Maggie 6-4 (Patreon)

After a long statement regarding a fictional government’s stance on product labeling, Cole said, “So young Margaret, after considering the government’s preceding statement, which of the following is most strongly suggested ... a) a warning that applies to a small population is inappropriate, b) very few p—”

Maggie said, “You and Max never ... what we did ... you guys never did that with ... some girl ...”

He set the LSAT guide down on his lap. “What? Me and Max—double-team a girl?”

“Double team?” she said, her brows tilting up high and forlorn.

“Oh, no way, Maggie. Max isn’t like that. You know Max. I’ve never done that before.”

“You haven’t?”

“Not two dudes. I’ve been with two girls.”

“Really?”

He nodded like it wasn’t a big deal. “Bunch of times.”

She crossed her legs with petulance and clasped her hands on her tummy, looked away from him and up at the wall. “Gross. I hate to think of you with them.”

“It wasn’t love, Maggie. It was just bodies.”

“I hate to think of your thing,” she said, putting a foot out and tapping near his crotch, “going in their things.”

“Don't think about it. I don’t.”

“You don't?”

“Maggie, I couldn't even tell you their names.”

“I don't know if that's better or worse.”

“Yeah, you do.”

“Yeah, I do,” she agreed.

He let her stew on that a while, and she wouldn't look at him, her gaze instead traveling around her room. Cole had been with a lot of girls. There were probably a lot of things he'd done that she didn't want to know about. Her own sexual experimentation had come late, and strangely, Cole had been a very big part of it. She'd been with multiple partners, she'd gone crazy with her Max and let him watch her with another man. There were other things still she wouldn’t mind trying. But somehow she was stuck on this set of men. Her good friends. Her fiancé and the Best Man. Two guys in her life that she trusted and loved and cared fully for. The idea of experimentation, while still glimmering, seemed to wane and grow distant. But the wedding date was getting closer with each heartbeat.

She looked at him now, and he was waiting for her, smiling and listening. She said, “Do you think you could both go in at the same time?”

“With you? We did that.”

“No ...”

“Yes, we did, Maggie. Or wait,” he paused, cocking his head and looking up like he was trying to recollect. To himself he muttered, “Maybe Max, and I did that with a different girl.”

She opened her mouth wide and frowned in mock astonished horror. “Fuck off,” she enunciated slowly, then sat up and punched his thigh.

“Ha ha, no, I remember. It was you. It was you in your music room.”

“You're damn right that was me in my music room,” she said getting up on all fours and crawling near him, looking in his eyes, hers narrowed slyly.

“How could I forget?” he whispered.

“Right. I mean both in the same time, same ...”

“We did ...”

“No, the same ...” She put her hand between her thighs.

“What?” he laughed. “Hole? At the same time?”

“Yeah. No?”

He stared at her, his eyes darting over hers, a trembling open-mouthed smile on his face, a creak in his throat as he tried to find the right words.

She repeated, “What? No?”

He laughed out loud, leaned close and put his lips on hers. Her arms went around him, wrapped his neck and she kissed him with an open mouth, her tongue going over his. When he withdrew he said, “God, Maggie, I’m so glad to have you in my life.”

“What, cause I want two at once? ...”

“It’s the way you want it. You’re the sweetest thing.”

His lips took hers again, presumptively, and she pushed him away.

He said, “Let me kiss you one more time. I swear I’ll stop at one.”

“We can stop at one?”

“I know we can. Kiss me.”

“One kiss, Cole.”

Putting a limit on it was exciting. Their whole relationship was based on limits and exceeding them. It was in the excess that she found the ecstasy.

So when their lips came together she focused on the hesitation, focused on the tightness around her neck like she was a dog pulling on its lead. Their kiss was sweet and completely PG, soft pressing, breathing against one another.

They kept it at one kiss. Long and protracted and sweet. Literally sweet. When she pulled back, eyes on his, she softly said, “You taste like maple syrup.”

