Cal settled against his pillow and let out a sigh. Then a groan. He heard Gillian give a light laugh from her side of the darkness of their bedroom. "Long day huh?"

"God yeah," Cal agreed.

"Do you need a cuddle?"

"Yes please," Cal readily approved.

Gillian was already moving toward him, shifting the blanket out of the way and settling against his side, her face in the crook of his neck, her arm over his torso, her fingers brushing a few times against the soft hairs of his right arm. "Mmm you smell good," she breathed softly.

Cal smiled and shifted his hand to rest against her waist. She readjusted her hand to his chest, curling it against his heart. "I'm wide awake. Are you wide awake?"

"I guess. I just got into bed."

"Hm," Cal noted. "I'm tired but I'm awake."

"Maybe you need to relax," Gillian noted in a sultry tone.
"Why is everythin' sex with you?" Cal grumped. He jolted sharply as Gillian pinched his nipple between her index finger and thumb. "Ow!" Cal complained loudly. "That's spousal abuse that is."

"Harden up," Gillian murmured, pressing a kiss against his neck.

Cal turned slightly to squash her beneath him and she protested herself, trying to fight him off. Cal used his body weight to pin her. "Not so funny when the shoe's on the otha foot is it?"

"I was offering to give you a 'happy ending'."

Cal laughed loudly over the top of her and smothered her with kisses. She giggled and gave up trying to fend him away, daring to slip her tongue against his lips, curling an arm around his neck. Cal gave a hungry grunt but pulled away. "No fair. I can't keep up with you anymore."

"I'm sorry," Gillian whispered on a pout.

Cal rested his chin on her sternum, lightly, not giving her his full weight because it would hurt. His eyes were starting to adjust and he could make out the general shape of her. "You know," he started conversationally. "Afta 'the change' you're supposed to get all miserable and lose your sex drive."

"I'm emulating Catherine the Great."

Cal chuckled. "Brilliant."

"There are little blue pills you know."

Cal straightened up a bit. "You want me to take blue pills?" He asked seriously. He had been thinking about it.

"No," Gillian scoffed, smoothing a hand through his hair. "It was merely good ammunition for more teasing."

Cal grumbled in his throat. "Not supposed to joke about a man's performance Gill."

She laughed lightly, combing his hair again. "So not joking about your performance."

"That one time was bad enough."

"Hey," Gillian cut him off sharply, her tone firm. "You know what I remember about that one time? I remember you told me you loved me, for the first time since you woke up, even though you couldn't remember a thing about our relationship. You told me how you loved me and why you loved me and then we made a baby, our son; a beautiful expression of love. And maybe that doesn't mean much to you but to me it was really special, a miracle, and I will always remember that about the day Owen was conceived."

Cal was stunned still for a second. "Right."

Gillian brought her hand to his cheek, smoothed her fingers around his jaw. "Just saying," her voice softened.

Cal gave a little chuckle but his heart was beating in a funny rhythm and he felt warm. He didn't quite know what to say to that but maybe it did make him feel a bit better about that day. Even though he still would have preferred to make love to his wife to conceive their son... Especially after the relatively unromantic hell of making Lewis.

"I could... happy endin' you if you'd like."

Gillian's hand smoothed through his hair again. "That's ok, I'm good."

"Have a go this mornin' did you?"

Gillian hmphed at him and Cal chuckled. "Why not? You were in the showa alone."

"Cal," Gillian's voice held a warning. A warning he didn't understand.

"Why is it I can't tease you about satisifyin' your own needs?"

"You satisfy my needs."

"We've had this convasation before," Cal noted, shifting a little so his head was now resting on her shoulder and his body was curled up around hers. "And you always manage to change the subject or... distract me... But why is it, honest answa now, why don't you like masturbatin'?" He felt Gillian stiffen slightly against him and seriously? Just saying the word was enough to make her uncomfortable? Why? 'Tell me why.'

"Hm?" Cal prompted. Gillian sighed. "You already told me about Mr College-Boyfriend so... what else could there be?" He stopped abruptly. God what if he was pushing it? They had only just talked about that guy, who was still nameless... Maybe she needed time to work it out in her head first, before she came to talk to him. He prepared himself to back off when she spoke again.

