Th Boarder or Was It

Lets start with a really big thank you to Randi, who as always did a remarkably awesome job of editing and guiding me through this story.

Additionally, I need to apologise. I couldn't help myself and tinkered again with the finished product.

Any mistakes found are attributable to me and me alone.

BTW, it is a long story, if you have a short attention span. You might want to give this on a miss.

*****

"Oh shit, really?"

"Come on, Hon, it won't be for long. He's a trainee teacher at the high school. He's only moved to town and doesn't know anybody. He just needs somewhere to stay until he sorts himself out. Plus, he's gonna pay two hundred a week."

"Yeah, but I like having our privacy. This isn't exactly a big house. There's only the one frigging bathroom."

"It'll he fine. He sounds like a decent guy."

"You only talked on the phone though, right?"

"Yeah, I got his number off the school gazette. He's staying at the camp ground, and he said it's costing him over four hundred a week. Come on, Hon. We can make a little cash and do a good deed."

Unconvinced, and feeling a little sceptical, I mumbled, "Yeah, I suppose so."

She gave me the megawatt smile, and it made me feel better. As if it was going to end any other way. It wasn't like I was ever going to get my way. I learned that a long time ago. When Leah wanted something, she usually got it. In our four year marriage I could count on one hand the number of arguments I had won.

I was given some good advice on my wedding day. "Luke, learn these words well, and they will hold you in good stead. 'YES DEAR, WHATEVER YOU SAY DEAR, AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, YOU'RE ABSOLUTELY RIGHT DEAR.'

"Learn them and use them every day. Happy wife, happy life."

Those words of wisdom came from my Uncle Greg, and he was right. They did work.

Leah had been a bit of a wild child when I met her. She was a teacher at the local junior school. She might have been a teacher, but she was also a rebel. We actually met at a climate change rally. She was fiery and passionate. She jumped on every cause she could and fought like a tiger.

In saying that, we were both passionate about climate change. It's what drew us together really. Every time I attended a rally, there she was right at the forefront: placard waving, chanting and yelling.

As passionate as I was about it, I was an amateur by comparison. She was like a guerilla warrior, and I was nothing more than a weekend warrior.

Leah was raised in a household where civil disobedience was promoted, not subdued. Her folks were old hippies, and as much as I liked them, they could be hard work. Oh hell yeah, they were trouble with a capital T.

Our life together, our marriage was full of love, and warfare. Four years in and we already had two kids. Leah didn't believe in the contraceptive pill. She used a diaphragm and the old fail-safe, condoms...

We both worked full time, which was only facilitated because her mum, Gloria, looked after the kids during the daytime. Money was tight; I had just started my own little business installing solar power systems. It had been my thing since leaving Uni. I wanted to do something positive for the planet and did a lot of research. I found a couple of trustworthy suppliers and started installing them. Mostly, it was for the farmers and people who lived out of town.

By using different suppliers and my own switching system, I managed to find deals way better than the franchised suppliers.

I did work long hours, but the money was good, and it allowed us to buy our little cottage on the edge of town. It was only two acres, but it meant we had no direct neighbours and we had a huge vegetable garden and orchard.

Leah's mum Gloria came out to the cottage to mind the kids while Leah went back to teaching, which she loved.

Gloria loved our two little girls, Serenity and Jewel. She was impossible to keep out of our lives. Not that I complained. She was unlike anything my mates warned me of. They were full of tales of interfering nagging women. Gloria was none of that.

In some ways, I suppose she interfered, but it was always filled with love. She was only forty-seven, and it was like looking at a slightly older version of my wife. Leah caught me several times ogling her mum and teased me mercilessly.

I was nervous around her parents, at first. They were so different from mine. Gloria and Roger were a couple of hippies. They loved life and lived it to the fullest.

That love of life flowed into Leah; she was every bit as free. It was what attracted me to her in the first place.

Life in Ashburton was relaxed; it was, after all, a farming town. Although these days, it had diversified a little. Allenton school where Leah taught was only a fifteen minute cycle ride from our little cottage, which suited her perfectly. We cycled everywhere we could.

The thought of sharing our home didn't excite me at all. Leah and I enjoyed our weekends together. It was part of the reason I worked long hours during the week. I tried my hardest to keep weekends free for family. Now we would have some other bloke hanging around.

