25 comments/ 56283 views/ 22 favorites Two Loves By: Romantic1 Two Loves, One Lover James was my soul mate from birth. We were born in the same hospital, minutes apart, and shared the same newborn quarters, side-by-side. That at least is what my mother has told me. The romantic in me thinks that in those first few days together, we bonded in some mysterious, unknown way. Our parents were best friends, so it was natural that as we grew, we would share time together. My mother to this day tells me that I was a fussy, demanding baby but when I was in James' company, I was different. In some way I found contentment in his company, as he did in mine. The two of us had bonded at birth. And we grew together, joined in some way, with no thought as to our differentiated sex. And he became my best friend as I became his. Our parents told us that when separated, we were both fussy, but when together, we would relax completely, apparently only at peace when with one another. And isn't that that the most wonderful beginning to one's life -- to have found one's soul mate from Day One? And we were never so happy as children as when we were in each other's company. We would play together, laugh together, and just be totally content being together. I know for a fact that my parents were perplexed and frustrated, as were James's parents, by this unbidden connection. Still, I can't remember a single moment when he was not in my life and when I was not bonded to him. In the end, both of our parents just caved to the simple fact that James and I had bonded, and that they separated us at their own peril. I remember in our early school years, that the other boys and girls would tease us unmercifully -- calling us names and telling us how we were boyfriend and girlfriend. They were so cruel. If not for James, I don't think I could have withstood it all. And other boys teased me. They did so, I learned in time, because I was pretty -- not that I could appreciate that. I didn't care that they liked me. I only wanted my James. Even as school-aged kids, we talked and shared with an intimacy our elders might have envied. He knew that I was popular, as he was not. But that didn't matter to me, as I was only dimly aware of my attractiveness. James was, well, James. He was everything to me and I had enough social coin to protect him, and to shield him from those who sought to come between us. I didn't care that he was socially awkward or shy. He was mine. James had always been mine. I was fiercely protective of him and of my relationship with him, even as a school-aged girl. And even then, I was aware of my personal strength. I have often thought that we are formed early. James was made a sweet, sensitive man from birth. I was otherwise. And yet, we were totally bonded. I could not imagine life without him, nor could he without me. Even as school children, I knew that he relied on my strength as I relied on his sensitivity. And of course we grew and developed over the years, yet whatever changes took place in our bodies, our love for one another remained constant. I told James of the changes in my body; my first period and the swelling of my breasts. He teased me about them as they ripened early and fully. I was terribly self-conscious of my oversized endowment. And I was even more uncomfortable with my first period. My mother and I had talked about these changes, but only James seemed to care about me and what was happening to my body. I wanted it all to go away. He might have teased me a bit but I knew that he cared. I told him in detail about the changes in my body -- the filling of my breasts and the hair growing around my secret place. I asked him about what he was experiencing. He told me about the hair around his sex and how his voice was. I was unsettled but very glad that he was my best friend as we shared the intimate details of the transformation of our bodies. And we continued to do so through those difficult, transforming years. I mean, we held back nothing. What would life have been like if I could not talk to my best friend? I ignored all of the other men who came on to me. They disgusted me, frankly. I was not stupid. I knew what they wanted. They wanted to penetrate me. Ugh! I had seen a few pictures of penises and I didn't want one inside of me. I had once asked James to show me his penis, but he blushed and said no, so I just never asked again. I did enjoy it when he kissed me sometimes. It felt good, though somehow lacking. Sometimes, in my quiet moments, I thought about being with a man. You know, I mean, about letting a man have me. And I touched myself. And it did feel good. I thought about my field hockey coach being with me. I felt disgusted when I did, lying in my bed and touching my private parts. How could I feel that way about a middle-aged man who had been nothing but nice to me? And how could I feel that way about another man when I loved James? I was so unsettled! But Mr. Leighton was so charming and attractive, and had gone out of his way to talk to me after each game. I couldn't help but think about him and what it would feel like for him to be between my legs. I came to my senses quickly enough each time I went to this dark place. I needed release from this torment. And so I sought out my best friend, James. I told him of my distress and of my desires. Forget the niceties, I needed him in the way a man and a woman want each other. I called him, seeking what I had always sought in him -- a comforting, reliable presence. Buy, oh god, I wanted more from him. James had always been there for me, so I had no doubt he would be there for me now. But it was not to be. James was shy in that way, though sweet and caring about me on a deeper level, so I was content with occasional kisses and holding each other when we had the chance. I was never so content as when I was with him and I knew he felt the same way. We would spend all of our free time together, just hanging out and talking. I remember that he asked me out to our high school prom and feeling giddy with delight at the thought of an evening with him. I loved him so much and wanted to make the night special. I wanted to look beautiful for James and, I suppose, I wanted to show the other boys in school that I was not some weird, different girl for being so devoted to him. He was sweet and the other boys made life so difficult for him. I hated them. I was very protective of James and didn't care a whit that I was popular and he was not. More than once I had snapped at a boy for being mean to him. I knew in some way that I had the social and personal power to get away with almost anything. Over time, everyone of any social significance in my school learned to respect my love for him. And I learned that my intelligence and physical beauty gave me social power. And while I enjoyed that, I always used my social cache as I could to shield and protect James from anyone who sought to do him harm. I honestly didn't have a single date in high school. It wasn't that boys didn't like me. They did. I mean, I had realized over time that I was pretty. Well, I knew I was more than pretty. My body had filled out more than I could have ever expected. Though I never was entirely comfortable with the changes in my body, I was in a quiet, personal way pleased with the transformation. I thought at one point that my breasts would never stop growing and more than once I stood in the mirror, looking at myself, and thought I looked like a fat cow! Even James would tease me about my swelling endowment and once I just cried, wishing I would stop growing as a woman. He was so sweet when I did so, holding me and comforting me in my distress. And, in time, my breasts did stop growing, thankfully. That didn't stop the boys at school from staring at them though. I had enough going for me socially to handle their stares and occasional taunts. And, as ever, I kept my precious James close to me, not caring a bit that others found my love for him to be strange. I don't know if he would have survived high school without my support. He was so delicate. And our love was deep and genuine. I think some of the people who made life difficult for us were envious of our love and connection for one another. The night of the prom, I felt incredibly special and lovely. My mother and I had worked so long to make sure that I felt lovely and confident. I no longer felt self conscious about the fullness of my body. My breasts strained against the tightness of the dress I had chosen. There was no way to hide my shape and frankly, I didn't want to any more. James was so gallant at the prom and he was quite handsome in his tux. I was proud to be his partner! We danced and danced and all eyes were on us. James was protective of me and for that I was glad. I was only too aware of the eyes of the other boys on me and though I was secretly glad to feel their attraction, I was repulsed that they whispered about me. I knew what they wanted and determined never, ever to yield to their lust -- or that of any man. I only wanted my James. High school gave way to college. The passage of time is inexorable. James got a full-ride to MIT and I was very proud that he did so, especially as his parents were in no position to provide the education that he merited. I was so slouch myself and was admitted to Washington and Lee with substantial scholarship money as well. I had applied to Harvard, hoping I suppose to be geographically closer to James over the next four years, but I had set the bar too high. The separation of those years was difficult for us but we managed. We had summer and our holidays together and somehow found the funds to be together over a few long weekends. I remember well the first time we slept in the same bed. James had a small apartment his junior and senior year. I had flown in for a three-day weekend. We had such a good time on our first day together, just walking around Cambridge, having coffee, and holding hands. We talked non-stop as we always did. I was keyed up though a bit anxious about spending the night at his place. I had made up my mind to allow James to have sex with me if he wanted to. That thought was never out of my mind all day Saturday. We hung out at his place Saturday evening, just snacking and watching TV. We snuggled a bit in his oversize chair and the warmth of his body felt nice. I decided to shower, as I wanted to freshen up. James must have wondered what I was doing as I took my time primping. I toweled down and as I did so I glanced sideways at my naked body in the full-length mirror on the bathroom door. I had always been shy about my body but now I wanted to see what I was about to offer to James. I was fascinated as I truly looked at my body for the first time in my life, assessing what I saw in an almost detached manner. My breasts were quite pronounced. It's no wonder boys had always noticed them. They were hard not to notice but they were high and firm and glistening with beads of water. I for once thought them attractive. My nipples were a dark brown and just the right size. I lightly touched them. They were always erect and I had to always be careful with my choice of a bra, lest my 'headlights' show through. My hands traced the curves of my torso and I was pleased that my waist was so trim and my hips, while womanly, were proportional for my slender frame. It was the simple truth that I had a slender, athletic build. While I might have wished for C cup breasts instead of the D cup boobs I had been saddled with, I determined that I should love my body and be satisfied that I had been blessed with a figure that men found so attractive. I had researched breast reduction surgery back in high school and knew that would never be an option. It was better to accept and love the body that had been given to me. Really, every other feature was pleasing to my eye. My legs were slender and I knew my calves were just flat out perfect. Short skirts loved me and I was learning how to wear them to draw attention to my legs and away from my breasts. Though gifted with a full head of luxuriant, thick brunette hair, my pubic hair was thankfully neither long nor thick. As I touched my private place softly I did wish that I had trimmed or shaved it as some of my female friends had done. Would James think my pubic hair gross? Oh god, I hoped not. Maybe he wouldn't notice and would just thrust inside of me. I was confident that his penis would have no difficulty entering my vagina. My sex was always wet the few times that I touched it and I knew that this would provide the needed lubrication for him to penetrate me. I shuddered at the thought that James would do just that tonight. I would have to deal with the birth control issue when I returned to Lexington, but for this weekend I knew my cycle and that the risk was small. "Hey, Claire, what's taking you so long in there!" I snapped back to reality in an instant and answered playfully that I was trying to look gorgeous. I hurried through my girly preparations but not before stealing one last, sideways glance in the mirror, turning slightly to view my ass. Okay, now any woman would kill to have my ass and I felt terribly pleased with myself. My butt was super firm, high, rounded, and just perfect. With that thought, I pulled on a t-shirt and tugged my thong panties on. I looked into the mirror, smiled and was ready and confident to offer myself to the man that I loved. James had changed into a t-shirt and boxers and had already slipped into bed. I wondered what his body would be like. He was so handsome and slender, with ethereal, almost child like features. I adored the fact that he wasn't all bulked up like so many other men. His waif-like features suited his sensitive nature perfectly. As I slipped into bed next to him I had a random thought wondering what his penis would look like. I would find out soon enough. James had never been overly affectionate with me; you know, kissing me and all of that. As I lay on my side next to him, I felt his breath on my neck and was warmed. I took his arm and drew it across my waist; and waited and waited. And then I could wait no more. I rolled to my other side and wrapped my arms around him and kissed him. He tensed and then I moved to kiss him again and he pulled away and sat up. "What's wrong?" I sobbed, and looked at him with distress. "I thought you loved me." I was devastated. All I could think was that I was not desirable. The thought that James did not find me sexually attractive was awful. And then he looked at me and I saw the shame in his eyes. "I love you, Claire. I love you so much. It's not you. It's me, I guess." His eyes were downcast and I forgot all thought of my pangs of rejection and wanted only to comfort him. But I didn't understand. "I've always dreaded this moment. I...I...I'm so sorry," and he began to sob. I took him into my arms and held him. My only thought was to protect and comfort him. I knew better than to ask him what he was feeling. I wasn't so much disappointed as confused, but I felt deep pangs of self-doubt, wondering that maybe I just did not excite him. Even as I offered him tenderness, I felt awful, just awful. "I don't turn you on, do I? Is that it?" My doubts were now fully exposed. He sat up, his tears now dried, and looked right at me. "It's not that, Claire. You're so beautiful. You're precious to me. God, I love you so much. It's just that, I don't know, it's just that sex and that stuff doesn't interest me; not at all. It never has. I saw my parents have sex one time and I was disgusted. I don't know how to explain it." It was funny but I almost felt the same way. "I understand. I sort of feel the same way," I said truthfully. "Just the thought of a man all sweaty and thrusting in me is kind of gross." He smiled at me. "But I did want you inside of me. You're the only man I would ever want to be with." I started to tear up. "Do you really think that I'm beautiful?" "Yes, I do, on the inside and the outside. You are the only woman I will ever love, Claire." And I melted with love for him. I kissed him gently on the mouth. And he didn't flinch. "Do you want to see me naked?" I so desperately wanted him to accept and validate my flagging self-esteem. "No. I really don't. You're too precious to me for that. I couldn't handle seeing you naked. Please don't go there. Please." And again he teared up. And I knew for a certainty that it wasn't me. This was all about James and though I didn't understand why, I knew that I would never doubt my attractiveness again. But I had to know something. "Are you attracted to me? I mean, you know, it's okay if you do." "No!" he answered sharply. "How could you even think that?" "I just wanted to know! I need to know everything about you. Don't be mad at me!" For the first time I, was angry with him. And I was still so confused. And then he smiled that special, knowing smile of his and looked at me with love. "I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I can't imagine a life without you." "I feel the same way." And I meant it. I did not want this bump in the road to keep me from having James forever. "You can, you know, date other men. You're not me and I know that you have needs that I can't meet. Just don't ever leave me. Please." "I don't want any other man. I just want you." He turned his eyes away and looked sad. "You will, you know. And I'll be okay with that." And then he brightened. "We'll figure this all out. We love each other." "Okay," I answered, wondering what our future together might be now. And I wondered how I could ever be with a man in the way he was suggesting. That was all for another time. And then we just slept in each other's arms. And I never felt so much as a twitch from his loins that night or any other night that we spent together. We graduated within a week of each other and made plans to return home together as we had both landed good jobs in our hometown. It was so much fun to plan and make happen our own place together. Our parents were supportive, knowing how much we loved each other and that we were so happy together. I'm sure they thought we were having sex, as did our friends, but I didn't care what they thought. I just was overjoyed that James and I were to have a life with each other. Each day was a treasure as we now could now be together every day. We had a big, beautiful king-sized bed. James took the left side and I took the right. He was very, very private about his body and went to some lengths to never allow me to see him naked. But I did once when he didn't close the bathroom door. His body was frail, slender to the point of being anorexic. And I had a fleeting glimpse of his sex. Well, all I saw really was a huge tuft of pubic hair. His penis was not visible. I don't know if he was just small or if all of that dark brown pubic hair covered it up. I had never seen any man's sex, so maybe what I saw was just the way it was. I did wonder though. James broached the subject of my 'dating' more than a few times that first year that we lived together. I always brushed it off, telling him that, yes, men were asking me out but I always told them that I was living with someone, which usually squelched their interest; all except Patrick, a salesman on my team at work. He was persistent in asking me out. And he was very handsome and attentive. But I always put him off, telling him as I had told other suitors that I was living with James. It didn't seem to bother him at all and while I did his enjoy his attentions, I knew from his eyes that he simply wanted my body. I told all of this of course to James. He encouraged me to go out with Patrick and finally I relented. And I have to say that I enjoyed our first date, though I knew that sometimes he was talking to my breasts and not to me. And I let him kiss me the second time I went out with him. His breath was sweet and I suppose I did kiss him back. I had made a close friendship with Linda, another member of the sales team, and we talked about everything, including James and Patrick. I couldn't help but open up to her. She was so confident and outgoing and though twenty years older than me, she became the female friend I had never had. In time, she learned everything about me and my situation with James. I learned from her that Patrick had a reputation as a ladies man; a man who seduced women. Knowing that, I refused his repeated requests for a third date, not wanting to go where he wanted to go. Eventually he gave up, and I had to admit that I was almost sorry that he did. I had enjoyed our kiss but I knew that a few more kisses like that would lead me to a place I could not imagine going to. James encouraged me to see him again, but I could not and would not. I felt I was violating my love for him just going out with another man in the first place. Two Loves, One Lover Linda became a close friend and confidant. I admired her so much. She was processing a troubled second marriage with her husband Frank, who could not make up his mind to stay committed to her. She loved him but would not allow him to dictate the terms of their relationship. I learned that she had slept with Patrick a few times. I was aghast at first, but she laughed off my naiveté and told me that she never saw him as anything other than a boy toy, to be used and discarded -- and advised me to treat him as such. It was then, as we talked about her fling, that I confessed that despite living with James, I was quite virginal. "What? You don't have sex with James?" "No. That's not how we are!" I felt defensive, both for James and for me. "Well, how is that working for you," she laughed. "It works fine!" I was now angry. "Oh, don't get all defensive about it. I just don't understand. I mean, you've gone out with Patrick twice. What are you thinking? What is it that you want?" Linda was pressing me but she wasn't saying anything that I hadn't thought about. "I don't know. I just don't know. James says it's okay for me to go out but I can't imagine having sex with some man. It would just be like violating my love for him. I'm confused." And so we talked. We sat over coffee that afternoon and we just talked and I was relieved to be able to share my feelings with someone. And Linda really wasn't judgmental. So I told her everything. "Well," she said in summary, "if you ever want children -- and a real husband, you'd best consider your options." "I've thought about that." And it was true, I had thought about my future. I did want children and knew that James could not -- would not -- provide me with what every woman wanted. And Linda was so sweet and understanding. "You need to talk with James about all of this." I raised my eyes and again was defensive. "No, you really need to talk to him about your needs." Linda was right. She was so smart about men and relationships. I relied on her now, more than ever. That evening I did talk with James. And he was wonderful, loving and caring as he always was. He told me that I needed to blossom as a woman. If I felt the need for a physical lover, he would be okay with that. I said nothing in reply but embraced his love for me and told myself to just follow my instincts. Linda and I talked several times after James had made clear his acceptance and love for me. She understood that while attracted to Patrick, I could never be with a man who was so obviously cavalier with his sex. He had slept with many women and I didn't intend to be just another of his conquests. But I knew that I was ready to experience the physical act of love. Likely, the next man who presented himself to me would have me. But who would that be? I wondered. Linda was still dealing with Frank and his issues, but ever the confident, determined woman, she had found another lover online. His name was Don, and he was an MD, an OB/GYN, recently separated and had just turned fifty. Linda told me that his ex was a real bitch and making his life terribly difficult, but Don was determined to live life on his own terms after many years of marriage. Linda delighted in his attentions, though making him jump through some hoops before sleeping with him. She knew men so well. I envied her. Don had made plans for a romantic Valentine's Day getaway in the hill country, to which Linda readily agreed. She said that he had been the perfect gentleman, attentive and affectionate on their first day together at the resort. She had kept his physical demands at arm's length until that first night, when, as they rode together in the elevator to their room, she had yielded to him. She knew what he wanted and gave in completely to him when they were together in their suite. She told me that he had mounted her repeatedly that night. He was a vigorous lover and took her three times before the next morning. "I don't think he has ever had it so good," she chuckled as we talked over coffee after work. "I know his wife never gave him what I did! That's for sure!" Linda laughed and I admired her for her confident sexuality. "What do you mean?" I asked naively. She laughed that easy, familiar, Linda laugh. "Well, I went down on him, which I don't think she ever did. And let me tell you, he was huge; the biggest I've ever had, that's for sure!" "You mean, his penis was large?" Linda laughed again. "Yeah, you could say that! He had to be pretty careful with me. I wasn't used to a man that big, after my years being married to Frank. Anyway, it all was good. He's an incredible lover. If I wasn't so in love with my loser of a husband, I'd snap him up in an instant." She saw that I was looking at her with deer-in-the-headlights amazement. "Oh, stop! It was nice but it was just sex!" She giggled and instantly I felt relaxed. Linda always knew how to taking me out of my usual intensity. I wished that I could be more like her, so carefree and relaxed. "Aren't you worried about getting pregnant?" Linda laughed that throaty laugh of hers. "Not likely! I've had a hysterectomy. And it's a damn good thing that I had one! He came inside of me like no one's business! The poor guy hadn't had any in months! Not that he asked or cared! He was just horny." The reality that Linda had so casually mated with Don, as she had done with Patrick, hit me fully. I wished that I could be like her, just having sex and enjoying it for its own sake. But I knew that I couldn't and I felt sad in a way. Linda continued to regale me with stories of Don's frequent visits to her bed as well as detailing her deeper desire to make her relationship with her husband work. Once, I came to her house after work one evening. Don had just been with her and when she told me about him having her, I just couldn't stand it any more. "May I look?" I asked shyly. "Look at what?" she answered. "You know, look at your sex. I've wondered what a woman would look like after a man has had her." I felt disgusted, asking her this. "Oh, what am I saying? Forget it." Linda smiled at me. "No, that's okay. Here, look." She raised her skirt without any shame and I saw her sex. She was shaven and her sex was brazenly visible. And I saw traces of Don's semen on and around her thighs. I was mesmerized by her casual display and captivated completely. I saw for the first time in my life, another person's sex. Without asking, I touched her private parts. She was wet -- very wet. And I wondered if that was her liquid or his. And I knew instantly that it was both, some mixture of his semen and her juices. I was enthralled. Don's penis had just an hour ago been in the place I was now touching. And he had left his liquid mark on her. This is what it meant to be truly a woman, to receive a man's seed. And I knew that I wanted that. Linda sought to touch me as I explored her sex, but I recoiled as she wanted to touch my breasts. I don't know why I did so, but it just didn't seem right, and she accepted my decision without question. Still, I continued to touch her and examine her sex, wondering with some awe at how she had received him so willingly. And I did caress her breasts, knowing and being excited that Don had enjoyed them as well. I wanted to know the pleasure that she had just experienced. I wanted that so much. And over time, Linda shared with me the explicit details of her lovemaking with Don, always allowing me to touch her, and never alluding to my reluctance to being touched in return, though I knew she wanted to do so. Don serviced her five times over those weeks; once having her twice over the course of one evening. I couldn't even imagine, but I listened with rapt admiration at their physical wanting of one another. And I wanted and wished for a man to desire me as Don desired Linda. I kept count -- it's my nature -- and knew that he had ejaculated eight times inside of her over the course of the five times they had been together. She did this even while hoping that her husband would return to her. And I thought about what he would find if she did -- that another man had bedded her. To Linda, this was no big deal, but I was fascinated, though a bit repelled, wondering the pleasures she had experienced. And in time Linda did reconcile with Frank. And she was so happy and I was happy for her! It didn't seem to faze her in the least that she had slept with two other men in the interim. Did Frank know, I wondered? Linda told me that it was none of his business. I didn't completely understand but I did so admire her ability to have such absolute charge of her life. Anyway, she dealt with all of these issues and Frank was glad to be back with her. And I had learned over time to graciously, but firmly resist her advances to me. I hoped that her husband could satisfy whatever she wanted physically from me. I never knew quite what to do when she tried to touch me in that way. Patrick eventually gave up trying to see me again. I can't say that I was disappointed, as I knew what he wanted, but still, I had enjoyed our one kiss. But I couldn't imagine being with him sexually. I mean, he had been with Linda in that way and I couldn't imagine allowing him to do the same thing to me. So, James and I just stayed together over the next few months. I was vaguely unsettled but never let him know it. Linda had found peace with Frank, but still would on occasion tease me with tidbits about her liaisons with Don. And I have to admit, I enjoyed her tales of what I considered to be her depravity. Don had been with her, or rather been inside of her, almost a dozen times. I wondered if she tired of me asking about all of this, but she always complied willingly to my requests, telling me how Don had been with her and had pleasured her. While I didn't really appreciate it at the time, Linda always told me about Don's generous endowment. I wondered about that. I knew that there some men were large, but I had never seen a man naked -- except that one time with James -- so I tucked that away in a private place. Linda and I talked constantly. Her open, caring spirit always delighted me and we were the very best of friends. One Saturday I didn't hear from her and I was a bit worried, as I knew that Frank had once more moved out the week before. I just hated the way he treated her. I called several times and left a message but when she didn't return my call, I was concerned. James was away that weekend visiting his parents and I didn't really have anything to do, so I just got in my car and drove the ten minutes to her house. I was just getting out of my car when my phone rang and it was Linda. She apologized for not calling me back earlier and told me that she had spent the day with Don, of all people! And here I thought he was out of the picture! I told her that I had just pulled up to her house and she laughed and said that my timing was great, as she had just returned home. She opened the front door before I could even knock. She was wearing an oversize bathrobe, which I thought was funny, but we hugged and kissed one another on the cheek. She had a drink in her hand and offered to make one for me, so I said okay. I was dying to know about what was going on with Frank and Don and listened intently as she told me. She shrugged off the difficulties with Frank, telling me that if he came back, there would have to be some changes. She was almost indifferent to her marital woes, which should have surprised me, but it didn't. Linda was too confident and spirited to let a man get her down. Maybe that's why I loved and admired her so much. She had spent the day -- and the night before -- with Don. Linda loved sex and I knew that Don was very good at it. As we talked the oversize terrycloth robe she wore opened a bit as she shifted on the couch. Linda has beautiful legs and I saw them fully exposed right up to her sex. I blushed at seeing her pussy but Linda just laughed and put me at my ease, pulling open the robe completely. "Not bad for 45!" she laughed. I smiled and had to agree. Hers was the body of a real woman. She had borne two children and though her breasts sagged just a bit, they were full and lovely. She patted the seat next to her and told me sit beside her. I couldn't take my eyes off of her body. As I moved next to her she said nothing but lounged back and her hand took mine, inviting me touch her. And I did and I was thrilled to once more have access to her body. Linda gently guided my hand as I explored her lovely curves. I was emboldened to caress her breasts, admiring their size and softness. And then I felt her hand move mine to her sex. Linda has a florid complexion and her pussy was set off by a small patch of wiry, red pubic hair. As I touched and caressed her vulva, I was aware that her pussy seemed swollen. I thought that perhaps that was the way her sex was. But then as I cautiously probed her opening with my index finger, I felt how wet she was. Fascinated, I then used two fingers to explore more deeply and as I did, I felt a glob of something slimy coat my fingers when I was a few inches deep. And I knew right away that I was feeling Don's ejaculate coating my fingers. Linda was moaning with pleasure. I shouldn't have continued but I had the strongest urge to taste his male essence. I brought my fingers to my mouth and softly coated my lips with Don's leavings. The taste itself was somewhat bitter but not altogether unpleasant. Seeing this Linda moved to kiss me. I almost pulled away but she was not going to be denied. And her kiss was deep and passionate and I responded, my hand returning now to more vigorously massage her pussy. I scooped another glob of semen from her vagina and this time brought it to her lips. Linda moaned with pleasure and took my fingers into her mouth, greedily taking the liquid I offered. Then, as I returned to ministering to her sex, her moans became deeper and throatier. My hands were a blur now, as I wanted Linda to have an orgasm. And as she climaxed, I felt, I mean I literally felt, her pussy contract and throb. It was very intense. Linda lay sprawled on the couch, her face flush from her orgasm. She smiled that Linda smile at me and as she caught her breath, she held my hand. "Wow! That was amazing, Claire. Thank you so much!" I blushed and told her that she was welcome. "Do you want me to get you off now?" Oh, god, no, I thought. I rarely touched myself in that way and even though I loved Linda, I would be too ashamed to let her do that to me. "No, that's okay. I wouldn't be comfortable with that." I tried to put on a smiling face as I declined her request. "Well, you are just so beautiful, but you're not a schoolgirl anymore, Claire. If you don't mind me saying so, you are missing out on one of life's greatest pleasures." She laughed, "Oh, I don't mean what we just did. That was just fun. I mean are you going to go through your entire life in a sexless relationship?" I knew that she had found the mark with that question, as it was one I had been asking myself. "I do want to be with a man one day. I'm sure that James will support me in that too. He's sort of indicated that he would be okay with me taking a lover, so long as it didn't damage our love for one another. But I could never allow a man like Patrick to be with me." Linda laughed, "He'd use you a few times and then dump you, that's for sure. Just go with your instincts. Is there any man you think about being with?" I was always truthful with Linda. "Yes. I've thought about Don. And I don't even know what he looks like or the type of man he is, other than he is your lover sometimes. Please don't be upset that I imagine being with him. I don't know why I think about him that way. He's yours." Linda patted my hand, "Oh, sweetie, he's nothing of the kind. Don's a very nice man; really. He's over-worked and trying to finish up his divorce. Yes, we have sex sometimes, but he knows that it is just a physical thing for me, as it is for him. He's grateful to have me that way, as otherwise he would have to start dating again, which he won't do until his divorce is final. We're good friends who just fuck occasionally. He knows that I love Frank and has been so supportive throughout my drama with him." "Oh, I see. Well, I don't know how these things work. Sometimes I wish I could be like you and just enjoy life instead of just thinking about it." Linda hugged me with real affection. "May I tell you something?" "Sure, honey, you can tell me anything." "It excited me when my fingers were inside of you and I felt him there. And then, I don't know why, but I wanted to taste him -- and you." Linda seemed pleased to hear this. "Claire. Do something for me and for yourself. Stand up and let me see you naked." "No! I can't do that!" "Why?" "I don't know. No one has ever seen me naked." "Then it's time that someone who loves you does. It'll be fine. Trust me. I won't touch you. I promise." And then I felt a surge of excitement. I wanted Linda to see me naked. So I stood up and fumbled at my clothes, first removing my top and then my shorts. I hesitated for a few seconds as I undid my bra, covering my breasts with one arm while I tugged off my thong. My hand strove to cover my sex and I looked at Linda for comfort. She said nothing but beamed with real delight. And so, I dropped my arms and stood there naked before her. "My god," she said softly, "I knew you had a lovely body, but, Claire, you are exquisite. Playboy models don't look as good as you do. You shouldn't feel ashamed of your body." My breasts were gently swaying with each deep breath. I didn't know what to say. I was aware that my pussy was now very wet. It was the most erotic moment I could have ever imagined. "Tell me what you're thinking right now." Linda made no move to approach me and I relaxed. "I'm thinking...oh, I don't know what I'm thinking.!" She said nothing but nodded her head, encouraging me. "I'm thinking it excites me that you are looking at me. I gulped, "I'm thinking that being so wet, Don could penetrate me easily with his penis." I shuddered saying this, but it was the truth. "Would you like to be with Don? You can, you know." "Really? But how? I don't understand." "Don will be my gift to you, Claire. You do want this. And I can and will arrange it." She smiled sweetly and I knew that she loved me, offering this to me. "I promise that you will enjoy being with him. Don is a tender, caring man, and an amazing lover." Then she laughed, "But he's going to have to be careful with you with that big dick of his! He gets a bit too excited sometimes." I gave a start. "Oh, not to worry, he'll be wonderful to you. Here, come sit next to me." I was glad to be able to sit and as I did so, my arms sought to cover my nakedness. "Are you on birth control?" "No." "Well, that is job one. I'll make an appointment for you with my OB/GYN, one of Don's partners, on Monday. Don has made noise