The Beginning
Driving west, Harold and Helen Yodersohn had left behind all they knew, the adjacent towns of their conservative religious community. Isolated, they knew the surrounding world only indirectly and not very well. The Latter-day Puritans had a 19th-century feel with conservatively dressed women and healthy hard-working men. The couple had fit in well, accepting the dominance of Holy Leader.
When it came time to marry, Holy Leader made all the decisions. He introduced Harold to Helen, and that was that. Harold had admired her from afar for years, but they had never spoken or even gotten close. He was quite pleased, for his stranger/bride had a bright round face, an enchanting turned-up nose, average height and long auburn hair. The rest of her body was permanently hidden under her traditional full-length dress. She looked down modestly during their entire first meeting, lifting her head only when Holy Leader demanded it. Of her personality, likes and dislikes, skills and needs Harold knew nothing. He was handsome enough, about the same height as Helen, with the full beard required of the community's males.
Their wedding was a simple affair, mostly hymns and warnings from Holy Leader. On their wedding night they got all the sex education they would ever get, as Holy Leader performed the marital consecration. He stripped the new Mrs. Yodersohn naked in her new husband's presence, laid her flat on her back, and had his way with her while giving minimal explanations of what was going on. Harold was astonished at Helen's body - full breasts, soft thighs, generously rounded hips. He had never seen anything so beautiful, that would soon be his to touch and caress. But first Holy Leader did the touching and caressing. Helen looked helplessly at her new husband while it happened; he was strongly aroused by the deflowering of his bride, watching her involuntary sexual responses and feeling his own. He knew deep down that something was wrong about Holy Leader's intercourse with a married woman, but he accepted the custom. The intercourse was painful for Helen, physically and emotionally, but it didn't last long. Harold had a painfully stiff erection the whole time.
After the marital consecration they were free to live together as man and wife. As a result of this custom about a fifth of the community's firstborns were Holy Leader's, raised obediently by married couples who passively accepted this and much else.
Having discovered talents in a specialized branch of software engineering, Harold was able to bring a good salary working from home. Computers do exactly what they are instructed to do, no more and no less, so Harold got along with them comfortably, perhaps better than he got along with most people. Before long he got an unsolicited offer for a much better salary, but it would require a move to California. Realizing that Harold's tithe would enrich his struggling community, Holy Leader allowed him to go, but only if he paid a tithe for Helen too. So Harold obediently promised 20% of his salary, still allowing a comfortable living for the couple. Fortunately Helen wasn't pregnant.
Moving was a harrowing experience for the couple, without the guiding hand of Holy Leader to make decisions. They found a modest house in a town in the high desert; after a period of disorientation, then orientation, then organization, life became routine. Gradually they accommodated to California life, helped by establishing a rigid routine. Bored with staying at home, Helen found a job as a bookkeeper, trading what she called just a dress but what her coworkers called a granny dress for more stylish but still-conservative skirts and blouses. Harold shaved his beard after being teased about it. Yet, accustomed to the dominating presence of Holy Leader, they felt at loose ends, drifting. Weekends were specially hard, free time without duties or commitments. They were fortunate to have found real love for each other, but at a deep level they both craved order, the submission to a dominant individual that they had always known. The new-age sorts of churches they found in their town didn't do the job.
Their lives changed again when Harold, still stiff and awkward among his more casual coworkers, got some advice from a particularly astute young woman. He found this new friend, Sheila, uncomfortably attractive, a petite well-built blonde who seemed to specialize in low-cut scoop tops. He couldn't resist staring into that low-cut scoop with its subtly shifting contents, but Sheila didn't seem to mind. The way she moved, perhaps she liked it. They had begun talking innocently around the water cooler when Harold found himself confessing his discomfort. Sheila gave him a close hug of sympathy, mashing her breasts into his chest while he stood awkwardly, hands at his sides. She told him of an acquaintance who might enforce order in their lives. Interested but cautious, Harold asked a lot of questions, receiving mostly vague answers, but he felt that this might be what he and his wife needed. Sheila set up a meeting at a restaurant, neutral territory.
Bradley Townsend III welcomed his guests with his booming voice. Just as they had sat down he ordered them to stand. They stood. Then he ordered them to sit again. They sat. Without asking he ordered for all three of them; Sheila had already told him more about what the submissive couple needed than they knew about themselves. Nothing was said as each read the body language of the others. After eating in suspenseful silence, Brad was blunt and direct.
"I have a proposal for you, take it or leave it, no negotiations. For fifty hours each week, from eight pm on Friday until ten pm on Sunday, I will own you - you will obey me without question, do whatever I ask, no matter how extreme or uncomfortable. At other times you can lead your lives as you like, but during those fifty hours you will submit to my will completely. I will have the right to assign this authority to others. If you accept this offer, no further decisions on your parts are possible. Come to my home at 8:00 this Friday to begin this relationship. Be punctual."
Harold and Helen sat dumfounded, unable to finish their desserts, staring wide-eyed at Brad. Feeling an unfamiliar stirring at her crotch, Helen knew that she had to accept Brad's offer/demand. Having been straight-laced all her life, she sensed aspects of life that were new and unsettling, but exciting. She felt a strange compulsion to expand her narrow world. Later she discussed it with her husband, who particularly craved order and control - his wife needed to accept for different reasons, reasons that she couldn't admit even to herself.