by Robin Baker
It was the childless woman who with typical brashness had suggested they should try swapping. At first they all treated the suggestion as a joke, but as they became increasingly drunk they began to talk about the possibility seriously. Soon they were discussing the practicalities of the exercise rather than its desirability. They devised a card game, based on chance, not strategy, that required the winner to remove an item of clothing. It was decreed that the man who was the first to lose all his clothes should have sex with the woman who lost all hers first.
A run of wins left the smaller of the two men naked almost before the others had started. He was far from muscular and had relatively tiny testes, but his penis was larger than average. As he settled back to watch the two women progressively expose more and more of their femininity, he became increasingly proud of his erection. In the event, the cards were disappointing. In a late run, it was his partner who was next to be naked. As she removed her knickers, she both surprised and excited the other couple by revealing a triangle of pubic hair that struck them as incongruously large for such a demure woman. An immediate suggestion that the rules should be changed so that partners did not have sex with each other was defeated by the alternative idea that they should still have sex, but in full view of the other couple.
Less exhibitionist than their friends, the ‘lucky’ couple found it difficult to begin their performance. Laughter, self-consciousness and a rapidly dwindling erection almost ended the enterprise. Eventually, as they lay together, it was the serious stroking and kissing of their bodies by the other couple that took them across the threshold from embarrassment to intense sexual arousal. The intercourse they had, while still being caressed by the other couple, was the most exciting either had ever experienced.
Aroused almost to the point of spontaneous ejaculation by what he had just seen, the childless man suggested they should abandon the cards. He should now have sex with the already naked and prostrate woman rather than with his own partner. Almost before anybody could comment, he was on top of her. The woman was to relive this moment many times over the next few years. The emotion she was always to remember as she felt him, penis even larger than her partner’s, slip gently into her was neither guilt nor excitement. It was instead an overwhelming sense of welcome. Excitement followed but was short-lived. He had been so aroused that he ejaculated within seconds.
All now naked, there followed a crude and drunken interlude of about half an hour while they first waited for, then tried to help, the first man to recover his erection. The childless woman, who had perhaps wanted all this to happen more than any of them, began to fret that she would not have her turn. The pressure on the first man was intense but eventually the prospect of sex with a different woman, combined with the now totally abandoned sexual encouragement he received from both women, did the trick. At the childless woman’s suggestion, he entered her from behind as she knelt down, bending forward over a chair. Watching his partner have sex with another man excited the childless man once more. He could scarcely wait for his friend to withdraw before taking over.
They never repeated the exercise. A month later, both women discovered they were pregnant. They both assumed that the father of their children was the one who had already proved his fertility. But they were quite wrong. The father of both was the one who had previously seemed infertile.
The couples were to stay together for another five years. For a while, until after their babies were born, both relationships stabilised. As the children grew, however, both relationships once more deteriorated. Despite continuing to have unprotected sex, the extrovert couple failed to produce another child and their mutual recriminations intensified. The man began an affair with the other woman. This time, they kept it secret. Eventually, though, they confessed their infidelity, both couples separated, and the unfaithful pair began to live together, along with the woman’s three children.
Financially, the more extrovert man’s life went from success to success and he was able to maintain in some comfort not only both of the children conceived that night but also his two stepchildren. By now he was convinced that he was infertile. However, his increasing wealth and status and his continuing physical attractiveness made him even more of a magnet to other women. He was often unfaithful. His partner knew about his infidelities – but she agreed to tolerate his behaviour in exchange for a guarantee that, no matter what happened, she and her three children would be financially secure. In the years to come, he unknowingly sired two more children via his promiscuity.
In previous scenes, we have watched men and women going to great lengths to hide their infidelity. If they failed, they suffered. Yet here we meet four people who are openly unfaithful. Partner-swapping is not particularly common in Western society, but it occurs often enough to form a recognisable part of the rich mosaic of human sexuality – a part, moreover, that promotes sperm warfare. A survey in the USA in the 1970s revealed that almost 5 per cent of couples had, at one time or another, openly swapped partners with another couple, though nearly 80 per cent of these had done so only once or twice. What circumstances can lead such behaviour to actually improve a person’s reproductive success?
The answer lies in the way criteria for choosing partners and lovers can change with time during the course of a person’s life. Of course, when open infidelity was first mooted in Scene 19, the conscious preoccupation of the four characters will have been with superficial matters. Excitement and fear will have been relished in equal proportions – the excitement of imminent infidelity will have been tempered by fears concerning their bodies and their sexual performances. Subconsciously, however, their bodies will have been wrestling with more important matters. Would the reproductive benefits of their planned actions outweigh the reproductive costs?
The more extrovert couple had an easy decision. After five years of unprotected sex, they had failed to produce children. Each thought their partner might be sterile, and here was a golden opportunity to have sex with someone of proven fertility. Both their conscious and their unconscious brains might well have reached the same conclusion.
