. 05

Author's note:

This is, in all its seven parts and their many chapters, one very,

very

long story. If long stories bother you, I suggest you read something else.

No part of this story is written so as to stand on its own. I strongly suggest that you start with

the beginning of Part 1

and read sequentially—giving up at any point you choose, of course.

All sexual activity portrayed anywhere in this story involves only people at least eighteen years old.

This entire story is posted only on literotica.com. Any other public posting without my permission in writing is a violation of my copyright.

About a month later, in the morning service, we formally professed our faith and were baptized. This might well have happened a week or two earlier, but in that church the normal policy was to hold baptisms on the second Sunday of the month, when communion was celebrated—assuming this was practical and acceptable to those involved, which it certainly was in our case.

Pastor Mac's normal approach to communion Sundays was to continue with what he was preaching on from the preceding weeks, but at shorter length than usual, to allow time for the sacrament. If there were also baptisms, he usually would, at the end of the sermon, refer to this—but most of what he might say about the baptisms had already been said earlier, when the people were baptized.

In this case, however, his text was the end of 1 Peter, chapter 3. In discussing verse 21—which speaks of baptism—he brought in at some length things Ellen and I had said in our testimonies. I was rather startled. Of course he knew us well, but we hadn't discussed with him in advance what we were going to say—yet it fit seamlessly into his exposition of the verse in its context.

Our first communion was a very emotional experience, for both of us. And at the end of the service, we found that our baptisms were a very big deal for quite a few people in the congregation who knew us. I was deeply moved by the number of people who came up to speak to us and to express their joy. Over the past months many of them had become very close and dear to me. I managed not to collapse into tears, but sometimes it was a near thing. These people had taken us into their hearts when we couldn't really be part of their assembly, and almost all of them understood where we stood, so that meant a lot to me.

And then Kelly took us home for dinner—that part of it was planned—but she also had invited about a dozen others as well. OK, that had been planned, too, but everyone had kept it from us. It was a potluck, as far as everyone but us was concerned—though I rather thought it was coordinated in a way that made the term "potluck" inappropriate. So we went home quite late in the afternoon, stuffed to the gills, and somewhat euphoric.

Pastor Mac returned to this passage the next week, to cover some issues of interpretation which he had left unmentioned. I was pretty sure he would have done this in any case, as those issues were fairly involved and really merited a sermon of their own.

Sometime in early to mid August, Ellen worked late one night. It was a Tuesday, so I had been doing taekwondo. I got home, had a small snack—I didn't eat much supper on Tuesdays—and then cleaned up and went to bed. She was later than she had expected. I left the light on and was doing some reading, a book for a class I would be taking, but I fell asleep at it.

Ellen woke me up just a little coming into the bedroom to get her nightgown. She kissed me, then took the book away and turned out the light as she left. When she came back, I was still more than half asleep. She took off her nightgown and climbed into bed with me, and snuggled up against me.

We kissed for a while, and I enjoyed her body with my hands. After a bit, she moved down and took me in her mouth. So far, there was nothing unusual in that. But she didn't stop and come back to kiss me and bring me inside her, as she normally would have. She continued stimulating me, and she teased me, bringing me repeatedly almost to the point of ejaculating and then backing off and letting me down.

I was really frustrated, but I remembered the time Sam had done that to me, during sex ed. I had gotten so frustrated I had grabbed her shoulders and forced my way down into her throat, and pumped her back and forth on me. I had felt completely guilty afterward, though Sam had treated it as nothing much when I apologized at the end. And then, I had teased Ellen in a parallel way during the honeymoon. So I kind of gritted my teeth, determined to just let her have her way. Sauce for the goose, after all.

In the end, I suddenly came. I thought Ellen hadn't meant to let me yet, but it was a relief to me. When I was done, she rinsed her mouth out, and snuggled back beside me. "Phil, was that good for you?"

"Coming in the end was good. I didn't enjoy the teasing process, once it got underway."

"I thought so. I really expected you to do something about it. You once said something about Sam's having done it to you, and I asked her about it later. Why did you just let me do it?"

I was a little surprised. "Ellen, I love you. When Sam did it, it was in sex ed, and I was pretty surprised. I got so frustrated I grabbed her and basically raped her throat. Um. It turned out she wasn't unwilling, so that may not be the exact word I want—but that's how it felt to me. Anyway, I didn't think that was appropriate. I would have just asked you to stop, but that didn't seem fair, since I did the same kind of thing to you during the honeymoon."

"Phil, my dearest, my husband. I promised to obey you, remember? And long before that, I promised I was done saying no to you about sex. I meant what I said to Mia, too, remember? I hope you won't do that to me often at all, the frustration part was so bad, but what came after was so good that I'd like you to do it once in a long while. Or I want you to feel free to, anyway. But don't put up with something you don't like from me, at least not without telling me. Please. I was expecting you'd do to me what you did to Sam. She said you apologized, but it didn't come across as strongly as you just said it. I wanted to see how that would be, with you—but if it bothered you that much with Sam, I'm glad you didn't do it now. But you should have said something."

