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From: "Jack C. Lipton" <cupasoup@pele.cx>
Subject: {ASSM} Show And Toil (MF rom preg)
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Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 00:10:04 -0500
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Newsgroups: alt.sex.stories.moderated,alt.sex.stories
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Author: Jack C Lipton
Title: Show and Toil
Universe: Crossings
Keywords: MF cheat
Archive: /~CupaSoup/
RCS: $Id: showAndToil.x,v 1.2 2006/01/10 22:15:18 jcl Exp $


		 Show And Toil

		by Jack C Lipton


Life has a way of changing suddenly.

Or, at least, how you view it.

Mine changed suddenly and I faced a lot of surprises.

_

One of my co-workers is a woman of wonderfully exotic
appearance almost 9 years my junior.  She joined our
department 6 years before this story began.

Her arrival left an indelible mark on me that I had to work
around.

In other words, I fell for her at first sight.

Mind you, I did my best to not act on it.  Not only did I
take my marriage commitments seriously, I was also fairly
certain that my feelings for Amy were not reciprocated, so I
did my best to not expose myself.

I'd had some bad luck in my life;  exposing "that loving
feeling" made rejection painful and humiliating.  Despite
being married I'd never fully recovered from a lot of these
experiences.

Workplace rules aren't helpful either;  there are a lot of
things that cannot be said between co-workers, especially
about sexual issues.  I did my best to *not* antagonize or
otherwise annoy her.  Admittedly I have never been all that
good at political correctness but I have learned some
control over the years.

Despite therapy over the last year, I was still working to
get a grip on my own perceptions of various interactions in
an effort to recognize that I was *not* facing constant
rejection and that I was *not* being looked down upon.
Instead of trying to analyze what someone meant when they
spoke to me, I was paying more attention to my own emotional
responses and making efforts to figure out which responses
were self-destructive.

Y'know, looking at yourself under a microscope isn't always
fun, especially when trying to understand why you react in
negative ways to the seemingly simplest remarks.  Being in
the middle of learning how to evaluate and understand the
genesis of my *own* feelings sometimes made me far more
sensitive to both the positive and negative transactions
from family and my co-workers.

Of more import, and what I was trying to concentrate on, was
_why_ I over-reacted to any even mildly critical comments
and didn't trust anything that sounded even vaguely like
praise.  I'd carried these habits for a long time so my
efforts to recover from them was not going to happen
overnight.

Despite the bouncing of my self-confidence in the middle of
this maelstrom, an in-water boat show was coming to town and
I planned to go see it.  I like sailboats.  I like sailing.
It was one of the few activities in my life where I felt
like I wasn't a "loser".

For me, blowing off a Thursday afternoon was easy to decide
on given how much overtime I'd cranked up already this week.

Now, because of my enthusiasm and the emotional lift, I did
something I'd not normally do:  Try to invite co-workers to
the show.  I want to share what I enjoy.  So, early on this
Thursday morning, as I felt buoyed by enthusiasm over the
show, I sent a co-worker named Amy an instant message:

{
Got enough O/T week stacked up to blow off the afternoon?
There's a boat show down in St Pete.  Wanna go?  I'll drive!
}

All right, my emotional strength was much improved over the
previous year since I would never have stuck my neck out
this far before.  I really didn't expect her to agree, but,
hey, sometimes hope *does* spring.  I was getting to the
point where I like to have as many friends around me as
possible.

All right, so I have what one co-worker has called a "jones"
for Amy, all right?  And I loved the idea of getting her
attention.

Did you know that even when suffering from a deep
infatuation that you can still step back just barely far
enough to appear functional?  Especially for a crush that
hits you in your forties?  It isn't easy, of course, but it
_is_ doable.

It didn't help that Amy wasn't merely physically attractive
to my eye. Oh, no, she was also brilliant, witty and had a
voice that had entranced me from the first moment we met.

In other words, despite the fear of exposing my infatuation,
I found Amy fun to be around.

And, because of the infatuation, I avoided spending "too
much" time by her cubicle.

So I didn't get my hopes up high at all, which left me very
startled to get her reply:

{
Sure, sounds like a plan.  What time?
}

Half of me was ready to dance on my desk;  the other half
was busy telling the dancing child to control himself and
be quiet so as to not scare her away.

We worked out the logistics;  I'd drive us down and then I
would bring her back to her car at the office afterwards.
We would also get something quick to eat in the Cafe on the
ground floor before leaving the building.

I did my best to not drool while sitting across from her at
lunch.  I also was extremely careful to not drip food or
drink on my shirt and, despite the distraction, was
unusually successful.

We headed for my car, dumped our laptop bags in the trunk,
and took off for St Pete, windows down and the wind
caressing Amy's short hair and running across my crew cut.

There are several CDs I keep in the car with mixes meant for
varying moods--  when I'm down it's a mix of "active music"
which includes cuts from soundtrack albums for action
movies to bring me up, soft romantic music when I can stand
to hear it and, today, I chose a "mellow out" mix to keep my
own feelings reined in.  For me, a mellow mix does not
include *any* of Barry Manilow's "music to slit your wrists
by" but did include a lot of Basia and Enya.  This helped
calm me down and smoothed out my mood swings just enough to
comfortably hold a conversation.

As we drove we talked about work, our decompression starting
to take hold as we crossed the Howard Frankenstein (all
right, Frankland) bridge on I-275.  It felt good that she
was comfortable enough to relax so deeply next to me in the
car.

Yes, I'll admit to some concern that I'd been scaring her
given my almost worshipful demeanor.  It also seemed that
she had her own issues to work out.  It seemed strange to
see someone I saw as perfect carrying a lot of the same
self-doubt that _I_ carry.  I'd never before paid any
attention to self-critical assessments.

I was fortunate that, once we'd found a good parking lot in
St Pete (i.e. "covered or in shade"), she spotted the tram
stop for the show which would take us down by the Pier.

Even with all the time I've lived in the area I've only been
near the Pier despite all the years of living here four or
five times-- and three of those previous times were for this
kind of in-water boat show.

For my own comfort, I paid for her ticket, making my own for
two days, figuring I'd be back during the week-end.

We smiled at each other as we got the wrist bands and I
signed up for a chance at a shopping spree before we entered
the main tent.

Now realize that I am left-handed.  I'd already noted that
Amy was also a south-paw and, oddly enough, this handedness
seems to make us more sensitive to how things are organized.
This tendency to find patterns will go a long way to explain
the serpentine route we followed through the tent, going
along one aisle and then down the next...

You know the pattern.

There was equipment that triggered massive drooling--  sheet
blocks, boom vangs, all kinds of things I wanted to replace
on my own boat.  Oddly enough, what I *did* buy wasn't a
requirement of any kind: I bought some hats with the boat
name for myself, my wife and my youngest daughter, figuring
that they'd be a hit.  I sure liked mine.

We worked our way through the second tent and even perused
the smaller separate tent that "Latitudes and Attitudes" had
set up before we stopped for something to drink.

It would have really helped had I brought sodas in for
myself and Amy given the high prices.  Amy opted for a beer
and we sat down to go through the collected swag and drool
over the soft-core sailor porn in the Sailing magazine
issues I'd gotten.

Finally off my feet for a rest, it was time for me to field
some questions from Amy so I did my best to explain sailing
to someone who had no experience with it at all.

