The Affection Multiplier - Chapter 194: A sudden visit. (Patreon)

It’s the first time that’s ever happened. At about 09:30 pm, you got a call from a crying Emily apologizing for “fucking everything up” and telling you that Julia is on her way to you place right now. It took you about 10 minutes to get her to calm down and explain things to you.

Turns out, Emily told her sister about the Affection Multiplier. It was difficult to get any more details out of her, and it was far more important to reassure her that it was fine, that you’ll talk alone tomorrow and she shouldn’t feel bad about this.

“If you decided to trust her, then I’ll do the same, alright? I’ll talk to your sister.” You told her.

You didn’t want to hang up on her, but Julia would be arriving soon, so you had to. That’s why you’re now boiling some water to make some tea and get a table and two chairs ready. This might go on for long.

You sit down and try to think of an approach to this, but you don’t have much to go on. You don’t even know why Julia is coming here. Is she mad at you? Did she believe Emily’s story or is there another reason? Whatever it is, you know you have to keep your cool. It didn’t feel good to get mad at Anzu that one time, so you want to avoid getting upset at Julia for anything she says.

If you got her right, she’s coming here because she’s worried about Emily. If so, then you’re on the same page and should be able to find common ground. All you need to do is convince Julia that you care about Emily’s wellbeing as much as she does.

The knock on the door alerts you of her arrival and you let her in. You open the door and see your P.E. Teacher standing there straight as a pole, looking serious and with a hand resting on her hips.

“Good evening, David.” She says almost out of obligation. “You’re not surprised to see me. Emily called, didn’t she?”

“She was crying.” You nod and step aside to let her in. “Can you tell me what happened?”

She comes inside and turns to you with a frown. “I’m the one with questions here. And I’m going to get the truth out of you.”

“It’s not like that’s going to be difficult.” You shrug and go get the teapot. “Sit down. I have tea ready. Or would you rather have some coffee?”

“I’m not playing around, Walker.” She says, raising her voice.

“Neither am I.” You say casually. “My house, my rules. If you want to talk, we’ll talk. If you just want to shout, I’ll have you wait outside until you calm down. You’re upset, I can see it, but I’m not exactly over the moon after hearing Emily cry over the phone.”

“What have you been telling my sister?” She asks with a scowl.

“Sit down. Calm down. Have some tea.” You say, looking at her directly. You narrow your eyes. “If you want to get answers out of me, getting upset will get you nowhere.”

You hear Julia clicking her tongue and letting out a heavy sigh/groan as she sits down. “Tea is fine. Four of sugar, please.”

Four? Man, she likes things sweet. You pour the two cups of tea and sit down across from her.

“Can I get some context, then? I spoke to Emily, but all I know is that she regrets telling you things.”

“I’m here because whatever it is you’re doing with my sister is making her not able to trust me. She said weird things, but the fact that she didn’t want to talk to me in the first place is what bothers me. What are you doing to my sister?”

“Trying to make her as happy as I can, if you can believe that.” You say as you get your phone out and unlock it. You slide it over the table towards Julia.

“Emily trusted you enough to tell you about the Affection Multiplier, so I’ll trust you too. The thing is, it’s real, but it doesn’t matter if you believe it or not. It’s in my phone, but you’ll never find it and I can’t even prove it exists without doing something drastic.”

Julia grabs your phone and starts fiddling with it. You can’t see it, but your guess is that, instead of looking for the app, she’s looking at your chat log. Well, all she’ll find there is that you don’t talk to anyone, because you delete them every time after a compromising conversation. You even deleted the harem group chat, just in case.

“If so, then why was Emily so upset? She said she didn’t want to screw things up. Are you threatening her?”

“Does it really look that way to you? Can you honestly look at her and say she’s being forced to do something? Anything?”

