Chapter 23

Holly picked up the gauntlet, "What's in it for me?"

"I, uh..." Cindy had no answer; she was way out of her depth.

"I kind of like cum," Holly continued, "but it's a lot of work blowing a guy and I don't get off or anything..." She seemed totally disinterested.

"Maybe you should make her some kind of offer," I suggested, grinning. Cindy gave a flustered shrug that said 'Like what?' clearly, so I elaborated, "Maybe if you offered to eat her pussy while she was blowing Ed..."

Cindy blinked owlishly, but Holly smiled. "Yeah, that might work. You have to make me cum, though."

Cindy opened her mouth, but I inserted, "Why don't you take it in the living room - the floor's kind of hard in here." I just looked at her until she dropped her eyes.

"It's settled, then?" Holly confirmed, turning to Cindy.

"Yes..." Cindy's reply was faint.

Ed got up from the table. "Guess we'll be back..."

"We'll hold a waffle or two for you," I replied, "won't we?"

"Sure." Kate smiled and went back to cooking.

Gina erupted, "So, Cletus, are you gonna complete your clean sweep?"

Kate blinked, "What?"

"He's fucked everybody but Joy," Gina supplied. "I don't see why he shouldn't finish."

"He has?" Kate's gaze swept to me.

"Sure. He did Holly early, then he did Heather..."

"He DID?" Kate erupted. "Heather?"

Gina confirmed it, "Yes. And he did me about two this morning when Amy stole Michael out from under me..."

Kate was counting on her fingers. "Did anybody else but me NOT sleep with someone last night?"

I rubbed my jaw, thinking about it. "Not in your generation. Neither your mother nor Heather's got any. I'm assuming Cindy did."

Kate shook her head, looking somewhat dazed.

"Joy." Pete snapped his fingers and pointed at me.

"Pete?" Joy blinked.

"Go take care of Cletus."

"Why?"

"You heard your sister."

"Yes, but..."

Pete sat back and looked at her. "I could come up with a half a dozen reasons why, but only one counts. Who do you belong to?"

"You." Joy actually flicked an apologetic glance at Michael.

"Okay, then. The only reason you need is because I said to, right Sweetheart?" Pete pressed.

"I, uh... Right." Blushing furiously, Joy turned to me. "Where do you want me?"

"You don't have to, Honey," I told her.

"Yes, she does!" Pete insisted, his voice emphatic.

"Yes I do!" Joy agreed.

"Okay, then," I murmured, getting up and taking a last hit of my coffee. "Let's see what furniture Ed and Company left in the living room."

Joy stood in the doorway waiting for me, peeking in at the activity in the living room - but before I reached her, Michael got up from the table, "Okay, Big Mouth, head for the living room." I spun to see what the fuck was going on and discovered that Michael was addressing Gina.

"What? Why?" Gina sputtered.

"What makes you think you can just hand off your sister to get fucked and not have to pay for it?" Michael rasped.

"What do YOU care?" Gina snapped. "Besides, you've got Amy..." This last was a snarl. Amy looked up, opened her mouth, and settled back, poker-faced. I reached around Joy to cup one of her sweet little titties, but continued to watch the developing altercation, wondering if Michael knew what was happening.

He did. He got out of his chair and strode to a position immediately in front of Gina, grabbed her by the back of the neck, locked eyes with her and said, "And your problem with that is?"

Gina's face twisted. "You're MINE!" she erupted, and took a swing at him - not a slap, one of those female poke in the side things. Now, Gina probably outweighs Michael by thirty pounds and is actually taller - their positions made this VERY clear - but she didn't hurt him any. Michael put his forehead against hers, still eyeball to eyeball, and declared, "No, you're MINE! Amy is just Amy - she does as she pleases and it's just sex. YOU, on the other hand, have been feeding me shit! You can't have it both ways..." He started hauling on her, using the grip he had on her neck.

Objectively, she could have broken his grip with a sweep of her arm, then followed it up by knocking him on his ass - but what she did was go to her knees. "Michael..."

"Shut up." Michael rubbed his cock on her lips and her mouth opened. A half-second later her hands came up and started rubbing the backs of his thighs. Michael took a handful of hair at the back of her neck, but I could tell it was only symbolic. I chuckled and headed for the living room, clutching Joy to me.

