Chapter Thirty Eight - Caution - Exploratory Blasting
Both Carissa and Sandy were very quiet while we ate, only discussing the meal, but I was no ball of fire either. Even though I'd had a short nap during the day, I was still feeling very tired, after all I really hadn't slept much the night before. Since I was feeling sleep deprived, I was probably not at my best and brightest in any way shape or form. Carissa noticed how tired I was, and when we'd eaten, she sent me out to the porch so I could relax with my evening cup of coffee. Of course, I didn't argue, instead I sat on the porch, almost dozing off, while they washed up the dishes and cleaned up the kitchen.
When the two of them were finished in the kitchen, they came out to join me, but even then it seemed to me they were still speaking extremely quietly. But, perhaps I was somewhat dull witted because I was tired and almost dozing off. I wasn't paying their conversation much attention, so their discussion didn't really register until my name was mentioned.
". . . but Chris was right about the way some women deal with folks who are well off. When Jess and Jean came home from school and said they'd made friends with a girl whose last name was Crawford, it was a big deal to Mom." Sandy was saying quietly.
"Whoa." I sat up and looked at her. "Could you go over that again, please? I guess I lost my concentration for a moment."
"Oh Chris, wake up for a minute or two." Carissa snorted. "Sandy was just taking a wild stab at guessing the reason why her mom is so much in favour of the three of us living together in Calgary."
"Why, because Beth is friends with the twins?" I frowned, still not understanding and trying to tie that idea in with what I'd heard.
"No, you silly ass." Sandy grinned at me. "It's because you're part of the Bender clan, well, Bender/Crawford Clan now I guess. Didn't you realise that your family controls more land than anyone else in the whole municipality?"
"So what?" I still didn't understand what she meant.
"You didn't hear anything I said, did you?" She laughed.
"Not really I guess. I think I zoned out for a while. I'm sorry."
"That's okay. I'll start over." She smiled, then sighed. "Mom really has a thing about owning property and I think the whole thing started because of her childhood. She was born and raised while they lived on a rented quarter section of land and her family went through the depression while they lived there. You see, her family has never owned any of the places where they've lived, not even now. So, Mom never lived in a place she could really call her own, not until she married Dad and even then, not until they bought the house we live in now. Mom is an absolute nut about owning property."
"Well, I guess that living through tough times like that probably would explain her attitude about property." Carissa reached out and took Sandy's hand in hers, then she frowned. "Just how old is your mom?"
"Let's see, I think she was born in 1929, because I'm quite sure that she'll be thirty-nine this fall." Sandy paused and her face took on an intense look of concentration, then she nodded. "Yeah, it would have been 1929, right when the depression started. Her whole family was very poor all through her childhood, because of the depression and then the wartime rationing, so I guess it kind of warped her perspective of things. She practically worships people who are well off or who have a lot of land."
"But, I always thought that people on farms lived quite well during the depression?" Carissa frowned.
"Oh no, not really, at least not for some people." Sandy shook her head. "Mom's family wasn't exceptionally big as far as families went in those days, but there were still five kids and like I said before, they lived on a quarter section of poor land. Grampa and my uncles used to work for other people to earn enough money and food for them to live on, because the farm simply didn't produce enough to keep them going. There was an awful drought at that time too. When she was really young, Mom and her sisters had to herd the cattle along the ditches next to the road to let them eat the grass growing there, because the pastures were over-grazed. Then the dust storms started and even the grass in the ditches was gone, because it was buried under drifts of dust. That's when times got really rough for them. Even the bread they ate was completely home made. Their flour was made from wheat that they ground up in a grain grinder that was meant to grind grain for the cattle. They'd just run the wheat through the grinder over and over, then screen it through an old window screen to get all the biggest unground bits out. Heck, they even made sourdough bread using a sourdough starter, so they didn't need to buy yeast."
"I know that sort of thing happened to a lot of people." I nodded. "Even the people who had more land had a hard time of it. Grampa Bender tells some awful tales about it and Dad does too. They used to use the dishwater and bathwater on the gardens, and they used to snare rabbits to make rabbit stew, stuff like that."
"Yeah, but people with bigger farms had a better chance." Sandy frowned at me. "With more land, they just cut back some. I'm not saying it wasn't tough on everyone, but what I'm trying to say is that it was tougher on the little guys."
