CHERRY BLOSSOMS // Revisited // Montréal // 3.7

Almost forty people sat at six long picnic tables, two sets of three pushed end to end. Covered in gingham tablecloths and lit by strings of small white Christmas lights laced through the branches of the trees above. There’d been cold pasta bowls with chunks of feta and big black olives, orzo with pesto and shrimp, and Chicken Marbella, and mushroom carpaccio. Other things too that he’d never had time to try. He couldn’t keep out of this salad Maria had made with melon and prosciutto and pecorino. He hoped no one noticed how much he’d hogged.

No wine for Geoff. He was on Odele-duty and would be driving home. Nia was taking it easy because she was with her boss and his family and Odie was with them, but he’d seen her take many a sip of red wine today.

It was getting pinky-orange out now; the sun setting. Odie had a nap after swimming and Geoff had laid out on the lawn with her in the sun and, he was pretty sure, drifted off himself for at least a quarter hour. The day had been a lot better than expected. He’d had his nervous bouts, his little anxious twists, but the rest of it was fun. He didn’t enjoy hearing the wives’ opinions on the woman he loved, but it wasn’t surprising. It was a little shocking to have his wife’s ex-boyfriend’s incredibly large testicles shown to him. Shocking and hurtful, but yet, there it was again: arousing. Dino’s obvious sexual power excited him, and the thought of his wife with a man like was so fucking erotic. And then there was Rocco: intimidating at first, but now, after a couple of beers in his own belly and probably a dozen in Rocco’s, Geoff kind of liked him. He was all right with Nia fucking this guy. Rocco’s size bothered him a little. His penis would be large, that was obvious. Nia had said she’d seen it through his pants and confirmed Rocco was packing. That was anxiously exciting. He was also worried about the size of the rest of Rocco. The man was huge. His hands were enormous. Nia had mentioned them before. And not in a sexy, playful way, more in a revelatory sort of Gosh, I can’t stop thinking about his hands kind of way. She didn’t talk about them to tease Geoff, she talked about them because she was thinking about them. His wife could have a genuine attraction to Rocco. The man was coarse and rough, but he had a charm. And ladies liked a man to make them feel safe. Rocco made Geoff feel safe. Like if he were in danger, if fucking ninjas dropped out of the trees and whipped shuriken stars around, he would run to Rocco for help without hesitation—if anyone could save them from ninjas, it would be Rocco. Rocco was MAN personified. Big, strong, capable. Big dick, deep voice. Unafraid. Those were attractive features for a woman. He was handsome, Nia was gorgeous. They made a good couple.

That was the lone wrinkle in this wonderfully (but hastily) woven tapestry that he and Nia crafted—their arrangement, their sexual experiment in liberty. Maybe he’d be more comfortable with a guy like the stripper. Some dumb hot-body, big-dick guy that would dart in for the night and then never be seen again. That would be more comfortable, wouldn’t it? More comfortable than the ex-boyfriend’s brother who she works for who is also her type, has a big dick, is handsome, and who his wife believed will deliver some much desired masculine roughness to her bored-with-Geoff pussy.

But when he put it that way, Rocco was ten times more exciting than the stripper. Because he knew the tingle that Rocco put between his lovely Nia’s long legs. That was what he wanted anyway, wasn’t it? Her happiness. So let Rocco make her happy, Dum-Dum. She’ll come home to you, you can brush her hair and kiss her cheek and watch TV and eat ice cream and raise your wonderful daughter together. And you can make love to her. Whenever you feel like it. Rocco can be her fuck-buddy, make her happy like the silver dildo he bought her made her happy. He was indulging Nia a living, breathing sex-toy that would give her all the things she missed, that made Geoff so hard thinking about—then she would come home to her family and Rocco would go home to his family. Dirty and messy and complicated, but frankly, somehow, hot as fuck.

“Dad?” Odie’s gentle whisper next to him, below the boisterous table conversation.

He turned to her sitting next to him, proud to be at an adult table. Her plate was cleared, she was glassy-eyed and full, hair wet and stringy, face flushed and happy.

He got low to her and put his hand on her back. “Yes, baby?”

She whispered, “Can we get a cottage?”

He chuckled, rubbed her back. “We’ll see.”

