My name is Constance Rogers and I'm a sex therapist and sometimes act as a sex surrogate, which means playing the role of sexual partner to men with crippling problems. Regardless of the public image of sex therapists, I am not a prostitute and I didn't get into this kind of work with the idea of balling as many men as I could under the protection of a scientifically sanctioned institute. More than half my time is spent in counseling sessions, in spite of the general idea that sex surrogates spend all their time in bed.
INTRODUCTION
The unrealistic and hypocritical attitude toward human sexuality has been the cause of billions of misunderstandings, the reason for the inability of countless individuals to function as productive members of society and perhaps more destruction of life than any area of human relations. Paradoxically, the trail blazers of early psychiatry who brought the emotional disorders caused by sexual problems into focus were disregarded. The research and findings of these scientists were long treated with contempt and the scientists themselves relegated to the lunatic fringe, labeled disruptive of public morals and worse.
In order to be accepted by the self righteous, writing about sex as recently as the first part of this century had to be slanted toward sexual immorality. Even sex within marriage was not to be enjoyed. It was to be dutifully endured by the wife and carried out in guilty haste by the husband under cover of darkness, and procreation was the only accepted reason. Humans still fundamentally believe anything enjoyable is wicked.
Scholars tell us the sex drive is second only to the desire for food. To avoid acceptance of humanity's second strongest drive is tantamount to sticking our heads in the sand in order to avoid a hurricane. The early insistence that good people avoid sexual pleasure has resulted in a dilemma that has spread like a cancer.
Freud was discredited by many as a lecherous man, probably crazy himself, who fooled around in areas where he had no business. The idea that many of mankind's ills are caused by sexual frustration and allied guilt is still unaccepted by many in today's world.
Freud's followers were equally maligned. The Kinsey report was the first meaningful study of human sexual behavior in this century, but millions still look upon the works as a joke. Kinsey and his staff are considered sex maniacs and voyeurs. It is the general but unfounded belief that Kinsey encouraged sexual promiscuity. In later years, Masters and Johnson made vast inroads into the realm of human sexual response.
There is no way of knowing how many crimes are committed due to sexual dysfunction, sexual misconceptions and sexually oriented hostilities.
Such violences might well be avoided if the parties involved could be counseled, but the stories about sex therapists and institutes of research devoted to sexual problems and their cure don't help the general attitude of the public. Comments made by an intelligent and knowledgeable man concerning sex therapists is typical of the negative attitude toward the entire concept:
"It would seem to me that any woman who has sexual intercourse with people and receives money for doing it, even in a medically and scientifically approved institute, is a prostitute. It doesn't matter whether she's helping men with sexual problems or not, and it doesn't matter how dedicated she is. She's still behaving in an immoral fashion, and if my daughter ever told me she was interested in doing such a thing I'd have her locked up."
CHAPTER ONE
My name is Constance Rogers and I'm a sex therapist and sometimes act as a sex surrogate, which means playing the role of sexual partner to men with crippling problems. Regardless of the public image of sex therapists, I am not a prostitute and I didn't get into this kind of work with the idea of balling as many men as I could under the protection of a, scientifically sanctioned institute; More than half my time on the job is spent in counseling sessions, in spite of the general idea that sex surrogates spend all their time in bed.
Everyone has heard at least one story about the unethical psychiatrist or psychologist who treated a patient with un orthodox methods. "I went to see him because I was frigid and he said he'd help me out by showing me how it felt to be fucked by a real man."
"My husband was impotent and suffering from severe depression. His psychologist told him to go to a whorehouse."
There are ministers of the gospel who sometimes step off the path of righteousness, and there are surely psychiatrists and psychologists who make the same human mistakes. It's my opinion, however, that most of the stories making the rounds about the sex-happy psychiatrist who offered his beautiful body to cure his patient are embroidered considerably, stemming from one or two isolated events. To say that all professionals who treat emotional disorders are sex maniacs is as ridiculous as saying all ministers ball their choir directors-even if one or two ministers have been known, to do that and a few psychiatrists and psychologists have paid more attention to the bodies than to the minds of their patients. I feel that those who enjoy repeating stories about the wild sex orgies that happen in sexually oriented institutions are in the same category as those who say all lawyers are crooked and all welfare recipients leeches. Now and then an unscrupulous group of pseudo-scientific wheeler dealers open a sex clinic. They might even go so far as to hire a psychologist to act as advisor. The treatments prescribed in these shady establishments are more in keeping with a treat to the clients and might well be described as a trick by the girls who do the treating.
Fortunately such establishments are few and like most cheap imitations seldom last long, but even the sex clinics that are nothing more than thinly disguised whorehouses don't do any real damage to clients. They just make themselves a bundle of money before they're closed down by the authorities.
I know a girl who is working in one of these institutions. She's an art major with two years to go before she gets her degree. Her name is Mona, and before she went to work as a sex therapist she had a job as a topless waitress in California. Mona is honest, open, and doesn't lie to herself or anyone else.
"There's not a lot of difference between working for a phony sex institute and being a topless waitress. I used to ball men I met on the job and now I do the same thing. What's to worry or feel guilty about? I make good money, my bosses make good money and the customers go away happy. Maybe I might even help some dude who hasn't been able to get a hard on for his wife. I teach them a lot of things they'd never heard about. Like this client who came for five sessions. He dug oral sex but his wife didn't. So he came to the institute to see if he was as morally depraved as his wife told him he was. I convinced him he wasn't and quoted from some really good articles that point out that there's nothing really wrong with anything anybody wants to do in bed as long as it's acceptable and pleasant to both persons. Then I gave him some little secrets designed to turn his wife on to oral sex. It's just a matter of overcoming hang-ups, isn't it? Anyway, it worked for this dude. He said and did everything I told him, and didn't rush it. Now he's grooving on sex with his wife. They don't always get it on together orally, but she's come a long way and I honestly feel I helped keep a marriage together."
I could have pointed out to Mona that she's treading on dangerous grounds, but she feels good about her life and I'm not sure she has the wrong attitude. Sometimes a kind and interested friend can help solve a deep-seated emotional problem. This is not an accepted point of view by psychologists and psychiatrists. Professionals aren't happy about the amateurs who read a few books and go around blithely acting as the poor-people's-psychologist. On the other hand, a lot of professionals grudgingly admit that patients with mental problems often get well in spite of, not because of, lawfully certified treatment.
I didn't say anything to Mona. I prefer for myself the security of working for an authorized institution, possibly because I'm more traditional in my thinking than the Monas of this world and partly because I am, after all, a fledgling psychologist with a lot of dedicated study behind me.
The field of medicine is dominated by an ultra-conservative element, which is usually a good thing, but sometimes a tragedy. There's a current controversy over the ridiculously long number of years that must elapse between the time a new drug is discovered and the time it becomes approved for consumption in this country. European doctors are not restricted from using a drug that helps relieve the pain and check the accompanying progress of certain diseases for nearly as long as doctors in the United States must wait to prescribe it.
Just as the medical profession is conservative in treating organic diseases, it is reluctant to try new ideas in the field of mental illness. Since emotional disorders are very often the cause of sexual dysfunctions, the relatively new concept of sex therapy is looked at with suspicion by many medical men. Perhaps my de sire to be protected by a duly authorized and professionally accepted institution dedicated to alleviating human suffering is due to my hope to become a licensed psychologist. I don't think I fit in too well with radicals.
Even so, I sometimes behave rebelliously toward hidebound attitudes that do more harm than good, especially in my own field.
An old friend of mine who is a doctor in a medium sized city learned that I am working as a sex surrogate. He raised his heavy white eyebrows and spoke coldly. "This new idea is all wrong. Sex is a private matter between a man and a woman. I think you're making a big mistake, Connie, and I wonder what your parents would think if they learned what you're doing."
Another doctor friend put it even more harshly. He is not old but, at least on the surface, a very upright member of society, in spite of his tendency to take mistresses and divorce wives at the drop of a bedsheet. "Connie, I'm amazed at you. You're no different from that little chippie who worked in my office one summer and then found out she could make more money as a whore. You're fucking your way through college no matter what term you use to describe yourself. Sex surrogate, indeed!"
And then there's my love, my own special delight when night falls and I'm home in the apartment with him and we get ready for bed. He doesn't know exactly what kind of work I'm doing because I haven't found the right words or the right time to tell him. Someday soon, I know, I must.
CHAPTER TWO
I didn't apply for the position. Instead, the position applied for me. I was a twenty-eight year old psychology major with forty hours of hard work and a thesis to be written before I could get my degree. In order to support myself after my marriage fell apart, I had taken a job for five hours a day as a typist in a psychological institute. Still too traumatized by the breakup of my marriage to be interested in men, I was spending all my energy on school work and my job that hot day in August when Doctor Patterson sent me a note.
"Ms. Rogers, please see me in my office at four o'clock."
Knowing my work was flawless didn't keep me from suffering through two hours of acute anxiety. I needed that job. Sure, I could easily get another one if Doctor Patterson's memo meant I was getting the ax, but looking for one wasn't something I wanted to do right then. The institute is within walking distance of my apartment. Even though my qualifications could have placed me in a better paying and more satisfying position, I wanted nothing more time consuming than typing. I would be free to finish school, get my degree and start practicing psychology. It didn't matter how often I told myself during those two hours till four o'clock that Doctor Patterson might want to see me for a hundred reasons that had nothing to do with terminating my employment. I still kept fretting. I reverted right back to my childhood when my father often came home with a pink slip in his hand. He was an alcoholic, but a genius and a loving husband and father. He gave me a sense of my own worth, the ability to love, an aversion to alcohol and a dreadful fear of being fired. My mother gave me my tremendous drive to succeed, patience, the ability to be loved and an enduring need to put down roots. On my own, I had learned to hold up my head in the face of adversity, so with a lighthearted smile I walked into the private office of Doctor Dolly Patter son, the head of People, Incorporated.
Doctor Patterson is in her early forties. She's tall, slender and exceptionally attractive. Her dark hair is worn in a classic style with a bun at the nape of the neck and parted down the middle. Intelligent brown eyes look out from behind glasses tinted a pale rose color. In the office Doctor Patterson wears severely tailored business suits, usually of a dark color and set off with a white or pastel blouse. She has a rather studied way of speaking, though her voice is warm and pleasant. Perhaps the slowness of speech is because English was not her first language. However, she has eradicated all trace of her Swedish accent.
"Please sit down," she said as she picked up a pen from the top of her desk.
Still wondering and worrying, I seated myself across from her and crossed my legs.
"I will get right to the point," she said. "You've been employed at the institute for two and a half months. You're a psychology major and have, at this time, about forty hours of study to finish as well as your thesis before you receive your degree. Am I right?"
"That's right." On her desk was my application. She made a small check mark with the pen, then again gave me her direct gaze.
She pushed a button on her desk. A red light was flashing. She spoke for a second or two into the white telephone, then turned back to me. "Forgive me, please. I dislike interruptions. Ms. Rogers, you are aware of the work we're doing at this institute?"
I nodded. "Research into autistic children, human sexual responses and therapy, bio-feedback research and behavior modification. That's all I'm aware of, though the institute might be into other areas."
"Tell me what you think of sexual therapy."
"Well, I think it's a good idea. I don't think it's a panacea, either. In the department where I work, I've learned that every sexual problem isn't solved by therapy, but about six out of ten cases are helped tremendously."
"What is your personal opinion of the men and women who act as sexual surrogates?"
"I have no particular opinion of them. They're doing a job. I couldn't possibly have a personal opinion of the case workers since I've met none of them."
Doctor Patterson smiled. "Exactly the answer I wanted. Ms. Rogers, I am offering you a position as sexual surrogate. Your hours, if you accept the position, will remain the same so your university work will not suffer."
My silence probably spoke more eloquently than words. Her smile grew wider. "You don't have to make up your mind right away. The therapist who is leaving will remain on the job for three weeks. Would you like to know why I decided to offer you this chance to work directly with patients?"
"I certainly would."
Once again those dark eyes appraised me. "You give the appearance of a warm kind person and in your case my colleagues and I believe the appearance is more than skin deep. You have superior intelligence and dedication. You have compulsion to succeed and integrity, which is needed in work of this nature. An added asset is your college major. As you may know, our sexual therapists must all be Psychology or Sociology majors. Further, you're easy to talk to and your appearance is perfect. You are a mixture of a pretty, wholesome girl next door and deep sensuality. In order to be a good sex therapist, one must have sex appeal. In order to succeed, one must not appear a prostitute."
Some time ago, I stopped blushing and denying I have good looks after receiving a direct compliment. Good sense tells me I have an oval face, expressive wide grey eyes and excellent bone structure. My mouth is full, my teeth good and my hair is soft, thick, beige-blonde and long. I am five feet six, wear a perfect size seven dress, and my measurements meet what is generally accepted as ideal. I wear fashionable clothes without going in for the extreme. It was easy enough for me to accept Doctor Patterson's appraisal of my assets, but in all fairness I felt I must tell her about the failure of my marriage.
"I'm afraid I've already marked down one sexual failure. My husband and I were divorced because of his sexual hang-ups. If I couldn't help the man I loved, I'm not sure I can qualify in helping strangers."
"I appreciate your honesty." Her eyes gazed off into space for a while. "If it's any comfort, I'll tell you, you're not alone. My marriage also ended in divorce because of a sexual problem-my own. That was several years ago. Physicians can't always heal themselves, you know. My dysfunction has been resolved, but I didn't do it myself. What was the nature of your former husband's problem?"
"After we were married, he could no longer get an erection."
Her eyebrows arched. "But before you were married he could?"
"Yes."
"Do you think he could now that you're divorced? Have you tried it with him?"
"No. He won't see me. And I still love him."
"Too bad. Divorce might have been the answer. Some men feel too tightly strictured by marriage. Others need the threat of being found out in order to function. Neither situation is ideal, and with proper therapy both can usually be cured. Ahhh, well. Please think about this offer, Ms. Rogers."
"I will." I stood up.
She held up a hand. "There are some negative aspects concerning working as a sexual therapist, and I must be as honest with you as you have been with me."
I sat down again while she told me of the dangers I might face on a person level. "The therapist who is leaving is a classic example of one common trouble. Her husband has issued an ultimatum. Either she must stop working in this field of human relations or he will get a divorce. In the beginning she had his consent. Husbands can sometimes be difficult. Lovers often feel very much the same. One woman had to stop working because her lover complained he felt like a bug on a pin. It upset him to think his lover was analyzing him instead of grooving with it, I believe he put it. Then there is the jealousy factor."
"At this present time I have no husband and no lover."
She nodded. "Exactly. But you are young and beautiful. In time you will feel the need of meaningful emotional relationship. I am a strong advocate in women's liberation, yet I also admit there is a difference between men and woman that I find delightful. I'm sure you do too when you aren't just recovering from a blow to your psyche. There are other things I must tell you. You must not allow your emotions to get the best of you if you do become a sexual surrogate. We allow no outside meetings between patient and therapist. You'll find this difficult at times, because some of the clients can be very persuasive. At the institute, we've found through trial and error that it's far better to maintain the therapist-patient relationship no. matter how much you feel otherwise. That's an important thing to keep in mind while you're deciding. Methods and clinical procedures can be learned quickly."
Doctor Patterson's attitude told me the interview was over. She stood and walked with me to the door of the outer office. "The pay scale is fifty dollars an hour when in session. You'll usually have two sessions per day, and they require about an hour and a half. The rest of your working time will be taken up with paperwork, conferences and pre-therapy counseling. Then the pay scale drops to slightly above your present rate of pay."
The idea of working as a sex therapist was intriguing, but I knew I would need every day of the couple of weeks I had to think over the proposal. Although I'm sexually liberated, I've always found it difficult to become involved with more than one man at a time and I've never been actively promiscuous. I wasn't sure I could keep my cool when dealing with men (and sometimes women) who have deep sexual problems. I've always been inclined to get carried away with anything I'm involved in and I knew myself well enough to know I would become very involved. Still, I had learned enough in my job to realize the value of sex surrogates. In black and white, I had typed up reports that pointed to great success in the field. The position offered me a chance to be active in my chosen field, to say nothing of the enormous increase in salary. So there I was, still stewing and fretting.
My apartment never looked better to me when I arrived home after work. I unplugged the phone, turned out all the lights and double-checked the lock on the door. I couldn't have a decision of such major proportions on my mind for two solid weeks no matter what I had origin ally thought. The question uppermost in my mind was could I, or could I not do it?
That old inability to divide my interests and emotions between two or more men kept recurring in my thoughts. At a very early age I had showed a distinct preference for a trouble free existence. My first boy friend was named Rick. We spent a lot of time kissing and gazing soulfully into each other's eyes when I was fourteen and he was sixteen. Now and then Rick would try to fondle my breasts but I always moved away from him. Then a boy named Walt came waltzing into my life and I started leading a double life. Walt lived on the other side of town and went to a different school from the one Rick and I attended. The city was big enough to allow anyone to do a little cheating without getting caught, I thought. So I started lying to Rick, who was nice and interesting and always there. "I'm going to get my hair set after school so we can't go down to the dairy bar."
"I have to baby sit for my cousin's kids tonight, so we can't go to that movie we'd planned to see."
Walt was nice and interesting and good looking too, but he was also exciting. He was well worth running the risk of losing Rick. He made me laugh and he knew a lot of different kids. What was more, Walt had his own car.
One night while Walt and I were sitting in the car at a drive-in, with me clammed over as close to the driver's seat as I could get without actually sitting in Walt's lap, Rick pulled up right alongside us under the dazzling outdoor lights. He was driving his father's car. "Hi, Connie," he said with a bold, grinning leer. He had another girl with him. That was the end of Rick as far as I was concerned, and a week later I learned that Walt was fooling around with hard drugs and other things I was afraid of.
Nobody learns completely and positively from a negative experience, not even when it happens in person. In my senior year of high school, I was exclusively dating a fellow called Roy and we were "going all the way." Along came Joe and I couldn't see why it would do me any lasting damage if I had sex with him, just a little bit, just once. Then it became "just twice, then I'll stop." After a while it was, "I'll see him just this once more and tell him this is it, baby." I really thought I was in love with Roy. There were many things about Joe I didn't like at all, but he fascinated me. Sex was much better with him, and I was becoming pretty knowledgeable about sex. The more I learned and wanted to experiment, the more Roy wanted to fuck the same old way, him on top and me on the bottom. Joe was willing to try anything.
One day I awakened to the horror of thousands of girls before me. I thought I was pregnant and didn't have the slightest idea whether the baby belonged to Roy or Joe. Three days later I awakened to the beautiful realization that I wasn't pregnant after all, but I told myself I had learned my lesson.
Of course I had not. Until I married Michael, I always seemed to be getting into double trouble, but never once during our two years of living together and year, of marriage was I even tempted to look around, let alone ball around. Even when it became increasingly apparent that Michael wasn't ever going to get it up after our marriage, I didn't look around. He loved me, or at least said he did. He tried to show me how much he loved me by eating me out all the time, which I liked, but not as much as fucking. Then I found out he was sleeping with a girl named Maureen and fucking her up one side and down the other. She told me so herself when she came to see me one day. She asked me why I wouldn't give Michael a divorce when he'd told me he wanted one, that he didn't love me any more, ad nauseam. I picked up the impression that Michael had been giving me one story and Maureen another, so when Michael came home that night I wasn't there. In the note I left him I said I didn't want to see him again, but I did want to keep my apartment. After all, I'd had it before we started sleeping together, before we were married. I said, "Get your ass out by the time I come home at five thirty and take all your filthy, rotten stuff with you. Take it over to Maureen's house, the cunt."
It was not the sensible kind of letter a girl majoring in psychology should have written, I suppose, but even people who have been practicing psychology or psychiatry for years come unglued now and then. The degree and clinical knowledge that enable a person to practice don't necessarily mean everything will run smoothly in the emotional life of the professional. On the contrary, the divorce, emotional breakdown and suicide rates are greater in the above professions. Like any other teachers, those with the degrees most of the time manage to get it all together for others. Writing teachers don't usually get published, art teachers seldom sell their paintings and life teachers, psychologists, often make a mess of their own lives. Which is another way of saying "Those who can, do. Those who can't teach."
I didn't want to go through my entire life getting embroiled in one thing after another. I wanted peace and security even though I didn't know how to get it. Going into the field of sex therapy didn't seem to be a road leading to peace and security.
I wanted to do it. It was a challenge as well as a promise. I've never been able to turn away from the excitement of challenge and the promise had to do with actually working in my chosen field before I was even finished with my education. The idea for my thesis still hung over my head like a threatening knife. Verbalizing is easy for me, but I've never been able to sit down and write. Maybe if I accepted the position I could use case histories to fill in the gaps, when writing my thesis, which I needed to get my degree.
