Closing the door behind us, I led the way through the house to the kitchen where I’d left my wine glass. “What can I offer you to drink?” I know that sounded plainly social but it was my best idea to circumvent the potential awkwardness of the two of us meeting for the first time.
“I’ll take a glass of whatever you’re having.” Roger nodded at the open bottle of Caymus Cabernet standing on the kitchen island. No doubt he was also attempting to be as relaxed as possible under the circumstances, I was liking him already.
We chit-chatted for several minutes, wine, cars, jobs, until the inevitable moment of awkward silence. We both sipped our glasses of wine simultaneously then looked at each other. Roger spoke “Where’s umm…Nicole?”
I’ll give him that he wan’t afraid to tackle these small challenges head on. Well, I can be relaxed about it too.
“She’s upstairs. She said that she wanted to take a shower but if I know Nicole, I’m guessing that she didn’t want to be in the middle of any awkward moments like this and she’ll let us figure things out…”
We laughed together like old buddies. Nicole is generally extrovert but I also suspected she was steeling her own nerves; she’d taken a glass of wine upstairs with her and I’d heard the shower shut off some time before Roger had arrived.
My phone pinged at the exact same moment as Roger’s buzzed in his pocket.
“Talk of the devil! Wanna bet that’s Nicole?’ I said.
We laughed together again, and once more as we both checked our phones and indeed had a message from my wife.
The message was a selfie of Nicole’s head and shoulders, she was laying on or in our bed as I instantly recognized the pillows framing her head; the room was clearly candlelit and she was clearly wearing her favorite dark green silk lingerie, it contrasted beautifully against her creamy skin and blonde hair, the sequined top of her breasts just peeking up in the bottom of the photo. It was followed by a four word text:
‘It’s now or never!’
Almost in sync Roger and I read the text, looked at the photo and then at each other.
“Guess we have our marching orders?” I said.
“Lead the way Neil.”
We stood. I turned to Roger and confirmed “Just to be clear though. Whatever Nicole wants goes and if she changes her mind or says no then we respect that right?”
Roger extended his hand to shake mine. “Understood. I agree totally and respect you saying it.”
I smiled, led him around to the stairs and then pointed at the master bedroom double doors at the top.
“Listen. It’s going to be awkward for Nicole if we both head in at once. How do we start? Who? Et cetera. So, you go on in and I’ll give you a minute or two then be right behind you.”
“Are you sure?” Roger asked.
I nodded. “100% Go ahead.”
Roger headed up the stairs as I returned to the kitchen to pick up the wine and a bottle of water.
———-
Nicole replayed back to me later how she had been mildly surprised to see Roger enter the bedroom alone, although she instantly knew what and why I arranged it like that. My interpretation of the photo and Nicole’s nervousness had been absolutely spot on and she’d suddenly felt way more relaxed with just Roger there first.