The question that arises on my husband’s birthday is always the same: ‘What do you get for the man who has everything?’ He isn’t a shopper. He once declared he has enough trousers to last the rest of his life.
So for his 40th, I decide to buy him a vintage watch. It would declare to the world that — despite his tattered sweaters — he’s an employed adult. But when I mention the watch, he says that what he really wants isn’t a good, but a service: a threesome with me and another woman.
mentioned this fantasy before, as had practically every man I’d ever dated. I’d always brushed it off with an eye roll and an ‘in your dreams’. The idea wasn’t unappealing, but it seemed logistically and emotionally complicated.
This time, however, I spontaneously say yes. As a journalist, I have trouble resisting a deadline. I’m also daunted by the price tag on a Rolex. And I pity him heading into his 40s consigned to sleeping with the same woman (me) for the rest of his life. I like what the threesome signifies: that we aren’t sliding quietly into middle age.
We agree on it in principle, but the idea is so exotic that for a few weeks it just sits there. Occasionally, I mention the name of a female friend.
“Would she be acceptable?’ I ask my husband.
‘Absolutely,’ he says each time.
It turns out that practically every woman we know would make the cut. But although I’m a novice, I’m pretty sure that recruiting a friend would be a mistake. There’s the enormous potential for awkwardness. And I don’t want someone creating a wedge in our cosy twosome. I’m envisioning this as a one-off.
Anyway, I wouldn’t know which one to ask. Straight women don’t tend to compare same-sex fantasies. I’m not sure who’d be tempted and who’d be appalled.
Finally, over brunch, we summon the courage to discuss our plans with friends of my husband. One of them, a single banker who’s nearing 40 herself, grimaces and then goes silent.
‘You look horrified,’ I say.
‘Yes, I mean, I just think it’s extraordinary!’ she says, blushing.
We rule out advertising for a third party online, since that seems like an open call for an STD. I decide the ideal woman would be a sexy acquaintance.
She’d be vetted (after all, everyone knows your acquaintances don’t have herpes), but easy enough to avoid afterwards.
A candidate soon emerges. She’s a friend of a friend whom I’ve met a few times at dinner parties. By chance, she’s seated behind us at a concert, with a man who appears to be her date.
For the first time, I notice that she’s quite attractive: tall and thin, with a little ballerina’s waist.
‘How about her?’ I whisper to my husband as the music starts.
‘Yes!’ he says, too loudly.
After the concert, the four of us chat. I make strong eye contact with the woman, work out that her name is Emma and ask for her views on the performance. She seems flattered when I suggest that she and I have lunch.
Over brunch, we summon the courage to discuss our plans with friends of my husband. One of them, a single banker who’s nearing 40 herself, grimaces and then goes silent.
A few days later, I get gussied up to meet her for Thai food. I’m pleased to see, when I arrive, that she has dressed up, too. Does she know she’s on a date?
I’m usually so concerned about what other people think of me that my lunch companion could be bleeding to death and I wouldn’t notice. But the threesome planning has made me more attentive.
Over soup, I listen carefully to Emma and quickly understand something that once would have taken me years to realise: under a pond of sassiness is, in fact, a lagoon of insecurity.
The common theme of her stories is that she clings to boyfriends who mistreat her. I’d mistaken tall for self-possessed.
She’s probably too emotionally fragile for a threesome, but I broach the topic to get some practice. I do this under the guise of exchanging girly confidences, saying: ‘You won’t believe what my husband wants for his birthday.’
I explain that I’ve agreed to this in principle, but that I haven’t yet found the third party.
I think she understands I’m propositioning her. But instead of taking the bait, she morphs into the Cassandra of threesomes.
She describes the ex-boyfriend who pressured her to go to bed with him and his other lover, and the couple who swapped partners for a night, then never swapped back.
She warns me I’ll be scarred by images of my husband doing unspeakable things to another woman. ‘And what if it’s someone who’s incredibly hot? How could you possibly handle that?’ (This seems overly alarmist; I doubt we’ll recruit a supermodel). Not only is Emma out of the running, she talks of future lunch dates. To my horror, she wants to become my friend.
I’m suddenly sympathetic to male friends who disappeared the moment I got engaged.
That night I tell my husband about my ‘date’, which cost me £40 and consumed half my workday.
‘Thanks for taking care of that,’ he says, without looking up from his computer.
It’s what he says when I’ve waited in all morning for the plumber. Planning the threesome has become another of the administrative tasks I do in our marriage.
Nevertheless, my new man’s-eye-view of the world is thrilling. I now notice women everywhere: browsing in shoe stores; in queues at the supermarket. I even scan my book group — middle-aged women who like to read about the Holocaust — for candidates.
Though I’ve managed only one failed seduction, my posture toward the world has changed. Instead of waiting to see who notices me, I decide who I want and go after them.
And it’s energising to put this once-furtive fantasy on the table. Threesomes suddenly seem to be everywhere, although the message about them is paradoxical; every straight man supposedly wants to have one, but no one seems to have had a good one.
A friend tells me he bedded two women on the night of September 11, 2001, as they all watched the news together. But one developed a serious, unreciprocated crush on him. ‘Inside every threesome is a twosome and a onesome,’ a character on a TV show warns. I’m undeterred but still no closer to finding the other woman, so I peruse some websites.
I quickly see we have competition. At least a dozen couples — all of them claiming to be gorgeous and under 30 — are seeking a woman for a threesome, too.
Since I can’t compete on looks or age, I decide to distinguish myself by sounding desperate. ‘I’d like to give my partner his best birthday present ever: an experience with me and another woman,’ my post reads. ‘Will you help me?’