Getting my head together wasn't easy. Thoughts ricocheted around and bounced off the ceilings and walls of my apartment. I wanted to, but-I shouldn't do it because-on the other hand-but even so
"Besides," I told myself when I had nearly decided to say I'd do it, "at twenty-eight, I'm certainly not over the hill. Before long, I would start seeing another man. I like men and I like sex, and I see no reason to deprive myself of either."
There I came up against a blank wall. The two dinner dates I'd had since Michael and I broke up ended in big yawns but sooner or later I would start something with someone. Not only that, I had my past history to consider. Eventually, I would establish a semi-permanent relationship because my particular needs include a man of my own. I didn't want another marriage, at least not in the immediate future, but I missed having a man I could depend on to be there to sleep with, go out with, eat with, talk and laugh with. Since I knew I wouldn't be content at home until I had that relationship, I wondered how he and I would handle the idea of my working as a sex surrogate. Unwisely, I told myself I would cross that bridge when I came to it. Right then I made up my mind to take the offer, but waited four days before I accepted formally, probably to give myself time to change my mind.
At the present time, I have been a sex therapist/sexual surrogate for one year and one month.
Due to the nature of my work, I have changed the names of everyone, including my own. I have also changed the location as well as the actual name of the institute. We promise our clients privacy and security, which means protection from exploitation at the time of therapy as well as in the future. When I was approached by the publishers to write this book with Ms. DuBreuil, I said I'd consider it although at the time, it seemed almost impossible. Again, I had two weeks to make up my mind. I talked over the idea with Doctors Patterson and Regelle, who gave me their permission and strong approval. "Look at it this way, Connie," said Doctor Patterson. "You have a good chance to negate the bad publicity sex therapy has received in the media. Too many scandal sheets have treated the idea as a form of sexual exploitation. Some have played it up as a kind of pseudo-science in the same category as fortune telling or astrology. Others have deliberately given it the appearance of glorified prostitution. I've read a few books on the market that certainly don't do much for sexual therapy even though they were supposedly written with the intention of getting the need for our work across to the public. I think you're quite capable of working on this project with a professional writer, and I'd like to see you do it." So I did it.
CHAPTER THREE
Not all my patients have been interesting enough to write about. Some were not included because of the complex nature of their particular sexual dysfunctions. Their reaction to their problems and my method of treatment and therapy would require volumes. In these pages I have selected a cross-section of my patients that will show a reasonably complete picture of cause, effect, procedure and cure-or failure, as the case may be. I have tried to give the reader an understanding of what goes on in the heads of sexual surrogates.
Before any therapist meets a subject, a certain procedure is supposed to be followed. Usually patients are referred to the institute by a general practitioner, psychologist or psychiatrist. Therefore, a consultation about the patient is in order, in which Doctors Patterson or Regelle suggest possible methods with the therapist. This isn't always the case, however. My very first patient walked in off the street. Later I learned it was not the first time James D. had entered the building, but it was the first time he had managed to force himself all the way down the corridor to register with the receptionist. Six months earlier he had paced back and forth in front of the building while he attempted to muster enough courage to enter and ask for help. About once a week later he repeated his footsteps, and once had gone so far as to enter the building. Then he'd fled, terrified of even talking about his problem.
Other patients come without referrals due to publicity. For a while a blurb appeared on several television stations that announced to the viewers that help was available for people with sexual problems. Then there were write-ups in national magazines and an occasional program on television with Doctor Patterson or Doctor Regelle.
James D. was in another room where a receptionist was taking down his statistical information. During my pre-therapy interview with Doctor Regelle, I moni tored his reaction to being asked such things as his age, date of birth and place of employment. He looked as if he wanted to fly right out and never return. We could observe him through the window. On our side it was glass that afforded a view of the small reception room and on the other side a mirror.
Doctors Regelle and Patterson are direct opposites. Regelle is blunt, sometimes discourteous, and addicted to fourletter words. For .fifteen minutes he had been reassuring me I would handle James D. capably and relating the best way to get to the bottom of the problem. "Fuck it, Connie, I don't know what to tell you. For your first session I would have preferred something less unusual, easier to cope with. Trouble is, there's nobody else available to handle this poor bastard. Loretta had to go to Colorado for her father's funeral and Marcia's home with a cold. That leaves Babette, who already has three sessions booked. Look at him! He's so nervous I'd bet ten dollars he'll leave a wet spot on the fucking chair. If anybody needs help, he does, and I guess you're it." I already knew that Doctor Patterson was doing a television talk show.
Again I glanced at the patient. He was tall, slender, around thirty years old. He was quite handsome but on his face was a tragic look of pain mingled with fear. He kept twiddling with things in his pockets, his reading glasses, his shoe laces. All the time he was talking to Leslie, the receptionist, he kept jiggling his left foot. "I'll try my best," I said, conscious of doubt in my voice. "You're not the only one who wishes my first patient had something more ordinary wrong with him." I gulped. To my knowledge, I had never met a pyromaniac before. Now I was not only about to meet one, but would eventually have sex with him. James D. could not participate in sex, could not get an erection unless a fire raged in the vicinity. To make matters more complicated, he was aware of his perverse behavior. I say "complicated" instead of "worse" because at least there was some hope. He had finally managed to come and ask for help. Most pyromaniacs convince themselves their behavior is perfectly normal. James D. did it out of his sick need. While he was setting the fires, all during the time he was working himself up to a frenzy of excitement, part of his mind stood off at a distance and watched in grief and shame. An emotional illness is hard to take if the subject is aware of it, and many disturbed people are very aware. To know your disturbance takes the form of pyromania, and to be unable to control it even though you know it, would create all kinds of disorders.
"Leslie just signaled that she's finished interviewing the patient," Doctor Regelle said quickly. "If you don't get over there and take care of him, he's likely to fly the coop. I'm sorry I couldn't go the usual route and give him some in-depth therapy before you take over, Connie, but he refuses to talk to a man. The situation is critical. I guess you'll just have to wing it."
"Wing it? You mean-?" I stood up, put on what I hoped was a confident face and smiled at Doctor Regelle.
"Ad lib a lot. I was in show business for a while-went through medical school doing gigs. We had to 'wing it' lots of times when the stage was too small for our act or one of the members of the company took off with a broad between sets. That's what you'll have to do, Connie. Play it by ear. Good luck, honey."
The patient was visibly shaken. His hands trembled when he lit a cigarette and his mouth twitched uncontrollably. Pretending I didn't notice his stress, I introduced myself and asked James D. to come down the hall to my office. His footsteps dragged against the tiled floor and his breathing was fast and harsh. I didn't need a blood pressure reading to know the patient was about to bounce off the wall with hypertension, but I went through the motions anyway, feeling the ordinary signs of a doctor-patient relationship would calm him somewhat. His blood pressure was alarmingly high.
"Are you taking any medication, Mr. D.?"
He had to swallow three times before he could answer. When he did, his voice was a high squeak. "No, I'm not, Doctor."
"Then I think perhaps a mild tranquilizer might be in order." I was amazed at the aplomb with which I was handling the situation. I am not a doctor, but right then I sensed that I must be a doctor first, then a friend and confidante, and when it came to it, if ever, I would play the role of sex therapist. Further, I was rapidly assessing the whole patient while we talked. It didn't take a medical doctor to realize he needed rest, plenty of sleep and a well-balanced diet. He was painfully thin, a condition I hadn't noticed when he was in the reception room. Up close he looked emaciated. After I had asked for and received a tranquilizer, I spoke crisply. "Would you consider hospitalization for a few days, Mr. D.?"
He appeared to jiggle around inside his skin. "I'm not physically sick. There's nothing wrong with my body. It's my head that's sick."
"I agree, but until you've had a little rest, it's doubtful if therapy will do much good. Still, I can understand the vicious circle you're in. You can't sleep properly because you keep mulling over your emotional problem all night long. You aren't hungry so you don't eat properly. You're obsessed with your urge to set fire to a building so you can enjoy a sexual experience, but you know you can't keep doing that. I don't want to give you the impression that I'm putting you off by asking you to check into the clinic for physiological treatment. That won't help you unless you feel confident that you've taken a positive step toward getting out of the pattern you've created. I want you to think about entering the clinic for a rest while we talk about your problem. Just consider the idea, that's all I ask."
"But I thought you'd be different. I might be all wrong, but I thought you'd-" He glanced away from me, reached for another cigarette and crossed his legs. His foot began to jerk up and down in agitation. "See, it was my impression that a sex therapist would be able to get to the basic problem and do something about it right away. I've read a couple of books that tell about how it's done. The girl takes the man into a bedroom and undresses, then she helps him solve his, not that I ever read about anybody with a sickness like mine," he added.
"A sex therapist doesn't press a magic button. I can't seduce you into having normal intercourse in one easy lesson. I've read the popular books about sex therapy, and believe me, the writers aren't all that enlightened. A woman is shown leading the patient into a bedroom for sex three minutes after the patient meets her. Take my word for it, that's not the way it happens. In time I hope to help you function sexually without having to set a fire first. But please remember all the years you've run your mind over your own sexual response. One session in bed with a woman isn't going to eradicate all those years. There'd be no need for clinically controlled sexual institutes like ours if that were the case." I spoke gently, and kept watching James D. The tranquilizer was beginning to take effect. He was losing some of his tension. A ray of sunshine beamed in on me. His next words showed me he obviously had a sense of humor.
He said, "I should have known just plain old fucking wouldn't do it." Then he frowned. "Christ, I've already tried prostitutes. Nothing happened."
"Can you remember when you first became aware of your need to set fires?"
"No." I sensed he was lying, but let it pass.
Then can you remember when you first became sexually aware?" Most children become sexually aware at two or three years of age, but few people remember those early sensations.
"I was in the second grade and my folks left town for a few days. They hired a young girl to baby sit me and she had her boy friend over to the house. During the night I woke up for some reason and went downstairs to the living room. They were on the sofa fuck-" he cut himself off, then changed to, "having sexual intercourse."
"You don't have to watch what you say here," I reassured him. "Any word you choose that describes what you want to say is all right with me. 'Fucking' is fine."
"Okay, they were fucking, then. It scared me."
"Why did it frighten you? Can you remember?"
"Not exactly. It was just that I knew they were doing something bad. I think maybe something in the way the thing looked gave me the impression she was getting hurt or something like that. I went back to bed and never told her about catching her out."
"Do you recall your own first real sexual experience? Either masturbation or mutual masturbation with other boys or with a girl?"
"I know people are supposed to be open and honest these days," he said in a choked voice, "but I'm not sure I'm ready to talk about beating my meat yet." He was flushing.
After considerable therapeutic reinforcement, I was able to get James D. to jump that hurdle. He told me about a common form of childhood fantasizing in which he made love to his mother. "She was a beautiful woman and still is. I knew I shouldn't want to do the things to her that I thought about and figured my dad did, but I couldn't help it. I used to go into their bedroom when I knew it was safe and put my head on the side of the bed where she slept. I'd rub myself against the bed while I breathed the fragrance of her perfume. Christ, it was a wonderful experience! But as much as I liked it, I was always edgy about it. Afraid she'd come in and catch me and know what I was doing, or afraid somebody else would walk in on me. It got to be a regular ritual. As soon as I'd hear my dad go downstairs in the morning I'd lie there and think of Mother and get all excited. Dad used to make the coffee and go out to feed the dog while the coffee perked. I'd smell that coffee and listen to Mother getting out of bed and going to the bathroom. Then I'd hear her going downstairs to make Dad's breakfast and my heart would thump something fierce.
"Every day I'd lie in bed and tell myself I had to stop doing that, but all the time I was thinking I had to stop, I knew I'd get out of bed and sneak down the hall to their room. I'd have a hard on by the time I got there. It would get harder and harder all the time I was sniffing her side of the sheets. I'd rub my cock against the sheet, along the side of the mattress, where it felt so good. Oh, God, it felt good."
"Did you ejaculate?"
"No, not ever on her bed. Matter of fact, I didn't ejaculate for a long time. I just got a hard-on and it felt good all over my body when I'd rub against the bed. It wasn't until I was twelve or so that I knew something great was about to happen. Maybe it was instinct that kept me from shooting off onto the sheets. Then too, I might not have been ready, but I think I probably knew about coming. I'd seen dogs mating, and other boys talked dirty when we were on the school bus. I'm pretty sure I picked up some of that talk, but I never took part in it. In school, at least by the time I started going to high school, a lot of my classmates thought I was queer. Gay, I guess you'd call it. It made me sick knowing they thought I'd suck another boy's cock. I never did want to do anything like that, but I wouldn't argue or fight about it, either. I just held everything inside and thought about what I'd like to do and say and wished I had the courage to lash out."
Pleased with the progress, I asked him if he'd lived on a farm.
"Not exactly. We lived out in the country, but my dad didn't like to raise crops so he rented the land to a farmer. He was an insurance adjuster."
During the next session the patient was able to relate even more freely and I began to have a glimmer of hope. He finally accepted the idea of going into the clinic for a few days to allow his body some time off from the constant tension and fatigue caused by his mental anguish.
Meanwhile I began seeing other patients and adjusted myself to a new way of life as a sex therapist. The study hours I spent with Doctors Patterson and Regelle were invaluable in dealing with the sexual problems of my patients. I had to learn how to relate to them and I knew that although many sexual hang-ups are similar in nature, each patient is emotionally unique. There are no patent answers, no standard therapy. The causative factors behind symptomatic dysfunction are personal to each case. For several weeks I continued to feel inept, and more than once wondered out loud to my superiors if I might be doing the people who came to the institute more harm than good. It was Doctor Patterson who convinced me I was hurting anybody and the chances of helping were great.
"Remember, Connie, sex therapy is a new field of human behavior. Sex has been in the closet too long and research into human sexuality is barely recognized as science. When Freud first started delving into the mind, he had to grope and hope, but he opened up a new field of medicine. At one time psychoanalysis wasn't considered a true science and that wasn't very long ago. There are still a lot of people who feel that psychology and psychiatry are useless, or ciminal, or not far removed from witchcraft. Sex therapy is just another branch of psychiatry, but since so many human beings are confused and apprehensive because of sexually oriented traumas, you must acknowledge that it's desperately needed. We're doing the same thing Freud did when he theorized that the mind needs help when people go haywire. We're trying to help these sick people and our rate of success should reassure you that our bumbling, trial and error procedures are working." My doubts slowly dissolved as I saw positive results from patient to patient. James D. remained unchanged for many weeks. For a long time I was unable to get him to talk after that second session when he opened up so beautifully and related a picture of a young, sensitive boy who suffered far more than most through the throes of adolescence. His preoccupation with sexual thoughts of his mother troubled him deeply at thirteen.
"I began to live in turmoil almost all the time. I was getting tall, my voice was changing, and I was still obsessed with the idea of having sex with my mother. Sometimes I was paralyzed with fear of my father finding out. I knew he couldn't read thoughts, but I kept fearing he'd manage to do it somehow. I still couldn't stop going to their bedroom and pretending my mother was lying there with her arms outstretched, wanting to receive me as much as I wanted to take her. I started chances because I had discovered the delicious feeling that stole over me when I pressed my hard cock against the bed was increased if I could manage to get there while the sheets were still warm.
"By then I was beating my meat every chance I had, but never in their bedroom. That was the one thing I wouldn't allow myself to do no matter how much I wanted to. It was a sickness and I knew it, but I couldn't help it. When I shot off that first time the pain was so intense I thought I would die. It only lasted for a fraction of a second, but it was enough to cause me to vow I wouldn't ever do it again. I was convinced that I had ruined myself for life and I was equally convinced that God was punishing me for having wicked thoughts."
He gave a halfhearted smile and looked away from me, something he often did during those first sessions. "Of course I was hooked on masturbation. Sometimes I'd make myself go as long as a month without it, then something would trigger that lust and I would have to go to their bedroom and get ready for the sinful thing I was about to do. I knew I shouldn't, but I couldn't help it."
There were times when he tried to conjure a vision of someone other than his mother in his sexual fantasies because he felt it wouldn't be quite so sinful if he imagined another sex partner. "But it didn't work. I'd get myself all set. I'd go down to the barn where the sweet smell of hay filled the air. It was dark there, too, and I felt secret and safe. I'd think of a girl at school, a pretty one named Darlene who smiled at me often and spoke to me sometimes. The minute I'd get my hand on my cock, the image of Darlene would fade and my mother's face and body take her place. Every time I came, I was coming inside my mother. At least that was the way it seemed to me. I suffered and lost weight and lived in fear of someone finding out how horrible I was."
Three subsequent sessions resulted in nothing but silence on James D.'s part, but each time he left he promised to come back. "Maybe next time I'll be able to remember more."
I knew his reticence had nothing to do with his memory. He found it to upsetting to relate what he considered wicked, sinful behavior, in spite of my attempts to reassure him his behavior was neither wicked nor sinful.
I knew I was making progress again when he started talking once more. He told me about being alone in the house. His mother had gone out with his father for the afternoon and he was free from the pressure. He went upstairs and turned down the sheets of his parents' bed. Then he undressed and lay prone on both pillows, which he fantasized were his mother. "I fucked those pillows until I came all over the place. Had to jump up and go down to the basement and run them through the washer and dryer. I felt better until about eleven o'clock. Then I had another hard-on, but didn't want to go through washing and drying the pillow cases, ironing them and putting them back on the bed.
"So I went down to the rumpus room in the basement, took down my pants and sat sideways in a big old-fashioned upholstered chair. I was going to do something I had often visualized but never tried. Sitting sideways, I got my legs elevated high enough on one arm of the chair and my head and shoulders on the other arm so I could suck my own cock. It took some pretty fancy maneuvering, but I got the job done. Of course my cock was as hard as a rock because I'd been thinking about doing this for a long time. You've got to realize I was half crazy because only a crazy boy would do such a thing."
"Oh, I don't know about that. My husband told me about one of his high school friends who did just what you're describing." What I was saying was true, and I was getting the picture. James was sure he had been insane as a teen-ager. Something had happened somewhere along the line to transfer his insanity in his own mind to the need to set fires before he could get it on. I was still wondering what had triggered his pyromania, but had a feeling I was getting close. I smiled and continued the story my husband had told me about the boy who sucked his own cock. "He was a bit of a contortionist and had a big penis to boot.
He'd make a bet with another boy that he could do it and then, of course, he'd collect the money every time."
"What happened to him? Do you suppose he grew up to amount to anything?" There was intensity in James' eyes when he asked the question.
"Oh, sure, he grew up to amount to something. He's a successful salesman with a big furniture company, tops in his field. If you're asking about his sexual ability, I can't say for sure because I've never slept with him. I do know he appears happily married and has three children. Incidentally, his wife looks as though she enjoys life too." I leaned over and spoke very softly. "What I'm saying, James, is that early sexual experiments are completely normal, even desirable and certainly no sign of early insanity."
"But it's not normal to do what I do now! Listen, Connie, I'll tell you something I haven't mentioned before. I want to get married. This girl-well, she's about the sweetest, most wonderful girl in the world, and she's beautiful, too. We've gone out a few times. I've taken her to dinner and the movies and once to a play. She reached for my hand and I kissed her good night after our last date. She comes from a good family and goes to church, something I haven't done since I was a kid. Don't you see how impossible it is for me even to think about getting married when-" he crossed his legs and started that manic foot jiggling again.
"When did you stop going to church?"
"I told you, when I was a kid."
"How old?"
"I was a junior in high school. I just couldn't face the priest any more when I went to confession. He kept saying it was a venial sin the first time I did it, but if I continued to do such a thing after confession and penance, it would be considered a mortal sin to masturbate. Even though I knew I wasn't supposed to hold anything back, I could never tell him what my thoughts were When I was doing it. So I couldn't go any more. My father was on my side, but my mother was very upset. She'd still like to see me go back to church."
"Maybe you will some day," I said. We were getting off the subject and I had a feeling James had manipulated the session and managed to bypass what was on his mind. I decided it was time to hit him over the head for a change, instead of remaining placid. "So you sucked your cock for a while. How long?"
"Until I found out I-oh, God! Do I have to go on?"
"Yes, you have to go on. Right now you're in the position of a person who has gone to a doctor for symptoms of pneumonia. He's given you a shot and a prescription. You've paid for the prescription but you won't take the pills."
He was silent for a while. "All right, but I have to go back to that first time I sucked myself off. It sounds awful."
"Not as awful as a case history I read the other night. The patient was a woman who couldn't bear sex unless she was laid out in a basket. Think how her husband must have felt after they were married and she sprang that little fetish on him-husband number three, I might add. The first two couldn't take it and divorced her. Number three loved her enough to get her some help. Now they make love in bed like other people."
James looked shocked for a second, but he shook his head. "She didn't run the risk of hurting someone, or killing someone. Do you realize how I feel when I try to sleep at night, when I think of how close I came to burning up a half a dozen innocent people the last fire I set?"
At last he had managed to get the words out in the open, to verbalize them instead of beating about the bush the way he had on his initial interview with Doctor Regelle. I swooped down on im. "Go back to the time in that chair, James, sitting sideways and sucking your cock."