"It's kind of also to do with him," she finally answered.

"Oh," and Cal opened his mouth again to back off, to tell her they didn't have to talk about this, whatever it was, it could wait, he wasn't pushing.

"Sometimes..." She stopped abruptly, gave an uncomfortable little shift, then started again. "He used to tell me I was... not very good. In bed."

"I'd just like to state for the record that I want to kill this guy," Cal interrupted around a flood of anger. "Fuckin' kill him."

"It's noted," Gillian responded dryly.

"Carry on."

"Are you sure you're going to be able to cope with hearing the rest?"

Cal paused. That was actually a fair question. "Yes. Is this the end of it though? This is all of it?"

"Yes."

Cal suppressed a sigh. "Go on." He softened his voice. "I'm listenin'." To be fair, he had experiences he wasn't entirely proud of either, things he hadn't told Gillian, but maybe should. She was doing some big-time sharing with him right now.

"He would stand over me and..." She paused and it sounded like she was forcing herself to talk. "Masturbate and come in my face," Gillian's voice got so deadpan it circled back to emotional and Cal resisted the urge to react. This is how she told her stories. Bluntly. She shifted against him, uncomfortable again, but he didn't move, he kept the pressure of his body against her, to ground her, because he knew it would, even though he could feel the heat of anger prickling on his skin. He wanted to her to know that he was right there, on her side. There was a long silence and Cal couldn't tell if she was crying, though he was pretty sure she wasn't. He also couldn't tell if she had finished telling the story. "He would 'show' me how he wanted it done."

"Gillian," Cal murmured.

"I'm ok to talk about it," she seemed to know what he was about to say. "I've just never told anyone else. Not Alec. Not... Not anyone." She pushed against him, making him turn over further so she could lie mirror image to him. She put his arm over her waist and threaded hers through his to do the same. "I used to be ashamed," she added. "But now that it's out I realise... there is nothing to be ashamed of. I didn't do anything wrong."

"You're not crap in bed Gill," Cal blurted.

She laughed and pressed a kiss against his mouth quickly. "Thank you."

"I mean that. I'm not just sayin' that."

"I know. We make magic Cal. I know," she added simply. "It was a really long time ago. It doesn't mean anything anymore. I got off to a rough start with sex, excuse the pun." Cal chuckled a little, mostly nervous tension. "Between my mother and a letdown first time and then that guy."

"Please tell me you had otha boyfriends in college who were good to you?"

"Of course. And then there was Alec."

"Ugh."

Gillian laughed this time. "Yes I know." Meaning, she knew how he felt about her ex-husband and he didn't have to mention the bad qualities because she knew all about them and agreed.

"But you always seem so..." Cal stopped to search for the right word and Gillian waited for him too. "Um. Willing?"

She laughed again, petted her hand against his back. "I worked through a lot of things before I met you. Some of them with Alec. He wasn't all bad," she quickly added before he could protest again. Although to be fair, she hadn't sat her first husband down for a heart to heart, she had just quietly got on with it. And it had been easy with Alec because despite what Cal wanted to think about him, he was patient and gentle and, more importantly in this case, tame. "I worked out even more after we got married... I guess masturbating is just one thing that still... weird's me out a little." Which was really so very strange now that she actually thought about it, because, what was she going to tell her children? The same load her mother had?

"Because?" Cal prompted.

"Because my mother implied it wasn't the right thing to do and she never made it ok. It's different for girls."

"I've heard," Cal noted neutrally. "She said it was all right for boys but not girls?"

"No it was more like, boys really can't help themselves but girls can so... you should control yourself."

"Right, so Matthew just went for it because it was easy but you never got the chance to actually explore yourself?"

"Yes," Gillian admitted. She would never in a million years have had this conversation with Alec, not even if it was in the context of what they would tell their children. Actually, if Gillian looked at her life with Alec, supposing it had all worked out like she had planned, she suspected she would have been raising Sophie almost single-handedly while he worked.

"We are gonna tell our boys that it's all right aren't we?"

"Yes of course," Gillian quickly agreed.

"They should," Cal went on. "You know, so that they know things about themselves. How else can they tell someone else if they don't know?"

"How very enlightened of you," Gillian noted impressed.

