Kelly delivered the lasagna to the coffee table with the borrowed hand towel, and Brian was ready with a metal spatula to divvy up portions and plate them for everyone. Stephanie and Kelly received equal-sized shares, Brian cut himself an enormous one so that Emily had a much smaller serving.

“Hey!” Emily protested with a laugh, comparing the two plates with a pout. “What the heck, man.”

“If you can finish that, I’ll share some of my slice,” Brian said.

“It smells so good!” Stephanie took up her silverware.

“Garlic bread too, guys,” Kelly reminded them.

“Mmmm, garlic bread,” Emily all but drooled at the prospect. “Now that’s my jam.”

“And Brian actually has a bread-knife, here,” Kelly remarked as she sawed off sections of the loaf and passed them out. “Chelsea just had steak-knives she used for cutting everything.”

“For shame,” Emily shook her head in apparent dismay. “Oooh, thanks, Babe.”

“Thank you,” Brian took his.

“Thanks!” Stephanie beamed. “Um. Do you guys say Grace?”

“Nah,” Emily grunted, immediately chomping into the garlic bread. “Mwufufu-hwafufu.”

“Jesus, Emily, manners,” Brian smacked her arm.

“Hwaf?!”

“I’m a bit religious, but mostly just ‘round Christmastime,” Kelly revealed with a shrug. “It’s no big deal. I spend all year living deep in sin, and then still really want to go to Christmas mass at that time of year—so I guess some tiny bit of Catholic wound up sticking.”

“I’m, uh, non-practicing but open-minded,” Brian nodded. “Appeals to higher powers seem a whole lot more real with all the supernatural stuff, lately though, I guess. I’ll have to start thinking about it.”

“I haven’t been to church since I started college,” Stephanie revealed, being the first to section off a bit of lasagna and try it. “Mmmh—this is good!”

“Feel like I’m the same, more or less,” Brian tried a bit of lasagna himself. “It was some obligation thing I did with the family, fell outta practice once I moved out on my own. Chloe was adamantly anti-Christian, but I dunno if she actually believed in anything. Emily’s some sorta fedora-tipping have a euphoric day atheist, I think?”

“I am not!” Emily pouted. “Mom used to take us to church. Just, we fell out of the habit. I’ve been to Rebecca’s church twice, it was okay. She’s a regular there all the time.”

“What denomination is she?” Brian asked.

“I dunno,” Emily shrugged. “Seneca Valley First…. somethin’ or other. I’ll havta ask, I don’t remember. Wasn’t a super huge megachurch, or anything. Little one. Buncha old folk.”

“That’s a relief, then,” Kelly said between mouthfuls of lasagna. “The whole religion thing, I mean. Didn’t want that to be weird for us.”

“Isn’t it, though?” Emily wondered out loud. “Not like most any of them are cool with like, polygamy or same-sex relationships or all that.”

The lasagna was good but not great, in Brian’s opinion. It was fresh from the oven and pretty nice, but somehow the flavor just wasn’t really hitting like he thought it should. For some reason he imagined he was tasting noodles more than he was tasting the sauce and cheese—something about the way they’d made it this time had the taste falling a bit flat. The garlic bread, thankfully, was gold-standard. He might have overdid it slathering up the garlic butter, but damn was the end result just absolutely amazing.

S’okay though, the lasagna isn’t BAD, it’s just not incredible, Brian told himself. Leaves room for improvement next time. I think it’s gotta be the brand of ricotta cheese we grabbed, I can barely taste it. Weak-sauce stuff, considering it was six bucks. You expect a great lasagna to have more of a kinda rich flavor.

“Well,” Kelly shrugged. “Relationship-wise… maybe not something I think we should really even be advertising in the first place? To anyone? Not with our whole situation. I mean, yeah it’s current year and polycules are a thing, sure, but we don’t need to be raising flags or tipping anyone off. Not if it’s something creepy Masters-types might look around for when they’re scouting for ‘talent.’”

Mention of the Masters gave Brian pause as he raised the fork to his mouth, but he tried to cover it up by quickly eating. The idea that there were real-life Illuminati-types with some secret society was a lot to try to grapple with. Especially if they seemed to be built up around abuse of the same sort of powers or gifts Brian and the girls here had just sort of stumbled into. There was just too much danger, there, and Brian had no clue what to do with any of the information Emily had jotted out across their whiteboard.

What the fuck does ANYONE do dealing with all of… THAT? How common are ‘Masters’? How many of them are there, are they everywhere? Just the threat of them potentially crossing paths with us in the future is fucking terrifying.

“I, um, I did tell my mom that I maybe got a boyfriend,” Stephanie admitted with a blush. “Over the phone. But—I, I didn’t know how to bring up… all of the rest. About Kelly and Emily. Not that I’m ashamed or want to, to hide it or anything, just—”

“Completely cool, Steph,” Kelly nodded. “Don’t worry about it.”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

“My mom barely even cared,” Emily let out a snort. “I was like, so—I have a girlfriend, now. She was like, oh, that’s great news! Thrilled. As if she’d never even expected I’d have a relationship ever anyways. Like she was just happy something was finally going on with me in that regard. Haaah.”

“You talked with her?” Brian asked, exchanging a discreet glance with Kelly over Emily’s head.

“Yeah, for a bit,” Emily shrugged. “I was over there grabbing stuff the one day, and I’m s’posed to call and check in every once in a while, so I do. I’m uh, I’m still on her family phone plan thing, so if I just disappear on her, she said she’ll cut my service. Dunno if she was kidding or not. Can’t risk it, man.”

“She say anything about the whole… Brian situation?” Kelly probed. “Since you told her you have a girlfriend, but then you’re all of the sudden just living over here with us?”