"Well, I just did it. That's all."
"Nothing happened?"
"Nothing except the fantastic feeling I got from it. The first time I gagged a little on the gush, but later I got so I liked it."
I hoped my disappointment didn't show. It was my hope that there was a connection between James' self-gratification through oral sex and his inability to get it up unless he was in the midst of the excitement caused by a fire. Time was up and all I could do was hope for continued success in the sessions. I was not disappointed. It all came spilling out three days later.
"Her name was Cheryl and she had a bad reputation around school, but I didn't care about that. I wanted to fuck a real girl, didn't want to have to argue and fight for sex. So I asked her to go out with me and she said sure. We went to a movie and I got turned on when she felt me up in the theater. At last I knew I was going to get laid and I wasn't hung up with pictures of my mother running through my head, either. God, I was excited. We went to her house and she was all for it. I took off my clothes and she paraded around in front of me naked and I felt grown up. A real man, for the first time in my life, and there I was, going to graduate from high school in another month.
"I remember how she smelled. Sexy as hell. She used some perfume that still affects me when I smell it on a girl, even after all these years. Her skin was smooth and her breasts were soft and young. I thought she was a bad girl and even now, after all I've read and the way attitudes have changed, I still think of Cheryl as a bad girl. I wouldn't want to marry a girl who bangs just anybody.
"She smoked cigarettes, too. I remember looking at her with disapproval when she lit up, and she laughed at me. The cigarette was in the ashtray last thing I remember, burning away. I got on top of her and shoved it to her. It was so good, so much better than jerking off or sucking myself off."
James began pacing the floor. His face was white, and the veins in his neck were throbbing. Behind the zipper on his pants a slight bulge was forming, indicating he was aroused at the memory of his first real lay. As if he read my thoughs, he covered himself quickly and slumped down in the chair, where he spoke in a mumble. I was afraid to ask him to speak louder, so the tape recorder failed to pick up every word, but the reason for James' problem came through loud and clear.
While they humped, the ashtray some how fell on the bed. Just when he was about to reach orgasm, the nylon bedspread burst into flames. James kept right on humping, oblivious at first, then determined to shoot off inside a real pussy even if he burned up. He made it, then he and the girl extinguished the fire. They kept their cool and smothered the flames, and neither one was hurt. Ever since then, James has been unable to get an erection. His first realization that a fire could work magic came as a happy surprise. A girl he dated in the first year of college lit up a joint. After she'd toked a few times, somebody knocked on the door and the girl hastily snuffed out the grass. Some cellophane was in the ashtray and it caught fire. James was elated as he poured a glass of Coke on the flames. He had an erection.
Later, he remembered the iron his mother had left on in the basement of his house. During his first attempt at oral self-gratification he'd smelled scorching fabric. After he got out of the chair in the rumpus room, he turned the iron off. So James had a double-barreled cause and effect but he'd buried the memory of that hot iron and resultant smell of burning cloth under layers of consciousness-not deliberately, of course. The memory of the first girl he ever balled was far more important.
Now that I knew what set my patient off, I hoped I could get him to enjoy sex without the excitement and the crackle of burning. James was now ready for his first session in the bedroom of the clinic.
CHAPTER FOUR
By the time James had progressed to the point of entering the carefully staged bedroom that led from my office where we had spent so many hours in verbal therapy, I was playing the role of sexual partner in the same way I would accomplish any other work. James was scheduled for three sessions a week. To date I had worked with a man named Fred who was impotent, one named Lawrence who wasn't sure whether he wanted to be a man or a woman, and another one, Tim, who was asexual. Then there were couples, for whom I shared the session with Gerald.
Gerald is a dedicated and competent therapist who helped me over many hurtles in the beginning. Tall, slender, blond and considerate, Gerald went into sex therapy for the same reason I did-to help pay his way through the university. A psychiatrist must first be a medical doctor. Before Gerald entered the field of sex therapy, he had planned to open his office and practice medicine as soon as he received his degree, thereby saving enough money to accomplish the next phase of his education. By working at People, Incorporated, Gerald could continue going to school and save himself long years of medical practice before he could resume his studies. He encouraged me tremendously when I grew jittery at the idea of taking Fred to bed, which happened in Fred's second session. "Just remember to keep your cool, Connie. Don't get involved with the patient on an emotional level."
"That's just the trouble," I answered. "I still can't see how I can make love to a man without getting involved."
"Think of something else, but pretend to be giving yourself heart and soul to this dude."
I smiled. "What do you fill your mind with when you're fucking some mixed-up, frightened female client, Gerald?"
"Easy, Connie. I split myself in two. One part operates physically. My body does all the things I've been trained to do and I say all the right words of encouragement. The other part fantasizes. You have to learn to fantasize, that's all."
I had doubts about the desirability of deliberately creating a schism inside myself on the grounds that such game-playing might lead to true schizophrenia, but I didn't say anything. Gerald must have guessed my thoughts.
"Don't worry, Connie. Just get in there and do what comes naturally. Hell, most people can function on one level and think about something else, and you're no exception. You told me you had a laundry job when you were in high school. You studied Latin while you folded clothing and ironed shirts. Menial tasks don't require much brain work, so in order to survive most of us think about something else."
"Yes, but when I'm fucking, I always think about fucking."
"So think about fucking," said Gerald. "Just don't dwell on the person who happens to be your partner. Christ, a woman has it made! A man has to have an erection before he can fuck, so count your blessings. You know, of course, you can't just lie there and let the patient do all the work, but at least you don't have to maintain an erection for somebody you wouldn't be attracted to under normal circumstances."
Gerald had just finished a session with a woman I'll call Gilda. In her fiftieth year, Gilda's husband was killed in an accident. They'd been happily married for more than thirty years, and Gilda was devastated by loss. As it happened, I interviewed Gilda when she came in for her first talk session. She came unwillingly, which is always a touchy situation for the patient as well as the therapist.
Gilda's twenty-five year old daughter made the initial appointment. Doctor Patterson saw the patient several weeks before turning her over to me for a few sessions, and Gilda's prognosis wasn't favorable.
"Frankly, Connie, I'm not optimistic about this case. The woman has severe mental aberrations. Her daughter believes sex therapy will help but I haven't much hope. She's become too hostile toward me for therapy to help her. To help Gilda overcome her particular psychosis would require several years of analysis, I'm afraid, and she'll never continue. I suggest you try convincing her to accept Gerald as a sexual surrogate."
Looking back after many months of working at the institute, I often smile at my early feelings about dealing with more unusual cases. I take everyone in stride now, but even so I feel Gilda's case was astonishingly unique. I listened to her speak about her love life.
"Now, I know my daughter Althea has told you I'm crazy, but I know I'm not. Althea never did approve when her father and I became interested in the spirit world. She's always been a scientifically inclined girl, not a bit like her brother Charles, who's very sensitive, and I never could understand why it turned out this way."
"What way, Mrs. L.?"
"Oh, call me Gilda. I never did like to be called Mrs. Not that I wasn't crazy about my husband, for anybody will tell you I just adored that man. I neyer was unfaithful to him either, not for all the thirty-three years we were married. Getting back to my son and daughter, what I mean is, I never did see quite where we went wrong with our kids. Althea turned into a marine biologist, messing around with creatures from the sea and cutting them open and all that stuff, while Charles is a beautician. Not that he's queer or anything, mind you. He's all man, Charles is, and Althea is all female, too. She's having an affair now and if you ask me, she ought to be ashamed. She wants me to let her live her life and mine too. That's why I'm here, because Althea's afraid I'm going to do something foolish and use up all the money my husband left me. Now, if Charles lived here instead of Althea, he'd understand what I'm doing."
Earlier I had talked with the daughter, who appeared to me a bright, sensible girl.
"Mother and Dad became interested in the occult several years ago. I think it was Mother who led Dad to it. He was crazy about her and always went along with everything, but privately Dad told me he felt there was a lot more fraud involved in seances than actual contact with the dead. My mother had been very close to her own mother and when she wanted to investigate spiritualism after Grandma died, Dad went along with her. I think he might have decided there was a little something to it, and I never thought it was harmful if it gave them pleasure. Anyway, after Dad died, Mother went into a state of shock for over a year. She barely ate, couldn't sleep, she was going downhill rapidly. I went to see her every evening, and I was greatly relieved when she began to come out of it because I had been afraid she'd grieve to death. Then I had something new to worry about when I found out why she'd suddenly taken a turn for the better. She told me Daddy wasn't dead. Well, that threw me for a loop, then she explained he'd simply passed over to the spirit side of life, but she was in communication with him. Although I didn't agree, I was relieved. I felt Mother was allowing her wishes to take over her common sense.
"For about a month, Mother was happy as a clam. Then she began to look radiant. I suspected she might have taken a lover and felt it was great. Mother and Dad enjoyed a beautiful sex life. When Charles and I were kids we knew all about it, and even thought it was a little embarrassing at first, we grew up with a fine appreciation for sex. They loved one another deeply but since Dad was dead, and knowing my mother is a highly sensual woman, I was relieved when she told me she'd been seeing a nice man. I kind of hoped they'd get married. Mother is too old-fashioned to settle for an affair.
"Okay, then I met this man. He was about my age, and a real bastard. A creepy little guy with a sunken chest and big soulful eyes and this proprietary manner toward my mother. She looked at him in abject adoration. When the fink left her apartment, I asked what she could possibly see in that character. Mother informed me that the greasy little man was nothing but a vessel for my dead father to use when he wanted to be 'close' to her. Translated, that means this man was balling her but it was really Daddy's soul inside his body. That Daddy was possessing the man during sex. Mother uses euphemisms for sex, but I understood what she was saying."
I nodded. "You objected, of course."
"Well, naturally, but I didn't let Mother know. I'm afraid I figured if I just didn't notice, it'd go away."
Then Althea told me about a succession of lovers following the first one. Her mother had a sharp argument for each new lover. It was her belief that a departed soul could only possess a living body for a short time, then the spirit had to look elsewhere. Gilda insisted to her daughter that she received impressions from her dead husband that guided her to a place where she would find a suitable sexual stand-in.
"I take it your parents continued to have a satisfactory sex life until your father was killed?"
"Oh, yes. Mother told me they were 'close' just the night before the accident. I doubt if their sex life slowed down after Charles and I grew up and left home. Back then it was at least every night and sometimes more. That's why I can understand her need for sex. She's still a good looking woman and she felt cut off in the prime of her life. Her children were no longer hanging around and she was beyond the age of worrying about getting pregnant. They had a bookshelf crammed full of books about improving sexual relations that they didn't think my brother and I knew anything about. I'd say my parents were exceptionally well matched. I can't just let my mother continue going out on the street and picking up these leeches. She's convinced that my father temporarily inhabits the bodies of the creeps she finds, and the creeps are certainly taking advantage of her delusion."
During my interview with Althea, I agreed with her. The mother's first session with me was startling. "Now, I know I'm not crazy and I don't care what Althea says. I balance my checkbook, pay my bills and keep my house. I drive a car and do my own shopping, entertain my bridge club and take an active part in organizations. That girl is making a mountain out of a molehill. I've got a right to a private life as much as she has, and as long as it's her own father I'm with, I can't see where it's hurting anybody. At least I'm married to him. I tried to explain it to that lady doctor-Patterson. She's got her mind made up the dead can't come back and there's no dealing with a closed mind."
I pointed out the hazards involved in picking up men on the street or bars where Gilda found what she called "a vehicle for Tom to use." She always ordered plain tomato juice, "because I'm against alcohol and always have been."
"But don't you see, Gilda, your daughter has a point. Some men are unscrupulous. There's a danger of getting harmed, to say nothing of contracting venereal disease."
The patient raised her chin and gave me a haughty glare. "Why, you're just as foolish as my daughter. Do you think my own husband would lead me to a man who wasn't on the up-and-up?"
"Two hundred dollars for an evening's entertainment seems to me a bit much, Gilda," I said gently, but she shot her strange rationale right back at me.
"Not when I get a chance to communicate with my husband. We do other things besides-you know. Get close to each other and cuddle up. Now you just tell that girl I'm sane and let me get back to living my life as I see fit."
I finally managed to talk her into meeting Gerald, whom I described as a fine young man who was probably not open to the idea of allowing her dead husband to possess his body. Grinning with the cunning such disturbed patients often present, Gilda said she'd meet him, "but don't be surprised if my husband takes the opportunity to seize his body and come to me!"
It was Gerald's task to persuade his patient that sex could be enjoyed with the living. Gilda's need to deceive herself by refusing normal sex was induced by her background. She understood the yearnings of her body but was incapable of accepting the idea of having sex with someone who was not her husband. According to her thinking, marriage was forever. Not only until death did them part, but on into eternity. To Gilda's confused mind, having sex with her dead husband was perfectly proper.
Gerald was able to convince Gilda that he had no intention of parting with his body to allow her husband to take over and make love to her. He'd played the case by ear and the patient progressed through a period of remorse because she'd enjoyed sex with Gerald, into a deep attachment for her surrogate. At the same time he gave strength to the daughter's fears that her mother was leaving herself wide open for a financial rip-off. Gilda offered him a fantastic salary if he'd leave his job at People, Incorporated and come to live with her. She generously said she'd let him continue going to the university, too.
"So now I'm about to introduce Gilda to Jack," he told me with a grin. "Once the old darling is convinced she's allowed to like sex for the sake of sex, she'll probably be all right. What she needs is a stud." He looked toward the reception room and broke into a whimsical smile. "Speaking of studs, your patient just arrived. Fred looks like a super-stud. Now, if you can just get him over his impotence, maybe we can get Gilda and Fred together. He's the right age for her and if a fifty-five year old woman with a maternal figure turns him on, she'll help him make up for all the sex he's missed."
Although making an introduction was pleasant to talk about, we don't act as a dating service at the institute. With a sigh, I left Gerald's interesting conversation for my patient.
Fred had the expression of a man headed for the gallows. Taller than average and nice looking if he'd get over his self-pity, he walked with a shuffle and looked at me out of soulful brown eyes that spoke eloquently of his low selfesteem. "Poor Fred," he kept saying in one way or another.
Fred's history was classic. The youngest of four sons, his mother wanted a girl. His childhood memories involve helping his mother with housework and never allowing himself to get dirty, get in fights with other boys or do anything else that might upset her. She went around telling her friends how much she'd wanted Fred to be a girl. Now and then she would ask him if he had money in his pocketbook. His father spent most of his time making fun of sissy Fred. All of this didn't exactly have a good effect on Fred's marriage. Fred chose a dominating woman for his bride who had many of the physical characteristics of his mother. The union produced a son in the second year. Incredible as it seems in this knowledgeable era, Fred's wife refused sex after the child was born. She said she'd never liked it in the first place, Fred wasn't any good in bed, and besides, she didn't want any more children. During our first session, I asked Fred why he had put up with no sex for twenty years.
"Because I was married to her and my church doesn't accept divorce."
"Did you ever ask her how she knew you weren't any good in bed?"
"I wanted to, but I was afraid she'd get mad. I just wanted to get along."
"And it was your idea that there should be no more children?"
"No. I wanted another child, but my wife didn't, so we didn't have any. I could easily support a big family." Fred is very successful in his business of tool and die making, a company he began before his marriage.
When Fred's son graduated from high school, his wife left him. He came home from work one afternoon and found the house emptied of furnishings and a note saying she'd gone to Reno. Fred went to his religious counselor, who surprised him by saying, "Good riddance." The old-school pastor who had been Fred's comfort over the years was transferred and the new one had some ideas which were considered radical by the congregation. He was a young man, vital, and as Fred described him, he sounded very humane. His advice to Fred was to stop allowing life to beat him down and start enjoying it. Such notions were hard for Fred to accept, but since a person in authority had voiced them, he consented to try. For a while, Fred dated a nice widow on Saturday nights. They Went to dinner and the movies, then Fred took her home and kissed her on the cheek, told her he'd enjoyed her company, then left to go to his almost empty house. So far, he had furnished the kitchen with a stove and refrigerator and the bedroom with a bed and chest of drawers. It was my belief that Fred felt he deserved to suffer. He took perverse pleasure out of wearing his hair shirt.
One afternoon his secretary blatantly put the make on Fred. He kept pinching himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming. The adorable creature he had admired from afar was actually sitting on his lap and showering him with kisses. When she put her hand on his cock, it rose to the occasion. When she unzipped his pants and touched his penis, he almost went into convulsions. Now and then he said, "Are you sure you know what you're doing?"
"She was very forward," Fred told me during his last session. "And I just-well-in heaven! She pushed me down on the floor and yanked off my pants. I could do nothing to defend myself, not without hitting her or something. Oh, it was just wonderful! I used to dream of something like that happening to me.
"Then she took off her panties and straddled me. When I felt my cock being sucked up inside her warm, beautiful pussy, I almost fainted. What a woman! She was the most wonderful thing that ever happened to me."
Fred had been programmed to believe that all good things must come to an end. The affair swung into full bloom with Fred and Rosalie, the secretary, balling every afternoon and night. She insisted she was madly in love with Fred, but after about a year, she began to want Fred to take the initiative once in a while. Every time he tried to make the first sexual move, something held him back. He couldn't maintain an erection unless Rosalie assumed the dominant position.
During that phase of Fred's therapy, I knew I'd have to do what Gerald called "playing it by ear." I told Fred a parable.
"Once upon a time there was a boy named Fred who was brought up to believe sex was bad. Fred married and his wife helped him foster his belief that sex was only to be indulged in if a child was desired. One evening while Fred was sitting around feeling sorry for himself after his wife left him, a big-breasted woman came naked into his house. She shoved one of her mammoth tits into his face and forced the nipple into his-mouth. While Fred struggled manfully to keep from suffocating and at the same time not to hit her, since he'd been brought up never to hit a woman, she handcuffed his wrists to the bedposts and spread-eagled his legs and handcuffed his ankles to the foot of the bed. Poor Fred. There he was, forced to engage in sex, tied down, helpless. When Fred did not immediately get a hard-on, the woman took a slender red leather whip from her bag and began to lay it on Fred's cringing flesh. She didn't hit him very hard, but hard enough to let Fred know he was being punished. Fred had an instant erection. Poor, humble, good Fred. There he was with a great big steaming hard-on, and the woman took advantage of him by sliding right down his turgid pole."
Under his pants, Fred's cock grew hard as I spoke. As I'd suspected, my story aroused him, a fact I marked down and put into my mental stash. I didn't want to act out the role of dominant female, but likes and dislikes of the sex therapist are not considered when therapy is involved. Fred's need to be sexually dominated could be used to free him of his inability to get an erection. I had to play the role of a heavily dominating woman in the beginning of his therapy and teach him to be normally aggressive later, hoping his need to be submissive wasn't as strong as his desire to lead a fully satisfying life.
Although instinct and hopeful groping plays a large part in any of the healing arts, I had good reason to believe I was on firm ground. Fred wasn't a completely confirmed masochist. After the affair with Rosalie ended due to Fred's inability to take the lead, he drifted into an affair with a girl I'll call June.
Twenty years younger than Fred, June appealed to him wildly. She was not only dominating, she was a natural castrator. Sweating profusely, Fred told me about her.
"Such a beautiful girl. On the surface, she was soft and sweet with blonde hair and baby blue eyes. She belonged to the new generation with sexual freedom, which was what appealed to me. I could never bring myself to tell her I needed to be seduced, but I thought she understood because she always started things. She picked me up in the public library one night and her first words were, 'Let's go someplace and fuck.' "
Fred became June's willing slave. For two months he lived for the time they spent together. One night June jarred him with a vicious verbal attack.
"Can you imagine how I felt when this beautiful woman was sucking my cock and all of a sudden she threatened to bite it? It shriveled right up and I sat up and stared at her. She leaned back on her feet and screamed the most horrifying vindictives at me, words I'd never even heard before!"
After that episode, Fred was unable to get an erection no matter who his partner was or how hard he tried. His always shaky sexual image was completely shattered. The more he tried the softer his cock became. "In the past when I woke up in the morning, my penis was usually hard until I went to the bathroom," he told me woefully. "But now it's limp as a rag. I'm not an old man yet. I've read where men can keep on being sexually active until they're a hundred years old, and I'm not even fifty-five yet. Now I've met a woman I'd like to marry. She's a good woman, but I know she won't expect a platonic relationship. She's already let me know she's willing to sleep with me before marriage, so you can see I'm really in a dilemma."
Hoping Fred wasn't repeating his pattern of selecting bad-assed women, I asked him if there was any chance his intended might come to the institute. At first he was horrified, but I gradually talked him around until he agreed to feel her out. "You could tell her you're having therapy, Fred," I told him. "You don't need to tell her what kind of therapy. Many intelligent people are going for counseling these days, before they get married."
