What She'd Be Saying Yes To · Single Brown Male

Reggie, Marissa, Sophie, and Brynn are sitting on the grass at the Seawall at night, continuing the conversation about Brynn's situation with her husband David. Reggie first clarifies the nature of Brynn's desire: she confirmed she wants to be with the three of them specifically, not random partners. The group then pressed into why Brynn hasn't simply asked David for a hall pass, and Brynn articulated her real obstacle — not David's likely answer, but her own inability to decide: as long as she hasn't asked, she can pretend she doesn't know the answer, and Wednesday nights remain merely sad rather than a conscious mutual choice. Reggie acknowledged this as a threshold only Brynn can cross herself, and Brynn agreed. Reggie then proposed they tell Brynn exactly what was on offer so she could make an informed decision. The offer laid out was: Sophie would ask Michael for Monday evenings under the cover of technical dance practice, making Mondays a regular night for Reggie, Marissa, and Sophie; Brynn would be invited for one exploratory Thursday after dancing — not a tea party — with every person holding a veto, meaning any single person's discomfort would revert everything to the prior arrangement; scheduling would accommodate menstrual cycles; if all four preferred the four-person dynamic over three, a further conversation about adding Brynn to Mondays could happen, but that was described as a possibility, not a promise; and all parties agreed to full disclosure of any change in circumstances affecting shared risk. Marissa and Sophie confirmed this was the offer exactly. Brynn asked one question: whether Sophie had gone home from her own first grass conversation knowing what she would do. Sophie said she had not — she made tea, sat at the kitchen table in the dark for an hour, and only knew that the shape of her life looked different. Brynn said 'Let's go,' but Reggie stopped the group to add a critical condition: the entire offer assumed Brynn would obtain a hall pass from David. If she could not, and it would constitute cheating, that would require a new and separate conversation, and Reggie said he was inclined at that moment to decline. Marissa and Sophie agreed the offer as stated did not cover that scenario. Brynn accepted this condition and said if she couldn't get the hall pass she would return and they would talk again. The chapter ended with the group preparing to leave, nothing yet decided or acted upon.

Reggie

Brynn, let's talk about the downside. But first I need to ask a question about this idea. Hall pass is a childish term but it's more correct than open marriage in this case as I understand it. Correct me if I'm wrong. You don't want an open marriage. You don't want to fuck randoms. You want to fuck the three of us. Do I have that right? Be honest, I want the truth if you also want to fuck randoms.

Brynn

She looks at him for a moment, then nods once, slowly.Yes. That's right. Not randoms. You three.A breath.I'm not looking for a catalogue. I'm looking for this. What's already here. Randoms would just be a different kind of Wednesday.

Sophie

It's the difference between wanting an exit and wanting something specific. Those are very different things to bring to David. If he ever asks what you want, that answer is a lot easier to hold than the alternative.

Reggie

I'm not sure it is, Sophie. If Marissa asked me to fuck a single man or randoms, it wouldn't matter. I'd break up with her. Just for asking. So to some of us, it's the same either way. But I'm not David.

So Brynn, you don't think David would leave if you cheated. He'd talk. I assume therefore that he wouldn't leave if you asked for a hall pass. He'd talk. If that's true, what's the downside of asking? What do you have to lose?

Brynn

The downside is that if he says no, I have to decide. Stay anyway, or leave. Right now I don't have to decide anything. I just have to get through Wednesday. Asking the question takes away the not-deciding. And I've been living in the not-deciding for two years because deciding is the part I don't know how to do yet. That's the downside. Not David's answer. Mine.

Reggie

Why do you have to decide more after that question than before it? Right now, you've admitted the most likely outcome is "do nothing". Why isn't that option available to you after he says no?

Brynn

She goes quiet, and the blade of grass she's been holding finally goes still between her fingers. She looks at the water for a long moment.Because right now I don't know for certain that he'd say no. So I can pretend.A breath.Once he says no, I know. And I can't un-know it. And every Wednesday after that, I'm lying there knowing that he knows I don't want to be there, and he said no anyway, and we both chose this together with our eyes open. That's — that's a different kind of Wednesday. Right now the Wednesday is just sad. After that it's a decision we're both making.

Reggie

Ok, I understand it. This is your hump you need to overcome, and you need to overcome it alone. Yes?

Brynn

She turns the blade of grass one more time between her fingers, and then she sets it down in the grass.Yes. That's mine. Nobody can help me over it. You can all sit on this grass and ask the right questions and I'll see the answers clearly and I'll still have to go home and walk into that kitchen and find the words myself. It's always been mine. I think I just needed to hear someone say it out loud.

Reggie

Wait. We can do one thing for Brynn. We can tell her EXACTLY what is on offer, so she can make an informed decision. Are you all game for that conversation? It shouldn't take long.

