Chapter Text
It starts, as all things steeped in resentment often do, on a rainy Sunday in Trenton, New Jersey.
Trenton isn’t so bad. It gets a bad rep, but there’s a restaurant on the riverfront that isn’t half bad. The town also happens to be a good midpoint between Philadelphia and Princeton, about thirty minutes each way.
Julie parks in the rain and joins Bonnie and Sam for the first time as they try and figure out a better option for lunch, as the outdoor seating is closed and that is their usual thing. Instead of the pre-arranged plans, they find a little Chinese restaurant a few blocks away, and settle there.
None of them have much in common, but Julie doesn’t find it hard to latch on to Sam and Bonnie’s interests, finding quickly that James’ tastes in women are actually impeccable, and that he is unequivocally—
“A total dick,” Bonnie asserts, waving a piece of sweet and sour pork around.
“I can’t believe he treated you guys the way he did,” Julie says with rage in her chest.
“Same goes for you, girlfriend!” Sam replies. “We all deserved better. James is awful. He’s wonderful, and he cares, and he tries to do good, but he also sucks.”
“Especially with House around,” Bonnie grumbles.
“House,” all three of them groan at the same time.
All things considered, they actually spend less time talking about James and more about themselves. It’s really, really nice. But, by the end of it, they all come to the same definitive conclusion: James is incredibly repressed about his sexuality, deftly in love with House, and might have been cheating on Bonnie and Julie with him the entire time he was married them and sleeping with him through his divorce with Sam – though none of them have any proof.
Julie is invited to the repeat lunches, and after a few months, jokingly, after a few margaritas, they decide to name their little group.
Thus, The James Evan Wilson Ex-Wives Club is born.