The Lovely Lydia's Blog for July 2022

I can't believe eight months have passed since I last wrote here! The time goes so quickly.

Today I'm going to share a very long story. I want to talk a bit about the greatest love of my life, who in these pages I call Gina, and the reason I've been thinking so much of her lately. 

Gina may be the only person I've ever known who had more kinks than I do. She was up for just about anything, and she wasn't content unless she could get laid at least a couple of times a day. Fortunately for her, she had plenty of people willing to oblige. 

Before I came into the picture, Gina was living with her girlfriend, who was her primary partner, along with two men -- one of whom was Tim, who as you may recall is my current girlfriend's boyfriend. I'll call the others who were living under the same roof with them Mary and Scott, as I have in the past on this blog. (All names have been changed for privacy reasons.) After Gina died, Mary and Scott dropped out of the polyamoury scene, adopted Gina's daughter, whom I'll call Alissa, and eventually got married and had a child of their own. My ex-wife had a short liaison with both Mary and Scott when we decided to open up our marriage, but other than that, so far as I know, they haven't entertained any further extracurricular relationships. 

I was also living in that same house with everyone else when Gina died, and it's not an exaggeration to say that I felt responsible for upsetting the delicate balance that had existed before I came along. 

Gina was a beautiful person at heart once you got to know her, and incredibly passionate about whatever she threw herself into. But she could also be selfish, reckless, and manipulative, something that she herself admitted. As a prime example, she deliberately got pregnant when she was a teenager just because she wanted a person she could love who wouldn't leave her -- and she deliberately failed to inform the father of her plans whilst they were sexually active. She took what she wanted, when she wanted it. As a consequence, Gina was someone who provoked polar reactions: People tended to either adore her or despise her. 

But she was especially good at reeling in men. She met Tim, for example, when she was the manager of a department store and waited on him as a customer. She told me later on that she immediately knew she wanted him, and she made her intentions as clear as she could without getting herself sacked from her job. After she rang him up at the counter, she scribbled her name and number on the back of a business card, thrust it in his hand, and told him with a grin that if there was anything else she could do for him, just let her know. He called her that night, they met up for drinks a couple of nights later, and they were literally in a relationship by that weekend.  

There's no doubt Gina was emotionally volatile, prone to wild mood swings, and that certainly played into the intensity of our relationship. When she and I were together, she was almost always on an emotional high. We were obsessed with each other and very, very sexually compatible. Some of the most explosive orgasms I've ever had in my life were with her. Suffice to say she was intense in every possible way, not to mention indescribably sexy, and I absolutely couldn't get enough of her. I hungered and ached for her when we were apart for any more than a few hours. I was like a horny teenager around her. I kid you not that I never had it so bad for anyone in my life, and I'd been with loads of women in my lifetime. 

And it seemed the feeling was mutual. We lusted for each other so badly that we just wanted to crawl into each other's bodies and stay there. We slept in the same bed most nights, and we were so laser-focussed on each other that we were giving very serious thought to gettting our own place together and being exclusive to each other. For her to leave the polyamoury scene and cut off all her other relationships would have been an extremely drastic move for her, but she was giving it a lot of consideration.

Yet as much as she wanted that, what she and I had together also made her feel incredibly guilty about her other relationships and their potential fate. In hindsight, I admit I probably let myself get pulled in too deeply, too quickly, and it did indeed have a drastic effect her existing relationships. Mary in particuar had pulled Gina out of a rather dark place when they met, which is one reason they'd always been so close to each other. They shared a special and very deep bond that none of the rest of us did with her. 

Since Gina and I were monopolising each others' time, Mary and Scott began spending more time together, which led to a deeper bond between the two of them. Meanwhile, Tim had met Cathy at the strip club where she worked, and he brought her over to spend the night more and more as their relationship took form. Eventually, what was originally a big house of polyamoury started to turn into a house with three distinct couples who occasionally spent the night with someone not his or her primary. 

Gina's self-punishment, and my conflict

Before I came along, Gina had started paying more attention to a guy I'll call Jack. He didn't live with the rest of us. He was into really rough BDSM, and Gina had met him at a party, where he came on to her strong. They soon started a sexual relationship that consisted of frequent liaisons at his place, and Gina said she found their sessions deeply therapeutic: She was his submissive brat, and he was quite physical with her. The more he pushed, the more she wanted. 

But things between them ramped up to an extreme after I showed up. The violence of their encounters, as she described it to me, was shocking. We're talking about throwing her against walls, choking her, spitting on her face, throat-fucking her until she threw up, slapping her so hard she came home with cuts and bruises, even pissing on her. Gina swore she loved every bit of it, that he never did anything she didn't ask him for, and that he always honoured her safe word if she had to use it. She claimed the violence was her outlet for her most extreme fantasies. 

It was obvious to those of us close to her that she had crossed a line. This no longer seemed like deriving sexual pleasure as much as it was a kind of self-punishment. Not only was she beating herself up mentally, but she was getting off having someone else beat her up physically. And this all came about, best we all could tell, because she was feeling conflicted about spending so much time with me at the expense of her other relationships. Jack became both her escape and the corrective daddy figure who took pleasure in turning her over his knee, so to speak. She went to see him more and more often, and she begged for ever more and more extreme punishment from him. 

Then, when that was no longer enough, she wanted me to get rough with her on the days she couldn't go see him. She didn't even think to ask Mary: She very specifically wanted me to dominate her. I'd never before done anything remotely BDSM, but she literally pleaded with me to at least try it. 