Someone wiser than I once remarked that "anyone can be
taught to sail" adding the corollary that "it's almost
impossible to teach someone _why_ they should sail".  I
could tell that most of what I was saying wasn't immediately
resonating with Amy and may have been going so far over her
head she wasn't even hearing a 'whooshing' noise.

So I finished up by telling her "I'll have to take you
sailing some time so you can *feel* it.  Once you get a feel
for it you can figure out if it's an ordeal or an
adventure."

Yeah, I stole that motto.  It was too clever to resist.  It
was worth it, though: I got a nice smile from her and she
patted my arm as she got up "I need another one of these"
to get herself another bottle.

As a tee-totaler I don't know shit about drinking or how it
can affect someone;  Amy came back with two more cold
bottles.

Given that she weighed less than 95 pounds I didn't realize
how much I was in for an "entertaining" afternoon.

We headed over to the docks where the boats were on display
in the water, skipping the trailerables sitting on the lawn.

I am _such_ a snob;  to me, a boat belongs *in* the water.

Hunter's sailboats have never done much for me and none of
these caught my eye.  Amy liked exploring the interiors and
she was learning the basic layout quickly.

Wiping up my drool after looking over a Southerly, we worked
our way past the Island Packets (with _prices_ posted
showing that they *cost* a packet), through the Beneteau (if
you have to ask you can't afford 'em) collection and finally
the Catalina sailboats.

My own boat is an ancient Catalina 30 which has served me
well in the three years I have owned it.  This goes a long
way to explain that soft spot in my heart for the brand.

Amy was having a blast having finished her third beer just
before we'd reached the boats.  I didn't realize then that
the beers were only _starting_ to hit her *while* we were
crawling around the boats.  By the time we got to Catalina's
end of the floating dock, though...

She was *not* swaying just because the floating dock was
alive with the small motions imparted by the others walking
around on it and... ummmm... No, I didn't realize Amy was,
by now, at least as fully loaded as some of these boats we
were seeing.  At one point she had to be dissuaded from
crawling into the v-berth of the 440 to take a nap despite
her attempts to talk me into crawling in with her...

Guiding her out of the show wasn't a simple prospect since
she leaned more and more on me and my body was responding.

Laugh all you want.  This was the woman who'd fuelled quite
a few of my fantasies.  You try supporting *your* dream girl
and not get a hard-on, all while trying to keep your hands
in "safe" places.  Especially when the unsafe places seemed
to find ways to move to where your hands were, necessitating
another move to maintain some semblance of propriety.

The tram ride wasn't a problem to get back to the parking
garage and I soon had Amy sitting-- well, laying-- in the
passenger seat, having cranked it back so she could rest.

We were driving down the ramp when Amy leaned over from the
passenger seat to me and stroked my arm.  "Alan, I'm feeling
really, really horny and I want you to take me somewhere so
you can fuck my brains out.  I need to get laid."

This time it was me that was feeling faint.  I managed to
recover enough aplomb to pull up to the booth and pay the
parking lot attendant.  I even managed to pull into the
street.

Her eyes drew mine and she repeated "I wanna get laid.  By
you.  And soon!"

At this point, despite the car being stationary at a traffic
light, my brain was suddenly flying in two wildly different
directions, one segment scared to death and travelling at
113MPH and the other, claiming to speak for my body, at
about 72MPH.  I was not in the mood to use the math needed
to compute the resultant vector, especially not with a horny
woman and her self-made perfume fogging my mind.

This was *not*, as I am sure you can understand, a moment
for trigonometry.

On top of these issues, I am a married man but, at the same
time, I am not particularly happy with everything within I
saw within that relationship.  I'd been feeling like I was
there for my wife but, for various reasons, didn't feel like
she was there for me.

In other words, like so many other men seem to complain, I
felt sex-starved.  Yeah, yeah, I know that this perception
isn't "objectively" true, but, hey, no human is completely
free of filtering reality through their own prejudices.

Given my unhappiness and need to "get my shit together", I'd
chosen to sleep on the boat one night a week, so that I had
time for myself without distraction to *think* and consider
what I wanted to do for myself.  I'd chosen Thursday nights
for this and, as you may recall, this particular night was a
Thursday.

Now realize that I wasn't sleeping on the boat as a
"bachelor pad" in hope of getting "lucky".  Hell, given the
disappointment I believed my wife felt, I was actually
_afraid_ to "get lucky".  Just like the line from Ray Romano,
I did not want to disappoint a second woman in my life.

So what did I do?

It's been said that a man only has enough blood to run one
of two organs:  his brain or his penis.  When a man's penis
gets first dibs on the blood in circulation, well, almost
all capacity for thinking of something other than sex is out
the window.

So I turned to head towards the gulf side of Pinellas where
my boat was docked.  Yes, my little head was giving the
orders.  It didn't hurt that my big head had been drooling
over Amy for years, either, so that part wasn't resisting.

All right, so I tried to justify this course by thinking she
was *not* up to driving herself home.

When I made a stop for ice Amy pulled enough of herself back
together to join me in the store, bringing me a six pack of
beer at the check-out.  I paid for it all, loaded the ice in
the cooler I kept in the trunk, and we continued on.

Amy was *not* sobering up much.  I kept on hearing terms of
endearment that made me harder and harder.  I joined her in
showering affection as well, proof that I am not a complete
fool by showing that I care.

Even though I'm not used to hearing sexually flattering
words from a beautiful woman,  I felt that if a woman is
willing to tell me she finds me attractive, I am going to
let her know how I feel, too.  This was a surprisingly new
experience for me.

I felt she was flattering me.  It felt good.  So I told her
the truth about how I saw her.  As I waxed rhapsodic about
my feelings for her and how much like a goddess I saw her
as, her face reflected some shock.  Despite being reasonably
sober, I didn't realize I was seeing evidence of her own
insecurities.

C'mon, the woman's a goddess, right?  So what could she ever
possibly feel insecure about?

When we got to the marina I made sure she could get into the
ladies' room and went into the mens' room to take a whiz.
We got back to the car, headed for the entrance to the dock
my slip was on and Amy had steadied down somewhat as I got
the cooler and my bag of extra clothes out of the trunk.  I
had to discourage Amy from trying to carry either of our
laptop bags since she seemed likely to fall into the water
without my active assistance.

I sighed, relaxing, when we got to the slip and felt
thankful that she wouldn't need to climb over the foredeck
to get to the cockpit.  I soon had her sitting and relaxing
in the cockpit as I unlocked the companionway and slid the
hatch forward.  I could feel her eyes on me as I pulled out
the boards to open the rest of the way into the boat.

Climbing down to turn on the shore power in the boat, I got
back up on a step and grabbed the cooler and busied myself
in getting the icebox loaded as Amy watched me with eyes
warm enough to have melted that ice before I got it all put
away.  I placed the cans from the six pack of beer she'd
picked out next to the soda cans and water bottles that had
been waiting here.  Emptying the ice bag on top of
everything in the the icebox would cool things down quickly.

Well, almost everything.  I was hot and Amy, when I reached
to help her down the companionway, was hotter.  And wetter,
as I was soon to discover.

Her arms, when she got to the bottom step, wrapped around me
and I got a dose of beery breath from her.  This last wasn't
much of a turn on but then she started kissing me all over
again.  Her kisses had enough enthusiasm to turn me back on,
fast, but she lacked coordination.

It was easier to carry Amy to one of the berths in the main
cabin where, seated, it was easy to shift her to my lap.
Once safely placed on my lab, I could cuddle, kiss and touch
her.  Even though she wasn't the most co-ordinated, her
hands were further inflaming me.

