by David Stone
“Shoot.” Stacy had dialed up the cleavage for this visit. That, or she accidentally left a button too many open on her blouse. Either way, I couldn’t help but appreciate her appearance. We enjoyed an ongoing but harmless flirtation with each other.
I decided there was no abridged way to properly fill Stacy in, so I told her everything about the prior night, sparing no details, even the money shots.
“Holy shit, Don. You two should start a porn webcam. You’ll be rich.”
“That’s not the perspective I was looking for Stacy. What I mean is, what do you think about it really? Are we abnormal? I didn’t think sex like that really existed in the real world. And shouldn’t I be really pissed about the ‘finger incident’? I’m still a little confused about everything.”
Stacy chose her words carefully. “Don, I guess you’ve been conservative on the sex front, am I right?”
“More or less.”
“How many women have you slept with?”
“Five.”
“Including your wife?”
“Yes, including Donna.”
“Right there you’ll a little light in the loafers, as my grandpa used to say.” Stacy paused, looking down at her coffee. “How many people do you think I’ve had sex with, Don?”
“I couldn’t say, but I get the impression it’s more than five.”
“Take a guess.”
“Ten?” I suspected more, but it was sort of like guessing a woman’s age. You had to underestimate even if you knew exactly.
“Forty”
“Jesus. I mean. Forty men...”
“Who said just men? Anyway, it’s kind of normal these days to have had a lot of partners. There’s a new world order as far as sexual matters go. I’m thirty-five. I was pretty active in college. Those years account for about a third of them.”
“You’ve been with women too?”
“A few.”
“So, you’re…”
“Lesbian? No. I go with the flow.”
“I see,” I said, still treading lightly. “Well, I think what you’re saying is that I’m a little short on experience.”
“Well, you seem to be catching up, Don. You’ve covered a lot of ground this week. No one has ever come on my breasts. You’re one up on me.”
“Was it a little over the top there?”
“Oh yeah... But in the right context, it works for me.” Stacy arched her back a bit and looked down at her bosom, thus providing a visceral response. “It’s just never come up before, so to speak. Look, let’s say you’re entering phase two of your sexual life. Look at how lucky you are. You’ve got a partner who’s into new things and your sex life is on fire now. You’ve won the lottery. You should hear how the other guys talk around the office. Most of them are miserable. They’re happy if they get laid once a month.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m not,” she said. “And the women too. Most of them say things like, ‘I just hope he’s quick’ or ‘I’d rather he go look at porn and leave me alone’.”
That sounded pretty grim. I never talked much with other men about their wives or sex lives at home, though a lot of them enjoyed sharing their road stories. I didn’t cheat and never had anything to contribute.
Maybe I had won the lottery.
“Don, don’t get too caught up with the other guy thing. Your wife is just being honest. She wants to light the spark with you. If that means she has to fool around to get you interested, well, so what? We’re kind of designed to seek out variety. I do. The idea of being with one man sexually all my life? No thanks. Marriage shouldn’t mean you can’t have sex with other people. In a hundred years monogamy won’t exist. I feel safe betting on that. Say, a hundred grand?”
“Sure thing. You’re on.”
“What else is on your mind? Ready to take me up on my offer? Do you want to come on my breasts?”
“I’m still not there yet. but thanks, Stacy. I’ll keep you posted.”
“You may as well ask your wife if she’d mind.” Stacy stood up to leave. “Or maybe she could join us.”
I knew Stacy was joking but then again, it wasn’t crazy to think down the road it could happen. Like I said, I didn’t know what the end-zone would look like. I didn’t know where this was all headed. A New World Order really was underway, and I was being invited along.
Liquid Lunch Confessions
“Listen, it’s a Friday tradition,” said Carl. He was our resident alcoholic and star salesman, and his Friday lunches were legendary. “We’re expected to drink at Friday lunch, or at least I am.” He laughed. “I’ve earned the right. If I didn’t bring in the meat, you guys wouldn’t have anything to do.” He was right. He brought in the projects that gave me a paycheck, so higher-ups cut him a lot of slack.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll have what you’re having.”
