By Sarah Rose George
Connie was almost certain that her boyfriend had just asked her a question, but she was too busy wondering if she was the only sick-fuck in the room.
I mean, really– what were they doing here? Really doing here? How many more game nights would they have with Francine and Dean until someone finally suggested an orgy? Or swinging? There was no other reason why Dean would look her in the eyes like that when they talked, Thomas and Francine yammering on in their own little world across the table from one another, an unfinished game splayed out on the dinner table, ignored.
There was only one real way to know for sure: someone would have to make the first move. It wouldn’t– could never– be Connie. God knows she had been mistaken about what she thought were sure bets before. But it was killing her. She felt totally insane, throbbing with unmet needs.
“Babe,” Thomas said, nudging Connie with his elbow. “It’s our turn!”
“I know,” Connie lied. “I’m just thinking.”
“She’s strategizing,” Dean said, raising his thick eyebrows.
She had been with Thomas exclusively for more than three years now, and already she was wondering if their romance had died. Were they really meant to go on like this? Both of them pretending that the other could give them everything they could ever want or need? She didn’t really want sex anymore– he always initiated. It wasn’t that she wasn’t attracted to Thomas, she was. Is. But there was just something missing. That drive. That desire. But isn’t that what everyone always tells everyone else? That sex dies when you get married? But they weren’t even married!
Connie picked up her blue piece and moved it three spaces.
“Interesting choice,” Dean said.
Connie just shrugged, trying to stop herself from staring but staring anyway at Dean while he considered his move, his brows narrowed toward the board in far too much contemplation for this stupid game.
When she had first met Dean, Connie had thought he was attractive, and she swore that he thought the same thing about her. Every game night onward, her fantasies congealed. She could picture it so clearly in her head, as if remembering a movie she had seen. It went like this:
She and Thomas got up to leave. Francine and Dean hugged them goodbye at the doorway. Thank you so much for having us. Thank you so much for coming. Dean hugging her, still hugging her, now a couple of seconds too long. That night, with Thomas snoring next to her, Connie’s phone, face up, would buzz, a nuclear bomb of light through the blue darkness, and she would snatch it to her chest as quickly as she could. A text. From Dean. Not in the groupchat with the four of them. Just to her. Maybe we should hang out just the two of us sometime. And then they would. And then they would start sleeping together. Thomas and Francine didn’t need to know. It was just sex, after all. Just something they needed to sustain their relationships that really mattered to them.
She should just say it. Chicken shit, just say it. You can laugh it off as a joke! Just–
“Connie,” Francine said, a smile on her lips that looked threatening and then coy and then… “It’s your move.”
* * *
Sarah Rose George graduated from Bard College with a BA in creative writing. She currently lives in New York City and works in book publishing as a production editor and freelance proofreader.