Maybe they could. They could at least rent one for a week during the summer. It was a wonderful notion. But if Nia was going to be away working long hours during the season, they’d only have the weekends to use it. They could buy one, use it whenever they wanted. And it would be an investment.

Maria and Stacy and two other women were up and moving now, collecting plates, clearing the table.

“Can I help?” Odie said to Maria as she got close. Maria gave her a warm smile and told her she could.

Maria said, “Grab some plates. You can bring ‘em up to the kitchen, help us get dessert.”

Odie beamed, and Geoff reached out and poked his finger into her soft little-girl middle, said, “Odie loves dessert.”

Odie turned, mad, and chastised him. “Da-ad!” She flashed a mean seven-year-old face that made him laugh.

Maria took Odie up to the kitchen, and Geoff watched her go. Maria wasn’t fond of Nia, but she was good with Odele. He wasn’t a hundred percent comfortable with Odie learning to clear plates for men and staying relegated to kitchen duty. In the Kane household, though, Odie learned she could do whatever she wanted.

Nia’s back was turned to him, elbows on the table, engaged with Doug and Rocco. Work related convo. He put his hand on her back now too, in love with both his girls. Nia still wore her bikini, but he’d got her a wrap from their bag and Nia had it over her shoulders. Her wet hair had been pulled back into a drying ponytail—tangled black, spilling over a narrow shoulder. He watched her profile as she talked with the boys.

Nia was exquisite. He used to draw her. Draw her from memory when they were just friends. He’d drink her in when they were together, then, alone at night, schoolwork done, he’d practice rendering those shapes. She had a long, graceful neck, a sharp jaw, and her skull took an amazing angle past her ears; a crown in perfect balance, offsetting the incredible facial mid-depth angle. A perfect profile. Nia kept talking, her hand coming up over her shoulder, and he watched her long fingers search for his, wedding ring winking in the setting sun. He moved closer. His fingers went under hers and she clenched them while she laughed and talked.

Rocco rubbed his face with his big hands. He was pushed back from the table, sunk in his chair. The chair flexed and bent underneath him, but managed to hold. He said, “I better bring up more wine. We’re going to do fireworks off the dock. You’ll stay for that, guys—Odele wants to see that, eh?”

Nia said, “Yeah, of course, we don’t want to miss that. I came here for fireworks.”

Geoff noted the emphasis on the phrase, coming up for fireworks. He knew her, the way she talked. It sounded flirtatious. Right in front of Doug. A little bold, Nia.

She said, “Can I get a place to change? I want to put something warm on, but not over my swimsuit.”

Rocco put an arm out and pointed to the sliding glass doors behind the barbecues. “Back there, where I showed you the wine cellar. Not as far as the cellar, in the hall before it. Bathroom there. There’s a shower too, you want to rinse off or whatever.”

“Thanks,” Nia said, and stood, bent and kissed Geoff, then gathered the wrap around her shoulders. He watched her walk towards the house. She turned and said, “You want me to grab the wine?”

Rocco didn’t look back, but he squinted as he was thinking. “Ah, no, I got it. I know what I’m looking for. Geoff, you wanna go with Doug out to the garage, start bringing down the fireworks?”

“Okay,” Nia said, waving over her shoulder and continuing on.

Geoff nodded and looked at Doug.

Maria yelled down for Rocco from the upper deck, a tinge of frustration in her voice.

“Fuck,” he whispered. “What now?”

Doug’s shoulders shook with a laugh as he looked down, smiling at the beer bottle in his hand.

Rocco hefted his bulk out of the punished plastic chair and Doug said, “Where’s the fireworks?”

“Side of the garage, the back one, right by the ATVs . . . Geoff, can you grab the wine?”

“Sure thing.”

“Yeah, it’s in a crate, there’s a bunch of crates by the door, right side when you go in. There’s a crate with a dozen bottles of different Primitivos. You can carry ‘em out to the fire pit. Go in the sliding doors, go right. Nia will show you where the cellar is.”

“Okay,” he said, and he hefted his medium-sized bulk out of his chair, feeling heavy from four helpings of prosciutto salad.

He walked up the grassy hill to the house, side-by-side with Rocco, a few feet apart, together but separate. He struggled with something funny to say, said nothing, then they parted wordlessly at the back of the house and Rocco headed up the wooden steps to the upper level of the deck to find Maria. Geoff headed into the dim basement, turned right, went down a wide set of steps.

