"OK," I said. "I guess what I wanted to say was that I'm just really sort of surprised that you and Phil are into this sort of lifestyle. I thought that after 25 years, I knew you guys. Today, suddenly it's like I never really did know you. When and how did this all come about? Please explain."
Tonya smiled. "You do know us Matthew. We're the same people we always were, but we just reached a point in our marriage where something had to change or it would have been over. It started about seven or eight years ago. We began to realize that our sex life had become as boring as getting the same hamburger and fries at the same fast food place every day. It was being done by the numbers. It was like acting out the same script, and we were both pretty bored. I think every long term marriage hits that sort of thing after 8, 9, 10 years or so. I'm willing to bet that you and Jean aren't getting it on the same way you were 15 or 20 years ago. That's a rhetorical "bet"; you don't have to accept it.
Anyway, Phil and I tried a lot of the stuff a lot of people do in that situation. We tried playing the little bondage games with handcuffs, and blindfolds, and floggers. We went through the whipped cream and chocolate sauce and edible panties. We got porno videos and sex toys and crazy-ass lingerie. We even went through the "role play" stuff where we'd blindfold each other and pretend we were other people. We'd pick each other up in bars pretending that we were "strangers" and go to a motel to fuck. By the way, this was our favorite bar for that game. None of it really worked for more than a short while. We had long heart to heart talks. In the process we even learned that both of us had indeed cheated on the other. For some people that sort of discovery often spells divorce for a lot of couples. They take it as a signal to end a marriage. But thankfully we didn't go that route. We took it as a wake-up call. We thought it was a reason to restart a marriage with different rules. The thing is, Phil and I love the hell out of each other, and we didn't really want to end our marriage. We have a lot going together.
That's when it sort of hit us. It wasn't baloney like handcuffs or sex toys per se that would do it for us; it was the fact that we needed to have the opportunity to be with other people occasionally. It was the need to experience some different partners to add interest and variation. I mean, other people look different and feel different. Then smell different and they taste different. They lick and suck and fuck differently. We both realized that it was those factors that fueled our mutual secret play outside the marriage fence. It was the excitement of being with somebody that wasn't each other. We realized that fidelity in a marriage is a hell of a lot more than just sexual exclusivity. When we understood and accepted that, the solution was simple. It also actually increased our interest in each other as I'll explain in a minute.
We considered the swinging thing, but neither of us felt comfortable and safe having casual sex with people who were essentially strangers. We really weren't interested in having sex with just any different warm body. We wanted to have the freedom to have other partners, but partners who were a lot like us. We wanted stable, educated, people with whom we were compatible, but who wouldn't pose a threat to health and safety. Basically we were looking for other people that were very much like Tonya and Phil in many ways, yet looked, felt, smelled, tasted, and sounded different enough from Tonya and Phil. We wanted the erotic thrill and excitement of somebody different. Does that make sense to you Matthew? I hope that you understand."
"Believe me," I offered. "I understand probably more than you realize. You're also correct that Jean and I hit that same place in our marriage, but unlike you, we didn't have the guts to talk it through honestly and openly enough to discover what you guys did. I suppose it hasn't worked out as well with us as it has with you and Phil, but I think we're still pretty much on solid ground."
"Tell me something Matthew," Tonya said leaning forward and locking her pinky with mine again. "Have you ever cheated on Jean over the years?"
I was silent. I didn't know what I should risk admitting that I had.
"Come on Matthew," Tonya encouraged, "Truth without the dare. I won't tell Jean if that's what you're worried about. You have to deal with that in your own mind. However, if you can't be totally honest with me; if you can't show me your naked soul; then I will get up and walk out of here right now."
'Yeah," I admitted. "I had a few affairs."
"So how many? What were they like?" Tonya asked. "Visits to whore houses? Pick-ups in bars on business trips? The next door neighbor? Some details please."
"Hell NO to the whores and pick-ups," I insisted. "I'm the same as you in that regard. I'm not about to risk my health or Jean's. I had four affairs over a period of the past 10 or so years. They all were with married women who were pretty much in the same situation you just talked about. Their marriages had hit the same wall. My relationship with them was relatively long term. Our affairs lasted anywhere from 8 or 9 months up to 3 years. We were friends with benefits, or whatever you want to call it, and none of us wanted to cause problems or break-ups in our marriages. We all had homes, kids, etc. We just each needed someone to be open with about our sexuality; someone with whom we could be openly sexual without judgement or recrimination. I suppose we were friends, confidants, fuck buddies, whatever you want to call it."
"Thank you for being honest, Matthew," Tonya acknowledged. "That's exactly what I hoped I'd hear. It tells me that you do 'get it'. You've experienced it yourself. How about Jean? Has she had any outside gentlemen friends with benefits?"
"Not that I know of," I answered. "I can't imagine Jean doing that."
Tonya smiled. "Excuse me if I chuckle. I like the 'Not that you know of;' and you "couldn't imagine Jean doing that'. Let me tell you my dear old friend, there are a lot more women out there living their lives more and more like men used to. They don't see themselves as the helpless innocents chained to the stove living their lives purely for the sake of their husbands. Since the 'Rosy the Riveter' days of WWII and the influx of women into the workforce over the past 70 years, women have had a lot more contact with men than they used to when they were 24/7 housewives living every day within the same four walls. Back then, if they had any extracurricular adventures at all, they had to depend on the milkman or grocery delivery boy. Also remember, women are a lot more discrete than men about it. Men like to brag. Women are too smart for that. They don't tell their friends. The more people that know about it, the greater the chance of it being found out.
