Passion Relapse

by Jack Fisher

  “That’s more hopelessly romantic than obscenely pornographic, Peter,” Mary said. “Is this really the way you want to talk about your problems?”

  “Bear with me, because this is where I start screwing up. You see, I was determined to be the right guy—the one those girls wouldn’t regret years later. In a place like LA, there are just too many stories like that. Kimberly was on the fast track to being one of those stories. She had been with this other guy who was a bit too…controlling. So, when she started noticing me—on top of all the other girls who had—I wanted to give her something different. Now that I look back on it, I might have given her too much.”

  He stopped himself again. Mary kept her silence, focusing on the softball game that was still going on. She had to let Peter tell the story on his own terms.

  “Stop me if this sounds like a bad sitcom. A cute girl is frustrated by her ex. She crosses paths with a cute guy who is nothing like him. She gets friendly. She flirts with him. He flirts back, albeit carefully. Then, one afternoon she invites him over to her house. She doesn’t admit that her parents are out. It’s just sort of implied.”

  “It does sound like a bad sitcom, but I’m not going to stop you,” Mary said.

  “Keep in mind that I was still a teenage boy. I was nervous, excited, anxious—everything you would expect from a guy when a cute girl whispers something sexy in his ear,” Peter said.

  “I’m guessing she said something really raunchy.”

  “I’d rather not repeat it in its entirety, but at some point she said she wanted to fuck until her legs went numb.”

  “And I’m guessing that was the first ominous sign?” Mary asked.

  “No. That was just foreplay. The signs only became obvious after our clothes came off.”

  Now it was poised to get detailed. Peter was obviously remaining mindful of the other people in the stands, keeping his voice down so no one could eavesdrop. That meant it must have gotten pretty steamy.

  “It started out as fun. I played with her breasts. She fondled my dick. We did the kind of heavy petting you’d expect hormonal teenagers to do when they’re hot, horny and unsupervised,” Peter said.

  “I did all those things at least twice before I turned seventeen. You don’t need to list them,” Mary said.

  “Then, it got serious. I told her I wanted to be inside her. She said she wanted it, too. Somewhere along the way, I said I wanted to be better…to be the kind of guy who went the extra distance.”

  “You said all this while a cute girl was touching your cock?” Mary said skeptically.

  “I…may have used different words, but I got my point across because Kimberly went with it. She had this look in her eye—this look of an animal that had just been let out of its cage.”

  “Wow. Sounds kinky.”

  “I’m not sure about that. I didn’t know if this was what she wanted or if it was just normal, but I went with it, too. I really did want to be someone better. In this instance, it meant letting a cute girl go to town on me the way she wanted.”

  He shook his head and scoffed. Mary couldn’t tell if he remembered the moment fondly or if it had become tainted over the years. Whatever the case, it was clearly a defining one for him.

  “Picture, if you can, a couple of sweaty teenagers in the basement of a suburban house. The guy who’d just recently shed his dorky persona, lying flat on his back while some cute blonde who’s nearly a foot shorter pounces on him,” Peter said, staring off into the distance. “She smothers her lips all over his face, she rakes her nails down his chest then she rides his dick like her life depends on it.”

  “Starting to get pornographic, but it’s nothing I haven’t seen, experienced or triggered before,” Mary said.

  “Then I’ll spare you more details because all the women told me the same thing. Doing what we were doing—the way we were doing it with them being in charge—felt really good.”

  “That’s usually a sign you’re doing something right.”

  “In most cases, it is. I sure thought it was at the time, but keep in mind…I was a teenager. I didn’t scrutinize what was happening. I just loved that I was getting laid. Every guy was going to feel that to some extent, but there was something else at work here, something that set the tone for what sex would be like for me.”

  “What did you do wrong?” Mary asked.