The day Felix turned up, my concerns evaporated. He was a really cool guy, chill, and easy going. We were able to forge a friendship easily.

When he stumbled on me sitting on the back porch, plucking away on my guitar, he rushed into his room, and came out with his own. Our music choices were so similar. We played along as Leah held a joint up to our lips.

That was the other thing that worried me before he moved in. Not all teachers were forgiving about such things as pot smoking. Thankfully, Felix enjoyed it, which meant we didn't have to hide our garden. Sitting out the back with a bottle of my homemade wine, or cider, smoking a nice fat joint and having a sing-song became our daily thing.

"See, I told you it would be okay," Leah said one evening while we were laying in bed.

"Yeah, all right. You were right, dear," I said jokingly.

She slapped my shoulder. "Don't say it like that."

"Like what?"

"Like you're simply saying it to save your arse."

I gave her a warm kiss, my hands holding her softly as our tongues danced a slow seductive sexy waltz. She hated me saying 'Yes dear' after I told her about the advice I was given.

"I'm not some old harridan who nags you constantly."

I let my kisses change the subject for me, and when my cock slid into her molten sexy core, I was in heaven and she responded appreciatively. It was lovely, the feel of her body responding, squirming and writhing beneath me. Making love like this was delicious, slow and sensual, our bodies as one, our mouths locked together, our breath combining sweetly. The rush to orgasm forgotten; it was merely an ambition, it was the journey that was the delight, her hips moving slowly at first, but then later as her need grew, I felt the urgency, the hunger and picked up my own pace.

The only anxiety centred on birth control. Her hatred of the contraceptive pill meant we had to take precautions. The diaphragm was a barrier, but not always safe. Around her most fertile times we added a condom, which I hated.

We had talked about me getting the snip, but we actually wanted another child, Leah wanted a year to get things more in order: a year without nappies and sleepless nights, plus, she was enjoying being back teaching again. It was more than something she enjoyed, it was a passion.

Felix came from a large family and wasn't scared off by Serenity and Jewel climbing all over him. They loved having another person around the house. He was often dragged into make believe picnics and school with their collection of dolls and toys.

The extra couple of hundred bucks didn't hurt either. That was the icing on the cake little bonus. The fact he was happy to join my side of any discussions Leah and I might have wasn't bad, either.

I guess I started to worry after Felix had been living with us about six weeks. Work was the killer for me. Keeping my weekends free meant long hours during the week, and with Government incentives available for households to switch to more environmentally friendly power systems, I had been inundated with requests. Now, rather than getting home at six or seven, it was more like eight O'clock at night.

It was way too late for Leah to stall the evening meal. By the time I got home, my meal would be in the microwave. Leah was unhappy with my hours and complained bitterly. "Stop coming home so late. You are missing out on far too much. The girls hate not having their daddy here."

"I can't. If this business is going to sustain us then I need to put the hours in now. I could defer the work to weekends, if you prefer?"

"No!" she said forcefully, like she was reprimanding one of her students. "I was trying to say money shouldn't be the deciding factor. Family should be."

No amount of arguing could shift her position. Initially, when I got home late, she came and sat with me so I didn't have to eat alone. Now as an act of defiant rebellion, she left me to eat alone. If she wasn't going to get her way, she was going to do her bit to make me feel her wrath.

After a particularly long hard day at work, I went straight to the microwave and heated up my stew, whilst I made a cup of tea. Sitting down to eat, I heard the laughter and chit chat coming from the lounge. Leah and Felix were mocking some stupid reality TV show they were watching.

It was giggly, and intimate as they invented lines to talk over the show.

Placing my dirty plate in the dishwasher, I walked into the lounge where I found Leah and Felix cuddled up together on the couch like a married couple.

"What are you watching?" I muttered, struggling to mask my disquiet.

Leah glanced up without moving. "Oh, hi Hon. I didn't know you were home."

Felix, at least, showed some shock and tried to move, lifting his arm from around her shoulder, and sitting upright. "Hey bro, long day huh?"

"Yeah, long, and tiring. So what are you watching?"

Leah, responded. "Married at First Sight. God, it's bloody funny. Such a load of crap, but bloody funny."

