Lastly, and with a head filled with confusion, I turn to Gordon. "I'm Gordon. We're really glad to meet you, Maggie."
"Do you have everything you need?" Harley asks.
"I do. I just need that glass of water."
"Here." I'm handed a glass by John, who's nearest the faucet. "You let us know if you need anything else. The fridge is full of food…"
"…that will last us a day," Dwayne laughs.
"Thanks." I feel as though I should say something else. Thanks for accepting me into your home, maybe. Thanks for giving my dad a purpose when I wasn't around. Thanks for trying to make me feel comfortable, even if it's an impossibility when faced with eleven gorgeous male strangers.
None of that feels right, though.
"Night then," I say instead. I leave the room as fast as I can while still looking normal and I power-walk down the hallway and up the stairs. It's only when I'm in the safety of my room with the door securely closed that I exhale deeply.
This is not going to be an easy few days.
To make it worse, I can't get to sleep. Harley's bed is comfortable enough, but all I can think about is the eleven men who are dotted around this house right now. Eleven men who have voted on whether they want to share me in a relationship and sexually. I actually shiver, thinking about how it felt to stand in the middle of them with all their focus on me. God, I feel deviant for the ache between my thighs, imagining what that might be like, to be with them the way Danna is with her men. I feel morally twisted inside for not being angrier at them thinking about me sexually when we’ve only just met. Why is it that their conversation has turned me on more than repelled me? What kind of person am I to be warm between my legs at the thought?
Instead of being angry, all I can wonder is if they’d want to be with me separately or together? Are relationships like that organized on a schedule, or is it more than that? I wish I’d known about Danna and her setup before now. If I'd spoken to her, I'd know all this. I'd know what their crazy discussion actually meant. There would be no speculation, even in my head.
Are my foster brothers sleeping well right now? Did they have that vote and move on like it was nothing, or is it playing on their minds? Are they imagining what it would be like to share me? Are they thinking about how they would feel to watch their brothers fuck me? Are they contemplating having me in the privacy of their own rooms or of them taking me all at once?
The group sex concept isn't entirely new to me. Justin told me that there are players in the football team back home who make a habit of ganging football groupies. They zone in on the kind of girls who hang out at parties waiting to score a player and hoping they'll like that player enough to marry them down the line if they go pro. In small towns, sport is a way out for the men that play it and the women who share their beds. I remember feeling sick at the idea of a girl getting used like that — players taking advantage of their power and shaming the poor woman afterward. It isn't loving or even sexy. The way Justin talked about it seemed abusive and manipulative.
I've also always felt sick at the thought of having to rely on a man for a secure future. Things between my mom and dad just proved to me that men can't be trusted to be around. Before the pregnancy, education was going to be my way out. It's why I've always tried so hard at school. I'm not a naturally gifted student, but my GPA is good because I focus. I put in my all because I know I want more from life than what I've been raised with.
It's not all about money either, just about opportunity, about choice, about security rather than living paycheck to paycheck, hoping the car doesn't break down or the roof doesn't cave in.
Now, with this pregnancy, I've done myself out of the opportunity I've been working so hard for. In my case, it's a man who's inadvertently stolen my security rather than failing to provide it.
I wish I knew what my foster brothers voted. Was it unanimous either way? If they voted yes, were there some who weren't positive who are now reluctantly going along with the idea?
So many questions and absolutely no answers.
Not that any of it matters either way.
This house is my security. This house is the roof over my head and the head of my child. If I can get my foster brothers to agree to sell up, I can take my share and head home, or maybe even go somewhere new. I can start again, holding my head high rather than trying to avoid anyone from college for fear that they know exactly what I did. Cathy is going to spread the news far and wide, I'm certain of that. I'm also certain that she's reclaimed Justin, whether they really want each other deep down or not. Maybe Cathy's looking up at the eagle-shaped crack in the ceiling right now, wondering if I noticed it too. Maybe Justin has his face between her legs, and all she can think about is that I wanted him, but she won.