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Jack doesn’t care, not really. He can’t when it’s him she comes home to, when he’s the one running his hands down her body possessively, when it’s just a girl thing, really. He doesn’t take it seriously, none of the husbands do.
─
Alice doesn’t take it seriously either, she tells herself as Bunny passes her a cigarette. It's just for fun.
Bunny comes over every Monday night when the boys gather to watch the game. They watch the game. Bunny watches her.
“You’re such an angel,” Bunny gasps as she reaches for the cocktail Alice poured her. “You have no idea how much I need this.”
“Long day?” Alice says sympathetically, wrinkling her nose. Bunny reaches over and smooths out her forehead.
“You'll wrinkle,” she says, and presses her red lips to Alice's brow. The skin tingles. Alice almost flushes.
“You have no idea,” Bunny says, moving on as if nothing happened (because nothing did happen, Alice reminds herself). “The kids were running a riot, getting them into bed was such a chore. I had to read them three stories before they settled down.” She says this with an exasperated tone but there’s a warm glow in her eyes that has nothing to do with the cocktail that tells Alice that bunny doesn’t mind, not really.
“And of course I burned dinner somehow, and it was Dean’s favorite, too. So I had to make a casserole at the last minute, who knows how I managed it.”
“I’m sure Dean loved it,” Alice says, means “I'm sure Dean loves you,” and Bunny hears it, softens behind her lipstick and her sharp eyebrows. It's a look Alice doesn’t get often, it’s reserved for quiet moments in corners when they’re hanging onto each other and giggling, right before their husbands come get them and Bunny looks at her like she’s the sun.
Maybe she really means “I love you.” Maybe Bunny knows.
─
The first time, it’s a dare. Everyone's had a little too much to drink and the boys are rowdy. In the spirit of hosting, Alice suggests a game.
“What game?” Kate says, hand on her stomach. As always.
“Charades?” Alice suggests.
“We played that last time,” Jack objects from the couch. She pouts at him, and he grins back at her, open and full. “You suggest something then,” she says.
“Truth or dare,” Bunny says from behind her cocktail glass and a cheer goes up.
“You go first then,” Alice says, and Bunny nods, pauses to think.
“Dare,” she says, as if this is a surprise. Alice has nothing to contribute, hasn’t played this game in years.
“Kiss the prettiest girl in the room,'' Jack says from the couch, and the husbands all whoop. they all have eyes only for their wives- but their wife AND someone else of her choosing surely is within bounds. Alice blushes, fiery red.
“Jack,” she protests.
“What?” He says, “We’re all friends here.”
So when Bunny leans over to kiss her and it feels at once familiar and achingly new, and her hand cups Bunny’s face, and her lips tingle the rest of the night, well.
It was Jack's idea.
─
Bunny comes over while the boys are at work and the kids are at school, the long hours they usually fill with shopping or promenading or the pool.
“You look comfortable,” Alice says as she brings the drinks over.
“You’re such a good hostess,” she says. “Of course I'm comfortable.” Alice just sips her drink quietly, watching as Bunny lazily strokes her arm and hums.
“What,” she says, catching Alice's gaze. and Alice leans over and kisses her, sliding her tongue past Bunny’s Revlon Raven Red lipstick. Their stomachs rub against each other, a hand tangles in hair, one slips between legs. She feels like she’s touching electricity.
Later, they are doing the dishes as if nothing happened, chatting quietly as the record player croons softly into the summer evening. for a moment, this is life: the two of them sharing spaces, sharing kisses, days slipping by with just the two of them. Alice looks at Bunny and Bunny looks back, smiling softly at her. The scene feels transient and yet unending, as if there was never any other life or any place, just this, just them. Alice opens her mouth, to say something, who knows what, but knowing that whatever is hiding behind her tongue needs to be said-
and then the door swings open, Jack tramps in, calling for her, and the spell is broken.
When Jack takes her to bed that night she bites her lip to not say the wrong name. She makes his favorite meals for a week straight after that, and he doesn’t even notice. Bunny would notice, she thinks, and almost burns the eggs.
─
In his defense, he never seems to be jealous, or turned on. Her escapades never feature in their sex life, and he seems so damned equivocal about the whole thing sometimes Alice would think she imagines it all. She has herself half-convinced she’s just deluded until she sees the lipstick marks on her collar. So it’s true- it just doesn’t matter. Not to Jack. She swallows. At least she knows where she stands.
Whenever Bunny leaves, she pecks Alice's cheek and leaves a trace of her lipstick behind. When Jack leaves, he kisses her and smacks her ass.
“A little freedom in a relationship isn’t a bad thing,” Bunny says. “The boys know we can get bored while they’re gone. There’s only so much shopping a girl can do.”
It just doesn’t seem right, that their lives are so regimented but this little bit of freedom can still exist.
“Don’t worry about it,” Bunny says, seeing her thoughts in her eyes. “Have I ever steered you wrong?” She hasn’t of course, and Alice is tired, so tired. She closes her eyes and slides down on the couch so her head is in Bunny’s lap. Bunny plays with her hair, humming all the while.
“How's Bunny?” Jack asks one night after dinner, and Alice smiles. “She's Bunny,” Alice says.