Front Leg Across

(

Note to readers:

This is an entry in the

Nude Day Story Contest 2022

. If you're so inclined, please read, vote, and comment. First, though, please read this whole disclaimer. This is posted in Mature, because most of the sex involves people around forty, and the story addresses their sexuality at later ages. Spoiler alert: In this story, mothers and daughters pose nude together, but this is an expression of their freedom, and there is no sexual activity among them. All characters in sexual situations are at least 18 years old, when those situations occur. All of the sex is consensual. The relationships are pair-bonded, to varying degrees, but they are also open, to varying degrees. The sex in the story ranges from M-F vanilla-with-oral, to lesbian, FMFM group, interracial, analingus, and a nonbinary coupling. The nonbinary character is referred to in the narrative with they/them pronouns. If you can deal with all of that, enjoy!)

***

July 1958

Walt squinted at the open copy of the

Kama Sutra

on the dresser. "This is what it's supposed to be," he said, amid audible breaths. He held Jessie's leg upright against his chest, and leaned to get at least the head of his penis inside her vulva.

Jessie chortled, one hand on a bedpost to help support the weight on her bare foot still on the floor. She was limber, but could only move so far to get her genitalia to surround more of his. "Just because it's possible," she said, and glanced at Walt.

"Doesn't mean it's enjoyable," he finished, in the sing-song tone she had used. Slowly he leaned away and helped lower her raised leg to the floor.

She gave him a peck on the cheek. "It's always fun, even when it's silly." She was aroused, despite having climaxed a few minutes earlier. She shivered as her stiff nipples brushed his chest hair. "I must be the luckiest housewife in town. My man comes home for the noon hour, but not for food."

"I want only food for the soul," he said, then turned to bring his lips to hers. He embraced the body he still adored, then freed his mouth to say, "If the petit-bourgeoisie prefer a ham sandwich to a bearded clam, they are beyond help."

She chuckled at the crudity with which he entertained her. It was part of their freedom, which they had to hide from most of the world. "I will forever bless not only your skill as a soldier," she said, "to return safely to me, but also the boulevard ladies who educated you to become my wonderful secret lover." Jessie still tingled from the licks and kisses he had given to what she and he called her flower, when they preferred not to be crude. Here in the small bedroom with the windows shaded, Jessie wondered if nearby housewives even knew the words 'clitoris' and 'orgasm,' let alone experienced the kind of pleasures she and Walt enjoyed.

She could never ask them, of course. No more than she could tell them how she and her husband satisfied their desires.

Walt sat on the thin rug. Donning his glasses, he arranged his legs to mimic an image from the

Kama Sutra.

"My Dear, would you please be the jewel in my lotus?"

"I don't think this is what that means," she said, standing with her feet outside his thighs. The electric fan behind her did little more than tickle the sweat sheen on her back.

"This isn't tantric yoga, either," he said, leaning back to prop on his elbows, so he could gaze at the full length of his nude wife. His glasses could interfere with their kissing, but to enjoy her sublime image fully, he preferred acute vision.

She crouched, and took hold of the spire that rose from his testicles. The prophylactic was still slick with petroleum jelly, as was her cleft, because they had done very little in today's attempt to adopt a practice from a book they stored under the bed.

Now they achieved a full congress, his entire length slowly welcomed into her entire depth, each savoring the other's heat, despite the stifling summer. Jessie rested her haunches on his thighs, and held still. Their efforts to prevent pain, and find their mutual pleasure, rewarded them now, more than twenty years after their first coupling.

Walt was also motionless, transfixed by beauty that had changed over two decades, but never diminished. Jessie had chosen to shorten her hair, and the rich earth tone was chased here and there with filaments of silver. Tendon lines had deepened in her neck, and some flesh was loose in her arms. Yet her torso was still trim, breasts barely descended since the time he had first been privileged to see, touch, and kiss them. A few tiny veins were visible on her calves, but the legs remained sleek and strong. Walt wasn't the only man so thoroughly besotted with her. Many others still sent in money for new photographs of his wife, who still enjoyed baring her skin for Walt's lens, and her admirers' secret delight.

Jessie was thrilled now by the organ within her and the rapturous look of the man who wielded it. She knew, in a way, that this wasn't fair. So many women never won the passion of men. Their appearance did not stir male ardor. Her parents always told her how lucky she was, that she would escape the labels from the previous century still used in this one,

spinster

and

old maid.