Ed was hunched up in an armchair, his body taut under the sensations Holly generated as she demonstrated her mastery of the deep-throat technique. Cindy was flat on her back on the carpet, her head between Holly's feet as Holly squatted above her rubbing her gash on Cindy's face. Knowing how worked up Holly could get, I didn't envy Cindy a bit. That left the couch...

"Let's do the couch, Hon," I told Joy. "Get comfy on your back and I'll do the missionary thing."

"Okay." Joy was back to being thoroughly biddable. I sat down next to her and caressed her thighs and rubbed her belly and slowly moved to her mons while we watched Holly work Ed - and Cindy - over. She got wet fast - not surprising, considering my history with her - and pretty quick, she was grabbing my wrist and tugging, having undulated on the couch a couple of times. I got up and crawled over her, rubbing my dick along her wet split. She locked eyes with me, nodding, her chest rising and falling rapidly; I seated my cock in her opening and pushed inside.

Three strokes later, she wrapped her legs around me and started making keening little whines. Nothing swells your head - either of them - like having a responsive little piece dancing on your dick; Pete was one lucky young motherfucker, and I hoped he knew it!

We were just getting going good when a distraction occurred - in the form of Gina and Michael. "Bend over the couch arm!" Michael directed Gina, propelling her forward such that she actually stuck her face in my ass, then he chuckled. "If Cletus's asshole is in reach, see if you can stick your tongue in it!"

"Michael!" Gina gasped.

"Shut up!" Michael snapped. "You blew it, Honey, when you got all jealous of Amy! Now EVERYBODY knows you're my bitch - so get used to it! And don't TELL me you don't LIKE it - if you don't, how come your pussy is soaking wet? Hmmm?" I was looking behind me at this point, so I got to see the look on Gina's face as Michael sank his bone in her in one stroke; it was a fine mix of surprise, embarrassment, and happiness. Apparently, I was providing the boys with a fine education in woman handling... I returned my attention to Joy - who richly deserved it.

Some time in the next couple of minutes - pleasure skewed my time sense, so I'm not sure how long it really was - Holly went "MMMMMMM!!!!" around Ed's dick and started seriously humping poor Cindy's face. I looked around and breathed easier when I found Cindy's glasses lying on the carpet out of harm's way. Cindy hunched up and thrashed and I figured she was either having trouble breathing or having her nose ripped off - or both - but Holly let up pretty quickly and resumed concentrating on blowing Ed.

The next thing I noticed was Pete. He showed up and patted Joy on the cheek, asking, "How are you doing, Sweetheart?"

"G-good!" Joy gasped out. She'd gotten one good cum already, so I tended to agree with her.

I didn't think it was a coincidence that Pete's dick was two inches from Joy's face - and Joy didn't either. She turned her head and opened her mouth, sticking out her tongue - and Pete fed her his blood sausage. I chuckled - it didn't bother me. Joy might lose out on an orgasm by having to concentrate on sucking, but I wouldn't. I settled back and tuned my stroke to give me the most pleasure, slowing down a bit to smell the roses or whatever - which allowed me to notice the next change...

"Do you want to fuck?" Holly popped off Ed's cock to ask.

"Yeah, maybe," Ed grunted. I was surprised he hadn't blown a nut, actually - I would have.

"Okay..." Holly got up and crawled onto the chair, balancing on the arms, and lowered herself onto Ed's meatsicle. Just before she did it, though, she turned and looked down at Cindy, directing, "Don't go anywhere!" Then she impaled herself, and, apparently typically for Holly, went stone nuts on Ed's dick! It was a show, for certain; I'm sure Ed was thrilled to death that she wasn't directly on his lap, because the chair caught Hell! She was up just high enough that she wasn't grinding his pubic bone to powder - which was probably better for both of them - but she was using him like a pogo stick. Cindy had a front row seat, watching Holly's pussy gobble Ed's cock from below; she reached out and grabbed her eyeglasses and put them on - then took them back off when she got dripped on. She made to get up, but I stopped her, "Stay right there! Watch your old man get some strange! A little pussy juice won't hurt you!" I knew she was a little bothered - this was 'in your face' with a vengeance - but she needed to get over it...

Joy reclaimed my attention by going, "Gurk!" Pete's balls were delivering a semen shake and she was sucking it in. Pete hissed in pleasure, his knees jumping, then he backed off, but bent right over and kissed Joy on the lips, which I thought considerate of him.