“Not really,” Emily pursed her lip. “I think she maybe knows? But, prolly doesn’t want to say anything, in case it’s not like that for real. She always seemed to know I had the hots for Brian, so. Yeah. I dunno. I’ve maybe been a bit touchy about the whole subject with her, in the past. Should we like, clear things up? Or make things official?”

“Whatever you want to do,” Brian said. “I don’t want to make things weird for you with your family.”

“Eh, they’ll be cool with whatever,” Emily seemed indifferent. “Well, mom will be, she’s laid back about that stuff. Katie’ll maybe groan or scoff or roll her eyes or somethin’. Little cunt.”

“Sisters,” Kelly muttered.

“Ah, right—have you kept in touch with your sis?” Emily asked. “I almost forgot about her. Sarah whatever.”

“Sarah Star,” Brian supplied.

“Yeah, her,” Emily said.

“No,” Kelly shook her head. “I said my goodbyes, and that was it. I don’t think she wants anything to do with me or my life. I’m gonna stay out of her business, and just… yeah.”

“This whole thing is—” Brian chuckled, clinking his fork against the plate as he scooped up more lasagna. “Where do we even start going about explaining our weird relationship paradigm to people?”

“We just call it a harem,” Emily suggested. “It is what it is, right?”

“It’s not even really a harem, it’s more of a polycule,” Kelly corrected her. “And people get weird about it, and some of us—well, Steph—have parents and whatnot, so we can’t be throwing her under the bus or outing her with all of this. I do not want her to have to deal with people getting judgemental.”

“I do want to tell them everything,” Stephanie gave them a sheepish look as she fidgeted with her slice of garlic bread. “I just—where do I even begin?!”

“Do you want me to meet your parents?” Brian asked.

“Yes!” Stephanie affirmed with a smile. “I, I want them to meet all of you! To see. To see how all of you complete me, how much love we have. Just, I think my mom will be… surprised. I’m not sure my dad will know what to think.”

“Oh, wow,” Kelly’s eyebrows rose. “Two-parent household? Both still together? That’s crazy.”

“It… is?” Stephanie looked like she couldn’t tell if Kelly was joking or not. “Really?”

“Yeah, kinda,” Emily agreed. “Mine were separated, then my dad passed away. For family it’s just me, my mom, my sister. Oh, and then my cousin Samantha, I guess. But, she’s cool.”

Everyone paused as Kelly choked on her lasagna, and Brian reached over to pat her on the back a few times.

“Are you okay?”

“Geez, Kell.”

“You good?”

“Yeah, I just… yeah,” Kelly cleared her throat. “Sorry. My um, my parents never even married, my dad split when I was little. Buncha losers went through pretending they could step-dad us just so they could pork my mom, but none of them even proposed or anything, things never got too serious.”

“Kelly…” Stephanie looked horrified.

“Brian’s parents are divorced,” Emily said. “His step-parents were super shitty, too. God, am I glad we got you away from them. Just even thinking about them makes me furious. Psychopaths.”

“Was actually my real dad and then a stepmom, there,” Brian said with indifference. “But, yeah, each of them, and then also my real mom—all racked up like two divorces each. I think my real mom’s on three, now. So, just got bounced around a lot for a bit, passed back and forth living with different people who didn’t give a damn about me.”

“Th-that’s awful!” Stephanie dropped her fork back onto her plate, aghast.

“Eh,” Brian shook his head. “You get used to it fast.”

“What about Rebecca?” Kelly asked.

“Oh, her parents are together, but they’re weirdos,” Emily said. “Like, van-life… gypsy… ren-faire folk, I guess? Absentee parents, for sure. They’re only even here three weeks out of the year, and just for the big state renaissance fair thing up the road. Rebecca’s grandparents are super traditional normal parent-types, though. I could see her grandpa not approving of the whole… this we have going on.”

“But, I mean, there’s ‘family,’ and then there’s family,” Brian said. “Like, my actual parents and step-parents are basically out of the picture, but I have Emily’s mom. I have Michael’s aunt; aunt Mattie. I have all of my friends, I have Emily, I have you guys. People who care about me. So, it’s not like I don’t have family—just, they’re not technically family related to me by blood.”

“‘Found family,’ yeah,” Emily pointed out. “It’s a whole damn genre, now. Super wholesome stuff.”

“Aunt Mattie’s the one you lived with after high school?” Kelly asked, tearing off a chunk of her garlic toast and popping it into her mouth. “I know in at least one of our future timelines, we moved to her place and lived with them.”

“Yeah, everyone’s always welcome there,” Emily nodded. “She’s super cool. We were—well, Steph and I—we were talking about maybe having the harem live together there at her place, when the lease here is up.”

“Whew, yeah,” Brian rocked back in his chair. “Wasn’t even thinking about that yet, really. But, there’s already three of us living here, and still only just the one twin-mattress. Not a lot of space for everyone.”

“I’m okay with us all being cozy!” Emily batted her eyelashes at him.

“We can always kick Emily out, too,” Kelly snarked. “She has her own damn bedroom at her mom’s place, just some ten minutes away.”

“Nooooo!” Emily protested, putting on her pleading puppy-dog face. “I’ll be good, I swear. An-and I’m tiny! I fit anywhere and you’ll barely even notice! I take up like, zero space! You can just put me up in the cupboard beneath the stairs!”

“We don’t have stairs, though,” Brian chuckled. “...Or we totally would.”

“Um,” Stephanie tensed. “Do we know what it’s like with, uh, Chloe’s parents?”

The coffee table fell silent at that.

“Does she have anyone that will be wondering where she is, or, ah, why they haven’t heard from her?”