13. Party Roles #2
Dex raises his hand again.
Ronan sighs. “What?”
“Can we define our terms for the vanilla?”
Griffin flips him off.
“I meant me.”
That gets all of us—even Ronan laughs.
“Okay,” Cami says once we’ve settled down. “Actually, though. Explain. I really do think we all know, but I don’t want there to be assumptions.”
Ronan looks to me—he’s continuing to defer to me.
“Relationship hierarchy is basically what we’ve already been doing.”
“Helpful,” Dex says.
I ignore him. “In polyamory, some relationships are considered ‘primary’ and have more practical… entanglement than others. Marriage. Living together—which obviously isn’t involved here. Finances. Medical decisions. Family obligations. Things you’ve promised each other.”
Griffin’s hand squeezes Cami’s thigh almost absently.
I notice, and I’m pretty sure everyone else does too.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean you love that person more,” I continue. “It means that relationship has certain commitments built into it that the others don’t.”
Cami sits up straighter. “So, then Griffin is my primary.”
It’s not really a question.
“Yeah,” Ronan says. “I think he is.”
She looks at Griffin.
His expression is careful, like he is waiting to see how everyone else reacts before he’s willing to feel good about it.
“And Dex is mine,” I say.
Dex turns his head toward me so fast I almost laugh.
I don’t, because something in his expression stops me.
“Yeah?” The question comes from him with emotion I’ve rarely heard in his tone.
“Yeah.”
The word comes easily—because it is easy.
Not everything about loving Dex is easy, but that is.
He’s my primary partner.
The person I’m building most of the boring infrastructure of my life with.
The person I expect to come home to.
The person whose name I’d put down first if some form asked me who to call when everything goes to shit.
None of that changes what I feel when Ronan looks at me a certain way.
It doesn’t change what Cami means to me.
It just names something that’s already true.
Dex’s fingers slip between mine.
“Okay,” he says softly.
Cami is still thinking. “So what does that make everyone else?”
Ronan leans back. “Depends on what terminology we decided we’re comfortable with.”
“Meaning?”
“In hierarchical polyamory, relationships outside the primary relationship are often called secondary relationships. Sometimes tertiary, if there’s another level of commitment or priority below that.”
Cami’s nose wrinkles immediately. “Yeah. I hate that.”
“Same,” Dex says.
Griffin looks between them. “Why?”
“Because it sounds like first place, second place, third place.” Cami shakes her head. “Like Ronan gets a bronze medal.”
Dex points at her. “Exactly.”
Ronan looks deeply unimpressed. “I don’t need a medal.”
“I’ll buy you one.” Dex grins.
“Don’t.”
“It can say ‘World’s Best Secondary.’”
“DEX,” Cami scolds.
I’m laughing before I can stop myself.
Ronan waits us out.
“Those terms describe relationships,” he says when Dex finally shuts up. “They don’t have to describe someone’s value.”
“I understand that intellectually,” Cami says. “I still don’t like it.”
“Then we don’t have to use them.”
She looks at him. “Just like that?”
“Yes.”
“But if Griffin is my primary—”
“He is,” Ronan says with certainty.
“And Micah is Dex’s—”
“He is.”
Her eyes stay on Ronan. “Then what are you?”
The question lands harder than I think she intended.
Dex’s hand tightens around mine.
Ronan doesn’t seem surprised.
“Ronan,” Dex says before he can answer, and the joking tone is completely gone now. “Are you actually okay with this?”
Cami nods immediately. “That’s what I’m asking.”
Ronan glances between them. “Yes.”
Dex frowns. “That was way too fast.”
“It was fast because I’ve already thought about it.”
“Okay, but—”
Ronan cuts him off. “I don’t want what they have.”
That shuts Dex up.
Ronan gestures toward Cami and Griffin first, then toward me and Dex.
“I don’t mean I don’t want commitment. I do. I don’t want to be temporary, or casual, or someone everyone fits in when it’s convenient.”
Cami’s expression softens.
“But I don’t want a nesting partner. I really do need my personal space.
I don’t particularly want to make financial decisions with someone.
I don’t need marriage. I don’t want to be the person another adult feels like they have to consult with before making every significant decision about their life. ”
Dex blinks. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Like... ever?”
Ronan shrugs. “I suppose anything can change. But I have never looked at what you and Micah have and thought I wanted that position.”
Something in my chest seizes momentarily.
Beside me, Dex goes very still.
Ronan looks at Cami. “And I don’t look at you and Griffin and wish you weren’t married. Or that I would be your priority over him.”
Her eyes immediately shine, and she blinks hard. “Okay.”
“What I want from all of you is different.”
“Which is?” Griffin asks.
Ronan considers that. “Permanence.”
Nobody jokes.
“I want to know I’m part of the life we’re building.
If we’re all growing old together, I want that.