"She said she'd come," he told me as we went into the bedroom of my office. "In a way she surprised me. I was afraid she'd think something was wrong with me if I told her I was in therapy, but she said she thought counseling was good for everyone. In fact, she said she'd like to have it herself before we get married. You see, she's divorced too, and although she didn't think so at the time the marriage broke up, she now believes she was partially to blame."
"And doesn't want to make the same mistake twice," I added. He was obviously alarmed at the sight of the office bedroom.
The decor is deliberately functional instead of flamboyantly seductive. People with sexual dysfunctions don't need to be overpowered by red velvet bedspreads and draperies, fur rugs and heavy perfume. It's furnished in comfortable beiges and browns, with a tweed rug and a few tame pillows and lamps to lend the place a homey look.
Fred was having difficulty choosing a place to sit. The bed, I could tell by his expression, was definitely out. He finally chose a gold brocade chair (nothing sumptuous, merely upholstered in cloth rather than coldly clinical vinyl) and sat down, carefully crossing his legs and assuming what looked like an air of nonchalance.
My icebreaker was swift and to the point. "Fred, you told me during our last session that you feel you've had a lot of bad luck with women. I let your statement pass at the time, but now I'm telling you luck didn't enter the picture."
He turned on a look of injured innocence.
I continued, "You have a pattern of choosing women who want to call the shots. You want to be a puppet on a string."
"I don't see how you can say that, when I've told you how those women all wanted to destroy me."
"No matter what those women did to you, Fred, remember this-You let them do it."
"Yes, but I still can't function as a man, and I want to. I need to. You made me realize I have a right to a full sex life."
"Sure you do, and I'm going to see that you get it." As I spoke, I slipped out of my casual pantsuit and exposed my carefully costumed body. I wore a pair of black boots to mid-thigh. Covering my hips but exposing my pussy was a black corset of shiny satin that laced up the front. My bra was black lace with holes cut out for the nipples. Languidly, I reached for a pair of handcuffs stashed under the pillows along with a little black leather whip.
Fred's smile was tremulous. "What's that stuff supposed to mean?"
"I'll give you one guess," I said in a husky voice. I told him it was necessary to make sure there was nothing organically wrong with him. He protested, saying he'd been assured by the doctor who referred him to the institute that he was in fine physical shape. He didn't lift a hand to defend himself, though, when I hauled his pants down and dragged his underwear along with them. His cock was more than medium hard. Just seeing me standing in front of him with a whip and handcuffs, dressed in classic sadist costume, had partially aroused him.
His shirt joined the pile of discarded clothing on the floor. He made a feeble attempt at pulling his feet away when I removed his shoes and socks, but it was a token gesture. "Now," I said as I applied the whip to his naked thigh. "Stand up, Fred, or you're going to get it harder." He stood up, protected his face with his hands and whimpered, "Don't."
Another lash with the whip to the other side of his thigh and Fred had a whopping erection.
I pointed to the floor with the whip. "Down, sweetie."
Fred obeyed, darting quick glances at me out of the corners of his eyes. I tickled his back with the tip of the whip for a few seconds before I gave him a couple of lashes across his back. He jerked, but his face shone with ecstasy and his mouth stretched into a delighted smile.
"Turn over," I ordered harshly.
He remained on his stomach. I gave him a lash that sounded loud as a pistol shot. He moaned and twitched, but he turned over, and his penis was seven or eight inches of hard, purplish desire.
Then came the hard part for me-my first sexual experience with a man who was not a lover. I knelt down and hoped I could give a good performance, and also hoped I could keep my own sexual desire under control. If I didn't, I would forget the role I was playing, which could be disastrous to Fred.
Since it had been several months since I had made love, my vaginal opening was taut and smaller than usual. I knew this the second I tried to penetrate myself with Fred's cock. When there is no lubrication, the sex act can be painful, and I don't dig pain with sex even if I don't intend to reach orgasm, which was the case. I had to do something to loosen my vaginal opening and I didn't think it was the right moment to go into the bathroom and apply some jelly lubricant. I lifted Fred's passive hand and told him to play with my pussy and suck my nipples. He did so reluctantly. After a few seconds I tried to insert his penis again, and found that Fred's grudging attention had worked like a charm. I screwed myself down on his cock, terribly tempted to let myself go. Though he was unwilling to cooperate, Fred was a very well-endowed man, and my own sex drive was purring along in high gear. I had to keep my mind on something else in order to keep cool, and it was very difficult. I managed to pull away from him after we'd been fucking for about a minute.
Fred gave me a pained look. "How could you do such a thing? I was about to come."
Calmly, I reminded him that I had needed to find out if he was capable of getting an erection. Now he must help himself by doing what women sometimes expect a man to do when they're having sex. "Get on top of me, Fred. You do the fucking."
His erection went flat.
CHAPTER FIVE
In spite of that abortive first attempt, Fred's therapy was a success. I gradually weaned him away from feeling he had to be coerced with punishment before he could get an erection. I cut down on the sadistic foreplay a little bit each session. The weeks flew by and finally Fred was capable of making love to me without even needing a little peek at the whip and handcuffs. Toward the end of his therapy, after I was convinced Fred could make it alone, I reminded him to ask his fiancee to come in for a little talk. Happily, she was just right for Fred. We didn't go into a lot of detail about his problem because it's often disastrous for men or women to bare their souls to their mates. But I had the definite feeling that this time, Fred would be very happy and his marriage would be a success.
Meanwhile, there were other patients to consider.
My pyromaniac responded beautifully at times, but just when I was beginning to think I was getting somewhere with James, he'd revert to his old nervous self. His foot would begin to jerk madly and he'd bite his fingernails in an attempt to squelch his desire to set fires. A week after I told Fred goodbye and wished him happiness in his forthcoming marriage, James went out and started a fire in a condemned warehouse. Wild-eyed and quaking violently, he came to his appointment half an hour late and told me he was going to cut his throat.
I managed to calm him down to the point of talking coherently. He didn't want to talk about anything but the fire, so I listened. Patience is a virtue a sex therapist needs most and I felt he needed to talk it out anyway.
That night I couldn't face going to my lonely apartment after work so I decided to eat at a Chinese restaurant and take in a movie. There are times when I must relieve my mind of the grief and sorrows my patients transfer to me, and that night was certainly one of them. On top of my disappointment with James, a patient I'll call Clyde canceled his appointment and called later in the day to say he didn't think therapy was helping him any.
Clyde had had exactly three sessions with me, but he was impatient. Our very first meeting had ended on a sour note. "Okay, baby," he said in a harsh tone. "Show me how you're going to cure me of shooting off too soon."
I said his problem was quite common, that there were several ways to handle it, but I had no magic button to push that would automatically improve his staying power. "It'll take time."
He sneered. "Bullshit. You doctors are all a-like. I get a fucking cold and you birds keep me coming back for five weeks when all the time you could cure it with a shot of something. I don't have time to fool around with that kind of horse-shit."
"I'm not a doctor," I snapped, "I'm a sex therapist."
"You're a high-class whore, baby. I know all about you dames. The only difference between you and the cunts who peddle their asses on the street is the fee you get and the fact that you fuck legally in a place called an Institute."
I lost my temper, sounded off at Clyde, and my final remark was brief and to the point. "Look, you made the appointment. You told the receptionist that your marriage is falling apart because you shoot off too soon. If you prefer to waste your time and money, calling me names instead of accepting therapy, that's all right with me, but you can only do it once. There are people on the waiting list who want help and work with us instead of against us."
Clyde settled down and gave a halfhearted attempt at verbalizing, but he wanted to place all the blame on his wife. "Betty is just as responsible as I am. She's like all the other women I ever fucked, including my first two wives. Maybe the problem isn't mine at all. Maybe it's always the woman's fault."
Helping Clyde get over ejaculating prematurely was not going to be easy or pleasant. Even so, there was a certain challenge involved and the progress was uphill. There were times when I saw the glimmer of a rainbow out there. Just the week before he canceled, he'd managed to stay in me for three entire minutes before he came, which was more than five times longer than he'd held out before. Usually Clyde shot off at about the time his penis touched my pubic hair. The first time, he had gushed off when he pulled down his zipper.
As I seated myself in the restaurant, I kept hoping Clyde's cancellation didn't mean what I feared it did. Betty kept threatening to leave him. It occurred to me that I had been remiss in not insisting Clyde bring his wife in. A willing mate can help a person solve many a sexual problem. While I looked at the menu, I kept going back over my problems with James the pyromaniac and Clyde the premature ejaculator, so I wasn't ready when the waitress came to take my order.
"I'm sorry. I've been staring at the menu and not seeing a thing. Just another minute or two, okay?" She smiled and nodded, and I gave the menu my undivided attention. When the girl came back, I ordered, then went back into my preoccupation with my patients. I jumped nervously when a voice spoke close by.
"Connie. How are you?"
A chance meeting with my former husband was not what I needed right then, but I knew it had to happen sooner or later. With Michael was a man close to his own age, around thirty. The girl friend wasn't along. I wondered how I should react. It would have been nice to have one of those civilized divorces, and after the fact I often regretted my hasty words. I sat there wondering just what in hell I was supposed to say. Should I ask Michael and his friend Tod to sit down and join me at dinner? Should I say politely, "What happened to that cunt you were fucking when we were married?"
I heard myself saying coolly, "How nice to see you, Michael. Nice to meet you, too, Tod. Are you expecting someone, or would you like to join me?"
They joined me, and I figured I was doing all right without giving the social graces any conscious thought. Michael told me I was looking beautiful as he eased into the seat beside me and Tod took the chair directly opposite. No, they weren't expecting anyone, Michael said. His wife was out of town for a few days because of a death in her family. "So he's married again," I thought without a stab of pain or remorse.
Tod said he'd heard a lot of good things about me. Michael mentioned rather sweetly that he still kept my picture on his desk. I wondered how the new wife felt about that, and Tod said he'd never believed the picture was of Michael's ex-wife. "I couldn't believe anybody in his right mind would let a beautiful creature like that get away."
Now anybody, male or female, intelligent or stupid, aware or unaware, responds to a compliment like that. I blushed a little and thanked Tod. From then on, my work was no longer my dinner companion. Tod was handsome, highly intelligent, well educated, possessed an excellent sense of humor and had all the rest of the requirements women find attractive. He was thoughtful, kind and came off as a very genuine, down-to-earth person. I wondered how he could bear to work in the same law office with tempera mental Michael, but as the evening progressed, I realized why. On top of all Tod's other positive traits, he was understanding.
"This is Esther," said Michael as he shoved his billfold toward me.
"She's-a very nice looking girl, Michael." The photograph showed a plump woman with steady eyes, a wistful expression and slightly bovine features.
"She's a gem," said Michael. "Very domestic, too." That was a little jab. Michael had always wanted me to take more than a casual interest in our home. He had spent a great deal of our marriage criticizing my cooking and the fact that I refused to bake bread three times a week as his mother had.
I raised my eyebrows. "Bakes bread, I suppose, and all the rest."
Tod continued to be attentive. After dinner he picked up the tab and looked at me in a way that let me know he wanted to see more of me. I mentioned that I was going to see a flick, so he spoke up right on cue and said he'd like to see that one too, even though I hadn't mentioned the title. Michael took it with unusual good grace and left us to do our thing, which was nice after the movie. We went to my apartment and straight to bed.
"That idiot! That absolute moron!" Tod said afterwards."
"You know what he has to do to get his wife to fuck? He has to beg and plead on bended knee! I could tell the minute I met you, Connie, that you're not a girl who plays games. You don't waste any time being coy."
This was news to me, because until then I'd always made it a point not to be an easy lay. A few dates first, a lot of kissing and petting beforehand. There was something about Tod that made me behave differently. Perhaps I'd always wanted to be one of those forthright girls who groove freely, but I'd never been with the kind of man who could accept such honest behavior.
As the relationship grew deeper, I appreciated the freedom from pretense even more. Within a month, Tod moved in with me. My apartment was nicer, bigger, and more centrally located than his, and when Tod took a look at all the possessions I'd accumulated, he decided it would be easier to bring his things over to my place.
Everything about my new love was wonderful. We were companionable, en joyed long conversations in front of the fireplace, and our tastes were similar enough to keep us from disagreeing violently but dissimilar enough to keep us from being bored. Most of all, though, sex was fantastic.
My work was interesting and a never-ending challenge, my school work required a tremendous amount of time and energy and I had never been so highly sexed that I had to go out on the prowl between relationships. On the other hand, my libido isn't exactly under par, so once I had a man of my own again I felt great and went around in a glow of contentment. My co-workers at the Institute commented on my sudden tendency to break into smiles and a new and different calmness about me. It was Gerald who guessed a man was in my life.
"Who is the lucky bastard?" He looked at me over the rim of his coffee cup one day while we were taking a break to discuss a couple we were getting ready to start on therapy.
"Strangely enough, my former husband introduced us," I answered.
"That's what I get for waiting for you to make the first move, Connie. I hoped you and I could get together."
"Sure-after Sue and Barbara, Gloria, Patty, Laurel, Beverly, Natalie, Margaret, Brenda and Dee Dee, I was next on the list," I parried.
"Oh, hell. Cut that list in half, maybe," Gerald said with his engaging smile. "Really, Connie, I'm glad for you."
"I'm glad for me too." I told Gerald about the honest relationship Tod and I had. "It just started off that way. You know, I think I was getting tired of playing sex games, but until it happened with Tod, I didn't realize it." I frowned. "All except in one area. I haven't told Tod exactly what I do here at People, Incorporated."
Gerald slapped his hand to his forehead. "Ahhhh! That's an honest, open relationship, all right. Tell me, Connie, exactly what does Tod think you do here?"
"I sort of led him to believe I do office work."
"Why the hell didn't you tell him right off the bat that you're a sex surrogate?"
I thought for a moment. "To tell the truth, I don't know why I didn't tell him. I guess I didn't want to hit him in the face, that first night. That would have been too much-like sticking my chin out and saying I write pornography or work as a stripper, defensively. I don't feel defensive about my job, Gerald, you know that. I feel we're doing a lot of good here at the Institute, but still-I didn't want to tell him in advance, then I kept waiting for the right opportunity. But I just can't seem to find the right moment to tell him."
"Yeah." Gerald snuffed out his cigarette and stood up. "Sure, the opportune moment. I've waited for that elusive point of time myself, and I hope you'll have better luck than I always do, Connie. The Dedricksons are here," he continued. "She looks as if she's been crying and he's got that expression on his face men get when they're about to ask that old, familiar question-'Honey, what have I done wrong?' "
"I know," I replied. "Then she says in a cold, hurt voice, 'Nothing. Nothing at all.' Very distantly."
"And he says, 'But you've been so quiet all morning, dear.' "
"And she doesn't answer." We both knew the scenario by heart.
The thing that was wrong with the Dedricksons' sex life was just as Gerald and I had agreed. They lacked communication on three levels-intellectually, emotionally and sexually. It was our job to make the couple understand why they no longer got along. Then they'd either start doing the things necessary to save their five-year marriage or get a divorce.
Neither Anne nor Kent wanted a divorce. Anne told me in one of our initial talks that she still loved Kent and wanted to stay married to him. Kent told both me and Gerald he adored his wife and couldn't understand where things had gone wrong. All he wanted to do was get their differences straightened out so they could be happy again. The next stop was to get them together in a foursome and start weeding out the problems by the roots. The first session wasn't very productive, but both Anne and Kent left with high hopes that next week they'd get down to the nitty gritty. They held hands as they left, which was nice, especially since I had a very negative feeling about my next session.
Larry was a big, raw-boned man from the deep South. He was married but separated from his wife of twenty years. Seven sessions had done little toward helping him with his problem. Larry was forty-five, in excellent physical condition, attractive to women and fantastically wealthy. He'd left the week before in a black frame of mind and exceptionally succinct down-home expressions on his lips. "I tell you, honey, if you cain't help me get so I can come, there ain't nobody that can. Me with all this money to spend and all that pussy around. I just get so all-fired frustrated when I fuck and fuck and fuck and still cain't come-I tell you I'm about to shit food I never ate."
He smiled at me as we went into the bedroom. "You must be mighty-assed tired of me comin' around here and not makin' any progress. Looks like you'd have give up on me by now."
"Remember, you have all the time in the world, Larry," I said as I turned down the sheets.
"The hell I have. I'm not gettin' younger. And you so patient and all, I feel plumb sorry for you. I bet you'd just as soon eat a box of crackers as fool around with me. Goddamit to hell, it ain't natcheral for a man not to get that good feelin'." His face was getting red. His blood pressure always shot sky high when he talked about his problem.
"I've got something new for you today, Larry. Something guaranteed to make you come."
His eyebrows bounced up and down. "No shit?" He peeled out of his clothes and I smelled his sexy cologne. "You invent a come-machine, or somethin'? I sure wish some smart-ass inventor would get to work on somethin' like that instead of those things nobody needs. Goddam bows and arrows that work like a goddam gun. I saw one of those contraptions in the store the other night, and I wish to hell they'd leave things be. A bow and arrow is just not natcherly sup posed to shoot off like a gun. My cock is, though. What trick you got up your sleeve, Connie, honey? Or up your pretty little snatch, maybe I should say."
"It's a surprise." I didn't want to tell Larry what I had in store, because I wasn't sure it would work. If it didn't I would resort to hypnotism, a technique Doctors Regelle and Patterson prefer not to use.
He stood there with his big cock in his hand, staring at it morosely. "You better behave yourself, you big fucker." It was rock hard and jutting straight out in front of him. "You better do your job, prick, or I might trade you in on a new one. Honey, you know what I used to call my dick? Bargain. I used to drive it so hard and it was a damned good performer and never cost me a cent. Shit, I'm not against givin' the ladies a little pleasurin' or even a whole lot of pleasurin'. Hell, no. Ole Larry never was one to go off quick like a rabbit and leave the woman pantin' and dry-humpin'. But I sure as shit would like to come once in a while."
He stretched out at my side and I took him in my arms to begin the usual foreplay. We kissed, and I thought about Tod while my body accepted and acted out the instructions my mind gave it. Larry's shoulders shook. He almost went into convulsions every time we went to bed, his need to ejaculate was so great. Larry was not in any real danger of working himself up to a stroke, although he kept thinking he might have one. In time, a man who has repeated erections and doesn't get the relief of orgasm will have a wet dream, but Larry swore he'd not had an emission while sleeping and was convinced that all that warehouse of unused come would cause him to have a heart attack or a stroke. If he did have one, it would be emotionally induced.
I fondled his penis with my hands and he trembled. "God, honey, I've got to have you."
"Wait a while," I murmured.
His face grew redder. "Wait? Holy shit, girl, what the hell do you think I've been doin' for three years?"
"We just started therapy a few weeks ago."
"I don't give a damn, I think I can shoot this time. Let me in there, honey."
"Just a second," I said. I pulled my body around and held my lips over his cock.
"Cock suckin' didn't work before and you know it," he muttered.
"It'll work this time." I've always been a believer in positive thinking, but this time I was reinforcing it with an action that would appear negative to Larry.
"What the hell you doin'?" He roared like a mad bull. "I be goddam if you're not tyin' a red ribbon around my dong! Now what the hell is that for?"
Conservative treatment had resulted in nothing. No results had been obtained by telling Larry the truth or using common sense, logic, reason or in-depth therapy. So I had decided to lie to him.
I was gambling on a radical idea with Larry which had occurred to me the night before when I was thinking about him. Larry was very child-like, and I hoped my subterfuge would work. I told him I was tying the red ribbon around the base of his cock to stop the come from flowing down into his penis.
"No, you don't!" He started flailing around with his arms and legs, but I managed to hold him down by sitting on him. "I'll just be god-damned if you do. Take that thaing off a there this minute!"
I spoke crisply. "Now you be quiet and listen to me, Larry." I whispered in his ear after I ran my tongue around it in tantalizing little thrusts. "Remember those x-rays we took of your penis and balls a few weeks ago?"
"Yeah. What about them?"
"Doctor Regelle was looking at them the other day and he found a by-pass."
"Now what the hell are you tryin' to tell me? What kind of a by-pass?"
I explained, lying sweetly and with elan: "There's a biological reason for your inability to come, Larry. We're sorry we didn't find it sooner, but it's a very unusual defect. Just under your balls, there's a little tube designed to jet the seminal fluid down the length of your penis until it gushes out. The tube is there, all right, but it has a tiny pinhole in it that dilates just enough to send that hot sticky stuff back up into the storage depots. That's why you can't come. By tying a ribbon around your penis in just that very spot, I've closed the little pin hole. You'll have to have a minor operation, but it'll only take a minute and you can have it done before you leave today. After that, you'll never have the problem again." If Larry had been thinking coherently, he would never have bought my story, but few men think to the best of their ability when they have a pair of breasts mashing against their chest, a gyrating pussy hovering just over their erect penis and a mouth and tongue doing fantastic things to their ear. He grinned at me, drew a long sigh of relief and said, "Fuck me, baby."