about getting snipped, but he's still shooting live rounds." Linda giggled and I did too. This was all so exciting. "Oh, one other thing. I think you should have your pussy trimmed, waxed perhaps." Oh god, was my sex so unattractive as all that? "Oh, it's no big deal, it's just the way women do things nowadays. My esthetician will see to that. "Linda..." "Yes, sweetie." "Will you be with him too?" "No. I can't give you this gift and still keep it for myself." "I see. Well, I don't think it would bother me if you were with him." Linda smiled. "We'll figure that out, sweetie." "Will he call me? Should I call him?" "I don't think a phone conversation is what's needed here. When you're ready, you can meet him for dinner or maybe drinks. Okay?" "Okay. I want you to be there with me when I do." Linda laughed. "Oh, god no, I'd just be a third wheel. You two need to see to your own chemistry." Two Loves, One Lover I bit my tongue. "No, I mean it. I won't do it if you're not there with me. I want to feel your love and support." "We'll see. I'll do as you want. I want this to be special. Now, you need to run along home. You have some talking to do with James." And she leaned over and kissed me softly, flush on my mouth. I kissed her back and again I was aware of my wetness. I put my clothes back on and with a peck on her cheek, I drove home, though how I managed not to have an accident with the thoughts swirling in my head, I'll never know. James greeted me with a hug and asked how things had gone with Linda. I didn't' know where to begin. But I just told him everything. He listened in stunned silence. "You did that with Linda?" "Yes." "And you enjoyed it?" He looked so serious. I was kicking myself for telling him. "Well, not at first. But I did enjoy it." "And you were naked in front of her?" "Yes." "Claire, I don't know what to say except that I love you. And I will support you in whatever you decide to do." I melted and sought his arms. He held me tenderly. "And I know it is time for you to experience what it is like to be a woman." "I wish it could be you, James." He stiffened. "Oh, god, I'm sorry. I don't know what made me say that! Please forgive me!" I looked to him for understanding. "Claire, we can never be me like that. And I love you for never once making me feel bad about it. But you have to promise me something." "Yes, anything." "You'll never leave me for another man." And I looked at him with conviction and said, "I never, ever will leave you, ever. You're my soul mate." I buried my head into his arms. "I will be with you forever." "Then it will all be fine. You and Linda just go about seeing to all of this. I don't need to know the details. Do that for me." "I promise," I said sniffling. And though James enfolded me in his arms I thought that soon I would be in Don's arms. And a thrill went through my body. James didn't so much as mention my situation over that next month. And neither did I. When I needed to talk with Linda, I went into another room. It was all moving so fast. After talking with the OB/GYN and Linda, I opted for an IUD for my birth control. I feared taking the pill or having a birth control shot, not wanting unknown hormones messing up my body. That all was unsettling, as was the procedure with the esthetician. It hurt a bit, having that hot wax on my sex, but I had to admit the results were worth it. She left a short landing strip of hair above my pussy, which was perfectly smooth. I felt like such a silly the following week, always looking at my pussy in the mirror and touching myself constantly. I don't know what Linda said to Don, but I gathered it took some convincing on her part to get him to agree to our plan. She asked me to e-mail her a photo of myself for her to pass along to him. I sent several, the best one being the shot of me wearing a flirty, short black dress. I guess that did the trick. Linda told me that Don went from being wary to being very, very excited. I wanted to know everything that they talked about and she gladly told me all. I was so pleased that he too thought it a good idea if Linda joined us for drinks as a first meeting plan. I asked her if I should sleep with him the same night. She laughed and told me that was up to the two of us. Truthfully, I had determined to do just that, not wanting to have to wait for a second meeting. We made the date for the following Saturday afternoon at a nice, upscale hotel. Linda told me that Don had booked a suite just in case. It was all terribly exciting, though I was a mess of nerves that week. It occurred to me that if I did sleep with him, it would almost certainly be more than once and that it would be bad formnot to spend the night with him. I told James I would probably not be home until sometime Sunday. He took it in stride. The only thing out of the ordinary was that he sat with me as I put on my makeup, though he left the room when I told him I needed to dress. I felt a longing on his part, a wanting to be near me. If he had told me not to go however, I don't think I would have done so. I was past that point. If I backed out now, I might never work up the courage to do this ever again. With a quick peck on his cheek, I headed out the door without so much as a backwards glance. I told myself on the drive to the hotel not to be nervous. I knew that I looked, well, hot I suppose. I had chosen a tight fitting, beige dress, short but too short. I had daringly opted to go without a bra and was very aware that my nipples were making a statement. I had given a thought to going without panties, but I feared Don would think that sluttish, so I wore a simple white thong. My legs were silky smooth as I had visited the esthetician that morning to have them waxed. I smiled a secret, knowing smile with the confidence of a woman who knows she is desirable. Linda and Don were already at a corner booth in the hotel bar as I made my entrance. Don's eyes lit up, but it was Linda who spoke first. "Oh, my, aren't you a vision!" I glowed with appreciation and gave her a quick peck on the cheek. "Claire, this is my friend, Don." Don arose and lightly squeezed my hands and then he too gave me a friendly kiss on the cheek. "Linda told me how beautiful you were, but you really are a vision, Claire." "Thank you," I said knowing I was blushing. "It's very nice to meet you." I felt awkward, not knowing what else to say or do, but again Linda came to my rescue. "Here, sit between us," she said and slid out of the booth. I took a seat between them and I felt warmth from both of their bodies. Don smelled so nice. And he really did put me at my ease, ordering me a glass of wine as we chatted. He was very handsome, in a rugged sort of way, with a large build but you could tell there wasn't an ounce of fat on him. I liked him immediately and felt my desire building. It always takes me a while to get past my shyness with strangers and despite my sense of anticipation, it was no different with Don. Linda kept the conversation going at first but then I found genuine enjoyment just talking with him. I felt his hand rest on my thigh but it took a few moments to accept that his touching me was okay under the circumstances. I shifted ever so slightly towards him. His touch turned to a gentle caress but never did I feel that he was groping or mauling me. It just felt good. After about 15 minutes, Linda said that she had to go. With a kiss and wink to me, she slid out of the booth. Don hugged her and she kissed him and whispered something to him. Don just smiled at her and then kissed her again and then she left. And it was just the two of us. When Don resumed his seat, he told me how wonderful Linda was. "Yes, she is very special. I love her so much." "And she loves you two. She told me to take very good care of you. And I will." With that he leaned in to kiss me. The touch of his lips was light but nice. I think I kissed him back, but I'm not really sure. Anyway, the ice had been broken. He gently held my face in his hands, and looked at me with both tenderness and desire. "I want you, Claire. You are so incredibly beautiful." And I just looked at him and knew it was time to let him know I felt the same way. "Thank you. I wanted to look nice for you." "Nice?" he said with a laugh. "You're incredibly hot, Claire." I looked at him with a wondering glance. "I really did want to impress you." And I meant that. "Isn't it strange that we just met and we might have sex tonight? You do know that I have never been with a man, don't you." "Linda told me. I'll be good to you, Claire. I promise. Do you find me attractive?" I blushed. My eyes were downcast when I replied, "Yes. It's just all a bit strange. I mean, Linda set all of this up and you've been with her." "I hope that doesn't bother you." His voice was soothing. "No, that's okay. Linda said you would be good to me." I looked up at him. "It does excite me to be alone with you now, knowing that you will be inside of me soon." "Do you want that?" I hesitated. "Yes, I do. I hope that I please you. But I don't know how to please a man." "We'll pleasure each other. Let me show you how." "Take me the room now. I want to be with you." And he kissed me again and this time I kissed him back. Our lips were fully joined, hungrily wanting each other. Don threw a few bills on the table and gallantly offered his hand as I slid out of the booth. He put his arm around me as we walked to the elevator, oblivious to everything but the two of us. The elevator opened and thankfully no one else got on. As soon as the door closed, Don took me into his arms and I melted as he kissed me deeply. His hand pulled my ass to him and my body pressed into his. I was mad with desire. I felt his erection press into me and the effect was electric. I went limp in his arms as he lightly touched and then squeezed my breast. I was dizzy as the door opened. Again, thankfully, no one else was around. Don had to adjust his trousers as his erect penis was tenting. I giggled and lightly touched his groin, my hand finding his cock now hard against his thigh. I felt light-headed knowing that soon his penis would be inside of my vagina and I would know at last the mysterious pleasures of being woman. Don unlocked the door to the suite and we walked hand-in-hand inside. I gasped with delight. The suite was incredible and when I saw that he had seen to flowers, I just turned to him and told him that he was amazing. And he was all of that and more. That special touch was so appreciated, adding romance to what might otherwise have just been sex. I think that I felt some love for him, but there were so many emotions surging in me, that I could not be certain. Don poured us each a glass of delicious Cabernet and we clinked glasses and toasted the night. I wanted to just jump into his arms but thankfully Don saved me from such a brazen act. He took me against him and again we kissed deeply. He felt and smelled so good. I felt tiny but safe as he brought me to his body. Again his cock had risen and I longed for him to release it, but I thought he would think me sluttish if I undressed him. He had no compunctions about undressing me however. In one motion he pulled my dress over my head and I was before him, my breasts now bared. He whistled softly and his mouth went to my left nipple as his hands cupped and tested the feel of my breasts. Then, I felt him caress my ass and then, he touched my sex. I surged with desire and let out an animal moan of pleasure. As my body went electric with desire, I felt him tug off my panties. I bent over and with a final tug, I removed them, tossed back my head and came to him again. Don began to unbutton his shirt, but I boldly stopped him and completed the task. His chest was gorgeous, lightly haired and manly. My hands ran over his chest and then, without him bidding me to do so, I went to my knees. I fumbled to remove his belt and unzip his pants. As I pulled them down I saw for the first time in my life, a man's penis. And, oh my god, it was so big and it just popped free from the restraining fabric of his trousers, pointing almost vertical. It was beautiful but somewhat menacing and I withdrew a few inches. His cock was thick and crisscrossed with veins, which I knew were feeding blood into the tissue of his manhood. His balls were large, not that I really had any idea what a man's testes should look like. And I quickly got over my fear and touched his cock and lightly held and gently squeezed his sac. I was fascinated as well as turned on. So this is what Linda had experienced, I thought. And that turned me on somehow. And then I knew what to do, and what I wanted to do. I began to fellate Don and he responded. His cock throbbed in my mouth as his hand gently guided my head forward. I could not take him all into my mouth and at one point gagged. I looked up at him and he said he was sorry. I smiled, telling him that I wasn't. Then I stood back as he shed his trousers, shoes, and socks. We were now both naked. And then we just picked me up as if I were a feather and carried me to the bed, which had already been turned down. I buried my head into his massive chest and knew that the world would never be the same after tonight. Don laid me gently on the bed. I couldn't take my eyes off of him and ran my hands along his muscled torso as he carefully but firmly took me once more in his arms. His right leg lay between mine and I felt his cock press into the flesh of my thigh. His hand sought out my sex, gently massaging while testing my readiness. And I knew that my body was ready for him, or as ready as it would ever be. The wetness of my pussy was obvious as he probed a finger inside of me, and I gave a start, feeling some resistance. And then I knew that he was working gently to complete the tearing of what was left of my maidenhead. I felt some discomfort but that was nothing compared to the pleasure his touch was giving me. He was being firm but still gentle with my virginal body. Everything he did was just right and I responded, parting my legs slightly but unmistakably, giving a clear signal that I was ready to receive his sex. Don's weight was now upon me and even as he took care to brace himself so as not to crush me, his body enveloped me -- and it felt amazing. As he kissed and held me, I felt his huge, erect cock press against my opening, which was open and ready to receive his passion. With gentle pressure I felt the tip of his erection push past the first few centimeters of my vagina. I gave a bit of a start, feeling the pressure. "Are you okay?" he asked. "Yes, I think so." He withdrew slightly and with his hand, moved his cockhead up and down the lips of my exposed pussy, coating his sex with my some of my copious moisture. I moaned with pleasure and then, looking him in the eye with passionate desire, I told him with my look that I was ready to receive him. Don cradled me in his arms and then, in an instant, fed half of his considerable length into me, pushing past the last vestige of my hymen. I was no longer a virgin. His penis was now unmistakably inside of me. And he held it there for the longest time, kissing me and then once more he returned to my breasts. My legs relaxed, as did my entire body. Don buried his head against my shoulder and then he fed his full length into my vagina. And I made an audible gasp and began to tremble. I knew, or thought that I knew, that his cock had hit bottom against my cervix. I experienced a moment of pain, as I felt a deep pressure inside of me. And I remembered Linda describing how big he was. I had nine inches of his manhood inside of me. I was overwhelmed with the totality of what I was experiencing. Don was now very still and once more asked if I was in any discomfort. "It's okay. Oh, god, Don you feel so good; it's all so wonderful. This is what it's all about, isn't it?" "This is the passion of a man for a woman, Claire. Do you have any idea how much you are turning me on?" "Am I? Am I, really?" I feared that I could not give him pleasure as Linda did. "God, you are so tight, so beautiful, and so receptive. Yes, you are giving me so much pleasure." He knew. And I knew in that moment that my body was indeed giving Don what he wanted. "Take me now as you want. Please!" I knew that he must have the friction and pleasure of repeatedly thrusting in and out my vagina. And with slow, measured thrusts, Don fed his erection in and out of me, carefully at first to allow me to accommodate his size, but after a few minutes, his rhythm became more rapid. And, oh my god, it felt so good. Time and again he sheathed and unsheathed his cock in my vagina, pausing only to kiss and caress me, yet still maintaining his demanding tempo. Then, he pulled my legs up and over his shoulders and his tempo quickened. His eyes were glazed with desire and I knew for a certainty that my body was offering him pleasure. I was glad that he was totally in charge and told myself that I had merely to submit to his demands and all would be well. I didn't want him to stop -- ever. I lost all track of time as he continued to plunder my sex. So, this is what is was like to be a woman, I thought; to willing submit to the lust of a man; to spread my legs and offer my sex up completely to his demands. And I so wanted Don to enjoy me however he wanted. I had no sense of all as to how long he would continue but I did know I never wanted him to stop. And then, his rhythm slowed and I felt the muscles of his thighs and ass contract as I held him. He gave several deep thrusts and then I knew he was going to truly make me a woman. "It's too much, baby, too much. I have to cum!" I didn't know what to say or do, so I just urged him on. "Cum inside of me, Don. I want you to." That did it. He cried out and in that instant I felt his cock throb inside of me as I felt his ass tense. I knew that part of pleasuring a man was serving as his receptacle, and so I simply tried to be still as he ejaculated inside of me. I counted one, two, three... maybe six or seven contractions of his body, very aware that each tensing signaled the release of his sperm inside of me. And then I felt a flood of warm wetness flood me as he emptied the potent content of his balls into my vagina. I understood that my only task now was to be still and receive the offering of his seed. And then, it was over, and Don laid on top of me, his body heaving from the release I had provided. And I was thrilled. I knew that my charms had been everything he wanted from a woman. I had excited to have a man to orgasm inside of me. And Don not just any man. He was a man who could have his pick of women, but he now was mine. Don took a minute to recover after his orgasm, and I felt his penis softening inside of me and then made an audible plop as he withdrew from me. I was all sweaty as he was and then I just lay there and just felt this incredible closeness to him. So I moved into his arms and was silent and content just to hold him and to be held. I was now truly a woman and was glad. I carried his essence deep inside of me. "I couldn't hold back, Claire." I didn't understand why he would tell me this. "Why should you hold back?" I kissed him. "Isn't that what you wanted?" I didn't understand why he would apologize. "Do you know how good I feel right now? I feel so close to you." "You were incredible, babe. I mean, I couldn't control myself." "Why would you want to control yourself?" I was perplexed. Don chuckled softly. "Well, I guess I didn't want to. You're the most amazing woman. God, Claire, I was so on fire for you." I sighed with contentment and as I did I was conscious that the liquid he had deposited into my body was coursing out of my pussy and onto the sheets. "Oh, my, what a mess we've made!" I laughed. And it was a something of a mess. I had no idea a man produced that much product. The sheets were soaked. "Goodness, you must be all spent!" I giggled. Don took me into his arms. "I am for now. But I am not done with you." And I was glad. I wanted Don again but had no sense how long it would be before he took me again. I didn't care. I would stay with him until he had no more desire for me. I wanted more of what I had just experienced. Don was dozing in total oblivion next to me. I carefully broke our embrace, so as not to wake him, as I wanted to examine his sex. He was so beautiful; so masculine. His body was so unlike James', more akin to a bull than a man. His penis now lay flaccid against his thigh, though somehow still menacing, even relaxed and spent. I was fascinated. I gently touched and caressed Don's sex, in naïve wonderment at his virility. What woman would not want to offer herself to such a man, I thought idly. He was magnificent. And he was almost thirty years older than me, yet he possessed such animal passion. I was like a little girl in awe of an older, intensely masculine man. I kissed his sex and he stirred slightly. And then my phone beeped at me. Two Loves, One Lover It was Linda. She had waited to text me but I was glad to receive her message. "Well?" was all that she sent. "We did it," I replied. "How was it?" My fingers punched out my answer. "Totally amazing. Thank you. I had no idea." And then she called me. Not wanting to wake Don, I took the call in the bathroom. "So, tell me!" "You were right, Linda. Oh my god, Don was incredible. He was sweet and gentle but finally he just, I don't know, fucked me." Linda laughed out loud. "I am so happy for you." "He's sleeping now." "He'll be awake soon and will want some more. He always did that with me." "I hope so," I chirped. "Oh, god, Linda, I don't know how to thank you. I can't believe I'm telling you all of this. Are you really okay with that we did it?" And there was a pause. "Claire, I like Don but I'm not in love with him. But I knew he had what you needed." And I heard her laugh that familiar and comforting Linda laugh. "Now, just go back with him. You just wait. He's not done with you." And so I did. And he wasn't. Don woke an hour or so later as I now dozed. And I felt his desire as I awoke slowly. In something of a daze, he moved me to my hands and knees and entered me again, this time less carefully as I took his full length on his first thrust. I groaned with discomfort but Don never slackened his pace for a moment as he took me. I could do nothing but relax and accept his renewed passion. Don grabbed handfuls of my dangling breasts and gratified himself with piston-like thrusts in and out of me. And then me rolled me on top of him as I grimaced, as I felt the full length of his distended penis inside of me. Don was not gentle as he rocked his hips so as to more enter me more deeply. So this is what Linda knew, I thought, and I wondered how much more I could stand. And then, unbidden, I felt my body spasm with pleasure as I felt the first orgasm of my life. It felt incredible as my nails dug into his body, holding on for dear life. I collapsed on top him but still he didn't stop. He rolled me to my back and then with a few powerful thrusts, he once more gave me the contents of his sac. If I thought I had felt pleasure the first time, I had peaked to a new level with his second demand on my body. Don rolled off of me rather quickly, my body heaving and sweaty from his release. I was spent; totally, and panting like an animal. At first I didn't know what had happened but I realized that he had given me an orgasm at the moment that he had had his. And I truly had been oblivious to his second orgasm. The experience was primal and unbidden. I looked at him and realized that with my orgasm matching his, my cervix had dilated and drawn his tens of millions of sperm cells deep within my uterus. My god! I realized right then how fortunate I was to be protected from the onslaught of his sex. This truly was a mating, the insane, ridiculous, but primal joining of a man and a woman. I fell back exhausted. Don looked at me with a glazed look, obviously satisfied but lost in what he had just experienced. I realized then what sex was all about. It was animalistic, despite the flowers and the nod to romance. It was all about penetration, submission, and release. And I learned more in the late hours of the evening, as Don took me again, although this time rather gently as he added even more of his essence to my vagina which was already brimming with his sperm. I didn't respond, more than to open my legs to receive him. He needed me and I wanted to give my sex to him. I think he only lasted for a few minutes before he came inside of me. It felt good but I was too tired to respond to him. The next morning was different. We were both rested and this time Don was more caring and gentle with me. He took his time with his lovemaking and I was grateful. I knew for a fact that he was captivated with my breasts. He couldn't take his hands off of them. And secretly I was glad. Linda had large, lovely breasts but mine were firmer and though I shouldn't have felt competitive, I did know mine were better. Don was enchanted and excited with their fullness. I was very glad for that. I realized that my chest was exciting him to a full erection once more. Was there no satisfying him, I thought? Obviously, not. I went down on him, no longer caring about how that might appear. I drank deeply of his beautiful cock, so long and thick. I fellated Don with skill, I think. He was obviously enjoying it as I all but ravaged his manhood. Then, he had apparently had enough of the appetizer, as he threw me to my back and almost savagely penetrated me. And I took it all. I felt so proud that I could accept his full length now without discomfort or pain. I was vaguely aware of Linda pinging me on my phone, but I could have cared less. Don was on fire to possess me. And I wanted him to do just that. "Yes, yes, fuck me," I cried out. "Take me. I'm yours." "I am going to fuck you all the time now. You're mine." And with those words, I surrendered completely to him. Don told me later than at that moment, I not only came, but also squirted. I don't know about that but I felt my body release completely in that moment. Don mounted me like a stallion. And then, in a whispered cry, he owned me. "God, I love you Claire. I have to have you always." And my answer came easily as he continued to feed his cock inside of me. "You can have me whenever you want." And I meant it. I couldn't imagine life without this man. And then once more I felt the familiar tensing of his body. Once more, Don was pouring his life-giving sperm inside of me. God, I never wanted this to end. We lay there together for some time, softly caressing each other, entirely content and satisfied. Finally, Don said, "Your phone has been ringing." "Has it?" I asked sleepily. I leaned over to see who had been calling as the morning sun streamed through the window of our room. The first call had been from Linda, but the second, a few minutes ago had been from James. I panicked. "It's James!" Don said nothing at first. Then he kissed me and suggested I call him back. "No. I have to leave." It was almost 10:00 in the morning. No wonder he had called. Oh god, it was time to return to the real world. I sat up, and with a quick look back at Don, I dressed hurriedly. I was worried and more than a bit ashamed. Don came to the door as I scurried out. He had thrown on a towel but his sexuality still was evident. "It'll be okay, Claire. I promise. Last night will not be our last. It cannot be our last. Promise me." I said nothing as I opened the door and turned from him. I only wanted to go home to James. I felt dirty. And I was beyond distraught, thinking of my betrayal of James. I cried all the way home and burst into the living room to find him at the dining room table, sipping a coffee. I was crying now, hating myself for what I had done. And then James just took me into his arms. And I just lost it. I felt so bad, so sluttish, and just so awful. James simply held me. And then he told me that I looked tired and led me to bed. I looked at him but he turned away, and so I undressed completely and sought comfort in the cool comfort of my bed, shedding my clothes as I fell asleep naked under the covers. I just slept. I was so incredibly tired. I heard him rustling about hours later and saw that he was examining my panties. And I just wanted to die. He just stared and them, fingering them and I knew right then that they must have been soaked with Don's spermy leavings. I closed my eyes and turned away. I would have to pay for my night of debauchery. I felt sick, but was still so tired. Later that afternoon, when I awoke, James was nowhere to be found. I gingerly made my way to the bathroom and showered. The water felt cool, refreshing, and wonderful. I toweled down afterwards and called for him, but there was no answer. I knew that he had left me. I was devastated. I had lost it all. Then, as I walked back to the bedroom, I saw his note on the table. "Went to get you some takeout. Back in a while." Last night's guilty pleasures were nothing compared to the joy I felt in knowing all was well with James. I quickly dressed and having a few moments, I saw both calls and messages from Linda -- and texts from an unknown number. I quickly thumbed through the several text messages and saw that three of them were obviously from Don, whose number I didn't know. I brightened. He told me that I was amazing and asked to how I was doing. I glowed. Really, all was well. I quickly answered both Linda and Don, telling them I was fine and would be in touch. And then, mercifully, I just relaxed, lounging in my big, comfy chair in the living room. James came back within minutes, smiling and carrying takeout from my favorite Thai restaurant. I gave thanks for having such a loving, amazing man as a partner. And he never asked about my night away from him, although he obviously knew that I had been with another man. I wondered about him checking the evidence in my panties, but put that thought out of my mind. It was as if nothing had ever happened -- even though clearly, something transforming had in fact happened to me. Once or twice as we sat and talked, I felt wetness well up from me and I knew that Don's masculine leavings had found their way past the opening of my sex. I felt ashamed, but also thrilled. It had happened -- all of it. It was not my imagination. As I relaxed, my mind drifted to an inexact memory of what I had just experienced with Don. It was all really just a blur, though the soreness between my legs was quite real. I was dying to call him but didn't dare do so as the evening was just for James and me. I don't why, but I was sure that Don knew, so I didn't worry what he might think. Nor did I concern myself with Linda. She too would know why I was silent. It was a special evening with just the two of us. We talked. And though he didn't dare bring up what had happened to me, I knew that I must. "Nothing that has happened, or will happen, will ever change what we share," I finally said. "Nothing." "You promise?" he said weakly. "I told you. I promise." And he smiled and completely relaxed. That was all that he needed to hear. And I told him anything else. He did love me. He allowed me to experience being a woman because that was how much he loved me. We slept soundly that night and once or twice I felt him touch and move to hold me. And I wanted that. It felt so good to be held by him. I called Don at work on Monday, not really knowing what he would say. He's a busy doctor so I wasn't sure if he would take my call, but thankfully he did. "I've thought about you so much, baby. Are you okay?" he asked with genuine concern. "Yes, I'm fine now. I'm sorry I left so abruptly. I just panicked when I saw the text from James. But we're fine." "You know that I'm crazy about you, Claire. I really am." I didn't know what to say but his words were so delicious. "I don't know how I feel, really, but I enjoyed being with you." "We have to do be together again, and soon." "Yes, I want that too!" He sounded relieved. The poor man didn't know what to think about me. And truthfully, I didn't know what to think about him. "When can you see me?" I asked. "Tonight?" "No, not tonight. Tomorrow." "Dinner?" he asked casually. And this was the problem. This is what I feared. I could not be seen with Don socially. I said nothing. "I think I understand. You really can't be seen with me, can you?" There was disappointment in his voice. "I can't. You'll have to understand that I can't be seen out with you. But I do want to be with you. Tell me where you live and I'll be there after work, though I can't spend the night this time." "Okay, I do understand." His voice was soothing. He gave me his address and I promised to be there by 5:00 the next day. And I made a vow I knew that I wanted to keep. "I want to be your lover. I can't believe I said that but it's true. I want to have more sex with you. And I want it often. But you have to accept my situation." "Yeah, Linda called and we talked about it. I'll respect that. But I can't help wanting you." That pleased me so much. "You will, Don. You will have me again and often. I want you." "So, you really enjoyed being with me." I couldn't help but telling him the truth. "I enjoyed every moment with you. You have my body and my affection. I think I am a little in love with you." I waited a second before continuing. "Please don't let that put you off. I've never been with a man before so it's natural that I now feel a bond with you." "It doesn't put me off. I am also a bit in love with you. We pair so well." "Do we, really?" I wondered. "Am I as good as Linda?" There, I said it. "Yes. You're both amazing -- both so passionate. I'm the luckiest man in the world, Claire." "I just want to pleasure you. And to receive pleasure from you." "You did and you do please me. And I will do everything in my power to pleasure you." And I tingled and wished that tomorrow were here. I told James the next morning that I would be home late, with no other explanation. He knew. Don was fucking me and I was going back for more. I felt a bit dirty but it passed. I wanted Don inside of me again. My body had healed and like an athlete trying a new set of muscles, I knew that in time I would feel less physical discomfort the more frequently I was with him. I left work a bit early and hurried home to primp. I didn't want Don to be disappointed in my appearance. I changed clothes, once more donning a flattering dress though I chose not to wear a bra. But this time, I also wore no panties. I wanted my sex available to him from the moment he took me in his arms. And it was magic the moment I walked through the door. I was instantly in his arms. We were like animals, hungry for each other. It was insane how much I wanted him inside of me. "Fuck me, now." I pleaded as I broke from our kiss. Don wasted no time, pushing me onto the bed. His mouth found my pussy and I felt a new and amazing pleasure with his tongue licking my most intimate place. I literally tore the shirt from his back as he did so, but Don never allowed his mouth to move from my wet pussy. God, he was giving me so much pleasure! I was bucking as he brought me to climax, not caring at all that I was responding like a wanton slut. Don all but tore the dress from my body and I lay there naked, defenseless, and wanting him to penetrate me. He ripped off his trousers and once more I beheld his male weapon, obscenely large, ugly, and veiny - and obviously intent on my pussy. I spread for him and with a less than gentle shove, he pushed me to my back. And then, oh my god, he gave me every inch of his cock -- all nine inches in one impassioned thrust. And I took it all, a bit breathless, but I did receive his full length. And he didn't make love to me. He fucked me and I fucked him back. I told him again and again to fuck me. I was crazed with lust. Don bottomed out repeatedly, but I didn't care about the pain. I only wanted him to fuck me. Don took me like an animal. There was no tenderness in his lovemaking. He needed my pussy and I needed his cock. And he fucked me into oblivion. I had no idea it could ever be like this! And with my words urging him on and my legs splayed open, he took me completely. Saturday, he had been fairly gentle, but now, he was a raging beast as he literally took every bit that my body could offer. And I took it all. I no longer wondered whether Linda had offered him more pleasure. There was no mistaking his need for my body and mine for his. Don was almost whimpering as he sought pleasure from me. I knew he needed release from his torment. "Come inside of me, baby," I said with a cry. "Give me your orgasm!" And then he was gone -- just gone. And I knew it, and was pleased that I had the ability to truly send him over the edge. Don's loins pressed deeply into mine over and over and then, with a groan, he sent out jets of his sperm into my vagina. There was no doubt that he was sending multiple volleys of his potent seed deep within me. And I came with him, unable to restrain my own craven need for release. My haunches melded with the spasms of his loins as we mated. And then he gave a deep sigh and I knew that he was through. I felt his cock release from me in as he rolled off of me. I was amazed that all of this was happening to me. We were both completely spent, our lust for one another temporarily sated. Don reached over and kissed me tenderly as his hand moved between my legs, as if to confirm that I was indeed filled to overflowing with yet more of his ejaculate. I was beyond content to be with him like this, naked and completely vulnerable. Feeling the deep connection that a woman feels after having mated with a man, I wanted to tell him that I had fallen for him, as indeed I had. I wanted to be in his bed every night, ready to receive his daily charge of sexual desire. I craved his touch and the unspeakable joy of receiving his penetrating cock. I felt like a tigress unleashed and, truth be told, I no longer cared if my needs seemed sluttish. "Don, will you be with me often? I can't imagine a future not being with you again and again like this." His reply surprised me. "You and I are lovers now. It's more than the sex, Claire, it's who you are even more than your body which makes me want you." I sighed contentedly. "But if we go forward with this, our connection have to be more than just sexual. I know myself." And then I just said it. "I love you already." "What about James?" he said softly stroking my thighs. "I love James too, but it's different. You know that it is. James can't give me what you do. And I want what you fully, the way a woman should want a man." "Can you love two men?" he asked. "Yes. I know that I can. We'll work it all out. I know that we will. We'll have to make the time to be together." He said nothing but kissed me and I was his and he was mine. That tender, loving kiss sealed our newfound love. "You're okay with the age difference," he asked casually. "I'm very okay with that. I feel secure being with a mature, successful man." And then I giggled, "Are you okay with such a young wanton cookie as your lover?" "Come here, you," he said and I yielded once more to his recharged desire. Don entered me on top, but this time extended his arms so that his weight was suspended above me. He looked down to watch his cock gently move in and out of my pussy. And I watched too, almost oblivious to the physical pleasure. The visual of his deep but gentle penetration of my sex was incredibly erotic. And then, as he moved to reposition me on my hands and knees, I boldly took charge and brought my mouth over his beautiful organ. I was wild for the oral pleasure of fellating him to completion. Don arched his back and as I cupped and