My whole cock turned in to one big sensitive nerve ending and my balls started crawling up to chamber a round of pregnancy-inducing flechettes. I got tunnel vision and grabbed Joy's little round hooters and started rubbing the shit out of her nipples. She and Pete were still swapping spit, but she started making urgent noises and arched herself and her pussy clamped down - and I went off like a Gatling gun, firing a dozen rounds at her Fallopian tubes. She let out a squeal and went nuts under me - which made us both happy. When my blood pressure dropped and my vision cleared, Pete was grinning at me while Joy sucked his neck.

"Thanks, I needed that," I puffed.

"We'll do it again," he assured me.

I got up, carefully clearing Gina, who was getting the living shit fucked out of her. Michael was showing her no mercy. I'd put it out of my head, mostly, while fucking, because it was directly behind me and too much trouble to turn around and look at, but every once in a while Gina let out a wail. Right after I got up, she did it again - and shook like a wet dog, titties and jellyrolls jiggling everywhere. She had the damnedest build; underneath, she was pretty solidly fleshed, but she had this big jiggly roll that sat above her hips like a innertube full of blubber inserted under the skin - and it jiggled any time she moved. Her titties jiggled the same way - they were EXTREMELY soft; anyway, that stuff was going NUTS under Michael's pounding and when she got off it went everywhere! Joy didn't have this - yet...

I decided to have some fun. I leaned in next to her and murmured, "You like that dick?"

She didn't say anything, she just looked at me - she was red-faced and panting.

"You know, you're not bullshitting anybody - least of all Michael. No doubt you've figured that out..." I grinned evilly. I could tell I had her full attention. "You're his bitch, now - and two grades of school be damned! Isn't that right?"

"Uh... huh..." She nodded, eyes vacant. She really wasn't in any condition to hold a conversation - but she would absorb anything I said like a sponge.

"Gonna be pretty humiliating when the word gets out that you're fucking a freshman, huh? It's not gonna be any secret, you know. Pete and Michael are probably gonna get you and your sister matching collars and leashes and lead you around school by them..." I watched her eyes bulge as she took that one in. "Of course the good news is that you'll be going to all the dances and stuff," I murmured, and watched her absorb that, pleased, then added the zinger, "and Michael will want to demonstrate his ownership, so he'll probably fuck you in front of his buddies - and maybe have you give some of them head..." From the look on her face, you'd think I'd poked her with a cattle prod. I followed up with, "You're not his girlfriend - you're his bitch! He OWNS your slut ass! We're gonna put rings in your nipples and drag you around the school track by them until you lose that jelly roll, then..."

"WAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!" Gina's eyes rolled up in her head and she screamed - and I watched her belly clench as her pussy locked up. Then she flopped forward, passed out - but Michael was blowing a nut in her twat, anyway; it was working even though the lights went out.

"What the Hell did you do?" Michael panted.

"Teased the shit out of her," I replied, chuckling. "Told her you owned her and you were gonna use her like toilet paper - and that she was gonna have to kneel up and take dick from all your buds, and we were gonna pierce her nipples and put rings in them - slave shit."

"And she passed out?"

"You miss the point, Son. She came so hard she passed out."

"Oh. OH!"

"Just fucking exactly," I nodded. "You're on the right track. When you figure how biddable little Joy is, doesn't it make sense that Gina is, too?"

"So..."

"So put a ring in her nose and don't let her give you any shit!"

About that time, Ed surged up and howled, "HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!" If Cindy thought things were drippy before, she got a surprise as white goo dribbled around his connection to Holly. Holly waited until Ed settled back, then got an evil look on her face. She pulled herself up off Ed, pinching off her pussy lips, then stepped down from the chair on shaky legs. Cindy made to move when Holly's feet hit the floor - probably expecting Holly to step on her - but Holly went "Whoa!" and squatted, pinning Cindy in place and said, "Here - a present for you! Suck it out..."

Cindy wailed, "Noooo!" and thrashed - but Holly bore down and her pussy made squishy noises and Cindy shut up, except for low moans. Body language told the tale - she gave up and started sucking and licking.

"Go deep," Holly prompted, grinning at us.

Michael swatted Gina on the ass. "Wake up! You're missing something!"

Gina groaned and opened one eye. "What?"

"Holly is feeding Cindy Ed's spunk. Isn't that nice?" Michael announced.