As if having your dream girl sitting in your lap wasn't
enough to steal all of your cognitive abilities.

All right, so at that moment I couldn't have _pronounced_
"cognitive" much less spelled it or explained what it meant.

Somehow, without me paying much attention to things, I found
us both topless, her small breasts with her little nipples
showing, hard and wrinkly, giving me something to feast my
eyes on.  It didn't take long for my lips and tongue to jump
into the act and feast on them properly.

We stripped on our way to the vee berth and our bodies
quickly entangled as we kissed each other again and touched
each other, fanning flames of desire.  She finally started
moaning "Fuck me, Alan, fuck me..."

Somehow hearing her say it that way woke me up, shocking me
out of this sex-fogged stupor I'd happily entered.

Why?

Even though I've been awful at romancing *anyone* in all of
my life, I felt the need to be more romantic.  I didn't want
to "merely" fuck the woman of my dreams, I wanted to make
love to her, to make her know I loved her, all so she'd see
me as a candidate for *her* dreams.

Make that "I wanted to make love _with_ her"...  which the
alcohol she'd already consumed made unlikely.

Yes, I'm weird.  I admit it.  I have my insecurities and
emotional baggage.  I have my vulnerabilities, like every
other human being walking this earth;  no one is ever truly
free of such weaknesses.  Part of my insecurities made it
far more important to me that she would *choose*, of her
own free will, to make love with me.  The thought that the
alcohol in her beautiful body was doing the talking spooked
me more than I want to admit to.

I'm sure you understand how it is when you still have many
problems feeling lovable, much less loved, and why you feel
the need for an enthusiastic and active partner rather than
someone merely tolerating your attentions, much less loaded
and "painlessly non-present".

Realizing that the alcohol made this more of a unilateral
activity, I decided to make love _to_ her in a different
way than she expected.  My tongue and lips seductively
worked their way down her torso to the junction of her legs
and, joined with my fingers, soon worked her up and over.

There is something fulfilling in hearing your partner tell
you-- and anyone else listening-- that they've enjoyed the
sexual attention.  I was getting more massive infusions of
confidence and pride just by the noises Amy made that night
under my tongue than I had gotten over all of the years I'd
been married.

I didn't give Amy a chance to even _try_ to reciprocate or
get me to jump on top of her;  every time it seemed she was
rallying after an orally instigated orgasm I'd again use my
mouth and fingers to take her up and over again.  Each time
I learned something new as I paid close attention to her
responses and discovered that I'd been "missing the mark"
with my wife over the years.  I learned more in that hour of
oral attention to Amy than I had in *all* of the time trying
to orally please my wife.

At the end, when she finally drifted off into a comfortable
sleep, I worried.  I worried for myself.  Amy was definitely
a sexual dynamo, having ridden through 5 orgasms to get her
to fall asleep.  It would not take long for her to kill me
if she set her mind-- and body-- to it.

Fortunately for our privacy the marina does not allow true
live-aboards, so very few people were likely sleeping aboard
their boat on a Thursday night.  I will tell you that this
level of quiet and solitude was one of the deciding factors
for choosing Thursday nights and it was strange how this
worked to ensure some privacy given Amy's more than "merely
audible" expressions of enthusiasm.   I really hoped no one
else had been listening.

Let me revise that:  I was of two minds.  One of them was
still cowed by my wife and wanting to maintain a low profile
while the other wanted to be able to proclaim "Look what *I*
can do to make a woman happy!"  Discretion is nice, of
course, but isn't as emotionally satisfying.

While the idea of holding Amy and just fading out in the vee
berth had a great allure, I managed to get the energy
together to climb out, turn out the lights, and, with a few
strokes, emptied my prostate into the t-shirt that was going
into the wash.

I didn't wipe my face down;  even if Amy and I never "got it
together" again I wanted to luxuriate in the smell of both
her regular lubricant as well as the ejaculate I'd gotten
with her third climax.  I didn't dress either as I climbed
up next to her in the vee berth, dragged a sheet over us,
pulled her to my side, arranging her for my comfort.

Yeah, I'm selfish.  I had her head on my chest, one of her
arms across me and a leg over mine.  She felt wonderfully
warm and took mere seconds for me to join her in sleep.

_

My awakening was very sudden as the night passed almost
instantaneously.  I woke up in the middle of a powerful
orgasm, my body and muscles spasming.  It was only as I grew
soft afterwards that my eyes were able to unroll themselves
from looking at the back of my own skull and saw Amy using
her mouth to clean my suddenly over-sensitive penis.

It was pretty obvious to me where the rest of my ejaculate
had gone given the notable lack of evidence elsewhere.

This was strange because I'd often dreamt of worshipping her
body;  instead, it looked like _she_ was enjoying this
process almost as much as I had my efforts the previous
night.

The sudden shock that the woman I'd felt "out of my league"
or otherwise "unavailable" was treating my sex organ so
lovingly left me with no defenses worth mentioning.

My hand reached down and caressed her head, my fingers
gliding through her short hair to caress her scalp and...
"I've loved you for a long time, Amy.  I'm sorry I couldn't
tell you before now.  But I _do_ love you.  And not just for
how you woke me up, either."

My dick wasn't completely hard but it wasn't all that soft
either being half in her mouth as she smiled around it, her
eyes glowing.

With a pop from broken suction she pulled off my dick and
said "Really?  Like I couldn't tell?  Could it be the way
you licked me silly?  More than once?  Even with me pleading
for you to stop licking and just fuck me?"

I shrugged as I nodded.  "I didn't want to take a chance of
doing something that, when sober, you might regret, so..."

She giggled which had a whole huge set of goosebumps march
down my spine before forming up and hardening my "resolve".
"If you don't think I've been wanting you for a while and
really got turned on when you invited me..."

"Well, the beer..."

She shushed me.  "Oh, I figured that you wouldn't be able to
resist taking advantage of me if I seemed affectionately
drunk.  That was three times my usual allowance of beer,
just so I worked up *my* courage to open up and express what
I was feeling for you, too.  Oh, sure, I was pretty loaded
last night, but, man, I was fucking horny *before* I even
chugged that first beer.  It doesn't hurt that I'm one of
the lucky ones:  I've seldom gotten a hangover from beer."

I nodded and asked "Can you come up here so I can hold the
most beautiful woman I have ever seen?"

The flash of anger in her eyes hurt me.  She backed off from
me, glaring.  "You..."

I was shook up.  What did I say?  "What's wrong?"

"Oh, c'mon, you *know* I'm not that beautiful."

But...  "What?  The woman of my dreams isn't the most
beautiful woman I've ever dreamt of?  You may be pretty damn
blind, Amy, but I'm not.  I've never seen a more perfect
woman in my life.  Live *or* on film."

The anger on her face faded into confusion as she asked
"Why would you think I'm beautiful?"

Gawd, how do I explain it?

I sighed and held out my arms to her.  It took a couple of
seconds of her staring at me but she finally moved to occupy
them and the warmth I felt with her cuddled up to me hit me
like a rush.  The look on her face let me know she still
wanted an answer.  "Amy, when I come into the office and see
your face I get a real lift.  When I wave to you and you
smile back... I feel like a million dollars.  You have a
face that is wonderfully expressive.  I love to see your
face when you feel content.  You have a small body which,
I'll be honest, turns me on.  I've theorized that I have a
'thing' for small women because I don't think I am properly
equipped to please anyone larger, even though I know, in
reality, that size isn't really all that important."