The other couple had a more difficult decision, though consciously neither would probably have appreciated their body’s logic. Their family was rapidly outgrowing their home and finances. Even two children might be too many for them to raise successfully without an improvement in circumstances. So how could they each have another? The man could manage to have a third child only if he could find somebody who would raise that child without his help. His friend’s partner offered just such a possibility. His own partner, on the other hand, could have a successful third child only with better financial support than he, her present partner, could provide. Her friend’s partner had potential, argued the woman’s body. Not only was he wealthy, he was in a relationship that was looking increasingly unstable. Maybe, if she had a child which he thought might be his, he would help her financially. Or she might even be able to wrest him from her friend, his current partner. On top of all that, her body could see a benefit in conceiving via this man: not only was he very attractive to women, he had also achieved a higher status in life. Genetically, a child by this man could be far more successful than another child by her current partner.
Of course, some of the potential costs of infidelity were still there for both couples – risk of disease, for example. But most of the dangers usually associated with infidelity were minimised by the nature of the situation. All of the characters knew and agreed to what was going to happen, so there was no need for deception and hence no risk of discovery. By agreeing to have sex in view of each other, they removed all possibility of deceit. Both relationships were already unstable, and the risk of anybody being deserted by their partner because of the night’s events would have seemed no greater than before.
All four, therefore, subconsciously computed that they might gain from a bout of partner-swapping. And as it turned out, all four were correct. This is easy to see for three of them. The childless woman conceived. He
r partner sired two children in one night. The other woman struggled initially, but eventually wrested the first man from his partner, benefited from his wealth, and successfully raised three children. Without that night of abandonment, she might have raised only two – and those, with difficulty. Only for the other man is it less easy to see the value of his decision. Of course, he thought he sired two more children that night. But he didn’t. Moreover, for five years he had the stress of raising a third child (which wasn’t his, though he thought it was). Eventually, he was deserted by his partner for a man with whom she had first been unfaithful with his consent. As a result, he also lost day-to-day contact with the children, for whom he cared very much.
At first sight, his may not seem much of a success story. However, as a result of that night’s events, the two children who really were his were raised more easily and given a better launch into life than he could ever have given them. He still saw them often and gave them what help he could. From time to time they lived with him for short periods, and they probably never really felt abandoned by him. If he hadn’t agreed to that night’s events, he might have struggled to raise his two children. And it is worth bearing in mind that, as we saw in Scenes 9, 11 and 16, such a struggle can sometimes have dire consequences. He might still eventually have been deserted by his partner, but in less favourable circumstances. In particular, he might well have been less fortunate in the man who took his place in raising his children. Indeed, a key factor in the less extrovert man’s success was that his friend did turn out to be a good stepfather. Of course, in part this may have been because he kept a close eye on the way his children were being treated in their new situation. Mostly, however, it was because his ex-partner tolerated her new partner’s infidelities. The latter was not by nature monogamous, but as long as he could be promiscuous he was happy to help support her children. In effect, she traded his sexual freedom for a guarantee that, no matter what happened, she and her three children would be financially protected.
All four gained from their night of sexual abandonment. But if things had turned out differently, and the previously childless man had failed to win those two sperm battles, he would have lost out in a big way. But, in fact, he was most unlikely to lose. He was a sperm wars specialist, producing too many sperm. His friend was not, producing too few. Put the specialist in a monogamous situation and he was sub-fertile. After each insemination, huge numbers of his killers and egg-getters clustered around his partner’s egg. Multiple sperm entered the egg simultaneously and dense concentrations of deadly chemicals were released by the surrounding sperm hordes. The egg always died. But send his sperm in to battle, and he was virtually invincible. His huge armies would decimate those of lesser opponents and, having been reduced in number themselves, would then send the correct number of sperm on to seek an egg.
On that night of sexual revelry, the less extrovert man produced small armies, rich in blockers (Scene 7) and family-planning sperm (Scene 16). His reproductive strategy in the past had centred on guarding his partner from other men. Then he could use long-term, routine sex to produce children at long but measured intervals when times were good (Scene 16). Twice, he had needed eight months of unprotected sex to impregnate his partner. Even so, he would probably have produced more children with his partner had he been more successful socially and financially. But in sperm warfare he was doomed to failure.
We discuss the existence of these two male types in Scene 35. We have already discussed why women sometimes respond to intercourse by ovulating on cue (Scene 15) and why men respond to the sight of another couple having intercourse by becoming aroused and erect (Scene 9). These sexual responses were important factors in determining the outcome of the scene we have just witnessed. Perhaps most important of all were the women’s decisions to drop the usual coyness and secrecy that one, if not the other, would usually have retained, in favour of blatant and open infidelity. The unconscious motivation was the same for both of them. In their lifetime of shopping around for genes, they had each reached a stage when it was worth trying someone new. As things turned out, theirs was a fair exchange.