I said, "I'll keep it in mind. But I mean what I just said, too. If it was OK for me to tease you like that, I shouldn't complain about your doing it to me. But now I'm curious. Was this something your instructors taught you?"

"Mine did. I assume Sam's did, from what you both told me. Yours told you a lot of things other guys' instructors didn't, it seems, so I can't say how universal this was for men instructors.

"Brian really liked getting blow jobs, but hated being teased that way. And he liked what you just said you didn't think was appropriate. He'd grab my head and control how he went into my mouth, how fast, how far, everything. I didn't like that much, but I got used to it. Phil, this was early on, when he was mostly very caring, sensitive, unselfish, too. I loved him, not the way I love you, not even the way I loved you then, but I did. I was thinking maybe we'd get married eventually, and if he had kept on the way he was at first and things worked out, I think I would have been happy to be married to him. It still bothers me how much he changed, and how suddenly, because I can't understand it.

"At any rate, if I ever tease you again, that way or any other, tell me right off if you hate it that much. I really thought it would be like your teasing me, for you, that it would be so good when you got to come that it would make up for the frustration. Or that you would take charge if you got too frustrated. I'm sorry it wasn't good."

"It was good. As orgasms go, it was probably a little better than average. Not enough to be worth it. But Ellen, I think I'll always be leery of—. Um. Of demanding that you put up with something and then being unwilling to take it myself. The time I teased you, I should have stopped and let you come, the first time you asked me to."

"No! Phil, thank you for being the way you are, more than I can tell you! But I really did mean what I said to Mia! In, oh, a few months or a year, it will be fine again. Once. Just, maybe, um, tell me what you're thinking first, and ask, or something like that? If I say to go ahead and tease, feel free, and ignore any pleas to stop. Don't go on indefinitely, but what you did before was wonderful in the end.

"But remember that as a rule—almost always—what I want from you isn't the world's greatest orgasm or even any orgasm. I want you making love to me, holding me, enjoying it yourself. Inside me, yes, definitely, but it's not—. It's not the feeling of the cock inside me, it's the man who's making love to me. Showing me he loves me!

"I never told you more than the course title, but there was that one required class last year that was supposed to desensitize us—that was part of the course, I mean. To make us able to talk to clients about really extreme things, without judging them and especially without showing any discomfort. We had to do role playing, but we also had to watch really nasty porn videos and discuss them. And OK, I see the value of it—to a point. But in effect they were trying to make us think and feel that, oh, really extreme bondage relationships are normal and perfectly OK—and I think they're wrong. Yes, if say I wind up counseling a woman who is being abused, but willingly, I need to be able to listen to what she thinks and feels, and talk to her about other problems without trying to take her apart and put her back together to suit myself. That doesn't mean it's not a problem.

"And of course they're selective about it, too. We're not supposed to be judgmental—as long as it's not something politically incorrect. If I were counseling a white supremacist skinhead, I'd be expected to tell him in no uncertain terms that his behavior is unacceptable.

"I'm sorry, I didn't want to rant at you at the time, and now it's spilling over. The reason I bring it up, we had to watch lots of women poking themselves with dildos, making love to other women with dildos strapped on, using vibrators. Anything to simulate the feel of a cock without having to have a man involved, I guess. Of course, we weren't supposed to ask whether this might mean that we're really made to relate to men in the first place!

"And you know that what you do to me, with hands and mouth and cock, feels wonderful, almost always. And part of that is that you pay attention, and if it's not wonderful, you see that, and try something else or ask questions. But it's not the feel of your hands or your mouth or your cock that's most wonderful, it's the wonderful man who loves me and cares what I'm feeling like!

"I guess I'm still ranting. And we need to get to sleep, but—. I teased you with something you didn't much like, and it was a flop. Are you recovered enough that you can make love to me, any way you want to, so that we both enjoy it? Please?"

I managed. The next morning came too early, but we were both glad to have taken the time, anyway.

I had been surprised to find—back in November of my junior year, when I met with Professor Wheeler to plan my spring term classes—that I was suddenly listed as an honors student. It turned out that this was automatic, based on grade point, weighted for classes in my major, with some weighting also for course level. The only reason I hadn't been one previously, fall term, was that there hadn't been any grades to base it on. Apparently I'd been accepted on the basis of midterm grades, in fact. Ellen, it developed, was in the same situation.

This put me in special sections of classes, when there were specific honors sections. Those theoretically involved more work, but for the most part it wasn't any more than I was already doing, except for the actual writing of papers. And the discussion in the honors sections was usually livelier and deeper, maybe even having been so before my arrival on the scene. Not all the students in these classes were honors students—or history majors, for that matter—but there really was an effort to make these sections more rigorous and demanding, and their advisors had to think they could keep up.

When we came to construct my fall schedule—for senior year—I found that honors status also made me eligible for a special senior seminar class and a senior honors thesis. Professor Wheeler told me flatly that there was no good reason for me not to take both of those, and that he was putting me in them—I would just have to construct the rest of my schedule to fit. The thesis didn't have a formal schedule, merely a list of deadlines to meet, and two professors to arrange weekly meetings with.

