by Tara Wimble
“Believe me? This was your apology.” Bella is suddenly reminded of the whole reason she came out to see Jacque so early and ducks her head. Then Jacque finds herself weakening at that look and saying what she didn’t want to say. “Look, I’m not thrilled because you didn’t give me much of a warning and technically, we’re still playing a part here. Your baker kneading you through the night-”
“Stop.”
“-isn’t doing us a favor.”
“I hate you so much right now.”
Jacque finishes the second pancake for Bella and slides it onto her plate. “You owe me one.”
“And how do you figure that?”
Jacque looks dead ahead as she prepares to make her own breakfast. “Because you guys had sex in my bed.” She clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth and Bella’s face drops. “Not yours.”
Her comment provokes a new stream of apologies from Bella as she eats her breakfast and her room is thoroughly taken care of during the course of the morning. Bella takes a walk of shame with the bed covers and sheets. Jacque smirks silently to herself until Bella brings out the pillows as well and Jacque almost has a fit.
“What the hell were you doing?” Jacque’s voice gets higher. “Pillows, Bella! Pillows!”
She doesn’t find out what caused her pillows to have to be replaced and for her mental state she’s grateful.
Jacque had half hoped that once her room had been taken care of and Bella had apologized that things would just die down. That she wouldn’t catch herself staring at Bella’s back and just giving into her thoughts. Getting back into her own bed the nights thereafter is no help and for all of her teasing about how loud Bella was, Jacque fights a similar problem when her thoughts are not enough to satisfy herself.
When Kathryn gets back from visiting her boyfriend things do settle for a while though Jacque and Bella both know that’s because the game is on again and everything is left to play for.
It’s great, it’s fine, up until the moment someone plays the wrong card.
*
They race to the door because they’re still giddy from their day trip to the lake and even though a turn of shitty weather forced them back home early it was still the perfect way to unwind on an off day.
She opens the door because Kathryn, typically, had forgotten her keys leaving Jacque with the burden of that particular responsibility.
It gets thrown open because she’s happy and she actually caught things and she’s overcome with the desire to tell Bella everything about it. They both look a mess with their muddy boots and wet jackets. Kathryn snickers at her as she tries to pull the wet items off her body, leaving her in nothing but a cutoff that was originally her base layer. Luckily the rain hadn’t soaked right through it.
She wishes Bella had come with them. There’s nothing like seeing Kathryn battle the elements trying to protect her hair or-
They’re naked. That’s the first thing that crosses her mind and it make such little sense that she blinks to try and reset her view.
When she opens them nothing has changed.
Bella’s face is screwed up in ecstasy, eyes squeezed tight, and even though bulls in a china shop were quieter than Jacque and Kathryn had been it was obvious that they hadn’t noticed them yet. Too lost in each other to give a fuck if the walls came down around them.
Her hands are clasped in his hair, pulling, and just on instinct Jacque checks the left hand like she always does because there’s something about seeing Bella with the ring, her ring, on that makes everything seem like it’ll be okay.
The finger is bare and it feels like someone reached into her chest and put a death grip on her heart.
Jacque knows she has to say something. She has to have an objection, voice one, rather than just bottle it in the back of her throat while she looks up at the ceiling.
The words come out of Kathryn’s mouth first. “What the fuck is this?!”
“Jacque-” Bella gasps out from the couch, from under him, and there’s only shock in her voice. Shock at getting caught with him, caught by Kathryn really, because it’s not like Jacque didn’t know. That he existed anyway, not that they were fucking on the couch they all sat on.
She gasped ‘her’ name.
It’s not the tone she wants to hear. There’s worry that everything is about to come crashing down because Bella’s brought this here, brought this on herself. Jacque can only play her part. This time it’s not an act when she lashes out against the wall with her hand, knocking a picture frame to the floor, and storms towards the guest room, the room that would have been hers if she wasn’t sharing with Bella, hoping that Kathryn is following her.
Bella doesn’t even make a move to follow her, and most of that has to do with the fact that he’s on top of her, and they’re not quite dressed for a chase, but there’s just a small part in the back of Jacque’s head that doubts if she would have pursued her anyway.
She hasn’t been introduced to him yet, officially, because walking in on them having sex a few weeks ago doesn’t count. And she’s not sure if she wants to, not with everything going around in her head.
Jacque seethes internally at everything. At the fact she’d told Bella not to do this. At the fact that this was happening now, so soon after the last time and how she was even less careful than before. And mostly, she notes, at the possessive way he keeps hold of her beneath him, like he owns her in a way that Jacque doesn’t, despite the ring she wears.
Kathryn doesn’t immediately follow either. And Jacque squeezes her eyes shut because she can hear Kathryn giving Bella a piece of her mind, a particularly nasty piece at that. All she wants is to just get this over with because the sooner she can get this confrontation over and start to wipe this from her mind the better.
“Kathryn!” Jacquey yells out, imbuing her voice with the hurt she feels anyway, that part isn’t an act and neither is the ice she’ll have to put on her hand either.
That snaps her friend out of it and with one final nasty remark she follows Jacque into the guest room.
