Versatile Ladies: the bisexual option (John Warren Wells on Sexual Behavior)

by Lawrence Block

  Everyone took a turn birching me, and on the last turn I was allowed to have a complete orgasm. I don’t know if I can describe how I felt. I felt as though I was getting out of myself completely. I have read about astral projection, where you learn how to make your soul leave your body and go on little trips around the world. I don’t know if I believe in this. It doesn’t make much sense to me. But I think I know the feeling of getting out of yourself. Except it wasn’t so much a matter of getting out of my body as of getting out of my entire self.

  I felt free. I was bound and blindfolded and being whipped beyond the point of pain, and what I felt was this incredible sense of liberation.

  After the birching I was fucked anally by the five men. I came almost constantly during this.

  Then I was removed from the buckboard and the hood was taken off. I looked around the room at all of them and it was as if they were strangers. I knew them all so well but everyone stayed in character, as if they were these weird Satanists and I was someone who had been caught sneaking around their meeting. They all absolutely glowered at me.

  While I stood there they discussed what they would do to me next. One of them said the girls should all eat me and make me come until I died of it. Another one said she didn’t want to eat me because my pubic hair was filthy. So they decided they would shave me.

  I thought this was just a threat that wouldn’t be fulfilled because it had never been done before. I was grabbed and forced to the floor and they brought in a razor and a can of shaving cream. I still didn’t believe this would actually be done. They washed me with hot soapy water and then lathered me, and when they actually started to shave me I realized it was actually happening for some reason or other I was terrified. I screamed my lungs out and they simply held me immobile and shaved my pubes absolutely smooth.

  Then I was frenched repeatedly by everyone present and forced to french everyone in return, both the men and the women. The men discharged deep in my mouth and I was forced to swallow their come. I also was compelled to perform anilingus on both the men and the women.

  At one point one of the girls suggested that they shave my head. By this time I believed they would go through with it, having threatened to shave my pussy and having done so when I did not expect it. I went absolutely crazy because I am very vain about my hair and certainly did not want my head shaved. But of course they had no intention of going through with it.

  Shortly after that the Victim part reached a peak and stopped. And then I was released and led to a soft mattress. They put a salve on my bottom where it still stung from the birching. It took away the last of the pain. Then I was washed from head to toe with scented towels, and more oils were massaged into my skin.

  Someone said, “We all love you, Pauline, and now we are going to be gentle to you.”

  And they all kissed and stroked me at once, all of them, very gently, while I simply lay there and received caresses to every part of my body. It was a very warm and loving experience. Nine people all concentrating all their attentions upon me, kissing and petting me everywhere. I had this feeling of well-being and security that I cannot describe. I’m sure it would be wonderful at any time, but after what I had been through it was especially good. After it had gone on for ages I had a sweet drawn-out beautiful orgasm and then it was over.

  I lay there with my eyes closed until everyone had dressed and gone home, and the host and hostess had gone upstairs. Then I found my own clothes and went outside to the car where George was waiting.

  The glow that I felt lasted for days.

  I couldn’t go through that once a month, or once every two months. While it was happening there were times when I wanted to call it off. I yelled for them to stop and really wanted them to stop.

  When I think about it now, I can’t wait for it to be my turn again.

  FOUR:

  “Just Looking For Mommy and Daddy”

  I have my own special definition of bisexual. The usual definition, the correct definition, is that a bisexual can enjoy sex fully with both the same sex and the opposite sex. My definition is more precise. I would say that a bisexual is someone who can only really enjoy sex with both a male and a female lover.

  I guess what I really mean is that there should be a special term for people in my situation. When I have relations with a man there is something missing to the point that I would rather not have relations at all, although I may be able to enjoy the act to a degree and have an orgasm. The same thing holds true when I have relations with a woman. It may be exciting and even fulfilling but something important is missing and I can’t help noticing the omission.

  Thus the ideal situation for me is to swing with a couple. I have done other things, such as foursomes and group scenes, but I don’t like that as much and haven’t been in a scene of that sort in a long time. These were just possibilities I explored during a period of time when I was trying to work things out for myself and figure out where I was at sexually speaking. What I discovered was simply what I said, that my ideal scene is a relationship with a couple. Now that I’ve learned this much about myself and gotten past the hangups that made it difficult for me for so long, that’s really the only sexual activity I have—myself and a married couple.

  I consider myself very fortunate in this respect. By this I mean that I have a requirement that is very easily satisfied. Sometimes it seems to me that every couple in the swinging world desires to meet with a bisexual girl. You can easily get this impression reading the ads. Ad after ad says the same thing. Couple desires to swing with bi-girl. Couple desires to swing with couples or bi-girls, but no single males. Wife desires to swing with bi-girl, husband participates if desired. It has never been necessary for me to run an advertisement of my own. I just answer the ads that appeal to me, and almost all of the time I get a letter back by return mail.