What does Jean do? She's an insurance claims field-adjuster right? She's out and about meeting a lot of people and has a pretty flexible schedule away from an office. She deals with a lot of people, including men. She's very attractive, and if some guy hits on her and presses the right buttons, she could easily decide to spend a little time with him in the afternoon and nobody back at the office, or you for that matter, would know. I'm not saying she has indeed done any of that, but she could. And that's the point. Women aren't immune to wanting to explore their own sexual desires and interests with 'other men'. They fantasize as much as men do. They just keep it to themselves. If they're bored at home, which can be a natural occurrence in any long-term marriage, they certainly can find a way to follow their urges. Hell, there are even internet sites for finding sex partners. Modern birth control has reduced one of the primary risks that they had to worry about a hundred years ago. Modern women probably have as many affairs as men. It's simply a fact of life that people in long term marriages have to recognize and be willing to accept. To put it bluntly, men no longer have a lock on fucking around. It's something that hit home with Phil and I when we started down our current path."
I listened to everything Tonya said and agreed that it made a lot of sense. I had to admit that since I had engaged in several long term affairs myself, I often wondered if Jean had done so as well. Doing so doesn't make lightning strike from the heavens like some people would like to think. It's not obvious by looking at someone that they had some afternoon delight or spent and evening with someone else while on a business trip. Nobody brands a scarlet "A" on your forehead. I wondered how I would respond to finding out that Jean had been with another man or two. Would I be as openly understanding and accepting as Phil and Tonya had been?
"So," Tonya continued. "Phil and I came up with a plan, an agreement, that we would allow each other to have friends with whom we'd share uncomplicated sex as long as we abided by some very reasonable rules. I'd say that I've been more active than Phil, but he's also had his lady friends."
"So," I obviously had to ask, "how many people have you and Phil had sex with over these past 6 years or whatever it is, and what are these rules?
Tonya responded. "I've had seven and Phil five. As with your affairs, these were, and are, not one-and-done quickies with strangers. We are both extremely selective and extraordinarily cautious. Our relationships are intended to be stable and long term, but not what you'd call emotional or in any way threatening to anybody's marriage. Right now, there are basically two guys that I see fairly regularly. I've been with them for the past couple of years. There are a few that I was with for a while and it's over. There's another that started seeing about 4 years ago and we still get together but maybe only maybe 5-6 times a year. Phil has one woman that he sees regularly about once or twice a month and two that he sees off and on irregularly. I think for Phil, the big erotic thrill is in knowing that I am actually having sex with another man. It really excites and arouses him when I tell him details of our sexual adventures. Sometimes there are photos and videos and sometimes he's been there together with us."
"Holy shit," I exclaimed. "You alluded earlier to telling each other about your outside friends but you didn't mention pictures and videos and being together. Is Phil one of these "cuckold" guys that sits there wearing a chastity cage? Do you guys have threesomes? What?"
Tonya laughed out loud. "Oh Lord Matthew, what HAVE you been reading? I suppose from the strict dictionary definition, Phil is a cuckold and I'm a cuckoldress in that we know of and accept the fact that each is having sex outside of what would be considered at traditional marriabe. But in a larger sense, he's not a cuckold in that he is fully supportive of my relationships. Also, there is no hint of the sort of humiliation or shame that's often associated with being a cuckold. Phil doesn't see himself as a sissy or a wimp or in any way inferior. He doesn't see the guys I'm with as 'bulls' to use another term you've probably heard. It's just that seeing me have sex with another guy truly excites him and motivates him to stronger and more uninhibited sex with me. It's what some have termed 'vixen and stag' play', but we don't really have a specific name for what we do in our relationship. It's just a win-win for both of us.
As for me hearing about or watching him with another woman, I can't say that it excites me in the same way it does him, but it does motivate me to drive him wild when it's my turn. I'm a bit competitive and I love to prove to him that I am still his number one sex partner in the world. Maybe that all sounds silly to you.
As for threesomes, we've done some, but mostly as sort of a tag team rather than the two on one at the same time that you're probably thinking of. I think Phil likes having some time just to watch me. If we aren't together at the same time, we can give each other vivid details of what we did or perhaps show pictures and videos from our phones. In Phil's case at least, it drives him wild and in no time he's ripping my clothes off and mounting me like a horny stallion. If he sees me sucking a guy off, he will want to kiss me knowing the other guy has had his dick in my mouth. That will also drive him to get his own dick in my mouth. If he sees a guy fucking me and cumming in me, he may want to eat my pussy and stick his dick in my cunt that's still leaking the other guy's cream. He seems to really be into that cream pie stuff. Hell, he adores taking my panties off and finding the crotch wet or seeing cum still leaking out of me.
If he's actually present when I'm with the other guy, he will usually sit and watch till we are done and then he will take me very passionately. It's that 'vixen/stag" thing. He has no problem slipping his cock into my pussy when it's still full of the other guy's juice. He fucks me like I'm the last woman on the face of the earth. I love it. He loves it. If the other guy is still there watching, he loves that too. Sometimes Phil may ask him to leave when he's done, but he usually likes him to stay and watch. Then when Phil's done, we may call out for a pizza and sit around having a few beers watching TV just like any set of regular friends. I know this may all sound foreign to you right now, Matthew, but to us, it's a perfectly fine way of life. It's actually brought us closer than before we started; that's for sure."