Kathryn is livid. Partly because of what they walked in on, what Jacque is running away from, and because she has to follow her and not continue to confront Bella. Kathryn isn’t walking in on bags being packed or things being thrown around in anger. Just Jacque collapsing on the floor by the bed as dry sobs, the ones that come out looking at the ceiling at night, are pulled from her chest.
This is the breaking point.
“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Kathryn utters. “Like why I just found your wife screwing some guy? And why you’re not out there kicking his fucking ass like I’m about to?”
Jacque twists the ring on her finger, resenting more and more how it fits perfectly on her finger, she wants more than anything to throw it across the room. But she could never and it’s that thought, that’s she’s tied her life to a losing hand, that zaps the fight right out of her.
Kathryn slides down on the floor between the bed and Jacque so their feet are staggered and they’re looking eye to eye.
“Jacque.” She pauses to get her attention, looking straight into her eyes. “You’re kinda freaking me out over here.”
“Because I’m not causing someone physical harm? Sorry.” Jacque mumbles.
“Actually, yeah. This isn’t a normal reaction to finding your wife of two years cheating on you.”
“I broke a picture.”
“Are you keeping score for me or for yourself?”
Jacque sighs and focuses back in on her wedding ring. Tuning out Kathryn because she doesn’t understand and Jacque doesn’t really have, or desire to have, the energy to make her.
“Don’t ignore me.” Kathryn presses on gently, seeing Jacque check out. “I just want to help, like, tell me what I can do.”
“Leave me alone?” Jacque attempts.
Kathryn laughs softly and nudges their feet together. “Yeah no. Anything but that.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“The truth might be a good start.”
Jacque laughs wryly because if only Kathryn knew how much the truth would not set her free.
But something in her head snaps, the part that’s been holding all of her emotions back because she imagines Bella again, how she had to see her. Naked. Underneath him. Enjoying herself up until the point where she noticed they were there.
She’s struck by the lack of respect that Bella has for her, for their fake relationship, but even more so for the very real life that they’ve built. A life that could come crumbling down if people start finding out it’s all a lie.
And worse is that she’d warned her. Told her to be careful and to not bring him around the house because it was too dangerous, it could ruin everything.
“I can’t believe she’d do this.” Jacque breathes out angrily and Kathryn nods, taking it to mean the cheating, and that’s fine for now. “And in our fucking house. On the couch.”
“Obviously we’re gonna burn that fucking couch.”
“Yeah.” Jacque nods getting into the revenge fantasy. “Let’s burn the damn thing.”
Kathryn hears her mutter her disbelief again into her hands. She pushes the words into her palms and her palms wipe the tears from her eyes. Meaning filled words roll down her cheeks and clog up red rimmed eyes.
“We can’t burn it.” She keeps her hands pressed to her face. “It’s Whemb’s couch.” It’s Whemb’s apartment.
“Shit.” Kathryn nudges her foot against hers. A pent up tapping. “She’s gonna flip.”
How was Jacque going to even tell her? Lie upon lie. The foundations will break and bit by bit she’ll crumble under the rubble.
“You can’t tell her.” Jacque rushes out, the weight of it all making her chest feel heavy, she feels like she can hardly breathe. “Not anyone, but especially not Whemb.”
She’s busy trying to slow her dwindling panic before she confronts the look on Kathryn’s face at being told that. There’s no doubt in her mind that her friend’s first instinct is to call in the cavalry and alert everyone, not in a snide way, but to build a support around her. Jacque can’t succumb to that.
“What the fuck is going on that you don’t want- Jacque.” Kathryn catches her eye every time Jacque tries to avoid it. “-Jacque, please.”
“Fuck.” She leans her head back, hitting it just a tad too hard on the wall. The pain knocks her back to reality. “This is such a goddamn mess. It was never supposed to get this messy.”
“Look, I’m no expert on marriage but-”
“Are you qualified to give out advice then?”
“-whatever’s happened, like forget what we just saw.” Though neither of them do from the telling sign of clenched fists and jaws. “-but it’s always going to be hard. Love is just that.”
“I really, really don’t want to get into it Kay-”
“I think you need to.” Kathryn counters. “Because you’re fucking blocking it out like you’re a child and Bella’s not some fucking random out there. She’s your wife.”
She’s- Jacque can’t even think it. Thousands of people do this. It was an arrangement. How many times have people thought about getting away with what they’ve done? How many have succeeded? None to the level they’ve attained under the pressure they’ve built for themselves.
But forget the deal. Forget all the stress and the worry and the legalities.
They’re married.
And she’s reacting the only way she feels like she can without blowing her own cover on feelings Bella doesn’t even realize she has.
The reaction is surprising truth.
“She’s not my wife.” Jacque blurts out and it feels like a weight lifted off of her shoulders.
Kathryn recoils. “Whoa, that’s a bit harsh. I’m sure you guys can work this out.” She pauses. “Well, after I kick her ass for being a cheating scumbag. I’d totally do that for you.”
Jacque bites on her knuckles for a split second just to bring her back to this. Words that need to be said. Some clarity for Kathryn. “Not what I meant.”
“Well then, what did you mean exactly? In English. No more cryptic bullshit.” Jacque can tell by the lift in Kathryn’s tone in the first sentence that she’s catching on to something she’s not sure she wants to.
