The morning after that first night, I felt so self-conscious about everything that had happened that I hid in the kitchen. I had never before had to deal with a situation quite like this -- making toast and tea for a woman who, just hours before, had come in my mouth. I waited for the jug to boil, frowning while I turned this concept over in my mind, and then suddenly laughed out loud when I realised something -- this was exactly what Sophie, Alexis and Vivienne had done for me! Steve asked me what was so funny, and then he shared the joke with Lily, and the tension was broken for the moment. When Lily left a little while later, she did something that, to this day, makes me believe that if it hadn't happened that way, we might not be where we are now. Instead of kissing Steve goodbye first, she came over to me in the kitchen while I was stacking the dishwasher. She stood behind me and murmured, "Leisl."
I turned slowly, not really knowing what to expect from this relative stranger. She just looked me in the eyes, and hugged me. I was so surprised that I hugged her back, mostly out of politeness. She held my shoulders, kissed me softly on the lips and said, "Thank you. I hope I can see you again." I said nothing; I was speechless. It was almost as if she and I had been on a date, alone, last night, and she was thanking me for cocktails and good conversation. I was still standing there stunned while she went over and kissed Steve goodbye (no tongue, I noticed), and let herself out of the front door. I walked across the living room and sat on the couch.
Steve asked me all that day if I was okay; I hadn't said anything about how I felt. We had done threesomes before, that was nothing new, but this time was different, and we both knew it. This was the first girl we had slept with since Steve said he was looking for a girlfriend, not just a lay. We could easily have judged wrongly, brought home another girl who would leave at 3am and never call us again, but Lily had stayed over, sleeping on Steve's other side, and had woken with her arm draped over him so far that her hand was on my hip. It had felt nice. I mulled over the events of the last twelve hours and finally told Steve, "Okay. I feel good about her. Let's do it." Which sounds, in hindsight, like the moment when it all started, but in reality it was just me telling Steve I was okay with it if he asked her out again.
It was four days before we saw Lily again, when we met for drinks at The Bank Hotel on King St. I was so nervous that Steve practically had to dress me, but it went so well I could barely remember afterwards why I had been apprehensive about Lily. She was warm and generous in conversation, always asking more questions about other people, and joking and laughing easily to break the tension when there was a lull. We had such a great time, had a few cocktails, got to know each other's stories, and the question of what we were all really doing there never even came up.
When I had loosened up a bit, I giggled and told Lily how nervous I had been earlier, and she laughed and touched my arm and said it was sweet. Steve told her he'd had to pick my outfit for me because I couldn't decide what to wear, and Lily did the cutest thing. She smiled at Steve, looked over at me, then looked down and raked me with her eyes from my feet to my face. I had never been 'undressed with the eyes' before, but suddenly I knew what it felt like. When her gaze met mine, she smiled wider and said, "Good choice. Steve has excellent taste." Our eye contact turned it from a pseudo-innocent line into a full-on flirt, and I reddened, giggled and turned away. After that, Lily put her hand on the inside of my thigh under the table, out of sight of Steve, and lightly stroked the soft skin there with one finger. She never got close enough to my pussy to make me truly uncomfortable, but made it clear with the variations in pressure and speed of her stroking that she wasn't doing it absentmindedly. She never wavered from her bubbly conversation, but she and I knew something Steve didn't, and that small secret held between us for even a short time was thrilling, like finding a favourite sex toy in a drawer when you thought it had been lost forever. Intoxicating, and dizzyingly tempting.
An hour later I felt quite forlorn when Lily said she had to go -- last train home. 2 am had come far too fast. We all exchanged hugs and kisses, hers and mine with a slow, questioning look just before contact -- lips or cheek? Lips or cheek ... it landed somewhere between, in that spot at the edge of the lips that said we weren't yet sure of each other's intentions but we were sure of our own. Steve and I fucked three times that night, all the while telling each other hot stories about what we would both be doing to Lily next time she came over. We each woke up to individual text messages from the woman herself, saying how much she had enjoyed the night before and were we free on Friday? We didn't even need to ask each other, last night's shared fantasies and imagined scenarios still echoing in our nether regions.
After that first night, there was no more nervousness. There was just pleasure. I dressed for maximum sensuousness (tight black top and red handkerchief-point skirt, with knee-high boots), and so did she (tight jeans, pink chiffon singlet, and stilettos). Steve wore the tight grey shirt he knows makes his torso look long, lean and amazing. We three were under no illusions as to why we'd want to be close to home, so the Marlborough it was -- within stumbling distance. I imagined we looked an incredible trio -- one gorgeous, tallish, dark-haired man flanked by two smoothly dressed, well-endowed brunettes, both pawing his chest and giggling at an endless stream of bad taste sex jokes we were all swapping with one another.
I can't imagine what the bar staff thought of us -- every time one of us got up to fetch the next round, the other two would be inevitably kissing passionately by the time they got back to the banquette we were sharing. When Steve came back from the loo, and saw Lily and I with our faces locked together and our hands all over one another (including one of her hands inside my shirt front), he downed the remainder of his beer in one go, banged the glass down on the little table and said, "Right, girls. We're off." He turned and strode towards the door, as Lily and I exchanged slightly embarrassed grins, grabbed our bags and followed him out. As we passed the main bar area, the bartender gave us all high fives.