"Oh, I agree." I nodded. "Heck, even now, farming can be tough though. Only a few years ago we had a really bad stretch when the weather didn't cooperate. We had too much rain come late in the fall one year, that was followed by an early frost; that year the crops were wiped out. The next year we got hailed out, then for a few years we had a bad drought. It was rough enough that we're still paying the bank for loans we had to take out at that time. Farming can be darn tough if Mother Nature doesn't cooperate."
"I'm not saying it isn't hard at times, but from Mom's perspective, she could see how much easier life was for people that owned their land, compared to how it was for her family." Sandy shrugged. "Anyway, she had one friend, living on a big farm in the neighbourhood, who used to pass along used clothes and stuff. So, when Beth made friends with the twins, Mom made a big deal about it. Then you came along and showed an interest in dating me. At that time Mom was in seventh heaven."
"Umm, am I reading a lot into this or are you going where I suspect?" Carissa looked at Sandy strangely. "You don't think your Mom raised you to be a man trap for a rich guy, do you?"
"I don't know, but it sure seems suspicious, doesn't it?" Sandy shrugged her shoulders. "It's not just Mom either. I mean, just look at the way I was raised. Dad wouldn't let me date at all, not until a nice guy, from a relatively well off family, came along and expressed interest in dating me. Then he almost threw me at Chris, no real restrictions on where we could go or what we could do. Nothing but having me home by a late curfew and not letting me miss work. On top of that, Mom never talked to me about any kind of birth control, but boy, did she ever manage to leave me with the impression that sex was fantastic."
"Well, sex is great, at least I think so." Carissa agreed with a wry grin. "But, I suspect you might have set up to get involved with someone like Chris and since you didn't know dick all about sex, you were almost certain to get pregnant. That is, until Beth and her Mom came along and explained things. They shot that lack of knowledge all to heck, didn't they?"
"Yeah, they did, along with some help from Janet at the hospital when I had wits enough to ask questions." Sandy nodded. "All of us are on the pill now, even if Jess and Jean aren't really old enough to get the pill without parental permission. We haven't told Mom or Dad though."
"The twins are taking birth control pills?" I stared at her.
"Well yeah! I talked them into it and Janet helped us out." Sandy nodded her head. "I mean, I screwed up when I tried dating you and then I didn't get along very well with Wil, so I was sort of out of the game. When the twins started to show an interest in Tom, Mom seemed to think it was fine and even talked Dad into letting the twins both go out with him, I got suspicious and decided to talk to them. She hadn't said one darn thing to them about protecting themselves against pregnancy. On top of that, she'd made certain that they overheard her saying things about how good sex felt, just like she had with me."
"You mean you think she's setting all of us up so that Tom or I might get one of her daughters pregnant?" I bleated, hardly able to believe my ears.
"In a word, yes." Sandy nodded. " When we were down swimming, you were talking about women manipulating men. I got to thinking about that. I think Mom does that to Dad and he doesn't even realise it. I think she's been doing the same thing with the three of us girls, so I suppose we're conditioned to make ourselves available to well off guys, maybe for years."
"Oh migawd!" She paused and looked at me, her eyebrows lifting in surprise, then she turned to face Carissa. "Gal, you'd better not leave me alone with him for any length of time. I'm a ticking, time bomb that's ready to go off!"
"Huh?" Carissa stared at her, her face wearing an expression of total incomprehension.
I wasn't in any better shape. I was staring at Sandy just as hard and probably understood her words just as little. Sandy stood up and moved away from us, her body held rigid and her face twisted into a deep frown. She walked over to the porch railing, then spun to press her back against it as she faced us. After looking at us intently for a second, she spread her arms and grabbed the railing with both hands, clenching them tightly, almost as if she was holding herself in place.
"I think I know what's happened to me, and to my sisters, and it pisses me off!" She spoke through gritted teeth.
"I don't understand." I said quietly.
"Chris, for God's sake, don't talk right now." Sandy moaned softly, shaking her head and closing her eyes. "Just hearing your voice is setting me off and I think I'm going nuts."
"Can I talk?" Carissa asked in a whisper.
