The next day at class Li asked how the trip to New York had gone.

“It was great, other than the part where I got dragged to Fifth Avenue to do some shopping,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“Dragged to Fifth Avenue to do some shopping? Oh, the horror!” she said with a laugh. “Next you’re going to tell me you were forced to do some sightseeing, too.”

“No, the sightseeing was my idea,” I said. “We did a boat tour completely around Manhattan, and also went up to the top of the Empire State Building.”

“Ooh! I loved the Empire State Building when I visited when I was a kid,” Li enthused.

“Yeah, it was my third time up there, and I have to say, it never gets old,” I agreed.

“Dang, Leah, I wanna be you when I grow up,” Li said, laughing.

During the break between classes, Myles, Li and I made plans to work on the upcoming project together, and I offered to host. The plan was that they would come over to my place Saturday afternoon, maybe staying long enough for dinner. It wasn’t until later, on the drive home, that it occurred to me that I was being inconsiderate.

“Ange,” I said after a hello kiss. “I invited a couple of classmates over to work on a class project on Saturday, but I really should have called and made sure it was O.K. with you first,” I apologized.

“Why wouldn’t I be O.K. with that? It’s your house,” she said, her forehead wrinkled up.

“It’s your house, too,” I said gently, holding her in my arms. “It’s your house, too.”

Angela sighed and gave me a squeeze. “I love it when you say things like that,” she said. “It means a lot to me.”

“Angela,” I said, leaning back to look into her pretty eyes. “It means a lot to me, too.”

Sometimes Angela’s face looked so innocent and young- like a teenager’s- and the way she smiled at that moment was one of those times. Her shy little smile, her big, baby-blue eyes and the slight flush to her dimpled cheeks made her completely adorable. Objectively I knew she was several years older than me and had lived through a lot, but right then, she was my sweet little baby doll and all I wanted was to scoop her up and hold her in my arms, so I did just that.

She squeaked with surprise when I lifted her up off the ground and crushed her body to mine, but relaxed into it and giggled with delight as I spun us around.

“I want you so much, Leah,” she said, breathless with laughter. “I want you forever.”

“Do you want me nice and clean?” I asked. “It’d be great if you could scrub my back in the shower.”

“Ooh! I can do that!” Angela replied, leaning down and kissing me.

In the shower, Angela said she’d talked with Emmy earlier. “She says she misses us already, and can’t wait until we can get back next. I said that I would try to talk you into going next weekend, but I guess if you have to work on your school project, that won’t work.”

“You could go,” I said as I lathered Angela up. “You don’t have to stick around LA just because I do.”

“I suppose,” Angela replied as she ducked her head under the spray to rinse off. “I’ll talk to Emmy about it and see what she thinks.”

Spooning in bed later, Angela asked, “You really don’t mind if I go to New York for the weekend?”

“I really don’t mind,” I said. “I’ll miss you, and of course I miss Emmy, too, but I’m a big girl. I’ll survive somehow.”

“You two are so amazing,” Angela said. “I just don’t understand how you don’t get jealous.”

“Do you? Get jealous, I mean. If you were here in Los Angeles and I was in New York with Emmy, would you be jealous of me?” I asked, curious.

“I’d be jealous of both of you,” Angela replied after thinking about it for a moment. “I’d want to be there with you two.”

I wasn’t sure that actually answered the question I was trying to ask, so I rephrased it. “I guess what I meant is whether you get jealous when I kiss or make love to Emmy. Do you feel… like you wish you were there instead of me or her?”

Angela thought about it for a while, eventually saying, “No, I guess I don’t feel like that. I want to be there kissing and making love to you both, but I don’t feel bad that it’s her you’re kissing and not me.”

“And that’s exactly how I feel when you’re in New York with Emmy. I wish I was there, holding you both, but I’m not upset at all that you guys are holding each other. In fact, it makes me happy to know that you have somebody when I can’t be there.”

Angela was silent for a while, thinking about what I’d just said. She pulled my arm in tighter around her middle, holding my hand in hers between her breasts.