I pivoted around on the head of his cock for a second or two before I allowed my pussy to slide down to his balls. He moaned, grabbed a nipple in one hand and the other with his mouth, and start ed humping. Larry was a powerful man with an equally powerful sex drive. My body responded to the best of my ability. Within minutes, his face distorted in the classic grimace of the most world-shaking orgasm I had ever witnessed. I felt it banging out of the end of his cock and up against the walls of my vagina in spurt after spurt.
His heart thundered and his breath was raspy, but he managed to speak almost immediately after his release. "Fuck-almighty, I sure-shit sent a load up there, baby. Gohhhhhhhhhh-damn!"
While I bathed, I wondered if I would lose my job because of this unorthodox approach. I had left a note for Doctor Regelle that told him exactly what I intended to do for Larry and added that I would bring the patient into his office for the "operation" if my plan was successful. If Regelle didn't go along I would not only lose my job, but my patient would go right back to his frustrating fucking. I douched while Larry hummed contentedly, stretched out on the bed. When I emerged I walked fearfully down the corridor with him until I confronted a smiling Doctor Regelle. Larry's "operation" took less than a minute, a true case of a stitch in time saving nine.
After Larry left, Doctor Regelle chewed me out a bit, but he spoke warmly and ended by saying, "Connie, I'll say this for you. You're different."
He asked me to give him my opinion as to why Larry stopped ejaculating. I shrugged. "As we agreed during our pre-therapy talks, Larry's dysfunction can be caused by a number of factors. I don't think he was holding back his semen in order to save it for the woman he loves. He's already shot at least a barrel into assorted vaginas during the past. Anyway, Larry loves all women. He could come after his divorce, so that wasn't what stopped orgasm." I didn't buy the theory that he was afraid of impregnating a girl. The last five women he bedded had been on the pill, and he knew I was, and there was one girl he took out who'd had a complete hysterectomy. That tended to negate that theory.
Regelle's forehead creased with a thoughtful frown. "He doesn't seem the type who would need to hold back orgasm because of religious beliefs. You know-the spilling of the seed on infertile ground and all that. I doubt if the gentleman has a religious bone in his body, and I don't believe he's grown selfish. Of course he could have a hidden desire to keep his semen under the erroneous belief that he'll live longer if he doesn't spend so much energy, but I doubt it. We'll probably never know. That's not important. What is important is that old Larry can get out there and not only fuck, he can come!"
I nodded. Doctor Regelle asked me if I had any hope for James, the pyromaniac.
"No. I'm about to give up on him. You knew he set another fire last week, didn't you?"
"And jacked off as usual while the sirens screamed and the burning wood crackled. But don't sell yourself short, Connie. You're resourceful enough to come up with something."
"Sure." I was already looking forward to the evening ahead with Tod. We had a party planned, our first since we'd started living together.
CHAPTER SIX
Tod was resplendent in a ruffled shirt, burgundy evening jacket and well-fitting trousers. I was always proud of his appearance, though, even when he wore jeans and a raggedy old shirt with the pocket torn off. Tod had the ability to look as though he just stepped out of the most exclusive men's store in town no matter what he was wearing. I was even more delighted with his appearance that night because I'd invited a few friends who had once been a part of my crowd when I was married to Michael. It always helps a woman's image when she's put down to be able to attract another man, but Tod was special. Every woman at the party was green with envy. I was pleased with my own appearance, too. I wore a clinging hostess gown of black crepe that set off my fair coloring and blonde hair exceptionally well, and the fabric showed off my curves beautifully. The pearls Tod had given me for my birthday the week before were obviously the real thing. His attentive behavior toward me and assured way of acting as host added to my happiness, and the party was a great success. When everyone had said goodbye and we closed the door on the last guest, Tod took me in his arms and held me close. "Connie, you're perfect. I've always wanted to throw a party like this, but it takes a couple to make everything run smoothly. Unless you happen to be the late Perle Mesta."
I wasted no time telling Tod how much I appreciated all the things he'd done. We went to bed after we straightened up the place and I knew I loved Tod as I had never loved any other man. I didn't want to get married and neither did he, but I did want to tell him I loved him, which I never had done before. Our relationship had progressed enough to let me know he wouldn't go around mouthing the word without the true meaning behind it, either. I started to tell him when I remembered the one bad moment during the party. Leslie, the receptionist at the Institute, seemed more than a little attracted to Tod and had spent a lot of time with him. For one horrible second I had wondered if Leslie were telling Tod that I was a sex surrogate. My heart almost stopped beating, then I took a good look at his face and his expression told me I was still on safe ground. I thought, "I've got to tell him, and the sooner the better." Right then, during the tender moment of gentle caresses that we both knew would lead to sex, I reminded myself I must tell Tod. It wouldn't be fair for him to hear it from someone else. But right then was no time, with his lips kissing my breasts, his hands touching my body all over. I couldn't bring myself to say offhandedly, "Oh, by the way, Tod, I've been meaning to tell you. I'm a sex surrogate at People, Incorporated. In case you don't know what that means, I'll tell you. I talk to men with sexual hang-ups and try to help them. If verbal therapy doesn't help, I fuck them. You don't mind, darling, do you?"
No, I couldn't do it right then. In the morning, maybe.
My response to his love-making was terrific. I had always enjoyed sex in the past, but until Tod came along I had never experienced wanting a man unless he was right there with me. Very often I found myself daydreaming about Tod at odd moments. To my surprised pleasure, I often felt my vagina contracting and my clitoris pulsating when I thought about him. I'd become aware of a wet spot in the crotch of my panties. His technique was marvelous, but never stereotyped or studied, as if he'd read a few good sex manuals and learned the art of fucking. I could never anticipate what Tod was going to do next because he didn't follow a pattern. We enjoyed each other tremendously, and in every conceivable fashion from the usual man-dominant, woman-submissive position to far-out positions I had never dreamed of. We also enjoyed oral sex, which is how we started getting it on that night after the party.
Tod's tongue moved sensuously against my fluttering clit and he kept his hands on my nipples. I was pleased when he told me early on that he preferred giving me cunnilingus without reciprocal fellatio until he'd made me come once. In the beginning, I told him I never came more than once. Defensively, I explained that many women experience orgasm only once during intercourse, but he gave me a puzzled smile and shook his head. I was afraid he was going to come off with the tired old answer I'd heard before, "Oh, baby, you've never really had sex until you've experienced it with me." That was the first night, when I didn't know Tod very well. He never said it, but he certainly proved to me, that sometimes men are speaking the truth when they say that. I'd always thought a really strong orgasm was all I could ever want or need. Until Tod, I was even a little smug about it. I had an idea that women who bragged about their multiple orgasms didn't experience the same soul-shattering, gripping climax I did when I reached my one.
How sweet it was to learn how wrong I'd been. Every time we fucked it was better.
That night after the party was certainly no exception. After my breathing was almost back to normal, I got on my knees between Tod's legs and teased his cock with my lips. His penis measured considerably smaller than those of many of the men I worked with, but it was incredibly sensitive and responsive. The slightest touch of my lips made it leap to rockhard readiness and when I had it deep in my throat I could feel the purring sensation of his response from the silky glans to his firm balls. I adored fondling his hips and lean, flat belly with my hands as I sucked him. My enjoyment was multiplied a thousand times when I held his balls in my hands and squeezed them gently because of his beautiful way of showing me how much he liked what I was doing. I wanted to suck him and lick him and kiss him like that for hours, but he stopped me after a while and guided me with his hands to where he wanted me. Underneath, I felt completely possessed and madly enjoyed each hammering thrust.
Quickly I reached that exciting plateau of the total come. I stayed at that delicious peak for a long time. Soon I lost count of the number of climaxes I'd I'd reached and I knew if I didn't change my position I'd faint with pleasure. So I moved my hips slightly, hoping Tod wouldn't notice, but he always does. Looking down at me with shining eyes, he said, "No more?"
"No more. I'll faint," I murmured.
He chuckled. "You used to say one was all you needed or wanted." I moved rhythmically along with him until I felt the tightening of his loins and the super hardness of his penis just before he shot off. When it happened, I deliberately sucked his entire length up into my hot vagina and clamped down hard around his penis. Experience had taught me that Tod loved that and I wanted to make sure he kept right on loving it.
Sexually fulfilled, pleasantly tired and well-fed, we still weren't ready for sleep. Instead we lay side by side, stretched out in close, comfortable silence for a while.
Tod told me he loved me. I was deliriously happy until I remembered I still had to tell him about the nature of my work. For a long time after he went to sleep, I continued to lie there and stare up at the dark ceiling, wishing I had been as open and frank with him in that area as I had in all the rest. Before I went to sleep I gave myself a deadline. It was December first. I Would tell him immediately after the holidays.
When morning came, I made a red check on the calendar I carry in my purse in case I was tempted to put it off again. The reminder was right there where I would see it every day. Before Tod left for work that morning, I said, "Tod?"
He had just knocked back his morning orange juice and had his coffee cup in his hand.
"You sound serious, Connie."
I smiled at him across the table. "I love you too."
Something deep inside me churned around and started making little warning signals inside my head. I knew exactly why I felt the time had come to tell Tod about my occupation at the institute. It was a simple matter of timing, and I had let it go unsaid too long. I took a last swallow of coffee and started to speak again when Tod suddenly stood up, an expression of dismay on his face. "Damn, I have an early appointment and I almost forgot about it." He kissed me, tweaked a nipple with his fingers and dashed out the door, taking my almost-confession with him into the snowy December day.
I dressed, put on my makeup and walked through the snowflakes to work. A hectic day was scheduled with five appointments at the institute and a heavy load of work at the university. When I had especially tiring days, Tod and I usually met at a restaurant we liked to eat dinner together, but because of his rush to the office we hadn't made a definite date. As soon as I arrived at work I called his office but I had to leave a message with his secretary because he was in conference. I intended to tell him about my work but I couldn't give the secretary the message. The urgent need to explain things to him was in my mind When I began my first appointment, but by the time I finished the session I was using all my mental energy on my job. The patient was Tim, a young man who no longer had the slightest interest in sex.
Tim had been coming regularly for appointments for almost the entire time I'd worked at the institute. I met him when I substituted for the receptionist one day when she was sick, and I liked him. When I became a sex surrogate, Tim be came one of my special projects.
Tim's problem dated back to his very early childhood. Strangely enough, several people I talked to about people like Tim couldn't see why he had a problem. Leslie, who should have known better, blithely said Tim was better off than most. "Look at all the trouble he escapes. He doesn't have to worry about getting a girl pregnant, having children to support, or even the hassle of asking a girl for a date." I didn't have time to give Leslie a course in abnormal psychology. I was too busy trying to finish my own work at the university. I did give her an article to read, which impressed her enough to ask me for more articles so she'd understand the patients she interviewed a little better.
Tim didn't come and ask for treatment of his own free will. He had a sister, Lois, who kept bothering him until he finally consented to give People, Incorporated a try.
The first few sessions were frustrating because Tim had conditioned himself to believe as Leslie did, that he had no problem. "Lois comes on with all this 'Now Generation' talk and tries to make me believe she's hip to the way things are," he argued, "but in her heart she's a conventional girl with traditional ideals. She's living with a dude over in the Village and says she doesn't plan to get married, doesn't want to have a child, but just wait a few years. She'll get into the same rut and get trapped in a sorry marriage and have no time to do her talents justice. Lois is a wonderful artist, you know." Tim spoke those words in his sister's presence, and she didn't bat an eyelash. He gave her a sarcastic look and continued. "She wants me to start grooving on sex because she's afraid I'm going to turn gay. Either that, or she wants me to settle down, get married and have a family, whether she'll admit it or not. What I want you to do, Connie, is tell her I'm perfectly normal, adjusted and happy. It's a relief not to be interested in sex."
"If it's a relief, then you're lying to yourself, Tim," I said flatly.
He was unimpressed, but his .sister convinced me she was leveling with her brother when she told him she didn't care if he ever got married, that she'd rather see him turn gay than deny his sexuality, as he was doing. "You weren't always turned off by sex, Tim. What I want you to do, Connie, is explain to Tim that he has a serious sexual dysfunction."
It had been a long, hard uphill journey that Tim and I had traveled together through his blighted childhood, traumatic adolescence and a disastrous marriage. At that point we were ready to attempt his first sexual encounter in eight years. He was thirty-three and he'd repressed his sexual needs for so long that he honestly felt he no longer had any.
The early years contributed heavily to Tim's situation. Born after his parents had been married only four months, he was anything but welcomed with open arms by his father. His mother loved him, but she was only sixteen when Tim was born and miserable in the marriage her irate father had forced on her. Tim's father, was a brute of a man, incapable of expressing any tenderness. Tim's memories of his father were colored with fear and hatred. When he was drunk or out of sorts, his belt came off and the young boy was beaten severely. According to the mother, who came in to talk to me at Lois' request, Tim's father was drunk and angry most of the time. "I wasn't well after Tim was born and my folks wouldn't let me come back home. They were very strict and my father told me I had made my bed, and I had to sleep in it. My mother told me God would punish me for getting pregnant-for having to get married-and when I was helpless, unable to protect my baby from his father's terrible temper, I kept telling myself God was punishing me."
Her health improved enough to enable her to leave her first husband when Tim was five years old. "I prayed Tim would be all right, and when I married again, I hoped my second husband would be good to my boy and make up to Tim for what his own father had done. My second husband was a wonderful man, and a good father to both of my children. He never made a bit of difference between Tim and Lois even though Lois was his own child. I just don't see why Tim should be having any trouble with his mind now. I'm not sure I understand exactly why his sister brought him here, and I wish you would tell me. He's able to keep his job, isn't he? He keeps his room clean and neat. Of course he wastes a lot of time fooling around with poetry and that strange religion he's taken up, but I still don't see why my boy needs a psychologist. Now I'll tell you about Lois. She had everything in this world when she was a little girl, and I took her to church and Sunday school and taught her right from wrong. Now just you look at what she's doing. Living like a Bohemian, or whatever you call them. Saying she's not going to get married like decent folks or have any kids. If you ask me, Lois is the one that needs a mind doctor, not Tim."
I explained to Tim's mother that Tim was not insane, but due to her inability to understand the problem, I didn't explain anything else. I was sure the lady would have expressed relief if she'd known her son had convinced himself he had no sexual drive. What I did want to know was more about Tim's early life. "Did you and your first husband have a two-bedroom apartment when Tim was a baby?"
"Ha! There wasn't even one bedroom. We had a room over a cheap saloon with a hot plate and an ugly old cabinet for a kitchen and a bed and a couple of chairs. Down the hall was the bathroom we shared with two other families that lived there."
In order for me to understand Tim's problem I needed to learn about his primal scene, but his mother refused to discuss her sexual relationship with Tim's father on the grounds that talk of sex "wasn't nice." Doctor Patterson agreed to hypnosis and I chalked up another point for that strange sense many therapists and laymen have of "picking up" on what are commonly called hunches. I had felt for quite some time that Tim's first encounter with adult sexuality had been grossly ugly, and hypnosis proved me right.
The primal scene is a term used to describe a child's initial introduction to sex; In spite of the care most parents take to keep their private lives to themselves, children usually manage to see or hear sex in action at an early age. Many adults believe a small child will have no memory of anything that occurred in the bedroom when he reaches the age of understanding. This is just one of the many fallacies people accept and live by. The human mind acts as a continually operating tape recorder from the moment of birth and no impression that registers on the brain is ever forgotten.
Regressed to age two and a half, Tim related variations of the nightly scene his young and impressionable mind duly recorded that would contribute to his state of sexual denial. The following primal scene was recorded.
My dad is coming into the bedroom. I'm afraid. He smells of sweat and whiskey.
He awakens my mother. His voice is rough and demanding, his words contemptuous. "Wake up, you goddam slut. Give me the only thing you're good for."
"Oh. Oh, no. Ralph, please, I don't feel well enough-"
A sharp slap sounds in the darkened room. "You filthy cunt! You goddam fool! You feel as good as I do, whaddya think I feel like workin' my ass off for you and the kid. If your old man hadn't threatened to cut my balls off I'd never've married you. 'Sides, I don't think that kid is mine anyway. How the hell do I know how many pricks got shoved up there before I came along?"
"Ralph, you know better than Ralph, no! Please don't hit me again!"
Another loud sound in the darkness. "Woman, I'm gonna fuck you and I don't want any more crap. You hear? I got my rights. I'm your husband. I pay for it, so I'm gonna get it."
Sounds of low sobs. "Go ahead and cry, you ignorant slut, See if it'll do any good."
"Ralph, the people downstairs! They'll hear you if you beat me up again."
"I ain't gonna beat you if you do what you gotta do. Just lay still and take it, goddam your ass. Spread them skinny legs. Come on, stop holdin' out on me. Goddam it, put a little action in it! Feels like I'm fuckin' a goddam hole in the ground!"
Downstairs, the juke box breaks into a blare of music. It sounds loud in the room. I smell grease from the hamburgers they cook down there.
He grunts and makes scary noises. The darkness isn't complete enough to blot out the thrashing and bucking of his big body as he devours her. She sobs a little but he keeps right on grinding into her. It seems to go on forever. I put my hands on my ears but when the music stops in the bar I hear the sounds he makes and she cries that she's suffocating, she can't get her breath. He laughs. "You like it, you bitch." I don't want to look but I keep looking. Finally it's over. He rolls off and starts snoring. For a long time she cries softly in the night.
The scene was repeated over and over again with variations.
Serious sexual dysfunctions like Tim's are often the result of a combination of factors, so I didn't stop delving into his past at that point.
When Tim was fourteen, a relevant incident occurred. A favorite woman teacher was raped and murdered by a homicidal maniac. Although Tim was not a witness to the crime, two boys who were his classmates were inadvertently involved. The teacher was driving the boys home because they'd missed the bus. She had a flat tire and the escape prisoner came out from behind an oak grove, held a gun on the boys and tied them to a tree where they watched the senseless act. Even if details had not been printed in the local papers, Tim would have learned of the ghastly event because the boys kept talking about it for a long time afterward. Tim finally admitted that he often found himself thinking about the death of his teacher and the gory details his schoolmates related.
The final contributing factor to Tim's sexuality was his marriage. Sandy was nine years Tim's senior and a high school teacher. She was married to a college friend of Tim's, an older man named Steve whose studies had been interrupted by the war in Vietnam. Tim fell in love with Sandy and experienced his second sexual confrontation at the age of twenty-two. His first had been pretty good, he said, but nothing like the way it was with Sandy. For several weeks Tim skulked around feeling guilty about betraying his friend by screwing his wife, yet he was unable to stay away from Sandy. They did the usual things-went to motels, knocked off a quickie when Steve was away from the house long enough, and fucked a few times in the back seat of Tim's car. He was so enamored of her that he felt he couldn't live without her and she was easily persuaded to divorce Steve so she could marry Tim.
Unfortunately, Steve came home and caught them balling on the living room floor before Sandy got around to filing for divorce. Steve took it well-he walked out and stayed away-but Tim's guilt never quite left him.
"Anyway, the marriage was no good from the start," he said frankly. "I was jealous. I could barely function on my job because I kept wondering if Sandy was fooling around with somebody the way she had done with me. Besides, after we were married, she didn't like sex any more. She kept finding fault with me. I wasn't allowed to open my mouth in my own house. Every time I asked her a simple question, like when she planned to use the car or something, she flew into a rage. No matter what I said it was wrong. She made fun of the way I screwed her while we were doing it and even laughed about it when we were with other people. She'd say things like, 'Tim is such a child. He hasn't the vaguest idea how to please a woman.' I think the thing that finally ticked me off was when she wanted to join a swapping club. So I left and began living again."
For a while, Tim did start living again-all the way, too. He went through a series of girls, all of them attractive, some exceptionally loving and kind. Quite soon they grew wearisome and he began to think of himself as a man who was beyond the lowly needs of the flesh. He had a lucrative position, but in his spare time he wrote morbid poetry that didn't sell and by the time his sister brought him in, he went around in a state of depression because editors didn't appreciate his poetry. He said his work was above the base mentality of the ordinary man or woman who couldn't understand the beauty of poetry for its own sake. "They want poets to write about sex and love, and I'm after purity."
Needless to say, Tim needed highly skillful psychotherapy before he could be helped. After three months, Doctor Regelle turned Tim back over to me, although he continued giving him analysis. I was not prepared for Tim's reaction to his first session in my office bedroom. The problem had come up for other girls who were surrogates, but so far I had managed to evade it. As I prepared to entice Tim into making love to me, he held me in his arms. "Connie, I suppose you know I'm madly in love with you."