"Yeah, I'm not affected by your voice. Well, except that I feel envious, even jealous."
"Jealous? Of me? But why?"
"Because you're with Chris and I'm not." Sandy said flatly. "This isn't about sex so much either. For some reason it's just that I see how much you two care for each other. You two are always touching and doing things for each other, almost without thinking about it. I guess I miss that more than anything, because I can see that you have each other while I'm all alone. I know part of that envy comes from what I've been taught and it bothers me a lot that my own family could be so shallow, but I still feel the envy and jealousy. If this is what I have to put up with when we're in Calgary, I don't think we should live together after all."
"Wait a minute, I do care for you." I couldn't help saying. "If I didn't like you, I wouldn't have gone out with you in the first place. Part of the reason that you see what you do with Carissa is the fact that we've lived so closely, almost in each other's pockets, for a month and a half. Most of the closeness comes from the way our lives have become entangled in that time. As for doing things without thinking, we know each other very well now."
I paused, then grabbed Carissa's hand. "We know we can expect certain things from each other, so we've gotten into the habit of thanking each other for the support in small gestures and actions. Now, I'm not saying that sex isn't part of it, but it's not the largest part. The sex is a wonderful bonus."
"I think what Chris is trying to say is that no matter what you feel now, over time your feelings toward us will change as you get to know us closer than you do now." Carissa smiled at Sandy.
"Yeah, but right now I can see him sitting beside you, holding your hand, and it bites the big one. I keep thinking that if I hadn't pushed so damn hard and screwed up so badly, that could be me, not you."
"Would it help if I wasn't here right now?" I found myself asking. "I could go for a walk or something."
Carissa squeezed my hand tightly as she gave a quick negative shake of her head and a mild frown.
"Or would it be better if you sat between us and we both sat close to hold you?" She offered.
It took a little time to calm her down and convince her to trust herself, but in the long run, we were all sitting on the bench seat with Sandy between us. Each of us had one arm around her, and each of us was holding one of her hands. Once she had calmed down, she began to talk.
"I've been thinking about what I said before, and I think Mom was probably conditioned herself, not only by her mother and her family, but by one of the people in her neighbourhood too. You see, toward the end of World War II, one of the neighbours had a relative come to live with them who had escaped from Germany. The neighbours had a little bit of money by then and they hired Mom to help look after the old woman because she needed someone with her all the time. The old woman was quite ill since she'd been forced to work in one of Hitler's youth camps even though she was Jewish, but since she was Jewish, she was treated poorly."
"She was Jewish and she worked with the Nazis?" I stared at her.
"Yeah, but I think it was either work with them or get put in a camp and be treated the same way as the other Jews." Sandy sniffled. "I think she was a psychiatrist or something like that, but I don't know for sure. I never met her, in fact, she died before I was born. Her job in the camps was to calm down the young women who were brought there and try to make them happy to have babies fathered by the men that the Nazis picked. I think the old lady probably exerted a lot of influence on Mom's thinking, but I also think Mom picked up some tricks from her about influencing people."
"What makes you think that?" Carissa whispered.
"Well, for one thing, Mom wasn't going out at all before she started working with the old lady, but after she was there for a few weeks, she started dating guys." Sandy frowned. "It wasn't long after the old woman died before Mom met Daddy. I know Daddy had a reputation for being wild at the time and I think Mom going out with him was something of a scandal. The scandal got worse when Mom got pregnant with me, but somehow she talked Daddy into marrying her. I know that nobody in her family expected the marriage to work out, but it did. I think Mom helped to reshape Daddy's character and got him to calm down a lot.
"After that Daddy got a decent job, then his parents helped furnish and set up a home, even if Mom wasn't all that happy that the house was rented. When I was born, I like to think that I calmed Daddy down a bunch, but I guess that's just happenstance. I do know he treats me special, but he's just as happy with the twins, even if they do make him a little crazy sometimes. Anyway, he went from being a wild single bachelor, who couldn't hold down a job, to being a good reliable worker and a decent father. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems to me that Mom was always talking to him at night when he came home, calming him down and soothing his ego. I think Mom worked as hard or harder to get him to stick out the job as he did. I don't know for certain, but I think Chris's dad helped Daddy get the job he has now and maybe even helped my parents get the mortgage to buy our house when we moved here. I do know that Mom thinks Mr Crawford is a great guy. I mean she treats Beth and even Chris like they can walk on water."