She looked at me.  "Beautiful?  But I don't like the way I
look in pictures!"

I laughed.  "I've yet to see a picture of you where you look
happy or content.  Heck, you try not to show your smile...
which, Amy, my dearest little one, qualifies as a weapon of
men's distraction.  Any man you smile at will walk on air
for at least an hour.  Or, at least, until he walks into a
wall.  I can't believe you don't realize how fucked up we
men get just seeing you smile at us."

There was some hope I was getting through with her until the
next question of "Well, what about my mosquito bites?"

"They sure tasted good to me, last night," I replied, almost
in reflex, "And they look so nice, too."

She looked in my eyes, soulfully, I think to see if I was
telling the truth.  "But your wife has... ummm..."

In my own reading I've heard about cup-size envy, the female
equivalent of penis envy.  The only problem, of course, is
that it's always "in view".  I laughed.  "I didn't marry her
for her hooters, you know, and more than a handful is
wasted... especially if they're usually off-limits.  I seem
to have the worst timing..."

She looked at me.  "So..."

I sighed and squeezed her in my arms, feeling her nipples
push against my chest.  "I like the way you look and how you
are built.  I also like how you smell.  And now I'm learning
about how well you fit my arms, too, which I'm finding more
that a little bit addictive."

She giggled.  "Your arms seem to fit around me pretty well,
too."

I nodded.

"So, you find me physically attractive, huh?  I thought that
no one would..."

I laughed.  "Of course.  That's the first step, of course.
Sight.  Then comes hearing.  You have a beautiful voice,
too, captivating me right away."

She shot me a perplexed look.  "But I _hate_ how my voice
sounds."

This got a funny look from me, I'm sure.  "Haven't you ever
heard yourself in a recording?"

Amy nodded, her eyes suddenly downcast,  "Of course!  It's
horrible to listen to.  I hate it."

What the fuck is wrong with beautiful people?  She was more
beautiful than any person who has ever claimed to be one of
the "beautiful people".  "Amy, I don't know how to explain
this to you.  I'm sorry, but...  your voice is enough to get
an erection out of a two-week-old corpse just by having you
read from a phone book, so, if I die before you do, be very
careful not to trip when walking across my grave.  I think
that the beauty implicit in your voice goes a long way to
explain why so many people want you on their conference
calls...  though, to be honest, that you actually have more
brain cells to rub together than most of those so-called
project managers put together could be a good reason, too."

A pair of saucer-sized eyes stared at me.  I suspected she
was shocked hearing something like that from me.  Especially
since I said two good things about her in one statement.

I sighed.  "All right, I'll let you keep your low opinon of
your voice, OK?  Just don't be cheap with it, *I* happen to
rather like to hear it, all right?  And I might have you
read some books or stories so it can be shared with more
people who will fall in love with you... and your voice."

She stared at me some more.  I wasn't sure if I was getting
through to her.  It was time to reinforce what I'd been
telling her.

"Amy, sweetheart, you need to factor in your less tangible
but far more important assets, too.  Sure, your merely
physical attractants are powerful, all right?  You can
entrance any man you want, just as you have me, just with
your face and voice.  Mix this in with your sharp mind, warm
heart and quick wit along with a tolerance for idiots that I
lack.  I think the biggest miracle I've seen yet is how you
can give _me_ a second look, much less a first."  I sighed,
realizing how much of my soul I was exposing to her, before
continuing with "Amy, it's a miracle you don't have a long
line of prospective suitors." I finally ran out of words, my
heart suddenly empty.  I'd taken a big chance in telling her
how I felt about her.  It did not help that I'd implied she
could do a lot better than me.

In retrospect, it was strange that a lot of her problems
with who she was came so close to my own insecurities.  But,
despite the shock fading from her face, she decided to
address the last thing I'd said.  "Alan, you're cute, too.
And I've been attracted to you from day one, too, and, to be
brutally honest, I'm surprised you ever found me attractive.
You've got brains, you've got a nice smile, you are amusing,
you treat anyone you work with like a friend regardless of
your mood and you have always been there to help anyone.
So I've found you attractive from the day I met you.  I just
didn't think that you'd find me-- being half japanese and
half black-- attractive enough."

I squeezed her and laughed.  "Amy...  I have no idea why,
but your exotic appearance must catch the eye of every man
who sees you.  If a man doesn't fall fast for you then he's
either brain-dead or just plain dead."

She smiled.  I seemed an almost sad smile as she told me
"I've not had _that_ good luck with men, you know."

I squeezed her.  "Anyone who hurts you is an unfeeling ass."
"And, on top of that, *I* am supposed the be the one here
suffering from insecurity and inferiority.  As a goddess you
are *not* allowed to be more screwed up than me."  I smiled
at her as I squeezed her again.  If she couldn't tell that I
was happy just holding her...

I felt her squeeze me back.  Her voice was muffled as she
told me "You always treated me with consideration, even when
we teased each other.  You never went too far with me and so
I started thinking that you're a good man to spend time
with.  I was worried when you seemed to be avoiding me, on
and off, that..."

Squeezing her shut her up for a moment.  "I occasionally
have to back off because I was getting too distracted by
you.  I didn't want to fuck things up given workplace rules,
number one, and I was afraid to let you know how easily you
could hurt me, too."

Amy sighed in my arms.  "So it was because you loved me that
you had to avoid me so much?"

"Of course.  There were times when my inner cave-man has had
thoughts of throwing you over his shoulder and carrying you
off to have his way with you, which was very difficult to
resist, but anything less would not be showing you respect.
Now I will admit that, in the midst of me trying to resist
these impulses, if I'd heard you laugh, or, worse yet,
giggle, I don't know if I could have kept myself from acting
like a complete neanderthal."

I heard silence.  Amy shifted and so I laid flat on my back
again as she re-positioned herself directly on top of me,
her legs straddling my body.  She initiated a kiss.

We were silently communicating for an extended time as we
kissed, our lips and tongues dancing with each other's.

Reality has an odd way of intruding, dammit.  Her cell phone
chose that moment to ring.

I looked at a clock I'd mounted on the bulkhead and saw it
was still fairly early as Amy got up to dig out her cell
phone.  She answered it.

There was no doubt in my mind from the way she was talking;
it was someone from work, giving her a head's up on a call
she'd need to be on in two hours' time.  Personally, I had
my own worries that it was someone who'd also fallen in love
with her and who wanted to keep her from me.

Gawd... I get paranoid, don't I?  And possessive?

I was getting clothing together for us and, when she closed
her phone, she told me stop, saying "Not yet.  You still
have to make love to me, using", as she pointed at my crotch
"that thing."

Being limp at this point seemed reasonable until she made
that invitation.  The giggle she made following it, though,
is what woke up my little head.

The sudden feeling up and down my back was startling.  How
fast my dick hardened, though...

"I hope," I replied, "that you want to make love _with_ me."

She giggled and then stopped, suddenly pensive.  Her eyes
met mine and she said "That's important to you, isn't it?"

I nodded.  "I'm sorry, Amy... but I need the feedback.  I
am weak, so I need to know when I'm getting it right."

Her eyes were fixed on mine and it felt like our souls came
together.  It took a fishing boat's wake, despite the no
wake zone, to break this lock as the boat moved around us on
the docklines.

Amy's own insecurity showed itself again: "You want me?  You
*really* want me?"