Carl ordered two double martinis, dry, with extra olives. By the end of the second round we had covered all the usual business gossip, sports news, and political mischief. I knew meaningful work for the rest of the afternoon was out of the question. I was feeling pretty loosened up and decided to dig into Carl’s personal life, particularly in regard to his wife. Stacy’s comments about the men in the office had intrigued me, and I wanted to see if they applied to Carl.
“So, Carl, how’s life at home? We’ve never really talked about our personal lives.”
Carl stared at his drink, now down to a swallow, and nodded to the waiter. “I don’t know, Don. How do you mean exactly? Have you heard something?”
“No, Carl. I haven’t heard anything. Well, I’ll tell you something, but this is just between us, okay?”
“Sure thing,” he said.
“I was talking with Stacy earlier. I’m not sure how it came up, but she said most of the men and women at the office felt rather ho-hum about things at home. I’m talking about in the bedroom, Carl. I was surprised at her comment.”
“You were surprised? I’m not. How long have you been married?”
“Ten years.”
“It usually begins around five years, I’d say. That’s when the magic goes out the window. The wife acts like she’s doing you a favor if she pays any real attention to you. You know what I mean about attention, right?”
“In the bedroom,” I said. I got the feeling Carl had a lot to say on the subject.
Carl’s fresh drink arrived and he took a big gulp. “Don, I’m guessing you’ve noticed something along those lines?”
“To be honest, Carl, I hadn’t really thought about it until Stacy brought it up. But I admit, Donna and I have kind of slacked off on the lovemaking.” I knew I was now breaking my vow to Donna not to share our story with anyone else.
“It’s lovemaking for the first few years, Don, then it’s just screwing. You perform your regular routine, get off, and then roll over and go to sleep. There’s no passion. What you want is to turn the screwing back into passionate lovemaking. To do that you need to fall back in love. Illogically, infidelity is the key.”
This surprised me. Right out of the gate he was discussing what Stacy and I had discussed. “That seems so contrary to a happy marriage, doesn’t it?”
“Are we just two girls talking here?” Carl asked. “Nothing leaves this table?”
“Of course. We’re just two gals yakkin’.”
“I’ve had what you might call affairs, Don. There’s a woman in Atlanta I hook up when in town. I’m there a couple times a year. It’s a very loose arrangement. She knows I’m happily married. My wife knows about it.”
“Wow,” I said. Carl was a good looking guy and successful. He could probably keep several families afloat financially, but I never pegged him as a lady’s man. “Your wife knows?”
“She knows. We’ve been together fifteen years. When we lost the magic in the bedroom — that was about ten years ago as I said, or five years in — I complained, just as most any man would. Comics used to joke about it all the time. She said our sex had become
routine. I asked her what we could do to improve the situation. She suggested affairs. It surprised the hell out of me. She said she read about it somewhere as a way to keep the home fires burning.”
“You mean, she told you to cheat on her?”
Carl surveyed the room, got the waiter’s attention, and nodded for refills. He looked at me a bit warily, as if unsure of how to continue. Finally, he said, “My wife thought we should both have affairs, Don. She was right.”
I wasn’t expecting to hear this. It made my situation feel a bit less abnormal, even a little behind the curve. Donna and I were ten years into our marriage.
“Carl, what the hell did you think when she suggested it?”
“Troubled at first, then I liked the idea. What man wouldn’t? She was giving me a free pass to screw around.”
“Yeah, but she was also saying she wanted to screw around. Didn’t that make you angry?”
“No, Don. Once I thought it through, it made me horny as hell. The idea of her fucking somebody else turned me on. We fucked like teenagers after that conversation. We still do. It brought the magic back.”
“Jesus,” I said. The parallels between his situation and my growing one were obvious.