gently kneaded his scrotum, I felt his cock pulse as he held my head in his hands. He cried out as I felt the warm liquid spew from the opening of his penis and into my accepting mouth. And then I moved off of him and shamelessly allowed a measure of his wasted seed to dribble out of my mouth and down my chin. I laughed as I wiped my mouth with my arm. I wondered about how a man could produce such a volume of semen so quickly. "God, I can't believe I did that!" I felt totally at ease sharing my shameless feelings with Don. "You did it so well, baby. Come here." And he drew me into his arms and kissed me, not caring that traces of his slippery cum were still on my lips. Then we dozed, though I kept my eye on the clock. It wouldn't do to arrive back home late. My thoughts were racing. I had professed my love for Don. There was no going back on that, not that I wanted to. But I worried that maybe our stolen moments would not be enough. Two Loves, One Lover "Don?" "Mmmmm...," he answered sleepily. "I want you to know I'm okay if you're with other women." He rose to his elbows and looked at me questioningly. "I mean, you have my love and my body, but I won't be able to be, you know, a proper girlfriend. James is in my life -- and he always will be." He looked puzzled, but finally smiled at me. "Let's not worry about that now, okay?" "Okay," I said and kissed him. "I have to run. May I shower?" "Sure. There's a bathrobe for you and I bought some girly things for you as well." "You are so sweet and thoughtful!" His vanity had been well stocked. And then I saw the familiar thick, terrycloth robe on the hook. It was just the same as the one Linda had worn home after being with him a month or so ago. I felt a bit angry at first but truthfully it also excited me in some way, seeing further evidence that Don had known the same passion with Linda as he had shared with me. And the most erotic thought crossed my mind. And I knew that I would do it. I made a mental note to call Linda later that evening. I showered for the longest time until I was sure that I did not have any trace or scent of Don on me, except of course for his sperm, which was safely tucked deep within my body. I wanted to keep that as a private and intimate evidence of our lovemaking. I was out the door with a kiss and a hug and arrived home around 7:30. We made a date for Saturday afternoon. James greeted me without any questions and we shared a light supper and just chatted away as we always did. I finally found time to phone Linda around 9:30. "Hello," she said with her usual animation. "I've been wanting to chat. How are you?" "I'm doing awesome," I said and she just laughed. "And I'll bet I know someone else who is doing awesome these days!" "Oh, you!" Linda wanted details about my trysts with Don, and I really wanted to share with her, but over the phone. "Could I come over Saturday about 5:00? I have so much that I want to share with you. My head is spinning." "Sure, that'll work. I can't wait to hear all about it! Don and I talked a few times and I know he is just gone over you, but he won't share details like we girls can." "I promise all the details. I love you so much and thank you so, so much!" "It was my pleasure," and she giggled, "or rather it's been your pleasure and his. I'm not getting any these days!" "We'll talk Saturday. Miss you. Kisses!" Don's communications with me became more frequent and affectionate over the next few days. I always beamed when he called or texted, and he knew not to call me in the evening, which I appreciated. James gave me my space, something I appreciated even more. He knew that I was changing before his eyes, but his discretion and support never flagged. But Don and Linda had become an integral part of my new life. I sort of dreaded the time when James would confront me, not wanting a scene and unsure as to how I would react, or what choices I might make. Saturday came and James was spending the weekend with his parents, which suited my plans perfectly. I tanned that morning, followed by a visit to my esthetician for a follow-up visit to be sure that I was silky smooth where it counted. I drove to Don's place around 1:00, hoping that he had finished his round of golf. I beamed with delight when he opened the door and we kissed immediately. He told me that he had two pieces of news for me. Uh, oh, I thought. Could this be good? But it was in fact all good. His divorce had cleared negotiations and should be final within two weeks. I really had never given a though to him being married and he had spoken only briefly about his marriage, which I knew to be loveless and childless. His ex was not a threat. But his second bit of news was thrilling! "I'm selling my townhome and buying a house at Willow Bend!" I knew this to be a very upscale area and I was delighted for him. "My realtor found it; it's perfect for me, and for us. It's secluded, with a large backyard that slopes down to the creek. It has a pool, spa, cabana, and it'll be great for us to hang out there, our love nest." I jumped up and down and hugged him! I could only think of how we might spend weekends there, with each other and with privacy. I wanted more from Don now than just trysts at his townhome. This was such great news! I was to have a life of sorts with him. I bubbled with delight and Don was obviously overjoyed that I saw this as a place we could share together. There were times I felt so confined in my apartment with James, as cozy as it was. The very notion of such a powerful, successful man wanting me to share his new space was exciting. Don showed me pictures of his new home and it truly was beautiful. I looked at him with admiration and love. "I love you so much. I am overwhelmed that you want me to share your lovely new home and your life." "I want you forever in my life, my home, and in my bed, Claire." I just melted. "I am yours forever, Don." And then we made love. Don had fucked me a few days before, but that afternoon, it was different. He took time with his caresses before exposing my intimate charms. He was mad for the delights of my breasts, which I now no longer thought of as large and bulky, but as a treasured gift for him. Don was enamored of them, showering them with kisses and soft but firm caresses. I was proud of my body now; proud that my body brought him such pleasure. He could have any and everything I could offer as a woman. Taking his time, he undressed me and we fell into the bed where he had taken my virginity only days before. But I was no virgin now. Don had released and unleashed me. I offered my mouth to his sex but as he gently pushed me off of him after only a few seconds, I realized that it was my sex that he wanted. And so I opened my legs in full surrender. And then he was upon me. Don's lovemaking that afternoon was vigorous and demanding. I knew that I had but to yield and receive his driving needs to satisfy him. I was learning. Don whispered sweet words of endearment and more primitive desire as he first entered, and then took me with jackhammer thrusts of passion. I wondered how I had gone so many years without the full pleasures of being a woman. Don moved me like a rag doll, first to my knees where I had no choice but to receive his pistoning cock, and then on top of him where, despite the slight pain of taking him fully, I had some measure of control. And I came several times. I was out of my mind with the pleasure his body was giving me. I didn't even open my eyes for the longest time. I just moved my loins to maximize my own pleasure. Then, he roughly moved me once more to my knees and penetrated me deeply. I knew by now the signs of his approaching climax. With several short, determined thrusts into my vagina, Don buried his full length inside of me and gave up the contents of his testes into my body. I thought for a second that he was actually in pain, but then I knew that my body had provided him with a receptacle for his orgasm. And, again, I lay still as streams of his potency entered me. This is what a man required of a woman and I had no choice but to offer my body as an accepting, willing offering to my lover's sexual needs. Don's hands grasped and slapped my ass. I felt a sharp pain as he was been almost out of control. But I liked it. I slumped to the bed, but with my plan still in my head, I kept my pelvis upturned. I didn't want too much of his cum to leak out of me. I brought my hand to my opening to prevent the flow of his seed from my youthful, tight vagina. All of this was lost on Don. He once more withdrew with an audible plop even before I had fallen to my back. I was by now more sensible to Don's rhythms. He gave his body completely and then would collapse completely. He held nothing back. I adored his physicality -- this was a man of fifty plus years?? God, he was a stallion! He thought I was the gift of the gods, knowing full well that he was every woman's dream. But he was mine. As I recovered I thought of weekends with him, with drinks by the pool, and sex in the spa. And as I turned to look at him, I gave thanks that he was mine. I understood that the youthful delights of my body and my energy would energize and delight him, perhaps for years. And I smiled. And then, I looked at the clock, as I remembered my 'date' with Linda. Yes, there was still time. And as I looked as his beautiful, wasted body lying there in sweet repose, I understood that both his energy and his balls were recharging, so I gave him his peace. But as the clock ticked closer to four, I awoke from my light slumber. He would be ready, I now knew. And I knew how to arouse him. I lightly touched and caressed his wonderfully masculine and muscled form. How could a man more than thirty years older than me look this amazing? Don stirred slightly and then I turned my attention to his flaccid penis. With gentle urging he began to stir. Blood began to surge into his organ and he began to writhe with pleasure as my mouth urged him on. His loins had recharged and he would require my body once more. And I was so ready. Though apparently still asleep, he turned me on my side and then I felt the familiar pressure of his erection pressing into me. Don said nothing at all as he grasped his cock and fed a few inches into my vagina. His motion was languid as he easily entered me. I knew that this would change soon. And it did. Awake now, and fully aroused, his thrusts became deeper and his cock swelled to a fully erect state. His hands mauled my breasts and pulled my waist tightly against his torso. And then he was fucking me. And I knew now was the time to yield to him. And I did. And this time he didn't come as I had expected. He just kept up a slow but insistent rhythm as he once more found his pleasure in being inside of me. I could swear that he kept this up for half an hour. I was amazed. I had had two small, but welcome orgasms as he continued to deliver his sex into me. And then his hands grasped my ass and he actually hurt me! But what could I do? It was his time. And though I could not feel the sensations I held felt with other, more intense orgasms, I knew that I was once more receiving his seed. And he fell away again, spent, and exhausted. I felt almost triumphant, knowing that whatever I offered him, it was more than enough to coax endless orgasms from his body. I felt proud and confident. Don really was mine. My body was a tool and I now knew how to use it. I let him sleep, the poor baby. And then, with him gone to the world, I slipped into the bathroom, naked, and into his terrycloth robe. It felt soft and warm against me. I gathered up my clothes and silently left him. It was time to see Linda. I drove to her house, knowing my purpose, and not caring how I might appear. I arrived just at 5:00, punctual as always. Linda opened the door within seconds and saw the smile on my face as I stood there, somewhat disheveled, and wearing one of Don's bathrobes. "You're awful!" she laughed but kissed me and let me in. She made me a welcome drink and we just collapsed on her sofa. "Okay, so tell me everything!" she said with animation. "I'd rather show you." I opened the top of my robe and my breasts were bared before her. Her look changed instantly, from animation. to a curious look of wanting -- and desire. Linda looked at me for a second before I said, "Touch me. You can have me now." And I so wanted her to touch me. I knew she desired me. And she kissed me as her hand found my naked breast. It all felt so good, different than Don's more demanding need for me, but I felt her desire nonetheless. And I wanted to give my body to her. Linda's passion for me was unmistakable. I had been right. I wanted to know what pleasure a woman could give me. And she delivered. Her hands were all over me and her kisses were almost violent in their intensity. After a fervid and intense minute of exploring my mouth with hers, she drew back, her eyes never leaving my breasts. And I reclined, pulled away the strap that held my robe together, and brazenly showed her my sex. And then she looked at me with intense desire and I told her. "Don has just been there. Do you remember when you showed me how he had used you? Touch me and see how Don used me just an hour ago." I don't really know if my erotic sense hit Linda, but I do know that she wanted me. I laid back and allowed her to fully release the passion I knew she felt for me. I was amazed. Don had only one time tasted my sex, but Linda was crazed for it. She must have had experience with a woman before this. That's the only explanation, as she made me come again and again. Don, for all the pleasure he gave me, had never been able to do what Linda was doing to me and for me. And her hand, her body, and her mouth brought me to new heights. Linda was incredible. And she required nothing from me. Like Don, she was wild for my body. I was incredulous that my charms could drive two seemingly mature, reasonable adults to such heights. But, what did it matter? I didn't want her to stop. But when she did stop, we both were exhausted. And I tried to leave but she told me to sleep in her bed. And her bed felt great. Her sheets were cool and fresh. And I just slept, oblivious to everything until morning came. And when I awoke, I was fully awake. And I felt Linda's soft breath close to me. And I had this most random thought - whatever had happened to the scared, virginal little girl of two weeks before? I felt good but almost out of control. I was so focused on my pleasure that I had lost my center. I had used my body to gather in both Don and now Linda. And I knew I should have felt shame, but I didn't. And I would not tolerate James leaving me. I wanted it all. And I felt emboldened get just that. And I would do it with no sense of shame or guilt. That was all in the past. And I went out to Linda's kitchen and in order answered texts from James and Don. "Yes, I'm fine." I replied to James. "Yes, I spent the night with Linda," I replied to Don. And in between coffee and warmed over muffins in Linda's kitchen, I replied repeatedly to their texts. And I just took charge of both of them, the two men I loved. And then Linda awoke and joined me and as we talked, I took a degree of charge with her, though she was too strong a personality to just yield to me completely. "I don't know what came over me last night," she said lightly. "I've never done that before." "I enjoyed it." And then she laughed, "Well, now we have both been robed and rutted by Don, haven't we?" And I couldn't help but laugh too. "Do you know that the first time I was with him, I just wanted to be as good of a lover to him as you were." She smiled lovingly at me and touched my face. "It's exciting to me, you know, that we've both shared being with him and have known the same pleasure from him." And I knew that she felt the same bond. "And we even have the same type of robe from him now. Don is such a guy!" And when she laughed that full, throaty laugh, I knew we were okay. Linda was the third and final love of my life. Her energy, spirit, and love for me had pushed and prodded me to find a new and exciting meaning to my life. "We have both been robed and disrobed by Don, haven't we." I had to laugh. It was so true. And from then on, we both would always tease other about our 'Don' robes. And we wouldn't have traded them for a Halston gown. We had shared his bed, given him our bodies, and received his seed. It somehow deepened and sweetened our bond. And we had only to say that we had "Donned" an outfit from then on to send us into fits of laughter. But, it was that robe which I wore so often which I think finally prodded James to ask about the obvious changes in my life. He did so Sunday evening after he had returned from his parents. We were sitting on the balcony, chatting and enjoying the cool air as I cuddled in the warmth of Don's robe. "What's his name," he asked, completely out of the blue. "Whose name?" I asked and then felt silly and foolish. I knew what he wanted to know. "You know." I blushed. "His name is Don." "Okay, now I know." And he sipped at his coffee and then said, "Does he treat you well?" "Yes, he does." I knew that anything I told him had to be absolutely true. I was scared, really scared that he might ask more than I wanted to tell him. "And you two have had sex?" "Yes." He said nothing for a few moments. "Okay. That's okay. You trust him?" "Yes. He's very good to me." "I think I want to know about him, but I also think I don't. Do you understand?" "Yes, I think so. I'll tell you whatever you want to know." "Is he a threat to me?" And I hoped that my reply came quickly enough. It did give me pause. "No, he isn't. But I want time with him." And then he smiled shyly. "We can work that out. I want you to be happy. Does he make you happy?" "You both make me happy -- in different ways." "Do you love him?" I knew I had to answer immediately. Now was not that time to put doubt in his mind, or mine. "Yes, I do. But it's not how I love you. I can't imagine a future without either of you." I sipped at my coffee. "I want and need time with him. Are you okay with that?" "We'll work it out, Claire." And he looked at me with love and vulnerability. I loved him all the more for his willingness to broach the unspeakable truth. "What does he do?" "He's a doctor, an OB/GYN. He's a lot older than I am." "Well, that's a relief." I didn't really understand, but it must have been some guy thing. "I don't want him to come over here." "I wouldn't ever do that." And I meant it. The thought had never really occurred to me. Don and James were separate compartments in my life. "Does Linda know about all of this?" There was a limit to my honesty. I could never tell him about Linda's role in bringing Don to my bed, or her sometimes role as his lover and mine. So, I just deflected the question. "Yes. Linda and I talk about everything." "That's good, he said. You need someone to talk to." He sipped at his coffee. "I never want to know anything more. And I will not question you or how you spend your time." I so wanted to kiss him as I was just blown away by his love, understanding, and commitment. But I knew a burst of passion would distress and confuse him, so I did what I always did when I felt the deep affection I felt for him. I just told him. "I love you so much." And I was entirely truthful. James allowed me everything that I wanted and required. "Claire, I promise never to question how you spend your time. What you give me is everything I want. I know that I cannot give you the same. So, things must and will change. But our connection cannot." "It never will. Trust me in that. I will never betray you." God, I felt so relieved. My life was perfect. I had three people who loved me. I was the luckiest woman who ever lived. I saw Don at least twice a week from that time forward and Linda and I always had our time together, either on the phone or together. She never did reconcile with Frank, and for that I was glad. I wanted her for myself. She became my lover as well, though our lovemaking was far less frequent than my sessions with Don. But she knew the true deeper secrets of my body and found ways to make me cum that Don did not know. It didn't matter. Both of them gave me pleasure. James always understood, or at least acquiesced to my wanton ways. I think he suspected that I was sexual with Linda, but really, that reality was beyond him. And with some prodding and my sweet suggestion, Linda from time to time was in Don's bed as well. She needed it, and in some way, he did too. Linda was not that complex. She needed a man in the same way that I did. And the three of us just became, well, the three of us! I knew Don's passion was greater for me, but I wanted Linda to have some of his male energy as well. I don't think they ever had sex more than occasionally, but I saw to it that we were all open about it. I insisted on it. And I knew I could make the rules, so I did. Two Loves Pt. 02 Chapter 3 I saw Emma again only a month after our initial meeting in Los Angeles. After I got back from the ACM Conference, I briefed my boss and colleagues on the papers I'd attended and my recommendations. After some further research, we realized there was some seminal work on relational databases being done by Larry Ellison at Ampex Corporation in Redwood City, California. My boss asked me to fly out to the Bay Area to see Ellison and a researcher in another company, and see if there were any synergies between their interests and Digital Devices. I talked to Em about once a week, usually for an hour or so at a time. Our conversations were wide ranging, covering everything from our technical work to how we got along with our parents. In between, Em even made me comfortable talking about Megan and how I felt about her. She made some suggestions for moving our relationship forward that I tried: a corsage and some of her favorite wine after one of her art gallery events, and a few weeks later some ideas on how to improve our intimacy. Her suggestions were on the mark and made me value her friendship even more than I already did. During our conversations, Em always found a way to refer to me as her 'Boyfriend' – with a capital 'B.' From our intimate times together, I knew she liked that term. Her use of the phrase made me feel guilty, not that I had a similar role with Megan, but that there were so many boyfriend things I should be doing to earn the title. I let her comments pass, yet thought when I saw her again I'd have to be sure she understood all the things I couldn't do for her in this role being three thousand miles away. Until the Redwood City trip, I thought our conversations would eventually wan and we'd become a pleasant memory for each other – an assignation at a computer conference when we were both far away from home and lonely. My second trip to the west coast changed all that. Em actually met my arriving flight at the San Francisco airport. She threw herself into my arms and showered me with kisses as we stood in the airport concourse just outside my gate. She led me home to her apartment to fix me dinner, however, only seconds inside her door we were making love on her bed. We went non-stop for a couple of hours until both of us needed to come up for air and some nourishment. Rather than cook, she took me to her favorite Mexican restaurant. I remember she wore a long dress with nothing on underneath it. As we sat side by side in a booth that afforded us some measure of privacy, she had me feel her breasts and finger her slit as we waited for our meals. I was mesmerized by her sexuality, and was more than just casually aroused during our entire meal even though we'd sated ourselves in the hours since my arrival. I never used the hotel that trip; I just called and cancelled my reservation after Em insisted I stay with her. She had a little grin when she insisted; a promise of the sexual times we'd enjoy. Whenever I wasn't attending to the primary purpose of my trip, Em and I were making love, sleeping wrapped up in each other, or eating. Three things came up in our conversations during that trip that forever changed our relationship, not that any one of them couldn't have been changed and reversed the course we set during that trip. In the end, these things held constant and formed the basis for our relationship. First, over dinner on Em's patio my second night in Palo Alto, she used the term 'Boyfriend' again to refer to me. I explained to her that when she used the term I felt guilty, primarily because I wasn't there to do things for her or be with her all the time. I also alluded to my unfolding and similar relationship with Megan, a relationship that seemed to be taking off in new and desirable directions. Em sat in my lap and held my face gently in her two hands. "Matthew, I know you're thousands of miles away most of the time. I don't expect a 'normal' boyfriend. You are just the way I want you." She laughed and added, "If you were around all the time, we'd probably fight and break up anyway." We kissed for a moment, and then Em added, "I mean it when I call you my Boyfriend. I'm not seeing anyone else, although I know you'd tell me to." I nodded in agreement with her supposition. "You are the nicest man I've ever met. I knew that in the first ten seconds when I met you – when I asked if I could sit next to you at lunch that day. I think it was chemistry or pheromones or something, but I knew instantly that you were my 'one.'" "But, Em, I can't be the 'one' if I'm three thousand miles away." "I knew that too, and that's all right. I take you just the way you are – where you are, how you are, as you are – all that." "But, ..." Em put a finger on my lips to stop me from talking. It was then that the second part of our conversation occurred; a part that surprised me in its candor and set our relationship for a long, long time. She said insistently, "Matthew, pay attention to what I'm about to tell you because it's profound." She locked eyes with me and kissed me gently on the tip of my nose. She went on, "I don't mind being the 'other' woman. In fact, I prefer it." I was shocked, and I guess my eyes must have flared in amazement at her statement. "I know you have your Megan. I also know that you're going to make love to her very soon, and then get engaged, and then get married. I don't care." She paused and added, "Well, I do care. I care about your happiness. I want the two of you to be happy – very happy. I'm not here to break anything up; quite the contrary. I'm here to help you put that part of your life together and make something good out of it." I spoke, "But, our relationship ... our time together ...doesn't that ...?" I gestured towards Em's bedroom. "Oh, I don't want to stop having sex with you. And I hope you don't with me either. We can if that makes a big difference to you. I still want a relationship with you, but it can be as little or as much as you want to make it ... providing, of course, that it doesn't get in the way of your relationship with Megan." I studied Em's face, looking for traces of sarcasm or jealousy, but I found none. Em added thoughtfully after a moment, "Of course, I know our relationship will change your relationship with Megan – it's silly of me to think otherwise. There are ways it could change it that will be bad and ways that will be good. I only want to have the latter – the good and positive ways. I don't want you to think about me ... us ... our relationship in any way that doesn't add something to what you and Megan grow." "Em, any other girl would be jealous, or possessive, or something other than that," I stated with a tone of amazement. I was also testing to be sure she meant what she said. "But I'm not any other girl," she said insistently. "Maybe it has to do with how I was raised and the fact that I matured over the past ten or twelve years with hippie parents and a liberal set of friends. I don't get jealous. And, what I'm trying to tell you is I'm happy for you – happy for you and Megan. I'm also greedy enough to want a piece of you too, but only what you can afford to give – and give in a way that doesn't detract from what Megan and you build together." "But, you'll find other people and date and fall in love too," I stated affirmatively and hopeful in her acceptance of the idea. "Maybe," She said, "But I don't feel a compelling need to go find someone since I have you." I insisted, "I won't live up to all you expectations. This is a rare trip, especially so soon after we met. I might not be back out here for months or years. You'll develop expectations about me, expectations I can't meet or won't meet, even when we're together. A telephone call once or twice a week – even everyday – just won't cement a relationship." "Oh, I'll fantasize about you a lot, but I'm enough of a realist that I know I'll keep things in bound. And, I underline what I just told you: I'm happy with as much or as little as you have to give." I looked at Em wondering what the future would hold for her – for us. Em said slowly and haltingly, "If you're trying to tell me 'this is it – that you don't want to go on any further' – then I'll understand. I'll ... I don't know what I'll do, but I can even accept that too." I didn't think she was being manipulative in her statement; it was just what she felt. "Oh, no!" I protested. "That's not what I was trying to tell you. I care for you a lot. I want to keep seeing you. I'll find a way ... we'll find a way to keep in touch, to be together once in a while. I just want to be sure you're all right with 'once in a while.'" Em held my face in hers and kissed me again. We spent a few minutes tenderly expressing our feelings. It was then that the third part of our life-changing conversation took place by way of two brief phrases uttered between us that changed everything in our lives forever. Em pulled away finally and looked me in the eyes with hers. She whispered, "Matthew, I love you." Without hesitation, I replied with genuine emotion, "Emma, I love you too." We'd never used those words before with each other, and I hadn't even said them to Megan – although we both knew they were implied. To me, they were a commitment and a vow of mindshare. Forever after, Em would be in my thoughts and on my mind, whether she was three-inches away or three-thousand miles away. I just had to acknowledge, as Em already had, that this was going to be an unusual relationship. I learned more about love from Emma on the rest of my visit. We talked about the feelings involved in love, the emotions, what love meant to us, including the commitment. We talked more about not being exclusive too, although I didn't get the feeling that Em would go out and seek the kind of more permanent and close relationship that I felt she deserved. Over dinner at one of our favorite restaurants, we also talked more about my relationship with Megan, and how to turn it into something more significant. Emma surprised me with her bluntness about making the relationship deeper. She talked openly about expressing my feelings of love for Megan too. She also admonished me to think clearly about how I felt about Megan independently of my feelings for her. She wanted me to love two women: her and Megan. I told her I felt peculiar talking about Megan with her, particularly when it involved creating a loving and physical relationship. Emma laughed and reassured me that there was no subject I could think of that she wasn't prepared to talk about in a supportive way with me. Based on that challenge, we then tried to think of subjects that might be taboo between us. This led to conversations about losing our virginity, masturbation, sexual fantasies, pornography, religion, suicide and euthanasia, lesbianism and homosexuality, incest, and our feelings about all kinds of living arrangements. We clarified our boundaries and had a lot of laughs in our discussion. I stayed over Friday, although that was to have been my travel day. I had a Saturday evening dinner with Megan, so I called to let her know that I'd be there, but that I'd be on an airplane a good part of Saturday. She seemed unusually quiet, yet didn't ask why I'd stayed an extra day. After that trip, Em and I continued our romance over the telephone. She taught me about telephone sex too, something I'd heard about, and something that she turned out to be particularly good at. We both improved our vocabularies about sexual acts and feelings. Later, I found out that she did research into the subject, talked to her friends, and even practiced by herself before engaging me in the salacious long-distance acts. I made another trip to Silicon Valley just after Thanksgiving. I worked for three days and used a fourth to do nothing but make love to Em. I stayed with her again. She was so comfortable to be around and even more comfortable to be in love with. Em always asked about how I was progressing the relationship with Megan, often making suggestions about how to express myself better to Megan, or raise sensitive subjects. Because of her ideas, I think Megan and I did move things along faster than they would have happened had I been left to my own devices. On one trip in the autumn Em and I went out to dinner. She tested me on my feelings for Megan. Based on my answers, she urged me to become engaged – to ask Megan to marry me. She told me how I should do it on Christmas Eve, and I followed her directions to the letter. Em told me her heart felt so warm with love for us. I was back in Redwood City for a week in February and then March. Much to my surprise, Em discovered she had to be in Boston for a conference in May. Somehow, we were managing to see each other much more than I'd initially expected. On one of those visits, I bought Em a one-carat diamond ring. I couldn't ask her to marry me, and I guessed correctly that she didn't want this. Instead, I presented the ring to her as a token of our friendship, love, and our commitment to a lasting relationship. Em cried in her happiness. During that year, my relationship with Megan changed from friend, to boyfriend, to fiancé, and finally to husband. Em coached me along, giving me helpful hints about behavior and ideas that would endear me to Megan. My concept of the 'other woman' was the opposite of how Em behaved: someone malicious and trying to drive a wedge into the relationship. I think if I'd suggested it, and Megan was willing, Em would have come and joined us in some complicated ménage a trois. Em would often tell me not to call her for a week or two, trying to get me to focus my attention and affection on Megan. I follow her directives, yet continued to think of Em every day. I decided in the first month after meeting Emma that there was no one I could share her with. By that, I mean I had no friend close enough that I could tell about her. As my relationship with Megan matured, I was even happier that I'd decided to keep Em all to myself. I watched with fascination the flaming affair two of my co-workers engaged in. Both were older and married, yet for months over lunch they would slip away several times a week to a local motel. Everyone at work knew and purportedly they'd even been caught flagrant delicto in one of the conference rooms after work hours. After six months, things ended and the woman left the company. I think one of the spouses got wise to what was going on. Kevin, the guy in the affair, told me he was guilt-ridden by his actions. He wanted to destroy himself over the breach of trust he'd created in his marriage. He'd been the instigator of the affair, slowly seducing Sheila, a pretty secretary from the steno pool. "I told so many lies," he confessed in our small cafeteria one day. I asked him why he did it and couldn't he have just not told any lies? Kevin stared at me with a strange expression. He never answered my questions. A few months later, someone told me he was having another affair with a pretty clerk from accounting. I kept waiting for a wave of guilt to sweep over me as my thoughts vacillated between the two women I loved, but none came. I even worried about my sociopathic behavior, but I didn't change. I had no regrets about how my life had formed. After Megan and I got engaged, and right after I got back from a trip to the west coast when I saw Emma, I sat down and focused on what I was thinking. I loved both women. I even wrote out little notes about each one and how I felt. I didn't see negatives in one that I was compensating for by engaging with the other; I didn't think of either of them that way. They were both unique, and in many ways unlike one another. I just liked being with and loving both of them. Em had me pegged; I'd fallen in love twice – simultaneously. On another trip to California, Em and I spent a day and night at the Seal Rock Inn next to Sutro Heights Park in San Francisco. We walked the beach for a few hours and then talked as we sat on a crowded at a cocktail lounge overlooking the Pacific. Initially, Em was in a carefree mood – a blithe spirit with seemingly little care for any consequences or fallout of our burgeoning affair. She talked about how we were all brainwashed about monogamy, exclusivity, and marriage, firmly stating that she didn't buy into any of the precepts. She was so persuasive, I thought of living with Megan but not marrying her; that fleeting thought left my head when I realized that Megan would never go for that idea. I asked Em about guilt and whether she had any guilt about 'us.' She gave me a funny look and said, "To have guilt, you have to be doing something wrong and think it's wrong. Do you think what we're doing is wrong?" "No," I replied solidly, "But other people would; like Megan probably." Em got thoughtful for a while. She then spoke slowly and definitely, "Matthew, I don't ever want you to lie about us to anyone." She stopped walking and stood in front of me. "Guilt comes from lies and deceit. I don't want that for you, Megan, or me. If that means this all comes out somehow, and there are bad feelings, then so be it. If it means we have to end our relationship, then so be it. Above all, let's value the truth through all we'll go through." After digesting her statement I said, "Em, you are profound." She smiled at me and we kissed in the chilly ocean air. Chapter 4 I stood beside Megan mesmerized as I watched the doctor catch the bloody and rubbery body of a baby that seemed to almost explode from her vagina. Megan was squeezing my hand, which by now was almost numb from the pressure. I'd alternated between feeding her small shavings of ice and rubbing her back during contractions. The doctor looked up with a smile on his face; "Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Carter, you have a lovely baby girl to add to your family." He paused and reminded us, "Don't worry about the blood; that's just from the episiotomy." The baby made a gurgling sound and then her tentative and protesting cry of being in this world. He held the naked creature up as a nurse dabbed with a washcloth at some of the fluids covering her purplish body. He looked at the clock and further pronounced in pleased tone, "This young lady entered the world at exactly 3:33 p.m. on April 24, 1985." The doctor handed the baby over to a nurse with great care. The nurse wrapped the baby in a towel of some kind and carried her to an adjacent table to clean her. I studied every detail with the practiced eye of an engineer. I thought this was bioengineering in its highest form. I'd been present at the birth of my first daughter too; even given that, this was momentous occasion. Dr. Charles Budray spoke authoritatively to Megan; "Now, just one more large push and we'll get the placenta too." Still holding