“Let’s just say that he’s probably had more sex with her than I have.” Jacque bites out, the taste of the truth of that statement already bitter and jealous on her tongue.
“This isn’t a surprise.” Kathryn sits back and closes her eyes like she’s running through everything since they walked in the door. “Jesus fucking Christ, Jacque.”
Jacque just studies the ground, not equipped to handle the amount of confusion being thrown her way. It’s not Kathryn’s fault, there’s no way anyone could just blink into understanding the situation. Hell, she lives it every day and doesn’t fully grasp it.
“So what? Your problem is the sex?” Kathryn tries to find reason. As if there’s one to find but the actual lie. “Jacque, listen to that sentence and tell me what’s wrong with that? Like, you’ve been married two years. Bang away, don’t let someone else do it for you!”
Jacque flinches. “It’s not a joke.”
“Are you having problems? Like in that department?” Kathryn asks. “Because last time I checked you two seemed to be fine.”
“It’s not-” Jacque rubs her palm over her face. “It’s not the sex. There is no sex.”
Kathryn comically falls silent. “Wow.”
It’s only in the brief silence that Jacque thinks that she’s still out there in the living room. On the couch. She digs her nails into her knees and glares at her wedding ring and hates how her mind remembers all the wrong details.
“Did she, I mean, is this just to get a rise out of you?” Kathryn is asking all the wrong questions. Like this is something Bella is doing out of spite, when in reality she has no idea what she’s doing to Jacque. “Is it just because she doesn’t want to recently or is this a marriage thing-”
It’s fantasy to think of a different life where this is really happening to her and that this cheating cuts deeper because it’s real and not just scraping the surface of a make-believe world. Yet the hurt, somehow, is still the same.
“Maybe we should just wait, I can go and kick him out and we can sit and figure this out. Because I know how much you love her, Jacque and whatever it is - it’ll be okay.” She leans forward to place a hand over Jacque’s left. She touches the ring. “You’re one of the good ones, both of you.”
There’s nothing cryptic about the bluntness in which she turns all of Kathryn’s words to dust and states; “Bella’s not gay.”
Kathryn furrows her brows. “Don’t be stupid. Bisexuality is a thing.”
But Jacque looks down at the ring, Kathryn’s hand covering the whole thing, and for a brief moment she allows herself to imagine a world where she couldn’t see it because it wasn’t there. Because she’d never followed along with this stupid plan.
And it must show on her face because Kathryn’s expression drops, the plaintive hope she’d carried for the both of them gone. Replaced with a sudden lucidity. There’s nothing left to talk around.
“You’re being serious.” She doesn’t have to specify about what because they both know that the short answer is all of it.
“Like a heart attack.” Jacque snarks but her heart isn’t fully in it.
“How even--fuck--how did we miss this?” Kathryn pulls her hand back from the ring like she’s been burned, like it even has an iota of the effect on her that it has on Jacque. “I’m such a moron.”
“No, I’m the moron.” Jacque states matter-of-fact, cutting off Kathryn when she attempts to refute that statement out of pure instinct. “You all just saw what we wanted you to see. What you were supposed to see.”
“Jacque--”
“I knew.” She laughs bitterly. “I knew it was all a lie and still I fell for it. For her. So what could that possibly make me?�
� She spits it out like venom and Kathryn, for her part, doesn’t immediately try to give the perfect answer.
They sit in silence because there is nothing left to say, Kathryn’s still reeling and Jacque can see her working through everything, every single interaction, in her head.
Jacque just wishes she could be anywhere but here.
Minutes go by and the only thing that changes is their position, Kathryn crosses the imaginary barrier between them and hugs Jacque from the side, holding her head against her shoulder.
“Human.” Kathryn finally blurts out after too much time has gone by for there to be any sort of reference point.
“Sorry?”
“You asked what that makes you.” Kathryn pauses to brush a few curls off of Jacque’s face and kiss her on the forehead, a sort of reassuring touch that Jacque wasn’t even aware that she was missing in her life until this moment. “It makes you human.”
That’s what it takes for the dam to truly break and Jacque finds little shame in how she breaks down onto Kathryn’s shoulder.
A few minutes later there’s a knock on the door and Kathryn motions for Jacque to stay where she is but that’s not going to happen. She moves past her, not in a rude way, but she means business.
Bella’s standing at the door, dressed in an oversized shirt she recognizes as one of her own, and even if Bella has the dignity, apparently, to look ashamed of herself Jacque snaps.
“You brought him here.” It’s matter of fact, there’s nothing Bella can say to refute that because the proof is in the flesh. “We made those fucking rules for a reason, Bella.”
Bella glances past her, disturbed by the fact that Kathryn is listening, but unable to leave Jacque’s words alone. “I know--.”
“Don’t talk to me right now, just listen.” Jacque interjects, her anger growing as words fall out of her mouth. “They were your idea so you’d think you would remember but I guess not. And now look where we are. Fucked.” She pauses for emphasis. “In some people’s cases more literally than others.”
Kathryn cuts in. “Jacque.” One blow too close to the belt.