“Jesus is right, Don. I don’t drink so much because I’m sad. I drink because I’m happy. Things couldn’t have turned out better for us.”
“You’re not afraid you’ll lose her? That she’ll be drawn to some other guy she’s sleeping with?”
“NO,” said Carl. “It’s au contraire, as the French say. This way, she’s happy, I’m happy. What other man would let her go out there and experiment? Not many. She doesn’t want to lose me. I don’t want to lose her. We’re living in the best of both possible worlds. But it takes an open mind.”
“Does she tell you about the other men? How many are we talking about anyway?”
“The number isn’t important, Don, but not many. We’re not swingers or sex addicts. Nothing of the sort. That’s not to say we haven’t experimented together, of course. You know what they say, you open one door, and another one opens. I guess what I’m trying to say is it’s not a lifestyle, but it’s in the mix.
“And yes, she tells me about the other men, what they do together, the things she’s tried with them. It’s like oral Viagra. It excites both of us to share our sex lives with other people. It’s crazy.”
By this point we’d each drunk half a dozen martinis or more than I might drink in a whole month. I was feeling emboldened, to say the least. I decided to share a little of my news with Carl, feeling it would help me sort out my own thoughts.
“Carl, you’re being very open and I appreciate it. I won’t say a word to anyone, of course.”
“Stacy knows, Don. But that’s it as far as the office goes.”
Jesus, I thought. There seemed to be a lot of symmetry between us in a number of ways. I wondered if Stacy had ever joined Carl and his wife but didn’t want to ask. If she did, I was sure it would come up down the road.
I now felt safe sharing my recent experiences. I wasn’t sure how far I’d go until I started talking.
“I won’t mention our discussion with Stacy, Carl.”
“It won’t do any harm. It’s your choice.”
“I guess I should tell you why I brought this all up.”
Carl smiled. “I knew we’d get to it. Remember, it’s my job to get people to open up. That’s why I’m good at sales. I know when to quit talking, even when a little drunk, which I definitely am now by the way. Don’t worry. Whatever you say is just between you and me.”
“I’m a little drunk myself, Carl. That’s probably why I’m about to open up.”
“You’re a pretty buttoned-down guy, Don. You need to let go once in awhile. You’re in safe company.”
“Thanks, Carl.” I did my best to make an outline in my mind before spilling my beans. It wasn’t working, so I just spoke, interested to hear whatever the hell I was about to say. “My neighbor fingered my wife in our kitchen during a dinner party. She told me about it the next morning.”
“That would get her attention, being fingered I mean.”
“You’d think, right? Anyway, she sort of let it happen, even helped it happen. She undid her jeans and put his hand in her panties. Let me emphasize she was wearing them at the time.”
Carl grinned knowingly. “She went all in. You must have been pretty shocked to hear this, Don. Did it make you angry?”
“No. We ended up fucking like two teenagers, right there in the kitchen.”
“So now you know,” said Carl, somewhat mystically.
“Know what?”
“That the idea of your wife getting it on with another guy turns you on.”
I mused on “other guy” for a moment. Ed wasn’t just another guy, and I didn’t think I would have had the same reaction if it had just been some random guy. That would have made me angry. There was something about Ed being a good friend that changed the chemistry.
“Carl, the idea of her sleeping around with strange men doesn’t work for me. I know this guy. We’re very good friends.”
“I didn’t really mean to suggest otherwise. Those are details, anyway, Don. We’re talking the raw materials here. Your wife with another man. Your final reaction will always be variable. You don’t want your wife being reckless.”
He was right. “The next time we were able to talk about it was a few days later, after my Cleveland trip. Every time we tried to talk about it, we ended up fucking like rabbits.”
“There’s a lot of energy there, Don, a lot of sexual energy, when it comes to redefining how you two view fidelity. You imagine a scenario involving your wife with another guy, say, with his cock in her mouth, and you just want to fuck the hell out of her.”
“That’s it!” I said. “That exactly describes what happened.”