"Ummm..." Gina started using brain cells - and wasn't sure she liked the idea.

"Next time I fuck Amy, she can give you MY spunk back - how's that?" Michael prompted.

"I dunno..."

"You don't WANT my spunk?" Michael snarled.

Gina's eyes popped. "No! I mean yes!"

"Which is it?!"

"I want it!"

"Damned right you do!" Michael left a big red handprint on Gina's ass.

Holly giggled - but I suspected that her little Dominatrix impersonation was just that - and, if pressed, she would roll over. She got up off of Cindy's messy face and said, "I think you ought to clean your MASTER's dick, don't you?" Cindy was a broken thing - you could see it as she slowly rolled up onto her hands and knees and crawled forward to suckle the combined juices from her husband's cock. Michael grinned and marched around to present his cock to Gina for cleaning -- and Gina took it in without complaint.

I blew out a long sigh and declared, "What a morning! I need coffee!" and headed for the kitchen.

Kate had made eight waffles in the interim

Breakfast was quiet after that; the guys were drained and the girls - well, half of them - were busy thinking about the holes they'd dug for themselves. Holly was a bit full of herself and Kate seemed somewhat peeved that everyone else was having sex.

Things drifted slowly into the afternoon. The rains kept coming, but the air was still warm enough that it was like standing in a shower - you couldn't breathe the stuff if you were in it, and even under the awning, if was like you were sucking in mist. Nobody left. Karen came out of the TV room and wandered around, but the girls cleaned up the breakfast mess and Kate managed to figure out how my washer and dryer worked (more power to her!) I figured it would take fifty thousand watts of electricity to dry anything, but what the Hell...

Jean stayed away.

The kids ended up in the TV room, fighting over what to watch on TV - except the Tabor girls -- that's Joy and Gina's last name, Tabor - they didn't get a vote. That made it two to two - Holly and Kate versus Michael and Peter. Fortunately, they settled on something.

Karen gravitated to me and Cindy sat with Ed, first in the kitchen, then in my office. Ed and I mauled their titties and otherwise pretended they were furniture while we gabbed about this and that - neither of them complained. Cindy seemed completely demoralized; Karen basked in the attention. At one point, I looked over at Cindy and said, "You're not ruined."

"I..." Cindy's shoulders slumped - she couldn't even express her anguish.

I squeezed Karen's right tit to get her attention; she was sitting tailor-fashion in front of my swivel chair between my legs. "If I fucked Cindy, would you suck my jizz out of her cunt?"

"Yes." Karen's attitude said, "You have to ask?"

"Would you be all mortified?"

"No."

"You're not married to him!" Cindy burst out.

"But you're married to Ed, which means you're a lot better off than Karen is," I pointed out. "Ed, you aren't planning on putting her on the street, are you?"

"Nope."

"Okay, then." I eyed Cindy. "What's the problem?"

"I was... humiliated..."

"That's in your head. If you let it get to you, you hurt for it. Is Ed allowed to fuck other women?"

"Yes." Clearly, she didn't like it.

"Are you allowed to fuck other men?"

"Well, I've been made to."

"You've volunteered a couple of times that I remember," I corrected her.

"Okay." She didn't like having me point THAT out, either.

"Hon, this has all been about getting rid of some bad habits and prejudices you have so you and Ed can enjoy yourselves and others - WITHOUT unnecessary worries about your relationship going to Hell just because some other dick or pussy puts in an appearance," I explained. "You know you like strange - are you going to be able to give it up?" I waited a moment, eyeing her, then pressed, "Go ahead - lie to me. You KNOW you can't put the genie back in the bottle..."

"Okay, maybe not," Cindy admitted, hanging her head.

"If it goes on in front of you, is Ed getting a little that awful?" I asked.

"That depends," Cindy sulked.

"Okay, if the woman doesn't rub your nose in it?"

"I guess not," Cindy admitted reluctantly.

"What about Ed and boys?" I pressed, adding, "I was there..."

"It's... kind of hot..." Getting the admission was like pulling teeth.

"Do you have a choice in all this?" I asked.

"No."

"Why do you think that is?"

"I... don't know."

"You DO know!" I insisted. "It's because if you had a choice, you would hide in your little box and not grow up! You have to play with the big kids, Hon - you ARE a big kid. You have to learn to act like one." From the look on her face, though, you'd have sworn she twelve! "Can you share?" I pressed.