He bit that sexy, plump lower lip and eyed her. He gave her a smile, said, “Me and Maxy had pancakes.”

“You did? Now I wish I got out of bed to go.”

“Why didn't you?”

“Tired,” she said, stretching one arm up over her head. She scooted to the head of the bed and lay her back against the pillows. “Late nights. I just doubled my load taking on these LSATs.”

“You brought that on yourself.”

“I know I did.”

“You just need me so bad you gotta follow me all the way to Harvard like a little puppy dog.”

She laughed, but it was constricted. She said, “There’s other schools I could go to. I’m not applying only to Harvard.”

His eyes met hers and slowly his smile faded seeing she wasn’t joking. “Don’t,” he said, his brow lowered.

She smiled warmly, said, “Who’s the puppy dog now?”

* * *

Max took a deep breath, said, “Well, let’s start at the very worst point.”

Ken said, “Okay,” and he put his coffee down on the floor as well.

Max said, “God, this is so hard,” and he rolled his head around on his neck. Ken’s eyes darted to the time on his phone again. Max said, “Okay, okay, I can guess you know why I’m here, and probably understand why this is so hard. So I’m going to jump right in: you saw us in the music room.”

As Max had started the sentence, Ken’s eyes drifted downward, not at his phone this time, down at the design on the carpet. This was not something he wanted to talk about. Neither did Max, but he was going to marry this man’s sister.

Ken said, “You know I did.”

“I know you did.”

Ken still wouldn’t look up. He said, “I saw you. I saw my sister. And Cole.”

Max said, “I’m sorry you had to see that. Don’t say anything, I don’t want to make this hard for you. I just want it to be addressed.”

“You don’t have to—”

“I really do have to, Ken. You can see that I have to.”

Ken shrugged his shoulders almost imperceptibly.

Max said, “I really am sorry that you saw that. I guess ... I guess you should know ... I want you to know that Maggie is okay. You know, I care about her.”

“Of course ...”

“Right, of course I care about her. I just don’t want you to think ... I don’t want you to think that I made her do something she didn’t want to do.”

“I tried not to think about it at all.”

“Right, that makes sense. But still, it weighs on me, that you might think that I’m bad for Maggie.”

“I hadn’t thought about it.”

“Well, okay, I just ... I just think that you should know, it wasn’t even my idea.”

“You came all this way to tell me what I saw was my sister’s fault?”

“No, I came all this way tell you that she’s happy. I might not be happy, but she’s very happy.”

“You’re not happy?”

“With what you saw? No. I don’t know how much I can tell you, or should tell you, but Maggie ... wants more experience ...”

“Don’t tell me ...”

“No, but I want you to know that I want what’s best for her and now I’m not sure if I’m doing the right thing.”

Ken shook his head, and looked up at the sloping ceiling above them, half-smiling lips probably trying to form the phrase Stop talking.

But he wouldn’t stop talking, he came here for a reason.

“I think Maggie needs help,” he said with finality as if this was the point he was coming to.

“Help with what?”

“I gave her freedom, and she’s taking more than I bargained for. I think Cole is taking advantage.”

“How?”

“Look, we don’t have much time, I know, so let me say: I came for your help.”

“What do you think I can do?”

“You can give me the security footage.”

Ken said, “What security footage?”

* * *

While Maggie struggled to reach her phone, Cole tugged on her ankles and kept her from getting to it. She kicked her legs lightly, putting up the appearance of struggle, and swam on the surface of her bed, one arm extending to the nightstand where her phone vibrated underneath her flea-market lamp.

“Cole!” she laughed.

“We were talking,” he said, yanking her further away.

She laughed and struggled to pull her sweatshirt down from where it rode up at her waist.

Cole said, “We have things to discuss, Margaret.”

“I have to get it,” she giggled. “Cole, I have to. What if it’s Max?”