Marissa

She looks at Reggie for a second, then at Brynn.Yes. She came this far tonight. She should know exactly what she'd be saying yes to before she walks into that kitchen.

Brynn

Okay. Tell me.

Reggie

Ok, this round is just for Marissa and Sophie. We all agreed we'd have one night a week just for us. I think that's right, at least for now, and we'll see what comes of that. I propose that Sophie, you ask if you could do technical dance on Mondays. Tell him you're feeling so much better about everything and you need another night, and you're leaving weekends for him and his parents.

And then Monday becomes our night, Marissa, Sophie and me. And Thursdays, we invite Brynn over if she has her hall pass. And if it turns out we love the four better than three, which I think is highly possible because it means nobody's ever just spectating, then we also invite Brynn over on Mondays but that's later.

What do you two think?

Marissa

She unwraps her arms from her knees and looks at Sophie first, then back at Reggie.Mondays work for me. Sophie, do you think Michael buys technical dance? That's a specific enough word that it either sounds completely credible or completely made up, and I can't tell which from where I'm sitting.

Sophie

She turns the root beer zero slowly in her hands.He'd buy it. He doesn't know enough about dance to question the vocabulary, and I've been visibly happier for months — asking for one more evening fits the story he's already telling himself about what's changed. The harder part is my mother. She watches the calendar. But she also watches me, and she's already decided whatever I'm doing is working. I think she'd cover a Monday without asking why. So yes. I think I can get Monday.

Reggie

Ok so this is what we're offering Brynn. One Thursday, just one, we invite her over after dancing. And I'm not talking about a tea party. If that goes badly, we all go back to the way things were. And every single person here has a veto on that. If ANYONE doesn't like that Thursday, we all go back to the way things were. And if we have to reschedule the first exploratory one to accommodate someone's cycle, we do that. Or we wait.

If we like it, and nobody exercises their veto, we make Thursdays regular. Keep in mind, women have cycles and with three women and four weeks, there's a very good chance that at least one of you is not going to be fully functional each week. Or a no-show. Whatever works for you when it's that time. About once a month, it'll be a full four-person thing.

On Mondays, just Sophie, Marissa and I will meet. Even then, about half the time it'll just be me and one girl, plus a girl who can't do everything because of cycles.

So far our experience has been that the girls show up during their periods but keep their panties on. But that's not a rule. Whatever makes each comfortable is fine. I have a consent fetish.

If it turns out that we all prefer four to three, and again I think that quite likely because assuming everyone shows up, nobody ever has to just watch, then we talk about it and decide if we just have two nights of all four of us. But that's not a promise, that's a possibility.

And we all agree to full disclosure of a change in circumstances. If Sophie finds her dream guy who wants her to divorce Michael and she starts sleeping with him, the rest of us deserve to know not because we own Sophie, but because we have the right to know what our risk surface is.

Sophie, Marissa, do you agree that this is the offer?

Marissa

Yes. That's the offer. That's exactly what's on the table. Nothing more than that right now, nothing less.

Brynn says nothing. The Seawall lights hold steady on the path below.

Reggie

Brynn, you know more today than you did yesterday. Do you want to ask anything or shall we go?

Brynn

She sits with it for a long moment, her hands finally still in the grass, not pulling at anything. When she finally looks up, she finds Reggie's face first, then Marissa's, then Sophie's.I have one question. When you had this conversation with Sophie — the first one, on this grass — did she go home and know what she was going to do? Or did she go home with all of it still just sitting there?

Sophie

I went home and made tea and sat at the kitchen table for an hour in the dark. I didn't know anything that night except that the shape of my life looked different from how it had looked that morning. You don't have to know yet. You just have to be willing to let the shape look different. That's all the first Thursday ever required of me.

Brynn

Okay. Let's go.

Reggie

Oh wait, please, sorry, I just thought of something important.

Marissa

She stops, one hand still brushing grass off the back of her leg.Okay. What?

Reggie

This offer we just made, it presumes you have a hall pass, Brynn. If you don't, and it is cheating, that's a new conversation and each of us needs to decide if we're open to that. And I can say I'm inclined right now to say that I'm not open to it. But either way, it's a new conversation. Agreed?

Marissa

She finishes brushing the grass off her leg and straightens up.Yeah. Agreed. That's a different conversation and it should be a different conversation. I said yes to what we just laid out. I didn't say yes to something else quietly attached to the back of it.

Sophie

Agreed. The offer we made assumed a hall pass. Without one, the ledger looks like David's, not Michael's — and those are different ledgers. So yes. New conversation. I'd want to sit with it before I said anything either way.

Brynn

That's fair. I'm not going to pretend the hall pass is a given just because I want it to be. If I can't get it, I come back and we talk again. Now can we go?

Reggie

Yes, let's go.

Marissa

She finally stands all the way up, root beer zero in hand.Yeah. Let's go.

Brynn

Same grass. Same root beer zero. I'll be here.