"Oh come on now." I snorted.
"She does though. I can even give you an example of what I mean." Sandy protested. "I've thought back and as long as I can remember, Mom has always sat and talked to us when she tucked us in at night. While we were getting ready for bed and even after we were in bed, Mom used to be there, talking to us and helping us relax. When we moved into town, I was in grade two and the twins were in kindergarten so they were going to bed before I was and she used to tell us stories until we fell asleep."
"Most mom's do that when their kids are young." Carissa frowned, interrupting Sandy. "Mom used to read to us every night, fairy tales and stuff like that."
"Oh Mom read us stories, but all of them were Cinderella sort of stories. They were always about the poor girl who married the rich prince and about how they lived happily ever after. After we moved here, her stories changed and she always managed to mention Chris or Tom."
"But we're not rich!" I protested.
"You are compared to us." Sandy snapped, then she looked shocked. "Sorry, I didn't mean to argue with you, but you are well off and you're a real nice guy too."
"I can't argue with that at all." Carissa laughed softly. "But, even with all that, why do you think you've been conditioned?"
"Well, you worked at the hospital with me, did you ever remember me 'coming on' to any of the young guys we treated?" Sandy asked.
"No, you were always shy."
"Unh huh, I sure was, but when Chris came into the hospital, I lost my shyness." Sandy looked about ready to cry again. "Ask him. He'll tell you I even wanted to help him use the bedpan. Then too, I peeked in on him, every time I had a chance. If he was awake, I went in and talked to him. I even kissed him two or three times when he was asleep and once when he was awake. Then when I went home and told Mom about the screw up with the medicine that made him so sick, I was so upset that she had to hold me in her arms and rock me to sleep."
"Actually I was quite upset about that myself and I wasn't even there." Carissa smiled. "Beth and Corinna were darn upset then too."
"Yeah, but you guys all had a reason. After all, Chris is Beth's brother and you were certain that Chris had saved you from being ridiculed by everyone. To all of you guys, he was your hero. I was just someone who was supposed to be caring for him. I wasn't supposed to get so involved. Heck, if he would have let me help him with that stupid bedpan, I'd have given him a blowjob." Suddenly she was blushing.
"Right there?" Carissa giggled. "Even if there was a chance for you to get caught?"
"Unh huh." Sandy giggled, then she sobered. "The strange thing is that I told Mom how I felt and what I wanted to do. She wasn't even shocked about it. She asked me if Chris got hard when I told her about the bed pan, then said that I might have had to give him a hand job or a blow job before he could use the bedpan."
"She did?" Carissa just stared at her and so did I, but I was feeling shocked and embarrassed.
"She did more than that too." Sandy giggled again. "She told me how to do it, even showed me."
"She didn't!" Carissa sounded shocked.
"Oh yes she did." Sandy hid her head in her hands so her voice was muffled, but she went on speaking. "She took one of my fingers and told me what to do, then she showed me, actually using my finger so I could feel what she was doing with her lips and tongue. When I asked her where she learned all that, she told me that the old Jewish woman had shown her and that she was passing on knowledge that I could use to get a man."
"Oh migawd!" Carissa squawked, then giggled. "She didn't, did she?"
"Oh yeah. She did." Sandy lifted her head and licked her lips, then both of them were giggling and looking at me strangely.
"What?" I wondered, completely embarrassed by the whole thing.
The two of them ignored my question. Instead, they turned to face each other. I think there was a silent question in Carissa's eyes, but although I could see that Sandy was grinning, her face turned toward Carissa so I couldn't tell much about her expression. Neither of them spoke, but suddenly they both got to their feet, then turned toward me.
"We're going for a walk." Carissa said quietly.
"Go ahead, but I'm not." I answered firmly. "I'm still feeling too tired after last night. In fact, I might just go lay down, then you two could sit here and talk without me overhearing anything."
"Oh, I know you're tired." Carissa leaned over and kissed me lightly. "You really didn't get much sleep last night, did you?"
"No, not really. Actually, I think I might have slept about two hours, then I had that nap today, but even with that, I'm bushed. I was trying to be polite because we have a visitor, but . . ."