Oh, yeah, I wanted her.  "Yes, Amy, I want you.  And, now,
how do you want me?"

She looked around.  "I wanna be on top, so sit here," she
explained, pointing to the single berth.  I did so.

How fast can a woman slide down on a man?

Well, this was fast.  Amy proved to be both wet and ready
and so slid all the way down onto my hard organ, massaging
it once she had all of me in her.

Her groaning and grunting told me that this massage wasn't
voluntary;  she was already coming, her arms and legs poorly
controlled as she tried to get as close to me as possible.

I had a long way to go but enjoyed the feel of her orgasming
around me.  This was the first time in my life that I'd felt
anything like this and...

*Now* I understood why some people get concerned that they
can become addicted to sex.  It can be claimed that this
experience only strengthened my existing addiction to Amy.

She tried to ride me but, after her second climax, her
nervous system was toast.  I got up, holding her, brought
her back to lay down on the vee berth and, awkward as the
position was, pumped into her while still standing, her feet
now on my shoulders.

There is nothing so flattering to any man as much as a woman
who can reach orgasm more than once through penetrative sex.
I mean that.  If her smiles had made me feel like I was ten
feet tall, well, sexually, I felt like I was 15 inches long!

I know size doesn't matter and I know I'm a bit smaller than
the average, but it was still doing a surprisingly good job
for the two of us.

Amy wasn't in any condition to complain when my prostate
finally emptied my second load of the day deep into her
spasming pussy.  If anything, her orgasm seemed even harder
as I sprayed her cervix with my load.

As soon as we'd calmed down enough I climbed onto the berth
next to her and held her close to me.  She held me close as
well as we relaxed and, seemingly, melted together.  Among
the other words of endearment she told me that I was more
than 'merely adequate' which certainly helped to ensure my
male insecurity stayed away.

The downside to being in a marina is that we couldn't share
a shower.  I brought her over first and sat while she used
my soap and shampoo and then it was my turn on the men's
side to bring myself to being presentable at work.

We spent a lot of time holding hands as we drove to the
office.  For once, somehow the traffic between St Pete and
Tampa didn't bother me.

Getting to the office we released each other before entering
the door to the building and went to our desks.

In the workplace we settled down to the appearance of our
"old" pattern.

_

The first real change wrought by our new relationship was in
choosing to share our lunch times more often.  She started
by seeking me out but, by the second day, I was extending
invitations to her.  Often we'd be going with co-workers so
we would be surrounded by people who provided us an illusion
of distance.  It did not hurt that I was learning to enjoy
new foods, things she liked.  Anything tasted good while our
eyes communed.

The second big change arrived the following Thursday as we
stayed overnight on the boat a second time.  This time she
wanted a lot of pounding.  "Gotta make up for the last week.
I got my drive back, now I want to make up for lost time.  I
want you to act like a cave man *now*!"

At the office's workout room we saw more of each other as we
started to work out together, just to be near each other.
When no one else was around it was easy to talk to each
other affectionately which went a long way to encourage the
new habit of exercise.  I was *finally* losing weight and
feeling stronger physically which complemented my emotional
state.  Finding that my blood pressure was normalizing to
the point that I was taken off of the meds _could_ have been
credited to the exercise but I felt that the sexual
satisfaction I felt having Amy in my life did more for me.

Hey, I spent a *lot* less time feeling angry.

Along the way I learned how sweet "stolen" kisses can be.

We had a *lot* of fun just talking, too.  It was nice to be
able to open up to someone who never laughed at me.  I was
also warmed inside that she'd be willing to tell me so much
about herself;  I felt very loved and trusted.  At the time
I didn't recognize we were reflecting each other.

So we spent Thursday evenings and nights together and, on
Fridays, I made sure the boat got a good airing out before
the week-ends.  We also took to using towels under us which
were easier for me to clean.

Many week-ends were spent on the boat with my family, either
working on it or sailing.  After the third week-end, Amy
dropped by, dressed fairly conservatively, one Saturday
while we were preparing to go sailing and joined us.  It was
tense at first but I soon relaxed as Amy made efforts to
talk to my wife and daughter.  I was glad my wife didn't
have any real racial issues with her.

The next week-end Amy repeated the "drop in" and my wife
Alyssa was soon actively encouraging her to join us.

_

It took three months before the bottom fell out.

Although Amy was only 42 years old, she'd been certain of
being post-menopausal, not having had a period in over a
year.

No one ever thought to explain "oopsies" to her.  I didn't
either and, so, I was _the_ problem.

When she started to have serious attacks of nausea in the
morning she didn't tell me, thinking that it was some kind
of virus.  When she finally told me about it I think my hair
stood straight up.  On our way to lunch that day we picked
up a pregnancy test.

Shortly after 5PM that Thursday she brought it to my desk
and showed me the indicator window with a dead rabbit
showing.

Yes, she was pregnant.

With few people still in the office I pulled her down onto
my lap and cuddled her to calm down her panicky demeanor.
She told me she was frantic, not knowing what to do.  She
even said "What about my problem?" she finally asked me.

Now don't get me wrong:  I'm an egotist.  I might have tried
to keep my ego down, but it's there.  I'm also male.  My "Y"
chromosome imposes it's own "twists" on my personality.

Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

"Amy, dearest," I said, pulling her close and kissing her
forehead, "this is *our* problem.  And, really, I will do my
best for you."

She sighed and squeezed herself closer to me.  I knew, at
that moment, that I was an incredibly primitive man.  I had
a woman I'd impregnated cuddling in my lap and I felt
*wonderful*.

I asked "In a perfect world, what would you want to do?"

She cried for a moment and then told me "Despite my nieces
and nephews, I'm not sure if I'm cut out for motherhood.  I
don't know if I can handle the changes I need to make.  I'm
afraid."

I kissed her forehead.  Of the four children I had raised,
only two of them were biologically mine, having inherited
the first two when I married.  "You need to see a doctor.
You need to know if your body can support this pregnancy,
what it would take to deliver if you could, and, most
important of all, at our age, we would have a problem coping
with a child who has special needs."

I could feel her nod.

I went on, adding "So, if the baby isn't defective and your
body can carry and deliver it with minimal risk to *you*,
there is nothing stopping you from having a baby.  And, to
be honest, I would have liked more children.  A lot more
children.  But, then, I came from a large family."

"But... the baby will be..."

"If the child is really, really lucky, she will resemble
you.  You are, in my opinion, a superior woman.  You should
have been dropping litters just to bring up the IQ of the
whole human race."

I got a smirk out of her before she turned pensive again,
asking "But what about Ali?  I know you still love her,
too."

I nodded.  I didn't know how to deal with it since Ali had
been getting into a lot more religion than I liked.  There
had been a time, long ago, that her possessiveness of me had
been flattering.  Nowadays it was smothering me and the
night sleeping on the boat had started out as my time to be
alone to think things through.  Since Amy and I were a pair
my Thursdays re-charged my ability to cope with the rest of
the week.

"It'll have to work out, hon.  She needs my support given
her health problems, but, if she decides to divorce me, I'm
all yours, OK?"

Amy placed a finger on my lips.  "No, there'll always be a
part of you she has a hold on.  You love her.  You love me,
too, and I find that I need your love, too, and, because of
how we fit together, I think you and I are stronger now
because of we each manage to provide for each other.  So, I
think, in order for this whole mess to work out, your wife
Alyssa will need to accept that I need her to share you with
me and that you need to have me in your life, too."