CHAPTER SEVEN
"We'll talk about it later," I said gently as I asked him to disrobe. A little thought told me I should have been prepared for Tim's reaction. In order to fuck me he'd convinced himself he had to be in love with me. Balling and love were, in Tim's eyes, one and the same thing. His mother hadn't loved his father, so she hated to submit to him. He could certainly understand that, because his father hadn't been lovable. His father hadn't loved his mother, but he'd taken her against her will. Tim didn't want to be like his father, so he would never ball a woman he didn't love. He'd told his first sex-mate he loved her and she cheerfully said she loved him too, but she was out fucking someone else the next night. Then he became embroiled in the affair with Sandy and the impossible marriage because he thought he loved her. After that he fell rapidly in and out of love with six different women, then decided he didn't want to love women any more. Since he couldn't love them, he made up his mind that he no longer needed sex. It was my job to prove to Tim that sex is nice, that there's nothing wrong with sex without love as long as it's mutually satisfying and nobody gets hurt. I didn't like letting him think he loved me, but he needed to get on with sex. Hoping I could find a way out of the dilemma, I let him think what he pleased, and I was glad to see he had an erection.
Undoubtedly Sandy had a valid reason for complaining about Tim's sexual prowess. I certainly disapproved of her method of telling him and considered her talking about Tim's performance to others a gesture of pure bitchery. "Tim, slow down," I said before it was too late.
Now that he'd been in analysis and accepted the idea that he wasn't really asexual, he appeared to be making up for lost time. "Listen, Tim, I'm going to tell you about the anatomy of a woman."
He looked disappointed. "Another lecture?"
"Not at all. I think you'll find what I'm going to tell you interesting and erotic. Incidentally, you'll benefit in another way. Once you learn the art of making love, you'll never suffer through another Sandy type. When I'm finished teaching you all the lessons, every woman you fuck will be your willing slave."
Tim didn't believe me, but I pretended to not notice his snort of derision. Then I let him walk around with his erection for a while as I talked. He had to pace the floor to keep from exploding, both physically and mentally, and I felt sorry for him.
"Here's the thing, Tim. No woman enjoys having a man jump on top of her and start humping. Even though I said it isn't necessary to fall in love with every woman you take to bed, I don't mean affectionate gestures aren't needed." I was lying on the bed naked. "Come here."
He strolled over and looked down at me apprehensively. "Sit down," I ordered. He complied, and I took his hand. "I'm going to put your hand on every erotic zone on my body and show you what to do with it to make me sexually aroused." I dropped his hand on my nipple, which was soft and pale pink. "Roll my nipple between your thumb and index finger, Tim. Watch it come alive. See? My nipple is sexually responding to your touch. There's a direct line of communication between the breasts and the reproductive organs. Now put your hand between my legs."
He left one hand on my nipple and put the other one where I directed. "Insert your middle finger inside my vagina, Tim. Right now it's dry. But in a matter of seconds, the exciting way you're manipulating my nipple will create a flow of lubricating liquid inside the walls of my vagina. Leave your finger there and you'll feel the channel get slick and dilate a little to accommodate more than a finger."
"You mean a woman's pussy does it automatically?" Tim looked amazed. By then I had been through this same kind of demonstration with other patients so many times that I no longer had to think about my lines.
"Yes. Automatically, but not without some kind of stimulation. The breasts are one of the most highly responsive sexual organs a woman possesses, but the only real point of excitement is the nipples. It feels wonderful to a woman when a man fondles her entire breast, but the main attraction is the nipple."
He was pleased. "It feels good to me to touch your breasts, too. I never touched Sandy's, though, "I doubt if you touched her anyplace," I said gently, "except when you shoved your cock in her pussy. Many women experience considerable discomfort when they're mounted before they're ready. I've known women who were forced to masturbate before intercourse. Not enough to reach orgasm, but enough to stimulate that vital flow of lubrication."
"I was afraid to touch Sandy. It didn't seem-nice, somehow."
"So you got sex over as quickly as possible and closed your eyes and went to sleep. Don't feel alone, Tim. Hundreds of thousands of people are suffering through the same kind of self-denial and mate denial. The most important contribution of modern sex therapy is teaching people to communicate about sex."
I showed him how to kiss my breasts and the method of biting the nipples enough to bring a woman to the peak of excitement without hurting her. "There are some women who like a little more pressure than others. The best thing to do is ask. Girls who are asked what they like and don't like are very grateful for your consideration. In return you'll find them leaping over their own hurdles of inhibition and asking what turns you on. Just start with gentle little nibbles."
Step by step I guided Tim through a tour of the erogenous zones of my body, being careful to tell him some women are more responsive to kissing than others, some like a lot of clitoral stimulation, oral arousal or other forms of foreplay. He said he hadn't even known a woman had a clit. I told him to take a good look at mine. "It's the center of my sexual nervous system. The slightest touch creates instant response. Put your finger on it and feel it vibrate."
"It looks a little like my cock," he said in a whisper.
I pointed out the erotic zones on either side of the belly that come down diagonally from the waistline and meet just above the pubic hair. "The automatic nervous system is fairly alive with those little response centers, Tim. Just under where I asked you to touch me lightly on my belly are my ovaries. Men and women have many places that respond sexually. Some women enjoy moderate pressure along the small of the back, just under the waist." I turned over and told him to touch me there. "I have a couple of dimples on the exact spot. Although I enjoy the touch of a man's hand when he caresses me anywhere, I'm not sexually responsive there. Nor do I like my ears kissed, but some women do. Another very sexy spot is on the soft, tender skin on the underside of the upper arm and the corresponding place on the upper thigh, but-inside. The closer your fingers get to my pussy the better I like it. It feels good when you gently stroke the place where my legs join my hips. I also like it when you pet my outer labia. Now look at that small area just below my vagina where the skin is satiny smooth-see how it has no hair on it? That's it, You're touching it gently and tenderly, just the way I like it. That's the perineum, the area just in front of the anus that extends to the fourchette vulva of a woman and to the scrotum in a man. Perhaps because few people know about the area, it seldom gets a chance to show how responsive it can be."
I explained about kissing, holding, caressing and the other more obvious expressions of affection. "In your health class in school, you probably learned that the skin is the largest organ of the human body. The skin is also highly receptive to sex play. In fact, during the peak of sexual excitement, almost any place the skin is touched is highly responsive."
It was my intention to spend equal time on the erogenous zones of the male, but by then Tim was so eager to fuck that I took pity on him. Briefly touching on the joys of cunnilingus and fellatio and promising to give him some lessons on both at a later date, I encouraged him to enter me.
Until that moment, I had never given in to my own desires during a session.
Since Tod and I started living together, I almost stopped experiencing sexual excitement even though I had grown very adept at pretending it. But for some reason or other, I couldn't turn off the flow of sexual energy I had built up during Tim's hour. I felt those heady, delightful sensations danced up and down my body and found myself grooving with it. I climaxed just before I felt Tim's healthy gush spurt out of the end of his madly driving cock.
It happened. I had been warned that I couldn't always control the need to climax, but until it occurred I had convinced myself I could always turn off when I wanted to. There wasn't time to worry about it, because James, my miserable fire-worshipper, was waiting out in the reception room. I had kept Tim fifteen minutes beyond his hour, so I had to rush through my bath and douche and repair my hair and makeup. I didn't slough Tim off, though. He had come too far in his treatment to give him a rush job and spoil things, so I lingered with him for another five minutes and pretended to enjoy the languorous, delightfully drained feeling of the afterglow before I prepared for James.
CHAPTER EIGHT
James was not happy about having to wait, "Who was the person that was so important you lost track of time?"
"Another client, James. You know I sometimes have heavy schedules. I've been running late all day long."
"What's his problem?"
It was ethical to give James an answer because the way the institute is set up the patients never see each other. "He's not interested in sex. At least not until recently."
"You mean you fucked him just recently. You just finished turning him on. The lucky devil. Anyway, what's so terrible about not being interested in sex? I wish I didn't think about it all the time."
"An asexual person often creates some very heavy psychological problems for himself because the disinterest is usually self-induced. Generally when a person becomes asexual, he's hidden his drive. It can result in major physiological symptoms too. But let's talk about you, James."
He was determined to keep his depressed demeanor on, a role he often played with the idea of creating sympathy. More than once I had told him he wanted to take too much time working at surface symptoms of his problem because he felt easier getting therapy for behavior quirks that were not traceable to his need to set fires. He shrugged his shoulders and sighed deeply, a "poor James" sigh calculated to create a sympathetic response. "I'm not getting any better. I keep going through the same old shitty scenes at work and the same old shitty fantasies when I'm home or driving around. I don't think you're ever going to be able to help me, Connie."
"Not if you continue thinking negatively."
"Well, we've been at it for all these months and we're not getting anywhere."
"Tell me about your fantasies. Start with your favorite. The one you have more frequently than others."
"We've done this before."
"Right. You get an erection every time you think about those destructive flames and soaring smoke."
"And the sirens. Don't forget the fucking fire truck sirens."
I looked at him and something clicked in my mind. Doctor Patterson had recently told me in conference she didn't care how radical I chose to be during James' treatment. Until that moment, I hadn't come up with an idea that might help him. In fact, I told Doctor Patterson just the day before that I'd already used up all my good ideas on James. Because I wanted to consider the new approach that had just occurred to me a little longer before I put it to the test, I again encouraged James to relate his favorite fantasy.
He balked. "We've gone over this at least twenty times."
"I know, but you always come up with a new twist. I'm waiting for you to drop something relevant, something you've never told me about before. But I've changed my mind. Tell me about your first impression of sexuality. The blonde."
"Well-okay," he said without much enthusiasm, and launched into his third most frequent fantasy.
There's this big old house in town.
I often walked past when I was a kid. A Victorian house with a lot of gingerbread and a front porch all across the house and down one side, and an enclosed back porch. It's a house I liked because it was not painted white like all the other big houses in town but was pale yellow with brown shutters, and besides the color and trim, it fascinated me because the people who lived in it were different. They looked different and behaved differently. People said she bleached her hair and wore extreme clothing, and he was one of those stud-types with that-attitude, I guess you might call it, of a man who knew his way with women. I had him figured for a real pussyhound and there was a rumor in town to the effect that he fucked around on his wife a lot. I remember thinking if I ever had a woman like that platinum-haired wife of his I'd sure never want any strange pussy. Long before I started beating my meat I used to get excited just thinking about that woman, only I didn't recognize it as sexual excitement. Her name was Rhonda and she was built. I mean, she was really built, with boobs about the size of grapefruit and an ass on her that stuck right straight out but didn't wobble around. She had a firm body and long, slender legs and in the summer she used to lay around in her bathing suit and let the lawn sprinkler keep her cool while she tanned herself.
Once I climbed a tree so I could look right down and see all there was to see. My folks would have shit a blue streak if they'd known I did that, Maybe I thought I was in love with her-hell, I don't know. What a picture she made, picking up that bottle of suntan oil and rubbing her legs with the stuff. Then she'd do her arms and all around her back as far as she could reach. I used to stand around for hours, waiting for her to come out of that big old house and start sun bathing. The day I climbed the tree, I had it made. She didn't know anybody was around, so she wasn't careful to keep her top fastened the way she did when people were passing by.
I interrupted. "You never told me about climbing the tree before, James."
"I guess I never thought about it during session."
"And I never did get the picture quite straight. Did she sun-bathe in the front yard or the back?"
"Neither one. The side yard. There was a hedge in the front that hid her from view when I walked along the sidewalk in front of the house, but if I was in the alley I could see her pretty good. At least well enough to get excited."
"So you climbed the tree to see her better. Go on."
Yeah. Okay, so I was in the tree looking down at her. About-about eleven years old, maybe twelve that summer. She took off the top of her bathing suit and sort of lifted her tits a little. They were heavy, but they didn't sag much. My eyes almost popped out of my head. They were big and beautiful and mellow looking. There was something extra tantalizing about the way her nipples looked. Big nipples and sort of brownish colored until she started pulling and squeezing on them, then they turned dark red. I licked my lips up there in that tree and felt something down in my cock sit up and take notice. I don't mean I got a hard-on, but it felt like it wanted to swell up, and sort of pleasantly itched, but not exactly. Never did feel that way before in my life, but I liked it. The thing aside from her nipples that turned me on was the way her titties looked so white against the suntanned part of her body. Her shoulders were brown and I could see just where her top covered her tits. I actually felt dizzy when I looked at her, but I kept looking anyway, figuring if I fell out of the tree it'd be worth it.
She kept rolling her nipples around between her index finger and her thumb, then all of a sudden she started humping her hips. I had never seen a woman do that, and it was sexy as hell. First she'd roll them sideways a little, then she'd hump her belly and pussy forward. She was lying on her back at the time, of course. Ahhhhhhh! She was a beautiful woman. The beach towel she was lying on was blue and white striped. Her hair was soft looking and curly around her face, about the color of pale butter. She had a terrific suntan, which made her eyes look brighter, just the same shade of blue as the stripes in her beach towel. Altogether, she was a lovely sight for a young boy to feast his eyes on. That dry-humping had me going. I knew that she was doing something sexual, but I didn't understand. So I kept on looking and pretty soon she slipped the bottom half of her outfit down and kicked it off. I remember how it vaulted up in the air a bit before it floated to the ground, but I didn't waste much time or thought on her pants once I was sure they weren't going to get snagged on the tree and she'd look up and catch me. Well, there she was, with her pussy hair right there for me to look at and drool over. My tongue came out of my mouth and I'm not kidding when I say I was drooling, either. I was slobbering. I wanted to touch that downy hair on her snatch with my fingers, or my tongue. My tongue tingles now when I remember. Her bottom half was white as snow and exciting as hell. The line of dark skin looked as if it had been drawn on where her panties ended. There was a band of dark, golden brown at her waistline, and it stretched up to the bottom of her suit top. It wasn't a bikini, just a two-piece swimming suit made out of some kind of pink material that looked lacy. She was so pretty. Naked and lying flat on her back and with her boobs turning pink because she kept squeezing them while she worked over her nipples, with her eyes staring up to the sky and her mouth making funny sounds and her hips and ass gyrating.
Then she took one hand and put it down on her snatch. I thought I'd faint at just seeing such a thing. Her pussy hair was blonde, but darker than her hair. People in town said she got that color out of a bottle, but I felt proud I knew she didn't get all that blonde hair color out of any bottle. Of course I knew I'd never tell anybody about what I saw.
She had her middle finger inside her hole and her thumb was fanning back and forth against the top of her pussy. Later, I learned she had been fingering her clit, but back then I didn't know a woman had anything but a hole and it hadn't been too long I'd known there was more than one hole in a woman. Originally, I'd thought women got fucked in the asshole and used it to piss out of, too.
Well she kept hunching and then she started moaning deep down in her throat. Her legs came up and she spread them wide. The sun was right on her, except there were a lot of leaves on the tree I was in, which made a sort of dappled pattern on her skin. Funny to remember that after all these years, when I doubt if I was aware of it at the time.
Finally she turned over, but she had her hand in her snatch, and it looked to me like she was riding her hand, but she still had that one finger buried deep inside her hole. Her breasts were smashed down against the towel and they were so big I could see them squishing out along her sides. She was sweating. It was a hot day, and she'd worked up a lot of sweat, and her back was shiny as satin. Now and then she'd take one of her hand and push it under her tits, and then she'd get to really bouncing her ass up and down. Then she came, I guess, because she made an awful sound, kind of like strangling, and she was still as death.
I remember looking down and wondering if she'd killed herself. Before long she started moving around a bit, then she must have heard a sound I didn't notice, because she hurried like hell to get back into her bathing suit, All the time she was going through those wonderful gyrations, I had my hand on my dick-skinner, but I wasn't old enough-or at least hadn't matured enough-for it to get hard.
A few seconds passed by while she sat up and put some tanning lotion on her back and shoulders, but she had everything in place and the ties tied. A car roared up in front of the house and she kept right on applying that lotion, then she turned around and gave her husband a big smile over her shoulder. He walked right over and sat down on the beach towel. She asked if he wanted a drink, but he said no, he had eating in mind. She said she'd go fix him something to eat, but he said she had it with her. She gave him another big smile and skinned out of the bottom of her suit again.
He told her to take off the top, that he wanted to see her tits. There were those fantastic jugs right out in the open again. He didn't touch them, he just looked at them. Then she spread her legs apart and he got down there between them and started using his tongue on her. This was before I knew men and women did things like that to each other, and I couldn't believe my eyes. He kept on doing it for a long time. Now and then I could see his tongue flashing when he'd dart it in and out, or up to the top of her pussy. Her belly was taut and her arms stretched straight out on either side of her body, but after a while she began milking her tits again. When she started doing that, the husband's face mashed down harder between her thighs, maybe because she was putting so much action into her hips and thighs. She stiffened and let out this unholy shriek that nearly shattered my eardrums. "I'm coming, oh, I'm coming!" Her head was moving back and forth like it was on a string and someone pulled it one way while someone else yanked it back. Her eyes were all rolled up in the back of her head and her mouth wide open while she hollered and flailed around.
The husband's face stayed down on her snatch for a while longer, but pretty soon he got up and sat on the grass, lit a cigarette and looked at her. She sat up, still naked, and put her arms around him. Said how much she appreciated him, how much she loved him. I wondered why she didn't do something for him since he'd given her so much pleasure. Let him fuck her, or suggest it, but she didn't say a word. He said he'd just been working away at his business when he started thinking about her and wanted to eat pussy, and she said she was glad he did, but she still didn't touch him or kiss him, or any of the things I thought she ought to be doing at a time like that, especially fuck him.
Then he said he'd go get the stuff. She said okay, and he went in the house and I sat there on the limb of the tree and wondered what it was. Before long he came back with a red velvet box. He handed it to her and she stood up and took out a great big prick made of plaster of Paris or something with a belt dangling from it. It was a whopper! She strapped the contraption around her hips and he dropped his pants and there was his cock, limp as a rag and not any bigger around than a pencil.
She looked strange as hell standing there with those tits jutting out in front of her and that big old cock sticking out from her pussy hair. She unscrewed the lid of a little jar in the box, dipped in her hand and lathered it all over the knob of that cock she was wearing.
He got down on all fours like a baby when it starts to crawl, and she got behind him on her knees. Then she pulled the cheeks of his ass apart and sort of slathered his asshole with the same stuff she'd already put on the end of the artificial prick. He shivered all up and down and the next thing I knew she plunged that big cock all the way up him. Her pussy hair was tufting out all around the cheeks of his ass. She held it in there for a while, making circular motions with her hips. Then she started fucking in and out of his asshole and he was making the goddamnedest noises I ever heard. Sort of like a wild animal caught in a trap, but as if he liked it. He pawed at the earth and his tongue came out of his mouth and he panted like a son of a bitch. Then he went into a kind of fit, kind of fit, shivering all over and banging his ass backwards every time she pulled that cock out, She started grinding in faster and faster and harder and harder, then she rammed it in deeper than ever and held it in there so deep I couldn't even see her pussy hair. By then he was shaking and sweating and foaming at the mouth, making a humming sound that just went on and on. After that, he fell down on his belly and she yanked it out. He stayed where he was while she wiped the end of the cock on the grass after she took it off, and he just stayed there on his belly, drawing in great big gasps of air. She got back down on her knees and patted him on the back and I wondered what was wrong with him, why he was jerking around so strangely before I realized he was crying. She spoke so low and sweet that I couldn't hear a word but the tone of her voice sounded soothing and comforting. After a while he flopped over on his back and looked at her. Tears were running down his face. She kissed him and he put his arms around her and begged her to promise she'd stay with him forever, and she did. After a little longer he stood up and put his pants back on and left. She went back in the house and didn't come out. I climbed down from the tree and went on down to the company where my father worked so I could ride home with him.
A glance at James' cock inside his pants told me that even though he was emotionally aroused by the story he'd just told me, he was not physically turned on. "Now let's get this straight," I said. "This is a scene that you actually saw take place, not something you dreamed up."
"Oh, no. I saw it. Matter of fact, I saw it happen again one time."
"Why do you think you go back to this in your mind so often?"
"Because it gets me hot, Listen', Connie, I've told you that just because I don't get a hard-on, it doesn't follow that I'm not hot as a firecracker. It seems to me that my brain just doesn't get the signal through to my cock."
"All this time, James, you've never once told me about fantasizing a scene with the woman, Rhonda. Don't you think that's a little strange?"
"Oh, I'm sure I did. Even now, I'd still like a chance to prong that woman."
"But you don't continue on with the event and fantasize that you fuck the woman. Therefore you don't fantasize. At least not that I know of. Every time I ask you to tell me your favorite fantasy, you speak about those fires and then you tell me about Rhonda and her husband. You refer to an actual event. When I ask you to tell me other fantasies, you relate other factual events."
"Well, maybe I just don't have enough imagination to dream something up."
