knew, had no place in threesomes—in any kind of sex, for that matter.
Sloane imagined Richard raising his eyebrows, imagined him feeling shy and nervous. His wife wasn’t around. He was a devoted husband. He said, You can propose that to Sloane, if you like. Then he went back to what he was doing, preparing food for hundreds of people.
Karin suggested they take off the rest of the day. She didn’t know Sloane well enough to suggest such a thing, and yet it was precisely for this reason that she was able to. Let’s bring a bottle of champagne to the beach, she said, taking Sloane by the hand.
They drove to Napatree Point with the champagne and Sloane’s dog. The two women laid out towels. Their toes were painted and their legs and feet were tan. The ocean was rough yet quiet; the way a snowfall blots out the world with its blanket, the ocean will do the same with its white noise. The two women played music from a little wounded boom box. They drank the champagne and ate grapes and Sloane felt like a girl. Something about Karin made her feel not just young but childlike. Also, Karin was somewhat in charge. Perhaps because Sloane had allowed it, but in any case, it was nice, that she could rely on someone else’s personality to outweigh hers for a change.
Around sunset they returned to Sloane and Richard’s home. After a day of drinking on the beach, walking into her home with this stranger felt foreign. It smelled acidic, like decaying roses. The taste on Sloane’s tongue was pink and ashy. She was burned from the sand and the sun, her skin felt at once coarse and moist, and the night looked as if it could go anywhere, though of course the path was much more knowable. It was, in fact, immutable.
The two women were, at first, alone in the house. Sloane thought of sending Karin home before Richard returned. But something stopped her. The alcohol, for starters. But also the way that sometimes doing something bad can feel homeopathic.
Within the hour they heard a car pull up. Richard joined them on the deck. He hadn’t brought a cake. There wasn’t one in the house. Sloane’s birthday was several days after the Fourth of July, and she owned a seasonal restaurant in a place where the Fourth of July was the most important holiday. She didn’t remember having had a birthday cake in a very long time.
The three of them drank cocktails and wine. Drinking was important, Sloane knew, for this kind of event. It was almost more important than the people involved. She knew she had to be the perfect kind of inebriated. Wine was good, a soft white. And in addition to alcohol, Sloane would say there is one other component involved in how a threesome begins. It is these words.
One thing led to another.
The individuals involved can rarely tell you the precise moment. That’s because it’s impossible. One would have to admit seeking something that feels unsavory, alien. A husband who desires to enter another body, to hold another breast. A wife who wants to see her husband want someone else, so that she may want him as much as she’d like to. A third person who is not frankly loved in the world, who enters a room as a cipher in a tank top. A husband who makes the first move. A wife who closes her eyes to the first move. A third person who has eaten nothing all day. Someone turns on the music. Someone pours a drink. Someone reapplies lipstick. Someone positions her body in such a way. Someone is less hurt than he should be. Someone is afraid of her carnality. Someone is worried about not being sexual enough. Someone lights a candle. Someone closes a French door. Someone’s stomach drops. It is everything to do with bodies and it is nothing at all to do with bodies.
One thing led to another, and Sloane was messing around with Karin. The phrase messing around means making out, feeling up, being physical with someone with whom you are not in a relationship. The connotation is that it’s a flimsy thing, it does not have holy meaning. There is also the idea of something being sloppy, mistaken. It was a phrase, with good reason, burned into Sloane’s memory.
One thing led to another and Sloane was messing around with Karin, and then Richard approached, and he would kiss