Carl nodded for a final round and asked the waiter to doggy-bag our barely touched New York strips. There was no question about returning to the office or driving home. I was glad to have heard Carl’s private admissions regarding his marriage and how they kept things spicy. It felt like I was joining a secret society of some kind. Not a swinger’s club, just a club for couples who’d found non-mainstream ways of maintaining vibrant sex lives.
I was still a little confused about the “end game.” Where did it all lead to?
“Carl,” I said. “Where does this sort of thing lead? I’m not sure what the trajectory is.”
“Happiness? You have to be clear on your goals, Don. What do you want out of it? It’s not like you’re getting onboard a train to a known destination. You’ll always be in control. It sounds like you and your wife are compatible. You want the same thing.”
“So, it’s not like an addiction. You don’t need to get further and further ‘out there’ to keep things exciting?”
“No. In fact, you might find things settle down. It sounds like you and Donna are already pulling a lot of erotic energy out of that single incident with your friend, right? That could keep you going for a long time.”
“I have a feeling the train’s definitely left the station, Carl. These martinis are giving me permission to just go ahead and admit I’d like to watch my wife fuck this guy.”
“There ya go, liquid courage… Listen, you won’t know until you go there, and going there doesn’t mean you can’t dial things back later. Maybe Donna won’t dig it and you will. Maybe she will dig it and you won’t. There’s always a risk. But chances are, you’ll both feed off that energy for a long time. Down the road, you might find you want to revisit the situation. Nothing is fixed. The point is, you love and trust each other enough to keep going, to keep trying. We’ve got pretty hot wives, Don. There’s a lot to be thankful for here. Just look at what it’s done for your sex life already. You’ve restored the passion.”
“You’re absolutely right.”
Afternoon Delights
“You’re home early,” said Donna, as I stumbled through the kitchen door. She ga
ve me a kiss. “Oh boy, liquid lunch? Carl?”
“Yes. We had a few martinis, perhaps a few too many. You’re home early too.”
Donna was wrapping a gift on the granite-topped island, one of the new features in our modern kitchen. She was still dressed for work, wearing her usual white blouse, black pencil skirt outfit, which was an excellent look on her. It was giving me ideas, but I knew I needed to nap if I was going to recover from the martinis in time for Kristen’s birthday dinner.
Donna knew the post-lunch-with-Carl routine so explanations weren’t necessary. I went upstairs and stripped down to my briefs, took two aspirin and fell onto the bed, falling asleep on the way down.
Two hours later Donna was cooing into my ear. Initially, it was just noise, which I quickly deciphered as an instruction to rise and shower. She had prepared an espresso. I sat up, and she sat next to me with her hand, very warm from the cup, gently stroking my thigh. This small action produced an immediate erection.
“Oh, look who’s joined us, Don,” she said. She moved her hand over my cock and rested it there. I looked at her with appreciative eyes. She had showered and looked refreshed. She was wearing a loose fitting robe, quite open at the top, exposing most of her boobs. I loved them dearly. For some reason I felt like a newlywed.
“So tell me about your lunch with Carl,” she said.
“The usual, I guess.” I knew this was a lie. “We ordered a big lunch, and then drank instead.” That part was true.
“No boy talk?”
“How do you mean?” I said. I knew what she meant.
“Nothing really. But I wanted to tell you, I had a girl’s lunch with Kristen for her birthday. That’s why I’m home early. But we only drank wine, not martinis.”
As far as I knew, this was her first contact with Kristen since the evening when her husband had his fingers in her panties. I wondered if that changed the dynamic of her relationship with Kristen.
“How was it, seeing her, after her husband…”
“Fingered my pussy?” Donna laughed. Apparently, and in less than a week, the “finger incident” had become a funny story. “To be honest, at first it felt a little weird. She didn’t pick up on it. Somehow, I managed to bring up how you’d recently become a savage in the bedroom. Kristen found that very interesting. She wanted details.”