"Since when do you watch that shit?"

She gave me a funny glare. "First time tonight. There was nothing else on." As if to annoy me, she wriggled over closer to Felix. I noticed the empty wine bottle on the table. It was a new one I made a month or so earlier from the wild passionfruit vines that were such a pest on the property behind ours.

We hadn't tried it yet, and I had been saving it for a time when we could sample it together.

"Was it any good?" I asked pointing to the empty bottle, my irritation obvious.

"Mate, it was bloody awesome." Felix said before Leah said, "Shush. The shows about to start."

I turned and walked out, resentment building quickly. I showered, enjoying the stinging bite of the needle point jets of water. I stayed in longer than usual, letting the scalding jets nullify my anger.

After changing, I walked back to the kitchen for a hot milo before going to bed. The show must have finished because Leah walked in behind me, slipped her arms around my waist and nuzzled her wet lips into the back of my neck. "What's up, Mr?"

"I was saving that wine for when we could enjoy it together."

She stiffened a little at my response. "Luke, there must be fifty bottles out in the shed."

"Yeah, but we hadn't tried it. I wanted to try it together."

She sighed as if mollifying a student. "Sorry, next time I'll wait."

With a final kiss, she said. "Could you make us all one please, Hon?" Without waiting for my response, she was gone.

They were again sitting on the couch, but now they were both upright, and the sound was muted. I placed the drinks on the coffee table in front of them and sat beside Leah.

"Dude, you're working some killer hours," Felix said, "You must rack up some bloody K's during a day."

"Yeah, the requests are coming from far and wide at the mo."

"Have you thought about taking on somebody else to help out?"

"Yeah, thought about it, but there's not enough money in it yet. Most of the work at the moment is for quotes and inspections."

"You don't have to take them all, though." Leah complained. "You could just pick out the more likely ones. Leave the rest."

"Nah, that won't work. A lot of quotes I gave out last year are now bearing fruit. Plus, I'm still trying to establish my rep. Lots of competition these days."

The conversation slowly dwindled down, the tiredness sinking in. With a stretch and yawn, I said. "I'm going up to bed."

Normally, Leah came to bed with me. Tonight, she stayed on the couch. "I'll be up in a little bit, babe."

I didn't hear her come to bed that night, and the next couple of nights were much the same. The connection between Felix and Leah seemed to be growing. The weekend did give me some reprieve, but Saturday afternoon, I was laying on the big rug by the French doors with the girls colouring in.

The sun beamed in through the glass warming the Autumn day. Leah walked over and reached for my hand. "Would you like to go for a walk?"

There was something about her voice that made me uneasy. "Yeah, no worries. Sounds good." Standing, I was about to tell the girls to get ready.

"The girls are staying with Felix."

Now I was worried, this was unusual. Felix walked out of the kitchen with milk and cookies. The moment the girls saw the cookies, they lost any interest in what Leah and I were up to.

Once outside, Leah grabbed my hand in hers, and we walked off up the road, our arms swinging.

"Okay, Leah, what's happening?"

"I wanted to talk to you about Felix and I."

She must have felt my stuttering step, as the shock hit me. "Luke, I would like to sleep with Felix tonight, okay?"

"What?" I spluttered. Her words still filtering through my addled brain. "What do you mean sleep with?"

"We've gotten close recently. I like him, he's nice. You know I don't buy into all that marital monogamy crap. It's not like we haven't talked about it, Luke."

"Yeah we have, but this has come out of left field, shit you never said anything. It's hardly like you're just talking about which shoes you should wear."

"Luke, come on, Hon. We talked about this before we married. You knew then how I felt about this."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. We spoke about it, and yes, you made your position clear, but I guess I always thought once we were married and the girls came along, things would change."

She stopped walking as we neared Melrose Road, which lead down to the river. "Why... Nothing's changed. We decided we were both free to enjoy trysts with other people so long as we were discreet and respectful."

"I know, but... Shit, Leah, there's so much going on. Felix lives with us. Are you suggesting this will become a regular thing?"

"I'm not suggesting anything. I want to explore our connection. You and I agreed we were free to explore, but we would both have the right of veto, and that we would never cheat or do anything behind each others backs. So, I am asking your permission to sleep with Felix tonight."