“I am the luckiest girl in the world,” she sighed.

“You can’t be,” I said, kissing her shoulder. “Because I am.”

The next night Andy and Jenna came over for dinner, keeping our Wednesday tradition alive. Andy said they couldn't stay late since the team was flying to New Jersey first thing in the morning, but it was a nice evening anyway. Jenna still seemed a tiny bit uncomfortable with the idea that Angela and I were together in Los Angeles and Emmy was in New York, but Andy seemed to take it in stride with no issues.

After they left, Angela said, “You should have suggested they visit Emmy if they’re going to be in the area anyway.”

“Well, I don’t think Jenna is going on the trip,” I replied as we cleaned up. “I get the impression that it’s team members and staff only on these things. Also, I think Jenna likes you, me, and Emmy, but I get the impression she might be a little, um, jealous? You know, she might not like the idea of Andy spending time with Emmy and nobody else around.”

“I think I can see that,” Angela said, after thinking about it for a moment. “Even if nothing would ever happen, it’s still… inappropriate?” she said, unsure if she had the right word.

“Yeah,” I sighed. “I think that Jenna would be O.K. with me and Andy hanging out together, since we’re more like, I dunno, cousins almost, but Andy did use to have a crush on Emmy.”

“That makes sense. I could be wrong,” Angela said, sitting at the kitchen counter while I washed a few dishes. “But I think Jenna doesn’t have very many friends. Women friends, I mean, girls to just go out with.”

“Both of them pretty much said so. All their college friends left when they graduated, and Andy doesn’t socialize much with the guys on the team, so she really doesn’t know the WAGs, either.”

“WAGs?” Angela asked, unfamiliar with the term.

“Wives and girlfriends,” I explained. “Usually used when talking about male sports figures.”

“That’s really sexist,” Angela said.

“Yeah, sports talk in general is pretty sexist. You wouldn’t believe how many articles about me when I was playing mentioned that I’m blonde and blue-eyed. They wouldn’t think to bring that up about a guy player, but somehow, us female athletes, well, it matters that we’re good-looking, too,” I said, and even I could hear the note of bitterness in my voice.

“But you are sexy and good-looking,” Angela protested.

“Thanks, but it shouldn’t matter,” I replied.

“Do you think, um, David Beckham is as famous as he is because he’s the greatest fútbol player?” Angela asked. “No, he’s famous because he’s a really good player and extremely handsome. There are dozens of players out there that are better, but not as handsome, so they don’t get on the cover of GQ.”

I laughed, because with a few words Angela had swept the feet out from under my high horse. “I guess you’re right,” I admitted. “But it still shouldn’t matter.”

“It matters in life,” Angela said. “Right or wrong, beautiful people get treated differently than plain people.”

“Speaking of which, you beautiful person,” I said, moving around behind Angela to wrap my arms around her. “I was thinking maybe, if you don’t go to New York this weekend, we could do something fun. Maybe drive up to Big Sur or something, you and me.”

“Is this a bribe to stay?” Angela asked, teasing.

“Ummmm… Maybe? Is it working?”

“I thought you had friends coming over on Saturday?” Angela asked, rubbing her cheek on my encircling arm.

“I’ll reschedule,” I said, kissing the top of her head. “If you’ll be here this weekend.”

“I’d like to do something fun,” Angela agreed. “But can we do something local, here in Los Angeles? Nothing too hectic, just, you know, fun stuff here. So we can sleep in our own bed at night.”

“Alright,” I agreed. “I’ll leave the planning up to you.”

“Seriously? I can plan the whole weekend, and we’ll do it?”

“Yeah, sounds good,” I said, enjoying the look of excitement on Angela’s face. I was happy enough that she wanted to do something local, since it seemed as if it had been go, go, go for a while and it’d be nice to relax and, as she put it, sleep in our own bed at night.

It also pleased me that she referred to it as ‘our bed’. Angela was rapidly growing more confident in her place in our household of three, and it occurred to me that letting her take the initiative for the weekend might mean more for her than I’d thought it would. I'd have to keep that in mind going forward.