Julia bites her lip, and you know she can’t disagree. Your days of questioning your relationship with the girls are far gone. You trust Emily and she trusts you. You love each other, and there’s no questioning that. Julia can’t come to you and tell you Emily looks dissatisfied when she always looks in high spirits and has explicitly told you several times how happy she is. Your relationship is no longer so fragile that you’ll start doubting yourself over something like this.

“Then what is she so afraid of screwing up? What can’t she tell me?” She asks, clenching her fist tightly.

You eye Julia for a few moments. She sounds genuinely distraught. She really does love her sister a lot.

…

“The Affection Multiplier is not the biggest secret we’re keeping.” You say with a sigh. “What Emily is afraid to reveal to you is what we have as a group. I mean me and my girlfriends.”

“What do you mean?”

“We’re all very content with what we have. You probably know that I’m dating four of my schoolmates plus Anzu, the nurse, right?”

“Yeah…” She says, prompting you to go on.

“Well, I’m also in a very serious relationship with both Emma and Mia, both of whom are teachers at Hayes.”

“…” Julia’s eyes slowly widen and her jaw starts to drop. She doesn’t say anything, but you can almost see the dots connecting in her head. “So… seven people?”

“Seven people.” You confirm with a nod.

“And two teachers…?”

“Two teachers.” You nod again.

“…” Julia looks down and into her cup of tea. She smiles wryly at you as she asks. “You don’t happen to have something a bit stronger than tea, would you?”

“I have some leftover whisky.”

“Please.”

She downs her tea as you pour two glasses with just a bit of whisky and a lot of ice. Yeah, this is going to take long, but Julia still has to drive back to her apartment.

________________________________________________________________

“Everyone at the teacher’s office wondered what the hell had happened to those two.” Julia says after a decent swig of alcohol. “Mia was always so stiff, but she started to loosen up a lot recently. And Emma was always chipper, but there was this this distance between her and everyone else that we could never seem to close.”

She eyes you carefully before she sighs and her shoulders drop in defeat. “Who knew they were both dating the same man? A student, too! This is too much.”

You just keep quiet. It’s not like you even want to make excuses. This is how things are, and if you understand Julia as well as you think you do, you don’t have much to worry about.

“No wonder Emily was so upset.” Julia realizes. “If you guys get found out, you’re gone.”

“And if she thought it was all because of her, she’d feel even worse.” You add with a nod.

“God, I was so fucking stupid.” She says, hiding her face with both hands. “No wonder she didn’t want to tell me anything.”

“I’m at fault as well.” You admit with a grimace. “Emily probably wanted to tell you, but felt she couldn’t unless she spoke to me and the others first. I asked her to keep it a secret from you, but it seems I was wrong to ask her that.”

“What you guys are doing is stupidly dangerous, you know that?”

“Of course we do. I asked Emma out on a whim. I never thought she’d become one of the most important people in my life. Things just… escalated from there. It’s the same with Mia. I’m seriously in love with all of them and I couldn’t bring myself to choose one. That’s why I used the app to make it so that everyone thinks me having more than one girlfriend is normal.”

“So you’re like your brother, except you have the power to keep the girls you like?” She asks with narrowed eyes.

“That comparison stings, but I can’t deny it. I think my brother would still be like he is now if he had this app, but that’s beside the point.” You shrug.

“…” Julia bites her lip as she looks down at her glass. “But… I know you’re making these girls happy. I can see that in Emma, Mia, and especially so in Emily.”

“I used to question myself all the time. I thought what I was doing was wrong, somehow. Even now, I understand that I’m far from a paragon of virtue, and that this is all still very morally grey, but… we’re happy. All of us. If I keep working hard, I’ll even be able to marry every single one of them. That’s our goal right now.”

“M-M-Marriage? Seriously?” Julia’s jaw drops.

“That hard to believe?” You chuckle. “I can’t imagine my life without them anymore. Marriage seems like the obvious step forward.”

Julia takes her glass to her lips, but her whiskey is long gone and it’s all just ice water by now. You haven’t offered a refill because she has to drive back home and she has to work tomorrow.

