I wrapped my arms around Taylor as she hugged me tight and asked, "Taylor, is everything OK?"
"Yes," she said, as we shuffled inside my house and shut the door behind us. She pulled away to look at my face, keeping her arms around me, and said, "I just missed you so much this weekend. More then I thought I would."
"Oh," I said. "I missed you, too." We hugged for a few minutes longer before we finally let go and walked over to the living room, sitting down next to each other on the couches.
"Did you really miss me? Because I figured you would be too busy with Lauren to even think about me," Taylor said, with her brown hair pulled up into a bun on top of her head and wearing gray sweatpants and a gray sweater.
I laughed and said, "Yeah, we did stay pretty busy. But, that doesn't mean I wasn't thinking about you and didn't miss you."
"Really? You were thinking about me while you were having sex with Lauren?" She asked with a smile on her face.
"Maybe once or twice. Honestly, a lot of it was when her and I were just hanging out or I was waiting for her to shower and get ready, I would think about what it would be like if you were in her place or just spending time with you. Not necessarily the sex part, but just being with you," I told her.
"Oh, that's sweet," she said.
"The real question is, why did you miss me so much?" I asked her.
"I don't know. It hit me Friday night out of nowhere. I was just fine and then I thought about texting you to see what you were doing and remembered where you were and I just started to miss you a lot. I tried to sleep it off but same thing Saturday. No matter what I did, I would just start thinking about you. And it got so bad today, that my dad pulled me to the side and asked what was wrong with me," she explained.
"Did you tell him?" I asked her.
"No. I lied and told him that it was just that time of the month for me," she said with a little laugh.
"Oh geez. Definitely not going to question you on that one," I laughed with her.
"No, he didn't. I did tell Michelle, however" Taylor said.
"And what did she say? You're crazy and you should go find somebody your own age?" I teased her.
"No, she asked if I was jealous because you were with another woman or if I was jealous because you were having sex with another woman," Taylor said. I could feel the mood in the room shift as I wondered what her answer was and asked what she had told her older sister. "I told her the truth. The thought of you having sex didn't cross my mind at all. And it didn't bug me at all that that's what you were doing."
"Well, that's good, I guess," I tried to reassure her.
"I guess," Taylor agreed as we fell into silence, both of us lost in our thoughts.
After a few minutes, I broke the silence by saying, "Lauren's moving."
Taylor looked up at me with a shocked look on her face and said, "Really? When? Why?"
"Her ex got a new job in Idaho and she doesn't want to separate them. So, she got a job up there too. I assume it's soon, but didn't actually ask," I told her.
"Wow," Taylor said. "Are you going to go with her?"
"She actually did suggest it, but I'm not sure if she was joking or not," I said.
"Would you?" Taylor asked quietly.
"That was one of the times I thought about you the most," I told her simply.
Taylor just nodded her head and I saw a little tear forming in her eye. I wrapped my arms around her and pulled in her tight, holding onto her for the next little while until she said she should get going.
I spent most of Monday texting Taylor as she worked. Same with Tuesday, Wednesday, and the rest of the work week. We enjoyed lunch together a few of the days, when we could both sneak away at the same time and talked about hanging out after work, but ended up hitting a few roadblocks that first week, mainly, my kids misbehaving and wanting to spend time with them.
She did finally make it to my house on Saturday, where we had lunch with my kids and played some games with them.
That Sunday night, I got a text from Stacy that said, "So, I think tomorrow, when you're youngest is napping, you should take a shower. And let me know."
I read her text a few times. It had been a few weeks since the last time I had been with Stacy and, between everything happening with Taylor and Lauren, I hadn't really thought about her a whole ton, as sad as that sounded. As I thought about what she was proposing to do, I knew that I should probably tell her no. But, then again, I had been wanting to shower with her for a while, and Taylor and I had not actually committed to being a couple yet. I decided to see how the day went that next day and told Stacy I would let her know.
Monday morning went smooth as I got my oldest two daughters up and out the door for school. I hung out with my youngest, little two-year-old Alexis, watching her play around the house, watch TV, and just be a little toddler menace. Around noon, I started to make us lunch, which we both quickly ate, and laid her down for a nap. Much to my surprise, she fell asleep quick, leaving me with my phone in my hand, a text message ready to send to Stacy, but doubts in my head.
Convincing myself that one last time wouldn't hurt, I hit send on the text and started to pull off my clothes as I went into the bathroom. As I turned on the water, I heard my phone dinged and checked it to see Stacy saying that she was on her way. I climbed into the tub and got myself wet before starting to apply soap to my body.