on outside of your inner circle of friends.”

“That’s just it,” Skylar said with a sigh. “I don’t have an inner circle of friends at the moment.”

“Then maybe you can start a new circle of friends with someone like me. And if not me, someone like Neevie.”

Skylar nodded slowly. “Thank you for the kind offer, but please forgive me for being skeptical that a first-year teenager - five years my junior no less - would be the right person to be giving me advice.”

I chuckled. “It’s not the years; it’s the miles. When it comes to relationships, I might actually be more experienced than you.”

“Well with four girlfriends at present, not to mention however many girls your little BTC left behind after high school, that very well may be true.”

“I’m always available should you ever want to talk,” I told her sincerely.

Skylar reclined in her seat, pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose again, and nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

I arched an eyebrow. “But not today?”

Skylar smirked. “Not today.”

****

In college, bells don’t ring at the end of classes like they do in high school. The professor knows what time it is and wraps up class whenever he or she is ready to wrap up class. Sometimes that happens BEFORE the scheduled end of the class period…

… and sometimes that doesn’t happen until well AFTER the scheduled end of the class period.

Today was one of the latter, with Professor Colquitt keeping me and the rest of my Archaeology of the Roman World classmates a full fifteen minutes beyond the end of the period. Skylar had posited that the man held a personal grudge against anyone affiliated with Engineering. By the time he dismissed us, I thought it more likely the man held a personal grudge against anyone and everyone, period.

Fortunately, Archaeology was in the Social Sciences building at the southern end of campus, so it wasn’t a terribly far walk from there for me to get home. Less than ten minutes later, I hopped up the porch steps of the house and my key snicked in the lock. I opened the door, walked inside, and kicked off my shoes in the front entryway while closing the door behind me.

But just before the door banged shut, a breathy moan that spoke of intense sexual arousal filtered down the hallway.

And it sounded like Naimh.

Lest you think I started to freak out or anything, I didn’t. Not at all. I knew my girls, knew their hearts, and knew that their undying fidelity to me was the bedrock foundation of our relationships. My very first thought was to think about the calendar and recognize that on Tuesdays it would be quite common for Naimh and Belle to both beat me home. And with the extra fifteen minutes Professor Colquitt had kept us after class, I figured my two reddish-haired girlfriends had gotten started without me.

So I grinned, felt myself starting to get a chubby in my pants, and sauntered down the hallway thinking that a spontaneous threesome would be a great way to spend the afternoon.

Apparently I wasn’t the only one with that bright idea of having a spontaneous threesome though, because I turned the corner to look through Naimh’s open doorway and realized that it was NOT Belle in the room with my gorgeous Head Girlfriend.

Instead it was Isabela.

And Luna.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Prologue & Chapter 1: The BTC: https://www.patreon.com/posts/99290461

Chapter 2: Hoalauna: https://www.patreon.com/posts/99357682

Chapter 3: E10: https://www.patreon.com/posts/99433482

Chapter 4: Leeloo: https://www.patreon.com/posts/99506524

Chapter 5: The Fifth Element: https://www.patreon.com/posts/99618767

Chapter 6: Lily: https://www.patreon.com/posts/100326143

Chapter 7: The Hangover: https://www.patreon.com/posts/100548952

Chapter 8: Quality Time: https://www.patreon.com/posts/100806434

Chapter 9: The Favor: https://www.patreon.com/posts/101140618

Chapter 10: Ku’uipo: https://www.patreon.com/posts/101372817

Chapter 11: The R-word: https://www.patreon.com/posts/101672192