With This Ring, I Thee Bed

by Alison Tyler

  “Can you take it?” Roy whispered in my ear as he held me.

  Snap: Yes, I could. All the way.

  Snap: My breasts fill the frame, ripe as fruit, my hands supporting them and squeezing them together to make a cleft as I lie back on the bed. Two cocks lie along the valley of my cleavage, one entering the frame from above and one from below. They snuggle up together, cushioned by the mounds of my flesh. They’re both so turgid and glistening that they look as if they’re molded from rubber.

  Snap: From behind, Roy’s ass and spread thighs, his hanging ball sac silhouetted between them in a halo of hair. My chin and lips just visible, out of focus, below. He’s got big balls by any standards, and I love to paint myself with lipstick and suck them.

  Snap: Me on all fours on the bed, getting spit-roasted. Roy is behind me and Calvin is fucking my mouth. I’m still wearing my satin shoes and my wedding stockings with their ivory lace panels, and the blue silk garter around my right thigh. My upthrust ass looks round and voluptuous, and Roy’s fingers are dinting it as he grips tightly, shafting me with obvious vigor. From the angle of my head, it looks as though Calvin’s cock is going all the way down my throat. My eyes are heavy-lidded, my mascara starting to streak as the tears well up.

  Snap: I’m bent forward and Calvin’s thick cock is halfway into my ass. It amazes me that Sylvia could get this angle for the picture. The contrast of skin textures makes my mouth water. My puckered asshole looks like a licked chocolate.

  Snap: Trench warfare. Calvin’s cock in my ass from above, Roy’s chin below, prickly with stubble, his tongue licking up to touch me. Between them my pussy gapes, a glistening no-man’s land of dark furrows and swollen ridges.

  Snap: My face, as I’m racked by orgasm. Tendrils of hair cling to my hot skin. My lips are spread in an O but every other muscle is locked with strain, my eyes squeezed tightly shut.

  Snap: Close-up on a double penetration. One cock where it should be, one in my ass. It looks oddly neat: all holes filled. My skin appears smooth as vellum, contrasted with the textures and corrugations of masculine flesh. Calvin’s scrotum rides high, a wrinkled bulge almost one with the underside of his shaft, while Roy’s balls are more distinct and bulging. Oh God, I’d never tried it before my wedding night; they’d been conspiring to serve it up for the special occasion, it turned out. And it took us some time to get into that position: lots of lube and easing of muscles, lots of working fingers in first. Sandwiched between their bodies I was held absolutely immobile, at their mercy. They soothed me and stroked me and forced me to come with terrible, ruthless patience.

  Snap: A head-and-shoulders shot again. My hair is in wild disarray by now, my veil askew where it’s fallen off and been pinned on again, my makeup smudged. Between me and the camera two heads, one dark and one light, suckle at my breasts. You can see my hands gripping the backs of their scalps, my nail varnish shiny, my new wedding ring very visible; you can’t tell what they are doing to me below, but you can see from the look of tormented concentration on my face that I’m about to come yet again.

  Snap: I’m riding Roy on the bed, cowgirl style. Well, sort of. Calvin stands behind me holding my arms stretched up and pinned over my head, so I’m one long line of tension as Roy thrusts up from below. My breasts are caught by the camera midbounce, weightless balloons.

  Snap: My left breast just as a hand smacks it, the shock wave billowing through my flesh.

  Snap: My butt, upraised, my pussy facing the lens full-on again. There are four hands on and in it. Fingers delve into my cunt and into my anus, competing for access. I’m very open. My clit shines like a cherry stone. Just visible on one ass cheek: the imprint of a slapping hand, fingers spread.

  Snap: My eyes are closed, my swollen lips parted, my face tilted back and ecstatic. I look like the model for a saint at prayer—except for the pale splashes of spunk all over my chin and cheeks, dewed in my eyelashes and dripping down my throat.

  Snap: The two men are reclining against the pillows, both gleaming with sweat, both grinning. You never saw anyone look so satisfied with themselves as those two. Between them I lie with limbs askew, my face hidden and my hair fallen across Roy’s thighs, exhausted and replete and as happy as I’ve ever been. You just can’t capture my muffled, disbelieving giggles in a photo.