I wished I'd been consulted about seminar and thesis—but without question I would have signed up for both of them, so I didn't complain, and fairly soon I even stopped feeling managed. My first job in thesis was to come up with a topic, working with my advisors. My classes were all more demanding, and I wasn't sure how much of this might be the result of what I'd done the year before. I enjoyed my academic work, but it took time. There were eight other honors students in seminar, and I got to know them all a lot better. I thought we must be all the honors students in history, our year. I had met all of them before, in classes for most but also in departmental social events. For example, I had met June Appell and Bill Williams at the Labor Day picnic the year before, before my very first classes ever met. At any rate, we all interacted much more closely in seminar. It almost felt a little like a couple of the smaller classes I'd had in high school.

Some of the papers I did for classes became part of my thesis—in other words, I was able to choose topics for those papers to make that work. Seminar should have been an especially fertile source—but the topics in that class were less related to my thesis topic.

I continued to take philosophy classes, too, and I was in honors sections there as well.

Being married to Ellen didn't really take more time than living together had, but we both found it a lot more satisfying and intense. She still insisted on taking on more of the cooking, under instruction as far as new dishes went, and Pete and Tammy continued to come once most weeks for cooking instruction and to share dinner. They stayed to study, those days. We had two classes together, but much of the time they worked together on their other classes and I worked by myself, with only a little back and forth as we found points of interest. With those, though, I did learn some things from their classes, and they were exposed to some of my work in seminar and thesis.

We became more involved at church, taking part in an evening Bible study group. I managed, with a little difficulty, to resist attempts to make me the leader of the group. This was a group Kelly had visited, and after we were in it she also became a regular.

Our Friday evening meetings continued, too, but not quite so consistently—and Jon often was there. That helped us get to know him better. I thought this was a good thing, since he and Kelly seemed to be on track to get married within a year or two. They were doing plenty of things together, but also spending time talking about issues. Twice, on long weekends, they went to stay with Uncle John and Aunt Sally. They talked to us generally about what was said, but not in great detail. During spring term, they officially became engaged, and had sessions with Pastor Mac.

To jump ahead, they got married the summer after Kelly—and Ellen and I, and Pete and Tammy—graduated, and they really were good choices for each other. They continued to be happy together, committed to each other and to the Lord, serving in ways that meet a lot of needs. Kelly wanted me to give her away, reminding me of something I'd once said to Jon, but I declined. I felt that I would be insulting her real father. Ellen was her matron of honor, though. The timing was really tight, with our jobs, but we did wangle Friday off, arriving in time for the rehearsal, and flying home Sunday.

We got to meet Kelly's parents at the wedding. They were nice enough, but what I saw in them fit with what Kelly had told me about them. They clearly both loved Kelly, if maybe a little coolly, and they plainly got along together just fine—but there were no signs of passion or even very close friendship between them. It really bothered me. They were way better than some couples I'd seen, who were always irritated with each other or making little digs—or worse—but it left me feeling sad. I felt like someone needed to take them aside and tell them that marriage takes work and to get busy at it—counseling or something, I didn't know what. Obviously, I wasn't in a position to be the one to do that, though. It might have left me feeling really depressed, if Kelly and Jon's overflowing joy hadn't buoyed me up.

I also met other members of Kelly's family, whom I knew a little about from talking to her—aunts, uncles, cousins, and sister—the last with husband and young daughter. Two of her cousins, Seth and Bob, I had met before, and I sat and talked to them for a while. I liked them a lot, and Kelly's description of them as being like brothers to her seemed to me on the mark.

I mentioned this, and Seth said, "I think that's true. I know I kind of feel that way about her, and there are times she's really needed a big brother looking after her." They were both a year or two older than Kelly. He went on. "I should tell you, though. She's said a few times that you really feel like a big brother to her, and she always wished she had brothers. I can see what she means, too. She's done a lot better since she got to know you, and I for one thank you for it."

Graduation was kind of a disappointment, for me. For Ellen, less so, mostly because she had expected it to be what it was, I thought. There were just too many people graduating, and I felt lost in the crowd. No individual recognition whatever, despite having my name announced and walking up to receive what was not in fact a diploma. Those weren't to be issued until final grades were all submitted and tabulated. Ah, well.

I said, "No individual recognition," but that wasn't quite true. I had actually met and talked to the Dean, who handed out the diplomas and shook hands, and besides saying, "Congratulations!" he managed to squeeze in, "Good job, Phil. I wish we could have had you all four years." For my ears only, but several of my professors—and several classmates too—had said the same. That meant something. He might have said something similar to Ellen, too—I never got around to asking.

Our families had come, and they enjoyed the ceremony far more than I did—even though it could have been a pair of chimpanzees in our clothes, for all they could see. Well, actually, not quite. There was a video camera focused on the point where the "diploma" and congratulations were given, and it was projected on a moderately large screen up over the stage.

Both sets of parents were very proud and happy, for both of us. I never completely figured out what lay behind the drastic change in my in-laws' attitude toward me, in a year and a half with only a few times together. But I could see that their initial resistance and disapproval had changed, far beyond the cautious acceptance they had begun with to enthusiastic liking and approval. This had begun even well before the wedding. I might not have understood it, but I was very glad to accept it.