I nodded, hugging her again.

Her bright smile as she backed off to look me in the eyes
lit up my cubicle like the dawn.  "Dinner? And then some
serious cuddling all night?"

"Deal" I replied.

Of course I'm no fool.  Nor was she.  Neither of us hurried
her warm and bony little bottom in leaving my lap.

_

It was three weeks later that we came out into the open with
Ali.  All right, so my wife wanted me to use her full name
of "Alyssa".  You can tell, I hope, that I am not the most
cooperative man on earth.

Driving this was the euphoria of learning, through
amniocentesis, that my unborn son showed no genetic
abnormalities.

We were sailing, on vacation.  My youngest daughter Dani, a
pre-teen, likes to go sailing and often tries to have her
friends along.  This trip she couldn't bring guests given
that it was a long "vacation" trip.  Ali and Amy had been
able to get along together pretty well, especially given how
much help Amy was in handling the boat.  Occasionally Amy
had teased Ali about how I was "so handsome" but this did
not amuse my wife.  Usually I heard complaints later on that
would become "orders" to avoid Amy.

Y'know, for a woman who'd been so badly burned in her first
marriage, she was quick to give orders while refusing to
fulfill requests, much less orders from me.

So, our three week vacation sailing trip was likely to be
even less amusing to Alyssa.  We were on our way to Key
West, an easy three day run, and so we'd all be "trapped"
with no escape until reaching Key West, ensuring that we'd
be working out our relationship.  We'd planned our trip to
Key West and then to the Bahamas despite the customs and
entry fees.  We had all of the necessary paperwork in hand
for this trip.

At lunch, sailing south in the Gulf well off-shore of Port
Charlotte, Amy opened the can of worms.  I expected an
explosion but it seemed, at first, to fizzle.

"Alyssa, I need to tell you...  I'm pregnant."

Looking at Ali's face I could tell that she was ready to
say "That's nice, dear" and to forget about it but I caught
her short.  "Hon, Amy's son is mine.  Dani is going to have
a baby brother."

Ali looked at Amy, then at me.  Dani looked at Amy and
went, with a happy sound to her voice, "Really?  I'm going
to have a little baby brother?  Couldn't you make a baby
sister for me instead?"

This broke some of the tension I saw gathering in Ali's
face but enough remained as she said "Does this mean that
you're leaving me?  Or..." she continued, suddenly looking
scared, "was this timed to throw me over the side?"

It was my turn to look horrified.  A glance at Amy's face
mirroring my horror was reassuring before I answered "Of
course not!  It's better to have you in the loop!  Amy wants
to continue working, and, since you really can't work
outside the house..."

Amy picked it up here "...I figured that, with the practice
you've had, you can help me by taking care of our son.  I do
want to be a mother, but I have very little practice at it.
So our son will be Dani's little brother which makes sense
to combine house-holds."

It seemed Amy's words mollified Alyssa enough that she was
no longer ready to kill, but Amy had obviously figured out
where a most of Ali's "on" switches were: Appealing to Ali's
maternal senses was a key way to calm her down.  It was
working, too.

It was strange;  Ali seemed tickled by this despite her
obviously mixed feelings.  There was no doubt, however, that
she wasn't really happy.  It seemed that she was dealing
with the idea of having another baby to hold a lot easier
than I would have believed possible.

That evening, as Amy slept so that she could pick up the
watch around midnight, Ali and I talked while at the wheel.

We talked a lot.  About our relationship.  About how I fell
into loving someone "extra" rather than "new".  About how I
couldn't abandon my wife or try to hurt her...

Somehow, as it usually did, Ali didn't bring up the
subject of sex.  When I tried to steer it in that direction
she steered it back away.  I didn't think she was thinking
about that aspect of my relationship with Amy.

Around 10PM, Ali went below.  I could feel the boat shift
under her weight as she took care of her bladder before she
climbed in the vee berth and, from the sounds of things,
faded quickly.

At 11:30 Amy was up and moving, making herself a pot of
coffee and pouring it into a thermos.  She seemed to be in a
good mood which certainly lifted my spirits as well.

The autopilot had been doing it's job as best it could and
we were fortunate that we had a steady wind out of the west.

Amy had some practice already on overnight runs with Ali
and I, so I had confidence in her abilities to manage the
boat at night.  I gave her some warming kisses and, when she
opened her shirt, pawed and then kissed her breasts, thanked
her for fuelling my dreams, and went below.

I climbed in with Ali and passed out almost immediately.

_

Over the time we spent sailing to Key West and then along
the Keys in the Gulf Stream to get to the Bahamas, our new
family order shook itself out.

Well, part way, at least.  I suspected that Alyssa was blind
to the reality of a sexual relationship between Amy and I,
all because she had her issues with sexuality in general.

When Amy had to sleep apart from the me, Dani would sleep
with her, cuddling up.  I once noticed her cuddled up to a
sleeping Amy and talking to the bare belly where her little
brother was growing.  I even saw some kisses given to the
"not quite" bulge between Amy's belly-button and mons.

I don't know about you, but seeing that brought tears to my
eyes.  There was no doubt that my daughter was happy with
the idea of having a little brother around.

Dani's enthusiasm did a lot to calm Ali, whose mood shifted
more often than the wind did.  I would have preferred to
deal with wind shifts, of course.  Eventually Ali settled
down.

Ali did, finally, discuss sex, mostly to say "don't you dare
have sex".  The timing wasn't *all* her choice and having to
deal with the subject at all put a rather irritated look on
her face.  She chose to bring the subject up at breakfast
the morning after Amy and I had been more than a little bit
athletic in the early morning hours, having put off sex for
over a week.  Ali was not happy we weren't trying to hide it
from Dani.  I suspect that Ali also didn't like having her
face rubbed in the fact that I was having sex.

Ali's initial sally woke Dani up, who came to the table.
"So what's wrong with you, Daddy and Amy, Mom?"

My wife asked an open-ended question she really should not
have asked: "What did you think of Daddy and Amy waking you
up last night?"

Dani looked confused.  "It's not like they're married, Mom.
And it doesn't look like they're really in love, are they?"

That stopped everyone.  All three of us adults stared at my
youngest daughter.  Ali was not looking happy but I saw
some shock on Amy's face.  Amy was the first to speak after
that confusing thunder-bolt.  "What make you think your Dad
and I aren't in love, sweetie?"

"Well," my daughter started, "you don't yell at daddy.  You
don't tell him to do things for you.  You don't look angry
at him.  You say please and thank you to him, as he does to
you, so, you must not have the kind of love with him that
Mom has."

Ali's face turned white as her eyes opened wide like
saucers.  I sat back in shock wondering where she got *that*
idea.  Amy was the only adult present at the moment with
working brain cells.

"Oh, no, Dani, what your dad and I were doing is making
love."

My eyes flipped between them like I was watching a tennis
match from the sidelines, stunned.

"But mom says that they love each other but all they ever do
is yell at each other.  I hear mom say 'I love you' to dad
and dad say it back but mom often gets angry with him about
something and I hear her complain that dad doesn't do things
for her."  Dani was trying to explain why she thought that
Ali's way was loving.

"But that's not..." Amy tried to explain, but Dani had more
to say.

"I hear about this being normal with a lot of my friends.
It looks like marriage means that the mom and dad are
supposed to be angry with each other.  At least my mom and
dad don't hit each other, I don't think I'd like it if they
liked to get hurt like that."