I want to be considered. I want to be invited to things and told when anyone is sick and consulted when a decision affects me or the polycule.
I want to know that if something changes, nobody quietly decides I’m the easiest relationship to cut because I am not in that primary position or I don’t share a bank account or a marriage certificate or whatever else with anyone. ”
Fuck.
Dex’s thumb stops moving over my hand.
Cami looks wrecked.
Ronan apparently notices, because he adds, “But none of that requires me to be anyone’s primary.”
Cami swallows. “So you’re really okay being…”
She stops.
“Secondary?” Ronan supplies.
“I hate saying it.”
“Then don’t.”
“But technically?”
He thinks about that one longer. “Yes. If we’re using hierarchy to describe practically priority.”
Dex shifts beside me. “But you’re not secondary to the family.”
Ronan looks at him. “No, I’m not.”
Dex exhales.
Cami reaches across Griffin and holds her hand out.
Ronan looks at it for a second before taking it.
She doesn’t grab him. Doesn’t assume.
She offers
He chooses.
“I need that part really clear,” she says. “Because I can be okay saying Griffin and I are primary if we’re talking about marriage and medical decisions and insurance and where I’m spending Thanksgiving when his mother will berate him if I don’t show up.”
Griffin snorts.
“But I can’t be okay with it if it means Ronan matters less. Or Micah. Or Dex.”
“It doesn’t,” Griffin says.
Everyone looks at him.
He shrugs. “I mean, I think that’s the part I had to learn.”
Cami’s hand tightens around Ronan’s.
Griffin looks at her as he continues, “Being your husband gives me things they don’t have. Legally, practically, whatever. I’m the one the hospital calls. I’m on the paperwork.” He pauses. “But none of that gives me more ownership of you.”
Ronan goes very still, watching the two of them.
“And it doesn’t mean I get to decide their relationships with you are less because mine came with paperwork.”
Cami looks like she might climb into his lap.
Dex looks like he might climb into Griffin’s lap.
I decide not to point that out.
“That’s it,” I say. “That’s what primary has to mean if we’re going to use it.”
“Practical priority,” Cami says, pulling her hand back from Ronan.
“Existing commitments,” Ronan adds.
“Not most loved,” Dex says.
“Not most important,” Griffin replies.
I nod. “And not automatic priority in every situation.”
Cami looks at me. “Explain.”
“If Dex and I have plans and you have an emergency, I’m not going to tell you that you’re shit out of luck because my primary partner has dibs.”
“Obviously,” Dex says.
“Or if Griffin is working long shifts and Cami needs someone, we’re not all sitting around waiting for her primary to become available.”
Griffin shakes his head. “Please don’t.”
“It’s a default,” Ronan says. “Not a trump card.”
“That’s better,” Cami says. “I like that.”
Dex looks at me. “So you’re my default human.”
I smile. “Unfortunately.”
“That’s so romantic.”
“You knew what you were getting,” I say.
“I really didn’t.”
Griffin laughs.
Ronan actually writes something down.
Dex groans. “Jesus Christ.”
“What?”
“You took minutes of default human.”
“It was concise.”
That breaks the tension again.
For a minute, everyone talks at once.
And sitting there listening to them, something settles into place for me.
Because this doesn’t feel like we’re ranking anyone.
It feels like we’re admitting that equality and sameness aren’t the same fucking thing.
Maybe that’s what we’ve been trying to do all along.
Not giving everyone identical pieces, but making sure everyone has enough.
“Okay,” Griffin says eventually. “So that’s relationship hierarchy.”
“Basically,” Ronan says.
“And metamours?” Cami asks, her tone a little confused.
Griffin looks at her. “What the fuck is a metamour?”
Dex gasps. “Oh my God. I know something you don’t.”
“Enjoy it while it lasts.”
Dex sits up straighter. “You partner’s partner.”
Griffin looks at him.
Dex points at Cami. “I’m dating Cami. You’re married to Cami. You and I aren’t dating each other.”
“Correct.”
“Painfully correct,” Dex mutters.
Griffin narrows his eyes.
“So you and I are metamours,” Dex continues.
Griffin considers that. “There’s a word for that?”
“There’s a word for everything,” Ronan confirms.
“Poly people basically had to invent vocabulary because apparently saying ‘my girlfriend’s husband’ every time gets exhausting,” Dex says.
I laugh. “That’s not entirely wrong.”
Cami looks around the room. “So we’re all metamours?”
“Not exactly,” Ronan says. “Only when we’re connected through someone we’re both involved with but partners aren’t with each other.”
She points at Griffin. “So basically, you’re all metamours with Griffin?”
“Yes.”
“But not with each other?”
I shake my head. “Not just metamours.”
Dex grins.
Griffin sighs. “Maybe we really do need a chart.”
“I’ve been saying this,” Dex agrees.
Ronan ignores him. “And this is where the other hierarchy comes in.”
The room quiets again.