As I talked, we leaned closer together. I pulled my foot out of my pump and traced the stitching on that old Doc she was wearing. I saw her admire my pedi, I saw her run her gaze up my calf and I could feel it like it was her hand, rasping over my panty hose. How can a femme walk out in the world and have people know she’s queer when she looks to most people like she’s just a regular straight girl? It’s like I have a storehouse of queer energy somewhere in my belly, and it runs out—it runs out all the time. Mitch does what he can, but he’s got so many of his own complicated feelings about queer and straight and man and woman—things aren’t as straightforward with him as they were before he transitioned (although, as it turned out, they weren’t even straightforward then, we just didn’t exactly know it). Per queered me. She sparked my queer energy until I was flaming like the queer northern lights, and even if I’d suddenly been transplanted to the wilds of Alaska where no one knew me and the three other people who lived there were straight, they would have known that I’m so queer it’s a force of nature. It was sexy as hell. Just when I thought we were maybe going to do it, right there under the watchful eyes of Where the Wild Things Are and King and King, Per put her hands on my upper arms and kind of pressed me down into the cushion. “Is your monogamy thing he writes about true?” she asked. I loved her all over again for asking, for not taking Mitch’s word about me.
I leaned against her, breasts to breasts. I could smell her hair pomade and a hint of musky excitement. I nodded against her neck, and she let go of my shoulders to pull me closer.
“Let’s go.”
We walked to a girl bar near the bookstore, and Per’s old-fashioned manners—opening doors, walking on the curb side—contrasted deliciously with her appearance. I expect these courtesies, but when Mitch performs them, as he does without fail, he does so as a man, as my husband, and that’s what most people see, and poof, I’m gone. With Per, there was no question that my presence is a queer one in this world, and I felt so bolstered that I almost appreciated the few glares we got, which Per countered with an even more protective stance toward me and a glare of her own. At the bar, we slipped right into the pool of the anything-goes crowd: ultrafemmed-out girls fixing each other’s outfits and feeling each other up, the bois and their Daddies, sporty girls dancing energetically, dykes in jeans and button-down shirts checking out their reflections in the mirror, middle-aged lesbians in work clothes sitting quietly holding hands. No one blinked or even for a moment questioned our right to be there, and I got off on it, that warm sea of women thing, caught that wave and dirty danced with Per like a wanton hussy.
As we were taking a break with long, tall seltzers in hand (I was done drinking booze, and Per kept right up with me), a few folks came up to say hi, and while I thought I saw a flicker of recognition in the eyes of a couple of them, they didn’t ask about Mitch. For them, I was just another femme ensnared by their handsome friend for the evening, a queer among queers getting ready, without doubt, to go do unspeakably queer things in bed.
In the bathroom, I stood in front of the mirror reapplying lipstick and trying to do something with my hair, which had come undone from its chignon and was flying every which way. I used to always travel with a few emergency items in my purse—hair spray, clean panties, an extra toothbrush—but really, it had been a long time, so that all I had in there was a few tissues and a folded-up flyer for Mitch’s reading. Never mind. I pulled out the hairpins and let my hair have its own way. I smiled at my reflection. I was glowing.
When I got back to our table, Per asked me if I was hungry, if maybe I wanted to check out a diner she and her friends really liked. In fact, there was a bunch of people heading over there now, if that sounded good to me at all. I’d been fantasizing about being naked with Per for hours, but when she named a couple of the women I’d met earlier in the evening, I found myself wanting to hang out with them more.
“That sounds great,” I said, and Per looked relieved, probably having worried that I’d be put off by the suggestion, think she wasn’t interested anymore. While the rest of the crowd was gathering itself, she moved her chair closer and stroked my cheek, moving my hair back out of my face, and kissed me for the first time that night, a sweet, slow, just-a-hint-of-tongue kiss that melted me completely.
Per’s slow, sweet seduction continued at the diner, where the big flamboyant crowd of us took over, making the regulars grumble and shift on their stools and the straight college kids gawk, especially when one of the group, fresh from a drag king contest at another bar, got up and performed his whole routine for us using the sugar shaker as a microphone.
After we ate, Per and I left the rest to their coffee and went outside into the chilly air. Per’s apartment wasn’t far from the diner, but the neighborhood changed dramatically in just a few blocks, from lots of light and people to sedate, almost-suburban rows of houses with big trees and not very many streetlamps. Per held me tightly as we walked, and I could feel her protectiveness amp up. She told me there had been a queer bashing a few weeks ago, and now the whole neighborhood was on alert.
“See?” she said, pointing to a house that had a small rainbow sticker in the window. “That means it’s a safe house and you can go there if you’re scared or need help. We have a whole neighborhood watch thing going on, too.”
I turned all shy when we got inside her place, and I could tell Per was feeling a little awkward, too. She rose to the occasion, though, clearing books and papers off of the tiny living room floor, where, she said, she studied best, then lowering the lights and putting on a little Al Green. She took my purse and my wrap, placing them carefully on a table teetering with more piles of books and papers, then wrapped me in her arms again and we danced through three songs until my knees were too unsteady to keep upright, undone by her kisses, her body pressed against mine, and the sexy ooh-baby vibe of the music.