“So… let’s say I believe the Affection Multiplier is real since it does feel odd that it’s normal that you can date many girls.” Julia stops a moment to think her statement over, wrinkles her brow and then dismisses it shaking her head. “What does that mean for my mom?”

“That time I went to her house and she asked you and Emily to leave us alone, she spoke to me about it. She knows I have it too. The app says you can’t influence another person who has it.” You explain. “Basically, she said that if I left her alone she wouldn’t interfere with me, either. I’ll be honest, the things she said really ticked me off. At first, it seemed like she didn’t care at all that I could be using the app to mind-control her daughter. But later I realized she doesn’t know that’s a thing it can do.”

“Just so we’re clear, you’re not mind controlling any of your girlfriends, right?” She asks with a glare.

“I’m not. I do have some… effects in place, but I wouldn’t call them mind control. Like I said, the most drastic change is that everyone thinks me having a harem is normal. It doesn’t force anyone to do anything. Other than that, well…” You sigh. “When I started using the app, I changed something in Emma to make her like the idea of me being with other women. We’ve talked about it, and she likes the change, but it’s what made me start questioning myself and what I was doing.”

“Alright.” Julia sighs and pauses for a moment before continuing. “I’ll believe that for now. So, about my mom?”

“I can’t confirm all of this, but I believe that, while she has the app, she hasn’t unlocked all its features because of the way she’s been using it. The app rewards you more the closer you grow to others, but she’s never taken a score past the halfway point.”

Julia grimaces. “Not even Emily and me, huh?”

You mirror her expression. “That seems to be the case, sadly.”

“Yeah, I can see it. She’s not exactly a role model.” She drinks more ice water. “Is that what Emily meant, then? She said mom could easily find someone to truly love if she wanted to.”

“I think so. The app lets you create strong relationships in very little time. It might sound extreme and corny, but I feel as if I’ve known Emily and the others all my life, even though it’s been about six months only.”

“You’re really trying to sell me on how great this harem of yours is, aren’t you?” She asks with a faint smirk.

“I guess I am.” You smile sheepishly.

“Oooh boy this is a lot to take in.” She says, letting out a heavy breath. “All you’ve said makes me want to blame that magic app of yours for all my thoughts, but like you said, they really do feel like my own feelings. I can’t see anything weird in my thought process.” She says, swirling her glass and making the ice rattle.

“What do you mean?” You ask with a raised eyebrow.

“That for a long time I’ve… entertained the idea that getting together with you and settling down might be really nice." She says, and you want to believe her rosy cheeks are because of her words and not because of how little whisky she’s drank.

“Really?” You ask, taken aback.

“Really.” She chuckles. “And it sucks that talking to you hasn’t really dissuaded me much at all.”

You can feel the heat rising to your face and start losing composure and control over this discussion. And judging from Julia’s smirk, she’s totally amused by it.

“So…”

“So we’ll leave it at that for now.” She says with a chuckle. “Let me think without a drop whisky in my blood and after a very serious talk with a couple of my colleagues.” She says before standing up. “Don’t worry. I won’t go telling things to Mrs. Hayes or anyone else. I’m not about to screw over my sister’s happiness.”

“That’s a relief.” You chuckle and stand up to get the door for her. “I was counting on that.”

“Everything going according to plan, huh?”

“I wish. Just trying to make the best out of bad situations.”

“Well, thanks for talking to me, David. And… sorry for raising my voice at first. You were right to tell me to calm down.”

“Good to hear. Drive safe, Ms. Miller.” You tell her with a grin.

“Cheeky brat.” She laughs, but leans in to give you a kiss on the cheek before leaving.

You quickly text Emily, telling her that her sister is going back home and that everything turned out fine.

-Miller, Julia-  
Affection Score: 51
Love Score: 12
Lust Score: 43

Available points: 600 Friendship points / 200 Love points / 350 Lust points

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