"Certainly you do. There's nothing wrong with your imagination." I leaned closer and was rewarded by a corresponding movement of James' body. He moved away from me and I was reasonably sure that he sensed I was getting close to a truth about himself that he had not as yet been able to verbalize. In fact, he might honestly have been un aware of the undercurrent that kept recurring as he talked to me. I was trained to be on the look-out for all the signs that should point to hidden desires and until that very day I hadn't seen it, so I could well understand that James had no way of knowing what he really wanted. Again I asked him if he thought he could fuck Rhonda if she walked into the room stark naked, ready and willing.
"No, of course not. Not without the' roar of an inferno, smoke, flames, the shrill scream of the fire engines. I couldn't fuck anybody without that. You know that, Connie."
"I'm not so sure," I argued. "In fact, I think you're going to have to prove it."
He gave me a startled look. "I don't get you. You know everything there is to know about me. Look how many times you've tried to help me get an erection. You're far more exciting than Rhonda was, Connie. Much more beautiful, and you're intelligent and talented, too. If anybody could help me get over this sick need to set a fire before I can fuck, you could-but no matter how patient you are with me, no matter what you do, it doesn't work."
"That's because I haven't done the right thing."
The thing that had clicked into my mind at the beginning of the session was the idea that James didn't want to be rid of his need to set fires before he could enjoy sex.
Just to reinforce my insight, I gave James a verbal test, Smiling, I said, "What if I told you that within ten minutes you'll have a king-sized hard-on?"
He turned pale, but he controlled his voice. Only a nervous gulping of his Adam's apple showed the very real terror he felt at the idea of being a clinically normal human being who didn't have to go to the trouble of setting a fire and risking jail to get an erection. "I'd say you were dead wrong."
I was confident, "You stay right there, James," I said softly.
"What are you going to do?"
"You'll see. Just stay there. Don't move. I'll be right back."
I dashed out of the office bedroom and into the bath, where I kept a small supply of useful objects. When I returned I instructed James to take off his clothes.
"I tell you, Connie, it's no use. Look, I don't think I'm going to continue therapy." He looked close to panic and I appreciated his finely tuned sense that he was about to have his covers pulled off. He took several steps toward the door, but I beat him to it by running over and locking it, I stooped down and slipped the key underneath, so it was on the office side. While I was doing it, I kept the object I carried hidden behind me, because I didn't want him to know exactly what I was going to do until I had him in the proper position to do it.
"On the bed, James," I said quietly. He swore at me, called me a cunt, a filthy whore, a slut, a fucking bitch and several other choice names because I had put the key out of his reach. But he took off his clothes and sat on the edge of the bed with a resigned look on his face, his body apathetic.
"On your belly, James."
"You'll never give up, will you?" He flopped over, and I nailed him with the vaseline-smeared dildo, right in the anus. Helpless, impaled upon the seven-inch artificial cock, James had to take it because I sat on the back of his thighs and jammed my elbow against the small of his back. Seconds later I demanded that he raise himself up on his knees so he could get the full effect of the dildo.
He was crying and bleating for me to stop, but he was also too weak with passion to argue. He had a giant erection, fully visible in the mirror across from the bed. Every time James banged his ass backwards in order to get the full benefit of the life-like cock that I was using with the velocity of an electric jackhammer, his bludgeoning cock became harder and redder and more eager to come.
It took some doing, but I managed to shove the dildo in to the hilt, then quickly position myself under my patient, Swiftly I plunged his driving cock into my vagina with my hand while I wrapped a leg around his ass to keep the dildo from plopping out. My maneuvering was fancy. I had to keep my mind on what I was doing which meant manipulating the dildo with the inside of my left knee, hump madly to meet each thrust of James' cock, and remember to shove the dildo in each time he shoved his cock in me.
Unlike the heady passion that came involuntarily with Tim during my last session, I had no trouble with a betraying sexual response of my own. James' rhythm increased. He was a raging, bucking, thrusting organism of desire. The only fire in the vicinity was in his loins, and the only way it could be quenched was in his orgasm.
It came in a gigantic spurt that I felt deep inside me. Again and again his sperm shot deep inside my vagina and instead of the anxious mouthings he'd been using before to protest my action, he roared with appreciation and gratitude.
He was soaked with sweat and completely relaxed as he lay against me, his heart thudding and his body twitching. I caressed his back and shoulders and spoke to him in a reassuring tone. "You've held this fear of being found out deep inside for too long, James. You were willing to' substitute one kind of abnormality for another because you convinced yourself it was more acceptable to be a fire-bug than a homosexual. Well, you're no homosexual. Your notions of sexuality became confused, that's all. It was platinum-blonde Rhonda that you wanted, and you were aroused by her sensuous body. You were even more turned on when she fondled her breasts and brought herself to orgasm. Initially Rhonda was the one you wanted. You wanted to grow up and become a man like her husband. You said he had a reputation for being quite a stud around town, remember?"
"Kids don't know all there is to know about sex. You were quite young and unsure about exactly how men and women go about making love. Instinctively, you wanted her to, in your words, fuck him or something. Apparently something was wrong with him. Other times when you've told this story you didn't mention anything about his penis except once. Then you said it remained flaccid, soft. Today you described it before she used the dildo on him, but I remember when you said it never did get hard. There you have it. A part of you continued to operate at the emotional age you were when you saw the couple together. Many of your non-fire-oriented fantasies have to do with the fabulous blonde Rhonda and her husband, the man you had a secret desire to imitate. You wanted her to use the thing on you. You kept this desire secret even from yourself, James. But now you understand. I think a few more therapy sessions will be enough to prove to you that you don't have to have a dildo shoved up your ass to enjoy sex. You had an enormous hard-on. You'll learn you didn't really have to set fires, either. You like sex for the sake of sex, and it won't take you long to understand it on the unconscious level."
"I already do," he said quietly. "Even though I don't quite understand myself, I believe you know what you're talking about. I think this time we broke the barrier." He grinned. "In more ways than one.
While we talked, I was combing my hair and getting ready for my next appointment. It was with Anne and Kurt, who still had a long way to go. Gerald and I had a little something extra-special planned for them, but I eased James out of the office bedroom gracefully, using the extra key I had hidden between the mattress and box-springs of the bed. I was confident that James wouldn't consider breaking his next appointment.
CHAPTER NINE
Gerald met me in the hall and mentioned something about the lime sherbet douche I use. Anne and Kurt were late, and I was glad to have a five-minute break for coffee, when I finally managed to telephone Tod. His secretary put him on rather reluctantly, I thought, but he sounded pleased enough to talk to me. I reminded him that I would be late that night because of classes and he suggested the Red Room for dinner. Then he said I sounded tired. "A hard day," I said wryly. Gerald gave me a lewd grin. When I hung up, he asked me if I had ever told Tod that I'm a sex surrogate. I said no, but I had a day marked on my calendar when I would. "Right after the holidays, unless the ideal moment happens to come before then."
"If you were in therapy, I'm sure your therapist would tell you-"
I broke in and said the words right along with him. "I'm not being honest, that I'm behaving in a typically self-protective fashion by putting the thing off." We laughed at our duet, then I said defensively, "But Gerald, I don't want to spoil Christmas and New Year's for us."
"You're not sure of him, or yourself," he said.
I thought about that, "No, I don't think anybody is ever sure of anyone. I don't know how he's going to take it when he learns the truth about my job and I don't want to risk losing him. He means a lot to me."
"But you don't want to get married."
"Of course not. Marriage isn't the answer for me. That license people get gives too many people the idea it's a license to behave disagreeably. Including me, I'm sure. I'd rather go on being Tod's lover and having him for mine."
"Anne and Kurt appear to bear your theory out. Look at them. They've probably been very disagreeable to each other."
I looked at the couple and paid particular attention to their expressions. She had a long-suffering look of patience tried beyond reason, and he was obviously angry. "Damn. The last time they were here, I thought we were getting someplace with them."
"Maybe they're keeping something from us. Maybe they have to fight in order to fuck."
I doubted it and said so, even though I realize there are many couples who can't get it on without a big fight beforehand. It was my belief that Anne and Kurt had a troubled marriage from the very beginning. Not only that, I suspected the basic problem that threatened the marriage was not sexual, but I had no proof to back up my gut feeling. Therefore I had to go along with Gerald, who took his cue from Doctors Patterson and Regelle. It was a situation of three professional opinions against one, and my own feelings lacked the strength of my two superiors and co-worker. Doctor Patterson was the undisputed head of the institute and her qualifications were enough to make most of the best psychiatrists stand in awe. Regelle's degrees were almost equally impressive and Gerald already had finished medical school and was well on his way to becoming a psychiatrist, while I was a lowly psychology student, forty hours away from getting my degree. Worse, both Anne and Kurt agreed with the majority. They remembered happier days in their marriage and since their sex life had deteriorated they blamed the rocky situation on the lack of sexual compatibility-which was why they'd come to People, Incorporated in the first place.
For today's session, Gerald and I planned another circus. It would be similar to the one we'd done before, but more sexually explicit, I objected to using the word circus in connection with our work because I had done a paper on the personality of performers in erotica and since the girlie shows complete with sexual acts including all kinds of far-out sex acts are referred to as circuses, I felt we were cheapening the serious work we were doing by using prostitute terminology. Gerald disagreed with me and so did the heads of People, Incorporated. I was told that I was too hung up on words. I replied that I didn't object to four-letter words but I did object to placing myself in the same category as a prostitute-and neither my two superiors nor Gerald could come up with a convincing argument for that. Even so, the sexual intercourse that Gerald and I did for the benefit of Anne and Kurt was still referred to as a circus inside the institute.
The therapy worked for many couples who were having a difficult time adjusting to one another. Usually this is be cause the man and woman are lacking in sex education. Parents, teachers and doctors often work hard at going all the way around the barn when they're trying to tell young people about sex.
There's also the religious element involved in human sexual response. Young people are taught that sex is not nice and completely out of the question until marriage makes it legal to fuck. Even after marriage, most of the religious denominations manage to impress upon the young people that sex is a necessary evil, something to be tolerated only for the purpose of procreation and not to be enjoyed because the lusts of the flesh are an inheritance from Satan.
Scotty and Wilhelmina are another couple who have been coming for therapy for a long time and Scotty's concept of sexuality occurs too often in our society. He was born in a New England state, one of eleven children. His family went to Mass faithfully and going to confession was as natural to Scotty as sitting down to the family dinner table. Prompted by the Priest to confess all carnal thoughts, Scotty as a young lad was hard-pressed to come up with any until he was told exactly what carnal thoughts were. Yes, he admitted when he understood the sinfulness of his instincts, he'd done wrong. He'd looked at his younger sister when she was naked, and yes, he'd once touched his older sister's breast, Sternly, the Priest informed Scotty that he was in danger of being lost to the good life forever, for to look up the naked flesh of his sister was a terrible sin but to touch the breast of any woman was worse. Scotty had seen his father touch his mother's breast on one or two occasions. Since he liked his father very much, he began to worry about his being condemned to everlasting purgatory. He also liked his mother, and when he heard sounds of pleasure coming from his parents' room in the dark of night, he put two and two together and came up with the most terrible sin of them all ... intercourse for pleasure. Because Scotty was no dumb-dumb, and when he heard his father mention something about hoping the time of the month was right because they couldn't afford another child, he knew for sure that his parents were enjoying sex. He became introverted and morose, but his parents felt he was just "going through a stage" and figured he'd be all right when he was a little older. Instead of going back to normal, Scotty became even quieter. He lost weight and began to actu neurotic, jumping at the sound of the telephone, turning pale when someone knocked on the door and unable to sleep at night. His grades suffered so much that he was held back in the eighth grade and his parents scolded while his siblings made fun of him. Scotty was the first of the family's children to fail a grade. Finally, his father called him in to the living room to have a little talk. In his kindly way, he said, "Son, you aren't acting right. Tell me what's on your mind and maybe I can help."
Scotty couldn't tell his father what was on his mind because his father was involved in it.
He couldn't say, "Dad, the Church tells us it's a sin to fuck unless you want to make a baby, but you and Mom fuck every night except during the dangerous time of the month. I know you do, because your bedroom is right next to where I sleep with Eddie and Baby Louis. They sleep sound, but I don't, and I hear you and Mom carrying on all the time. Worse than that, I've been a bad, wicked, sinful person. I looked at Geraldine when she didn't have any clothes on and once when Frannie was close to me I pinched her tit. The Father told me if I didn't stop it after I confessed and he forgave me that I'd be condemned to purgatory along with you and Mom, but I can't help it. No matter how hard I pray for deliverance, my penis still gets hard and the first thing you know, there I am jerking it off again." No, he couldn't say that, so he told his dad he was worried about his grades, about failing the eighth year. His father reassured him to the best of his ability by talking about famous men who had gone down in history even though they'd been held back a grade or two.
Scotty's hectic, guilt-infested life went on. Every morning he awakened with an erection. Since he felt so good when he skinned the flap back and masturbated, he usually did it, but after it was over he was mired in shame, overcome with fear of Godly retribution. He was fascinated with girls and with each passing year he grew even more infatuated with the opposite sex. He kept confessing his lewd and lascivious thoughts to the Priest, who kept warning him to think clean thoughts or suffer the consequences. For every clean thought he had, twenty dirty ones came crawling into his mind. He began seeing himself in all kinds of sexual positions with all kinds of girls and he couldn't shut away the sexy fantasies. Within ten minutes of a living nightmare he'd imagine himself fucking fifty women, including a Sister who taught at his parochial school, two of his more seductive sisters, the girl next door, the librarian, grocery clerk, postal clerk, even the lady who played the organ at the local roller rink. Then he'd have a hard on and have to do something about it in order to keep his mother from noticing.
One summer a cousin named Bernadette came to visit. Scotty fell in love. Bernadette was fourteen and Scotty was fifteen. Until then, he'd managed to keep his hands off girls except for one horrendous autumn day when he'd succumbed to playing doctor. Scotty was busily inserting a wooden stick in the girl's tight little anus when her mother came unexpectedly under the trailing arbutus arbor where doctor and patient had felt safe to play their game. With his shaking hand still in the process of shoving the play thermometer up little Alice's ass, his penis out of his pants and his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth, Scotty yanked the stick out and got to his feet, A spray of white sticky stuff landed on little Alice's milk-white belly and a couple of drops squirted on her mother's ankles before the older woman grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and booted him across the fence. As if that weren't bad enough, she vaulted the fence in hot pursuit, where she shook Scotty until his teeth rattled. Then she said, "Young man, I'm going to make you pay dearly for this!"
Raging and screaming, the woman ran into the house and told Scotty's mother all about her nasty-minded son who had been in the pervert act of ramming a stick up sweet little Alice's ass. "Ruined! I'm sure he ruined my daughter," she yelled as she waved her arms around and kept fixing her wrathful eye on Scotty's pale and guilty face. "And he was the very one that started it, too. Why, my girl was down on her back just as helpless as she could be and she wouldn't think of doing such a thing if it wasn't for that little devil."
"Yes she did," Scotty said quickly. "It was her-"
"Don't you go trying to blame it on my little girl, you horrid, mean, ugly boy!" The woman stuck her head through the kitchen window and screamed for her child, who came running tearfully and blamed everything on Scotty.
"He made me do it, Tripped me and got me down, then he pulled off my panties, Mama!"
So Scotty was taken out to the garage by his father when he returned that night from work and severely strapped with the belt, Which he remembered quite well when Bernadette asked him to walk out to the country with her. He asked two of his sisters to go along, but they both said it was too hot, All Scotty intended to do was take Bernadette to a farmhouse and show her the horses, cow and pigs. But then he saw the wallow where the hogs had been rooting and his artistic nature beat down his good intentions. Taking a pointed stick, he drew pictures of pussies and penises on the smooth floor of the hog pen. Then he drew a picture of an open pussy receiving a long hard cock and his artistic talent was so pronounced that he even drew hair in the proper places and droplets of semen oozing out from around the vaginal opening. Bernadette ran to the farmer's wife after Scotty printed her name under the pussy and his own name under the cock. She told, and Scotty was in for another belting.
A few incidents like that, and Scotty's sexual ambitions were carefully hidden away from that moment on until he was safely married-except for one other time. He made one abortive attempt at screwing a prostitute on the night he was graduated from high school, but his penis had been denied so long that it refused to cooperate. Then Scotty met Wilhelmina and fell headlong in love with her. Legally married, he was sure he'd have no trouble with his penis. After all, he reasoned, his mother and father enjoyed sex even if they didn't want to make a baby, so since they were good people and he was their son, he felt it would do no harm for him to do the same. He'd learned a little about life by then, and the true actions of human beings concerning sex regardless of the lip-service they paid.
But Scotty's marriage was not one long idyllic fuck-fest. To his chagrin, he found that he couldn't function sexually except during Wilhelmina's fertile period. Wilhelmina, who had few sexual hang-ups, wanted to fuck every night. Four months of therapy, and Scotty was relieved of his sexual repression because his problem definitely was of a sexual nature.
While we were heading toward the reception room where the couple waited, I repeated my doubts to Gerald.
Gerald shook his head. "You know good and well that most marital problems are related to either sex or money. Anne and Kurt have no financial worries. They've already told us they find it difficult to come right out and tell each other what they want when it comes to sex. I don't see why you're so stubborn, Connie. Let's just go in there and fuck for them."
We used a tape sometimes, with Doctor Patterson's cool voice explaining what we were doing. Gerald didn't like the tapes because he often had ideas of his own and as long as the tape played we had to act out the particular kind of sex that was being described. For my part I preferred the tape, because it lent a certain air of dignity to what we were doing.
The last time Anne and Kurt were in, Gerald and I acted out the more usual positions. This was because Kurt complained that Anne never seemed to want to try anything different, Anne disagreed with him in theory, but she came across to both Gerald and me as a person with very rigid ideas about everything, including sex. "Kurt isn't telling it the way it is," she'd said. "I never refuse him when he wants to do something in bed that I don't know about, It's just that he doesn't feel right about asking me to do something he thinks might upset me."
"I'm not afraid it'll upset her," said Kurt, "I know it will. She doesn't have to tell me in so many words that it displeases her when I want to-for instance, have her on top. Tell the truth, Anne, that's what we're here for, that's why we're spending all this money. Tell Connie and Gerald how you reacted to being on top of me."
Anne turned her hands over, palms up. She smiled sweetly as she spoke in a clear, unemotional voice. "Well, it was just that I always thought people were supposed to do it with the man on top."
One of us explained to Anne that there was no stereotyped position that as considered more proper than another. Kurt became indignant. "That's exactly what I tried to tell her, but she wouldn't believe me. Tell them what else you said, Anne."
Anne lowered her eyes and a flush crept onto her cheeks. "Well, I know better now, but in the beginning I guess I made a mistake. I told Kurt it made me feel funny to be on top of him because it made me think he might be-kind of feminine."
Kurt exploded. "That's not what you said and you know it! You said you couldn't bear to do it that way because you kept thinking I was queer!"
Anne's reserve broke a little. Turning on her husband, she said, "I wasn't the one Who kept insisting! It was you! And why wouldn't I think you were queer when you never did want to have intercourse like normal people? Not after we were married. Before we got married you always screwed me! I don't like to have to screw a man!" She'd been close to tears, but when Kurt explained that he'd wanted to have her on top because he was afraid of crushing her, she settled down.
Gerald asked Anne and Kurt to come up close and watch us. We've found that seeing a couple in the act of performing a certain position is far more enlightening than simply hearing or reading about it, Kurt came to the bed where Gerald and I were in the process of getting into the woman-dominant position, but Anne hung back. She looked sullen, and her face was aflame. I coaxed her and her husband reminded her angrily that they were spending good money. She finally stepped to the side of the bed, but it was easy to see she'd rather be any place else than there. While Doctor Patterson's voice on tape explained exactly what was taking place, Gerald and I went through the motions. I held my body high and away from Gerald's penis and asked Anne to put her finger on my clit, to let it ride along with me until I had reached the point where I had all of Gerald's considerable penis inside me. She did, but her face registered disgust at what she was doing. When I automatically pried my thighs down and around, she drew her fingers away and wiped them on the tissue she had clutched in her right hand.
After we had worked for about five minutes on the woman-dominant position, we went into four other postures, including digital clitoral manipulation during the woman-passive, man-dominant position. Anne's face stopped showing disapproval but she still didn't look happy. After Doctor Patterson's voice had explained that digital manipulation of the clitoris is sometimes necessary to help the woman reach orgasm, especially if the man feels himself about to climax and he knows his partner hasn't, Anne whimpered. When I asked what was bothering her, she said, "But it all ought to be natural. Doing something to my clitoris while he's balling me isn't natural."
The session had been difficult, but Anne and Kurt had left a lot happier than when they came in. They were even more obviously hostile now, up close, than they'd appeared when Gerald and I watched them enter the reception room.
After we were seated in my outer office, Kurt spoke in a sad voice. "This is going to be our last session. We wouldn't even be here now if we hadn't already paid for it. Anne and I have decided to get a divorce."
"I'm sorry," I said quickly. Gerald made the proper gestures and said the right words too.