“Where…?” I whispered, and she led me into another tiny room, almost entirely taken up by a futon. The sheets and blankets were tangled together and the room smelled slightly stuffy. I tumbled onto her, stretched out over her, grinding myself against the seam of her jeans, gasping as she rose to meet me. We kissed and rolled, giggling as she tried to get my skirt off and I squirmed away.
“You,” I said, and obediently she skinned off her shirt, exposing a muscle tee. She wasn’t wearing a bra and her breasts were small handfuls, dark nipples showing through the white cotton. I was all over them before she had a chance to take off the shirt, tasting laundry detergent and a hint of sweat as I mouthed the soft flesh. She arched and moaned, a hand on her belt buckle, which I began undoing without abandoning her breasts. She helped me get her jeans off and then her boxers, flopping back unselfconsciously, arms over her head, hands pressing against the wall. She smiled up at me happily. I reached down to cup her pussy, dusted with a sparse crop of silky hair, parting now at my touch, the lips slick and swollen. I lay propped up on one elbow beside her, still fully clothed, my mouth on her tits and my fingers dancing around her cunt as she sighed and moaned beneath me. I stayed on her tits for a long time, sucking them while she ran her fingers through my wild, flyaway hair, anchoring herself. Every time I came up for air, I noticed her legs were more widely splayed, and she got wetter and wetter. At last, I began kissing my way down her taut belly, moving the shirt out of the way so that it was askew on her chest, exposing her breasts, which I continued to work with both hands. When I reached her crotch, she shoved herself up to my mouth with such force that I bruised my lip, something I realized later, too turned on in the moment to notice anything other than how badly I wanted to eat her pussy and how badly she wanted me to.
Despite our mutual need, or maybe because of it, I went slowly. I savored her delicate aroma, sampled her taste with the most demur of licks. I covered her inner thighs with kisses; I reached down to massage her calves and slowly moved my hands back up to her hips. Her belly button seemed to require attention, and I gave it a thorough scouring with my tongue, allowing my br
easts to fall against her pussy. She humped them tentatively, perhaps back to feeling a little shy, but obviously in need of some good, old-fashioned titty fucking. To accommodate her, I took a moment to slip out of my top, sitting up to let her get a look at my pink, lacy bra, before slipping out of that, too, and sinking my boobs right down on her cunt. I pressed my tits together, pressed against her, and let her slide all over them. My nipples were exquisitely tender by this point, and her wet pussy bumping against them felt fantastic. I didn’t want her to come just yet, and she sounded close, so I rolled reluctantly away and sat up again. I am blessed with a big rack and can suck my own nipples, which definitely adds to an evening’s entertainment. Per’s pussy juice coated my tingling nipples now, and I lapped it off, pretending not to notice how closely she was watching me, her eyes wide and shiny with lust. She tried again, more feebly this time, to get my skirt off, but I just giggled, letting my breasts shimmy as I positioned myself between her legs again. This time, she was very docile, a very good girl, not pushing up so greedily, just letting her knees loll to either side, whimpering a little as I bent over her, inviting me in, giving it all up.
I buried my face into her, nose to chin. I slowly ran my tongue between her lips, flattening out when I came to her clit, exerting pressure. She was making really cute noises, little yips and gasps, her hands clutching the bedclothes on either side of her, her knees drawn up now, feet flat on the bed. The insides of her thighs were so sweet and soft, I took a break from my licking to get back to them, stroking first one, then the other, resting my cheek against her pussy, my nose full of the smell of her musk. I was thinking about how I would lick her until my tongue was exhausted, and then, when I knew her hole would be aching and ready, I would fuck her, see how many fingers she could take, how deep I could go, how many times she would come for me. Her thighs quivered as I stroked and she shifted her ass on the bed. I could feel every movement through the tender skin of my cheek and I made my own little noises of contentment and arousal. I reached around to the back of her knee to stroke her there, and she hissed with pleasure. She said my name.
Per dropped me off in the hotel lobby the next morning, early, on her way to the library to prepare for the class she should have been studying for last night. We had showered together after a brief, sticky sleep, and I knew the memory of her soap-slick body rubbing me up and down would be one to take out and linger over in the future. The whole evening was already feeling precious to me, restorative.
“I am under no illusions,” Per murmured in my ear as we hugged good-bye. “I know you are a true and loving wife, which is, by the way, incredibly sexy, but if you ever need me, wherever I am, I will endeavor to be your girl in that particular port.” Then she left me, hurrying to class, her hair still damp and her shirttail untucked.
Mitch was awake, the newspaper spread out over the bed, a breakfast tray from room service waiting for me.
