Ch. 2 The Setup
Of the six couples that made up our clique, two were the parents of two of our children's best friends. Not surprisingly, we were repeatedly bumping into them at school and after-school activities. We soon became friends and over time, very good friends. The other three couples had children older and younger than ours but we found each other in neighborhood activities. We all were like-minded and as time and events bore out, we enjoyed each other's company immensely. Unable to wait for the irregularly scheduled grand gatherings we began a familiar routine: every weekend we were at one or another's home playing cards, having pool parties, the wives concocting an elaborate meal, barhopping, eating out, etc. until we hit on themes. Themed evenings were scheduled once a month. By that time Rosemary had served the medieval dinner and we used it as a point of departure. Next came a fancy French meal, followed by meals structured around different cuisines. When it came time for a Roman-inspired dinner the host and hostess specified that we wear clothing appropriate to the era. Without much imagination everyone showed up in togas. Not technically the correct garb [the Greeks wore togas] but the wives worked it out beforehand.
The most flirtatious of the wives had an attractive figure and she took advantage of it to wear her toga without a bra. To push the envelope further she arranged the toga to have a cowl neckline that hung open below her cleavage. Topping things off was the fabric's ends meeting vertically down her right thigh. Holding it all together was an ornate tasseled, curtain tie rope around her waist. To take best advantage of the overall effect, she made it with semi-transparent fabric barely hiding her areola. It didn't disguise the location and prominence of her nipples. This was before the thong, and going without panties being too blatant she wore high-rise French cut bottoms. With the toga's dramatic side opening their waistband above and top of the leg hole on her hip below occasionally flashed. It had an electrifying effect on the rest of us. So as not to stand out too much, she made a toga for her husband using the same material and design cues.
It was pretty racy by our informal group's standards but well within the permissiveness of the day. Carol, always the flirt took every opportunity to flash her skin: bending over a lot, crossing and uncrossing her legs a lot, and first turning and then moving her legs one at a time getting in and out of her chair. The overall effect was transformational on the group. No one was offended especially the wives, Carol's husband Bill could hardly move without displaying the color [white] and type underwear he wore [briefs] that evening. He hadn't yet gone to paunch so his half-revealed chest was nicely shaped and defined.
Neither was exhibiting more skin than was on display at any of our pool parties but in the evening when everyone but them was not on display it had a profound effect on us. Thereafter the wives having greater opportunity than their husbands showed more and more skin and acted more and more provocatively. Always enjoying the group's gatherings I now looked forward to them, Rosemary, as well. My curiosity lay with wondering what the women would do next. Rosemary's lay with how the husbands would react. By this time the women collaborated on the themes, festivities and dress. As time wore on a self-imposed need for more outrageous behavior caused them to set up their husbands. Some were more liberated than others and quickly adopted Carol's forwardness while others lagged behind but nevertheless, followed. The women were having fun pushing how scandalous they could become without becoming scandalous. The men were in seventh heaven.
Due to the nature of work it was not uncommon for a husband to be out of town on business or receiving training. Similarly, wives would occasionally fly home with the kids to visit families. This would cause the numbers to be unbalanced when we got together, more men than women, or vice versa. What was less common occurred when there were double or more absences causing men and women to be without their partners. When this happened it was natural that the odd man and woman would become a pseudo couple for the evening. This allowed them to spend more time with one another than usual. When this happened it was, for the most part, innocent and nothing untoward happened. But, every now and then alcohol and circumstances would conspire to encourage more than casual intimacy. This was most likely to occur when unattached husbands were singled out by the wives as targets of opportunity to see how much they could get away with. In these circumstances the unattached wife would be urged and prodded to hit on him. And, sometimes their plans would result in a greater reward than originally intended. When this happened the miss-matched couple would excuse themselves from the party early, or simply leave together at the end of the evening. It didn't take much imagination or snooping to find out what happened; the women kept few secrets from one another.
As they are wont to do, the wives frequently and freely discuss their private lives with their friends. To what purpose I'm not sure. Maybe it's cathartic, maybe it's a need to scintillate friends' imaginations, maybe it's to brag, but whatever it is, they do talk a lot and leave precious little to the imagination.
It was this set of circumstances that caused me to cheat on my wife but, unknown to me at the time, with her full knowledge, approval and heavy involvement in the planning that led to my downfall. Apparently, I was the last husband in the group to fall from grace. As I was to learn later, my fall included participation of the husbands. They couldn't let one of their number hold out, voluntarily or otherwise, without him casting questions on their own behavior. So, I was set up by all my friends.
Bill was going to be out of town for more than a week and Rosemary was taking the kids to visit the grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins for their semi-annual indoctrination in Italian customs, food and folk lore. Being the woman she is she also took the kids to spend time with my family for similar indoctrination into the ways of my ancestry. This meant that Carol, the flirt, and I would attend the weekly bash alone together.
Carol came dressed and made up to kill. She could always be counted on to do this but on this evening she set a new standard for seduction. She arrived after me, making the grand entrance as was her style and latched on for the evening. Everything I said was either fascinating or outrageously funny. It seemed that much of what she had to say had to be whispered in my ear. To do this required that she hold my arm to her chest, and lean into me as she breathed her revelation into my ear. Two things immediately came to mind every time she did this: 1) she wasn't wearing a bra and didn't her breast feel nice rubbing my arm, and 2) her perfume was intoxicating.
She was going through her drinks like water [I found out later that as I left to get her another glass of wine a husband or wife would relieve her of her half empty glass]. I was drinking scotch one for one and so, felt the alcohol's effect more quickly and profoundly than she, just as they planned.