"We're just never going to get along when it comes to sex," Anne said bitterly. "Take this morning, for instance. There I was sound asleep at four-thirty in the morning, and Kurt woke me up with that thing of his prodding me in the back. I don't like sex in the morning."
"Shit, baby, admit it-you don't like it any time," Kurt said.
"Not with you," snapped Anne. "You're so thoughtless. Nobody but an inconsiderate dolt would dream of waking a woman out of a sound sleep to have intercourse. I didn't even know you were in bed with me, I was so sound asleep. I like to get out of bed and brush my teeth and wash my face before I'm ready to get close to somebody. I don't think it's fair of a man to expect his wife to indulge his every whim."
"Little whim, my ass," Kurt raged. "Last week after we left here, we went home and fucked." He was no longer looking at his wife but gestured toward her as he spoke. "So what does Anne do? She very obediently gets on top of me and gives me this patient look. Then she consents to let me fuck up into her while she sits on me, all the time with a pitying kind of look in her eyes and all the time drawing these deep breaths. Long, aching sighs that let me know how glad she'd be when it was over. So I thought, what the hell. I turned her over on her back and started pronging her that way. She's never been all that agreeable about giving me a little tail, but at least she didn't put up too much fuss when we did it her way. So I remembered the session-I mean what we learned about manipulating her clit, and what does she do? She slaps my hand."
"Well, I didn't feel like having myself poked and prodded. Your penis was more than enough!" Anne's face was beet red. I realized that the flush I had taken for embarrassment was anger. She stood up and attacked her husband with the most vicious tongue I had ever heard in action, yet not once did she use a four-letter word.
"You miserable, selfish, inconsiderate swine! And to think I've wasted all these years with you, hoping you'd grow up enough to stop wanting to satisfy your base sex appetite. I never wanted anything to do with you physically. I wanted companionship, a man to take me places and a man to be there because I've never wanted to grow old alone. I put up with your nasty demands and selfish attitudes and hoped and prayed you'd change. I kept thinking if I kept the house clean and cooked good, nutritious meals you'd get over thinking about sex all the time, but no, I was mistaken. My mother was right, The man doesn't live who wants to do right, and for my part, the sooner you're dead, the better!"
In the midst of failure, I knew a small sense of pride. I had been right about the couple, but only half right. I'd thought their basic problem had more to do with personality conflicts than sexual difficulties and now that Anne was letting it all out I understood she was a woman with a decided neurosis and the sexual problem was just another symptom. She continued to harangue her husband for several minutes longer, and every word she spoke eloquently of her deep hatred for men in general. She'd reached the point where psychotics often continue unabated, relating the deepest secrets of a warped psyche.
My elation over my insight wasn't of long duration. My sympathy was for Kurt, who remained a gentleman. I admired him. In his place, I might have at least told the woman to control herself and probably risked a short slap to her face. All he said after his wife finally slowed down to a quiet scream was, "So therapy doesn't always put a couple back together. You wanted a meal ticket. You know, I should have realized there was something odd about you right from the start."
"When I wasn't always panting after your ugly body?" Anne's voice again rose an octave.
"No, not at all. When you refused to try a new recipe, a different vegetable or even go to a movie theater we'd never been to before. I remember what your answer always was-Mama never used anything but the Woman's Home Companion Coolj Book. Mama never served that kind of food. Mama never went anywhere but the 20th Century Fox. Mama's ass. I remember how livid you got when Tasked you to stop talking about your goddamned Mama all the time and you stopped, but you still kept thinking about her-and her sick notions about sex."
Kurt had common sense as well as the ability to keep his cool. Anne finally dashed madly out of the office, slamming the door behind her like a child in a temper tantrum-which was exactly what she was. Although Kurt's words smacked of pop psychology, Gerald and I assured him after his wife left that he was absolutely right, "But I couldn't see the forest for the trees," he said. "I suppose a person gets used to certain discomforts and pretty soon the upsets and discomforts become a way of life."
My desk telephone rang and I picked it up automatically. All the blood drained from my face when Leslie the receptionist announced that Tod was waiting to see me. During all the time we'd been living together he'd never come to the institute. I said I'd be right out and tried to calm myself by making myself believe Tod's unaccustomed appearance meant nothing in particular. After all, I had been in his office a couple of times. Maybe he'd tried to get in touch with me by telephone but I had been in session. Maybe something important had come up and he wasn't able to keep the dinner engagement-he'd just stopped by to let me know. Nobody was going to tell him I was inside my office bedroom fucking patients. I knew I was making a mountain out of a molehill, but I was very shaken as I walked down the hall toward the reception room.
CHAPTER TEN
Everything I had speculated concerning Tod's unusual appearance was true, as it turned out. He'd tried to reach me by phone, but Leslie told him I was with a patient and he knew the rules. No telephone calls are allowed to interrupt therapy. Something important had come up. His sister was in town from California, and instead of wanting to meet me at the Red Room after my classes he thought it would be nice if' we went to Mama Leone's. Certainly nobody at the institute would have been so gross or unethical as to explain just what I was doing with the patients. My world would have been unshaken if Anne had not continued her tirade after she left my office. Of course I didn't know everything that happened the moment I saw Tod. All I saw was a baffled expression on his face and a kind of vulnerability to his mouth that hadn't been there before. When he spoke, his voice sounded very cold, as if he might be talking to a stranger. "Sorry to disturb you."
"That's all right, I don't have another appointment for a few minutes. Come into my office?"
"Sure."
We walked down the hall and my heart felt cold and ached, for I knew how much Tod meant to me. It had been less than twenty-four hours when I'd had that same feeling-that my world would not be complete without Tod. When people have lived together, whether married or as lovers, something takes place that's invisible, intangible, but very powerful. Our relationship was better than anything I'd ever dreamed about. We'd had a magic wonder, a delighted acceptance, an open, honest way of living together and understanding-except in the one area I had held back. Long before we stepped into my office I was afraid I'd blown it for good.
Instinctively I took the psychological advantage of placing the desk between Tod and me. Doctors, lawyers, judges have always known the effectiveness of a barrier during a stressful situation. I borrowed another idea from the people who go into a profession that creates an instant captive audience. I grabbed the conversational ball. "It was my intention to tell you myself, Tod. In fact, just this morning I marked a date on my calendar."
"Sure, Connie," he answered as he seated himself across from me. Suddenly, our roles reversed. Regardless of the fact that I was in my own office, Tod had the advantage. It was almost as though he had usurped my office, my desk, and changed things around to place me in the chair where clients usually sit, He's much taller than I, but he's also a very forceful personality. Just by saying those two words in that dry, unbelieving way, he let me know he was not impressed.
I responded with unprofessional defensiveness. "I swear I had a date planned to tell you. And I would have told you sooner if-" I hesitated, searching for words that would say what I meant without sounding childish. "
"If you found the opportune moment." His words stung as he finished my sentence.
"Look, I don't care to be verbally sandbagged. I'll remind you I'm not a defendant in a murder trial."
He smiled, but there wasn't a spark of humor in it, "We had a good thing going. I thought we'd been honest with each other."
I told him truthfully how I felt that first night, "If I had known how things were going to work out for us, I would have told you then. But I had no way of knowing any more than you did and it isn't my habit to go around telling every new acquaintance exactly what I do for a living."
"You're ashamed of being a sex surrogate, I take it,"
"No, I'm not ashamed! I'm very proud of the work we do here and I feel good about my job. People with sexual dysfunctions need help just as desperately as people who have other physiological or psychological problems. When I can see with my own eyes that I've been instrumental in ridding someone of a dysfunction so grave it's nearly impossible for him to cope with life, I'm extremely happy about it. Still, I wouldn't want to put myself in the category of those who go around talking about what they do when it's sexually oriented, just for shock value."
"Okay, I'll buy that, But we've been together for quite some time. Surely you knew me well enough to tell me within a week or two. Especially since we went to great lengths to make sure we both understood we didn't want any absurd game-playing. I remember distinctly the night we sat down and talked about the possibility of your getting interested in another man or my getting interested in another woman. We agreed we'd be adult enough to level with each other. We said we'd have an open relationship. We both admitted that we wouldn't like the idea of the other one playing around on the side, but we didn't want to make any promises. We felt we owed it to each other to be truthful. You stressed how humiliated you felt-how put down you were when you found our your former husband was playing around with another woman, remember?" He was speaking in a cold, clipped voice and looked at me without a shred of emotion.
"I can understand why you're angry, but I wish you'd look at the situation from my point of view. We don't have many hours to spend together and we're always totally involved. It's just that I could never bring myself to spoil the magic of the moment."
"I'm not angry," he yelled. "I feel betrayed."
"We're not married," I stormed. "And whether you think you're angry or not, you're behaving as though you are. If I've crushed you so terribly, just leave! Go home and get your things and move out!
Besides, working as a sex surrogate isn't the same as getting emotionally involved with another man!"
"No, of course not," He shot me a bitter look. "You aren't involved with just one other man, you've taken on an army!"
"Bullshit! I don't take them on the way a prostitute takes them on and get that straight. I don't turn tricks, Tod. It's a job. A profession, and one I happen to find very interesting as well as fulfilling.
"But you should have told me about it! I can understand your reasons for doing it, but can you imagine how I felt when that crazy woman came careening down the hall and crashed into me?"
I experienced a mental picture of Anne. The distraught way she looked when she left, the vitriolic words she used, her scathing tone of voice. "She's a patient, What did she say to you?"
"Oh, just that People, Incorporated is nothing but a medically approved and legally accepted whorehouse. That all the people on the staff are so wrapped up in sex that they feel any problem can be solved by learning how to screw better. That Connie Rogers is in the same category as a street hooker, and she's going to blow this place wide open-go to the newspapers, the police, the T.V. and radio stations. Male whores and female whores all over the place-Connie Rogers and Gerald Peyton undressing and parading their sexuality around in front of honest people who were tricked into paying gobs of money for the privilege of looking at Connie's big obscene tits and Gerald's oversized penis. She just mentioned a few little gems like that, Leslie tried to calm the woman down, and after a while Doctor Regelle came out of his office and the crazy lady screamed a few choice remarks at him.
"It took less than two minutes for it to sink in, Connie. When the wild woman first started screaming and yelling I told myself she was just a sick patient, maybe somebody who was going to have to be put in a mental hospital for a while. Emotionally ill people do get carried away sometimes and make up stories. I've had to work with a few of them in my own field, and this is what I kept telling myself and hoped was the case. Then, after things had calmed down a little, Leslie offered me a Coke. And she said sex surrogates have a rough time of it now and then. I suppose she was making conversation, but she mentioned something about how lucky you were to have me because I'm understanding. Then she said she doubted if you carried the problems of your work home with you because you're such a level-headed, contained person and she envied you. Hell, I'm not a psychologist, but I certainly know what a sex surrogate is!"
"So we're through, I take it." My pride was doing the talking. I didn't want us to be through, but when it came down to it, losing a lover was similar to losing a job. I preferred to be the one to say it first.
Tod lit a cigarette. "I don't know. I didn't say it, you did. I'd rather talk about the situation a while. Unless you have someone waiting to fuck you, of course."
"As a matter-of-fact, I don't, I had a cancellation at the last moment. But I think it's pointless to talk if you're going to imply men are standing in line waiting to fuck me like I'm some hooker. Will you get it through your head these people are patients?"
He gave me a real smile. "Forgive me. Let's say I'm still in a state of shock. Trouble is, I love you, Connie."
"Trouble is, I love you, Tod."
"I'd thought maybe we might go on as we are for a couple more years to make sure we have the real thing going and then-" His smile turned inward. "Oh, what the hell! I like you, too. You're such a damned good companion and you're fun to be with, intelligent, a great conversationalist, and you're so beautiful sometimes I can't believe it, I know we talked about never mentioning marriage, but I've thought about it a couple of times."
"So have I." I felt like crying. "And you-you're all those things to me, too."
"Would you quit your job if-I asked you to?" His eyes were hopeful, his question a shocker.
"I don't know. I'll have to think about it. Of course you realize I'll soon have my degree and open my own office. I don't know whether I'd quit now if you asked me to, or not. You put me on the spot, Tod."
"You put me on the spot, Connie. Oh, by the way, I didn't let Leslie know your-ah-specific kind of therapy came as a surprise to me."
I was grateful for that. He said something about my classes. I said I'd skip them and make them up if he wanted to talk. Then I wondered out loud what he intended to do about his sister and the dinner engagement. He said he didn't want to change anything. "You'll like Maryanne. She's a nice person, having problems with her marriage. She flew here on the spur of the moment to talk to me because she's contemplating divorce and wanted some advice before she made a decision." He said he didn't feel comfortable in my office and asked if I'd just as soon go home and talk. That way we could dress for dinner and take our time about it, settle down with a drink and come to a conclusion about whether we were going to stay together or go our separate ways.
If someone had entered the apartment before we arrived and planted' a tape recorder, nobody would ever believe from our conversation that we were two adults, both with better than average educations and both possessed with high intellects. Nor would anybody believe the man in the dialogue was an affluent, highly successful attorney and the woman a normally poised, confident student psychologist.
We both wanted to keep on living together and we'd finally admitted that we'd thought about getting married in the future. But the odds seemed stacked against our even maintaining a speaking relationship.
Tod said he wondered if every time we fucked I compared him with my patients. He asked about the size of the men's cocks, if they could satisfy me as well as he could. He wanted to know if I had learned anything new-any especially arousing positions he didn't know about. If I were sure I felt impersonal about every one of the men I had been with. He couldn't believe I could remain une motional, that I didn't respond to men I had intercourse with, patients or not. "God damn it," he said at one point, "you can't sit there and tell me you don't get excited when you've got a cock banging in there. You're too damned passionate for that kind of aloofness, and I don't buy it."
He said a lot of other things, and kept insisting that I stop working at People, Incorporated, something he'd mentioned in a roundabout way when we were at the office.
I continued to be on the defensive, even though I knew I was going about the confrontation wrong. Professionally, I'm sure of myself because I know I have an affinity for working with people who have psychological problems. When it comes to my own emotions and behavior, I'm at a loss. Doctors should never try to treat their own diseases and psychologists should never try to give themselves counseling. They're in the same category with accountants who can't keep their checkbooks straight even though they can keep an enormous organization on an even financial keel and balance the company's records. I screamed defiantly at times, and other times I broke into uncontrollable sobs. When I wasn't doing that, I came off like a fifteen-year-old girl who has been caught meeting her boyfriend instead of going to the library where her mother expected her to be. When Tod kept accusing me of being incapable of maintaining my sexual cool with a patient, I remembered in an intermingled red blaze of shame and fury that I had let myself respond that very afternoon with Tim. I almost confessed it, but bit my tongue in time to keep the words back. By the time we were dressed for dinner and left the apartment to meet Tod's sister, we were no closer to reaching an understanding than we'd been when Tod first learned I was a sex surrogate. He promised he'd forget the past if I'd just stop working at People, Incorporated. I said I didn't think anybody could ever forget the past and anyway, he had no right to ask me to quit my job. He wanted me and I wanted him, but the chasm between us was too deep to cross.
On the way across town we agreed to keep our troubles to ourselves because nothing would be gained by burdening Maryanne, who had enough worries of her own. So we behaved normally, which meant Tod went back to his usual style of thoughtful courtesy, and he even touched my bare shoulders in a lingering caress when he helped me off with my cape. I felt a soul-shattering pang when I realized how barren life would be without him, which was probably the motivating factor behind the gentle touch of my hand on his cock when we were seated at the table and nobody could see what I was doing under the tablecloth.
Maryanne rehashed the final quarrel with her husband through most of dinner, but she did it with the same kind of grace and elan Tod might have had under similar circumstances. I could easily see that Tod's fabulous sense of humor as well as his great intelligence was a family trait.
Over dessert, Tod looked at his lovely sister and said, "So you want my advice. Otherwise, you'd never have flown several thousand miles to spend a few hours with me."
"Well, I gave you some good pointers when you asked me," Maryanne answered. "I told you your marriage didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell and never had. You were worried about April and what the divorce might do to her, understandably enough. I told you the way your marriage was not working out would have a far more negative effect on your daughter than a good clean break, and I was right, April's fine, isn't she?"
I think I deserved an award for composure. Never once had Tod mentioned he had a daughter. I listened to the conversation and learned that April was now eleven years old, that she was no longer taking things that didn't belong to her and hadn't since the breakup of Tod's marriage. Maryanne mentioned something about kids suffering a lot more through a miserable marriage than they did from a final divorce, that April had probably turned to kleptomania out of a need for attention. "Everybody you and Natalie knew kept wondering why you didn't split, Tod. Your daughter was going downtown and stealing because she needed attention, and you and Natalie were too busy fighting to give it to her. I didn't like to come right, out and tell you for God's sake, get a fucking divorce! On the other hand, I couldn't see why you didn't do it years ago. So now you tell me what you think I ought to do."
"Stay with him," said Tod. "Bill isn't a rank-assed bastard, you've just managed to convince yourself he is. You still love him and he still loves you. He called-me this afternoon and told me he loves you more than he did when he asked you to marry him, which means a lot."
"Then why the hell does he keep a woman like that cheap bleached-blonde bitch!"
"Because you've fallen into the same old trap too many wives get into. Husbands do it too. You figured after you had his name on the dotted line you didn't have to be agreeable any more.
Bill told me you've got a thousand excuses to keep from balling, for one thing."
Maryanne spoke through her teeth. "Well, he's not all that great in bed."
Tod gave me a blazing smile before he turned to his sister. "I understand there are places where couples can go where they can learn how to be wonderful sex partners. You might need to take a little brush-up course yourself, Maryanne."
Maryanne said she'd take his advice under consideration. Her return flight to the West Coast was at seven o'clock in the morning, and she'd made arrangements with an old friend on Long Island to spend the night and be taken to the airport. We drove her to Long Island and waited until the friend came to the door and let her in, but on the drive out I got into the conversation and together, Tod and I felt reasonably sure we'd convinced her to go back home and try to make a go of her marriage.
We drove for fifteen minutes in silence, and it was Tod who spoke first. "I feel a cold front coming from your side of the car."
"I don't mean to come on to you like that,"
"But you're sitting way over there."
"We had some problems of our own to resolve, remember?"
"You're not going to say anything about the daughter I didn't mention?"
"No, I'm not,"
"But you're thinking about it."
"Yes. I'm wondering why you didn't mention her."
"Well, April lives with her mother in Connecticut, Her mother has remarried and she's very happy, so April is all right,"
"But you've not seen your daughter during all the time we've been together."
"Yes, I have. I didn't tell you. I never knew exactly how you felt about children, and well, frankly, Connie, the opportunity-"
"I finished his sentence. "The moment just didn't happen to come up. So how come you can understand why your opportune moment just didn't happen to come up but you can't understand why I had to wait for one?"
He looked straight ahead. I was looking at his profile, handsome, lost, withdrawn, but wanting not to be withdrawn or lost. He smiled a little. "I suppose because I thought the subject I withheld was different,"
"It certainly is. A daughter you love, or don't love. When have you visited her, by the way?"
"Every Wednesday afternoon. I didn't lie and say I was going somewhere else, though. I just didn't mention it when I went. And I do love her. What do you mean, it certainly is different? It isn't, not in the long haul. I didn't tell you about something life-and-death important to me because April means just that to me. Life and death. I had these plans, see? I was going to take you to Connecticut, and on the way I was going to tell you about her. She's a lovely little girl, and once she had a great big problem, but she doesn't have the problem any more. I guess I wanted you to love my daughter,. but I couldn't tell you I wanted you to love her. I just wanted it to happen naturally. By the way, Natalie isn't a bitch. She's a very nice woman now that I'm no longer married to her."
"Okay," I said quietly.
There was a long silence. Then I said, "I'm sure I'll love your daughter. I like children very much. That is, I'll love your daughter if I have a chance to meet her."
Tod looked at me. He put his hand on mine where it was resting in my lap. Then he looked back at the white ribbon in the middle of the road that shone up in the darkness.
I spoke again. "Tod, you know you could have warned Maryanne not to mention anything about April and then I'd never have known the difference. At least not until the time was right for you."
He nodded. "I could have, sure. But I didn't, She came unexpectedly. Then I tried to reach you by telephone. You were tied up so I came over. Then that woman-"
I put my other hand over his, a gesture of possessiveness. And I moved over close to him and spoke softly. "You know, Tod, sometimes I think there really is a time for all things. I knew damned well I should have told you about my work this morning. Time had run out, You knew damned well you should have told me about April, too. With your sister in town, time had run out for you, too. But you didn't tell her not to talk about April and I didn't let you know about my job. We can't just forget about it. I can't forget that you didn't tell me about your daughter and you can't forget that I didn't tell you the truth about what I do at People, Incorporated. But I don't think we're in the same place we were before we had dinner with your sister."
"No, I don't either," he said softly. "Right then, it looked as if we couldn't get here from there."
