A FRIEND STAYS OVER
Erika's look upon him prompts Rik to say something after a time together that has gone beyond anything that they have ever known of before and after many years of friendship.
"It's been wonderful being here with you. Saying thanks doesn't get close to how I'm feeling right now."
His lightly stubbled face is creased in smiles, and she watches him as Rik pushes the fingers of one hand through his greying, swept-back, hair. He has a long, lean, face, just as her husband Bram has, only her husband has a full beard that makes him look older than he is.
Rik is Bram's business partner and friend; someone they have known since she got married and the two men had been working together for a large infrastructure management and installation company. Rik is a good-looking man with his frizzy swept-back hair going grey at the temples and his lightly tanned face, with its laughter lines, often engaging her attention upon him.
"You won't mind if Rik stays over for a night after one of our business trips, do you?" Bram had asked her a few days ago, knowing what the answer would be. They all got along and much more so since Rik's marriage had fallen apart. He travelled a great deal and would be gone again in a day or two.
The crazy thing about it all is that she and Rik once were classmates at Leiden University some twenty years ago and even then, she thought of him as a happy-go-lucky guy who pulled in the women and paid no particular attention to her. He was mad about sports, and football in particular; an interest, obsession even, that was cut cruelly short by a knee injury. It had knocked him off his life's plan in sport but his will to succeed had not left him; instead, he turned to being successful in business and to climb the corporate ladder. Rik had set his sights on being CEO and Bram, her energetic but not so ragingly ambitious husband, would become his chief operating officer. Bram had other diverting interests outside of work and she had chosen to allow him that, rather than cause unnecessary strains in her marriage.
She had prepared their supper before going to work, that morning, and what had been their start to the evening. She had called to them from the stylish and expensively fitted-out kitchen, unaware of how their evening together was to play out.
"Supper's ready so you two can go and sit down at the table. No shop talk while we eat, okay?"
"Yeah, okay...we're both hungry, aren't we pal?" she had heard Rik laugh, his comments directed at Bram, and she had thought nothing of it, nor what may have been behind Rik's compliment on how she looked, a patterned wrap-around dress flattering her figure.
"Well, I've got something ready that I know you both like." She had decided that she would be the perfect hostess and would wait on how their uncommon evening together would play out.
♥
The washing-up machine hums softly and the coffee has been made. Ericka wonders, idly, if the men are watching some football game on the widescreen plasma TV in the living room and if they're seated on the sumptuous corner sofa that's ideal for relaxing.
"They can't be watching that!" she gasps softly as the sounds of groans and gasps reach her as she walks along the hallway, intent on joining them. The tray shakes in her hands, the coffee mugs rattling against each other.
The sounds reaching her arouse quite different thoughts in her now. She's disconcerted still more when she hears Bram's soft, admiring laugh in response to what they are watching.
"She sure knows what she's doing!"
Both men laugh and it's soon clear that they are enjoying what is to be seen on the screen. There are two men that she's fond of, in the house with her, and who are amused and pleased from seeing some porno film and seemingly unconcerned by her expected return. That, and the soundtrack, affect her too, arousing a charge of excitement that may tamper with her control.
She wants to see the acts being played out too and wonders if she should interrupt them and bring in the coffee. Listening to the sounds of porn film characters gasping and groaning only leaves her feeling aroused. The longer she waits the hornier she becomes, and she can't stay out in the hallway with the tray in her shaking hands.
She slips on the high-heeled shoes that were worn to work and then clumps over the hallway floor, pretending that she is unaware of what they have been watching.
They both laugh on seeing Ericka appear and gaze at her suggestively, wide grins creasing their faces. Her wrap-around dress suddenly feels tight, seeming to cling to her body and to shape her breasts and curvy hips.
"Come and sit with us and enjoy the show!" Rik laughs with scant embarrassment to be heard in his deep voice. His look on her is unwavering as the fuck-fest on the screen continues and seems to be nearing a climax. "We'd like you to be with us."
He never gave voice to his strongest opinion of her, that he found his friend's wife a beguiling and sultry woman...an enigmatic smile and direct look of her eyes on him that had often set him wondering if more lay behind such a look; that, in love as she was with Bram, she would not deny herself the pleasure that another man's look and touch would bring to her.
Erika's riotous honey-blonde hair framed an oval face, unlined, and blessed with full lips that often broke into a captivating smile. With him, she could frequently be bubbly, and flirty, and together they could laugh and be at ease. The comfort of knowing each other was more than a superficial friendship that remained even after many years.
Erika meets his gaze, and she feels a shock of recognition course through her body as she remembers what Bram had asked her some weeks ago. The tray with the coffee mugs is put down on the glass-topped table but the men show no interest in that, only in her. Bram had asked what she thought of living out a fantasy, of becoming involved in a trio. She had wondered at the time if he could go through with it if those involved were two men and a woman, and if both were claiming her no matter who the other player might be.
She had even wondered about her and another woman getting together and Bram making up the threesome. She did so again, now, as what her darling husband had said at the time came to mind.
"It all depends on you Erika," Bram had suggested before going on to say, "and also that it's a man that I know and trust as a friend; a man who is not going to involve me as I'm not into that...I'm not bi. Never have been and I'm not interested in even discovering those ways. Imagine that it could be Rik, a man you've known for longer than I have and he's into you...I know that because he's often said that you're a looker and that I'm lucky to be with you."
"We love each other...luck doesn't come into it."
"You know what I mean..."
"Yeah, I do," she remembered sighing on hearing Bram say it. She had never gone down on the handsome man, Rik, that she looked at again, now, and when they had been at university. Bram, at the time of their speaking about trying a threesome, had spoken out some more.