“The coffee’s really good,” he said, pouring me a cup. I got all shy and just stood there for a moment. Mitch held out the cup. “Now then, honey,” he said in his deep morning voice. “You come and tell me all about it.” I took the cup, holding it in both hands and letting the delicious steam wreathe my face. Today we would be going home, getting the dog out of the kennel, settling back in to our work and our routines. I mentally inventoried the contents of our freezer and decided to defrost some chicken thighs. Mitch chuckled.
“You’re not getting out of telling me,” he said, patting the bed beside him. “There was something special about this one, I think.”
Right, as always, Mr. Observant. I sipped reverently at my brew as I regarded my husband, upright, expectant, bed headed. Oh, I would tell him, of course I would, because that was our arrangement. He would hear about the miniature couch shaped like a fire truck, the dirty dancing and the tiny room where I ate pussy for the first time in many years. For the first time, though, I found myself wanting to hold some things back; some personal things, like how Per made me feel when she was a girl for me, the way she coaxed my queer out of hiding. If I told Mitch all of those things, he wouldn’t be able to stop himself from writing about them—I can hear him now protesting that this is the kind of information our queer people need to hear, but I don’t care. He can talk about himself all he wants, even talk about our marriage, that’s fine. But I am remembering what my grandmother says to me all the time: the man doesn’t have to know everything, and he doesn’t want to, not really. Keep a little something back, sweetheart, it adds to your allure. My grandmother is a wise woman, and I am thinking that I’ll take her advice. Careful not to spill my coffee, I got in bed beside Mitch, snuggled up to my husband, took a deep breath and began.
SMALL BLUE THING
Julia Serano
Way back when, on many an occasion, I would get aroused, even to the point of orgasm, without my penis ever getting hard enough to properly perform penetration. And back when I considered myself a straight boy, I was embarrassed by this. And the women I dated—twentysomething het girls, trained since birth to burden male shame—tried to take the blame for my flac-cidness, despite all my assurances that I was intensely attracted to them, that my lack of erection was not a reflection of them.
But by my late twenties, I had moved beyond missionary position vanilla sex. And I found myself with bisexual women who were into topping me while I played the femme role. And when their hands hiked up my skirt and began to flirt with the space between my legs, they didn’t really care how hard I got, just as long as I was hot, squirming and breathing heavy.
But I did have one last fling with the whole penetration thing, and I shared it with the most kick-ass girl in the universe. For most of her adult life she considered herself a dyke, eight straight years of exclusively sleeping with women. And ironically, I first met her shortly after she had rediscovered her appreciation for men. She was trying the word bisexual on for size and, much to my surprise, I found myself ready, willing and able to rise to the occasion!
For about a month or two. Eventually, pretending to be a boy lost its novelty and I found myself once again imagining how wet my vagina was getting when I should have been entering her instead. And like I said, this girl was kick-ass and I didn’t want to disappoint. So I did what any self-respecting semblance of a man would do: I set out to score some Viagra.
It was so easy to get! I just went to my doctor, told him I was impotent, and voilà—he wrote me a prescription, no questions asked; he didn’t even take my temperature. But designer drugs don’t come without a price, as I spent thirty bucks for three blue pills.
I wasted the first one on a necessary test run and it seemed to work just fine. So the second time I tried it with the kick-ass girl. After a date, we went back to her place and began to suck face, and before I knew it I had circled second base, and that’s when the pills kicked in. And unlike most drugs I’ve taken, there was no buzz really, no giddiness or disorientation: just a reliable hard-on.
Afterward, I let the kick-ass girl in on my little secret and she thought it was hilarious. And my little blue pills became our little inside joke that no one else knew about, although I only refilled that prescription twice before we both got bored with straightforward sex and began to explore more sordid acts.
So here comes the happy ending: I married the kick-ass girl, transitioned to female, and we were together for ten years, living as lesbians. And on the rare occasion when one of us had a hankering for penetration sex, I no longer needed Viagra. I just used my strap-on.
THE VISIBLE WOMAN
Rachel K. Zall
I’m staring out the bus window and Natalie is taking off her clothes. Her long, slender fingers delicately work each button on her plaid flannel shirt through its hole, popping one button at a time out, slowly, patiently, inch by inch of skin revealing itself, and I’ve missed seeing this so much while she’s been away. I wish she was here right now.
As I’m lost in that dream the bus bounces over a bump in the pavement where new asp
halt was recently laid, and the bottle of wine I’m bringing home leaps out of my hands. “Shit!” I yelp, snatching at the air just above it as it continues on toward the floor. I can’t get another one—I spent my last ten dollars on this one, a special treat for Natalie who’ll be home when I get home, and who’ll need cheering up after being dumped by her other girlfriend in Seattle.
Just as the bottle is about to crash, a hand with well-manicured nails and just a hint of black fuzz near the watchband appears from nowhere and snatches it from the jaws of death. “Got it!” a deep, even voice intones.
As I take the bottle from him, I look up into the face of my hero. The first thing I notice are his eyes, so dark brown that they’re almost black to match his ever-so-slightly shaggy hair. He smiles and I smile back and thank him.
“No problem,” he says, righting himself and turning back to his book.
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