"So! Go to bed. You certainly don't have to be polite and stay up because I'm here." Sandy interrupted. "Carissa can keep me company. I certainly don't want you to stay up just be polite, not since you're exhausted."
I looked at her, then at Carissa and made up my mind to take their advice. I hugged them both, kissing Carissa on the lips and Sandy on the cheek, wished them both goodnight, then went inside. Ten minutes later I was sacked out.
When I awoke in the morning, I was on the very edge of the bed. I could feel Carissa spooned tightly against my back as her arm draped over my body, gently caressing my morning erection. At least, I thought it was Carissa, until I turned my head and saw Sandy's tousled red hair and sleeping face lying next to me. That's when I flung off the covers and leapt out of bed. A second glance proved to me that Carissa was in the bed as well, but she was snuggled on the other side of Sandy, not against me as I'd first assumed.
I suppose by diving out of the bed, and rather violently throwing the covers off, I shocked them enough to awaken them. At least they were both sleepily looking up at me in a second or two.
"Hi." Sandy said very tentatively as she blushed.
"G'morning." Carissa slurred. "Don't blame Sandy. It was my idea for her to sleep next to you."
"Holy humping hell, what is going on?" I barked, trying to cover my morning wood from Sandy's gaze with both hands.
"Sandy was feeling lonely and wanted to sleep with us." Carissa sat up and stretched. "And there's no sense in trying to hide that thing, I made certain that Sandy saw what it looked like last night. The only problem was, you were uncooperative. You just rolled over and went to sleep, so we were left frustrated and had to sleep with a big snoring lump."
"Why did you do something like that?" I stared at her in astonishment.
"Because Sandy had never seen a guy's cock before and she'd never slept in the same bed with a guy either." Carissa shrugged. "It's not like she was going to do anything, not with me right here. What are you so worried about? Nothing happened and you weren't hurt in any way?"
I just stared at her, unable to express the feeling that somehow I'd been taken advantage of as I slept. I knew that if I stayed there and discussed it with the two of them right then, we'd end up arguing. I didn't want to start my day like that. Instead I just shook my head, grabbed my clothes, then I walked out of the bedroom, closing the door behind me.
In the kitchen, I threw on my clothes, then put the kettle on to make coffee. Leaving it to perk, I walked out on the front porch. I was still trying to get a handle on what had happened to us in the last twenty-four hours and especially what had happened the night before.
I really didn't understand Carissa's actions. Right at the moment it seemed to me that Carissa was playing around with Sandy's dreams of romance. To me it seemed they were both using me as a pawn, which was really upsetting.
Mostly though, I was remembering that Carissa had done something similar before, only that time it had been with her twin sister. That whole episode had turned out very badly. Carissa had told me then that she wasn't the jealous sort, but after something had happened, she'd shown feelings that were at odds to her words. At the same time, I felt that our actions might have been the final straw that triggered Corinna's suicide attempt. Since I felt that the same thing could happen again in this case, I certainly didn't want to be involved in a similar incident. The other situation had been too damn painful for everyone involved.
I was still standing there, thinking about the situation when Carissa came outside with two mugs of coffee.
"Sorry about last night." She said quietly as she handed me one of the mugs. "I guess you're pretty annoyed, aren't you?"
I just shrugged my shoulders, then sighed deeply. I really didn't know what else to do.
"I did come into the bedroom alone and ask you if Sandy could sleep with us, you know. You said uh huh, so I took that to mean it was okay. I sure didn't want you to wake up and be pissed off like this." She said quietly. "I guess I should have made sure that you were awake, huh?"
"Yeah, you should have." I growled, not feeling at all mollified.
"I'm sorry." She grabbed my hand. "I don't want to lose what we have, but I guess last night might have been a mistake."
"Yeah." I muttered softly. "We've been through this same sort of thing before. I didn't like it then and I don't like it now."
"You mean with Corinna?"
"Yeah." I snapped. "That's exactly what I mean."
"But this was totally different." She frowned as she looked at me.
"I don't see that much difference."
"Well, Corinna expected sex, and I was willing to help her get it. I was very explicit with Sandy and told her that sex was your choice, not mine." Carissa sighed. "Last night she just needed to feel what it was like to have someone sleeping at her side all night long."