SCENE 20
Tasteful Display
By chance, their business trip coincided with the first hot day of summer. The man had engineered the visit and they had been looking forward to it for days. The weather was a real bonus.
The woman had made a point of telling her partner where she was going and who she was going with. The last thing she wanted was to make him suspicious. He was steady and reliable, both as a partner and as father to their two children, and she didn’t want to lose him. But, at the same time, she felt that she needed some excitement in her life, and the man with her in the car could be it. He was a challenge, and he was attractive. She enjoyed teasing and flirting with him – she even enjoyed arguing with him, which she did often.
In contrast, the man had not bothered to tell his partner. It was not that unusual for him to go on such a journey or to take somebody with him. In fact, his partner no longer seemed to care what he did and appeared to welcome his days away. Secretly, he had decided she was having an affair. Not that it bothered him much – in fact, he would almost have welcomed her infidelity, taking it as a licence to pursue infidelity himself.
As they drove the two hours to their destination, he pondered their budding relationship. After a year of platonic acquaintance, they knew a lot about each other. Enough, for example, to know that there was no way they could live together. Yet, somehow, even this incompatibility was attractive. Recently, they had begun to touch each other as they spoke. On a few occasions, like today, they had even greeted each other with a friendly kiss. He was sure they had an unspoken understanding. One day they would have a proper affair, snatching and engineering sex when they could. And, as he drove, he had high hopes that today might mark the beginning of that affair.
Their business completed by mid-day, they decided to enjoy their freedom and the weather and to buy food and drink for a picnic. As they drove into the country, passing field after field and wood after wood, she began to tease him. He was looking for somewhere secluded. She pretended not to realise and kept pointing out roadside verges or open fields near houses – suitable for a picnic, but nothing else. Eventually, growing hungry, she decided she had teased him long enough. When he pointed out a small, secluded field, she accepted. Rows of freshly mown hay lay silver-green in the intense sunlight. He thought it looked perfect. She said it would do.
There was a large blanket in the car which they took and stretched out in the corner of the field, part in dappled shade, at her request, and part in sun, at his. She was wearing a loose cotton dress and, knowing from the minute she got up in the morning she could engineer a picnic, had brought a straw hat with her. He had started the day wearing a suit and tie but within minutes of finishing their business meeting he had taken off his jacket and unbuttoned his collar. Even so, sitting there in the field in the heat he looked uncomfortable. Knowing he was no stranger to nude sunbathing, she began to tease him again, challenging herself to persuade him to take off his clothes. The dénouement came when she accused him of having something to hide.
Interpreting her teasing as a sexual overture, he was becoming aroused. Even so, he felt slightly silly as he removed his shoes and socks and even sillier when he stood up, took off his shirt, then in one movement pushed down his trousers and pants. Now naked, he stood there, penis half erect, wondering what he should do next. Avoiding any reaction to his nakedness, she simply commented that he would be much more comfortable now and busied herself with the picnic. Still standing, he suggested that she, too, should take off her clothes. She shook her head, saying that she would burn, even in dappled shade.
It didn’t show in her manner, but she was also becoming aroused. Wetness was beginning to ooze out of her vagina. She wanted sex with him, but was worried about losing her partner and her security. There were many things about this man that she found attractive: he was going to be one of life
’s achievers; she liked the way he stood up to her and sometimes even outmanoeuvred her. Not many men could do that, including her partner - these days he had become something of a doormat. But there were parts of this man’s character that bothered her.
As they talked and ate, she glanced occasionally at his naked brown body and at his now shrunken penis. Sometimes, she wondered about his sex drive. The only way they were ever going to have sex would be if he engineered a situation, safe from discovery, in which she just couldn’t say no. So far, in the year they had known each other, he hadn’t even got close. His lack of insistence and persistence in sexual matters – at least, as far as she was concerned – was a surprising contrast to his drive and sharpness in all other areas of life. Maybe he had some sexual problem. True, he had produced two children, but maybe his problem was a recent development. All of his moves with her so far had been rather ill conceived. In fact, the way he had contrived their trip today was the nearest he had come to showing any real sexual enterprise.
Even so, whatever he did today, there was no chance of her saying yes. Not here, not in a field with stubble, flies and searing sun. She wouldn’t take off her clothes and she wouldn’t have sex with them on. How could she explain dirt and grass stains on her clothes or stubble scratches on her back to her partner? Anyway, she had other ways of amusing herself. Although they were evenly matched in most areas, there was one in which she could always outmanoeuvre him. All she had to do was give him the merest sniff of sex. Then, like a puppeteer, she could control him for a while. She could even get him to take off all his clothes in the middle of a field.