Yet, in a number of 'camera club' sessions through the years, Jessie had been told by photo hobbyist men, and even their wives, that when Jessie revealed herself to them, and allowed them to keep images of her, husbands accepted the matches they had made with their wives. So perhaps beautiful women, who did what Jessie did, brought happiness to both men and women, in this secret world.

Jessie remained motionless as she said, "I'm going to talk with Darla tonight, about what we do. She's twenty now, she even has her own income. It's time she learned."

He nodded. "I can go bowling."

She put a hand on his shoulder, tenderly. "If she'd like to pose...you could be the first--"

"No!" he said sharply. "It's wrong, completely wrong!"

Jessie nodded, eyes downcast. "Can I tell her that you'll, um, interview any man who wants to photograph her?"

He thought that over, scowling. "Yes. I'll want to learn a great deal about him."

"She'll need a good, trustworthy man, if she wants to do this. As you have been for me. My guardian." She smiled.

Walt returned the smile. His love enveloped more than her appearance, her personality, and her sweet soul. It also included her life force, what he'd lately heard called 'libido.' During the war, separated by the Atlantic, they had both satisfied their physical needs, but with great care and secrecy. Before he boarded the troop train, Walt had whispered to her that he respected her freedom to exert her passion with other partners. In deference to the four-year-old daughter who held her hand, Jessie whispered back that he should make sure that the women in USO shows who swooned over him should be ravished gently, so they could still walk and dance afterward.

The strongest feeling Walt retained of this was not that his wife had sex with other men, but that she had so eagerly returned to his arms, and remained there, holding no grudge against his own dalliances in Europe. Indeed, she had been eager to learn from his experience, and enjoy it.

Now, in their steamy bedroom, his member flexed. She jolted briefly, her smile blooming to a grin.

He lurched forward, hands gripping her sides. "How do you want it?" he breathed.

"Fast! Deep!" she yelped, back arching from the rise of spasms. Recent televised images of rocket launches almost claimed her attention, but she drove them away and looked at her man, her virile lover behind the glasses and mustache. His dear, blessed penis filled her female depths, again and again. Its base shoved against her clitoris, which she swiveled, seizing the pleasure he offered. Her inner squeezes wrestled with his swelling, and her belly contracted hard, sending flashes through her limbs' nerves, and joyful noise from her throat.

Walt labored to keep his eyes open, to feast them on Jessie's most powerful beauty, this active ferocity of her womanhood, her skin flushed, her hair a wild torrent. He had never captured this on film, the ultimate display of female joy. So many of his photos of her were tame, showing an alluring body and gorgeous face, enticing but static. Home movie cameras were becoming cheaper--but that thought halted as her libido took command of his, and his trunk lurched up with his bursts of semen. His voice joined hers in wordless, triumphant ecstasy.

Only one radio station in town had switched over to the kids' new music fad, rock and roll. As the lovers' voices eased and their bodies converged limply, they could again hear the raucous music blared out by their old Philco. Walt and Jessie shared a smile at the thought that this naughty, hip-shaking sound may have kept their naughty, hip-grinding secret safe from the neighbors.

***

Jessie picked up the heavy blue ceramic lighter, and flicked it to ignite a Pall Mall. She then returned the lighter to the coffee table, between the matching ashtrays, and looked at her daughter. "Your father and I have decided," she said to Darla, "that you're grown up enough to know about a hobby that we have. The thing is, we don't want you to talk about it with anyone else."

"All right," said Darla, thinking mostly about her impending date with Steve.

Jessie raised her voice a bit, hoping to get Darla's full attention. "This is something we really want to keep confidential."

"Oooohh!" said Darla with a giggle. "Are you Communist spies?"

"Nothing like that," Jessie said with a smirk, then a puff. "We're not even beatniks."

"I'm not either," said Darla, thinking she was being teased. "I wore a beret for a couple weeks, that's all."

"You looked great in it," said Jessie, assessing her daughter's dramatic combination of pearly skin and coal-black hair. "Anyway. You know about Dad's darkroom in the basement, don't you?"

"It's pretty hard to ignore," said Darla. "The chemicals and all. I'm glad to do the laundry, I can open the detergent and smell something nicer."

