Just Game

I was lounging on my side with the Boyfriend spooning me. I was moist, naked, hair scattered on the pillow beside me, adoring the post-fucking endorphin high.

And then the Boyfriend broke the post-sex enraptured silence: "So, how do you view our relationship?"

Fuuuuuuccccckkk.

I rolled over and propped myself up on one elbow: "can you just tell me what the right answer to that question is?"

"There is no right answer." Double fuck. As any slut knows this is worse - if he doesn't know what the right/wrong answer is it means he will identify which answers are wrong based on my responses. As in, I didn't know there was a wrong answer until you said that...

"Well", I said - frantically wondering what the hell he was getting at - "well...I would say we are lovers."

"Lovers, I like that word." (Yes, pass.) "But what's the end game here?" (Motherfuck, an extra credit question.)

"End game? What do you mean?" (Jesus fucking fuck.)

"Well, we don't want to leave our partners but we are enjoying each other's company, so where is this going - end game?"

Ok, well now at least I understood the question, essentially: what kind of trouble are we in for here?

And, dirty darlings, it is a fair question. Let's be clear, extra-marital relationships do not have a reputation for working out real well - largely I would argue because we do not accept that there could be a framework in which such relationships are "normal". An end games is required because there is no paradigm for having a number of ongoing relationships - one of which is an acknowledged primary one, some of which are secondary and all of which are satisfying and can be enjoyed for what they are. Once a secondary relationship is really formed - once that initial spark moves into a longer term connection and once preliminary interest is replaced by a more abiding friendship - we are told that a conflict must ensue and that by its nature it must become a war for the heart and soul.

In the conventional paradigm there are two broad sorts of end games for a close, mutually enjoyed and longer-term extra-marital relationship. The first is the drastic game changer: a choice to divorce or the choice taken away by discovery. A storm of tears and recrimination. Chaos that brings about either our own destruction or true happiness. The second is love: a tortuously unfulfillable love - star-crossed lovers forever yearning, perhaps eventually parting when the first option is rejected or the pain becomes too much. There are variations on the theme to be sure, but the bottom line is that most people want only one relationship - or perhaps I should say allow themselves only one relationship - and therefore the presence of a second relationship on the scene means that there are one too many bitches in the kennel.

Yep, from under the covers of the extra-marital bed the end game looks pretty bleak. His question was legit and his concern for my point of view on the issue not misplaced.

So, what is our end game?

Well, we have already established between us that neither of us seeks a game changer in the other. He is not holding auditions for the role of "wife" and, let's be clear: a woman who is looking for a husband never had one - my divorce fantasies involve a bachelorette apartment. We both have well-established, pre-existing lives many hours apart - lives that we don't seek to disturb.

And love? Well, neither us seeks the torture of love either - we have both flirted with strong emotion in the past and realized quite clearly the danger that lies therein. You may disagree with me, but I do feel that love is a choice and that those who seek it outside of their marriage are likely to find it while those who specifically seek to avoid it can do so as well.

Where is this going? Well, nowhere. And I mean that in the best possible way. Basically, we don't need an end game: we enjoy each other's company both in and out of bed, we both acknowledge ourselves as poly and crave the connection of an outside relationship. I like this man: I genuinely enjoy his mind and his company as well as his cock, he treats me with caring and respect and I intend to keep him as a part of my life for as long as this is a mutually agreeable circumstance. No relationship strategy, just relationship.

And so, reassured that I had the right answer to the $64,000.00 question, I cocked my head to the side and leaned in to give him a quick kiss. Leaning back I smiled at him, eyes all sauciness and flirtation: "no end game, babe, just game."