  “That’s just it. I’m not sure I did anything wrong. I just approached sex the same way I approached my training. I tried to be great and not just good—better and not just competent. In this case, it meant holding out for Kimberly, letting her set the tone so she could get what she couldn’t from her ex. I like to think I got the job done as well as any inexperienced teenager. I let her ride me, I fought the urge to come and I waited until she had an orgasm that left my ears ringing for the rest of the day.”

  “Now you’re just bragging,” Mary said.

  “I think I earned at least some bragging rights,” retorted Peter. “She said I did set myself apart. She even rewarded me by giving me a blow job and letting me come on her tits. It was incredibly satisfying, but it was just the beginning of a cycle—one that I failed to recognize.”

  There had been some pride in Peter’s voice as he’d recalled his first sexual experience. Mary didn’t doubt that he’d exaggerated some details, as most men did. However, she also sensed conflict in his words. As crazy as it seemed, the act of having sex with a cute girl had been secondary. Peter clearly had gotten something else out of it.

  It heightened Mary’s intrigue, but not just with respect to the details. She recalled her own early sexual experiences. They were varied and extensive, especially during her teenage years. However, Peter’s story cast them in a different context.

  “Needless to say, I liked what I experienced,” Peter said. “I liked it so much that I wanted to do it more, and after Kimberly shared the details with her friends, I had plenty of opportunities. Girls sent me very vivid notes with some very detailed instructions on how to hook up with them. Some of them even included pictures that might not have been legal in some states.”

  “Sounds like a teenage boy’s wet dream,” commented Mary.

  “It was, but keep in mind…I was still growing at that time. I’d used what I learned from you, working out and getting stronger to avoid being that pudgy dork I was as a kid.”

  “You’re welcome…I guess.”

  “No need to guess. I’m still grateful, because it came with a lot of benefits. Some of those benefits helped me become a firefighter, and that, I’m proud of. But by the time I hit my senior year, those same benefits had turned me into this big, strong, athletic guy in a town full of sexy, ambitious women. Needless to say, I took full advantage of the situation and that I’m not nearly as proud of—well, not as much as I used to be.”

  “So…what changed?” Mary asked.

  “It’s not that something changed, per se,” Peter said. “I just realized that what I was doing kept fueling that cycle and I didn’t realize how bad it got until it was too late.”

  He kept coming back to this cycle. He made it sound like a wound that had started small, but had kept growing and growing. It reminded Mary of the burden she’d felt after she’d left Miami. She hadn’t realized it had even been a burden until it had finally broken her. Whatever the pain had been, it had done the same to Peter. For someone who’d worked so hard to improve himself, it must have been pretty traumatic.

  “How exactly did that cycle play out? Is it as bad as I think?” Mary asked.

  “Then some,” admitted Peter. “It would go like this. I’d encounter a pretty girl, go out of my way to tell her I’m better than the men she knows and she’d give me a chance to prove it.”

  “With sex?”

  “Among other things, but yeah. A lot of it came back to sex. In order to be that better man I claimed to be, I had to dedicate myself to art of satisfying women. I pushed myself to be who they wanted me to be, to perform how they wanted me to. I was
n’t rich. I didn’t drive a Ferrari. But I was a hard-working guy who knew how to get the job done…both in and out of the bedroom.”

  “You always were pretty motivated. I almost feel bad about pushing it when we were kids,” Mary said.

  “Don’t be. When it came to women, I motivated myself more than anyone,” Peter said. “It was a big part of what got the cycle going…especially early on.”

  Shoving his hands in his pockets, he turned away from the softball game and stared at the ground. He became more emotional, sounding angry with himself. Having had plenty of experience with self-hatred, Mary could understand those feelings.

  “Just like my workouts in the gym, I set ambitious goals. Toward the end of high school, I set out to sleep with half the cheerleading squad and most of the girls’ soccer team,” Peter said.

  “And…you succeeded?” Mary asked, not sure if she should be impressed.

