HUGE HOUSE HATES: Chapter 23

Why does the universe do this?

Things start off great, and then it’s as though the rug has been ripped from under my feet, and I land flat on my ass.

I turn into Danny’s pillow, inhaling the scent of his ridiculously masculine cologne, stretching my limbs, and sighing. Since Mom called, I haven’t been able to face up to what she said. I haven’t wanted to imagine what it would feel like if I have to move out and never see the Carlton brothers again.

I’ve done what I always do when life gets tough and buried my head in the sand. I spent last night letting them fuck me into oblivion because while I was coming, I wasn’t thinking about real life and what needed to be done.

Danny held me all night, and in his strong arms, with his lips pressed to the top of my head, I felt secure enough to sleep, but he had to leave early this morning, and now my mind is whirring, and my heart is thumping, and I have to face up to the fact that I have no idea what I’m going to do.

I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to go back to the life I had before them.

I want the feeling of safety they bring to my life. I want encouragement and kindness. I want laughter and unity. When Maggie got together with her men, I thought she was crazy, but now I understand. There’s no chance that I’ll ever feel this way about anyone else because five men deliver five times everything a woman could ever need.

I didn’t want to feel this way about them. Keeping them at arm’s length started out as my priority, but somehow, they’ve managed to creep under my armor and touch my heart, my heart that now feels achy and sad.

Once again, I pull up my Instagram account and search for Cathy’s profile. Flicking through the images is hard because, on the one hand, I can see the emotion and connection between me Tobias, River, Danny, Mark, and Alden, and on the other hand, I want to tear Cathy’s head from her neck for uploading the pictures. She knew what she was doing. When Mom set up an Instagram account for herself, she asked all my friends if she could follow them, so she didn’t look like someone with no friends.

What Cathy did wasn’t an accident. It was a deliberate act to fuck up my life.

The trouble is, I know what will happen if I confront her. She’ll plead ignorance and pretend that the images were all innocently uploaded. She’ll deny noticing that I’m intimate with my stepbrothers. She’ll make out that I’m the one at fault. If I didn’t want people to know about what I was doing, why the hell would I do it in public? And maybe Cathy would be right. Maybe we should have been more careful.

But I didn’t imagine that the pictures would find themselves in my mom’s Insta feed, or that someone who is supposed to be my friend would try to fuck up my life in such an obvious way.

I drop my phone onto the bed and haul myself up until I’m sitting on the edge of the mattress. Looking down at my body, I can see the evidence of what we did last night etched onto my skin. Hickeys on my thighs where Tobias sucked, beard-burn where Alden scraped his chin across my belly, little reddened tips on my nipples where Mark’s fingers pinched, and Danny nibbled. I even have five little bruises where River’s fingers dug into my hip. Each mark tells a story of pleasure but also reminds me that this is too much. It’s too intense. It’s too outside of what fits with society’s expectations and what would be accepted by everyone we know.

Well, everyone except Maggie and her harem. I think she’d be grateful to have a friend living the same kind of lifestyle. Oh, and Mason and his family too.

We may not be totally alone in this lifestyle, but that doesn’t make it easier.

I shower quickly and dress in my cut-off denim shorts and a green retro tee with a huge daisy emblazoned across the front. I firmly believe that the way I dress has a big impact on my mood. I’m hoping the daisy will lift my spirits. If I had a shirt with a sunshine print , that would have been my first pick.

I’m driving to my studio when my phone rings. It’s Maggie, probably the only person outside of my men that I’d pick up a call from right now.

“Maggie,” I say, already feeling an ache in my throat at the relief of hearing from my friend.

“Shit, Cora. I saw Cathy’s photos. Your mom…”

“Yep. She saw them too,” I say, misery clouding my tone.

“Well, if my mom’s initial response to my relationship is anything to go by, I guess she isn’t happy at what she’s seen.”

“Understatement,” I say. “At least your mom didn’t have a connection to your men. Mine is raging that I’m going to fuck up her relationship.”

“No…Oh shit. I hadn’t even thought about that angle.”

“She told me I have to break up with them.”

“I’m so sorry, hon.”

I exhale a long, sad breath, allowing my shoulders to slump. “Yeah. Me too. I haven’t told them yet. I just don’t know what to do. I mean, I know what I have to do, but I don’t want to do it.”

“Of course,” Maggie hums as though she’s thinking about my options and trying to come up with a solution to end my problems. “I would tell you that time is a great healer of problems,” she says. “Especially in these kinds of situations. If your mom saw how awesome you all are together, she wouldn’t be so down on the idea.”

“If Mom was already married to Randolph, she probably wouldn’t be feeling so worried about her own situation. She thinks he’ll call off the wedding if he finds out.”

“Why the hell would he do that?”

“I don’t know…I guess maybe to put some distance between our families.”

“Those boys aren’t going to listen to their dad. They’re grown men, and this isn’t a strict country where adult children let their parents dictate their lives. If they want you, they’re going to fight for you. The way they were with you at the exhibition…well, I can just tell that the feelings are strong.”

“You can tell?” I say, wanting to hear her reassurance to squash my own niggling doubts.

“Of course,” Maggie says. “Maybe you didn’t notice, but I caught some seriously adoring looks heading in your direction.”

“Are you sure those looks weren’t just hot gazes where they were thinking about sex?”

“I can tell the difference,” she says. “And what about those kisses? They were seriously tender.”

Flashes of perfect kisses invade my mind. Not just passionate kisses, but sweet and soft ones. “Yeah, they are really great.”