Megan's hand, I could feel her bear down in a final push to expel her insides. Assisted by the doctor, a mass of bloody pulp popped from her birth canal into a stainless steel dish a second nurse held beneath the vaginal opening. The doctor pawed through the dark red mass of tissue, and then nodded his acceptance to the nurse who walked away with the waste. Megan still clutched my hand tightly in hers. She gave me a wan smile. Perspiration ran down both cheeks even though the operating room was cool. I leaned in and kissed her on the forehead. "You did well, Megan, very well," I told her. "Well, we're not doing that again!" She expounded loudly. Even the nurse looked surprised with her emphatic statement. I nodded acceptance of the edict. Years before, we'd plotted out the timetable for our ideal family. We were on right on target with children. This was our second child. Eleanor Beth Carter had been born two years earlier. We'd agreed to name this girl Sarah Alice Carter. Both girls had one of their grandmother's names as their middle name. Two Loves Pt. 02 The doctor glanced up from suturing Megan's episiotomy. She winced once and squeezed my hand tightly one more time. "Sorry," he exclaimed. "Almost done." "Not quite," Megan quipped to the doctor in a sassy tone. "You need to snip my husband's tubes." I made a gesture with my free hand to cover my pubic region from assault. Dr. Charles Budray laughed. He said, "Megan, you bring him around the office someday soon and we'll take care of that. Today is all about you." The vasectomy was also part of our family plan. The nurse had swaddled the baby and brought the small bundle over to us. She placed her in Megan's outstretched arms. The baby immediately started the instinctive motions of searching for a breast to suckle. Megan looked surprised. Dr. Budray was not only our family doctor, and in this case the man we'd asked to deliver our two children, he was also Megan's boss. For the past five years, she'd been his Physician's Assistant; working in both his Wellesley office as well as a clinic he ran in Roxbury a day and a half a week. After he completed his work on Megan, he reached for the baby. "Let's see what we've got here," He said. With great care he unwrapped the squirming baby atop Megan's stomach, examining every inch of her body and gently pushing and prodding here and there on the small torso. He made a few motions over her feet and back testing reflexes. In three quick moves he had swaddled the baby again and put her back in Megan's arms. "I think this one is as perfect as Eleanor was," he announced. Megan and I both breathed a sigh of relief. "You guys make good, healthy babies." He paused and looked around at the nurses, who stood ready to attend to Megan. He told them, "Take good care of her; she's more valuable to me than my right hand." He turned to Megan and said, "I'm going to clean up and see a couple of other patients. I'll check in on you before I leave the hospital." With that he stretched to his full six-foot-six-inch height and left the operating room at a brisk walk. One of the nurses finished covering Megan and adjusting the gurney she'd birthed on. "We'll keep you on this until you're back in your room. Right now, you go to post-delivery care for a couple of hours, just to be sure everything's all right – you know the drill." She turned to me and said, "You can get out of the scrubs, if you want and rejoin your wife." I nodded. We'd walked through all the stages of birth and recovery again only weeks before, even though this was our second child. Before I left the room, I paused and looked back at Megan and the baby. She cosseted the sleeping newborn to her breast in a maternal and protective gesture. A wave of relief and gratitude swept through me. I was so glad Megan and Sarah Alice were unscathed by the birthing process. Beyond that, I felt lucky to have this family and the love we shared. I captured the moment in a mental snapshot to share with her later, or even share in four months time when we had our ninth anniversary. I went down the hall and changed out of the scrubs the hospital had provided me. Before I went to Megan, I found a pay phone and made three calling card calls: first to Megan's mother, who waited anxiously with Eleanor at our home for word of the delivery. Second, I called my mother who was also pacing around my house waiting to hear about her new granddaughter. Lastly, I called Emma to let her know all had gone well. In her own way, each woman was excited about the birth and cheered us both on with sighs of relief that the birth was over and congratulations. As I walked down the hospital corridor from the men's locker room to find Megan, I thought of the years we'd been together. Except for nine months after we got married, Megan was always immersed in her medical career: first, as a student for three years working towards her degree and certificate as Physician's Assistant, and then for the past five years as Dr. Budray's PA. Megan was exceptional and the kind of person you'd want on your side. She constantly studied. Any undiagnosed patient bothered her. She sometimes kept unusual hours to cater to a patient, and she'd even made an occasional house call, particularly for pediatric cases she'd been asked to oversee. Budray had given her more and more responsibility as she proved herself. He often told me she was better with patients than he was. Megan would laugh in self-derision, but we all knew he was right. She cared more for the patients and often was more emotionally involved in their outcomes than her aging boss. I was proud of Megan and told her often. She basked in my praise as well as the comments of others. Given that she'd sought to separate herself from a life as a housewife, I thought she'd moved about as far in the other direction as she could go yet still have children. With two robust incomes, Megan and I had bought a house in Wellesley about four years earlier. The sprawling contemporary was a block away from a local college in one of the nicer neighborhoods. The college proved to be a source of smart young women that were more than willing to babysit for a two year old. Most days, when she worked at Dr. Budray's Wellesley office, Megan was only about five minutes from home. I rated our marriage 'average' in terms of our compatibility and disagreements. Our two-career marriage quickly ended the honeymoon period. Megan and I were initially wrapped up in our work or studies. Consequently, the growing intimacy between the two of us rapidly found a plateau and then slowly solidified around our professional lives. We both found fault with the hours the other put into their work or study. Getting in sync was a lot harder than talking about it. Oddly enough, when I was traveling Megan never complained. I attributed this to the fact that she could then come and go as she pleased, with no issue about having to sync with my schedule. It was only when I was nearby, worked late, and was a few minutes from home, that she found fault with my schedule and attention. From my point of view, Megan spent an inordinate amount of time at the college: taking classes, working in one of the labs, or doing practical work with patients at one of the clinics where she interned. Her studies spilled over into the evening, and more than once she found me asleep in bed by the time she got home. We tried to sync my long days to hers, but I'd no sooner learn her schedule well enough than it would change, and we'd have to start all over again. After the arrival of Eleanor, I made more of an effort to be home at what Megan agreed was a reasonable hour. For her first year and half, I didn't know what to do with Eleanor, however, as she hit the two year old mark, she seemed to know 'Daddy' and sit still long enough for me to read a story to her sister and her at bedtime. At least at this stage, she was an easy child. Megan's other complaints often stemmed from my inattention to a list of small projects around the new house. After the umpteenth time the issue came up, I found a home handyman that came by periodically to work on our home improvement and fix-it list. The young man's work seemed to mollify Megan and things went back to being peaceful again. Megan and I struggled with intimacy. As an engineer and more recently a software designer, I knew I did not have the romantic gene in my body. Consequently, I became a student of techniques to foster our relationship, particularly in a romantic way. As promised, Emma was a valuable source of ideas and information in this arena. At her prompting, I learned where the local florist and greeting card stores were. I kept a calendar of 'special' dates, always trying to conjure up a new one when the time looked right. She'd also prompt me to do a 'date night' with Megan from time to time. On the nights when I did get home at a reasonable hour and when Megan wasn't wrapped up in classes, a lab, or study group, we'd enjoy a few hours together in rich conversation. Mostly, we shared what was going at our work or studies, or we negotiated some balancing act between our two families, particularly in terms of the moms seeing and caring for our children Sarah and Eleanor. We both had siblings that provided a source of conversation as well, and Megan maintained her interest in the arts, albeit at a greatly reduced level due to her commitment to school. Both our mothers decided that they wanted to spend at least an afternoon a week babysitting. Often, we slid the day around to fit my travel or Megan's academic schedule. In any case, they made it easier to work with other childcare arrangements, such as the college girls. I had started to lobby for us to get a more mature nanny or au pair on a full time basis. We could afford it, and we had the room in the house for another adult; any spontaneous lovemaking that might have suffered had long ago faded away as a pleasant memory. Mark Dalton, one of my long time friends from work, knew Megan and me well enough to have watched the quelling of the romantic fire in the marriage, particularly after the kids came along. He was at the same stage of things with his wife and family. One day, he groused about life to me: "Don't you feel gypped? You find this hot babe and marry her, and then you destroy each other, the love disappears, the kids and house suck up all your attention, and the world feels like shit." Usually optimistic, I found his rhetorical question surprising. Although I answered him with some platitudes, Mark's venting caught my attention. That afternoon and into the evening as I played alone with Sarah and Eleanor, I studied whether I felt 'gypped' as Mark had put it. Maybe I was the cockeyed optimist at that point; however, I saw where we were in our marriage as just one of many stages we'd already gone through or would go through in the coming years. I already viewed our marriage like living entity – something that ebbed and flowed over time; Megan and I had even talked about how our tides shifted from year to year. If we were having a down time, I knew we'd have a good time sometime soon. I thought things were seldom in balance. Instead, we moved around in some crazy dance with each other and all the other things impacting our lives, shifting our attention to the places that needed it most. I acknowledged that our relationship was just one of those areas requiring attention. There were many other relationships to focus on: Megan's parents, my parents, her siblings, my siblings, her friends, my friends, our friends, her work, my work, and on and on – including Emma. We could get dysfunctional about our marriage, and rant and rave about being 'gypped,' or we could choose to roll with the things buffeting us and not let them upset our relationship. Another friend had shared with me a quote by Otis Maxfield, 'Fate is what life deals you; destiny is what you do with it.' I could live with that. I resolved to share my thinking with Mark the next day. When the two of us sat down for lunch and started to talk, Mark confessed to me of a recent fling he'd had with one of the admin assistants in the company. I was numb struck. Mark never struck me as the kind to play around. He confessed it was a sexual thing; there'd been no love or caring in the 'one-night stand.' He felt guilty about the deed, yet rationalizing it because so much of his family life sucked, as he put it. For a brief instant I thought of telling Mark about Emma; however, I wisely paused and said nothing. Emma remained my private secret. As I listened to Mark talk, I realized how few similarities there were between his liaison and my ten-year relationship with Em. I had never gone to Em because I was mad at or had fallen out of love with Megan; to the contrary, I loved Megan. Emma and I deeply loved each other too; we were an event in an alternate reality called the west coast; I still felt no guilt over the affair – it was just something to be carefully managed so that no one got hurt; and lastly, there'd been no lying about the relationship – I just let it happen the way it did each time we met. Like Mark and the secretary, we had a sexual relationship; however, my relationship with Em went so much deeper than that. As I thought about Em, my mind drifted three thousand miles away. I reflected a moment, until Mark snapped his fingers in front of my eyes. "Helloooooo!" He echoed. "Earth to Matt, earth to Matt. You in there?" He grinned at me. I shook my head and rejoined the discussion. If he thought anything of my reverie, he didn't mention it. Three years prior, I'd pulled off a bit of coup at work. After several years of research and development on database technology, as well as becoming exceptionally well informed about this industry segment and its future, I orchestrated the sale of my entire group, including the computing center, to a recently formed company called Oracle Corporation. The company was named after their primary product, the Oracle Database – a product developed for the CIA while the founders were at Ampex Corporation. Oracle was based in Redwood City, California, down the street from Ampex where they'd initially worked on the database. It's CEO was Larry Ellison, an entrepreneur I'd met many times in my work for Digital Devices. Oracle was at the leading edge of software technology, right where my group and I wanted to be. Instead of competing, we joined up. By the time of my group's sale, I had a pile of stock options in Digital Devices. Because of the success of the sale for the firm, they honored the options. I made a lot of money overnight, enough to buy the Wellesley house outright, as well as some vacation property on a lake in Maine. In the deal, I got myself named as head of the Boston area subsidiary with a sterling compensation package. Nominally, I reported to the CEO; in fact, I became my own business unit president. Megan was very proud of me. At thirty-two, I'd achieved a great deal. My database group, including the computing center, moved out of the Digital Devices building shortly after the sale. We got our own offices in Burlington, Massachusetts, right along Route 128. We also started to hire. Six months later, I had about seventy people reporting to me. I was the youngest subsidiary head in Oracle. A year later, the number of staff in my subsidiary had risen to two hundred. My travel schedule called for a trip a month to the west coast. Occasionally, there'd be some other conference or special meeting to attend, but usually those trips only involved a day or two rather than the five or six days I usually spent on the coast. Since I was such a regular out there, I decided to have the company rent a studio apartment for me; it worked out to be less expensive than staying at many of the acceptable motels. The condominum seemed like a piece of home to me after a while, and I could leave clothing and toiletries there. I gave Em a key. Chapter 5 Emma and I sat at dinner in a little bistro near Stanford University. The place had a few students and professorial looking people in it. We both liked the collegiate atmosphere around the campus; so on many of my trips, we'd go to the campus area near her condominium and walk around. This small Italian restaurant had become a favorite of ours over the years. The owners even knew us by name and always greeted us with enthusiasm. We traded stories about our day's work with each other. I'd been in meetings all day about the development of package software solutions atop the Oracle database that an increasing number of my customers in the New England area wanted. We had so many opportunities, I found it difficult to set priorities on which directions to go. My colleagues from other areas were having the same problems. More resources! We all wanted more people and product improvements. Emma had gotten in on the ground floor at Verbatim twelve years prior. You could count the people in the world that knew more than she about magnetic digital storage media on one hand, and she was a best friend to all of them. Further, she distinguished herself as an R&D engineer, becoming a vice president in the young company. Over the meal, Em had talked about Verbatim's acquisition by Eastman Kodak several months earlier. The company had been having a rough time in the highly competitive media market, not helped in the least by a continuing parade of manufacturing problems. Now, they had a different label; however, she told me, the quality control problems showed no sign of improvement. Em had been working with her team on how to reliably manufacture three-and-a-half-inch floppy disks with twice the memory capacity. She toyed with a diskette as we lingered over dinner, almost as though she find some inspiration by contact with the product. She said, "It's a chicken and egg situation again, and there are some bad hens out there. We've got to be manufacturing the disks before the companies like Seagate will start manufacturing the drives for computers. That's when the price breaks will make it worthwhile to upgrade. The worst thing right now; however, is that we've got to get our quality control in hand." I asked, "But when can I get a disk with a hundred megabytes or a gigabyte capacity. Are we that far away?" She responded, "In terms of a hard disk, you know you have a hundred megs in your computer now, it's just not removable media. The industry is on its own version of Moore's Law with this stuff. You'll have a hard drive with a gigabyte around a decade from now, and a hundred gigs a decade after that. We seem to be improving a hundred fold each decade, at least with magnetic media." She spun the plastic floppy drive between her two hands. She said, "The days for these are numbered. The replacement will be compact disks or CDs, and probably some denser format beyond those. The music guys are getting a whole album on one CD; that's about a 600-megabyte capacity, but re-write capabilities are limited. We'll have our brand on the market soon, but the drives are the issue. The burners are pricy, but they'll get cheaper over time. Initially, they'll only allow you to burn once, but sometime in the '90s you'll be able to do read and write and re-write on CDs." We kicked around the implications of the various technologies. As storage capacities exploded over time, so many limitations of computers would disappear, portability would increase dramatically, and data synchronization would become an issue, at least within businesses. I thought of being able to put some of the entire databases we worked with on one disk. Now, that would be an accomplishment. We settled up dinner and then took a stroll through the campus. There was a natural competition between MIT and Stanford, so I launched into a length discourse to Emma about how I was a spy from the east coast sent here to learn all the secrets of the school so we could overtake then in the rankings. The rankings were a bit of a farce; yet I knew the schools drew great esteem if they were ahead of the other. In any case, Caltech remained atop all of the technical universities. Em and I walked the two miles back to her condominium. She told me, "Management is talking about moving me over to manufacturing." After a long silence while I digested that point, she added, "It'd mean I'd have to move to Charlotte, North Carolina." "Wow," I said trying to be enthusiastic about her move. "I've never been to Charlotte. I hear it's nice." My stomach had tightened into a knot. Not only had I never been to Charlotte, but I had no reason to be within several hundred miles of there. If Em moved there, it'd be tantamount to ending our comfortable relationship. I gave her a tentative smile, wondering if she'd thought about that aspect of a reassignment. A thousand other questions rushed through my head. Two Loves Pt. 02 Another long silence ensued before Em said with a wry smile, "I'm going to turn them down. It means I'll probably lose my job." "Em ...?" "I'm turning down the move because if I go to Charlotte I'd never get to see you again ... or maybe only once or twice a year. It'd make things difficult. I know you're going to have to keep coming out to California for a while, and if I stay here, I'll still get to see you every few weeks." She gave me a smile and squeezed my hand, "I'm just trying to stay close to my boyfriend. Charlotte wouldn't let that happen." "Where would you work? The job market's not all that good right now, is it?" "There are lots of places still hiring around here, particularly proven engineers. I was thinking I'd look around anyway. The continuing hiccups at Verbatim are starting to get to me." We walked into the condo holding hands. I knew I could always be romantic with Emma and that she'd appreciate it. Boyfriends did that kind of thing. She still liked to use that word when she referred to me. I'd long ago given up the discussion about my inadequacies in that role: because I was anchored to the east coat, married, the father of two, and because I couldn't do all the things I thought a boyfriend ought to do for a girlfriend. She rebuffed my comments with a puff of air – a harrumph of dismissal at the ideas. We made love as we always did once we were settled in her condo. In our afterglow, Em lay with her head on my chest wrapped in my arms. I told her, "Em, I love you very much. When you first told me about Charlotte ... well, I felt tears in my eyes and a bad feeling in my gut. If you have to take a job like that, we'll find a way to make this still work." Emma leaned up and kissed me tenderly. She said, "I love you too. I'm committed to you silly, and I know you're committed to me ... and we're both committed to Megan, even if she doesn't know about me. Commitment is about making choices that preserve the relationship. In this case, we all want to preserve the balance of things. Staying with Verbatim would make things go out of balance. The choice is to leave the Big V and find another job. I could float and do nothing for a while too; I have money to sustain a float for a while." "Thank you," I whispered to her as my hand moved to rekindle the carnal pleasures we'd enjoyed a while earlier. I leaned in and kissed her breasts, sucking the nearby breast. Emma moaned and pushed up into me; she clearly liked the direction I'd taken our conversation. Soon, we were both involved in a second round of sexual pleasure. When we were cuddling again in our feelings of love for each other, Em asked softly, "Are you doing well inside ... you know emotionally? The last few times we've been together, you've talked about work so much I've been wondering if you're avoiding some other issues." I thought for a while. Em knew I'd heard her and had gone into analysis mode. I started slowly, "Em, I love you, and I love Megan. You seem content with our limited time together, and I wish I could give you more. In the meantime, Megan has moved into her own world surrounded by patients, the clinic, and keeping up with modern medicine; between her work and the kids, I'm just feeling like I've moved to the back of the priority list." Em sat cross-legged next to me. Her posture proved highly distracting given her nudity. "Well, Matthew Carter, let me remind you that you are my highest priority. But, and don't take this the wrong way, I wouldn't want you around all the time." She reached and took one of my hands and held it in hers against her breast. I could feel her erect nipple. She went on before I could say anything, "I'm glad there's a Megan in your life, as well as an Eleanor and a Sarah. They're my family. I live vicariously, like normal people, through you having a growing family. Every time you share some little family thing you've done, I'm grateful in at least three ways. First, I'm glad you feel you can be open with me about your 'other' life; second, I find joy in sharing the experience with you. The more colorful and detailed you make it, the more it's like I was there. I like that. And third, I'm thankful that I don't have to go through the experience to feel it. Isn't that silly, I like to hear about it, but not experience it." I started to say something, but Emma put a finger on my lips. "I'm not finished yet," She told me sternly. She gathered her thoughts and then went on, "Megan has picked a tough profession, and she's good at. Her inattention to you is temporary. If anything, the two of you are in a dance where you both work hard at your jobs and parenting, and then expect the relationship to remain romantic. It won't; that's life. Rest assured, that if you were living here and we were married, we'd have the same kind of relationship you have with Megan. You'd fly to the east coast once a month and have your romantic time with Megan." She laughed and added, "Maybe, this time, when you go home, you should think that's what's going on." I laughed and said, "I'll try it." "Now, what else bothers you," Em asked. "If you and I were married, would you want me to feel guilty over having an affair with Megan?" Em said, "Deep question. Are you having guilt feelings?" "Every now and then. To be honest, I have my life compartmentalized. When I'm with you, I'm the boyfriend. After ten years or so, we have our own vocabulary, our rituals, our sacred areas, and areas we avoid with each other. We're in my west coast compartment now. The east coast compartment contains Megan, the kids, our parents, and circle of friends. My roles there include husband, father, son, son, friend, and so forth. We speak another language back there, and have different rituals, sacred cows, and taboos." She asked, "So, if things stay in their boxes, you don't feel guilty?" "Usually," I replied thoughtfully. "Sometimes, something happens that reminds me of both worlds, like that time when my friend Mark confessed that he'd had a series of one night stands. Completely different, and no love involved, but it reminded me that I live in two worlds at the same time. What bothered him most was being labeled a 'cheater.' That label bothers me too; yet somehow this doesn't feel like cheating. I just happen to be in love with two women, and one just happens to know about the other." After a pause and some kisses, Em asked, "Have you ever told anybody about us?" "No; no one. How about you?" "A few people at work know I have a boyfriend. I also told my sister a couple of years ago. She was worried I was a lesbian. She asks every now and then about you, and I tell her about what we've done – the dates we've been on. She's been great – not judgmental about my seeing a married man, but she always reminds me that she doesn't want to see me hurt." "After these years together, do you see this heading someplace that will give you pain?" I felt concerned. "No. If it stopped tomorrow, I'd still be the most grateful person on the planet because I had a all this time with you." I leaned in and kissed her. I said, "We're both in our mid-thirties. Supposedly your biological clock is ticking very loudly about now. Do you want to have children? If we don't do something about that, will you feel hurt?" "God, no!" Em exclaimed. "That's one of the primary reasons I like watching you and your kids from three thousand miles away. I'm not a kid person, except to hear about it from someone else; same with my nephew and niece. Moreover, the thought of childbirth scares the hell out of me, not helped I might add by your detailed descriptions of the birthing process for Eleanor and Sarah. Ugh!" We both laughed, yet I felt some pang of the past deep in Emma, a part of her she'd not shared with me. Perhaps it was in her tone of voice. Even though her parents lived an hour's drive away, I knew she seldom saw them. Yet, when she spoke of them, it was always with affection and pride. Her father had just retired and her mother had stopped working full time. Her sister's family lived in Texas, and again, despite the blood relationship they seldom saw each other. The conversation turned to blander topics, and then the kiss of sleep sealed the night. Two Loves Pt. 03 Chapter 6 I mumbled something that must have been intelligible into the telephone. It was dark in the bedroom. "Hello, Is Dr. Carter there? I'm sorry to be calling so late -- or rather so early, but one of her maternity patients just checked in at the hospital. She's probably an hour from delivering, and we need her down here." I passed the phone to Megan who groaned sleepily as she listened to the obstetrical nurse at Newton-Wellesley Hospital explain the situation to her. She got out of bed and shuffled off to the bathroom. I cranked one eye open and glanced at the clock beside our bed; the digital dial showed it was 4:12 a.m. As Megan dressed, she said a few words to me. "I won't be back until dinner time. I was scheduled to do rounds around six-thirty anyway, so I'll just stay at the hospital and then go to the office. This baby may interfere with that anyway. Bye Hon." She gave me a peck on my cheek. She was alert, just the way you'd want the doctor to be who was about to deliver your baby. A few minutes later, I heard the garage door go up and down as she pulled away from the house. The hospital was ten minutes away. Being married to a female doctor is a unique experience. For instance, we'd occasionally book dinner reservations as Mr. and Dr. Carter, but every place turned it around assuming I was the physician when it's Megan. Being an OB-GYN, she gets calls at all hours of the day and night, weekends included. There's no time off. Not all the nurses or patients know that Dr. Carter is a woman, and they'll launch into symptoms with me on the phone before I can stop them. Usually, I don't want to know the symptoms. After five years as a physician's assistant, Megan decided she wanted to be the 'real deal,' as she called it. It took her three more years to get her M.D., and then a year as an intern and another year as a resident. Fortunately, she'd been able to do her studies, internship, and residency within thirty miles of our Massachusetts home. Now, she was the OB-GYN doctor in a family practice with ten other physicians, her older friend and mentor Dr. Budray being one of them, although she told me he wanted to retire and move to Florida. From the time we married twenty years earlier, Megan had been driven by a need to excel in the medical field. At first, she'd thought she'd become a nurse practitioner, but then she aspired to be a physician's assistant. After working at that job for five years, she started going back to school to become a full-fledged doctor. She already knew the specialty she wanted based on her family practice work with her mentor. Even with the obstetrical and gynecological practice, she continued to work at the clinic in Boston. She also worked doing clinical trials with a couple of pharmaceutical companies, and she was doing research on drug treatment of post-partum depressions. In the latter area, she'd already published four papers in peer-reviewed journals, one being the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine. While the bulk of Megan's hours were spent professionally, somehow she still managed to find time for the girls -- Eleanor or 'El' as she wanted to be called, and Sarah. They were now twelve and ten, respectively. Megan was not a soccer mom, chauffeuring the girls from their private school to a sports game or the mall and then to friend's homes. She emphasized 'quality time' with the girls, often taking them to some cultural event or taking them to lunch if they weren't in school. We'd also added a nanny to the family: Esmeralda Sanchez or Izzy as she had us call her. She was an older Hispanic woman, recently widowed by her second husband. Izzy cooked and cleaned around the house, and also proved to be a skilled chauffeur getting the girls from one event to another on their busy schedules. Of course, our life style had ratcheted up again as our careers advanced, the girls grew, and we added live-in help to the clan. Consequently, we bought a larger home in Wellesley, one with a separate apartment for Izzy over the garage. My job at Oracle remained unchanged; however, the challenges of the high-tech marketplace multiplied many fold and continued to be a daily challenge. Based on my bonuses, stock options, and feedback from my peers and boss, I was doing an outstanding job running the northeast operations for the company. Our initial forays at forging partnerships with the big consulting firms had paid off handsomely over the past decade. This was a personal pet project, and one with which I took some risks a decade earlier. I'd given extensive education to the consultants in the big accounting firms for free, figuring if they were smart about the Oracle software and how to use it, they'd recommend it for their clients. My 'bet' paid off handsomely and moved me into being one of the top earners in the company in record time. My travel had also increased during the decade. I helped get the same kind of consultant's education program going in our other regions. While doing this, we also overhauled our national accounts management, and I ended up leading that effort as well. One of the mellowing factors in my life was that I had the secret relationship with Emma. I think some of my colleagues on the west coast thought me strange for passing up social opportunities after work with them. I did participate occasionally -- just enough to take the edge off their curiosity. A few people in the company knew the company had bought me a pied-à-terre on the outskirts of Redwood City; however, no one sought me out there. I didn't even get a telephone. Instead, I relied on the cellular service so I could catch any incoming call regardless of where I was. My secretary was the only person that called me routinely, often a dozen times a day. Given the time differences between the east and west coasts, her calls to the west coasts usually ceased around three or four o'clock in the afternoon. My reputation in the company was that of a doer, a go-getter, the go-to guy, and a bit of a goody goody. When I heard someone's opinion verge on the latter trait, I often smiled to myself at my own secret -- the Secret of Emma. A day never went by that I didn't think of both Megan and Emma with love and affection. Given my travel schedule and Megan's 'doctoring' schedule, there were some months I saw more of Emma than I did of my wife. My relationship with the two women had stabilized and matured. I'd been with Emma for twenty-two years and married to Megan for twenty. My friend and colleague Kevin O'Conner had remarried years earlier and tried to achieve some stability in his personal life. Although we didn't work together as much as we had, every couple of weeks we had a steak and beer dinner near our office. We were both forty-five. Kevin confessed he was in the midst of a colossal mid-life crisis that he was trying to hide from his wife and stepchildren -- both in their teens. He wasn't sure he should stay with Oracle, yet he'd accomplished so much and was one of the top executives in the company. His kids were typical teens, yet he was having trouble coping with them. He was backtracking on whether he should have gotten married again. He recited a list of typical physical changes associated with midlife: slowing sex life, receding hairline, occasional panic attacks, and anxiety. "I think there's more I want to accomplish, but I'm not sure where or how," He told me. "I feel held back. I want to do something wild, but I did so much of that when I was younger. And, I certainly don't want to damage my marriage again; been there, done that -- very painful." I provided an empathetic ear to his plights, noting that he'd recently purchased a used Corvette, symbolic of his quest for change and new satisfaction in his life. One night as Megan and I shared a late supper, both of us having put in fourteen-hour days, I mentioned Kevin's struggles to her. I wondered if she'd come across anything like this in her research, perhaps knowing of some pharmacological solution to his anxiety and unease. Much to my surprise, Megan laughed. "Most men say they have a midlife crisis," She declared with mirth. "It's part of the transition from youth to maturity. I'm surprised you're not feeling the same way. When you do, you'll want a sports car, a mistress, a tattoo, and a motorcycle, amongst other things -- and not necessarily in that order." She looked over her reading glasses at me and added, "Just please come home once in a while to me, El, Sarah, and Izzy." She laughed again and went back to her meal. My heart skipped a beat when Megan taunted me with having a mistress. I'm sure I looked horrified and hoped I'd hidden my reaction inside my desire not to have a crisis. Megan continued to snicker at the idea of me also indulging in a crisis. After a moment, the doctor part of her personality kicked in, and she said, "Women have midlife crises too. Mine probably came early; it was my rallying cry to become a physician when I could have sat back and been a dilettante of the arts and lover of chocolates and tea every afternoon. More typically, women have their crisis when the last of their children leave home -- the empty nest syndrome we call it. Other causes, for men and women, might be the death of a beloved parent or a hiccup in their career." "Am I doomed to have one?" I asked, trying to veil my reaction a moment earlier. "No. The really deep psychological crisis, with remorse over unaccomplished goals, a search for something indefinite, anxieties, alcoholism, sports cars, affairs, divorces, and marrying a trophy wife, only affect about one in five. A much higher percentage feels something, but not the depth or longevity of the crisis. They last longer in men than women, however." Megan looked at me with her fork poised in midair, "If you aren't planning one, you have a pretty good chance of avoiding it. Tell your friend Kevin, to shift his focus outside himself, and he'll probably be able to duck the bullet. If he wallows in it, it'll never let go of him." Now I laughed, but I promised to pass the message along to Kevin. A few days later, I did, and a few days after that I was on an airplane back to the west coast. On the plane, I ruminated about my life again, particularly the role that Emma and Megan played in it. While a Porsche might be nice and something I might even look into when I got home, the fact was I'd had a mistress for longer than my entire marriage -- over twenty years. I confessed to myself my love of the two women. I could conjure up resentments and inattention with Megan; however, I was more at fault than she was. I could even resent Emma; after all, she'd been the aggressor and purposefully made