"Carissa, I woke up this morning with her hand feeling me up."
"Well, I can't say I blame her." She giggled slightly. "I mean a guy has this fascinating piece of flesh down there that seems to do the strangest things. It has a mind of its own too. Last night it wouldn't cooperate when I tried to make it grow just to show her what it looked like."
"But, that's just it, in some ways you treat me like a toy or a possession, something that you can share around with others. I'm not! I'm a person. I need to share in the decisions that we make about each other, especially decisions that involve our bodies and feelings."
"But I did ask." She protested.
"I was asleep." I growled. "To make a decision like that, I need to be wide awake so my brain is functioning. After that mess with Corinna, I'm surprised that you even asked."
"Why do you keep comparing the two happenings? They aren't alike at all. Corinna is my sister and I knew she wanted sex, but we've always shared. Sandy is a friend, and she didn't want sex, she only wanted a cuddle."
"Maybe they aren't alike to you, but they are to me." I shook my head. "Heck, even last night sex was involved. You did say that you showed Sandy my dick and tried to get me aroused, didn't you?"
"Umm, yeah, I sorta did do that." She admitted. "But, it's still not the same thing."
"No, it isn't exactly the same thing, but it's close." I sighed. "I think what it boils down to is that I was raised to be a one woman guy and you seem to be more like those hippies in the States who believe in free love."
"Well, not really, but just what do you see wrong about the idea of free love?" She asked.
"To start with, people like Corinna and Sandy could get hurt."
"I think you're misjudging both of them. Corinna was ill and I think Sandy is a lot more resilient than you are giving her credit for."
"Look, Carissa, right now all this is doing is confusing me. I really don't see why you're so much in favour of bringing extra people into our bed."
"I'm doing it because it's natural, dammit. Just look at your fucking horses. How many mares can one stallion service? Look at your cattle, or your chickens, or your pig, or even the damn dogs; the males dominate the females and one male dominates the rest. Most of all, look at wild animals. In almost all cases, there's one dominant male who dominates and breeds the whole female herd, or pack, or whatever a group is called. The animals that don't act that way are exceptions. " She snapped. "Of all the animals I can think of, you're most like a lead wolf of the pack. You're a natural leader and you're going to collect followers. So, I'm doing it because I want to be the next in line to the leader of the pack. If you're the dominant male, I want to be the dominant female."
"Huh." I grunted, not liking the way her argument was going.
"Face the facts, Chris. Whether you like it or not, you're a dominant male. I know it and so does every woman who meets you." She stood up and faced me then. "I'm a strong woman, and it's natural for me to want what's best for my man. I've picked you as my man and damn it, I plan to make sure you get what's best for you."
"Whoa there, back up. What do you mean when you say I'm dominant?"
"Oh for cripes sake, Chris. Look at what happens in your family. The only one you aren't dominant toward is Grampa Bender and sometimes I'm not sure about him. For any of the others, all you have to do is suggest something and the whole damn family scrambles to make it happen."
"Wait a minute, what about Mom and Dad?"
"You're still dominant, even for them. You respect them as your parents and relinquish part of your dominance, because of your age and experience, but you still remain the center of the active family decisions." She paused and took a deep breath. "However, like I said, I'm a strong person, even dominant. That means that I want to be partially in control in our relationship, but I don't mind being subservient to you."
"So what else are you going to tell me?" I snapped, still uncertain about the dominance thing.
"Well, while I'm explaining, there is one other thing that involves me personally and will affect our relationship, but it might shock you." She sighed heavily and frowned deeply.
"Yeah, what's that? I might as well hear all of your opinions."
"Well, until I met you, I thought I was a lesbian. In general terms, I like women much more than I do men. Since you're so dominant, you turned out to be the exception." She flushed bright red as she spoke. "Even so, I want at least one woman involved in any permanent relationship we have."
With that, she grabbed the two empty coffee mugs, turned, and went inside the cabin. I was left staring after her, my whole world turned upside down and set spinning by her words. Talk about a double whammy! First she tells me that I dominate everyone around me. Then she goes on to mention that she likes women as much or more than she does men.
I was stunned.