Panacea

I took a break from them when they ordered dessert and went to stand outside. The evening air was chilly, and it woke me up from my spell. I started freaking out. What had we done? That was unreal. What if things were never the same between Heather and me anymore? What if all my greatest fears would come to pass, and I was just riding the afterglow high right now?

I didn’t hear David join me, so I jumped when he began speaking.

“I know what you’re thinking.”

I stared up at the sky and resisted the urge to give him a shove. He pissed me off with his paternal tone all the time. If I was thinking clearly, I would have been amused that my feel-good thoughts about David had abruptly vanished, just like that, all because I was getting stuck in my own head.

“You’re trying to feel bad about this.”

I looked at him then, a little alarmed that he was echoing the same thoughts I’d just had minutes before.

“We still have a lot more to learn about each other, and I don’t have you figured out just yet. But I know you fairly well now and I know you’re a good guy. This isn’t the sort of thing good guys do, you’re probably thinking. Or maybe you’re thinking that this is some kind of infidelity and we all just broke our vows and now it’s going to be a big mess.”

“Wow, I had no idea you were such an insightful therapist, David.”

He ignored my sarcasm and put his arm on my shoulder, exerting a little pressure so that I’d turn and face the window. I saw Heather and Kristen inside the restaurant, laughing together. I couldn’t remember seeing Heather so happy, so young. So at peace.

“I was thinking the same, actually,” David admitted. “I almost couldn’t eat my dinner. Then I looked up at saw my wife glowing. She wasn’t frowning, she wasn’t lost in her dark thoughts, she wasn’t stressed that we didn’t have a baby yet and that the adoption process was going to take us forever. She wasn’t thinking about her cycle or my sperm count or why we had to be the unlucky couple in our group of friends. She was just sitting there, having an excellent time with people she’d just shared an incredible, life-altering experience with. And you know what, Jack? Heather looks the same way.”

I stared at him, starting to thaw a little.

“Get over the macho shit, Jack. Get over that I have a dick, too, and I saw your dick, so if either one of us has to feel a little insecure, it’s me. Get over what society has brainwashed us into thinking. You’re not a cuckold, you’re not some schmuck. You shared your wife with me and I know what a fucking gift that I was because I did the same. You don’t have to feel threatened by me or afraid you’re going to lose her. I know that we are all going to go home tomorrow and back to our lives with our lovely wives, and this will feel like a dream. Maybe we’ll do it again, I don’t know, but I do know we all needed this because for some reason we were all meant to be each other’s source of healing. I know that sounds like a bunch of bullshit, but I believe it. You need to believe it, too.”

He gave me a pat on the back and went back inside. I stayed outside for a bit and continued to stare up at the sky. He was right. I wasn’t afraid, not really. We really had experienced something precious and unique, and I wasn’t going to be the asshole who screwed it up. My wife loved me, and I loved her. If this is what she needed, and truth be told, what I needed, to deal with the messed up cards life had dealt to us recently, then I wasn’t going to feel any more angst about it.

When I returned to the table and Heather asked if I was okay in a whisper, I said, “Yeah, I’m fine.”

And I meant it.

*****

I had sex with my wife when we got back to the hotel. The sounds of us fucking, along with the passionate moans of David and Kristen in the other bed, might have been even more erotic than what we all went through earlier.

Heather took me deeply inside of her, her sleepy violet eyes on mine. “Say you love me,” she begged.

“You know I do.”

“Say it.”

“I love you.”

She crumbled into a thousand pieces beneath me, rocking with the force of her orgasm. I wasn’t long after her, thrusting deeply until my cum flooded inside of her.

David and Kristen went quiet after they found their own ecstasy.

Then, just before we all fell asleep, Kristen whispered. “We love you both very much. Thank you for this.”

*****

We never swapped again. It wasn’t necessary. Heather and my sex life was revitalized, and David and Kristen seemed to get their desire to share out of their system. Those gaping holes left by our losses were healed by people who understood, and who knew how to reach out to us.

That isn’t to say things weren’t a little awkward afterward, as much as we promised it wouldn’t be. We had a few dinners after, but things weren’t the same. David would catch me staring at Kristen licking her fork, or I would glare at David as he stared at Heather’s breasts. Still, we never regretted what happened. It was what we all needed, for different reasons, and we felt healed.

We stopped seeing David and Kristen as much until our contact drifted off to occasional phone calls and e-mails. They moved back down to Florida and last we heard, they had adopted a beautiful boy named James. Our friendship hadn’t ended, but it morphed into something more platonic. We were all fine with that.

One night, I asked Heather if she would ever want to swap with another couple again.

She looked at me with wide eyes. “Hell, no. Do you? Oh, my God, please say no.”

I laughed and shook my head. “Of course not, but I thought it might come up again.”

“It was different because it was Kristen and David. I wouldn’t want to ever attach myself to other people like that again.”

I kissed her, happy to hear that.

Two months later, I nearly passed out when Heather tossed something on my desk. A pregnancy test.

I looked at her before examining it. She was pregnant. We were going to have a baby.

Fear broke in, as it was wont to do, and I was afraid to be too hopeful this time. What if I jinxed us?

I looked at Heather’s face and all my anxiety faded away because that was no way to live. We could survive anything together. I kissed her and kissed her and kissed her until she had no choice but let me take her into the bedroom. We had passionate and gentle sex, and held each other as we cried with relief for hours after.

We were healed.