  In fact I can pick and choose, so that I can limit myself to the ads that are specifically a couple wanting to meet a bi-girl, not bi-girls or couples, which sometimes means they know an extra guy who will be glad to make a fourth. By sticking to couples who specifically want to make a threesome, I’m more likely to get together with someone who wants the same basic thing I do.

  Not that it always works out that way. Naturally it isn’t always perfect. There are a lot of things that can be right or wrong about a scene of this sort. Anybody who thinks all threesomes are the same just doesn’t know very much about threesomes.

  But even if it isn’t perfect, I can almost always have a good enough time to justify spending an evening. I may not necessarily want to see those particular people again. Whether I do or not, I usually have a good time, a better time than I could possibly have with either a man or a woman alone.

  All of this comes right out of the way I grew up and the particular problems I had. I knew that much on my own, digging into myself and thinking about it, reading things and relating what I learned from books to what I already knew about myself. There was a time when I did go to a psychiatrist, and had five sessions with him. He helped me tremendously. I’ve heard so many stories of people who got nothing out of psychotherapy or analysis or whatever, and I guess I have to say I was damned lucky. Either it was because I went to a good man or because I was ready to make the insights he pointed out for me. Whatever it was, I’m damned grateful for it.

  He helped me see a lot of things about myself and helped confirm some things I had already guessed about where I was and how I got there. And the best thing of all is that he encouraged me to relax with myself and go on being myself instead of trying to change it.

  “You happen to be bisexual,” he said. “If you were exclusively homosexual and you were worried about it I would regard it as neurotic, and I could probably help you learn to relate sexually to men. And if you were exclusively heterosexual and worried about it I could help you relate that way to women, but no one ever comes to me for that kind of help. But you’re bisexual, which is very possibly more normal than either of the two extremes, and
what would be the point of reinforcing a guilt pattern over this form of behavior?

  “At the present time you have rather highly stylized sexual requirements. You have to relate not to a single individual of either sex but to a couple. Your life style is such that you have every opportunity of gratifying this desire as often as you wish. I would think that, as you grow and mature, you’ll learn to broaden your horizons to a degree. You’ll most likely learn to relate to individuals as well. You might ultimately form a relationship with a bisexual male, or with a man who approves of female bisexuality, rather like some of the men in the couples with whom you’ve had sexual relations. This sort of change will come when you’re ready for it. Until it does, or even if it doesn’t, you’ve evolved a way of coping with sexual desire that seems to be serving you well. The only problem you have is a feeling of guilt about it, and that will recede the more you know yourself and understand yourself. You can come back and discuss this further with me if you continue to feel troubled from time to time, but I won’t be at all surprised if you find it’s not necessary.”

  I consider myself very fortunate. He could have had me locked into a once-a-week situation with no trouble at all, and he wouldn’t have had to be a confidence man to do it. So many of them honestly believe that that’s what a person needs. And I suppose I could have afforded to pay twenty-five dollars a session once a week if he made me feel I had to. But instead he helped me and then let me fly on my own, and I’ve been in better shape ever since.

  I’m not sure if I believe, at least for the time being, that my orientation will eventually change and that I’ll eventually want to have a permanent relationship with a man. I date men occasionally—it’s hard to avoid it in my work situation. Frankly, most men stop seeing me when they realize I don’t want to go to bed with them. I’m not blaming them for this. I’m not taking the they’re-only-interested-in-one-thing position. I have the feeling that everybody is only interested in one thing. But I don’t usually want to have sex with the men I date, and I guess it’s because I don’t want to get involved.

  In fact I’m sure that has a lot to do with it, because there are two men I sleep with occasionally, and have been dating for a fairly long time. And they are both married, and not the type who would break up their marriage over another woman. I know very well that I feel secure having a continuing relationship with them because I know it can’t go anywhere, and I don’t want it to go anywhere.

  What I have with these two men is more a friendship thing than a heavy passion thing. I went out with each of them for a long period of time before anything sexual happened, and when it finally did happen it was because I had the feeling that it was an artificial thing on my part not to sleep with them. That I knew them well enough and was emotionally intimate with them, so it was only right to share the physical intimacy as well.

  I can enjoy relations with them. Largely because it’s a warm feeling, and because they enjoy it so much. But it is nothing to compare to the feeling I get making love with the right sort of couple.

  It’s not hard to see what it’s all about. It never has been, even before I saw the psychiatrist.

  It’s a very obvious parents hangup. I don’t go to bed just with a couple, I go to bed with my parents. All I’m doing, really, is just looking for Mommy and Daddy.

  • • •

  Monica is twenty-seven and looks several years younger. Her hair is honey brown and she wears it long and flowing almost to her waist. Her face is closer to cute than to beautiful—small turned-up nose, a sprinkling of freckles on her cheeks, a pointed chin. She has an excellent figure, with thrusting breasts and a narrow waist and generous hips and thighs. All she needs is a white letter sweater and a megaphone and she could lead cheers at any high school football game in America.