I had to jump in and try to sort things out before Ali
turned blue from not breathing.  "Hon, mommy and daddy did
things like Amy and daddy did last night but we did it
quietly in our bedroom."

This obviously didn't make much sense to my daughter.  "You
mean what you and Amy did is something you have to hide?"
She then turned to Amy and asked "Is it really bad to have
sex?"

Amy shook her head.  "No, it's the way I think people who
love each other _should_ be showing it.  There are other
ways, too, but that's one of the easiest ways for a couple
to tell each other how much they love each other."

Dani's brow furrowed as she tried to digest this.  It was
obvious to all of us at the table that she was still a very
confused girl.  "So if you're supposed to hide this way to
show love to each other, why didn't you hide it last night?"

I sighed.  "Dani, we didn't expect you to wake up and see or
hear us.  There are people who believe that children should
never learn about sex.  I didn't realize that hiding this so
much could confuse the signals to you."

My daughter didn't look completely convinced.  "So why did
you do it then?"

Amy took point, starting "Because I'm pregnant by your dad,
I get upset if we don't hold each other enough.  So I woke
him up and had him come to my berth and we..."

"I saw you, you put dad's penis in your mouth.  Wasn't that
icky?"

Ali's eyes rolled up and she fainted.  Amy was sitting by
her and moved her to a more comfortable position, then eyed
me before answering the little girl.  "It's only icky if he
doesn't love me or I don't love him.  I wanted him to want
to make love with me."

I giggled.  "Like I didn't already.  I was more than ready,
you know."

Amy smiled, a brilliant flash that felt good as she teased
me "I noticed, yes, you were quite ready."

Dani asked "What do you mean he was ready?"

I sighed, not wanting to answer but now there wasn't a whole
lot of choice.  "You know the term ejaculation from your sex
education classes?"

Dani nodded.

"Well... I did that in her mouth."

My daughter's eyes got real wide and she looked at Amy. "Was
that why you hummed and smiled?"

Amy nodded.  "Yes.  I wanted it to feel the best it could
for him."

Ali chose that moment to fade back in from her faint as
Dani asked "OK, so you think it feels really good for
daddy?"

I nodded and said "Yes, it feels very good for a man.  It's
very flattering and makes me feel important to her."

"Amy, it still sounds... icky.  How does it taste?"

With this question, Ali checked out again.  She really could
not easily cope with this kind of discussion.

"Your dad loves me, right?  You understand?"

Dani nodded, finally agreeable.

"So, because it's a measure of my love for him and his love
for me, the taste doesn't matter."

Dani was mulling this for a moment as Ali faded back in,
moving to sit back up when my daughter hit the subject again
in a way she didn't expect.  "So, dad, was that why you were
licking her between the legs?"

I nodded.  Ali looked like she was up to staying with us,
this time though just barely.  We were on a set of details
that didn't squick her immediately, so I answered Dani "Yes.
She loves me, I love her... and, to help me get another
erection, I like the smell and taste of my lover.  It also
helps that I was able to listen to her enjoy the sensations
of what I was doing.  I wanted her to feel it and know how
much I love her."

Ali was still with us though she seemed to be stunned into
silence.  Dani asked the next question "So it wasn't
because you wanted to do that?  You did it because you had
to?"

I shook my head.  "No, I did it because I wanted to.  I like
doing that for her.  It doesn't hurt that she tastes good to
me, either.  So, for me, because I love her, it isn't, ummm,
'Icky'."

Dani nodded, understanding more and trying to connect it to
her own experiences.  "I don't have to ask Amy what it feels
like, do I?"

Amy giggled.  "It does feel better than your own fingers,
girl.  And having him do it for me is, well, I feel special.
He does it and I feel so loved and special.  I feel valuable
to him, like..."  Amy's beatific smile provided the rest of
an answer.

I smiled back and said "And when she does that *I* feel very
loved, special and worthy of her."

Dani next did something unexpected by turning to her mother
and asking "Do you and Dad do that?"

Ali checked out again.  This was *not* a subject she even
wanted to admit existed.  I answered "I have.  Your mom did
not want to like it, though.  So I've been there for her.
She doesn't like to do it for me."

My daughter's eyes were like saucers.

I sighed.  "I don't understand mommy either, hon.  There are
people who say that sex is disgusting and I sometimes think
that mommy listens to them too much.  She thinks that all
oral sex is degrading to the giver, at least when she's the
giver.  She has usually been unenthused when I've tried to
do for her, too."

Dani looked at me and Amy, closely.  Ali was fading back in
but didn't seem to be relaxed at all, and, in fact, seemed
to be building up a head of steam, starting her attack by
snarling "What kind of crap are you corrupting her with?
You should be ashamed of yourselves!  You should have
controlled yourselves!"

Amy and I looked at each other;  this version of Alyssa was
breathing fire and, finally, the shit was hitting the fan.

"Mom?"

"You are too young to know about sex, Dani.  They should be
ashamed of having sex.  Especially at their age.  And, most
especially, doing _perverse_ sex."

I spoke up "Dani, mommy hasn't really _liked_ sex and never
has been more than tolerant of it."

Sadly, this didn't defuse the situation *at all*.  Ali chose
to snap at me "I've been willing, you just haven't _tried_,
it's been _your_ choice whether to have sex or not, so don't
blame me when you say you never get it!"

I snorted and fired back "I didn't think your heart was ever
in it, so I didn't try!  If you aren't interested in talking
to me and letting me know what you want, then I don't *want*
to do something you won't appreciate!  I've controlled
myself for a very long time and Amy is lovable and loving--
and _told_ me what she wanted-- and what she wants, and it
feels good that she enjoys it!  I'll be damned if an act of
shared love is something to be ashamed of!"

Amy seemed perplexed and asked "What does she mean that she
has been willing?"

Ali said "I have a way to let him know that he can have sex
with me.  And, because he doesn't act on it, he claims we
don't have sex."

Amy's face frowned in a way signalling that the answer was
not clear enough.  "I don't understand.  What did you do to
tell him?  Ask him to fuck you?  Give him a blow job?  Got
on top of him?"

"No, I go to bed naked so he'll know I'm willing."

Amy looked at me and I nodded that yes, this was her signal
to me that she was open to 'making love'.  "That's all?"

Ali nodded her head.  "That should be clear enough!"

Amy looked at me, saying "Now I understand.  No wonder you
were so desperate for me to show interest and why you went
at it when I took an active role, right?  I told you I
wanted you, and that made a difference?"

I nodded.  "Yes, and you told me how you wanted me.  I like
that, it makes it harder to make a mistake.  It makes me
feel like I'm *good* enough for you."

Ali looked at Amy and, brow furrowed in anger, spat out "Are
you some kind of a slut?"

That got *my* hackles up as much as Amy's and I snapped out
"How dare you insult a *loving* woman?  Who is willing to
show me that *I* am both worthy of love _and_, on top of
that, *am* loved?  That I'm worth her time and attention?"

Ali sat back, her mouth hanging open.

"Ali," I continued, "It is *NOT* about sex!  It's about
love!  So what if it's expressed sexually?"

I reached to put my arm around Amy as Dani asked her mother
"What is a slut?"

Ali is fucked up, which I've known for a long time.  "A slut
is a loose woman who'll fuck anyone."

