So far Sarah had been distinctly unimpressed by this year's offerings at the festival, as a junior reviewer she was often forced to sit through hours of dreadful student productions of Shakespeare or endless 'experimental theatre' but at least in previous years she had been able to relieve the tedium with a good shag at the end of the day, the two occasions singledom had coincided with the festival there had been a steady stream of fresh new talent, eager to gain an extra star or two for whatever godforsaken production they happened to be in. However, this year pickings were slim, a fact noted by all her female colleagues, and a few of the men.
Thus it was with trepidation, and not without a certain amount of frustration, that Sarah took her seat in Studio Two, the miniscule audience not boding well. The press blurb had thrown around phrases like 'orgy of the flesh', 'highly erotic' and 'insanely sensual' but she knew better than to be that expectant when the two hours of mind-numbing tedium she had just sat through had been described as a 'high-octane, adrenaline fuelled riot' when it was all she could do not to fall asleep. She elected to take a seat in the front row, not because she really wanted to but because she thought that proximity might act as a deterrent to napping, being on the front-line as it were. The lights dimmed and onto the stage stalked four masked, topless men strutting and posing about and generally being terribly butch. Sarah's instinctual reaction was to sigh at the inevitable clichΓ© of it all but despite her cynicism she couldn't help but note the quality of the torsos on show, each of the actors displaying a fine, sculpted set of abs and smooth glistening chests; a sharp relief to all the acne-ridden schoolboys and butch lesbians she had previously been subjected to. The masked men were soon joined by for women. Sarah had expected flesh to be on show, but she hadn't expected this.
The women each wore gravity-defying corsets, tiny knickers, stockings, suspenders; pretty normal fare except that each of these creatures was gorgeous. Sarah, although able to appreciate female beauty, had never been physically attracted to a woman, until now. It wasn't just the perfect figures, the glistening skin, and the heaving bosoms; there was something else, something in their eyes, a hunger, a raw sexual energy, an invitation. The actors formed into four couples and began a slow, sensuous dance, twisting in and out, hands tracing contours, lips hovering but... never... quite... touching. Around her Sarah became aware of the predominately male audience shifting uncomfortably around her, becoming nervous about the abundant sexuality displayed in front of them. But Sarah did not feel contemptuous as she might have expected instead she felt herself stirring, her face flushing as she took in what unfolded in front of her, the stroking and grinding giving away, almost as if they knew what she was longing for, to undressing and probing until each of the woman was clad only in a thong, their heels and a filthy smile. Sweat mingled with rivers of water poured from bottles produced as if from nowhere, all the actors abandoning dance moves to spasms of pleasure as the icy water hit their skin.
The man next to Sarah moved his programme over his lap in an attempt to disguise his raging hard-on, and to her surprise Sarah could now feel herself becoming wet as the hands on stage strayed closer and closer, tantalisingly close to performing obscene acts. She must have inadvertently strayed into a sex show, surely this was illegal? A logical part of her brain told her to leave but she was too turned on, an exhilarating mix of excitement and shame rooting her to her seat, knowing deep down that if she had been alone her own hand would have strayed by now.
And then suddenly a naked man strode manfully onto centre-stage, his enormous erect cock almost frightening in its proportion, almost. The man came to a stop directly in front of Sarah and looked down at her, his eyes an invitation, his quivering phallus a challenge. Despite herself Sarah ached to reach out to it but reminded herself that this was a show, cursing the cruelty of being able to look but not touch. She squirmed involuntary in her seat, the seam of her jeans catching against her engorged clit and sending a wave of desire through her body. Then two of the women were at her sides, taking her arms and pulling her onto the stage. She knew she should resist but there wasn't a part of her that wanted this to stop. The audience that should have inhibited her instead spurred her on, the gaze of the ten or eleven strangers feeling to her like a pair of hands on her, willing her forward, clutching at her desperately with the anticipation of virgin flesh, of unexpected and unflaunted pleasure.