  “I even slept with someone on the volleyball team for good measure. I’ll let you be the judge of that,” he said flatly. “Then, after I got involved with the fire academy, I set my sights on every cute sorority girl, aspiring model and waitress in the greater Los Angeles area.”

  “I’d say that’s pretty motivated. Then again, I’d slept with half the basketball team by the end of my senior year, so who am I to judge?”

  “Except I went about it in a different way than your typical pussy hound,” he continued. “I made it a point to show these women I was better. I did whatever I needed to do to impress them. When they responded, I couldn’t jump into bed with them fast enough. I made it my personal duty to seal the deal, so to speak. But once the panties came off, the script got flipped.”

  “How so?” Mary asked.

  She sensed more memories playing out in his mind. Mary knew this because she had seen that look in her own eyes when she’d studied her own reflection. Peter shifted uncomfortably where he sat. Some of the memories must have been too difficult. He seemed to want to keep going, but Mary sensed that they made him feel things he likely had been avoiding for a while.

  “I’m still trying to figure out how to describe it without sounding like a bad Hustler article,” Peter said. “Basically, I willingly got out of the driver’s seat and became a passenger. Regardless of whether I seduced a woman or she seduced me, I let the woman set the tone…or women in the case of three-ways.”

  “Don’t see how that would make much of a difference,” Mary said dryly.

  “In any case, I just set aside my strength, my will and my ego, along with my underwear. I let the woman control me, guide me or do whatever it was I needed to do to please them.”

  “Some women might call that being a considerate lover. Others might call it being a man-whore. I’m sure there are other, less flattering things to call it,” Mary said.

  “Call it what you want. It worked,” Peter said. “I did everything I needed to do to satisfy a woman. Sometimes that meant lying on my back and watching her ride my dick or maybe pinning her up against the wall and humping her brains out. Sometimes it meant bending her over and fucking her ass until she screamed my name. Sometimes it even meant—”

  At this point, Mary put her hand up to silence him. Between his details and her weakened capacity for restraint, he was pushing it. She didn’t need such specific memories playing out in her head as well.

  “Okay, I get it, Peter. You let the woman be in charge. I don’t need to know every scenario,” she said, blushing in ways she didn’t usually when talking about sex.

  “Sorry about that. I…got carried away,” Peter said awkwardly.

  “Well, to be fair, I haven’t had sex in a while. I’m usually all for perverse chit chat, but…” She let her words trail off so Peter could fill in the blanks. She had to collect herself for a moment. It was a good thing nobody else was watching. They would’ve seen two grown adults shifting like a couple of kids waiting to get their teeth pulled. It was humbling and awkward in too many ways, but she had no intention of leaving and, it seemed, neither did he.

  Eventually, Peter collected himself enough to continue. He gazed back out at the softball field, pretending to watch the game while he recalled this transition from a woman-pleasing stud into a sex addict.

  “You’re right. I’ll skip the part where I tell you how much I enjoyed it. Just assume the things I did for these women got pretty elaborate,” Peter said.

  “I guess every sex addict feels that way about it early on. I know I did.” Mary sighed.

  “And I managed to do all this while establishing a career as a firefighter. It turns out being strong and motivated is a great way to get ahead in this field. I went from the guy who checks the tank gauges to the guy organizing rescue operations. I developed a reputation as someone you wanted on your squad when lives are on the line.”

  “That’s a good reputation to have. I’m sure it went even further with the ladies.”

  “It did. Boy, did it ever,” he admitted. “It also accelerated the cycle. I attracted more women, so much so that I didn’t have to pursue them anymore. Being a guy with a respectable job in a city where there aren’t many respectable people… Let’s just say the women just came to me and I ran with it. Then, as time went on, there were…complications.”

  “In the bedroom?” Mary asked.

  “Not really,” he answered. “Some of it came from the women. It’s easier when you’re young and you just want to have fun. You don’t want to tie yourself down with commitments and responsibilities. That’s why I went out of my way to tell the women I slept with that I wasn’t looking for anything exclusive. I wanted to keep things simple, sexy and fun.”