"Dani," I called out, trying to undo the poison that Ali
seemed hell-bent on injecting into the four of us, "Mommy is
using the word to hurt someone.  There are women who don't
think it's 'right' to enjoy sex enough to want more.  Mommy
also thinks that a slut is automatically promiscuous, which
is another word for 'fucking around'.  Mommy, however, can
be called a whore.  She makes sure that any sexual contact
is as expensive to me as possible in order to get something
else from me.  For some, love and sex, together, are their
own reward.  Mommy isn't thinking that love and sex can be
put together."

Ali was breathing fire at this explanation, since I'd just
escalated this argument.  "You and her just fuck like
animals!"

I laughed.  "We might _fuck_ like animals but we also make
*love* to each other as human beings.  Both halves of that
equation are important."  I decided to bring Amy back into
this fracas by asking her "Amy, dear, is it a punishment for
you when we make love?  Do you regret it or look forward to
it?"

Amy laughed, a wonderful sound.  "Of course I don't regret
making love with you!  And I look forward to the next time
we can make love, too!  Oh, there are times when I want you
to just fuck my brains out, but I love it so much since you
are always so sweet to me.  I feel loved and lovable each
and every time we touch..."

I loved how dreamy her eyes got;  I wasn't watching Ali's
reaction to this until I heard her snarl again "God, she is
so *cheap*, Alan!"

I laughed.  "Of course you'd think she's cheap!  She's a
lover, not a whore!  She doesn't prostitute her body for
money, emotional dominance or social position!  She does for
love what you think she should begrudgingly offer!  Love can
be *very* expensive, too!"

Ali looked like she was stunned as I heard Amy ask "Do you
really think I'm cheap, Alan?"

Turning to her I saw an unhappy face.  "Maybe in money,
sure, but in love?  In how warm my heart feels?  In how much
I want to warm yours?  In how much of my soul is invested in
you?  No, you're not cheap, Hon, you own a large chunk of my
heart, but I'm not sure Ali can measure this in a currency
exchange she can understand, so she doesn't understand why
you're *not* cheap to _me_."

Seeing Amy's face transition back to a position of warmth
did wonders for my own feelings.  "Oh, I didn't understand."

"Ali, here, doesn't want to see sex as part of love, she's
wanted something 'pure', which, to be honest, I'm not really
happy going along with.  Her expressions of affection for
me, the things she's told me I should recognize as her
'loving me' have tended to feel sterile since they're all
distinctly separated from sexuality and sensuality.  Some of
it was my own damn fault, of course, thinking that she
should appreciate my sexual attentions as much as I wanted
to get hers, but I've since learned a *lot* about the
various emotional needs we humans all have to one degree or
another."

Ali tried to speak up but I stared her down "You are *not*
always right.  You are *not* an objective observer.  It also
took me too long to see that I can't listen closely to your
critiques given your conflicts of interest.  You don't want
to hear *my* critiques, and it took me a long time to learn
to reject *yours*.  Amy wants your help with our baby;  if
you can't accept that I love her and she loves me, and we
will be expressing this love in ways that include sexual
congress, then you may file for a divorce.  I care about you
but if I'm not worth your time, then, fine.  You need to do
what is important for *you*."

It was strange;  this time I had fire in *my* eyes and steam
coming out of *my* ears and Ali just sat there, staring at
me.

I made my voice as gentle as I could.  "So, Alyssa.  What do
you want?  A role in an extended family where both Amy and I
provide support for you and the children?  Or do you want to
divorce me so I can marry Amy?"

It was a silent tableau as Ali seemed to withdraw to think
things over.  The silence was broken as Amy got up to start
another kettle of water for coffee and tea.  Dani finally
moved to get herself some cereal for breakfast.  I sat there
watching Alyssa as she seemed to be furiously thinking.

The next move was the ultimate catalyst to bring Alyssa's
thinking to a head:  Amy sat on my lap and cuddled up, her
head on my shoulder.  My arms went to hold her close to me
and I heard Alyssa sigh.  "I can't cuddle with him like
that, Amy, I'm too big."

Amy nodded.  "But you like having him spoon with you, don't
you?"

Ali nodded.  "Especially when I'm feeling cold."

"So if he sleeps between us we'll be all right, right?"

Another nod from my wife.  "I don't want to share him, you
know."

My lap's passenger spoke again "I know, but he needs more
than you are able to give him.  And he gives me what I need,
too."

Dani watched all this, as if watching a tennis game from mid
court.

A sigh from Ali signalled her first compromise.  "I'm sorry
I called you a cheap slut.  I should realize that my husband
has high enough standards and so you'd have to be something
special.  Just like I was when he and I met.  I miss that."

I stayed silent as Amy nodded again.  "Yes, I didn't realize
I was special.  He was the first who managed to tell me in a
way that I could believe.  He didn't realize how special he
is, either, but I think I managed to get the message across.
Even though he feels hurt by you he still loves you... and
he must feel you're good enough to be a mommy to our son."

You know, it took me a bit to realize that they were doing
all of the negotiation over me and that I wasn't allowed in
the loop.  Amy gave a lot of ground up front by not choosing
to monopolize me and, it seemed, this softened some of Ali's
own position.

By noon the two of them had everything hammered out, my only
contribution was saying "OK, I can live with this" when they
finally asked me.

We spent the rest of our vacation sailing from place to
place as an extended family before bucking the Gulf Stream
again and wending our way along the ICW to get back to the
Gulf.  Dani did her best to *not* take notes as I spent time
pounding into Amy when she let me know she feared that the
pregnancy would reduce her desirability to me.  Alyssa was
present for all of these so that I was no longer "doing it
behind her back" and, if anything, it seemed Amy was even
hotter given this level of exhibitionism.

While Alyssa wasn't _comfortable_ watching us, it wasn't
actively hurting her, either.  Only once did Ali want me to
jump her during the whole trip.

As Amy gained weight with the pregnancy I got more and more
sexually aggressive with her as she showed more and more
"down" moods which worked as a reminder that I *wanted* her.
Our child was likely to be a "happy" baby given how much his
mom's womb bounced him around.

Alyssa wasn't doing without my attention, either, though she
still preferred cuddling to any kind of sex.  On infrequent
occasions she would let me know that she needed sex as well
and having Amy as a voyeur didn't help matters.  Alyssa had
some deep-set hang-ups, but, we'd learned that she needed to
feel I cared for her and wasn't out to abandon her.

All of this helped us bond together as a unit which further
consolidated housing and finances.

By the time Drew (short for Andrew) was born we'd managed to
move into a nice Condo and bought a larger boat for our
extended family.

Alyssa had her issues on and off but being Drew's mommy did
steady her, which helped me recognize that the "empty nest"
had been haunting her.  Dani loved her little brother and
spent a lot of time cuddling him.  Amy, given the amount of
attention I lavished on her, seemed to go even farther at
work despite the time lost on maternity leave.  Our two
incomes didn't hurt matters, either.

It didn't take long for Amy to "have another accident" and
we had a little sister for Dani and Drew;  with this, Amy
had her tubes tied.

It's never completely easy with two women, of course, but we
did work things out well enough.  It always worked smoothest
when the two women worked out issues dealing with me by not
consulting me until the last minute.

Even so, I'm pretty happy with my women *and* my children.

Though, really, it seems that they think I am more "theirs"
than they as "mine".

			* Fini *
-- 
Jack C Lipton | cupasoup at pele dot cx | /~CupaSoup/
 "Those who cling to religion can't acknowledge dissent because it's a
  breath of doubt.  Those who do not doubt themselves are more dangerous
  (and less empathic) than those who can." -me

-- 
Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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