Ahead on the left, an open cedar door, pine wedges still holding the unfinished framing square. Pale yellow light spilled across the dark concrete in a sharp-edged rectangle. He made his way to it and stood in its light.

His heart stopped, and he gulped. Nia’s back was to him, turned to a three-quarter profile. Her long black hair spilled in drying tangles across her bare tanned back. She was naked, standing there in bare feet and painted toes, a towel clutched in her hands. Her hip cocked toward him, one bare globe flexed, the other pert, but lower, a tight seam below her buttock where it met her thigh. Her ass was paler where the sun hadn’t been lucky enough to kiss. Her right breast was bared to him, the nipple hardened and brown. She was on her toes, flexing her calves.

Nia was waiting to be seen and wanting to look her best.

The first time he’d seen Nia naked was the morning after they first made love. He woke with her in his arms, and the first thought he’d had was Please, Lord, I will do anything for that to be more than a one-night stand. He woke up that morning and knew he wanted to devote the rest of his life to the woman in his arms. Nia was his best friend, and now they’d been intimate. She’d sat up and stretched, her long arms twisting and writhing, her bare breasts swaying as she arched her back and groaned. She’d turned and smiled, got out of bed, and he’d watched as she crossed the room, his heart pumping with fiery happiness. She’d crossed the room, bare as she was born, and he’d watched her ass, watched it without shame for once. His breath had caught in his throat as he enjoyed the sensational gift life had just delivered.

She stood now before him, bare as she was born again, revealing herself to him—but intending it for another man.

His jaw dropped. The strength left his body at the ugly truth about what they were doing. He saw the incredible gift he was sharing. His knees buckled, and he slumped against the cedar door frame.

Nia’s head was in narrow profile, her eyes turned down, her long eyelashes feathered and curled. Her eyes opened, her chin raised, a coy woman just realizing she was being watched . . . her eyes turned to him, her shoulders opened, her ass flexed.

She saw it was Geoff.

She jumped, laughed, then her hand covered her bare breast. “Shit, Geoff . . . holy shit.”

“Nia,” he croaked.

“Hi, baby,” she said, eyebrows up in the middle, knowing she’d been caught and feeling guilty.

“Fuck, Nia.” A fever washed across him, heavy, flu-like symptoms, an aching weakness across his back and shoulders, a pervasive weight on his heart and lungs.

“You caught me, Geoff, you caught me,” she said, a weak and submissive smile on her face.

“Oh, Nia. This is . . . real,” he said, and stepped into the deep, cedar-paneled bathroom. He crossed to her and Nia put her hands out to hug him, but he needed to sit down. He slipped past her and plopped onto the wooden toilet seat.

Nia’s hand went through his hair, her thumb soothed his temple. “You caught me,” she said again.

“Nia—”

“You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m . . . it hurt to see it. I’m dealing with it.”

He took her wrist and lowered her hand so he could rest his cheek in her palm. She thumbed his beard now. He looked up at her bare body, her other hand clutching the towel across her breasts, suddenly demure.

“Odele could have come down, Nia, one of his kids—shit, Maria.”

Nia shrugged, her expression sheepish. “Or you. Maybe I knew it was you.”

“I don’t think you did.”

Nia lowered her eyes. “No. I was expecting Rocco.”

“You’re really going to do this?”

“I am.”

He clutched his stomach. His eyes welled with tears.

“You sure you’re okay?”

He nodded. “I am. It’s . . . a lot.”

Nia hugged his head to her belly, and he kissed her there. He pushed the towel aside and hugged her waist, pressed his cheek to her belly. He looked down. Looked at her bare, waxed cleft mound. That thing that was his, hers . . . theirs. That intimate part that made her a woman. That twisted bit of hidden flesh that stretched and parted, that swelled with ecstasy, that had yawned painfully wide and delivered Odie. That most private piece of her that also felt so good and put dirty thoughts in her head. His head too. He kissed her lower, suckled at the flesh above her mound.

“The door’s open, Geoff,” she whispered.

He stopped and inhaled deeply. Deeply as he could, trying to draw in as much of her as he could.