"What does sleep with mean? Are you spending the night with him?"

She shook her head as we started walking again. The gravel was uneven, the road surface requiring more care. "No, I was being polite." She leaned closer, the north westerly wind biting at our exposed skin. With her mouth close to my ear, she asked teasingly, seductively, "Would you prefer I was more direct?"

I sighed slowly, her words tugging painfully at me. "Yes, that'd help."

She almost giggled as she coquettishly whispered. "Would you mind if I let Felix fuck me tonight?"

There it was... No more confusion. "I should have started with that, shouldn't I?" she continued to whisper, her breath condensing on my skin as we neared the river.

"What am I supposed to do?" I asked.

"Luke, you don't have to do anything. The only change will be, when we go to bed tonight, I will go with Felix. As soon as we're done, I'll come back to our bed."

"Jesus Christ, Leah. How can you be so calm about this? What about birth control?"

"I'll have my diaphragm in place, and he will wear a condom, of course."

"Shit, Leah. Why did you have to spring this on me like this. Couldn't we talk about it first. This is a huge deal for me."

"I wanted to talk to you, but you're never here lately," she snapped bitterly. "Every night when you get home, you're exhausted. We haven't had sex in over a week."

"I know, but I'm trying to build our future."

We had reached the little track that led down onto the river bank. Leah sat down on a rock and tugged at my hand. "Luke, don't make it into a big deal. It's only sex. Bloody hell, I'll be back in our bed afterwards."

"Yeah, well... I'm not like you Leah. I think it is a big deal."

Now she looked really confused. "We talked bout this while we were dating. If you think it's such a big deal, don't you think you should have mentioned this back then?"

"Yes, I know I should have. In all honesty. I always hoped the situation would never eventuate."

"Well it's here now, so what do you say? Felix is a nice guy. You get on great. It's not like I'm running off with him."

"Yeah, that's now. What happens if you have sex and then fall in love with him?"

Again she gave me the deep frustrated sigh. "Because I'm not looking for love. I don't want to replace you. It would simply be two friends having a little fun."

I sat there, staring at the sunlight glistening off the sparkling water. Usually, I loved walking down here. The light and flowing water always seemed to be carrying hope, a fresh new day. Now it seemed to rumble, carrying dark forces of doom.

Leah snuggled closer and leaned in for a kiss, her hand curling around my neck. Her grip tightened as our tongues played.

We sat unmoving apart from the gentle kisses. It felt like all day, but after what must have been less than half an hour, she said, "Well?"

"If it's what you want. What choice do I have?"

"Oh for heavens sake, Luke. If you don't want me to do it, just say so."

"Okay then," I said, sucking in a deep breath. "No, I don't want you to do it."

Her brow furrowed in a deep frown, arched and hooded. "You're serious?"

"You just asked me to be honest. There it is."

She let her hands drop, and she stood quickly. Brushing of her jeans where she had sat on the ground, she said, "We better get back then, I suppose." She walked off quickly, and I had to jump up to keep pace with her.

"What happens now?" I asked.

She shrugged as she walked. "Nothing, I guess. I have to say though. I am really disappointed. We frigging well talked about exactly this before we married. I always thought you understood. You have always been so open minded. Now it's like I don't know you at all."

She walked so quickly I had to stride out to keep up with her. "Bugger it, Luke. This is why I asked for your thoughts about this when we dated. You knew I dated other guys while we went out."

"Yeah, but not after I proposed."

"No." She sighed. "But you should have said you were against it. What am I supposed to do now? Everything our relationship is based on is a lie. I thought you were open to opportunities, that you were open minded, not an intolerant conservative."

"What do you mean? I have always been honest with you."

"No you haven't. I always thought this would be just a little bit of fun, that you understood this moment would eventually arise. All the while you were lying to me. Bloody hell, Luke. You know how I feel about lying."

She was right of course. Shit, even when we were writing our wedding vows, we left out all the stuff about forsaking all others. We left out obeying, like we were property. Our vows were all about love and respect, honour, caring for. Leah said time and again that she did not believe in monogamy. Stupidly, I went along with her. Looking back, I did lie about how I felt, whereas she had been totally open and honest with me. Hindsight is so easy. Yeah, I should have done things differently. I was young, in love with the woman who I already knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.