Chapter Nineteen

Jake came back a few days later, and even though I was kept busy in every possible way, I had missed him. I missed our walks, our talks.

There was snow in his hair from the few minutes he was outside when he entered the house. He smiled at both of us.

"How are you doing?" he asked.

But before we could reply, he crossed the hall and lifted me a few inches, planting a kiss on my lips. For those few days, I had had other lips kissing me. These were familiar, bigger, stronger lips.

"God, I missed you, Emily," he said, and buried his face in my hair, just for a moment, his nose rubbing my neck.

He dropped the backpack and hugged Alice. "I missed you too, sis."

She laughed.

"Let's get some food. We have a lot to discuss," he said and went straight to the kitchen, washing his hands before opening the fridge, and closing it. "What did you two eat? The fridge's empty." He shook his head and opened it again. He retrieved a pack of cherry tomatoes, a cheese we had no idea existed there, and a jar of sauce. "Pasta it is."

Alice moved to prepare tea, suspiciously looking at Jake's hands as they sliced tomatoes.

"How was your trip?" I asked, hovering at the kitchen entrance, the space inside was cramped already.

"It was fast. I made only one stop; I wanted to finally get back here. Honestly, I was curious about how you two were doing."

I blushed. "We're okay."

He snorted. "Yeah, I see how you're blushing. So, I guess everything's fine?"

"Yes, Jake, we're fine," Alice said. "More than fine."

"Good."

In twenty minutes three plates of pasta were steaming on the table, and three cups stood around the teapot with Chinese symbols.

Jake turned to me and asked: "Emily, are you still comfortable with the arrangement we discussed before?"

I looked at him, his kind eyes on me, his strong hands in his lap. I looked at Alice, who crossed her hands over her chest, who held my gaze.

"Yes, but how? Should we set some kind of schedule, rules of privacy, of behavior around each other?" I asked.

"I thought that you should decide where and how you want to spend each night. If it was for example, and I mean only, for example, three days with Alice, three days with me, one at your dorm, each week, it would turn into a nightmarish schedule," Jake said.

"It's like a kid of divorced parents, going on a schedule from parent to parent," Alice said and shuddered. "Yeah, you should choose where you want to spend your day and night, with whom, if anyone."

"That's a lot of pressure," I said and laughed nervously. "How do I balance evenly? What if one of you needs me, and I am with another?"

"We'll just call," Alice said. "We need to have maximum transparency here."

I noticed a small impression on her face, of anguish. It was there and gone in a second.

"Also, we're talking about private moments here. Most of the time you could spend with the two of us. Like before, we spent the time together anyway," Jake said.

"What about being in public?" I asked.

"You are Jake's girlfriend," Alice said. "At least "til we work it out between us."

I nodded. "What about signs of affection? What do you think we should show when there are three of us?"

"Let a quick kiss on the lips be the most we see of another's intimacy," Alice said.

"Everything else happens behind closed doors, or wherever, just make sure the third person has no idea."

"I agree, but it would be difficult to manage this in this house, the walls are paper-thin," I said and looked at both of them. I almost giggled when I imagined this conversation from the outside. I was discussing having sex with two of them, separately, in such a business-like way that we should all be wearing suits and have contracts ready to sign.

"Well, we'd have to be creative. I guess, use your dorm room. And anyway it's only "til the end of university, then I'm going to move out and we could have separate places of our own," Jake said, ""til then, it's a private matter between the couples. Right?"

We nodded.

"No sounds though," Alice said to Jake. "If I hear you grunting like you did with that girl before, I'll kill you."

"Mmm, girl before?" I asked.

"At a previous uni I brought a girl to the house we were renting. Alice almost kicked me out the next morning."

"I woke up to the girl talking dirty in the room next to mine, and the squeak of a bed. And he managed to grunt in the end. I never want to hear it again," Alice said, disgusted.

"That was embarrassing but true. That girl loved to talk." Jake laughed as Alice put her hands to her ears and shook her head. "What else should we discuss?"

"Protection," said Alice.

"I'm on the pill," I said. They nodded.

"Also, Emily, it's up to you to check how frequently you want to be with us, I mean, that's embarrassing, so there aren"t times when it's one after another, I mean …" Alice grunted.

"I got it," I said hastily. "What about jealousy?"

"I'm happy as long as you two are happy," Jake said and it was true. It was easy for him, transparent.

"It'll be fine," Alice said.

The awkward silence filled the room.

"Let's eat?" Jake asked and lifted a fork. Alice poured three cups of tea, avoiding looking at me.

I honestly could not imagine how it could work. How this double dating could be a thing for me. Could I want them both equally? How could I possibly divide myself between them? How could I be the manager of the time? I wanted somebody to take care of my actions. I wanted somebody to decide with whom I should spend that day, that night, the next night.

My head was buzzing when a warm touch brought me back. Alice. She wrapped her fingers around mine.

"We'll figure it out," she said.

"Yes."