Jessie took another puff. "He takes different kinds of pictures. Not just with you and me, at the park, or on vacation."

Darla shrugged. "I know he uses a camera for business. When there's an insurance claim."

Jessie nodded. "And there's more than that."

Darla said nothing. Jessie could see she wasn't very interested.

"Darla," she said, "what do you think of girlie magazines?"

She chuckled. "I guess I don't think about them." Then she blinked. "Wait a minute...Dad?" Her jaw dropped. "And

you?

"

"No, no, I was just, uh, we've never done that. Um, I'm trying to explain something." Jessie took a long draw, then let the smoke out with an audible breath. "Those magazines are out there now. Men can see more of a woman there, than they can see anywhere else, even at the beach. Their bosoms, especially. Does it bother you that men buy those magazines?"

Darla's knit brow looked becoming on her.

As does every other expression,

Jessie thought, as she tapped ash into a tray.

"I don't mind that men look at pretty girls," Darla said at last. "I can understand them wanting to see more of us."

Jessie laughed. "I'll take that as a compliment, Dear. I've always been able to turn men's heads, and I know I still can. And, yes, you're a living doll. I like that you aren't stuck up about it." After another puff: "Anyway, what your father and I do is about men liking to look at pretty girls. It's no harm to anybody. If you ever want to do this, you should know that we'd be okay with it, but we want you to be careful, and safe."

Darla's voice was a low monotone. "Doing what?"

"I'll have to show you," said Jessie, standing. "In the bedroom."

***

Darla watched as her mother moved aside various things under the bed, like cardboard boxes that held winter blankets. Whatever this was about, it didn't get Darla's mind off of her date. Work had been tedious, as always. Taking dictation, typing, filing, all while having to wait for the evening.

Jessie straightened up, holding a stack of photo albums. "These never leave here," she said. "If you ever want to see them, ask me or Dad."

Jessie sat on the bed. As Darla joined her, Jessie said, "The first few pages are just cheesecake."

She flipped through those pages. Darla did no more than glance at the black-and-white prints of Jessie, usually outdoors, in shorts and light blouses.

"Now for the secrets," said Jessie, turning another page.

Darla's eyes popped. Her mother was shown bare from the waist up, breasts fully revealed.

"This is why Dad has the darkroom," said Jessie. "We can't take film like this to the drugstore."

"I see," said Darla, gazing.

The photos were more daring with each turned page. Jessie was sometimes shown facing away, with a bare bottom, and then fully nude, or wearing only stockings on a garter belt, and high heels. Sometimes she touched herself, hands sometimes covering her breasts demurely, but then with nipples both revealed and lightly pinched. Her facial expressions ranged from pleasant to saucy.

Jessie wasn't just younger in these pictures. To Darla, her mother looked...provocative. Her eyes, her smiles. Maybe for Dad. Darla knew that her parents were still very lovey-dovey. "Do you keep these hidden," asked Darla, "because they're just for you and Dad?"

"Some of them are," said Jessie, "but we've shared them with other people." Jessie flipped forward a few pages. "And we've let them take pictures, too."

Darla was even more surprised by a large photo from an unfurnished indoor space, with a closed roll-up overhead door in the background. Jessie was shown with two other women, all nude, standing side by side, holding each other with arms behind their backs. They smiled, brazenly displaying even their private parts. At the sides of the picture, and the lower foreground, were men with cameras.

"Before the magazines," said Jessie, "People found a way for men to see pretty girls, and take pictures of them. We learned about this from classified ads in newspapers, for camera buffs. It had to be private, not like at burlesque theaters." Jessie smiled at her daughter. "When Dad got home from the war, some of the times when we took you to visit Grandma, we'd go to places like this. We did this for money, but we also loved doing it."

Darla's thoughts of Steve mingled with what she saw. "Did the men...touch you?"

"No. We had to be very careful, and everyone agreed that this was only for taking pictures. There could be enough trouble as it was, over things like a town's blue laws, and crossing state lines. But the freedom we had in places like this, an abandoned bus garage, was thrilling. These other women were like me, wives who had learned to love their bodies, with husbands who had learned to value a woman's happiness."

