MEARA
If heaven was a place on Earth, I thought it could have been Chicago. I floated from one boyfriend to the next, each time experiencing something I’d never thought I could. Damien handled me gently while Kent was rough and exciting. Sean was a mixture of both, domineering and jovial. I was never alone for the better part of a month. Every night I spent in someone else’s bed, and though we had yet to work up to a combined experience, that was always on the horizon.
In the office, things were tense. Everybody knew what was going on. We were only so good at hiding it, and since the three of them were partners at the firm, they didn’t see a great need to keep things a secret. The two other women who worked with us, the other intern and the receptionist, kept their distance.
The receptionist was nice enough. I didn’t really have much interaction with her. She arrived at nine on the dot and left at five. She took three breaks: one in the morning, a lunch break, and then a short bathroom break in the afternoon. Occasionally, I sat out at her station during her break if there was an important call she was expecting. It was that kind of mutual assistance that brought her over to my side. She never said anything to my face, but I got the impression that she was approaching it with a “live and let live” type of mentality.
That wasn’t the case with Sam. My office partner gave me the cold shoulder more often than not. But when she did decide to talk to me, her tone was derogatory. She took every opportunity she could to make me feel like a slut.
In the beginning, I could see her trying to flirt with Kent. When that didn’t work, she took it out on me. I tried to maintain some semblance of professionalism. It was hard when the guys kept coming into the office and touching me.
They would put a hand on my shoulder or lean down for a kiss. Sometimes they would rub my upper back or touch my knee. I loved these little electric moments that we shared, but if Sam walked in on us, she inevitably killed the mood.
I tried to extend an olive branch. I wasn’t going to go deep into my own motivations or share any intimate details, but I did want to win her over. She was having none of it and warned me away.
Looking at it from her point of view, I could see where the problem lay. This was an office building, not a bar. There really shouldn’t be so much sex. But I couldn’t help it if all of the men were attracted to me. And the fact that I was so happy all of the time drove her crazy.
She began doing little passive aggressive things like eating my lunch and locking me out of our office. One time I found the door locked and went immediately to Damien. Instead of helping me out, he pulled me down onto his desk and had his way with me. An hour later, when I returned to my own station, the door was open.
I gave Sam a tight look as I walked in. She sneered at me, letting me know that she understood where I had been. It was like that for weeks before I finally demanded help from the bosses.
“I know it’s got to be hard for her,” I told them as we were all seated in a Chinese restaurant, working on buffet plates. “But if one of you could just talk to her.”
“I’ve been meaning to do it for a while,” Damien answered. “It should be me.”
“Why?” Sean asked.
“Because I’m senior partner,” Damien said.
“Like hell,” Sean reacted.
“There’s no senior partner,” Kent objected.
“We could bring Vlad in to talk to her,” Damien suggested.
Sean snorted. “Surely we can clean up our own mess.”
It was my night to be with Damien, and as I stood in the parking lot, kissing everyone else goodbye, I felt a strange twinge in my stomach. Putting it down to the greasy food, I got into the car.
It was so rare for me to go back to my apartment, I wondered why I was still paying rent. Of course, I couldn’t rely on my men to put me up every night. I had to have some place to fall back on if things didn’t work out.
But most of my stuff was at various other houses and condos. I had pajamas that I wore on different days, and I was looking forward to getting into the Damien pair. Weirdly, I wasn’t interested in sex that night. Damien suggested that we cuddle up on the couch and watch a movie. That was definitely more my speed, and so we got comfortable and made ourselves some hot chocolate.
It was the perfect way to pass the evening, and when we crawled into bed, I almost forgot about my wayward stomach. That wasn’t the case the next morning. I barely made it to the toilet in time to throw up. By expelling the last of the restaurant food, I felt better but only marginally. I was nauseous and headachy. I wanted to stay home, but Damien was overly concerned.
He convinced me that we should go to the medical aid center so that they could make sure I wasn’t suffering from anything serious. I told him I was fine, if he would just go to work and make my excuses, I was sure it was just a mild case of food poisoning.
“If that’s the case, we’ll be on our way before the market opens,” Damien predicted, bundling me up and helping me to the car.
I wore my favorite pair of jeans, but I couldn’t help feeling a little bit fat. The waistband was digging in painfully, making me wonder if all the sex and late-night munchies it fueled was affecting me. I would have to be careful. I didn’t want to lose my figure and risk losing any of my partners. They were too kind to mention an additional five pounds, but if I let it creep up to ten or twenty, I was sure that would be a problem.
I didn’t mention my suspicions to Damien. There was a bathroom scale in my apartment, but I didn’t bring it on overnight trips. Why would I? So there was no way of knowing if I’d gained weight. Sex was aerobic, so that probably wasn’t it. It was likely just another symptom of this stomach bug, whatever that was. I wasn’t worried, although after the medical aid center got ahold of me, I was singing a different tune.
They had me lie on an examining table, and a young woman who was probably only five years older than me rubbed her hands with sanitizer before slipping them into powdered gloves. She touched my stomach gently in four different places. The last place she touched sent pain shooting up my spine.
“I’m afraid I have to recommend that you be admitted to the hospital,” the doctor said.
“What?” I sat up on my elbows.