"As far as we see it," Kim said. "The three of us are linked now and always. We don't have a problem with that."
"Not at all," Rachel agreed. "You always had a thing for Kim, right Joey?"
"Yea," I said.
"Do you still?" Rachel asked.
I fidgeted in my seat. "Well, yea," I said softly.
"Hey, don't be so nervous," Kim said. "I already said I was cool with it."
"Wait a second, then," I said. "So how come you never told me that before?"
Kim laughed again. "Let's see, did you ever bother to ask me?"
I realized that I never did. "No, I guess not," I admitted. "But you never asked me, either," I said, in an attempt to make myself look less pathetic.
"Sorry," she said, "But I'm something of a traditionalist, and think that the guy is supposed to ask the girl." She shrugged her shoulders at me.
Rachel said, "That's not the point, Joey. The point is that you've liked her and she's liked you, too. As for the two of us, we've always been...kind of bi, I guess."
I nodded. "Any other day that might have shocked me a little," I said, "But not today. So you guys ever...you know?" I asked, trying to dart around the point.
They both smiled. "Yea, we have," Rachel said. "Not more than a couple of times, but enough to know each other."
"She's very giving," Kim teased.
Rachel slapped her slightly in the arm. "Back to the point, silly," she said. "The point, Joey, is that, again, believe it or not, I've always liked you."
That did surprise me. While Kim was always friendly with me, Rachel had always seemed kind of distant, at least when compared to Kim. "I've always thought you were beautiful, too," I said. "But I guess you never had an interest."
"Oh, I did," Rachel said. "I guess I just never had the courage to tell you."
"See how messed up we all really are?" Kim laughed. Rachel also laughed, so I found the situation funny, too, and laughed along with them.
Rachel stopped laughing and said, "So like Kim said, we're all linked to each other. We're a team, the three of us, and we want to stick together. I'm sure you do, too."
I thought about it for a minute. I didn't know what they had in mind, but I couldn't think of anything else I'd want to do. "Yea. Yea, I do," I said with as much resolution as I could.
They both jumped out of their seats and hugged me. "Let's get started, then," Kim said. She extended her hand to me, so I took it. She led me back to the shower room and Rachel followed behind us. Once we were there, she said, "We need to break the tension first."
"How do we do that?" I asked.