herself so attractive in our early years together that any path other than the one I chose now seemed impossible to contemplate. I had been physically attracted to both women, and now two decades later remained that way to the exclusion of others. Megan's work impacted our sexual intimacy more than I liked, but at this stage in our lives that factor seemed less important than a decade earlier. I saw an article in a book while I was browsing in a bookstore; it said that affairs don't necessary happen because of sexual attraction. After our initial foray into that territory, even Emma and I cooled. On some visits I had with Emma, it was the warmth and comfort of each other's company we sought rather than the torrid sexual romps someone might envision. More than the physical side, I remained emotionally involved -- attached -- to each. I couldn't end my life with either one. I would be incomplete and probably incapable of continuing in some new the way that didn't include both of them. I thought I'd become open about my feelings, more so in the past decade. Given my preoccupation with work, there was little I held back from either woman. I didn't vent to Emma about Megan; those were personal things for me to deal with. I had kept Emma a secret all to myself. The more I thought, the more I realized that I hadn't become as open about my dreams, thoughts, and feelings as I'd credited myself with a few moments earlier. There was a part of me -- a large part of me -- that I didn't share with anyone. I regretted that. The more I thought and accepted that shortcoming in my own personality, the more I regretted not opening up more to Megan or Emma. What did I think they'd do? Was I that fearful of their rebuke or criticism? Good grief, at work I'd fought battles that would have made Napoleon cringe. Megan was analytical and clinical when I'd brought her problems. She was a superb thought partner, but she didn't have a deep understanding of the high tech area I'd risen and worked in all these years, any more than I had an in depth understanding of the pressures and work she did. Emma knew the high tech area, and she often was unusually insightful about office politics not to mention the interactions between companies. She also understood contemporary relationships and more often than not, urged me deeper and more completely into my relationship with Megan. I don't believe it was self-sacrifice on her part; she loved me and fully accepted the fact that I loved two women. With Emma, I could raise what I called the craziness of the situation I'd propagated all these years. She understood. She was the one that told me, "There is no normal. Normal is what you make it; what Megan makes it. If you don't like 'normal,' change it -- you did change it all those years ago. You broke out of the meme that demanded you be a couple to the exclusion of all others." The flight attendant brought me another glass of wine, and I thanked her. She paused to see if I wanted to make conversation. The first-class seat beside me was empty. When I returned to my reverie, she faded away down the aisle. Normal. Loving two women wasn't normal. Then, I thought of the women I'd 'loved' -- my mother, wife, daughters, and Emma. For years, I hadn't examined the differences in the love I felt for each of them. My mind scolded me: only two were relevant to this meditation -- Megan and Emma. I flitted between the two of them inside my mind -- analyzing, testing, weighing, questioning, ... The scales never wavered from the position I'd set decades earlier. I loved them both, equally and without equivocation. I wondered about the future. Could I project the trajectory of our lives as we went another twenty years in the future? I'd be about sixty-five and ready to retire. What would that be like? Would both women still have a role in my life? It pained me to think otherwise. Two Loves Pt. 03 We dispersed to the various bedrooms after kisses, hugs, and handshakes goodnight. Megan and I went into the master bedroom, and I began my nighttime rituals getting ready for bed. As I puttered around putting on what passed for pajamas for me -- running shorts and a t-shirt, I became aware that Megan sat on the edge of the bed watching me. I looked at her and asked, "You coming to bed or are you in the middle of some hot medical journal?" I smiled. Megan shook her head and patted the bed beside her. "No. No journals tonight. Just come sit with me for a minute. I have something to share." She sounded serious. I went to her and put my arms around her. "What's up?" I asked as I sat on the bed and put my arm around her. "Matt," She started, suddenly in a broken and choked voice, so different from the party voice she'd had for the past six hours, "I'm sick -- very sick -- very very sick." She looked up at me, with tears streaming down her face, and then broke into uncontrollable sobs. This wasn't at all like my professional wife that had seen it all. For years, she'd been the rock of the family with a will of iron and the mental strength of Titan. Now, suddenly, something was very wrong for her to be reacting this way. I hugged her close and kissed the side of her head. I used my forefinger to wipe the tracks of her tears from her cheeks. "Hey," I said looking into her eyes, "We can work at getting you well. What kind of sick are we talking about? What do we need to do? What's happening?" "I ... I ... I have a rare kind of leukemia," She sobbed. "It's not good. I found out Tuesday -- part of my annual check-up -- and then a few more lab tests. I've spent a lot of time the past three days verifying the diagnosis and looking at options." She paused and looked up into my face, her eyes red and running, "Oh Matt, I love you so." I hugged her tight. I said, "I'll stop work. We'll put all our focus on getting you well. We'll do whatever it takes." Megan shook her head. Her crying slowed, and she spoke in her doctoring voice: "There's no 'getting well' from this; it's fatal." Her remark hit me so hard I recoiled; my body lurched against here. I was stunned. I was going to lose Megan. "How fatal? How much time ... I mean, what's the prognosis?" "Five to nine months at this point -- maybe a little longer." Megan put her head in her hands as I rubbed her back and then pulled her into my lap. We cried together for a long time. She explained she had a complication of chronic lymphocytic leukemia known as Richter's syndrome. I didn't understand a lot of what she told me about the disease, but I did understand that she had it, and it was going to kill her, most likely within a year. There was no cure; there was no mitigating treatment. We told the children on Saturday morning, amid another round of crying and anguish over the potential loss of my wife and their mother. Practically everywhere I looked that morning, there were tear soaked tissues. About the only thing positive I saw come out of the weekend was that Eleanor and Craig decided unilaterally to move up the date of their wedding to December -- near Christmas -- to be sure that Megan could attend in a state of reasonably good health. Monday, I went to the office with Megan, and we met for an hour with her colleague, Richard Creech. Megan started the meeting by imploring Dick to hold nothing back, and to not sugar coat the situation for us. Dick, as he told me to call him, was an oncology specialist and had many years of experience treating leukemia patients. His credentials aside, he was direct and not very hopeful about Megan's prognosis. His description of Megan's decline over the coming months depressed us further. While I got lost here and there in the medical terminology, the rapid physical decline of Megan's abilities over the coming months from this disease was well documented. He urged us to see at least two other oncologists; he had one of the secretaries in his office set up the appointments. Based on her being an 'insider,' she got one appointment for that afternoon. Several of the other staff and doctors spoke to Megan as we left the office, extending their concern and hope for a better diagnosis. She'd worked with some of these people for over twenty years. Dr. Ray Zuchovsky was the chief oncologist at Mass General Hospital. While his entire persona exuded an air of 'trust me' and 'I'm the most skilled person in this area you'll ever meet,' his office demeanor was polite and solicitous. He'd personally gone over the blood and other lab work. While we were in his office, he drew another blood sample from Megan and shipped it off to the hospital's laboratory for immediate processing. Zuchovsky agreed to the letter with Creech's diagnosis. Megan had Richter's syndrome. That night we talked about the different ways she could move forward from this point. She could probably get about two more months of work in before she'd have to curtail her medical practice. Curative treatments were futile in the long run, yet in rare cases slowed the progression of the disease and extended the morbidity prior to death. Pallative care would eventually be called for as the debilitating effects of the disease became evident. The following Monday, Megan started chemotherapy in the oncology center at the Newton-Wellesley Hospital. Although Megan had hoped to continue working for a couple more months, the three-days a week chemo regime forced her to give up anything resembling a normal life. Megan started the treatment with a fair amount of energy; she was almost asymptomatic to the disease she carried. Two weeks into the chemo, the fatigue started; a week later the nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea commenced; and a week after that she was totally bald and pale. We met together with Dick Creech weekly in the first month of treatment and at month's end after a full round of blood tests. One question before us was whether to enter into bone marrow transplantation as a way to slow down the progression of the disease. Creech was direct yet sympathetic to Megan's plight. "Megan," He told her, "The numbers are not improving at all. We'd hoped to stabilize things, but the chemo isn't doing anything for you. Richter's is a nasty and unresponsive disease. I know you'd asked about doing something with bone marrow, but I don't think that would help, and the trauma to the marrow might just accelerate things in this instance." I asked, "So, what should she do? Nothing?" Creech thought for a minute and said softly, "Yes, do nothing." He turned to Megan, "Enjoy the last few months of your life, take advantage of your palliative care, and find a way to transition gracefully." He locked eye contact with Megan, and they nodded to each other. "Thanks, Dick," Megan said. "I'm stopping treatment now, while I still have some time and can get around." Dick nodded, "The side effects from the month of chemo you've had will wear off faster than they came on. Go do something fun -- both of you." He nodded at me, and gave us both a weak smile. It took Megan another week for the nausea and other debilitating effects of the chemo to stop. At that point, Megan wanted us to go up to the camp in northern Maine -- just the two of us. I'd put myself on a restricted regime at work, so I could be with Megan. Now, without much difficulty, I put myself on indefinite leave and the two of us went up to be in nature on our lake in Maine. I paddled Megan around the lake almost everyday, and we got in a few short hikes as her strength returned. She noted that having her strength return from the chemo would meet the waning strength she'd experience from the disease. She thought that happened our second week at our camp. Our hikes became short walks. Megan slept a great deal. Around the end of the month, Megan started to have to lean on me for support when she walked. I made her a cane from a piece of driftwood we found along the edge of the lake. After another few weeks, I found myself helping her wash and take care of herself. I'd already been doing the meal preparation, although this was not my forte. Megan decided she needed some drugs and another close examination by Creech to see how Richter's was progressing, so we came back to Wellesley. He verified what Megan already knew; she was sliding downhill a little faster than expected. Her life became more passive. She read a great deal, particularly what she called 'junk novels.' She spent more than half the day in bed resting or sleeping, and I could find her dozing in her favorite chair other times. At her insistence, I went back to work. People were sympathetic with what was going on with Megan, and I found I had to develop some rejoinders to their frequent questions and 'How's it going?' questions. I confess to feeling guilty about working. I could lose myself in the complexities of the company and our aggressive marketing, sales, and customer service programs. We had the top selling corporate database software package in the world, and were embarked on a program to make it better and better. I could hide in the details and the meetings from the terrible situation Megan faced. It wasn't that I was leaving her to face it alone; far from it. I dedicated myself to making her life as easy, peaceful, and loving in everyway I could. I cancelled all my travel to the west coast, taking advantage of some new video conferencing capabilities we had installed in the office. Emma was not only sympathetic and empathetic to Megan's plight, when we talked, we often-focused on things I could do to ameliorate her suffering and ease her ultimate transition. We knew that we'd be able to spend some time together after all this ended. We got day care for Megan. Together with my own curtailed schedule, this meant she had round-the-clock care. The number of drugs to cope with the various adverse side effects of the disease grew exponentially each week. Four months after Megan discovered the illness, we turned the living room into a hospital ward. We also started round-the-clock nurses. I worked less, and often spent hours at her bedside, sometimes just holding her hand as she slept. Megan paled and her skin turned that pasty ashen color we too often realize belongs to the dying. She'd made peace with the spiritual side of her temporal life. She liked it when I'd read her spiritual books of some kind. She told me she found peace and serenity in them that she needed to cope. On Wednesday morning, Megan surprised me again. I'd been reading to her, but my voice had gotten strained so I'd asked for a break so I could get a cup of coffee and recover a little. We felt so in harmony with one another. "I like it when you read to me," She said. "Part of what you're telling me is the story, but the more important thing you're telling me is that you still love me." She smiled at me. I squeezed her hand and vocalized my love for her -- forever. "Matt," She said, "There's something I want you to do for me before I erode away much further." "What's that, Darling?" "I want you to bring Emma to me. I want to meet her -- face to face." Chapter 8 Emma appeared to take Megan's request in stride, without any hesitation whatsoever. "I'll be on the next airplane," She said. "I'll call you back in a few minutes after I've made arrangements." As it turned out, she'd arrive on a red-eye the next morning. She told me later, she'd been ready for the meeting for most of her life. Megan found some delight in her secret knowledge of my long-running affair with Emma. When I had asked, "How did you know?" she'd brushed off the question with a sly smile. She'd said, "I'll tell you later when we're all together. Don't worry. I won't talk about any of this until Emma is here." I'd even asked, "Are there things you want to know?" Megan replied, "Nothing and everything. Wait until Emma is here, and then we'll talk." I accepted Megan's edict. She drifted off to sleep on the hospital bed with a peaceful smile on her face. The next morning, I drove in and picked up Emma at Boston's Logan Airport. It was the first time I'd seen her in months -- since before Megan announced her cancer. We hugged and kissed at the airport. I really had missed seeing her, yet I was uncertain about how this day would play out. Emma seemed more self-assured. As I drove us to Wellesley, I noted how the distance between my two worlds -- my two loves -- was finally shrinking to zero in this one short trip from the airport to my home. For thirty-five years -- thirty-five years my mind screamed! -- I'd kept my two worlds so separate: Megan-Emma, east coast-west coast, doctor-engineer, care giver-free spirit. Now, like the collision of two galaxies, I felt the merging energies of all those years on this one day in March. Emma didn't ask a lot of questions. We didn't even talk much on the drive. She did ask about Megan's current state of health, something I'd kept her fairly up to date on in our brief telephone calls several times a week. I led Emma into the foyer of our home. The nurse met us with a smile and urged us to go into the made-over living room and see Megan. "She's excited about seeing you," She said with a smile. Megan was sitting up in her hospital bed. She'd put on some makeup, the first I'd seen her wear in weeks. She didn't look so pale. She'd also gotten the nurse to give her one of her wigs, so she looked more natural and less sickly than she really was. The bed covers were tight across her legs and their starched crispness seemed appropriate to the meeting in some way. Emma walked to the bed with her hand extended in friendship; "Hi. I'm Emma," she said. "I take it we both know a few things about each other." Megan smiled and said, "Yes, and I've wanted to meet you for thirty-five years. I've known about you all this time." I practically recoiled in shock at that statement. "Megan!" I exclaimed. "Why didn't you say something?" At first Megan ignored my comment. There was a long silence as Emma and Megan studied each other. I watched a palpable warmth pass between the two women as they held hands. Emma hitched herself onto the side of the hospital bed so she could remain close to Megan. The instantaneous connection between the two women was not lost on me. Megan finally turned to me and said, "I didn't say anything because I love you. I've also come to love you Emma." She paused and said, "I have some things to confess to the two of you. You see, you aren't the only people that have kept secrets all these years." I looked with both astonishment and confusion at Megan. I didn't understand her statement. Megan went on, "When you and I started to get serious many years ago, my father insisted I have you checked out by a private investigator. At the time, I was horrified that he'd want to do that -- He was being protective, but then it seemed such a simple move that would remove any doubts my family had; I'm sure you remember my father. It was in an age before prenuptial agreements, and he wanted to be sure that you weren't after me for my inheritance or money or whatever. Anyway, I told him the only way I'd do it was if I hired and got the report directly; he or mother weren't to be involved. Any decision was mine. Dad agreed." I started to see where this might go. She continued, "Summer Investigators -- that's who I hired. Frank Summer was the investigator all those years ago. He followed you for a month, and according to him used some sophisticated listening devices that he described in those days as barely legal." Megan laughed at the expression on my face. "I think you two had been seeing each other for about four months at that time." I thought back to the passionate times Em and I engaged in all those years before, limited only by the hours in the day and our need to be gainfully employed. I winced to think what an investigator would have to report about our activities. My unease apparently showed on my face. Emma, I noted, had a peaceful look on hers as she sat on the side of the bed next to Megan. Megan went on, "When Frank Summer came back from following you to the west coast, he was confused by what he found, and at first so was I. Oh, he knew unequivocally that you two were sexually involved -- romantically involved. At first, I thought my father had been right, and that you were after me for my family's money, but then Summer played a tape he'd made of the two of you talking -- about me. Emma, you were telling Matthew how to love me, how to court and woo me, how to be nice to me, how to be open and honest with me, how to build a long-term relationship." Tears were forming in Megan's eyes as she talked. She continued, "I remember those early years vividly -- perhaps more so because of what I learned. Matt would come back from seeing you and follow your directions. I kept Summer working on this -- he had some friend he worked with in the Bay Area too. Anyway, there was never an inconsistent message. Matt loved me, and Matt loved you, and that love grew every day." She turned to Emma and squeezed her hand and added, "What surprised me is that you loved me too." We all had tears in our eyes. I moved to the bed so I could sit opposite Emma at the foot of Megan's bed. I said, "You could have turned and run. That was right before we got engaged. Why did you ...?" Megan interrupted me, "There were other tapes. Summer never let me hear you two making love. I think in the long run that was a wise decision on his part. He did let me hear some of your pillow talk, and certainly some of the more casual conversations you had -- at least the ones he'd captured. They had a common theme: you were two caring people, you both cared about each other, and you both cared a great deal about me and the longevity and permanence of our relationship." "I had a decision to make about whether I should enter this fray -- this convoluted threesome that I wasn't supposed to know about, or whether I should run the other way." She paused and looked between the two of us, "Of course, by then, I was really in love with Matthew. I knew it was treacherous ground and probably a very unwise decision at the time, but I accepted his proposal of marriage. I even knew about it ahead of time because he'd talked about it with you only a few days earlier." She grinned at Emma and the two women's hands tightened together again for a moment. I asked, "Did you just keep an eye on us all these years?" I wondered how much of the evolving relationship Megan knew about. Megan blushed and said, "Yes, but please don't be mad at me. I'm not angry with you -- either of you. A first, I had Summer and his west coast associate see what was happening every few months, then every year, and later every few years. Summer finally retired, and I just stopped for a long time; that was over ten years ago. I got curious last year whether you two were still seeing each other; I was glad to find out you were. The findings were always similar -- you two had a loving relationship and had extended that to include me, even though I wasn't supposed to know about it." "I figured I could bail out of things -- before we got engaged, before we got married, and later, before we had children. I remember thinking I'd leave if I saw any signal that you didn't love me or that you loved Emma more. I never saw or felt anything other than your love. Sometime, early in our marriage, I realized I didn't have to compete. All I had to do was be myself." "Over time, I learned a little about Emma and how she thinks. I had a candid photo for a while so I knew what you looked like -- how pretty you are. I knew you were a free spirit and smart, that you had your own cautions, fears, and aspirations, and I think I understood why you loved Matthew." Two Loves Pt. 03 Emma shook her head in disbelief and whispered, "Weren't you jealous?" Megan said, "It's funny, at first I was -- or I thought I should be. My upbringing was to have a knee-jerk response that would have been anger, rage, and jealousy. Frank Summer said something to me, maybe it was even at the first meeting when he was telling me about Matt and you; he said, 'You have a choice about how you think about what I'm about to tell you. Before you settle on a traditional response, I urge you to think of all the options.' And, do you know, I did." "Frank told me that jealousy is a learned response: we're taught if this, then that -- if infidelity, then divorce; if unfaithfulness, then breakup, but the world is not so black and white. One thing most people in the world couldn't imagine -- or tolerate -- was a man loving two women, or a woman loving two men. This was the 70s and we had the 60s as prologue to my discovery. Matt loves you and me. When I got past how other people might like me to think about that, I actually found the idea rather acceptable -- certainly tolerable." "Did it change how we interacted?" I asked Megan. "Oh, most definitely," She laughed. "In the early days of your relationship with Emma, I learned you had tremendous respect for her professional skills -- her work. Frank Summer pointed it out to me. You two talked about your work a lot. I was working as a part-time volunteer guide at a nearby museum back then -- a not very challenging position. I realized if I didn't turn my own life around and do something challenging, I'd lose Matthew. We'd only been married six months I think; I decided on a career in medicine. I got deeper into it as the years went by; the rest is history." Emma asked softly, "Why didn't you let us know that you knew?" She continued to hold Megan's hand. Megan thought for a moment. "At first I was shocked and puzzled. I had to work things out in my own head. I started to heed Frank Summer's advice, and looked at things differently. If I said something, it could have upset everything. As I got into my studies and career, your relationship was like a safety valve for me. I could be more selfish, because you two had each other; I could study more or work more, and not feel guilty. I soon liked the way things had turned out." I asked, "Did you ever want us to stop -- to break-up?" Megan shook her head, "No, never." I tried again, "Is there anything we can share with you -- something you've wondered about?" "Yes," She smiled between the two of us, "What will you two do after I die?" I recoiled slightly at her question and noticed that Emma did as well. We hadn't talked about Megan's death or, for that matter, anything that would change the relationship between us. She continued, "I'd like it if you two continued your relationship -- maybe even got married." Emma and I looked at each other. We both held one of Megan's hands. "There is one thing you need to do," Megan said thoughtfully; "you need to figure out how to tell your daughters about Emma -- about us. I'll go along with whatever you decide." She paused and then said, "Now, you two go off someplace; I'm tired again and need to sleep." Next: The Last Chapters Two Loves Pt. 04 I took Emma to an early lunch at Bertucci's -- a chain of Italian restaurants. Again, we were quiet in the car. My mind was racing, trying to recall every conversation with Emma that might have been overheard. I couldn't very well be angry with Megan -- we'd both done something controversial and debatable. My mind raced even further at the prospect of telling Eleanor and Sarah. We'd raised them to be open thinkers and to avoid snap judgments. I can remember many times thinking of how I interacted with them, teaching them some lesson, to leave room for this eventuality without knowing it. Not that I wanted to make it easy for myself, but rather that I wanted them to have this option in their lives. After Emma and I ordered, she turned to me, "Matthew, I love you. I also love Megan. You know that through you I always have loved your children too." She reached over and took my hands in hers, "Now, we have one of many challenges we'll face this year, telling Eleanor and Sarah." I nodded. Em went on, "The same principles we thought about with Megan need to apply. We're honest, we answer all questions as best we can, and we accept whatever results. We always said we'd be open and honest about 'us' if and when we were discovered." After a minute she asked, "How do you think they'll take the news -- the news that their father has had a thirty-five year love affair, and that their mother knew about it." "You have a way of being succinct," I told her with a slight chuckle. I added, "There's one more part to what we want to tell them." Emma tilted her head in the cute way she always did when she had a question. I said, "We need to tell them we want to spend the rest of our lives together." I changed our touching so that I embraced Emma's hands in mine. We smiled lovingly at each other. Two Loves Pt. 04 My two daughters came, and we hugged goodbye. Sarah and Jake were driving Craig and Eleanor to the airport, and then heading to their apartment in Boston. We all hugged goodbye. Bart and his wife left next; it was the warmest departure we'd ever had from one another. Catherine and Mark were next, along with the rest of the relatives. Emma and I policed the house with the help of the caterers; gradually restoring the rooms to what Megan had called the 'Wellesley Look.' I kept having a thousand moments of déjà vu sweep over me because the small tasks I'd done hundreds of times before; only Megan was my partner for the clean up. Right after the caterer left and we were alone, Emma guided me into the living room. She pulled me onto the plush sofa and then sat beside me, cradling me to her chest in a loving and tender manner. She just held me -- silently. The worst of this event was over now. I felt comforted by her presence, by her embrace -- by her love. After a long time, I sighed, and asked rhetorically, "What now?" Emma spoke softly, "Soon there'll be another wedding, and then pregnancies and grandchildren. There'll even be a couple of retirements; I'm ready when you are. Soon we'll talk about where to live what times of the year, and how to remain healthy and have fun. We have time to indulge in many of the things we postponed. We do all the rituals that we like ... more together now than before." As I processed her words, I noticed the long rays of sunshine and how they penetrated the rooms at the back of the house, including the living room windows. I stared at the familiar oriental carpet with new fascination because of the patterns the light and shadows made across the floor. Had these patterns been here all these years and I'd never noticed; or had I seen them and just dismissed them as too trivial to the moment. Now, they seemed so important. Emma waited a minute before she went on answering my 'What now?' question in a more conscientious tone; "We keep living -- and all the things Megan asked us to do. We keep being who we were -- who we are. We remain grateful for all the days we've had together, all the days you had with Megan, and all the days we'll have in the future. And best of all, we keep loving." We hugged each other and slowly watched the shadows slowly disappear. Two Loves, Three Lovers My life was just about perfect. James was a devoted, loving father for my three children by Don. He doted on my twin daughters, Jennifer and Janelle especially, and they adored him in return. Though I was their mother, I sometimes envied the way in which he brought them so close to him. And I was glad that he had such a natural capacity for parenting, especially because he was not capable of siring any children on his own. It came to him so easily. My first born, J.D., adored him and I was so glad that he did. James was such a loving father. And he knew that despite Don's presence in the lives of my children as their biological father, he had earned their devotion. I was happy for him and of course delighted that he not only accepted the children that Don had sired, but never for a moment gave them any cause to doubt that he was in fact their father. And Don never let slip that fact either. My children always thought of him as a doting uncle of sorts, a delightful and welcome presence in their lives. Don was especially enamored of the twins. Well, I mean, what man could resist two twin daughters? And they never wanted for a thing -- Don had seen to that. All three of the babies that he had fathered with me had trust funds provided by him, as did I. James and I were able to live life with a measure of independence, thanks to him. Don remained my knight even as his sexual needs for me diminished over the years. Or perhaps I should say, even as his sexuality waned over the years. I had no doubt that even in my mid-thirties, I was still desirable. I made sure that I was so, with care to my health, my nutrition, and time in the gym. Don and I made love on occasion, when time and circumstance allowed, but we no longer had the passion we had enjoyed years ago. He knew that and, more importantly, he knew that it was not the same for me, nor would it ever be. But he never let on the truth of the change in our connection, and found contentment in being 'Uncle Don' to our children and to creating a wonderful retirement for himself. I never let slip that I no longer found him desirable as a lover. He knew it and our time together, while enjoyable, became increasingly platonic. Don seemed quite content with his time with his beautiful Willow Bend home and his second home in the Caribbean. He had retired from his practice and I knew that his financial legacy was entirely mine and for my children by him. Such is the reward I suppose for having a mature man as a lover. The few times I was with him sexually, he seemed to be so grateful, and so appreciative that I made no mention of his inability to perform at the level of his earlier years. I suppose that James knew that our sexual connection had waned, but he was as ever discreet and silent on such a taboo topic. James was my rock. He was a father in all but the most fundamental sense, and I adored him for that. Linda was always a presence in my life. Though I was sad that her marriage to Frank never panned out, I was privately and secretly pleased that she had no other demands on her affections. When the time and place was right, we found delights in each other's bodies. Linda and I shared so much in every respect. We had both been Don's lover and had willingly offered our body to him again and again. But more importantly, we had years of intimacy between us -- both emotional and physical. Linda had I were lovers, in every sense. Though Don would fail to satisfy me fully on occasion, Linda never did. Even through my two childbearing experiences, her desire for me never flagged. I never quite understood her passion for my body but I only rarely denied her access to my charms. Linda understood me. She knew my body. She knew how to make me cum. And she was my best friend, so I rarely said no to her. But I still wanted the pleasure of a man -- the pleasure that Don had provided me -- the submission to a man that I had given to Don. I needed a man. But I was too proud or perhaps too settled to find that on my own. I needn't have worried in that respect. Patrick contacted me again, horny as always, and still as determined to have me. I had always either ignored or rebuffed his persistent attempts for years, not caring to be one of his conquests, and as I was quite content to be Don's lover. Linda had his number and though she had slept with him a few times years ago when she worked with him, she had no romantic misgivings about his real intentions. She had in her own way guided me away from that path but still I remembered the thrill when I had kissed him that one time on our second date. Aside from Don, he was the only man to have stirred me sexually. Linda and I were together one Sunday afternoon. Don was in Bermuda and the kids were with James, so I was enjoying a day of simple relaxation and sensuality with my best friend. We gossiped about this and that and then relaxed into the easy familiarity we had with other's body. Linda's desire for my body never waned even with the passage of some years. I loved her and as Don became less of a physical presence in my life, I found comfort in her charms. We had shared so much together. Both of us still wore and treasured the same terrycloth robes that Don had given us. We wouldn't have traded them for anything. We had both been his lover and the bond of having given him our sex made us even closer. Linda stayed active sexually and socially as she approached fifty. She was as always the life of any party and her lust for life always energized me. Even with my wanton ways with Don and with my control of my husband James, I was still at heart a somewhat shy woman. I had only been sexual with Don and Linda, which perhaps explained why I was so enamored with both of them. I envied Linda's uncomplicated embracing of life and its pleasures. She could and did take men to her bed without a thought or care. Men were drawn to her energy and her light, flitting about her like gypsy moths to a flame. She wasn't promiscuous however. But when she wanted a man, she had him. I was particularly enthralled by her liaison with Andrew, a personal trainer at our gym. He was such a nice man and had pursued her with an intensity that stirred my own desires. Andrew was a sweetheart, according to Linda. He had gone through some hell with an ex-wife and had in the end opted to pursue his life's passion of fitness as a personal trainer at her gym, rather than continue as a cog in the corporate world. I had seen him frequently on my visits. He was less than handsome but he was totally buff and had always struck me as a nice, approachable man. I was far too shy to talk to him, but that was never a problem for Linda. Andrew went out of his way to talk to her and in time they went out, first for coffee and then on a real date. Linda learned that he had rather vexing issues with his son and his ex, but enjoyed his attentions. Andrew was more than focused on Linda and over time she grew more appreciative of his obvious interest in her. And given the flow to her life, he finally had her on their third date. That is course what men want, isn't it? They want to fuck a woman they want. So, Andrew fucked Linda and got what he wanted. And I suppose she got what she wanted as well. Andrew was a physical marvel, with a youthful, muscled body at fifty. He proved to be an impassioned, vigorous lover the night that Linda spent with him. The next day, a Sunday, we met as we frequently did at her place for coffee. "Oh god, what to do, what to do with this guy," she said. "He's such a nice man but his life is a shambles." I asked her what she meant. "Well, his ex is on his case constantly and his son is in and out of trouble. I don't need that." "But you slept with him, didn't you?" I meant that as a simple statement of fact. "Yeah, and maybe I shouldn't have. He has so many issues that I want no part of." "I can understand that." But I was not to be deterred. "How was he?" "Andrew? Oh my god, he was almost beside himself having me. And I know for a fact that he has made it with several other women at the gym." Linda laughed. "I think all of those months of watching me in my workout clothes made him crazy." I too laughed and enjoyed her easy, simple delight in life. "I wonder how long it's been since he's been laid. God, he went ape-shit over me!" I pressed her for details of their lovemaking and Linda gladly provided them. "He was pretty amazing really. What a body! Of course, I knew that from the gym, but his cock was incredible. Whew! Andrew could school even Don when it comes to that! He's very, very thick. And he knew how to use it. He wore me out!" I sat there with her, looking at her, almost incredulous that the woman I was with had just hours before taken a new lover