The next morning, during a quick break in my workout routine, Josh the trainer came over to talk.

“Um, Leah, I hate to bring it up, but Angela is still listed as a guest,” he said, tilting his head in her direction. “But she’s here almost every day still. Is she, um, still staying with you until she gets on her feet?”

“What does ‘guest’ mean in this context?” I asked, wiping my forehead with my gym towel.

“Well, she’s only supposed to be able to use the gym three times a month,” he began. “And some of the services are off-limits.”

“Who do I talk to about getting her listed as a resident? She’s moved in with us permanently,” I said, not going in to any details beyond that simple fact.

“Well, uh, the front desk, I guess, and they’d pass it on down to us here at the gym.”

“Alright, I’ll take care of that today,” I said. “Thanks for letting me know.”

“No worries,” he said. “I just wasn’t sure.”

"Seriously, I appreciate it. I thought I’d cleared it up that she was living with us, but I guess somehow it slipped through the cracks. I’ll make sure it’s sorted out. But in the meantime, yeah, she’s a resident,” I confirmed.

“I’m glad you guys were able to step up and help her out. She’s a nice girl, and that was a terrible situation her boyfriend put her in.”

“Yeah, it was,” I agreed. “I’m really glad we could help, too. It’s been really nice getting to know her.”

“She’s a sweet girl,” Josh agreed as we both looked in Angela’s direction. She glanced up and caught us looking at her, and a big smile lit up her face as she waved hello from the other side of the gym. “I hear her boyfriend had to sell his unit to cover legal costs.”

“That sucks,” I said. I didn’t know the guy, but the few minutes I talked with him led me to believe he wasn’t a terrible person, and I didn’t want his life ruined.

“Drugs are bad, m’kay?” Josh said in a terrible South Park imitation.

My workout regimen was only ever half as long as Angela’s, so I’d already stopped by the front desk, then showered, gotten dressed and was chipping away on my schoolwork by the time Angela finished her routine.

After a quick, sweaty kiss she was off to the bathroom for her own shower, and I returned to the report I was working on. A few minutes later, I completely lost my train of thought on the supply-chain analysis of an automotive start-up when Angela walked into the living room, completely bare-ass naked. They say that guys are more visually stimulable then women are, and that may be true- but a gorgeous, confident, nude woman will always be a sight that will set my loins on fire. Angela laid out a beach towel on the bit of the balcony that still got sun in the late morning and settled down on it to catch some rays, undoubtedly knowing the effect she was having on me.

I know she didn’t tan much, since she was paler than me by a long shot, but she was, after all, a swimsuit model and so had to have at least a bit of color.

I completely gave up on my homework and just sat there, enjoying the view as Angela occasionally rotated to catch the sun evenly. I was grateful that Angela was providing me so much to look at, and not even feeling a tiny bit of guilt that I was shirking my assignment. Some things in life are more important than others, after all.

After a while, Angela came in and saw me sitting idly, my laptop closed in front of me. She wedged herself in between me and the table, straddling my lap and resting her arms on my shoulders. “Did you enjoy the show?” she asked, cheekily.

“Yes, as a matter of fact, I did,” I said, wrapping my arms around her and feeling the sun-heated skin of her back. “That’s a show I could watch over and over and never get bored.”

“I’ve thought of what we are going to do this weekend,” Angela announced.

“Yeah?”

“Yes. I have it all planned out. Your friends can come over on Saturday, after all. I’ll make dinner. But you’re mine Saturday morning, and all day Sunday.”

“Do I get any hints?” I asked, curious.

“There will be sexy times,” Angela responded.

“Anything else?” I asked, hoping the answer would be 'no'.

“Yes, we will do a few other things in between,” Angela admitted.

“You know, we can get a head start on those sexy times right now,” I suggested, leaning in and kissing the top of Angela’s breast.

Looking thoughtful, Angela said, “Hmmm… I guess we could…”