As the guilty party looked up in surprise, Natalie took in the scene as if it were a movie set in slow motion. Stephanie on all fours facing the foot of the bed, her bottom high in the air and her naked breasts flushed. Nathan, positioned behind Steph, both hands on her hips and obviously deep inside her. Nathan’s expression was one of pure horror at being caught, Stephanie’s was a strange mixture of guilt and relief. As the two disentangled from each other and started grabbing their clothes off the floor, Natalie could only look on in silent disbelief.
Once she got her panties and tee shirt back on, Steph was the first to make an attempt at conversation. “I’m so so sorry Natalie. I came over to Nathan’s house looking for you and it just sort of happened…” Stephanie trailed off as
Natalie shook her head. “You were always a bad liar Steph. I just can’t believe you would do this to me.” She looked at Nathan, who had pulled on his boxers and was struggling to untangle his inside-out football jersey — the one she had gotten him for his birthday. Her eyes swam with unshed tears and all she could do was leave. She turned and ran down the stairs, not stopping when she heard Nathan’s shout to wait up. She pushed out the front door and was fumbling with her keys when Nathan grabbed her arm and spun her around.
“Damn Natalie, I said to wait. I can explain, I really can.”
Natalie laughed as the tears finally spilled over and streamed down her face. “What is there to explain Nathan? You were having sex with my best friend. If you were going to cheat on me, couldn’t it at least have been with some girl I didn’t know?”
“We never meant for it to happen!” Nathan protested, “But she came by and we both sort of… well we… shit Natalie, what do you want me to say?”
“How long?” she asked him bleakly. “How long have you two been doing this behind my back? Don’t bother lying to me Nathan, I can tell this isn’t the first time it’s happened. It was written all over Steph’s face.”
Nathan looked away, and she thought he wasn’t going to answer. But as they stood there in the driveway, the wind starting up around them, he finally whispered “Three months.”
“Three months,” Natalie thought, “Right after he really started pressuring me to do it with him. I guess he found someone else more willing.”
“I see,” she said aloud. As she turned back to the car he grabbed her arm again.
“It’s not my fault you know. If you had just been less of a frigid bitch I wouldn’t have had to -”
SMACK! The sound rang out clearly in the air as Nathan grabbed his face in pained surprise. Natalie wanted to scream and rage at him, tell him if he had been that unhappy he could have broken up with her, or really talked to her… or something besides sleeping with her best friend. But she didn’t think she could ever truly convey to him the magnitude of her hurt, so she got into the car and slammed the door. Nathan didn’t try to stop her as she reversed down the driveway, and as she drove away the last thing she saw was Stephanie coming out of the house and tentatively reaching out to him.