and was so blasé about it all. And she had no apparent interest in returning to his bed, despite his endowment and bedroom skills. Linda had no use for a man who had the drama that he did. Her sexing with Andrew had been a one-off affair. Linda's need was for a man of more substance than a personal trainer with limited resources, whatever his talents in bed might be. Andrew to Linda was simply a disposable pleasure. But I was fascinated. We both went to the same gym and I had seen Andrew there and I knew that he had seen me. I had seen his eyes on me and I didn't care that his eyes had been on Linda as well. He now fascinated me, having had Linda. I now knew that he was a capable, skilled lover, well endowed and obviously on the prowl for women. That should have been enough for me to dismiss him, but I was on the prowl myself and a man like Andrew might be just what I was looking for. And he had bedded Linda and had pleasured her, whatever his other shortcomings might be. And he was no stranger. I mean, I saw him every time I went to the gym. I was alive with desire. Linda knew from my questioning that I had more than a passing interest in Andrew and she did not take it amiss. She knew that I wanted a man. She seemed to take some pleasure actually from teasing me about my libido. She thought it funny that I should be so turned on by men she had been with. I was at first embarrassed, but then had to admit that there was truth in her stating that I was in fact excited by the details of her lovemaking with several men -- Patrick, Don, and now Andrew. I knew all three of them and had fully experienced one of them. Linda had brought Don to my bed years ago. He had not only taken my virginity, but had fathered my three wonderful children. Was it any surprise that I now thought about Patrick and Andrew as I had once thought of Don? I was so turned on, being with her just a few hours after a man that I knew had been with her. Without a doubt he had cum inside of her as well. I knew that she almost always had sex bare. Linda was somewhat taken aback that I was approaching her sexually again. It had been several years since we had been intimate; my choice, not hers. She was instantly receptive to my first kiss and yielded quickly to my desire, which was fueled in equal measure by own ruttish needs as by her body. And she had such a desirable, womanly body. Her breasts were full and her skin was soft to the touch. We renewed our passion as we kissed. My hand sought out her sex, which had only hours ago been used by Andrew. His warm, wet remnants coated my fingers as I explored inside of her. I was mad now for her body, kissing her with uncontrollable passion. And I pushed her to her back on the couch and found her pussy with my mouth. She tasted of sex. My mouth was soon covered in her juices and Andrew's. I'm sure she knew what was fueling my lust but she was too lost in her own pleasure to care. And then she came and I felt her sex spasm with pleasure. Linda slumped into a heap on the couch, completely spent. I know that she wanted my body but she was exhausted and sated. I laid next to her and we held each other for a brief while. Her body was radiant with sexual heat, a condition I had experienced so often with Don after he had finished with me. Linda was primal, almost feral in her sexuality. It was this quality, more than a lust for her body, which now compelled my desire for her. I had given my body to but one man for years and had been content to do so, but now my loins ached to receive another man -- but it couldn't be just any man, it had to be with a man that Linda had been with and would select for me. Linda tenderly stroked my hair as I held her. I wanted to speak my desires, but just couldn't. She made it easy though. "You're ready for a new man in your life, aren't you?" My reply came in a low whisper as I snuggled closer to my best friend. "Yes, I am. But I just can't be with some random guy that wants me. I could never do that. But if you had been with him before me, well, I guess that's what I want now. That way I can share the experience with you more fully. I need that as much as the sex. Does that make sense?" "Not really, but I love you and want you to have what you want. Is it Andrew now that you want?" "Yes. Do you think he would want me? Would it bother you if I was with him that way?" Linda laughed out loud and that made me smile. "Claire, you can have him or any other man that you want. And, no, it wouldn't bother me at all. He's a sweetie and great in bed, but he's got too many issues that I don't want to deal with. What I had with him was a one-off thing. As long as you don't expect too much from him, he would be a wonderful lover for you." "Will you arrange things, like you did with me and Don?" "No! I'm not going to do that again. You are such a goose! Just use your charm on him when you see him tomorrow at the gym. Trust me, he will be yours." She slapped my ass playfully. "Now, time for you to get home. You'd better let James know what you're up to." "I will. Love you," I said as I stood up and rearranged myself a bit. "Call me later," she said. "I need to take a shower! I'm a mess!" Later that evening, after the children were in bed, I sat on the patio with James and just talked as we often did in our quiet moments. I was rather quiet and let him do most of the talking. He knew something was on my mind and it didn't take much coaxing for me to share my desires with him. "I've been thinking that I want a lover in my life again, James. It's been a while since I've felt that need, but I can't stop thinking about it. Would you be okay with that?" "I am always okay with whatever you want, Claire. I know that you'll handle it well and not let him disrupt our life together." He sipped at his drink before continuing. "Do you have someone in mind?" "Yes, well, I have two men in mind actually. One of them is man I went out with a few times before I met Don. The other is a man I sort of know from the gym." "Are they aware that you're married?" I knew that Patrick was very aware that I was married. I had no idea about Andrew, never really having had any personal contact with him. So I told James that and also said that it wasn't likely that my marital situation would deter either of them. I mean, Patrick wouldn't care at all and Andrew had certainly bedded several married women. "Do you plan to have sex with both of them?" There was no emotion in his voice as he asked me this. "I don't know. I just know that I am interested in both of them that way." And I truthfully didn't know. "Just as long as they don't interfere with our home life, I'll be fine with that. I've wondered sometimes why you have never taken on another lover after Don." And then he looked at me quizzically. "You haven't been with anyone besides him, have you?" "No, of course not. I would have told you, sweetie." "Are you wanting another child, Claire?" His tone was very serious. "No. At least I don't think so." I hadn't really thought about that possibility. But it was something to consider. "I'll take the necessary precautions though. Okay?" "I'm sure you'll handle it fine. I want you to be happy. I love you so much." And he kissed with me with something approaching passion and I was taken aback. Here I had just told him that I wanted to share my body with another man and he had responded in an almost physical way. If he had told me that he now wanted sexually, I would have certainly let him do so. But the moment passed, but I wondered at the intensity of his kiss. I didn't go to the gym the next day. Instead, I shopped for a new workout outfit, something tight, revealing, and seductive. I found a beautiful sports bra, pink and scooped out so that my breasts would be displayed to their best advantage. I hesitated when selecting a bottom, but settled on a trim, tight, form-fitting black spandex model that would leave little to his imagination, or anyone else's. The next morning, after seeing to the children, I donned my new, somewhat sluttish outfit and took extra care with my makeup before heading to the gym. I knew I looked great and was full of confidence as I headed out. Andrew was there and he was obviously between clients as I made my way to the machines. I made a point of walking past him as he relaxed in a chair near the front desk, smiling as I did in his direction. He smiled back and I knew that my seduction would be easily accomplished. Or I thought that it would be. Andrew made no move to come on to me as I went through my regular rounds. I was aware once or twice that he was checking me out, but then so were half a dozen other men. Finally he went to the trainer table, apparently to check on some records and then our eyes met. I looked right at him and smiled with an unmistakable invitation and he returned it. Then he made his way towards me and my heart fluttered and my pussy moistened. I didn't move an inch but made sure my smile was welcoming of his advance. "My name's Andrew. You've become quite a regular here recently." "I'm Claire, it's nice to meet you." and I felt an electric tingle as he took my hand. "Goodness, everyone knows who you are, Andrew. You're the top trainer at the gym." "That's so nice of you to say so, Claire. May I call you Claire?" "Yes, please do." We chatted easily and amiably for several minutes. I thought at first that his interest in me was only as a potential client but his eyes kept straying as he checked out my body. I was not at all experienced in this type of foreplay and wondered how to proceed. And he was making no overt attempt to seduce me so I had to act. I didn't want to prolong the preliminaries. I wanted him in my bed even more now that I saw how truly buffed he was standing next to me. "You are so easy to talk to, Andrew. It's no wonder you have so many clients." - and bed partners, I thought! "I could use some more personal attention. I know you must be busy, but could you join me for a coffee now? I was just about to leave." And he accepted and I beamed! I told him I just had to throw on a top in the locker room and we could go across the street to the Starbucks. I actually had a full change of clothes, but opted only for the cotton blouse I had brought with me. I wanted my charms to be on full display. I felt like a giddy schoolgirl as we walked out of the gym. He had obvious experience with other women like me at the gym, but that didn't faze me in the least. I was rather relying on him taking the initiative at some point and was ready to follow his lead. And he was just totally charming as he chatted me up over coffee. He complimented me on my figure and seemed amazed that I was the mother of three, noting that my husband was a lucky man. "I suppose that he does," I answered with some sadness in my voice. "He never touches me." "What? I can't believe that." "No, it's true." "Then he's a fool. You're totally hot." "Really?" I said coyly. "It's nice to hear that from a man, especially from a man as attractive as you are." Two Loves, Three Lovers Andrew reached over and took my hand. His touch was warm and firm and I knew in that moment that he would be mine. "What does the rest of your day look like?" "It's very open. I'd love to share it with you." Could I have been any more brazen in stating my desire? Andrew wanted me and the random thought crossed my mind that only a few days ago he had rutted out Linda and would gladly service me as well. The fact that his sperm was still alive and quite viable in another woman didn't faze him a bit. I suppose men are built that way. They fuck one woman and then are quite ready and willing to fuck someone else. It didn't matter really. I wanted to be his next conquest. "I'm free until 3:00, if that works for you. Let's go to my place." "Okay, I can do that. But I don't want it getting out what we do. I mean, I'm sure you do this with other married women at the gym, and that's fine, but I don't want to get a reputation." "I'm the soul of discretion," he said amiably. I hoped so. James would be quite upset if it got out that I was indiscreet. "Let's take your car, okay?" "Sure. It's parked just across the block." We drove the short distance to his apartment and his hands were all over me, caressing my breasts and my exposed thighs. I was not unresponsive and I'm sure he thought me as a married slut out to get laid, which I suppose that I was. At a stoplight I moved to touch his private area and was pleased to find him already quite erect. This was going to be so easy. Like a lamb to the slaughter, he led me to his first floor apartment. When we entered I can't say that I was impressed. His place was rather careless; that's the best I could say but I had little time to think on this as he was instantly all over me. And I responded just as quickly as he all but mauled me. I think he would have just had me on the floor had I not indicated I wanted to go to his bedroom. Clothes were haphazardly strewn on the bed but I didn't care. He none too gently peeled off my bra and hungrily devoured the flesh of my breasts, greedily sucking on my distended nipples. His hands roughly tested their heft. There was no romance here -- none, zero, nada. His balls had obviously recharged fully after he had drained them inside of Linda two days ago. Andrew was wild to have me. And I wanted to experience the thrill of yielding to my lust. Without his bidding, I sat on the bed and tugged off his shorts. His penis literally popped out, fully erect and ready for action. God, he was everything in that department that Linda had said that he was. His cock was almost funny looking, ultra wide at the base and then tapering sharply to the top, where it bulged again to a large, mushroom tip. He wasn't as long as Don was, but his girth was almost unbelievable. And he sported a pronounced, upward curve. I almost wanted to giggle at the sight of his organ, but I knew that his rather strange gift would give me pleasure. I fellated him but had to pull back several times as he seemed intent on fucking my mouth and I gagged as he tried to feed his full length into me. So I just did my best, slobbering like a bitch in heat as I pleasured him with my mouth. Andrew had shed the rest of his clothes and roughly pushed me onto the bed and yanked off my spandex shorts. My sex was now fully exposed and he went down on me and began to minister to my pussy with his mouth. God, it felt so good to have a man down there again. And then he stood up and reached into the drawer of his bureau and I saw him take out a condom. He was tearing it open when I said the first word I had spoken to him since we entered his apartment. "You won't need one of those. I'm fixed." I lied, but what did he know or care. "You don't need a condom with me, so long as you're clean." Andrew grinned. "I'm as clean as a whistle, baby." And he tossed the unnecessary latex protection away and moved on top of me. With a kiss, he mounted me and his cock easily found my sopping wet opening. I spread my legs wide as he fed his erection into my vagina. And he was only the second man to have done so. I wondered how experiencing Andrew would be different from what I had known with Don. But I didn't have to wonder for very long. I knew right away that I felt a complete fullness with Andrew, a total filling of my sex. I understood immediately that it was girth that satisfied a woman, not length. Andrew could not quite bottom out on me as Don could and taken care not to do. Don had to be careful with his sexing as he could easily hurt me with his length. Andrew needn't be concerned as my vagina could stretch to accommodate his plus-sized width. And he fucked me like I had never been fucked before. He pistoned me with pile-driver intensity, obviously wild for my married charms, and driven by a super-charged sexuality. I was completely helpless to do anything but allow him whatever he wanted from my body. Andrew totally controlled our sexing and I knew that I need only to yield to his passion. And I did. His thrusting in and out of me was intense and rhythmic. I received his passion with pleasure, wondering after some time at his stamina. Andrew was incredible -- his tempo never slackened. And just when I thought I could take no more, he threw my legs over his shoulder and then he did in fact hit my cervix with his final thrust. And then he groaned as he ejaculated inside of me. I felt the wonderful, warm and wet feeling of a man emptying his testes into my vagina. Andrew's climax was prolonged and I didn't stir a muscle as I received the virile contents of his balls. As he slumped his full weight onto me, I felt joy that I could seduce and coax a man to such a release. I knew at that moment the power of my pussy. And I knew that a new world awaited me. Andrew released himself from me and there was an audible plop as he withdrew his spent cock from my vagina. His cum immediately began to well up and drain from my ravaged opening. He certainly was Don's equal in the volume of his ejaculate. I was filled to overflowing and had a moment of panic as I realized that neither was I fixed, as I had told him, nor was I in any way protected from the teeming millions of his sex cells now inside of me. I had to take care of that if I was to be sexually active but I relaxed a bit knowing I was not mid-cycle. Linda no longer had to care for such matters as she was in menopause, but I was still quite fertile. And I didn't want a child by Andrew. He made no attempt to hold me or show any real affection and I understood why Linda had been so dismissive of him. Andrew was simple -- a true bull, with nothing substantive to offer a woman, materially or otherwise. I just wanted to leave but when I made a move to get out of bed after dozing a bit, he had other thoughts and roughly pulled me next to him. And I didn't resist. He took me again and I wondered at the lust that must drive men. He moved me to my knees and entered me, this time with a more measured pace. And I again simply allowed him to use me as he wanted, offering my sex to him with no complaint. While he was not as out of control as he had been the first time, neither was he tender at all. Andrew simply used my pussy as a receptacle for his needs and while I did enjoy it, I was glad when he had his second climax inside of me and was done. My pussy was already sopping wet and I had no sensation at all when he came inside of me the second time. I really just wanted him to finish and leave. And I left him there, lying on his back, and dressed quickly and just left. I felt ashamed and disappointed in myself and determined never to have this happen to me again. Ever. I didn't tell James about the experience. I just went about the daily routine of my life for about a week, though I did tearfully share what had happened with Linda. She was supportive as always but said that she had tried to warn me off of him. I told her that it was my mistake and that she needn't worry. After a week, I knew that Andrew's masculine essence no longer was inside of me. I had tested several times and was incredibly thankful that he had not impregnated me. I was angry at my impetuosity and was glad that the following week I was fitted with an IUD. I had realized that I never wanted any man but Don to give me a child. And no man ever did. To have done so would have broken an unspoken commitment to him, to James, and in a way to my other children. My childbearing years were over. Period. I thought it might be best to stay away from the gym for a while, but really that would have been silly. So I kept to my regimen, pointedly ignoring Andrew who gave up trying to come on to me after a few weeks. I never told James about what I had done. I think that in a way he would have thought less of me. He had in his own way respected my connection with Don and would have been distressed had he known that I given my favors to a man far less worthy. Patrick continued to contact me and while not particularly encouraging of his advances, neither did I brush him off entirely. I talked this all over with Linda and though her connection with him had been brief some years ago, she did give me some sense that he might offer more than I suspected. He had made a fine career and was both highly intelligent and charming. I knew from Linda that he was an exceptional lover, but I stayed more or less aloof, though I did indicate that perhaps we could hook up at some point. I did remember our one kiss and that it was thrilling. I wondered if we could share something more. His persistence finally paid off. I had dusted off the emotional remains of my regrettable tryst with Andrew and was once more ready to have a man in my life and in my bed. I finally agreed to see him again for dinner and he was delighted. Ever mindful not to go public with my rather unusual marital arrangement, I told Patrick that I would agree to see him at a hole-in-the-wall place on the outskirts of town that Saturday. He perhaps understood my requirements and readily agreed. I gave more than a good bit of thought to how I would dress for the occasion. I didn't want to be sluttish but I did want to look nice for him. I wondered if the passage of years and my having borne three children would diminish my appeal. But, really, I knew that I was prime, so it only remained to choose the right outfit. And I think that I did, opting for a casual top and a skirt, which aside from being a bit daring in length was not at all suggestive. I was terribly keyed up to see him again. And when I saw him I almost melted. He was even more handsome than I had remembered. Some men age, and some men just become more, well, distinguished. Patrick fell into the latter category. He was as fit as I remembered and the few traces of gray in his hair suited him perfectly. And he lit up as I walked into the restaurant and kissed me with sweetness and familiarity and I responded in kind. I was instantly at ease with him. And we dined and talked for hours. And I felt so connected to him. Had he come on to me sexually, I know that I would have frozen up, but he didn't. He was the soul of gentlemanly perfection. I learned that me had been married, briefly, but that it hadn't worked out. That was certainly new information. I told him a bit about my marriage, saying only that it was sexless but loving. He didn't ask more and for that I was grateful. Obviously just my agreeing to see him told him that I was not having my needs met but he thankfully didn't press me for the details of my sterile marital situation. The hour was getting late and as we walked out to the parking lot, I would have accepted his invitation to spend the night with him. Instead, he just kissed me as I stood next to my car. And with this second kiss I yielded to him fully. I was his and he knew it but he showed restraint, asking only that I see him again the following week. I readily agreed. We made a date at his place for Wednesday evening. I drove away as he stood there, hoping that I had at last found the next love of my life. I was aglow for the next few days. I'm sure that James thought I had taken another man to my bed, but really it was just the anticipation. He never asked as to my situation. I made an appointment with my esthetician for Wednesday morning, wanting to be physically perfect and smooth for Patrick. I told James that I would likely not be back before morning and it was really then that he knew that I was going to be sexed. He accepted this as he had always done before when I had been with Don. He simply told me to have a good time and that was all. I went to some lengths to look amazing for Patrick, taking special care with my makeup and my attire. I was born to wear a simple black dress and was pleased that I could still do so and look great, even after having borne three children. My breasts filled and overflowed the top and the slight fabric of the dress hugged my curves. My athletic, toned legs were shown to their best advantage. I smiled, knowing that none of this would be lost on Patrick. He only lived a few miles away and I was glad for that. His townhome was beautiful and befitted a man who had been successful in his career. I parked in front and stepped out and even as I did, his front door opened and he stood there beaming. I smiled right back at him and hoped that he didn't miss that I had given him quite a shot of my legs as I exited the car. I was glad to provide him with such a nice visual. I had worn no panties, so perhaps he had seen my sex. But it was almost dark, so perhaps not, but he could have no doubt as to my intentions. I had no wish other than to be open and wanton with him that night. He kissed me with passion but without the animal wanting I had felt with Andrew. I just felt so right. His place was immaculate and inviting. I felt instantly at home with him. We had drinks and shared warm conversation, never for a moment however being in the least sexual. He had made a wonderful dinner of blackened salmon and savory vegetables, and I enjoyed every morsel. If this was a seduction, I wanted it. We sipped wine and talked about our lives. It was then that I told him the truth about James and my marriage -- and about Don. He was nonplussed, saying that he had always wondered about James from what he had known about him. I told him that Don had been my only lover -- there was no reason for him to know about my rather random coupling with Andrew a while back. I told him that I was ready now for another lover and that if he wanted me, I was his. Patrick didn't respond immediately, obviously thoughtful about his reply. "Look, Claire, I've always wanted you. You know that. I know that you are married and I know now that it is in name only." I didn't agree fully with that, but let him continue. "I want you, or at least as much of you as you can offer me. And if we connect, as I'm sure that we will, I will only be with you. Okay?" I was thrilled. "Yes, that would be very okay with me. I want you so much, Patrick." He leaned over and kissed me. And this time I kissed him back. I wanted to withhold nothing from him. I was alive from wanting him. And then I arose from my chair as he did and he pressed into me. I felt his cock push against me and felt the last restraint leave me. Patrick's kisses were full of his want for my sex. And I was totally prepared to give him whatever he wanted. The next few minutes were a blur. Before I knew it, Patrick had taken me to his bedroom and had stripped away my dress. I was in his arms, naked, and aching for his caresses. And as Don and Andrew had been wild for my breasts, so was Patrick. I was so pleased that they held such delight for him, and moaned as he helped himself to the pleasures they offered. His hands roamed freely over my ass and tested the wetness of my sex, and I was glad that I was so very wet and willing. I wanted to taste him as he stripped away his clothes but his desire was such that he had only a need to penetrate me. And he did. I really had no idea of the shape or size of what he had just put into me, but it felt amazing. His desire was fueled by more than just lust. I'm a woman and I now knew the difference. Patrick was on fire for all that I offered as a woman and as a person. And I submitted completely. I spread my legs so as to receive him fully and he responded with the deepest, most loving kiss I could ever have wanted. Only Don's first penetration of my body matched the intensity I was experiencing with Patrick. I received his repeated thrusts with joy, wanting only to give him what he wanted. I knew from the start that while he was neither as long as Don nor as thick as Andrew, I was taking a beautiful, wonderful penis inside of me. And then I came. I came with incredible intensity. And I did so from wanting and loving him. I cried out with anguish and as I had done once with Don. I just opened up completely my sexual flower to him. Patrick too came, in sync with me, and jetted his life giving seed into me. I grabbed his buttocks and felt each contraction as he pulsed over and over, sending out volleys of his potent, baby-making sperm inside of me. This was the release he had sought so long from me and I was thrilled to provide it for him. He stayed inside of me for quite some time, kissing and caressing me. Patrick had had his way with me as a woman, but I knew that his desire for me was more than simply as a sexual receptacle. He wanted all of me. When I realized that, I knew that he could have just that. Patrick had found and touched my inner most desire. I would be his and he would be mine. As he finally took his weight off of me and his cock withdrew, I felt my body relax. I had given him everything that could be expected of a woman. I now carried his sexual marking and nothing could change that. I had felt the same sensation when Don had marked me and had recoiled with disgust that Andrew had done so. I knew the difference now. Receiving the offering of Patrick's body was intensely satisfying. I would carry his essence with joy and pride, because of who he was as a person and as a man. Of course I never let him know this. For all of his wonderful qualities, he was still a man and my pussy perhaps gave him the same pleasure as any other woman could. I remembered Linda's warning about him and tempered my craving to bond with him as best I could. But there was no denying that Patrick made me surge with oxytocin pleasure, such as I had always felt after Don had sexed me. He radiated masculine beauty, laying next to me, so beautifully toned, his proud warrior now flaccid after doing its duty. Those years of our pent-up desire for another had at last been consummated. Though I hoped that our night together would not be our last, I had to be realistic. Now that Patrick had had me, he might just move on to his next conquest. I mean, he was prime in every way -- incredibly handsome, successful, sexual, and radiating power. I had to remind myself that I was a married woman with three children after all and a man like Patrick would have no use for the baggage I would bring into a relationship. So I just decided to let go of my deep desire to have him as my own and just make our night together a memorable one. He was lightly dozing next to me but I was wide-awake, processing my thoughts and desires. I touched his tumescent organ and examined it closely as I gently caressed it. It truly was a thing of beauty, the embodiment and sexual extension of his perfect masculine qualities. Both Don and Andrew sported generous endowments, and while I had perhaps found extra pleasure in being filled so well, there was no real beauty in their organs, being more menacing that beautiful. Patrick was different. There was nothing oddly shaped or out of proportion in his cock, though he sported a large pair of low-hanging balls, much like Don's sac. As I gently began to fellate him I wondered idly how many women had received his cock into their bodies over the years -- the same cock I was now using my mouth to bring him to another erection. He moaned with pleasure, dimly awake, and enjoying my sluttish need for him to take me again. I could literally feel blood surge into his penis, as he enlarged into a full, wonderful erection. My pulpy, wet mouth was providing him with new pleasures. I wanted to stop and have him enter me, but I thought perhaps that he would be more satisfied if he came in my mouth, so I just went to town. I wanted to be sure that he would not soon forget me or our special night together. Two Loves, Three Lovers I needn't have worried about where his second load was intended as he moved me to my hands and knees, cupping my swaying breasts as he positioned himself to enter me. With one hand on my upturned ass, he fed his beautiful erection into my vagina. It took only a few slow thrusts of his organ inside of me to bring me to an intense orgasm. I slumped as I came but Patrick never released me from his pinion, as he repeatedly sheathed and unsheathed his demanding cock in my completely receptive vagina. I cried out my desire for him over and over, pleading with him not to stop what he was doing. My craving for his sex had pushed me over the edge as I let him know that he was making me his bitch. And I wanted nothing more than to be his bitch, to let him know he owned my body. This spurred him on as he hit me with repeated pile driver thrusts, plundering my womanhood with his masculine needs. I was soaked with sweat, no longer the sweetly seductive woman who had come to his house earlier that evening, but now a crazed animal in full heat, driven by the lustful need to be bred. As Patrick reached his orgasm, I had another wonderful sensation of opening up as I received the full measure of cum that he was sending into me. Patrick's system delivered half a dozen rhythmic pulses and I thrilled to each one, knowing that each volley was sending tens of millions of his sex cells deep inside of me. And when I felt my body spasm again, my cervix drew his essence deep within me, sucking his life force into my womb. I came with such intensity that I thought I would pass out. Patrick and I were both spent and fell exhausted into each other's arms. His hands cupped my sweaty breasts, enjoying their fullness as we both fell asleep. As the sun rose the next day, Patrick was ready to give me his morning sperm, a nice, slow languid fuck as he found me wet and receptive. Once more I felt his erection penetrate my sex seeking the release my body could provide him. I was content to lie still as he used my pussy, his hands roaming at will over my naked body. And he grunted with pleasure as his penis sent out the contents of his recharged balls inside of me, adding more cum into my already brimming vagina. Patrick spoke no words of tender affection; he simply helped himself to my charms. I was ready to leave and return to my familiar world. He had gotten what he wanted from me, marking me, as he had wanted to do for so many years. Now it was over. I really wanted to get away. I let him sleep after his morning sexual exertions, taking a quick shower and then dressing. I would have to walk the walk of shame and hoped I wouldn't be recognized. As I walked silently to the door, I saw that he was awake and looking at me. "You were amazing, Claire. Let's do that again -- soon." "Maybe. I don't know. Call me later." And I really didn't know whether I wanted to do that again. "Hey, don't be upset. That was an itch we both wanted to scratch. All of those years of waiting were worth it." "I suppose. I've got to go. Bye." My kids were starting to stir when I arrived home. James was up and had made coffee as I walked through the door -- truly a walk of shame. And I felt such shame, hoping for an evening of romance when all it probably was just me out rutting around. He kissed me lightly on my cheek and asked no questions, knowing of course that I had been fucked repeatedly. I sometimes wondered what went through his mind, knowing that his wife was giving her body to another man. I was very content to just be a mom and wife for the next few days, though I checked my phone almost obsessively for messages from Patrick. There was nothing -- nothing at all. I was crushed. He had used me. Life went on as usual, but my sexuality had been enflamed by Patrick and to an extent by Andrew as well. Linda and I talked at length about both men, but particularly about Patrick. She had in fact cautioned me about him, but shrugged off my emotional disappointment. "He is what he is, Claire. Don't let it get you down! You did have a wonderful evening with him after all, and if he's good for anything, it's that. Gather in the experience and move on. Do you know how many men out there would kill to be with you?" "I suppose," I sighed. "But I'm not really in a position to 'date' someone, after all, and I want it to be more than just sex. I'm as starved for romance as I am for sex." "Well, don't expect another 'Don' to just fall in your lap. He was one in a million." And I had to agree. So I decided that I would keep my antennae attuned for the right man for my desires and situation. In the meantime, I opted for the path of least resistance and that meant a fuck-buddy. And of course, that was easily had. Andrew had never entirely ceased coming on to me at the gym for a repeat of our tryst a while back. And he was charming, in an obvious, rather common sort of way. And he had a totally amazing body with an obscenely large cock, which he wielded if not with particular skill than certainly with an immense physicality. And I was confident that he would do whatever it took to have me in his bed again. It didn't take much to gather in his attention, I must say, not that that his desire for me was any surprising. I let up and was not so standoffish with him at the gym for the first week or so, allowing him to chat me up a bit. The hook was in his mouth, but I was not quite ready to reel him in. I made sure that my look and attire was super attractive and being the rather simple, horny, muscle-bound man that he was, I knew he would be mine on any terms. I declined several invitations to coffee and then finally agreed one morning when he had a few hours off. We met at the same Starbucks across the street and Andrew was playing it cool, though I'm sure he had hopes that I would be in his bed for a quick roll-in-the-hay before he had to return to work. I too could play it cook, requiring him to show his cards before I did. "You're looking good these days, Claire. You're the hottest thing going at the gym, you know." He grinned at me. "Oh, well, thank you. I try to stay in shape but with all of the hard bodies there, I've got a lot of competition." His hand touched my leg with an easy familiarity. I'm sure that his cock was stirring with desire. I know that my pussy was moistening. I almost couldn't believe I was playing this game with him. But I had to control the situation. "Oh, you, I know what you want." I laughed. "Well, can you blame me? That afternoon we spent together was awesome." "Was it now? Well, I did enjoy it though I'm not sure it's something I want to repeat." "Yeah, you've been really distant for a while. Wasn't it good for you? I thought it was. You sure rocked my world." And I just decided to cut through the verbal fencing. "Look, you're a sweet guy and you were good in bed. I did enjoy it. And I'll be with you again -- regularly, but we've got to set some ground rules." He gulped before saying, "Sure. Like what?" "Okay, here's the deal. I'm married. My husband and I do not have sex -- ever. He knows that I do and is okay with that but that but I don't want you blabbing it to everyone else at the gym. He has his pride and I do as well." He started to talk, but I cut him off. You've bedded or are bedding other married women there, so don't tell me that's not true. I know otherwise and I'm okay with that. It's not like I want to date you or anything." He looked a bit hurt. Perhaps I had gone too far. "Look, Andrew, this has to be just about the sex, okay? And we had really good sex and we both want more of it." And I winked at him, "Besides, where else can I find a man as 'gifted' as you are?" And I smiled. He lightened up. "Yeah, sure, okay. I can do that. Mum's the word. I promise!" "A few other things...first, I want a clean bill of health from you before I am with you again and I want you checked monthly. Okay." "No problem." He never thought to ask me if I would provide the same. Jeez, he was like putty in my hands. "And, don't take this wrong, but I want your place to be tidy when I'm there -- with clean sheets please. I don't expect the Taj Mahal, but I have my standards, Andrew. Really -- just make it all a bit more