Jessie paged further, and stopped on a display of more solo nudes. "Dad and I both believe that there's nothing more beautiful than a woman, with her body free, to be seen and loved and, yes, worshipped, if a man is moved to that feeling." She held the right-side page in thumb and forefinger, and looked at her daughter. "Are you disgusted, looking at these?"

"No, Mom. You're so beautiful! Dad was right, to want to, um, I guess, honor you. Uh, your image. That way it's been saved. Not hidden forever by clothes."

Jessie smiled. "That's exactly how I feel about this next one."

She turned the page.

Darla gaped, and gasped.

The enlarged photo left only a half-inch margin on all sides of the page. Rich, brilliant color was everywhere, azure sky, verdant foliage edged with golden sunlight, deep brown bark of a massive tree. In front stood Jessica, her blush-rose skin revealed fully to join the glorious life all around her. Chestnut hair tumbled to her shoulders, carmine nipples left shadows on puckered areolas, the full breasts cast far more dramatic shade down her ribs. Her left arm was raised to a branch above her head, the right hand held a bunch of violets at her hip. Her sleek, parted legs revealed her belly and her tufted cleft, bright scarlet peeking through. A blissful smile curled her ruby lips. Her blue eyes invited the viewer to join her in this paradise.

Darla whispered, "Is this...what they have in girlie magazines?".

"Good heavens, no!" Jessie said with a laugh. "So far, the publishers have been lucky not to be shut down, or arrested. All they can show are breasts and butts, usually in indoor studios. In what we did for ourselves, your father and I would sometimes hide my, um, flower, if we were in a teasing, mischievous mood. But it meant so much more to us, to celebrate a whole woman, and show the part of me where I have given life. Many people are afraid of that, and the real power a woman holds." Jessie sighed. "I hope people can get over that, someday."

"How did you get this in color?"

"We had some money saved up. I was hoping we could get a new car. But then Dad told me he'd rented this fancy foreign camera, and bought color film! In 1949! I was furious! It took him two days to calm me down." She smiled at the memory. "A friend had sent us a naturist magazine, which had color pictures of naked people, outdoors. They looked very happy, and I admitted that it would be fun to be photographed outdoors, in color. And he kept telling me how much better I looked than any of those people. He was right, but I didn't say that out loud."

"Nine years ago...this hasn't faded."

"Dad still has all the negatives. I won't tell you where. Every year or so, he makes new prints of the eight shots that came out really well." Jessie then turned pages to show the rest of the color work.

Darla smiled. "You were really having fun! This one, where you're giving the come-hither gesture."

Jessie nudged Darla. "Then I used a different finger. Dad didn't print that one."

After a shared laugh, Darla said. "I still like the first one best. You're Mother Nature, only sexy."

"Yes, isn't that a pretty notion of nature? We won't talk about how I shaved my legs and armpits, and put on mascara, plus lipstick the color of a stop sign."

Darla herself turned a page, and saw more shots from a group session. "You posed for other men too."

"Always with Dad there. Some of these people, we didn't know very well. We'd heard that police might sneak in. We had to be really careful about where we held sessions, and what we put in the mail. The Post Office enforced obscenity laws. The phrase we'd hear in every session was 'Front leg across.' Posing that way would cover my flower. Only, sometimes I'd have to trim some of the hair, even

that

wasn't allowed to show."

"Those boots! They're above your knees!"

"Yes," said Jessie. She tapped the cigarette over the bedside ashtray. Her look to Darla was less playful. "Sometimes we had...requests, for things to wear. And props. Some men want to see more than a woman's skin."

"Like what?"

Jessie took a puff before saying, "I suppose it's a kind of make-believe, but for grownups. We've seen examples of what other photographers take. Like, with women tied up, in ropes. We were surprised at first, by what people asked for. Some of it, we just wouldn't do, even with a hood hiding my face. As it was, we got some nice pin money for me wearing these boots, or gaudy stockings, or a leather jacket, open to show my breasts."

Darla paged some more, saying, "I've read articles, um, saying that things like this are perversions. Psychologists call it deviant behavior."

Jesse snorted a laugh. "Psychologists. They could do so much good in the world, but they can't overcome the attitudes they've lived with their whole lives. Your father and I don't think there's anything wrong with what we do. It gives us pleasure, like sex does. We love each other, and we can share the love and the pleasure and be happy. No matter what some crackpot head-shrinkers think.