He passed the folded paper across without a word and She pocketed it for later. Engine on; eyes checking the mirror; left hand reaching down ...
... and across into his lap. One brief hard grip of his still-erect penis through the cloth; one swift possessive squeeze. Then Her hand went to the gear stick, and they were driving away.
*****
In Laura's second year at university, she took a module on slavery in nineteenth century America. It wasn't particularly pleasant: it wasn't supposed to be, of course, and in fact she became a little concerned that it wasn't worse. She read the statistics and a few of the narratives; it appalled and disgusted her. Somehow the parade of atrocities repulsed her intellect but left her emotions almost untouched: as if the cruelties of the system had succeeded inside her mind, and made its victims into something other than people. Until she came upon the whipping house.
She had never realised. You don't, it's not a part of the stereotype. In the naive mind, it's all sadistic owners and psychotic overseers -- people who actively enjoy the infliction of suffering on those who cannot answer or defend themselves. Bullying carried to its pure, unconstrained conclusion, to death itself in some cases. In truth, it wasn't necessarily so. In truth, as often as not, it was the casual act of necessary maintenance on a piece of unreliable equipment; no more consciously sadistic that sending your car to the garage for a minor repair. Off down the whipping house with you, get your two dozen on the back, and bring Massah back the receipt. The sheer cold-blooded banality of the discovery left Laura nauseous and ruined her sleep for a week. She found herself resenting that reaction for a few minutes, and then hated herself for the resentment. It never quite went away from her, it became her emblem of depravity.
By the time she was twenty-five, Laura had come to the conclusion that she was one of the army of women short-changed by four decades of sexual revolution. She wanted a man to share her life and her bed, to be her companion and helpmate and give her truly satisfying sex. She didn't want a thirty-year-old adolescent to sit around the house and let her do all the work; she didn't want some self-righteous wimp in bad hair who insisted on sharing all the bills and letting her open her own doors all the time; she didn't want a constant cavalcade of amusing cocks that disappeared when it was time to wash the dishes. Having looked around at the few among her friends who did seem happy in their lot, she came to the sad conclusion that she wasn't really cut out for sharing her years with a good woman or an impressive vibrator collection either.
She met Geoff at a concert; one of those Breton folk groups playing what the untrained ear would call Cajun. He wasn't the expected type for the venue at all. Six-two of inverted triangle -- Geoff was unquestionably six-two, she could think of nobody she had ever met less likely to think of himself as 1.88 meters -- and suggestive twinkle in his eye. He seemed to have played almost every sport she knew at some point, and come through them all with his nose intact. She had assumed he was, for whatever reason, simply on the prowl for folk club totty; but they got talking and it seemed he even knew what he was talking about. Sorry, not really up on your actual French-French but I like the traditional Louisiana stuff: the Balfas, of course, and Menard's great. Either not a bullshitter, or a pretty good one. Laura became very interested. By the third drink out, she had come to the conclusion that he was so perfect he simply had to be gay. She invited him home. As it turned out, he wasn't gay.
They found themselves in bed very quickly, but once there he didn't hurry her at all. Kissing and stroking, and all those little teasing things with the mouth; and then his weight bearing down and his length inside. Feeling so safe and secure under the steady thrusting and the gentle voice saying the most beautifully ugly things that made her feel strangely proud of her body and what it did for him.
It was, emotionally speaking, as good as it could possibly be. From the physical viewpoint, Laura and vaginal orgasm remained the strangers they had been throughout her life. Geoff kissed and stroked, and made her very happy but slightly regretful that he was not where he belonged when it happened. The second time he took her from behind, kissed her neck and stroked her until she came around him: she wanted to see his face. The third time he said he wouldn't mind in the least if she joined in. She was shy, of course, but he kept on very gently until she slid her hand between them and he let her dictate his rhythm. He talked to her very quietly, telling her everything was fine and beautiful and never to be ashamed of anything she wanted with him. She wrapped her free arm hard around his neck and herself around his cock, and screamed into his shoulder as he kissed her hair.
Sex together was wonderful, in so many ways. Some she had expected, a few had come as complete surprises. Talking was among the latter. She had never understood the compulsion to talk dirty, not until she met Geoff. Not that it felt 'dirty'; oh yes, if you'd written it all down and looked at it in daylight, it was pure obscenity, but at the time it was poetry. He had shocked her -- for a few short seconds had almost completely ruined it for her -- by telling her sweet and loving things about her c-word. It was not something she was used to, but he certainly meant nothing ugly by what he said, however ugly the word might be elsewhere. When you can feel that someone truly loves you -- feel it in your heart, and in their movement inside you, feel it in their lips soft on your eyelids -- when that person whispers into your ear that your sweet tight cunt around their cock is the most beautiful feeling in the world ... Honestly, it's hard to find that a dirty thing. She had, in fact, developed quite a taste for both the hearing and the saying herself.
After a few months, she knew for a certainty. This isn't good, this isn't simply great. This is Daniel Craig in the shower great. This is It! As if it wasn't perfect enough already, she was still screwing up courage when he proposed to her.
So far, so unbelievably wonderful ...
"Listen, Laura, there's ... There's something I need to be quite open about before the wedding."
She could tell from the tone: it wasn't going to be some weird genetic thing in the family that made it unwise to have kids, or I did three months inside when I was a stroppy teenager. It was sex, she could tell.
"You are gay after all, aren't you? Well, you know ... Bi or whatever?"
"No, love, I'm really not. Can we come back to that one in a while please, it's sort of connected."
Eh what? What, exactly, is sort of connected to that, other than that itself? He was twenty-eight, surely too young to have started out as Jennifer. What's the big secret Geoff?
The secret, as it turned out, was that Geoff was everything he had proved himself to be: big and strong and protective, not to mention enthusiastically and skilfully heterosexual. He wanted to share his life with her, to protect and pamper and carry the shopping; he wanted to be strong for her. Maybe ninety-five percent of the time. Just once in a while, it got a bit much; just once in a while, he felt the need to let go. Now and again, for a short time, not to be the strong one ...
"Not a problem, silly. I didn't want a thug, did I? I know you've got a soft side, it's what I like about you. One of the things ..."
"Sorry, not making myself clear. I don't want ... Need. I don't need to show you that I'm vulnerable. I need
you
to show me. I'd rather you didn't ask."
"Errrr ... Geoff, sweetheart, are we talking about a bit of spanking or something like that?"
"'Something like', yes."
"Ohhh-kay ... How 'like'?"
"Not really talking about 'a bit' of anything. Don't want to play around: real thing or nothing."
They had the long awkward conversation demanded by the subject. It wasn't a huge part of his life, but when the need was there it was real enough. They weren't talking about a bit of a giggle and down to Ann Summers for the pink furry handcuffs. It was not something that Laura had ever been drawn to, but she loved him and she wanted to understand; everything was fine, as he had said in another context, don't ever be ashamed of anything we do together. Oh, and by the way, what was that bit we were going to come back to?
