Ava was a pleaser. She was perky, endearing, and always fittingly friendly. She manufactured brightness. She had silky brown hair, a round figure and hated conflict. She once refused to say something to her waiter when her turkey sandwich arrived with no turkey.
"Someone made a mistake and I don't want to get them in trouble," she said to her sister, Arabella and added, "it's fewer calories without the turkey."
This translated, in the three relationships she'd had since graduating from Central Ohio State college with a degree in elementary education, into her doing things with her boyfriends she didn't enjoy at all. She went to a hockey game, at the request of her first boyfriend, Mel, wearing a short skirt and no panties. She sat shivering through two periods and then in the parking garage, on the upper level, between two cars, Mel bent her over the back of a Nissan Leaf, entered her, and pumped his short fat penis in and out until he came.
It was a horrible experience for Ava except that she loved the feel of his penis. She loved his desire for her too, but she had no idea where, or even if, she could draw a line she wouldn't let him cross.
She once asked Arabella, "How do you get a man to fuck you without doing everything he wants?"
Arabella said, " You take hold of his balls and never let go."
Ava was private, very private. When she was fifteen, and Arabella sixteen, her mother had randomly plucked a pair of their dirty panties from the laundry basket, held them up to her nose sniffing them, while they lay in bed watching and said, "I better not smell semen or you're grounded for six months. Sex before marriage will ruin your lives."
This might explain Ava's willingness to go along with her boyfriend's pantiless requests as well as his occasional insistence on a blowjob in the front seat of the car (she'd never been a fan of oral sex.) But eventually she couldn't bear it and left Mel.
"But you loved it? You told me you did," Mel complained.
"I know. I did. But still. I'm leaving," she replied.
She left because she had a date with Graham who she knew wanted her from the moment they met a week before when she was picking up her birth control pills in a drugstore.
The same cycle of unobjected repugnance happened with Graham, except his thing was anal sex. Ava had a small anus, so the pain was way too much for her. Still she never said no and endured a regular Friday evening buttfuck until she left him for her next boyfriend Jack. Jack liked to tie her up and lick her feet while she wiggled her toes. While this was easier to accommodate than anal sex, she was self conscious about her feet. They were too big she thought and each time he snaked his long tongue between her toes she grew more and more disgusted though she couldn't bring herself to tell him. This was in large part because she feared he'd stop having intercourse with her and she loved his penis, which was long and slender; a perfect fit, she more than once told Arabella.
By the time Ava met Billy she was determined to be more direct, to say, "no" when she needed to and ask for what she wanted.
But when Billy asked if she'd like to try a venison dish he liked to prepare she said, "of course," even though she had been following a vegetarian diet for months.
But unlike her past three boyfriends, Billy was interested in learning about Ava, including what she liked in bed.
She told him she liked sex. "I like sex- where you enter me and we go at it for a while until you explode. I don't think I've ever said no to that. Actually I don't think I've ever said no to any kind of sex," she smirked. And then she told Billy that the only way she was able to have an orgasm was with her vibrator and that she used it often.
Billy for his part was frank with her without being domineering which helped her feel she could speak honestly.
It was in this spirit that Ava surprised herself one night while she and Billy lay in the dark just after having made love. She said,
"You know, your balls are small. At first I thought maybe you were missing one until I realized they were just so small they were hard to find."
Billy rolled his eyes and grinned. For a moment Ava couldn't believe she'd said what she'd said.
But Billy responded playfully, "I did not know men had different sized testicles. I guess I have small balls. They certainly are full of desire for you."
Ava was not only relieved, she felt a strange sense of power, or at least equity, something she'd never felt before. Though she really hadn't meant too, she could mock her boyfriend's testicles? Really? She felt like she been walking on glass for the last ten years for no reason at all.
A couple of years into their marriage Ava and Billy were staying at her parents house in their guest room which was in the basement.
Billy woke early and slid near Ava, her back to him. He reached across her shoulder, sliding his forearm across her breasts, grazing her nipples before pulling her tightly against him. They spooned.
Ava awoke to feel Billy's hard penis pressed against her bottom. He loosened his arm and ran his fingertips over the curve of her hip, then lightly caressed each of her nipples, tugging gently on one then the other. Ava rolled onto her back, then side facing Billy. She pressed her hand on his shoulder as if to pin him to the bed, her pressure was tinged with irritation that she'd been awakened but was tempered by the pleasure she experienced when Billy hugged or held her.
Ava began caressing Billy's chest tentatively. She was tentative because her parents might hear, especially her mother and that was not okay.
"You know," she whispered in his ear while pinching his nipple, "we're not going to do anything here except sensuous touch."
Billy seemed to understand. But Ava struggled to stop herself. Her caresses grew eager, she might slip into a state of desire where her boundaries failed much like the alcoholic after his first drink. But Billy's orgasmic cries would wake her mother and that would definitely not be okay. Her mother was probably listening at the door. She needed to stop but Billy's firm penis beckoned too and she'd now taken to stroking it up and down.
He groaned. That was enough. She let go and began running her fingertips just above the broken line of his thick pubic hair, the back of her hand touching the tip of his penis which was now wet with hope of release. His hardness, his precum, how he arched his hips up slightly to attempt to touch her hand with his cock delighted her. But she needed to stop. She slowed herself. She stopped.
"We're stopping," she whispered in his ear while pulling his nipple again.
Billy groaned. "I can be very quiet."
"No, no," she said sitting up on the edge of the bed after one last pat to his erection.
She left to go to the kitchen snd when she returned with coffee Billy showed no signs of the irritable displeasure her former boyfriends would have shown. He seemed fine.
Ava asked,"Are you okay?"
He told her he was fine. They had coffee in bed and then went out to a Hungarian Bakery with her parents on the east side of town where they got egg sandwiches, donuts and more coffee.
Ava felt something about the morning had refreshed their relationship. She felt free. But there was more. Billy seemed gentler, more loving, the opposite response she expected. She could say no. She could deny him. Every erection didn't entitle him to orgasm.