inviting. Okay?" He slumped a bit but smiled. "Yeah, okay, I hear you. I'll do better. I'm sorry, I just live alone, and, well, you know." I let up a bit. "I suppose that I do. But if I am going to be naked and be sexual where you live, I need it all to be a good bit more inviting." Andrew nodded. He got it. "Don't think me a bitch. If you do these things for me, you can fuck me just about as often as you want. I need it too. And I just want it from one man. And I won't ask you any questions about what you do when I'm not with you. Now, what more could you want, I ask you?" I leaned over and kissed him. It felt good. I wanted him again. He did ask me one question. "What about birth control?" "You didn't ask me about that before?" "Well, I am now. I mean, I guess you've taken care of that, but, well, I'd like to know." "If that's what you're worried about, don't. I've taken care of that." And I kissed him again. "And I don't ever want you to use a condom with me -- ever. Take me bare or don't take me at all." Well, that sure did it. He caressed my thigh and promised that he would do as I had asked. "So, how about now?" "No! Let me know when you've been checked and when your place is in good order. Then I'll be with you." And I smiled. "I'll drain you completely, you gorgeous stud!" That was all that it took. I didn't make eye contact with him again at the gym for almost a week. And then, one morning, at the gym, he slipped a note into my hand as I left the front station after checking in. "Meet me at my place at 10:00. It's all been done." I looked back him and smiled and slightly nodded. He looked back with a smile, and with wanting. I could see it in his eyes. And I wondered if he could see that I wanted him as well. I couldn't concentrate on my workout, thinking about taking his horse-cock once more into my body. I no longer wanted romance -- I wanted what was between his legs. I hurried home and freshened up. I had until 2:00 before I had to pick up the children from school. With care to my timing, that would give me three hours with him, not that I knew his schedule. I didn't want to waste a minute and I arrived at his place a few minutes before 10:00. I had dashed out the door and driven to his apartment having thrown on only Don's bathrobe. Andrew opened the door and before he could say a word, I was in his arms, crazed with lust. He took me, dropping some papers on the floor -- his test results, I suppose. I didn't care. I just wanted to be pleasured. He kissed me with animal hunger, fumbling at the tie of my robe, which he removed within seconds. I stood there in his arms, naked and alive with passion. His cock was already fairly bursting at his shorts, pressing into me as he pressed his face into my exposed breasts, suckling and biting my swollen nipples. He face was already raspy with whiskers, but the sensation of his stubble on my breasts was electrifying. Andrew quickly found my sex with his calloused fingers and found me ready to be penetrated. And he pushed me against the door, pulled down his shorts, lifted my haunches and entered me. God, I knew he was big but it felt like a truncheon had been inserted inside of me. And I came on his third powerful thrust. My pussy squirted repeated streams of pleasure as he took me, the liquid coating our bodies. I was helpless to stop the eruption of my sex. And he never let up, banging me into the door as he plundered my body. I stood there on my left leg, my right leg now wrapped around his muscled torso as he fucked me with a will. I came again, this time screaming out my pleasure as his thick, stallion-like cock ravaged me without mercy. I was in terrible pain but had entered a zone of pleasure where I no longer cared the cost, so long as I could experience such pleasure. Fortunately for my own well-being, Andrew did not last much longer. With a grunt, he buried his head into my neck and began to jet his cum into me, and with each tremor of release, he drove me against the door. His first few pulses of crazed lust gave way to perhaps half a dozen more sedate thrusts as he fully discharged the pent-up contents of his balls into my vagina. I wanted to just slump to the floor, but he held me upright until he had fully released his ultra-virile load of sperm into my body. For the second time, I had been marked with the seed of this amazing gladiator. Then, with unexpected tenderness, he kissed me as I stood wobbling in his arms, grateful he had the strength to keep me upright. I kissed him back, totally spent, but grateful for his show of caring. His softening penis, finally yielding to the inexorable demands of gravity, plopped out of me and there was an audible sound as a huge plug of his viscous semen tumbled out of my pussy and onto the floor. We both laughed and that broke the tension. As we broke our fevered embrace, I glanced down at the floor and saw the wad of his DNA that had tumbled out of me. Even as I did so, another sizable blob of his spunk escaped my gaping opening and landed beside it. And in the next glance I saw his still distended, veiny instrument of sex dangling between his thighs, coated with our sexual juices, almost menacing in its size and power. Andrew was the real deal -- a true bull and I would be pressed to my sexual limits each time he serviced me in the future. The future arrived sooner than I expected. I went to my knees, wanting to taste and savor the instrument that had just ravaged my pussy. It was less loving and more worshipful as I wanted to experience the full measure of his overpowering sexuality and physicality. I wanted to yield completely to him as I had once done with Don. My eyes looked upward into his as I took him into my mouth, fellating him with an almost reverence, caressing his large, low-hanging testicles as I did so. I was not yet sated nor, as it turned out, was Andrew, as I felt his penis begin to swell with new desire. I wanted to be his bitch and was well on my way to surrendering a large measure of my personal power to him. Andrew grabbed my head and urged me on as I slobbered over his cock, gagging as he used my mouth to reinvigorate his sex. Andrew was all about his testosterone and I no had no wish to make something other than what he was. Five minutes after he had fucked almost insensate, he was fully erect, and ready to make further demands of my body. I realized that once aroused, Andrew was like a beast unleashed. There was no pretense of romance or tenderness in his coupling with me, or likely any other woman. It was all that I could do to let him know that I wished now for the comfort of his bed before receiving him a second time. I had but a few moments to check my surroundings and appreciate that he had gone to great lengths to make his place more acceptable. And I do mean that I only had a scant few seconds, as he moved me to my back and literally inhaled my swollen pussy, his mouth engulfing my pussy as his tongue greedily rasped over my clit. I yielded totally to his fevered desire as I came with intensity for the first time from the oral ministrations of a man. But he was not done with me. No sooner had I come down a few notches from my orgasm before I felt his girthy cock enter me. Not since childbirth had I experienced anything so demanding of my body -- and remember, I had given birth to twins. As intense as the physical sensations were, it was the roughness of his face pressed into mine as he kissed me that truly sent me over the edge. His whiskers scraped me almost raw as his mouth sought mine, all the while pistoning my vagina with repeated, deep thrusts. And I came again...and again...and, god, I lost count of the number of times that he brought me to climax. And somewhere along the way, my sex erupted in a spray of liquid, as I was beyond helpless to stay my sluttish response to his ravaging of my body. I simply yielded, and in that moment of surrender, I became his completely. I didn't need his love, but I could not imagine a life without him now. And it was beyond anything Don had ever given me physically, and certainly on a different level than what Patrick had provided. Andrew was a warrior; a bull; a gladiator; a stud in the truest sense. I was out of my mind with pleasure. Andrew required nothing more from me than to be his sexual vessel; fortunate for me as I had no strength to offer more than my open sex for him. I came with uncontrollable abandon to the point of physical exhaustion. My thighs were raw from the friction of his muscled legs, unable to spread any further in the total surrender I offered him. I was not conscious of his second spasm but knew when he collapsed his full weight on me that I had received his second spermy offering into my body. When he had finished with me, he rolled off of me and lay there panting, obviously as spent as I was. I was a mess; sweaty, my body flush and heaving from the physicality of Andrew's fucking. I wondered how any woman could handle his demands on a regular basis, wondering whether I really so hot to compel him to such sexual exertions, or if he was equally vigorous with any woman who offered herself as I had done. The bed was a mess now, soaked with sweat and cum. I sat up with a start, remembering that I had children to pick up and was almost flabbergasted that it was just 10:30. Andrew and I had generated all of these sexual pyrotechnics in just half an hour. What had I gotten into? I had to leave. I had to. My body needed time to recover, though I had over three hours before I had to pick up my children. I made a move to get up and leave, but he pulled me back and kissed me passionately, though with some tenderness, which allowed me some measure of respite to assert myself. "I have to go now, baby." I said. "We'll be together again, I promise." "Mmmmm, I'm not done," he said with a feral grin as he stroked my thighs. "You're too much for me. You've got to be patient with me. I'm not used to a man like you. You're so hungry." "Hungry for you, Claire." I looked at him with a questioning look. "I wonder if it's me or you. You're almost too much." He seemed almost hurt, which surprised me. "It's you. I swear it. You've got me all wrong." Was it me? Was I wrong thinking I was just a willing cunt for him? I looked for an answer in his eyes and found something surprising; a sweetness which I had not expected. I was so confused now. "I don't know what to say to you. You confuse me. We need to talk -- not now, but soon. Okay?" "Yeah. Just keep an open mind about me, okay?" I was suddenly conscious of being naked, sated, and on the verge of being emotional with a man I thought of as nothing more than a sexual animal. I knew that I wanted to find out his secrets -- but not now. I dressed and strode out the door. The sensation of his cum seeping out of me down my thigh reminded me of what might be the true reality of our connection. But unlike our first time together, I left with no sense of regret or revulsion for having been with him. James tucked in the children that evening as I felt a bit queasy and was also dead tired. The feeling persisted for the next two days, something I initially attributed to the draining physicality of Andrew's sexing me. Then it dawned on me that perhaps Andrew's seed had found its mark. Don had explained to me years before that an IUD does not prevent conception. It only prevents carrying to term. He was certain that he had impregnated me multiple times before I was ready to go the distance and have his child. The notion that Andrew had done me the same way, while unsettling, was in a way thrilling as well. The timing was certainly right. I was mid-cycle and I had always been eager for sex at such times during my years with Don. That would explain my whorish passion the other day. Though I hadn't asked Andrew whether or not he had been snipped, I had little doubt as to his virility. His ejaculate was both copious and quite potent -- a fact I would need to bear in mind as I had every intention of continuing to be with him sexually. Two Loves, Three Lovers Andrew and I worked out something akin to a schedule for our trysts. Evenings were a possibility, as James certainly would accommodate my needs as he had done for years when Don was in my life. But for the time being I was content with morning and afternoon delights, finding time when his training schedule and my family commitments allowed us the opportunity to be with one another. Andrew was insatiable. I had thoughts of perhaps spending a weekend with him at a lakeside resort close to where we live but questioned whether I could withstand two days of his rampant sexual needs. And though we were now closer personally, I also wondered whether we would exhaust our conversation before 48 hours was up. So I was content with our arrangement for the present. It actually was rather exciting when he would text me during the middle of the day asking to meet him at his place. It was fun in a way to be his beck-and-call girl. We would tease each other a bit, with me alluding to him that he was my boy-toy and him calling me his rich bitch married lover. There was more than a bit of truth in both assertions. Andrew and I enjoyed each other two to three times a week for the next few months. I marveled at his stamina and ability to recover so quickly after his release. It was rare that he did not have me twice over the course of an hour or two. He learned to amp it down a bit with me and I was appreciative that we had a rhythm to our lovemaking that suited both of us. There was not a moment during that time when I was not carrying countless millions of his viable sperm cells deep within my body. My body had adjusted in time to his size and in time I grew to crave the unique pleasure his oversized manhood provided. My lust for Don was as much a part of my love for him as for the physical satisfaction he gave me. With Andrew, my desires were fueled almost solely by his sex and the pleasure he gave me. One evening, James broached the subject of who I was seeing. He knew that I wasn't going out in the evenings but he knew me well enough to know that I was rather content, and that meant that I had a new lover. I wasn't ready for his direct question, but answered it honestly. "His name is Andrew." "Where do you know him from?" "He's a trainer at my gym." "I see. Is he good to you?" "Yes, but it's not like it was with Don. It's nice but that's all." "Are you in love with him?" "No -- not at all. We just enjoy time together on occasion. You have nothing to fear, James." He smiled. "I wasn't worried about myself, just about you." He knew. "Are you together with him during the day?" I flushed a bit. "Yes -- sometimes. I did see a man named Patrick once, but that didn't work out." James smiled. "I remember Patrick, if it's the same man who worked with you some years ago. He wanted to be with you. I know that." I wanted to share my disappointment with Patrick with him, but how could I? How could I tell my husband that I had been crushed when another man had bedded me and then just cast me aside? That wound had not yet fully healed. I felt shame as he prodded me for answers to questions I didn't want to hear. "Yes, he's the same man." "Well, you are the only one who cam make yourself happy. I can't. I can only love you as I always have and always will. I adore you and so do the children. But only you can have the complete life that you once had when Don was present in your life. Just take me as a given, and go from there." I looked up at him with such love and admiration. James wanted me to have the life that I wanted and that he felt that I deserved. Was a woman ever so lucky to have such a wonderful husband? And he was so right. I knew that I was doing well by him and by my children, but it was up to me to make my life extraordinary. And, really, it was all just fine. I had a loving husband, three amazing children, and a vigorous, adoring lover. I decided to embrace them all. My romance with Don had provided me with my children and financial security for the rest of my life, and theirs. Andrew might not be my romantic ideal, but he was totally smitten with me, provided me with unrelenting sexual pleasure, and showed no signs of crossing any of my boundaries. So I accepted and gathered in all of my joys and was for quite some time a content woman. One afternoon, after a typically vigorous session of lovemaking with Andrew, he asked me if I was content with what we had. I giggled. "Yes, I'm very content. Why do you ask?" "We just never talk about 'us'. I mean, you show up, we make love, and you leave. I just wanted to know if that's all that you wanted." I wanted to pat him on the head and tell him that it all was just fine. "Andrew, you know I'm married. You know my husband is absolutely fine with us being together. You are everything I could want from a lover. We have amazing sex. What more do you want or expect?" He said nothing in reply. I gave it a moment and then broached a subject that we had never discussed. "Look, I'm sure I'm not the only woman you are taking to your bed. And that's fine, really it is. I never expected monogamy from you, only that you take a care to my health. And you've been good about providing me with the results of your checkups. It's all fine." I kissed him sweetly. He looked at me in some wonderment, obviously reassessing just who and what I was. "You know about that? I mean, I've been with a few other women but not that often, well, except for one. I mean you only see me during the day, you know." "It's okay, Andrew. It really is." I kissed him with real affection. I chose my next words carefully. "Who you are and what you do fuels my desire for you. I have no wish to change or restrain you in any way. I really don't." Andrew eyed me warily, somewhat incredulous that I both accepted and embraced who and what he was. "You're different than any woman I've ever been with." "Am I now? Well, my life is different than that of most women, I suppose. I have a family that I love but I want and require passion. I suppose that as I have a husband who loves and accepts me, I would offer the same to a lover. You are my stallion and if there are others in your stable, well, that is as it should be." I was now alive with wanting him. "You've made me your bitch -- you and your cock!" Andrew chuckled and began to caress me. "So you want some of this?" he said as he none too gently pushed my hand onto his ridiculously sized erection. I simply complied and moaned with desire. "And you don't mind that I'm going to fuck other women with my big cock?" he said as his hand guided mine to stroke him. And I didn't mind a bit. A stud like Andrew could, would, and should fuck other women. He merited a stable of women and I knew it. I only wanted to be one of his mares. I thrilled as I stroked his thick penis, urging him on. I was in heat now, craving submission to the power of his sex. "No, oh god, no I don't mind at all. I am honored to be one of the women in your stable...only please fuck me. Fuck me like you do your other bitches." And he smirked as he mounted me, knowing that I had finally and completely submitted to him completely. Andrew fed his penis into me with repeated, demanding thrusts, knowing that I would do his bidding now and in the future. His hands roamed freely over my body as he roughly fucked my pussy. We were both crazed with lust. I came with incredible intensity on his thick, veiny cock as he plundered my sex, my pussy pulsing with spams of pleasure as I squirted wildly. Andrew never let up on me for a moment, helping himself to my breasts as he sought his own release. And when he too went over the edge, I felt for the third time in my life the full opening of my sexual flower as he pulsed his ejaculate inside of me. I was totally receptive in that moment, taking in the full and total release of my lover. I had no doubt that I had ovulated and that the fertile product of my body was being engulfed by Andrew's liquid virility. I lay still as I received repeated pulses of his potent seed into the depths of my body. The sensation was the same that I had experienced when Don had mated with me. I was awash in feminine hormones, writhing and out of control as he bred me. I may have been mistaken a few months before thinking that Andrew might have fertilized one of my eggs, but this time I had no doubt that he had truly done the job on me. When he withdrew from my raw pussy, his cum flowed from my pussy, a raw, reddened, and open wound. I was truly his bitch. James continued to be supportive of me during this time. He would have been fine had I carried another child to term, but I was truly done with bearing children. Don would be the only man to have given me that gift and three fruits from his fertile loins were enough. His infrequent reappearances were always welcome however. Twice I lay with him but our lives had otherwise completely separated in that respect, though he was otherwise an attentive and committed father. He allowed James to fulfill that role and for that I was deeply grateful, as I was for his financial commitment that allowed me the freedom I enjoyed in my life. Though I yearned for a man who could offer me what he had, it was not to be. Still, I had Andrew, who performed with his usual magnificent self time and time again. I was addicted to his cock; to the way he pleasured me, and realized that search as I might, no man could ever offer me what he did. Andrew had his other lover, Janice, to occupy him when I was not available. She too was married though I learned that she had separated from her husband. Like me, she was a denizen of the gym and became over time a frequent visitor to his bed. Andrew pointed her out to me one day at the gym. She was a stunning blonde, drop-dead beautiful with a perfectly toned body. It pleased me that Andrew could land such a beauty. Janics was very into their lovemaking, being newly single and Andrew serviced her several evenings a week when her children were with their father. Andrew had learned to share with me that he was generous with his cock, no longer fearing that I would take it amiss. He had an appetite for married women, which suited me fine, as I trusted that he would be safer as my lover as a result. I cared only that he would desire me and fuck me with regularity. And he did. My weekdays were always a joy, anticipating and yielding to his demands on my body. On the evenings when I knew he was fucking Janice, I was beside myself with wanting to reclaim him the next day. Janice would usually spend the night with him, which meant that Andrew would empty his balls into her at least twice in the evening and once more when they had morning sex. And he was still able to fill me to overflowing with his potent ejaculate later that day -- the stud! I was lying next to him after a mid-afternoon session, spent and content, just enjoying touching and caressing his amazing body. I saw a few photos scattered on his nightstand and thought nothing of them, but when Andrew went to go pee, I picked one up. It was a shot of Janice smiling, naked in his bed. All of them were of Janice and in all of them she either naked or in various states of undress. I was both fascinated and aroused; it was one thing to know that he was with another woman but it was quite another to see the evidence. She was incredibly sexy. Most of them were likely taken before they had made love, but several of showed her lying blissfully in his bed, with the sheets disheveled. One incredible photo showed her with her legs slightly apart, with a distinct glistening of moisture on her pussy and an Andrew-sized shot spot underneath of her. I didn't even hear Andrew return to the bedroom, as I was enthralled. He said nothing but sat on the bed next to me, touching my shoulder as I viewed the photos. He needn't have asked how I felt about what I saw as I dropped them to the floor and sought his mouth with mine, out of control with desire. Andrew moved me to my back and mounted me, feeding the full length of his cock into my pussy, which was sopping with my wetness and the cum he had jetted inside of me only half an hour before. "Did you like seeing those pictures, Claire?" he whispered roughly. "Yes. She's so lovely, and you have her over and over..." I whimpered in reply as he ground his cock into me. "Do you make her cum like you do me?" I was almost out of control as my orgasm neared. "Janice cums like a slut on my big cock, baby. She loves it like you do." My climax was almost upon me and my head was spinning. "And you love fucking her, don't you?" I panted. "You love cumming inside both of us, don't you? Oh, god, cum in me now! Please, Andrew, please!! Now!!!" And then I mercifully came, my body heaving with release. Andrew joined me, as he too could take no more. The full weight of his body all but crushed me as his cock spasmed madly inside of my vagina, spewing thick ropes of cum into my gaping pussy. Our mouths were locked in passion as we released in unison, our passion for one another draining our bodies completely. Mercifully he rolled off of me as the press of his body on mine literally made me breathless. I gasped for air as my body continued to heave from what I had just experienced. Andrew returned to my body, caressing my breasts and my pussy as he quickly recovered, as he always did, from his release. "You always amaze me, Claire. You're everything a man could want; beautiful, passionate, and quite the slut as well. I like that, you know." "Those photos were incredible. Why don't you photograph me like that?" "I will if you want me to. I just thought you were to prim and proper for anything out of the ordinary." "I don't know who or what I am any more, except that I'm your bitch. And I want you to take me to places I have only dreamt of." We kissed and I wondered just where indeed he might take me. Andrew got up and went to his bureau drawer as I gazed with lust at his firmly muscled ass. He took out a binder and offered it to me as he sat on the bed. In it I found hundreds of shots of him with other women, including Janice. I was both fascinated and appalled. Many of them were obviously taken by someone else and there was a series of Janice with a man I recognized -- Derrick, a trainer at our gym. He had caught my eye certainly, a gorgeous, sculpted black man. And here were photos of him fucking Janice. My mind was reeling. Andrew saw that I reacted to this set of photos. "Derrick and I sometimes team up. Janice had the hots for him, so we had a threesome a few weeks ago. Pretty hot, isn't it?" I was all but speechless. "It's incredible. I want to do that too," I said looking at him. "I'll make it happen, babe. He's sweet on you, I know that." "Does he know that you're fucking me?" "Sure, of course. He fucks a few married women at the gym. And he'd love to fuck you. Are you sure that you want this?" There was no doubt in my mind. I wanted to amp up my sexuality. "I'm very sure, if you'll be there with me. I want this very much." His hand roughly sought out my sex and I gave a start. "Tomorrow, then -- after work. Can you be free then?" I had never been with him of an evening but I knew that James would have no problem if I asked him to take the children then. "Yes." was my reply. And then he took me again. I was very aware of Derrick's eyes on me the next morning at the gym. Andrew had obviously set things up as Derrick eyed me closely, checking out my body to the point where I couldn't concentrate. I knew that he would be my lover and the thought thrilled me. Once we made eye contact, and his look was knowing. He knew that he was going to fuck me. I knew it too. I arrived at Andrew's just after 7:00, James having been quite agreeable to my having a night out. I saw Derrick on the couch as Andrew kissed me in greeting. He told me to sit next to him, which I did, but at first it was all a bit awkward. Andrew disappeared for a few minutes as I sat next to Derrick, unsure of what to say or do. But his hand sought out my thigh and he told me how beautiful I was. We chatted a bit and I admitted to being a bit nervous. "It's gonna be fine, Claire," he said as he caressed my body with an easy familiarity. "Just relax." Then, he kissed me. And his lips were warm and inviting. I responded in kind, enjoying the taste of his mouth. His hand slipped between my legs, seeking out my sex, which he found rather quickly. And he found that I was wet and receptive. I moaned with desire. Then I sought his sex with my hand, and found his cock fully erect and tenting his shorts. It was all over -- Derrick was going to fuck me. But where was Andrew? Derrick slipped off my shorts and panties, and found my wet, exposed pussy, with a practiced skill that I admired. He tugged off my top and his hands found my breasts. I was now naked on Andrew's sofa, yielding to Derrick's desire. He roughly massaged my sex as I fumbled to remove his shorts. I heard Andrew clicking away with his camera and realized he was recording our lovemaking. I didn't care as I was now totally into my soon-to-be lover. My hand quickly found his cock, which was not surprisingly fully erect. I moaned with desire and yielded as he pushed me back onto the sofa. His beautiful, black cock was poised to enter me and he did, with one savage thrust. I felt his balls slap against me as he took me -- and he took me again and again, feeding his naked shaft into my vagina, as crazed with lust as I was. And I heard the repeated click, click, click of Andrew's camera as he fucked me. Derrick's hands were all over me as he took me with a savage intensity and I offered him my complete submission as he did so. And he didn't last long. With a primal, guttural moan I felt his muscled torso tense as he released his sperm into my body. Derrick's loins were joined to mine in an intensely primal mating and I could no nothing but accept his seeding. He filled me to overflowing with his ejaculate as Andrew recorded the event. I don't know if it was having Andrew present, or the fact that I was with a black man, but my orgasm was of an intensity I had never experienced before. Derrick slumped on top of me, drained of his essence, which now filled me. I should have felt shame for giving myself to a man I didn't know, but all I really felt was warm, sated, and wanting more. Derrick, having marked me, was surprisingly tender afterwards, caressing me and whispering sweet endearments to my ear as we lay together. He smelled good, felt good, and he had obviously triggered a significant release of oxytocin as I absorbed the liquid results of his passion into my body. I was oblivious to Andrew's presence for quite some time and I appreciated that he gave the two of us our space. I readily complied to Derrick's request that we retire to Andrew's bedroom. And all the time I could hear the click of Andrew's camera as he recorded our tryst. Our passion having been for the time being sated, we took our time exploring each other's body. His kisses were incredible, long and searching, as he helped himself to my naked body, touching every inch of me and obviously savoring what he found. I was fascinated by his lean, muscled body and found the deep ebony darkness of his skin a real turn-on. His penis was quite long, even a bit longer than Don's, though not nearly as thick as Andrew's ridiculous member. And he sported a gorgeous, G-spot pleasuring upward curve. But it was a thing of beauty, deeply dark but with a lovely pinkish hue at the tip. He tasted of sex, his, and mine as I gently fellated him. And his sex was totally devoid of hair or even a hint of stubble, which fascinated me. His sac was gorgeous, generously full, but not distended or low hanging as had been the case with Don and Andrew. I gently caressed his balls as his cock swelled once more with desire. I marveled at the physiology of men; at how their testes churned out potency in a never-ending cycle. And I craved Derrick to offer up their contents into me once more. Two Loves, Three Lovers And the second time he took me, it was almost beyond belief. Derrick's lips never left mine as he mounted me, moving my loins to receive him as my legs opened in receptive submission to his requirements. I gave a start as he fed his now fully erect ebony shaft into me, bottoming out easily, though he took great care not to push me past the limits of what my vagina could offer. He gave me a few moments to relax as I accommodated his size. Then he began to rhythmically feed his penis in and out of me, which he did easily as I was sopping with my own lubrication and the copious leavings of the ejaculate he had earlier placed inside of me. He was careful not to crush me with the weight of his body, but my breasts pressed deeply into his chest as he took me. It was the most perfect joining I had ever experienced with a man. The totality of his sexing me was beyond amazing. Though I might deny it to anyone who might have asked, there was an incredible eroticism to making love to a black man, which moved and compelled me. His skin was so smooth, so dark, and so incredibly masculine. And I felt in his never-ending kiss that he was totally enamored of me. I wanted to offer him more than a sexual surrender, which I'm sure he knew that he already had. I wanted him to experience my desire. "You're incredible, Derrick," I whispered in his ear as he hunched me, "I've never wanted a man as much as I want you." And I meant it. And he responded with a more vigorous tempo, kissing me more deeply than before. "God, you're incredible, Claire. I've never wanted a woman like I want you." The words from his mouth and the sweetness of his lips sent me over the edge. I came. I came with such intensity that I cried out over and over, only dimly aware that my pussy was pulsing repeatedly and squirting wildly as I did so. But Derrick never lost a beat as he continued to feed his cock into me. I was now cumming almost continuously; beyond caring who was present or how sluttish I was behaving. And as I felt his breathing become quicker and shallower, I grasped his muscled buttocks, ready to receive his seed. And Derrick delivered. I lay still as he sent out repeated volleys of his virile sperm into my vagina, his body spasming with the release of his lust. I gladly took every drop of his masculine potency, delighting that my charms had provided him with the release he craved. And when he had fully spent the contents of his testes into me, he remained inside of me for more than a few minutes, still kissing me. This was a true mating, akin to what I had known so often with Don. Derrick had found my personal center and had fucked that, as much as he had fucked my sex. We slept a bit and when I awoke, Derrick was slumbering peacefully next to me. I was glad. Andrew was nowhere to be found. The afternoon had given way to evening and I knew that I had to return to James and the children, so I got up and dressed. I made myself as presentable as I could manage in the bathroom and heard Andrew as he cracked the door open. "Hey babe," he said lightly. "Do you have to leave?" I turned to him and smiled. "I really do. It's getting late." He looked disappointed. "I gave you your space but, damn, that was hot." His hands were on me but I was in no mood for him. "Another time," I said, pulling back a bit. "I really have to go." I gave him a peck on the cheek and without a backward glance, I left. Derrick proved to be an incredibly attentive and quite romantic partner for me. I learned that he was an amazingly sensitive, intelligent, and fascinating man over time. And after a few more trysts with Andrew, Derrick made it clear that he wanted me to be exclusive to him. This I agreed to readily! Derrick wanted me as his woman. And I wanted only him. He signed on with another gym as a trainer and I followed him there. Poor Andrew -- but I wasn't too concerned. He still had Janet and I'm sure other married women as well. And Derrick did as well, though he was far more selective and discreet about his ways than Andrew ever was with me. Derrick was almost ten years younger than me; super attractive, and women were hitting on him all the time. And that didn't bother me. As was the case with Andrew, it excited me that I was with a man who could have his pick of women. Derrick required my monogamy, which I readily offered. I never gave a second thought to Andrew and I let him know that. I told James that I had a regular lover as well, and he seemed somehow pleased that I was not catting about. I never mentioned that my lover was an African-American though -- I'm not sure how he would have handled that. Derrick and I were together as frequently as our schedules allowed; days, evenings, and then over time weekends as well. Derrick, as I had mentioned, had a few other women in his stable but as our romantic connection deepened, he committed to me. And while I never asked for this, I was thrilled when he chose to only be with me. He simply offered it up. I made it clear that I understood that while I was perfectly content to be his lover to the exclusion of any other man, I did not require the same from him. He was a deeper, more complex and loving man than Andrew, and I suppose that I was confident that in time he would only want what I could offer. I gave him my body time and again, without reservation. I gave him my love, without condition. He gave me his devotion, knowing that I was married to another man. And it just all worked out. I suppose that my unconditional love for him and my acceptance of the realities of our situation made it all work. James knew his name in time and allowed me time with him, even to the point of suggesting that I spend more time with Derrick. James loved me and he knew me. And I think he knew that I was the most content when I was being regularly fucked. And I was. Derrick fucked me often and never seemed to tire of me. I never tired of receiving him into my body. And, being a woman, I did want his child. But that was impossible, both because of the situation and the simple fact that I could not bear a child from a lover of a different race. Whatever James had been forced to accept in rearing three children from Don, he could never handle the impossible obstacles of my offering a mixed-race child into our marriage. So it never happened. But Derrick certainly impregnated me repeatedly over the past few years. That was a given, seeing that I was protected from the onslaught of his repeated seeding of my body only by the thin shield offered by my IUD. There was not a day that passed when I was not carrying his teeming sperm cells within me for years, save that two weeks when James and I vacationed in Europe. And I did not take it amiss that he had found relief with another married woman from our gym in the interim. I never wanted Derrick to be in the least concerned over such trifling matters. And he was both pleased and relieved that I loved him enough to allow him such indiscretions. Derrick was a stud and the price a woman must pay for having such a man in her life is turning a blind-eye to his rampant sexual needs. This, I was glad to do. Our relationship was so solid that he felt no compunction about pointing out two married women at the gym who had come on to him and who he had serviced a few times. Neither woman was in my league in terms of attractiveness, which pleased me. I understood their desire to be with such a gorgeous African-American male. And Derrick pointedly no longer pursued other women, which I appreciated. But he was available in the right situation. Yes, I understood only too well the fascination a married, white woman would have for my amazing Mandingo lover. Each time he undressed in front of me, I surged with