Fifteen minutes later, I get a reply that’s literate and nice. ‘Hi, I have a boyfriend with the same fantasy (not very original, I know, but boys will be boys!!). Maybe we could end up doing a deal (though not necessarily). If we like each other, I’d be happy to help out. What kind of scenario did you have in mind?’ She signs it ‘N’.
It’s probably imprudent to pledge loyalty to a woman who scans ‘no-strings’ websites, but I decide on the spot that I won’t respond to anyone else. I like her sisterly tone and her perfect spelling. I’m not sure about the exchange deal, but that doesn’t seem to be mission-critical for her. (Though when I read her message to my husband, he immediately says: ‘I’ll swap you.’)
We exchange several more emails. N claims to be a straight, divorced mum in her late 40s. She says she responded to my ad out of a kind of sexual altruism, and she quotes the French expression ‘One need not die an idiot’.
As I’m putting on a dress to go to meet her for coffee, I’m suddenly nervous about what I’m about to do: try to convince a stranger to sleep with me and my husband. I’ve only ever been on the receiving end of seduction attempts. How do I convince a woman to take off her clothes?
My husband, who devoted years of his life to exactly this question, gives me a little pep talk.
‘With women, you have to listen to all the stuff they say. They have these complex emotional issues, and you have to try to figure out what they are. Just keep asking questions. Be pleasant and reassuring but also slightly mysterious.’
I’m already sitting down when N walks into the cafe. She’s a pretty, slim brunette with a friendly face. Her make-up is fresh; she’s eager to make a good impression, too.
I try to seem riveted as she describes her boyfriend woes, her life as a single mother and the health issues of her elderly father. Despite the peculiar circumstances, she’s clinging to the conventions of female bonding.
I steer the conversation toward sex. She says she’s never been with another woman and isn’t sure how she’ll feel about that.
I’m not sure either. When I show her a picture of my husband, she just glances at it. For her, this is more about the two of us.
We part warmly with a chaste double-cheeked kiss. I wait several days before sending her a note explaining that she’s been in my thoughts, and that I found her charming ‘in every way’.
She replies immediately, saying that she’s game for our adventure, but that she’d like to meet again to discuss our plans in more detail.
Plans? I’d imagined the threesome unfolding spontaneously. But now I’m goal-oriented. If that’s what she needs, I’ll do it.
At our second meeting, her insecurities surface: Do I think this counts as cheating on her boyfriend? (‘Of course not!’) What kind of women does my husband like? (‘Brunettes!’)
We lay down ground rules for the threesome. To avoid it becoming too porn-like, the two of us will be in charge. My husband won’t make a move unless we allow it.
Everything seems to be settled, but again we part without fixing a date. I send the usual lovely-to-see-you follow-up.
She replies that she enjoyed it, too, but that she’d like to meet for another drink.
I’m beginning to doubt whether she intends to go through with it. But when I complain to my husband, he assures me that this is the normal pace of seduction.
‘Obviously she’s not ready yet,’ he says. ‘She has some sort of hesitation. You need to work out what it is and help her through it.’
On the way to my third meeting with N, I decide to loosen up and become less calculating. I tease her about all the planning we’re doing, and joke that I’m going make storyboards and cue cards.
I confess that this is a big deal for me; she says the same. We coquettishly call each other N and P.
This new playful mood seems to be what was missing for her. After about an hour, she takes out her diary. We schedule the threesome for a week later, at lunchtime, at the small apartment my husband uses as an office.
When the day arrives, I’m nervous and giddy — and surprised that I’ve actually managed to arrange this. ‘I have a threesome in two hours,’ I keep telling myself. ‘I’m not going to die an idiot.’
I meet N at a cafe for a quick coffee, then we head to meet my husband nearby. On the way, I insist that we stop at a little food stand to buy supplies, in case we work up an appetite later. Clearly, I’m shopping to calm myself.
When we arrive, it’s N who’s nervous. ‘You’re in charge, OK?’ she tells me.
We’re both relieved when my husband arrives. They introduce themselves, and he’s immediately very physical with her, which breaks the ice.
We have a sort of group hug, and then we agree that he can take off both of our dresses.
My first surprise is that women are allowed to wear jewellery in bed. N even keeps on her large hoop earrings.
My second is that a threesome is so, well, sexual. I’d focused so much on the organisation and the catering, I had almost forgotten that we were going to be naked.
My third surprise is that when you’re detail-oriented like me, threesomes are confusing.
You quickly lose track of who’s at which stage. There’s a lot of ambiguous moaning.
My husband tells me afterwards that he got a little lost, too.
It’s a polite threesome. I get the sense that we’re all trying to divide our attention equitably.
Occasionally, N and I ask each other ‘How are you doing?’ like concerned friends.
After about 40 minutes, I’ve had enough. I wonder whether I might check my email. N is quite beautiful, but seeing versions of my own lady parts on her feels too familiar. I realise that part of what appeals to me about men is that their bodies are different.
I try to stay involved — it’s a birthday present, after all. When I glance at the clock again, an hour has passed. I had no idea that sex could last so long.
Finally, they tire themselves out. There’s a sweet moment at the end when the three of us lie together under the covers, with the birthday boy in the middle. He’s beaming. I’ll later get a series of heartfelt thank-you notes, saying it was as good as he’d hoped.
N seems pleased, too. As we walk home together, she says she’s surprised by how erotic she found the whole experience, especially being with me.
She hints that she’d like a repeat performance. I’m flattered, but I’m not planning on it.
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