Cindy looked bothered.

"Let me rephrase that," I amended. "Can you share Ed sexually? We're not talking about your committed emotional relationship - frankly, we never were. What we're looking for here is for you to learn to separate sex and the other things you tend to attach to it - like love and commitment. Sex can be good clean fun if you treat it that way. We've been over this, haven't we?"

"Well, some..." Cindy admitted.

"Let me give you an example," I said. "Do you ever foresee Julio being your man? The love of your life?"

Cindy recoiled. "Gawd, no!"

"Did you have a good time with him, anyway?"

Cindy wet her lips and flicked her eyes from me to Ed and back. "Yes."

"See where I'm going here?" I sat back. "Ed, is Holly a hot fuck?"

"You know it!"

"Would you replace Cindy with her?"

"God, no! She'd KILL me! Besides, I'm two and a half times her age!"

"So Holly isn't a threat to Cindy?"

"Not even," Ed shook his head.

"Are you likely to fall in love with, say, Karen, here, if she spreads for you often enough?" I asked.

Ed frowned. I knew he was afraid that I'd just undercut my argument, so I added the caveat, "We're assuming that Cindy is available and doing her job and you two aren't in trouble emotionally or something."

Ed still looked bothered. "If it happened often enough, I couldn't guarantee that I wouldn't develop SOMETHING," he muttered, "but - all things being equal - it wouldn't affect Cindy."

Cindy clearly wasn't reassured - but then, I wouldn't be, either, in her shoes. "Okay, I deliberately threw you a curve. What are the chances that your relationship to Cindy would crash and burn just because Karen warmed your bed periodically?"

"Just from that?" Ed asked. "Remote - unless Cindy made it an issue."

"Aha!" I erupted. "THIS is where I was headed! You see, Cindy - it's not a problem unless you MAKE it a problem! It's all in the approach - if you feel and act threatened, it damages your emotional relationship with Ed - you have fights, rifts. And THAT causes the very thing you're worried about to become more likely! Similarly - and I'm gonna go hog wild with this example, just for the impact - if I bring in six big black bucks with fourteen inch dicks to work you over and you don't go totally ga-ga and get 'Slut for black dick' tattooed over your pussy, Ed probably won't get too excited, even if you want an occasional return performance. And if he doesn't make an issue of it, what do you think the effect on your relationship will be?"

"I'm... not sure..." Cindy muttered. Looking at her, I could see the shock value of the situation I described was distracting her.

"What if I enjoy watching?" Ed chuckled.

"You could fluff for her, if you like - and bat cleanup - but that's another situation," I replied, grinning. "In that case, the tattoo might turn out to be okay."

Ed laughed - but Cindy looked extremely agitated. I decided to throttle it back. "Let's look at something more mainstream - I think her imagination is getting in Cindy's way. Cindy, if you and Ed had Karen in your bed Tuesdays and Thursdays, and Michael or Pete Mondays and Wednesdays, how would that change your relationship with Ed? After a month, say?"

Cindy frowned. "A rotation?"

"Yeah. You and Ed share whoever it is, male or female," I agreed.

Cindy puzzled it out. "It shouldn't..."

"It might even improve things, huh?" I chuckled.

"Well, yeah, actually."

"The other people wouldn't be a threat, even if you developed a certain fondness for them, would they?" I pressed.

"Probably not," Cindy agreed.

"Humans are naturally polygamous," I declared. "It's obvious in the male, but much less so in the female. I've read recently where a female researcher posited that monogamy is a male construct - which surprised me, because I always thought it was a female one. The point is that in early human cultures, the dominant male probably had access to every female in the tribe. Women shared a man - perhaps several - and the structure was efficient, because then they could divvy up child-rearing and the other domestic chores - AND provide adequate service to the ever-demanding male libido. It's been my experience that males want sex more often than females, even though the individual sex act may actually be more rewarding for the female. That more or less drives you to the conclusion that monogamy sucks - it's too demanding on women and leaves men unsatisfied. And that's without even discussing the fact that everybody - male or female - likes variety."

"That's an interesting theory," Ed mused.

"Divorce rates tend to bear me out," I resumed. "And they're even more compelling evidence of why monogamy sucks - because all of the artificial legal crap we've put in place to ensure that females, in particular, in a monogamous relationship are adequately protected ruin both partners for life when they discover that a particular relationship isn't working for them and they want to move on."