  That’s the last picture in the album. It’s the perfect wedding memento. The perfect present.

  There goes the doorbell now; quietly, I lay the books of photographs aside. That’ll be Sylvia and Calvin come to pick us up. I can hear Roy heading down to answer the door. We’re going away on a cycling weekend at a hotel in the Lake District.

  And just for now I’ll put off growing up.

  Mother of the Bride

  Cheyenne Blue

  Since when had dove-gray defined who I was? Dove-gray and lilac.

  The dress laid out on the bed was…elegant. It was tasteful and refined. It was mature. When had I become mature? I picked at the lace that adorned the neckline, thinking absently that it would itch like hell. It matched the trim on the huge floppy hat. The hat simply screamed “Mother of the Bride” it looked like a drooping satellite dish. I’d have to stand in the back row for the photos or it would obscure half the wedding party.

  The wedding party. The bride and groom. The mother and father of the bride, the mother and stepfather of the groom, the father and stepfather of the groom. Five bridesmaids, ranging in age from thirty-two down to two, and five groomsmen, all supposedly of adult age. A best man, a matron of honor. And cousins, aunts, uncles, all with their husbands, wives, partners, live-in lovers, fuck buddies and “good friends,” plus endless, mostly annoying, children.

  I hated it. Jonas, my partner, hated it. But the bride—Skye, our daughter—loved it all. She had picked the dress out for me, told me it looked perfect and wonderful. Skye loved it, and that was what mattered. Wasn’t it?

  Jonas appeared naked from the en suite bathroom. His long gray hair was already tied back in a neat ponytail and he’d obviously just trimmed his beard. A whole inch was gone from the bottom. Droplets clung to his sparse frame, a trickle ran down his lean leg, winding through the still-dark hairs. He turned to the closet and his skinny butt jiggled, just a little.

  When he came over to the bed, his hands were full of charcoal suit, silk shirt and purple tie.

  “I still can’t believe we’re doing this,” he mused. “How did we acquire such a traditional daughter? When we were her age, we were backpacking around Europe.”

  “Drinking too much.”

  “Sleeping on beaches.”

  “Squatting in that Victorian terrace in London.”

  “Doing drugs that wrecked our heads and should have wrecked our livers.”

  “Voting communist. Saving the whale. Campaigning for Greenpeace.”

  “Free love. Free Nelson Mandela.”

  We’d had this conversation hundreds of times and the gist of it was always the same.

  “When Skye was little,” said Jonas, “we were living in the commune in Arizona. She ran around naked in the dust—”

  “We all did that.”

  “—she was vegan, she went on spirit walks, she had never watched television.”

  “Now she lives in a condo in the city, eats out five nights a week and sets her TiVo to record three or four TV shows each night. Dear Goddess, she’s even an accountant. She talks about her IRA.”

  “She has an IRA, which is more than we do. The only IRA we knew were the Irish freedom fighters.”

  I sighed. “They say that children do the opposite of their parents, but I never thought it would happen to us. I thought she’d be even wilder.”

  Jonas put down the suit and came up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. “She’s a conformist. Before you know it, you’ll be cuddling your two point five grandchildren.”

  “Not too soon, I hope. She’s too young. I’m too young.”

  He touched his fingers to the strands of gray threading thro
ugh my dark brown hair. “It’s the way she is.”

  “I know. And I’m happy for her, truly I am. I just wish… I just wish she could be roaming free, as we used to do.”

  “Maybe she did her roaming with us. Not many kids have sailed around the world by the time they were six. Or lived on an ashram and a kibbutz.”

  “She says she was happy. But I think she would have preferred a settled childhood.”

  Jonas’s hands wandered around my waist, stroking my skin. His touch still had the power to move me, even after all our years together. I clasped his hands where they rested on my waist. Strong hands, strong man. Truly my soul mate.

  “We can do the navel gazing another time. But right now, Penny, we need to dress for our daughter’s wedding.”

  My mouth turned down. “Dress.”

  “I know you hate it, but Skye picked it.”