  Her background includes elements that appear again and again in case histories of emotional maladjustment. Her father died before Monica’s third birthday, and she is unsure whether she remembers him or not. She has pictures of him and thinks she may remember his face but cannot know for certain whether she simply remembers looking at the picture itself. She also says she remembers sitting on his lap, remembers him smelling of whiskey and tobacco and holding her close, remembers having a tremendous feeling of well-being in his embrace. But she realizes herself that this may well be a false memory triggered by her desire to remember the man in this fashion.

  Her mother remarried several years after the father’s death. When Monica was seven years old, her stepfather seduced her.

  • • •

  I don’t know if I remember the first time that it happened. He liked to have me sit on his lap and cuddle with him, and he gradually came to touch me more and more. I was very ignorant of what was going on. Sometime or other we reached the point where I would masturbate him to orgasm while he touched my body. It happened so gradually I don’t think I was aware of ever crossing a particular line.

  I remember he used to come on a handkerchief. Then he would tuck himself in and put the handkerchief in his pocket and tell me how much he loved me and that we would have to keep this a secret from my mother.

  I felt both good and bad about this. I didn’t like to keep secrets from her but I liked the way it made me feel to be close to him. I felt loved and important.

  I also liked to be close to my mother. My stepfather had a factory job and left the house early in the morning while we were still sleeping, and he would come home about three in the afternoon while my mother was still at work. He always came to my room before he left the house and would kiss me goodbye. Sometimes he might touch me a little but it never went further than that in the mornings, maybe because my mother was in the house and he knew it wasn’t safe. Afternoons, before she came home, were the times we would get sexy together.

  After he left, I would get up and get into bed with my mother. I would curl up next to her. I can remember the way she smelled, warm and sleepy and doughy like fresh bread. She always slept naked. I would put my face up against her breasts and cuddle close to her and she would put her arm around me and we would stay like that.

  I don’t know if she responded to me sexually or not. If she did, I don’t think it was something she was aware of. I know she liked to have me there with her and I know that my feelings in bed with her were virtually identical to my feelings when I was with my stepfather. The same sense of being warm and safe and loved.

  I remember one time touching her genitals. Part of this was curiosity. I wanted to know how she was built there. But part of it was a desire to make her happy the same way I made him happy. He liked it when I touched him and I thought she would like it also.

  She was half asleep. I remember marveling at how she was made the same way I was but that there was so much more to what she had then what I had.

  She let me do it for awhile, then asked me sleepily what I was doing. I said I just wanted to touch her.

  “You shouldn’t be doing that,” she said. But she let me go on and I kept my hand on her. Eventually I guess she enjoyed it more than she cared to and she giggled and moved my hand away.

  Then one day she came home and caught him with me.

  I was sitting on his lap. He was fingering me and I had his penis out and was jerking him off, and there was just no way in the world to pretend it was good clean innocent fun. It was all too obvious what was going on, and it must have been obvious that it wasn’t happening for the first time, either.

  An ultimate traumatic moment . . .

  Since then I’ve fantasized so many alternate endings for that scene. They all amount to the same thing. Instead of reacting antagonistically, Mommy comes over and embraces both of us and we all go to bed and make love to each other. Countless variations on this theme, but all of them adding up the same way. The permissive-seductive parent fantasy, I think it’s called.

  That wasn’t the way it happened at all, of course. She blew up completely. There was a horrible fight during which she threw things at him and scrat
ched him and called him every possible name. He threw some clothes in a suitcase and left the house.

  I never saw him again. When I tell people that they don’t believe it at first. People don’t drop out of your life that abruptly. It simply doesn’t happen. It’s like those convenient car accidents and plane crashes in bad fiction, with characters just dropping neatly and permanently out of the picture.

  But that was the way it happened. I never saw him again and neither did she. She had threatened to call the police and that may have scared him so much that he left town immediately and never looked back. I don’t know, but he was gone and he never came back. I have no idea what has happened to him since then. Whether he’s alive or dead. Where he might have gone, what might have become of him.

  Of course I’ve thought about him over and over again. A few years ago I ran a series of ads in newspaper personal columns, asking for information about him or for him to get in touch. I got some tracts in the mail from religious fanatics and one reply from a man with the same name but a different middle name who had never even been in the same state. He wrote to say that if there was a legacy due he might be a surviving relative or something. When people smell money, they really come out of the woodwork, don’t they?

  After Mommy was gone I had dreams of meeting my stepfather again. In the dreams he was married to another woman and the two of them made a home for me and we slept together in the same bed every night, with me in the middle and my stepfather and my new stepmother on either side. As I got older the dreams became more specifically sexual but they were essentially the same all the way through.

  Mommy—I still think of her that way, not my mother but Mommy—wasn’t mad at me at all at first. All her fury was directed at my stepfather. I was the young innocent and he had corrupted me, and all she wanted to do was hold me and tell me that everything would be all right now.