“So maybe you should be thinking about telling your mom to butt out. She doesn’t need to tell Randolph. He doesn’t have to find out until after their wedding. By then, you’ll all know if the relationship is something that you want to pursue in the long term, and you can fight through any objections you face.”

“You make everything sound so simple,” I say, shaking my head.

“Nah, everything is complicated as fuck. I’m just used to working through really tough issues and trying to keep my head on straight even though the world is burning around me.”

“Very poetic,” I say, smiling sadly. Real-life isn’t like the movies where everything ends up tied into a neat and happy ending. It’s gritty and harsh, and it hurts like a MF.

“You try managing a relationship with eleven men and then tell me how easy you find life. I mean, I love them all to death, and they are awesome partners, but we have our disagreements – the same as any couple –, and then they have disagreements with each other. I seem to spend half my life trying to mediate in sibling dramas.”

“Yeah, I can see how that will happen. So what you’re saying is that I should just ignore Mom and tell the boys we need to keep this a secret from their father, and just get on with my life.”

“Give yourself time to work out if this is a forever relationship,” she says. “And if it is, then you fight for it with absolutely everything you have.”

I’m just about to steer the conversation away from myself and ask Maggie how she is when another call lights up my phone. It’s Naomi.

“Maggie, can I call you back?” I ask, worried that there might be an issue with the studio.

“Sure, honey. Whenever.”

I hang up and immediately take the call from Naomi. “Hey, Nai. Is everything okay?”

“Have you seen the art and culture section?”

“What art and culture section?”

“There’s a feature online about the exhibition. They picked up the story because Mason’s profile is on the up. There’s some stuff in there about your ceramics.”

“Really? That’s awesome.”

Naomi clears her throat, and it strikes me that she’d never call me about something like this when we’re going to be at work together in less than thirty minutes. “It is awesome, isn’t it?”

“Awesome if you don’t mind your private life becoming public.”

“What do you mean?” For the second time in as many days, my chest feels hollow with anticipated concern.

“The article is less about the actual art. The title is ‘Why does art result in multiple-partner relationships?’”

“What?” I spin the steering wheel to the right and pull over at the side of the road.

“The article includes information about Mason and his family and also about you and the Carltons. I thought you’d want to know.”

“What? Oh my God.”

“Look. It’s just an art and culture piece. It’s not front-page news. Only people in our limited circles are going to read it.”

“That isn’t making this sound less awful, Naomi.”

“I know, sweetie. I’m trying to find a silver lining to your privacy being violated, but there really isn’t one.”

“I need to call Alden,” I say. “Can you send me a link to the article? I want to read it for myself before I speak to him.”

“Sure. I’ll do that now. And don’t worry, sweetie. It’ll blow over. New news today is old news tomorrow.”

“Maybe,” I say, closing my eyes and rubbing my face with my hands. “But in my experience, gossip sticks and changes minds. Can you imagine if I start losing orders because of this? Not everyone who appreciates art is liberal-minded.”

“Just read the article, and if you need anything, just let me know. You are still coming into the studio today?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe.”

“You have to, sweetie. Those orders aren’t going to wait around. You don’t want to get behind on your work just because some asshole saw a way of making a boring article about art into something salacious.”

“I’ll message you.”

It only takes Naomi five seconds after we hang up before she sends the article. From the moment it opens up on my phone, I’m overwhelmed with a swelling sick feeling. The pictures Cathy posted on Instagram have been picked up by the writer of the article. What he’s written is only loosely about our show and mostly about the impact of art on sexual relationships. “Does creativity make us more liberal with our sexuality?” is the question of the piece. Suddenly, those pictures have gone from reaching a small number of my friends and my mom to reaching the whole city and maybe even further afield. The first real exposure my brand has received will forever be linked to the fact that I’m fucking five brothers. And even more terrible is the mention of Randolph Carlton.

There is no way this isn’t getting back to him. Someone he knows will read it. Maybe they already have. Maybe Randolph is fuming and about to unleash his wrath on his sons.

As I carry on reading, there is a quote at the bottom of the article from Alden. “Sex and art go hand in hand. Even in ancient civilizations, sex was depicted in pottery and sculpture. Experimentation has always been an important part of finding inspiration.” Alden Carlton says of his relationship with Cora Horton, “Sex and Art are like two sides of the same coin. Cora and I both take inspiration from our polyamorous relationship in form and emotion.”

Experimentation? Is that what I am to Alden and his brothers? A body to experiment with? Somebody to use for their own pleasure and artistic inspiration?

I swallow sour-tasting bile and toss the phone onto the passenger seat so that I can quickly flip the car around. This isn’t a conversation suitable to have over the phone. This has to be made in person.

As I pull into the driveway, hoping to find Alden still at home so that I can tear him a new one, I find a familiar car parked outside the house. Whoever owns it was at one of the parties thrown by the boys in our pranking phase. It must be one of their friends.

I jump out and jog up to the front door, my heart beating so fast that my head spins.

It’s as if the scale of my life that felt so balanced at the exhibition has now been heavily weighted on the side of disappointment and disaster.

I want to seek solace in the arms of the men who’ve become so important to me because they’ve always known how to help me when I’m lost, but nothing is the same. The earth has shifted, and I’m caught in the chasm that’s opened beneath my feet. Alden should be the one to give me some reassurance that this isn’t the end of the world, but he’s betrayed me with his words. He’s given me false hope that what we shared was anything more than a convenient fuck. Tears leak from my eyes at the disappointment, and when I finally get the key in the door, it’s not Alden I see. It’s Kyle Christopher.

And at that moment, everything falls apart.