Page 30 of Misadventures of a Curvy Girl
“I think it was bad. I mean, I know it was bad. He was in so many of the places you’d see on the news, and he knew so many people who died or were seriously injured, and I think he saw a lot of fucked-up things. He was always so sensitive…”
I make a noise at that, thinking of his cold eyes, his sneering smiles. “Ben? Sensitive?”
Caleb sighs. “Yeah. He used to get bullied a lot, as a kid, before he filled out in high school.”
“God. Why?”
Caleb shrugs. “Because kids are awful? Because his sister was older than him and already out? Because he could never hide how he felt about anything?”
I ask the obvious question. “Were you two in love as kids?”
He rubs the back of his neck. “No…and yes. We’ve always been close. He lived with his grandma growing up, and after she had to move to a home, my parents unofficially took him in. His sister had already gone off to college at that point, but she wasn’t ready to be responsible for another person, I guess.”
“So you lived together? Is that when you found out you wanted each other?”
“It was complicated, you know? It didn’t—I don’t think either of us knew until the first time we had a third person. Someone between us.”
“When was that?” I sit on the bed now, reluctantly enthralled. “High school?”
“A cheerleader named Serena.” A faint smile blooms on Caleb’s face. “She had a crush on both of us, and we both liked her. For a while, I thought we were going to fight for her, but then we all got drunk at a field party and the three of us ended up together in the back of my truck. We did that a few more times, until she started dating a basketball player instead.”
“And you never…” I wave with my hand to indicate what I mean. “Never just the two of you?”
“We did,” Caleb admits softly. His ears go red, but he meets my eyes so I’ll know he’s being completely honest. “Just the two of us. The summer after graduation.”
“And?”
“It was still fun,” he replies, with an almost shy smile, as if even the word fun is impossibly dirty, “but there was something about being a three that fit us better than being a two.”
I think about that for a moment. Think about how electric it felt last night to be between the two of them, because it was electric and somehow also comforting—like nothing I’ve ever felt before in bed. As if between the three of us we could handle anything, we could explore everywhere, our shared strength and energy creating a web of safety and affection all around us.
I look out the window at the barn, where the three of us fooled around last night, wondering if maybe I fit better in a three than a two myself. Or is it just Caleb and Ben? Even if I left here and found another set of boys to play with, would it be the same?
I sigh. How could it be the same? When it’s them I want so much, not the number?
“So we went to college and dated around for a while,” Caleb continues. “And it was at the end of freshman year that my dad took me aside to have a chat. Turns out our little college flings had made their way through the town gossips back to him.”
I grimace, and Caleb just laughs.
“Don’t worry, he didn’t kill me. Instead, he told me about Mrs. Parry’s sister.”
“What about her?” I ask, a little confused.
“She lived with two men on the other side of Holm for fifty years.”
“Oh,” I respond in a surprised voice. “That’s unusual.”
“The more unusual part is that I guess the town got used to it. She and her two men were part of everything—church, Rotary club, town picnics. And my dad told me if Ben and I wanted to live that way, the town would accept us. And he said if we wanted to be a couple, just the two of us, then he’d make sure the town accepted us that way too.”
“And did they?” I ask. “Accept you?”
“Yeah,” Caleb says with a smile. “They did. Mackenna lived with us for four years after college, and we never had to hide it. Not here in Holm, at least. People stared a bit in the beginning, when the three of us would hold hands or share a blanket during the town parade, but they got used to it fast. Maybe even bored with it. And after she left, when it was just the two of us together, it was the same way.”
“Huh.” It goes against everything I’ve ever thought about small towns, being a city girl myself, but maybe there’s something about a tightly knit community that can absorb differences in surprising ways. “When did Mackenna leave? Why did she leave?”
Caleb’s smile drops and drops fast. He looks out the window and rubs the back of his neck again. “She left nearly five years ago. Honest, it doesn’t keep me up at night, but for Ben—well, Ben’s the reason she left.”
“Why? Was he a jerk to her too?” I ask a little bitterly.