desire. Just the sight of his lean, muscled, black body stirred me as no other man could. His cock was seemingly always turgid, though even when soft there was no mistaking its power and potential. I loved to press the firm flesh of my white breasts into his firm, ebony chest. And I delighted knowing that Derrick was no different than the other men I had been with, as he too found pleasure in the firmness and fullness of my tits. And when he was unshaven, the rasp of his whiskers on my nipples gave me so much pleasure. I learned that he preferred a woman to be very submissive when he fucked her, so he had his way in moving me into whatever position suited him. The verbalization of my pleasure spurred him on, so I always told him exactly what I was feeling and thinking when he fucked me. And, yes, I played up to the white/black difference and the fact that I was a married slut. Well, I was a married slut after all! He never tired of hearing me beg for him to fill me with his potent, superior black seed. I certainly never tired of the thrill of being inseminated by a superior male. It took me some time to get deal with my fear that he would tire of me and that my charms would no longer satisfy him. The thought of losing Derrick filled me with anguish. I wondered if my complete submission, surrender, and craving for him would bore him. I wished at times that I could have been less needy, but he appreciated, understood, and cherished what I offered. And my love for him deepened as a result. Don's financial provender allowed me to treat Derrick to more than a few lovely, romantic vacations with him. I was glad that as I approached forty that I could sustain a romantic and sexual connection with such an incredible, desirable man. My body thankfully never lost its shape. My breasts never required surgery to retain their exquisite fullness. I have never drooped! As with Don, Derrick never lost his passion for me. In time, I dropped all pretense of being married. I wanted to be seen with Derrick and though I had a few friends comment on my wantonness in being seen in public with my black lover, I didn't care. And why should I? I had three amazing children, a loving, wonderful husband, and a devoted, passionate lover. Let them talk! I made sure to shower Derrick with not only my charms, but my resources as well. A personal trainer has limited means and in time he learned that my financial gifts to him came from my love and derived from the wellspring of Don's undying devotion to me. Yes, Don knew in time about Derrick, and he was not only supportive, but also glad that I had found a man worthy of my body and of my love. Don was and is, my most fervent love. From time to time, and with Derrick's permission, I did offer my body to Don. While enraptured as always, he never penetrated me again. I don't think he was capable of that any more, but he did enjoy lying with me and I did once coax an orgasm from him. He offered only a thin dribble from his cock, but he was so grateful. And he was, after all, the father of my three fabulous children. We shared several very nice, relaxed vacations together at his casa in the Caribbean. I think that James was in some way rather glad that I had not altogether abandoned the man who had fathered our children. I hid nothing from Derrick and I loved him all the more for allowing me to share the special connection and love I felt for Don. James never met Derrick, though he learned in time that I had settled into a relationship with a black lover. Nothing has ever seemed to faze him or diminish his love for me. I had sensed for some time that he needed to know more about Derrick and my relationship with him. Surprisingly, he asked me questions about my relationship with him one evening, which I of course answered honestly. He was tentative at first, but my loving acceptance and wish to accommodate his needs encouraged him to be more bold with his questions. "Do you love him," he asked with downcast eyes? "Yes, I do. But that doesn't diminish my love or commitment for you." "He's black, isn't he?" "Yes, he is. But that's not an issue for either of us." "What is his name? What does he do?" "His name is Derrick and he's a personal trainer at my gym." "Okay. Is he a good lover, you know, like Don was?" It shouldn't have surprised me that he knew about Don's skill in bed, but it did. He had never mentioned it or asked about it before. "Derrick is a very good lover and he's devoted to me, like Don was. He makes me very happy." James was silent for an uncomfortable time, and then finally raised his eyes and looked right through me. "Do you want a baby from him?" I had to think about that for a moment before answering. And I answered truthfully. "I would be glad to have Derrick's child because I love him and would want to give him that gift, but Don will be the only man to give me children. It would be selfish of me to diminish what I had with him by carrying another man's child. It would hurt him so much and it would hurt you as well. And the baby would be mixed-race, and that would be impossible to explain. Everyone thinks that our children were from you and that's how I have always wanted it. I've never wanted you to be anything but a father to our three wonderful children." James smiled in some relief and I was glad. "I've seen to it that Derrick will not impregnate me to term, James. But I am not on the pill. I wear an IUD, just so you know. He has fertilized me several times, that I know that, but I will not carry to term. Is that okay?" "Yes, that's fine." He seemed thoughtful and a bit upset though. "I know a lot about Don, I mean, I've know him for some time. I'd sort of like to know what Derrick looks like." "Well, I guess you could drop by the gym sometime. He's the only black trainer there, if you'd like to see what he looks like. Would you like to meet him? I'm sure that he'd be okay with that." James was immediate with his answer. "I never want to meet him. I just want to see what he looks like -- maybe some photos of him, or...him with you. You know..." He was embarrassed and I knew why immediately. James wanted to see Derrick making love to me. After all of these years, he had expressed an erotic desire. And he had done so openly. I would do anything to make him happy. "Would you like to see some pictures of Derrick with me?" I asked, reaching out for his hand. "Yes, please." I had the photos that Andrew had taken of me the first night I had been with Derrick in an album I kept secreted away. I got them and handed the album to James. He seemed perplexed at first, and looked at me for help. "It's okay. I want you to look at them." I loved James so much and wondered if after all of these years of celibate marriage, he had found some semblance of sexuality. I held his hand and leaned over and kissed him. He blushed a bit but began to thumb through the pages, obviously fascinated. It seemed an eternity as he took his time to absorb the visual evidence of my sexuality. It struck me that this was the first time he had seen my naked body. He lingered on one photo of me alone, stretched out naked on Andrew's bed, obviously ready to receive my lover. "You are magnificent, Claire. I had no idea." And when he looked up and at me, there were tears in his eyes. "Please don't ever leave me." I kissed away his tears. "I will never leave you, James. You're my husband and I will have no other as long as you live." He wiped away his tears. And then I asked him the question I had asked him many years ago. "Do you want to be with me?" His answer was immediate. "No. I just can't. I can't." And he started sobbing. I moved to him and held him as he wept. He took his time recovering from the emotional upset of seeing me for the first time as a sexual being. And I couldn't help but notice that there was a small tenting of his pants. James had an erection, though I also couldn't help but notice that it was barely noticeable. "I have to be by myself for awhile," he said and abruptly got up. He carried the album with him. Obviously he needed to masturbate. As much as I was willing to do whatever it took to please him, I knew that the visuals in the album were what he required, not the reality of my body. And he kept the album with him, in a drawer of his nightstand. And over the years I saw to it that new images of my body were discreetly added -- and those of Derrick with me as well. I explained it all to Derrick and he was wonderful in working with me to see that I was supplied with images that might excite James. James never again commented that I added new photos of my naked body, but I knew that he appreciated them very much. Andrew was enlisted on occasion to photograph Derrick and me together and was cool with the reality that I didn't want to be with him sexually again. But I was sluttish enough to enjoy teasing him with the sight of my naked body, so close and yet so unavailable to him. I have three men who love me and their devotion to me makes me so very grateful. James is and remains my rock. Don is the father of my children, and forever has my undying passion and the final, ultimate expression of my love for him. Derrick is my lover, sweet, smart, and unrelenting in his demands on my body. And he is really just incredible. I could be with him for days and days and never tire of his passion or his conversation. And while a part of me wants to carry his child, that can never be. Alas, would it could be otherwise! And he knows it. Don would be devastated if I carried another man's child. So would James. But there are those occasions when my sweet husband alludes to my having a lover and over time I have shared with him some details and hopefully I have given him some release from a sexuality that he has found only after many years of denial. So, I simply live in blissful and total delight in a life which is as perfect as I would make it. I have three men who love me. I have had three lovers as well, but am perfectly content with one perfect one. Derrick for me will always be my most perfect lover. I never tire of receiving him, nor does he ever seem to tire of me. Oh, I forgot to mention, Patrick was on my sexual trail again! But I shut him down quickly enough! I sent him a note telling him that I had a loving husband, a rich, devoted father to my children, and a highly skilled and very black lover. So, what did I want with him? That was the end of that! I am the luckiest, most fortunate woman in the world! And I know it and embrace it. What a long, wonderful journey it has been since my virginal youth. I am now wife, mother, and unapologetic slut. And as amazing as Derrick is, I wonder if he too in time will yield to another man. Two Loves We abandoned the car and strolled into the hotel, taking the elevators and a maze of hallways to her doorway. As she opened the door she said with authority, "We're not going to have sex tonight. We're going to hold each other and kiss a lot." I nodded my acceptance of her boundaries, and she pulled me into her room. We met for breakfast again on Friday morning. Our lips were both chapped from the passionate make-out session we'd shared for several hours the previous evening. We'd petted some, and I'd confirmed that all curves and bumps on her sexy body were genuine. I'd eventually tiptoed out of her room after we'd both fallen asleep in each other's arms. Over breakfast Em said in a soft voice, "Thank you for last night. It was special falling asleep in your arms ... and all the other stuff we did." She smiled warmly at me and added, "Do you have plans for tonight?" "I'm all yours, Em; in more ways than you may realize." We repeated our activities of the previous day, attending conference sessions, and taking a sunshine bath over the lunch break. Em and I touched a lot, romantically and sensually. We stroked each other's arms, hands, necks, and anything else that seemed socially acceptable as we sat in the darkened rooms listening to technical papers. My focus was almost completely on her; every move, touch, whispered word, or look carried a new and important significance to me. Between sessions and over lunch we talked about the sessions we'd been in, analyzing the import of the breakthroughs being presented. My estimate of Em increased even further. She was brilliant, seeing insights and drawing conclusions the speakers had missed. Further, she linked together several of the talks, drawing other conclusions about the future of computer technology. As we completed the first afternoon session, Em said to me, "Is the next session crucial to you? Could we skip it and go someplace special?" I didn't have to even think about it. "Let's go," I replied. "Where?" "I have some elderly relatives about an hour east of here. I've wanted to see them for over a decade. I thought we could just stop in for an hour or so, and say hello. You'll like them. They're colorful; and they've been here since forever." An hour later Em introduced me to Nancy Belle and Eli. Both were in their late eighties, yet appeared healthy, spry, and alert. I forget the family connection, but they were ecstatic to see Emma and glad that she'd brought her 'boyfriend' with her. They were solicitous of our visit and served us herbal tea. Em and I sat beside each other and she held my arm in hers for most of the visit. I actually reflected that we probably looked 'cute' to the octogenarians. I learned that the two of them had ridden into San Bernardino in a covered wagon pulled by six oxen in the early 1920s. They'd weathered all these decades and raised a slew of children, grandchildren, and now great grandchildren. We left after a fascinating hour. I had a renewed interest in history given their unique perspective on the past seventy years or so. When we got close to the hotel, we stopped and had Chinese dinners. Again, we shared multiple dishes, laughing at some of the taste sensations we'd purchased. Em had experimented with food much more than I had. Towards the end of dinner, Em asked, "Do you have to go back tomorrow? Could you stay an extra day? I'll drive you to the airport on Sunday morning. I'll stay over too and go back north at the same time." I had no firm commitments back east, so told her that was a great idea. I'd change my flight back at the hotel. I wasn't sure what Em had planned, however, being with her pleased me, even if we just sat around the pool for the day. We headed back to the hotel and Em invited me to her room again. We made love. There was no hesitation, no shyness, no vacillation or equivocation. Once the door to her room shut, Em turned to me and floated into my arms. We kissed, passionately, and then she just said softly, "Make love to me." Hours later, our spent bodies woven together across her bed, we kissed yet again and then drifted to sleep. I spooned behind Emma, cradling her head on my arm, the other arm wrapped around her and holding a breast with her hand atop mine. I wondered if there had ever been greater contentment on the planet. In the dark morning hours, Em woke me, and we made love again. As she sat astride my hips, she told me that like the sunshine she was soaking up, she wanted to soak up as much of me as she could because our time together had to 'last' until the next time, whenever that would be. After our session, we cuddled back to sleep again. Saturday morning we made love again before we showered together and dressed. At Em's suggestion, I checked out and moved my bags to her room. We spent most of the day in bed, taking time out only for breakfast and lunch in the hotel, and then dinner at a nearby steak house. We made love into the morning hours. We'd allowed time between the wake-up call and our departure for one more romantic interlude. We used every second of the time, ultimately rushing through our showers and checkout. With some laughter and some tears we raced to LAX for my morning flight to Boston. Em would take a commuter flight back to San Francisco after I left. We stood and kissed goodbye with a passion I'd not known before. I felt like I'd been kicked in the gut after I left her. Em and I both had tears in our eyes. Chapter 2 I not only slept on the plane back to Boston, but also ruminated about Emma and where the relationship might go, particularly since we were three thousand miles apart. During the few days since we'd met we hadn't talked about the future of our relationship. The only future was Em's request for me to call her soon -- to stay in touch the way a boyfriend and girlfriend might. Given the flash with which it had started, I wondered if it would survive the following week. The closer the plane got to east coast, the more my thoughts also turned to Megan -- pretty, conservative, intellectual, artsy Megan. I liked her too. Thinking about her so close to my encounter with Em made me feel torn -- torn between the east coast and the west coast, between Megan and Emma, between a free spirit and a conservative one, and between a polite non-physical relationship and passionate sexual one. The more I thought about it, the more contrasts I saw. I saw myself as the bridge between the contrasts. I liked them both -- maybe even loved them. I'd postpone the choice as long as I could. Back in my studio apartment, I found I had a couple of messages from Megan, the last one suggesting dinner that night. I returned the call with a rather lame apology about not calling in to empty my answering machine while I'd been in California. She wasn't too miffed and any irritation passed quickly. After some other chitchat, we agreed to meet for dinner at a small Italian restaurant in Burlington. Thus, two hours later over dinner, I found myself talking about the ACM Conference with Megan, wondering how much of what I was saying she was taking in. She showed genuine interest; however, technology, engineering, and databases were outside her sphere of interest. I conveniently left out any mention of Emma. Megan shared her week with me. She worked part time as a docent at the DeCordova Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts, only a few minutes from her home. During the week, they'd opened up a new exhibit for the fall season, and she waxed eloquent about the exhibits and the artists for a good part of the meal. After dinner, as we left the restaurant, Megan gave me a functional goodnight kiss on the lips. I tried to nudge her into something more significant, but the moment passed and she slid into her car and drove away. We had talked briefly about when we'd see each other again. Since we'd met, Megan had been determined to turn me into someone that not only appreciated the arts, but also had a discerning eye and ear for its fine points. Thus, many of our dates took us to a concert, the theater, a gallery, a poetry reading, an author's forum, or a show at one of the many museums in and around Boston. Megan wasn't a false intellectual, trying to feign interest in the arts so she appeared cultured. She was cultured, and her interest in the arts was genuine and enthusiastic. Discovering a new artist or author she liked brought her great delight. I found my immersion into the arts pleasing, and liked the fact Megan expanded my horizons into areas I'd left untouched by my focus on engineering and technology. I liked most of the events or places we attended, and already had a burgeoning hobby studying many of the things she placed at my feet. I was open to learning, and the opinions and viewpoints Megan taught me. Megan lived with her parents. She'd graduated from Wellesley College only thirty minutes from home, and although she'd lived on campus, I noted that she still shared an exceptionally close relationship with her mother and younger sister. Megan was a carbon copy of her mother, a lovely and matronly woman in her early fifties devoted to the arts as well as several charitable causes in the western suburbs. One drawback to Megan living at home was that it severely limited the opportunity for us to have moments of physical intimacy. I wasn't at all sure that such moments even appealed to her. Usually, when we went out, I'd pick her up at her house and drop her off there. If there were an invitation to come in for coffee after our date, that was what the invitation really meant. However, after the time I'd spent in Los Angeles I decided to be more assertive about Megan and me creating a more physical and romantic relationship. I needed to know if there was something there other than a polite kiss or two. The Friday evening after I'd returned from LA, we attended the opening of a new exhibit at the Steven's Gallery in Cambridge. I then brought Megan back to my small apartment in Lexington. I'd romanced her more than usual that evening, even plying her with a flowers and new Pinot Noir I'd bought. I was soon rewarded with a physical passion from her I didn't know existed. We cuddled for a couple of hours on my sofa, exploring at least superficially each other's bodies without the removal of any clothing. The evening was transformational. I'd been uncertain of Megan's ultimate appeal to me or, for that matter, my appeal to her. The next day a different Megan greeted me, one that hugged and kissed and wasn't shy about displaying her affection for me to her family. The relation with her family changed too. I suddenly became increasingly involved in Megan's family functions -- her sister's birthday, a family dinner at some exclusive club, an overnight cruise with her family on the magnificent yacht of a family friend, and even her mother's birthday. Of course, turnabout is fair play. Megan started to play a more evident role in the doings of my family as well. Megan and I became increasingly physical with each other too, much to my pleasure, and I was pleased to discover hers too. About a month after I'd come back from Los Angeles we consummated our relationship at my apartment. The shy Megan turned out to have a passionate streak that could turn almost wild during sex. She'd been a virgin when we made love the first time, but after our first time together she would try anything. Things changed even more profoundly after that between us. We both tacitly assumed that sometime, in the not too distant future, we'd marry and start a family. Basically, over the following couple of months Megan and I became an event -- we were officially a couple, and one with a long-term future as far as both families were concerned. I knew we'd get married soon when I was at my parent's home alone, and my mother started to talk about giving some of her jewelry to Megan. My mother would only consider such an act if Megan would be a long-term part of the family. Thus, a couple of months later, after confiding in my parents, I had my grandmother's diamond engagement ring re-sized so that it would fit Megan's ring finger. I decided to wait for a special occasion and decided that Christmas Eve day would be the right event. I was a guest for a large afternoon dinner at Megan's home. A television in their den allowed frequent diversions into several football games during the day. I finally captured Megan and pulled her into the vacant living room while the rest of her family hovered in the kitchen or watching television. "Megan," I started as she studied my face, "You make me very happy and I think I make you happy. I think we are a good couple ... well ... Megan will you marry me?" I reached into my jacket pocket and produced the flashy ring. Megan let me slip it on her finger, kissed me with renewed passion, and then shrieked at the top of her lungs about how she accepted. "YES, YES, YES," she screamed as we hugged again. The racket attracted the rest of the family who proceeded to fawn all over us the rest of the day. I felt happy, and that I'd made the right decision. Christmas day we brought both families together at my parent's home in Dillon for an impromptu family-only engagement party. By the time all the aunts, uncles, cousins, and other assorted relatives from both families paid a visit, over sixty people had come by to wish us well. We had a great time being the center of attention. As the holidays faded, Megan and her mother went into wedding planning mode. I acceded to the decision the pair made to have a large wedding. As far as I was concerned, it was a large party; if they wanted to spend their money to that extent it was fine with me. I made it clear that I'd do any size wedding, even just standing with the local justice of the peace with close family members present. The spring and summer months passed with amazing speed. Occasionally, I'd get asked my opinion about how an invitation looked or whether I liked this place setting or that. Towards summer, our first wedding presents arrived. This was becoming all too real, but I kept my cool and didn't let the anxiety of a life-changing event sweep me away. In late August, over three hundred of our 'closest' friends and relatives gathered for our wedding. We used the Congregational church in Concord, Massachusetts, for the ceremony, and a mammoth tent in Megan's parent's spacious backyard for the reception. A live band provided the entertainment, and about thirty caterers and bartenders kept a supply of food and drink flowing into the crowd for the rest of the afternoon and early evening. Out of deference for the neighbors, the Winston's shut things down about ten o'clock that evening. Megan and I and about thirty of our real friends then had a party after the party at my friend Bob's house in Bedford. Bob had an above ground pool that we all crowded into, singing, carousing, and carrying on until the wee hours of the morning. We eventually called it quits about three a.m.; Megan and I went back to my apartment. We were so exhausted, we just fell into bed together. In the winter, Megan and I moved to a bigger apartment in Lexington. I could almost walk to work. Megan continued with her volunteer work only a few miles away at the DeCordova Museum. She also helped in her mother's volunteer work at a black tie gala for the American Cancer Society. I finally bought a tuxedo. "Matt, we have to talk!" Megan announced to me with authority one Saturday afternoon in early spring. I could tell she'd had something on her mind for the previous week, but even when I'd asked she'd brushed off her mood as nothing unusual. I had a unique sensitivity to 'we have to talk' statements, believing with each one that my continuing relationship with Emma might have been uncovered despite my care. Megan led me into our new living room. I felt comfortable in the room, a mix of furniture from my apartment and several new pieces Megan and I had purchased. We both sat on the sofa. Megan took my hand in hers and squeezed affectionately. My angst subsided slightly. "I'm going back to school," Megan announced. Inside, I breathed a sigh of relief. Outwardly, I asked, "Tell me what your thinking." "I want to contribute more to the world than just be a docent at the museum and do charity stuff. Right now, the best I can do with my education is a clerical job of some kind. What was I thinking when I signed up for an art degree?" Megan rolled her eyes. "I'd need a doctorate in art to teach, or at a minimum a masters in education so I could get a teaching certificate in some school system. But, that's not enough; I don't want to teach or play guide in a museum." She took a deep breath and said, "I want to be a doctor -- or at least a physician's assistant." "Wow!" I exclaimed aloud. "You have been thinking." Megan pulled out a glossy folder out of the drawer in the coffee table. "I've been in town to talk to Simmons College about their program. I went through a lot of other places too, but settled on Simmons' School of Health Services. My advisor there thinks that if I start full time this summer and take a course overload now and then, I can finish their PA program in two-and-a-half years. I want to make sure it's all right with you before I apply." "Are you sure?" I asked. "The more I get into it, the more excited I get." The tone of her voice rose in obvious excitement. She flipped a few pages in one brochure and laid a list of courses in front of me. "This coming summer and most of my first year I'll be taking a lot of basic courses: anatomy, physiology, chemistry, microbiology, statistics, and psychology. After that, I start to get into the practical clinic work and patient care courses, possibly with a couple of electives to direct me into specialized training. If I want to go further, to become an MD, they have all the right connections to other nearby schools and hospitals." I thought for a minute and said, "Megan, I'll support you in this, but I don't want you to set yourself up for disappointment. Only a few months ago, we talked about starting a family in a couple of years. Have you forgotten that discussion?" "No, no," She insisted. "I'm just not going to start popping babies out this year or next. After I finish, I think there'll be some time for all that. I'm just postponing." She looked at me eager for my approval of her idea. "Have you talked to your parents -- your mother?" "No. Mom would just try to talk me out of it. For her, the museum thing and maybe a charitable gala once a year would be adequate. I realize I've been burning up inside wanting something significant in my life, and I'm sure this is it." "How will it affect us?" I asked, although I could already feel the wheels turning about a curtailed social life -- something I'd been getting used to. Megan answered slowly, "I guess a lot." She moved closer and sat right beside me, holding my hand in hers again. "I'd be a co-ed again. This place would become my dorm room. I wouldn't be the chief cook or laundry queen I've been. Our social life would suffer. I'd be sure to pay lots of attention to you -- lots of quality time though." She grinned at me, and then went on, "I don't know beyond that. I can't envision it until I'm doing it, I guess." I approved. Something inside me felt that Megan was making a move to a more substantive life. I just hoped that she could handle the pressures and workload of being a wife and student at the same time. I knew she'd pour her heart and mind into the endeavor. In June, Megan started commuting every day into the Boston's Fenway. My sophisticated intellectual artsy wife became a co-ed again. The heels and dresses gave way to Levis, a sweatshirt, and running shoes. The evening discussions we'd had about art and authors, gave way to quick synopses of some physiology class or having me quiz her about anatomy. I started to learn a lot about bones and muscles. Two Loves I didn't have too much time to dwell on Megan's abrupt career change. A digital signal processor that my modest-sized company made became a best seller. Digital Devices soared into the stratosphere of success. Every air traffic control system, air force, navy, or airport in the world suddenly couldn't get enough of them to process radar signals. We couldn't hire fast enough. I got what I called a 'field promotion' to head the database program when my boss moved over to work with the manufacturing group. My pay took a couple of jumps over the year too, part of it a healthy bonus in company stock options. While I wasn't in the mainstream at the moment, I knew that I was the seed corn for the company's future. I redoubled my efforts at work, and with it came longer hours and weekend work. Much to my delight, I was able to capture one of the company's computers as a dedicated machine for my data base efforts -- an IBM System 370. The machine was huge and filled the corner of one building on our campus, complete with air conditioning requirements and all. Nonetheless, the dedicated machine enabled us to quadruple our research efficiency, as well as sell our surplus computer time on the timeshare market. We were trying to build the perfect database machine. One of the requirements of my new job turned out to be travel. I started to travel all over the United States to meet with just about anyone doing database research or related computer interface work. At home, Megan seemed just as happy with my increased absorption with my work and my trips every other week. She admitted it made her feel less guilty about devoting so many hours each week to her studies. Because of her nature, she signed up for an overload each semester. We both agreed that this was the time in our lives to put our heads down and focus on our careers. We made it a priority to spend some quality time together each weekend. With her exams or my travel schedule, this didn't always work out. In those cases, we'd declare a make-up time some other evening. We'd take day trips around New England and try to do something interesting: canoeing along the Charles River, touring the mansions in Newport, touring Mystic Seaport, or walking the beach along Maine's coast while we had lobster rolls for lunch. Being with Megan was always romantic, although I suspect neither of us got enough of each other. Our lovemaking suffered as our roles at work and school changed, and thus, so did the feeling of intimacy I felt with Megan. I tried to gage if we were 'in trouble,' and decided we were not. I knew our life was a temporary situation that would pass when she finished her program. Besides, mentally I had about all I could handle. When we looked around at the few close friends we had, we seemed to be doing better than most. A couple of our friends had split up after only a couple of years of marriage. Others were struggling with the emerging dual income-dual career life style. For the time being, we were unique insofar as Megan's return to school, but we could see that ultimately we'd be facing the same pressures others in our cohort faced. Our friends that had children were fairing no better. Well-educated women that had embraced the feminist movement of the '60s found themselves stuck at home with a swarm of children under the age of six. I had to admit the situation seemed unfair if the husband didn't help out in some way. Without adult stimulation or something meaningful to do, not only did skills atrophy, but also the psyche withered. A few women in this category managed to breakout of the child-rearing roles thrust on them, but many seemed hopelessly resigned to the milieu of diapers, potty training, and an empty stay-at-home existence. I started to run. I needed exercise and jogging was the big craze of the era. I started, thinking that the two miles around our apartment loop and some neighboring streets was a superb accomplishment, until one day as I finished my run I found two neighbors trudging home from a ten miler. After being so significantly one-upped, I started to increase the mileage on my runs. I found a group at work that liked to run at lunchtime. We had showers and a small gym at work, and a comfortable course of several miles around the roads and trails of Lexington and Concord. A few months later, not only was I running five to seven miles at lunch, but I'd also lost twenty pounds and gotten in the best physical shape I'd ever been in. Some weekends, depending on Megan's schedule, I'd run ten or twelve miles or do a ten-kilometer footrace in some nearby town, usually supporting a needy charity. I started to amass a collection of t-shirts from all my races. The Boston Marathon became the ultimate accomplishment for runners about that time. I decided it'd be fun to run the full race. I pushed my daily runs up to ten or twelve miles, and my weekend runs up to eighteen miles or more. I wasn't particularly fast, but I was consistent in maintaining a pace between seven and eight minutes a mile. As mid-April got closer, those of us from the company planning to run the marathon made weekly sojourns to one or another portion of the race course between Hopkinton and Boston. Soon, we knew what the entire course was like, including the terrible hills in Newton and near Boston College. Megan urged me on in my training, occasionally accompanying me at the start of a weekend run and then cutting out to go home and study. She became my cheering section the third Monday in April when it was marathon day. She dropped me in Hopkinton, and then went into Framingham to meet me with my special brew of energy drink. I think there were over twenty thousand runners that day. I couldn't even cross the starting line from my position in the pack for seven minutes after the gun went off. That was when I started my watch. The pack thinned out pretty quickly. I found Megan in Framingham and then in Wellesley and Newton as she hopped the course ahead of me. She cheered and yelled appropriately as I tore by each meeting point, grabbing a disposable bottle of my secret potion from her hands. I finished with an official time of 3:20 --fewer than eight minutes a mile. I hit the wall on the hills, despite my potion, and suffered my way across the finish line in a mix of pain and elation. I cried I was so overcome with emotion at my accomplishment. I think I'd also depleted every electrolyte in my body. Megan found me and wrapped me in a blanket. I collected my souvenir medallion and went home feeling wonderful. I was on a colossal high -- an endorphin high. I'd finished in a respectable time. Megan shared my joy, and much to my surprise and pleasure she'd arranged a surprise party for me that evening. A parade of our friends arrived with joke gifts for me that celebrated my first marathon. Surprisingly, I thought her hand in arranging my celebration was one of the warmest and most touching things she'd done in our marriage to that point. I felt such love from her, and such love for her. The whole evening I couldn't let her out of my reach. A couple of my friends even jested that we were clearly still on our honeymoon. After the party, Megan and I made love; it was one of our peak experiences up to that point. Each semester, when final exams came, I'd declare myself to be Megan's slave. I started my servitude over her first summer back in school, fixing meals and keeping the apartment unusually neat. I did all the shopping, arranged our slim social life, and tried to find all those things that I could do to make her life easier. I made a trip to a local stationery store and made sure she had a supply of every conceivable study aid: the new Post-It notes, highlighters, pads of paper, and more pens and pencils than we'd ever use in our lifetimes. By the time the fall term came to an end in December, I was more geared up to be her servant. I had romantic meals arranged, carefully synched with her arrival home from her classes or study sessions. I bought her warm fuzzy pajamas, but only let her get in them one evening after I'd given a full body massage complete with warmed oils. Another night, I had a bubble bath for her, complete with candles floating in the tub. I toweled her down with a new fluffy warm towel. We made love. The meals I made were tailored to her palate, although I cheated a few times using the takeout service from a few of our favorite restaurants. I made sure her car was always full of gas and clean, and searched for dozens of other ways to be helpful and supportive as she took her exams. No task was too small so long as it made her happy. In the spring, just after Megan's last exam, I swept her up the next day and we flew to the Virgin Islands. I didn't tell her where we were going until we got to the airport, but made sure she'd packed all the right clothing for the resort we spent a few days at. We sailed, snorkeled, swam, sunned, and made love over and over. What a wonderful vacation. People at the resort thought we were on our honeymoon and did special things for us. We didn't dissuade their opinions even though we'd been married almost two years by that time.