  “It’s not me. It’s matronly. I’m not matronly…am I?”

  “Never. You’re still my lover and soul mate, and to me you’ll always be my rainbow girl, in the tie-dye and Birkenstocks you wore to our commitment ceremony.”

  I turned in his arms and kissed him, my lips sliding over his to briefly suck on the lower one. “That was a day to remember. The closest we’ve ever come to doing what Skye is doing now. I wonder why she feels the need to make a legal bond. We never did. Our affirmation was enough.”

  “Just us and some friends, under the sky, in the Rockies in Colorado, the sun on our faces, nature around us.”

  “We exchanged woven anklets instead of rings. Skye and Owen have traditional gold bands, the exact symbol we rebelled against.”

  “Henny Penny.” Jonas turned and leaned his forehead against mine. The pet name fell warmly into the space between us. “How blessed I am to have you in my life.”

  “Blessed,” I echoed, and reached up with seeking lips.

  His hands rose and wound themselves into my long, gray-streaked hair—the hair that Skye had wanted me to dye and style for her wedding. The silver strands stood out against his tanned hands. His lips moved with assurance, caressing mine, deepening the kiss until our tongues tangled in a slow, wet dance.

  When the kiss reached the point where we had to move it forward into something more than a kiss or stop, Jonas broke off. His forehead rested against mine again for a moment, our breath mingling in the space between us.

  “Not now,” he said. “We can’t tell Skye we missed her wedding because we were having a skin celebration of our own.”

  I smiled and let my hand drift down his side. “Later.”

  “Later,” he echoed.

  The traditional stone church was mostly packed with traditional smart people. There was a small knot of bright clothing, flowing hair and beards—some of our friends whom Skye had invited. They stood out like dandelions on a sleek, manicured lawn. Like the rest of the congregation, I stood as the organ swelled into the “Wedding March,” and Skye glided down the aisle on Jonas’s arm. Her face was obscured by the long veil. I remembered how, mildly, I’d pointed out to her that she wasn’t a chattel to be “given away” by her father. That she didn’t have to wear a white dress; even our traditional daughter wasn’t a virgin.

  Skye had smiled her sweet but determined smile, her endearing smile, the one that usually got her what she wanted. “I know,” she’d said, taking my hand over the breakfast table, “but it’s what I want.”

  What she wanted. We’d raised her unconstrained by the shuttered thinking that said women couldn’t do this, or nice girls didn’t do that. We’d encouraged her to be open and free, taught her that sex was a gift and a pleasure, not a sin, not something to be hidden. And here she was, age twenty-two, binding herself to a staid traditional world.

  The words of the Christian service were unfamiliar to me. Behind me, I could hear my friend quietly repeating the words of a handfasting ceremony. And suddenly it was over, and Skye and Owen were kissing, and then they were returning down the aisle to stand outside in the watery May sunshine, hand in hand, confetti in their hair and clinging to her peachy skin.

  “My back aches,” I grumbled to Jonas, interminable hours later, as we were shunted into yet another photo lineup.

  “I’ll rub it later.”

  “Later” came after the photos, the cocktails, the congratulations, more photos, the dinner, the first dance, the last dance. And finally, Skye and Owen disappeared to change, and then left in a welter of hugs and good wishes. She’d hugged me and Jonas, a long, tight clasp, that spoke of a farewell far deeper than the two-week honeymoon in Jamaica. I thought I could feel the echo of the little girl she had once been.

  As the younger people settled back in for another round of drinking and dancing, I slipped my hand into Jonas’s. “Think we can leave now?”

  He hummed in affirmation, and together we slipped out the door of the ballroom, down the long anonymous corridors of the hotel, up to our room on the third floor. The lights were off when we opened the door, but I’d left the drapes partially open. When I turned on the light, I saw the bouquet of flowers on the bed. Skye’s bridal bouquet. I picked it up and turned it over in my hands. The only tradition she’d omitted was throwing her bouquet. Now I knew why.

  Her note was simple and to the point. “Because I love you, and because you loved me enough to give me the wedding I wanted, not the one you wanted for me.”