"So what do we do?" Ed asked. Cindy had settled back to listen when I stopped challenging her directly and got scholarly.

"That's a problem," I replied. "We've painted ourselves into a corner using the law and religion - although the clear indications that polygamy was the accepted lifestyle in early biblical days would seem to contradict current religious beliefs. Solomon had 700 wives or some such - why? Because he was the head motherfucker in charge - the dominant male."

"What about 'cleave unto thee only'?" Cindy asked.

"That applies to the female - not the male - take a look if you don't believe me," I replied, "but I'm wondering if even that wasn't a popular newfangled notion to the original authors of the Bible. You see, the problem with religion is that it becomes sullied by politics; whatever inspiration that caused a religious document to be created eventually becomes diluted by the fact that the thing gets handed to mere humans to enforce. The Catholics had a death grip on Christianity for nearly a millennium - and during that time, they were a major political power. As a result, a lot of crap intended to keep the peasants in line and properly subservient became 'God's word' - and once that happens, there's no undoing it. That was the source of the Protestant Reformation - Martin Luther protested the Catholic Church's sullying Christianity with a bunch of politically motivated crap designed to keep them in control of things. And, of course, the Christians don't have a corner on such things; Muslims, Hindus - just about any religion starts out as a grand idea, then politicians get a hold of it - witness your average suicide-bomber. The whole, 'You have to take it on faith...' piece attracts charlatans and the self-serving like flies to honey. I think a serious effort is made in some of the organized religions to keep such things to a minimum, but power corrupts - period. Anyway, like I said, you've got laws and you've got religion behind the whole monogamy thing - it's gonna be a bitch to fix, particularly with religion, because once it's stamped 'God's Law' you can't just repeal it."

"So..." Ed mused.

"So you work with what you have," I replied. "The Mormons still do it in places despite the law - and they're generally left alone as long as they don't rub anyone's nose in it. They're a prime example of us going back to our roots. Why did they do it? What possessed Joseph Smith and his little group to go hunting in scripture for justification of plural marriage? Simple hardship. They were going to rough places and it didn't make sense to put widows and kids out of a wagon train - basically to starve to death -- because the husband died. They needed the bodies to grow their community - so why not make it legal to take responsibility for more than one woman?"

I sighed. "Nowadays, the trick seems to be avoiding marriage. Gay marriage and civil unions and similar are slowly stripping marriage of its privileged status. If you're not married, you can't be prosecuted for bigamy because you live with more than one woman. You lose out on some perks put in place for taxation and such, but the tradeoff is not being gutted financially when the contract is broken and laws that haven't kept up with society get invoked when they shouldn't be. Swinging surfaced in the Seventies as a visible thing - but perhaps for the wrong reasons. In any case, we apparently weren't ready for it socially. Now, we're better prepared, but the pendulum has swung toward hypocritical moral outrage and as a result it has to be done in a more clandestine manner. Fortunately, we've had several decades of poor performance data for the whole marriage thing and people are learning to tolerate the alternatives. As a result, I can bring Karen into my house and nobody is going get incredibly excited - even if I decided to get kids on her, it wouldn't be anything huge." The look Karen gave me was absolutely priceless and I chuckled. "I could do the same with Jean, too, and all I would excite is envy. Some hypocrites might look down their nose at us, but no one would DO anything - there is no structure in place to put a stop to it. Guys in the ghetto do it all the time - and the welfare system picks up the slack. Paternity suits are another solution - and they're enforceable and DNA testing makes identification of the father pretty certain - but who takes care of kids like Pete and Kate? Who would want to interfere when they ARE being taken care of?"

I stopped myself, shaking my head. "I've drifted some. The point is, two women can share a man - in fact, more than that can, depending upon individual needs. This would be more or less full-up equal footing-type sharing. If you're just talking about an occasional roll with something new and strange, that doesn't even count for a primary female partner unless somebody fucks up and kids result. But it ONLY works if everybody keeps things in perspective! Running around and wailing, 'My marriage is ruined!' is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You need to use the new, the fresh, and the exciting to make your relationship a richer thing, rather than as evidence of its dissolution. Collaborate. Learn what excites you and bring it back to each other to talk about and implement to make your relationship more satisfying!"

Cindy and Ed both nodded and I left it at that, since Cindy was out of the dumps.