"Yeah well on occasion I read the stuff you put on my night stand."

Gillian gave a slight laugh. She remembered that article too. And she had that warm proud feeling of knowing how Cal tried for her and their kids and how he was her husband and good lord did she love him. She leaned forward and placed a kiss on his mouth and he gave a surprised but pleased little hum. "Then there is also the fact that we do it all the time so I don't ever feel the need to touch myself."

Cal chuckled. "That is flatterin'."

"It was meant to be."

"But we're not doin' it all the time anymore. Your sex drive has sped up, not slowed down. Don't think I haven't noticed. You don't feel the urge durin' my absolute refractory period?"

Gillian laughed at his facetious tone. "Well... sometimes if I do, we fool around anyway."

Cal was quiet and she could hear him grinning in the darkness. "So you get me to scratch your itch anyway?"

Gillian laughed. "Yes," she admitted.

"Naughty."

Gillian pressed her forehead against his shoulder in shame and Cal laughed again. "Not that it's such a chore," he added. Gillian turned her head to kiss his neck. He was warm. He gave a slight sigh that made her want to kiss him harder. "And me doin' it offends you?"

Gillian had to take a second to realise what he was talking about; back to the subject of self pleasure then. "Not offends me but my logic makes me feel that maybe I don't satisfy you."

"You do!" Cal cut in quickly. "You do. I've told you that before."

"I know."

"It's just, I don't know what. Somethin' I've always done. I like it."

Gillian laughed a little. And she murmured that that was okay while petting the hair at the base of his skull again.

"Gill. I'm glad you told me about that guy."

She hmmed.

"No I mean it. Cos... you should be able to tell me those things. We're friends aren't we?"

"Of course," she cut in quickly.

"I know you and Casey used to talk about a lot of stuff to do with your Dad and all. But you don't always talk to me about the stuff that's botherin' you."

"That's not true."

"The really deep stuff," Cal noted.

"We don't have to share everything do we?"

"No, that's not what I'm sayin'. I'm sayin'... everyone needs someone to talk to and I'd like you to be able to talk to me about somethin' if you needed to."

Maybe that wasn't quite it either. He didn't know what he wanted to say. But he wanted their table of conversation to be absolutely open to everything. He was a better listener now, he felt he had earned his chance at being her confidant. And there were clearly still things locked away in her psyche that either of them knew about.

"Is this because I didn't talk to you about Dad?"

"Not entirely," Cal tried. "But yeah that does cross my mind."

"Hmm," Gillian agreed.

"Cos you know, sometimes you think everythin' is out in the open only to find, it's not. Or somethin' you thought you'd dealt with ages ago, it's still there. It's like a shrapnel wound. You might get most of it out in one go but even twenty years late-a you get a pain and it turns out a small sliva is still in there, workin' away... you have to take it out... maybe it brings up memories again..."

Gillian gave a short light laugh. She pressed a kiss against the corner of his mouth, her hand tightening against his flesh and he fell silent. Sometimes he really surprised her in such a delightful way. "Sometimes you're so very good with the analogies. And you're right. I did think I had dealt with everything. I thought that when Dad moved back here to live with Mom. And again when I found out he was drinking. I know it's not an excuse at all but it just stunned me so much. That he would go back to that after everything. It's like he completely forgot how our lives were. And it's like Mom forgot too. I..." She hesitated. "I didn't want to help her, when she told me. She went back to him. She should have dealt with it. Or he should have. He's a grown man. He has to take responsibility. You know?"

"Sure," Cal agreed. "I feel that way about my mutha."

He felt the slight shift of Gillian's head nodding against the pillow. "But as for the boys. I thought Mom being there as an intermediary was enough but in hindsight... even when I was their age I knew there was something wrong. Dad always smelt like drink and..." Gillian sighed. "I guess this is my thing."

"That's ok. I have abandonment issues."

Gillian kissed him again.

"Help me with mine? I'll help you with yours."

"You're already doing so well with yours Cal. I, however, think I might have missed my opportunity with mine," she added glumly.

"There'll be somethin' else," Cal supplied. "It'll come up again, in a different form, and you'll get your chance to confront it." He paused. "Gotta get out all that shrapnel."