  Tears pricked at my eyes, and I handed the note to Jonas. “Obviously, we didn’t hide our feelings too well.”

  “I doubt we could have kept them from her. She’s very astute.”

  Carefully, I set the bouquet on the bedside table and reached for my partner again.

  His hands moved to the top button of my despised lilac-and-gray dress. Working swiftly, he slipped the buttons, pushing aside the cloth, moving it down my arms until I stood there in my simple cotton bra. Bending, he set his mouth to my nipple, warming it through the fabric. The dress pooled around my waist.

  In a glissade of motion, we moved to the bed, dropping our clothes as we went. We’d moved like this a thousand times before. We knew each other so well. No need for a slow striptease that night, no need for the ritual undressing of each other. This time was all about us, and a celebration of our life together. And a celebration of Skye, as well; our daughter, made in love, who today was leaving us for her own love and life.

  We lay on the bed, facing each other. I stroked the long gray strands of his hair, reaching behind to release his ponytail, combing out the strands until they flowed free over his shoulders.

  He growled at me, biting my nipple playfully. “I should let you be. Maybe I’ll go and have a drink at the bar. A fine bourbon, some good company…”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” I said, and wound my fingers tightly into his hair, tugging as he tongued my breast.

  I treasured these moments, lying together in bed. Whether it was the afterglow, or a slow buildup to intimacy, the warmth and the loving were the same. Even when we didn’t make love—when he couldn’t or I wasn’t interested—we still held each other, and stroked and played and cavorted like puppies, softly warm and playfully tender.

  He pretended to think, his hips undulating into my groin with casual disregard. I could feel him swell slightly against me. I tried to feign indifference, but my gasp gave me away.

  “Maybe I’ll join Owen’s mother and stepfather. I’m sure they appreciate a fine drink.”

  I caught his lips with mine. “Too staid for you.”

  I kissed him slowly, feeling him engorge further as he wriggled against my belly. I knew he was aroused, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of rolling over and letting him drive into me until we were both sated. No, I liked to tease.

  “I told them I’d meet them at the bar later.” Another stalling tactic. He’d said no such thing, and I knew it.

  “Liar.”

  His lips settled on the curve of my neck, and his hand crept up my side, insinuating between our sticky bodies to find my nipple. It bloom
ed into his fingers, peaking softly between his finger pads.

  I smiled at the touch of his hand, and grasped him by his hair again, dragging his head back, forcing him to look into my face.

  His expression was not one of sly manipulation; not like when he talked me into letting Phoebe, his sister, come and stay with us. Phoebe intruded upon us, claiming Jonas, trying to drag him away from me. When Phoebe was coming, Jonas’s expression was one of trickery. But this time, his expression was content. He rolled me over so that he was on top, and parted my thighs, pressing down into the cradle of my hips. The tip of his cock rested at my opening. I was slick and wet with desire. He rocked toward me, his erection growing, pushing through my outer lips, damp and warm.

  I lifted a thigh, still slender, but without the tautness of muscle I had when Jonas first met me. He stroked its softened surface with his fingertips. I was still his Penny; he didn’t love me less. My fingers teased between his legs, stroking the seam where his sex met his body. He responded and the tip of his cock slipped inside me. I rocked forward to meet him, and he slid home, sheathed in my liquid heat.

  I cradled his face in my hands. “Just love me,” I said.

  He rocked with me, in the rhythm we had perfected during our years together. His movements made me moan a little, and I clasped him tight, keeping him deep within me, close against my skin.

  We were closing our world around us again. For twenty-two years there’d been three of us: him, me and Skye, and now, while she was still part of our circle, Skye was stepping away into her own life. The sadness I’d been suppressing welled anew, and the sky fell, just a little.

  Jonas’s fingers touched my lips. “I know,” he said, and his eyes were rueful. I waited for him to continue, but he was silent again, moving gently within me.

  We lay together, and our hands communicated what our voices could not. He stroked my hip, I grasped his hair and pulled his head to my breast. Our love was as strong as ever. He seemed to sense my uncertainty, and opened his mouth over my breast, biting softly, leaving his mark on my skin.