He released her, the phone now in its fourth ring. He ran his hands up her calves but she got to her knees and retrieved the phone. She flipped it over and looked at the screen and saw who was calling. She said, “Ugh,” and turned it to face Cole, showing him the screen of her phone, saying, “Speaking of ‘Margaret.’” On her screen the word Carol floated over a picture of her mother, an executive portrait where she wore a crisp suit and a stern face.

Cole smiled and lay back, humming Flight of the Valkyries.

Maggie, still upright on her knees, answered, said, “Hello?”

It was like walking in on a conversation midway. After a curt, “Margaret,” a confirmation she had on the phone the person she intended, Carol was right into business, leaving Maggie wondering why she answered when she could have easily stayed play wrestling on the bed with Cole.

“Your father and I have been spending time on the paperwork needed for your applications.”

“Yes,” she said, feeling a bureaucratic entanglement settling on her and robbing her of the fun she was having. She settled down to sit on her heels now.

Carol continued. “You understand the effort required to attend?”

“Of course.”

“I mean your obligations, Margaret.”

“Yes, of course I do.”

“You have too much going on, Margaret. We worry about your focus.”

“My focus?” she said, exasperated, rolling her eyes for Cole who watched her intently. “I’m studying for the LSAT right now. I’m confident I will be accepted.”

“I’m confident you will as well.”

“You are?” she said, hating the automatic bolstering she felt, a lifetime of conditioning in the Becker household pumping chemicals of acceptance and appreciation into her bloodstream.

“Margaret, you’re capable of much more than even Law School.”

“I am? Like what?”

“Listen, Margaret, have you considered you would be married when you attend?”

“I know,” she said weakly, that endorphin rush quelled by sudden dread.

“What does Max say about this?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? Would he be opposed to postponing the wedding?”

“Max? No. I don’t know. I don’t want to, I—”

“Would you and Max visit next weekend?”

“Why would we postpone the wedding?”

Cole’s jaw dropped, and he made a Holy Shit! Face, scooting closer to her and resting his hand on her knee. She felt her posture slump, the effort of staying upright a chore now and she fell back to sit in her pillows, Cole stroking her foot and watching her expression with concern. But Cole kept his expression bright, and he mouthed, Don’t worry and the warmth from this made her feel so good inside.

“Your father and I would like to meet you and Max next weekend.”

“Okay,” she said, hating her phone and the fact that she could be reached. “I can be at Law School and married. I have no doubt.”

Cole scooted closer, his thumb on her foot coming close to tickling her and she flinched. He did it again, making her jump, and she made a mean face to him, mouthed Don’t, but she had to cover her mouth to stop her mother from hearing her mirth.

“Is something funny, Margaret?”

“No,” she said, a tremble in her face as she took her foot out of Cole’s grip while he winked at her. “I’m going to Law School and I will be married.”

“If that's what you want, but you should consider what it may do to your school year. Harvard isn't easy. And you're not going unless you’re top in your class.”

Those words put a sick dread in her stomach like she was back in high school, and insurmountable pressure was on. Somehow the idea of marrying Max—being out of the Becker household, maybe working at a gallery dabbling at painting while Max earned a living, which he would certainly do, grew more appealing. And she hated that her mother had made Max that escape, mad that Carol had made Max something that was easy to settle for. The truth was he was easy to settle for. Marrying Max would be like slipping on a water slide, rushing along an easy groove, something with no friction. It was a terrible thought.

She said, “I'll think about it,” though she knew she wouldn’t.

Carol said, “You should talk to Max. Come next weekend, and I’d like you to bring Cole as well.”

“Okay, mother, I have to go, my study partner just arrived. We have a lot to do,” she said and got to her knees again, ran her nails through Cole’s hair just above his ear and he leaned his head to her touch. They said their curt goodbyes, and she tossed her phone to the bed and groaned.

“Bad?” Cole asked as she collapsed theatrically into his arms.

“Next time I try to answer my phone I need you to fight harder to stop me.”

“Deal,” he said. “You okay?”

“I’m fine but I want to have fun right now. I don’t want to study any more.”

“But Margaret, you’re study partner just got here,” he laughed and held her.