  “In other words, you just wanted to fuck and not commit.”

  Peter shook his head and chuckled wryly. “Yeah, that’s about right,” he said.

  “You know, in a lot of places that kind of honesty works against you,” Mary said.

  “Well, in Los Angeles, it just got me more pussy,” Peter said with a shrug. “But even in a place like Los Angeles, people can’t be completely callous. Some of these women wanted more than a one-night stand or a quickie. And I’m not going to lie. There were a few times where I wanted more with a woman—something deeper than just great sex.”

  “So, what stopped you? It couldn’t have just been a fear of commitment.”

  He stopped for a moment. He obviously hadn’t given it much thought until recently. That was typical of an addict. Mary had experienced it first-hand, getting to the point where the addiction and the desires no longer fell in line.

  “I’m still trying to figure that out,” Peter said with a defeated sigh. “I sure as hell didn’t think about it at the time. I enjoyed it too damn much, banging all these pretty girls and satisfying them in my own special way.”

  “It’s hard to stop enjoying something as good as sex. As a woman, I guess I should thank you,” Mary said.

  “Well, I can’t say you’re welcome, because I ended up breaking a lot of hearts, including my own at times. I’d tell these women that I wasn’t ready for a relationship. I’d say I wanted to focus on my career and enjoy my youth.”

  “Most guys would just lie,” Mary said.

  “I’m sure I did plenty of that, as well. It didn’t matter, because I still hurt those women. But when you’re a young, cocky, pretty boy who can easily attract other women, it’s easy to shrug off. Then, over time, as you watch your friends and colleagues settle down, it starts to get to you. It doesn’t happen all at once, but it still takes a toll.”

  “So, when did it really start to bother you?”

  “Too late to make a difference,” answered Peter. “If I ever got upset about it, I just found another pretty girl and drowned my sorrows in her tits.”

  “That’s understandable, I guess, but it never works in the long run. Believe me. I know.”

  “I guess every sex addict knows, to some degree. And in order to learn from it, I guess every sex addict has to find out the hard way. In my case, I don’t know
how I could’ve learned any harder.”

  Peter grew increasingly anxious, rubbing the back of his neck and diverting his gaze in every direction. He looked tempted to run off on her again. He’d already shared plenty of uncomfortable details about his life. This might be too much for him.

  In an effort to dissuade him from escaping again, Mary scooted closer. She then reached over and placed her hand on his knee. It was a simple gesture, one that had no sexual connotations whatsoever. It seemed to settle him down, but he remained hesitant.

  “How bad was it?” Mary asked intently.

  “I’m…not sure you want to know. I’m not even sure I want to tell you,” Peter said.

  “I think you need to. You’ve come this far and, unlike sex, pulling out isn’t as option.”

  “That’s a bad joke for an issue like this.”

  “It’s not a joke.”

  Mary offered another gesture, lightly grasping his shoulder and eventually drawing his gaze toward her. Peter might not be ready to do this. It might even do more harm than good, revealing all these details to someone who had yet to figure out her own problems. Even so, Mary remained committed to seeing this through, and she needed Peter to see it through as well.

  “I’m not a priest. I’m not your therapist. I’m not your parole officer, either. I’m your friend,” Mary said. “You know you can tell me anything, right?”

  “I know. I just…can’t put it in a way that isn’t awful,” Peter said.

  “All the more reason to keep it simple,” she argued. “Every addict has that painful moment of clarity. I had mine. And, yes…it was painful. I’m in no position to judge and a perfect position to understand. The way I see it, you won’t get this opportunity with anyone else.”

  He didn’t argue her logic. He tried to divert his gaze from her again, but Mary gave his leg a light squeeze to hold his attention. She could literally see him wrestling with it internally, fighting all sorts of conflicting feelings.