So this week’s story is a little out of character, and I am not sure what I was thinking when I was writing it. It feels a little like a summary of a longer story, but follow the story of Shilah, Stephan, and Grayson, who find a different way to look at happily ever after.

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Every morning she woke up, miserable, exhausted, over tired, and then she remembered. A smile slowly crossed her face as she turned at the edge of the bed to take a long look at her lovers.

It wasn’t common, and most people would never be able to handle this kind of relationship, but for them this was it.

Shilah and Stephan had been friends since they were kids, and half way through high school they met Grayson. Until that moment Shilah had been able to ignore the crush that Stephan had on her, and it seemed that Gray changed everything, throwing it all out of balance.

Soon Steph was more into Gray than Steph, and then it seemed he bounced between them until her and Gray finally started dating.

It flamed out after two and a half years, not due to lack of love, but due to lack of resources. They both had things they wanted more than each other, and at some point there just wasn’t enough time being made.

They said they would be friends after, and well, they were. A year later when Gray and Shilah went to a fundraiser for her Mom’s work, it was as friends, and soon it spiralled into more. A year and a half later it started to spiral back out.
By that time Steph was living with them, a small door-less office had a bead curtain to delineate the transition into bedroom. He had tried dorms, living alone, roommates, and after two months a couch surfing had finally, reluctantly accepted the office conversion.

When Shilah and Gray had started melting down, Steph had stepped up to help out, by going to Shilah’s work events, or watching stupid sci-fi movies with Gray. Gray and Shilah had in turn stepped up their friendship with Steph with treats from the grocers, or an afternoon out at the park to people watch.

When a classmate had casually commented on her partners, Shilah hadn’t even really parsed it. When the subject of polyamory came up, and she got several pointed looks, she explained that they were just good friends.

It was a kind girl with purple hair and big glasses that explained that she understood, but did Shilah know that they could be more?

It was like the genie had been let out of the bottle and from then on, it’s all she could think about.

In the days that followed it was always with her. Even when she wasn’t actively thinking about it, it was still there, lurking in the back of her mind.

Multiple google searches, followed by history clearing just in case, had given her a better idea of what she was looking at and to her surprise it was a lot more than the threesome that she was thinking about.

Honestly, with her own lack of interest in the bedroom lately due to midterms, it was what they were already doing. The thing was though, that sex changed everything and while they had been together in a few configurations, this would be different, more, and if they fucked this up it would be the end of a friendship that she wasn’t sure she could take.

Even bringing it up could ruin everything, and once she put it out there, it was a bell that could not be un-rung.

She was not however as cautious as she had thought, she realized as she looked up at the screen. The three of them were sitting curled up on the couch watching a movie with a triad relationship and she doubted it was an accident, especially with the way that Steph wouldn’t meet her eyes.

It had only taken 5 or 6 times of Steph looking away and flushing before Gray had realized something was up and by the end of the film, he two was flushing.

Bell rung.

So she started to talk, laid out her case, and then fled, mortified, to the small café down the street mumbling coffee as she stumbled out the door.

She sat on one of the overstuffed couches drowning her sorrows in a coffee that was mostly sugar, letting the crappy music wash through her when she heard a familiar cough.

She looked up, and there were her boys, red faced and awkward as they sat on either side of her.

They sat in silence for a while until, almost so quietly she couldn’t here him, Steph said that they were in.

That was 23 years ago, and against all odds, here they were, still together, still happy, still them.