Three Bodies

Don’t you ever have a threesome with your best friend and a guy you’re interested in if you’re not prepared to lose them both. Actually, don’t have a threesome at all with your best friend and a guy you’re interested in.

I said this to a bartender once as he handed me my glass of gin and tonic. I don’t remember what the conversation was about that led me to say this or volunteer the story that followed, but my friends were sitting at the bar with me so I assume they had something to do with it.

My sister, Peacely, always manages to bring it up because it is one of those things my family knows happened, but never speaks about—how do you even begin to breach a conversation about how you invited two boys over and had a threesome? For the longest time I expected that someone would tease me about it like Peacely does, and that people would somehow finally be forced to confront it, but no one ever did. The only way I know that they know is because Lolo, my other sister who wasn’t at the party, literally opened up with it later on in the day on the WhatsApp groupchat I was in with the rest of the sisters.

She texted: did you bring a boy home last night? uncle dan says you had the mother of love bites on your neck this morning. that it was probably from him.

I was flabbergasted and a little embarrassed to think I spent that day with a hickey on me that no one dared to tell me about. For some reason this inspired the rest of them to participate in what I found to be a cringe discussion on my sex life, and not even something I found to be a pleasant experience. It didn’t occur to me that since they had not sat me down to discuss the hickey, they would also not discuss the incident that had led to it being on my neck or wherever else it was, so I spent that time waiting for shit to hit the fan, self-conscious and embarrassed hoping it would happen sooner so I would not have to suffer the suspense any longer.

But it never did. It would be at another family gathering that I would learn why this was—a lot happens when my family throws a party, both good and bad. It is something we have stopped trying to control over the years. We are also notorious at ignoring and repressing things, only to bring them up during arguments when we try to see how deeply we can cut each other with words. It’s not our best attribute.