So against my better judgement, I gave in. I went out and bought the gear to play the role of dominatrix and did the best I could to give her what she wanted. I felt extremely awkward about all of it at first, and I hated the demeaning dirty talk she wanted me to lob at her. I broke down crying the first time I slapped her face at her request. But she kept begging for more and more, so I did my best to throw myself into the headspace of a femdom mistress, reminding myself the best I could that I wasn't abusing her out of malice but rather giving her a sexual thrill. I actually did get off on the power aspect of the roleplay once I got used to the idea -- but I never did get accustomed to how violent she wanted me to be towards her. And there were things she wanted me to do to her that I just couldn't bring myself to do. 

The whole situation was really messed up, truth be told. As much as I was on fire for her, I gave serious consideration to leaving, hoping it would help restore some sense of a healthy relationship balance in Gina's life. But in the end I feared that my withdrawal would only make her worse, as she was so very deeply attached to me by that time. Sure enough, if I so much as dropped a vague hint about taking a little bit of time apart, she'd become frantic and beg me not to leave.

I should note that it was clear to everyone who knew her that Gina had some significant abandonment issues -- and in fact I think that problem lay at the core of most of her emotional turmoil. Her mum and dad had divorced when she was young, and her dad, for all practical purposes, had abandoned mother and daughter. Gina almost never saw him or heard from him. Meanwhile, her mum, according to her, was distant and not very warm or loving. So Gina ended up leaving home at 14, sneaking out of her mum's house one night and never coming back. Her mum tracked her down and begged her to come home, but to no avail, and her mum essentially gave up and left Gina to the fate of the streets and whatever friends she could find. As a result, she grew up well before she should have had to. She sought the love she didn't get at home in relationships, using her looks and her manipulative side to extract what she wanted from people -- who would then also abandon her once the initial thrill of the relationship was gone or Gina would become too unstable and push the person away. 

She said she began to take comfort in the love of women when she found they would often give her the emotional support she needed without always demanding sex in return -- and yet she couldn't resist the physicality of being with a man. And women she loved deeply would break up with her when she violated their trust by cheating on them with a man. 

One of those men was the father of her child. She stopped her birth control without telling him and, as I mentioned, deliberately got herself pregnant, thinking that she'd essentially force him to stay in her life so she wouldn't have to be alone. But, she told me, she also had it in the back of her head that if he did leave, at least she'd have a child who would love her and never leave her. And sure enough, the guy did end up leaving, the instant he figured out she was trying to entrap him. 

When her mum left the St. Louis area where Gina grew up to take a job here in the Pacific Northwest, Gina stayed behind and continued to make her own way. She and her child continued bouncing from place to place, staying for a night, week, or month with whoever would take her in. She had no stability in her life whatsoever, no one she could count on, and very little money. So she relocated here to at least be close to her mum. They managed to re-establish some kind of relationship, and Gina succeeded in getting a steady job. For her daughter's sake, Gina got her act together the best she could, buckling down in her job to become a reliable and responsible worker, and then finding love and stability in Mary. 

So this was the volatile situation that existed when things seemed to be getting out of hand for Gina. Not knowing what else to do, I went to meet Jack and had a private conversation with him about Gina, and he admitted he was worried about her as well. I learnt a lot from talking with him about the finer points of BDSM -- I obviously had some idea, but it was plain from our conversation that I had more to learn -- and when I explained a little bit about Gina's troubled background, he felt he needed to sit down with her and reassess their entire relationship. Turns out she had told him almost nothing truthful about herself or her past, and it was important to him that his role wasn't simply to inflict a level of abuse that she felt she deserved but, quite the opposite, to build a trusting relationship with her. And he couldn't do that if Gina was either lying to him or withholding the full truth. He even acknowledged that Gina's mood with him lately had indeed gone from sexy and playful to dark and brooding, and now he said he understood why. 

When I asked why she sometimes came home with injuries, Jack said Gina had pleaded with him to hit her harder and harder. It was as if she wanted to live out some kind of domestic-abuse fantasy, and he said he did everything short of punching her. That was his own hard limit, and he was open to a lot of crazy stuff. He said she started begging him to, in her words, "beat the shit out of" her -- and he went right to the edge of what he was comfortable with. He never intended to inflict bodily injury, he said; that was never the point. But he'd whip her ass so hard that she couldn't sit down for a day afterwards, or she'd come home with a busted lip from a slap that went awry, or bruises on her neck from being aggressively choked. She told those of us in the house she was okay and was always a willing participant, but it got harder and harder for Gina or any of us to explain her injuries to Alissa, who was old enough to start worrying about her mum's well-being. 

So much of what Jack told me about their encounters absolutely shocked me. I don't have the stomach to write about the worst of what he described to me. I was aware that, legally speaking, people actually can't consent to certain types of extreme abusive behaviour, but Jack swore that he always honoured safe words and gestures, that he never violated anyone's agreed-upon limits, and that he always engaged in loving aftercare with his subs. He did admit, though, that aftercare with Gina was difficult, because she tended to recoil from receiving too much affection. I'd known that about her as well. She wasn't one to cuddle in the afterglow. When she was satisfied sexually, she'd be ready to jump with both feet into something else -- until she got horny again, which wouldn't be long, and then the process would repeat. 

As horrid as some of the things sounded that Jack told me about, I left our conversation with no doubt that he really was only doing what Gina had asked of him, and, crucially, that he did care about her -- but that he also felt betrayed by her. At the end of our talk, especially now that Jack knew more about Gina,'s background and her true motives for engaging in BDSM, we both concluded that we were doing Gina no favours, and that we'd both talk with her. 

I alerted everyone else in the house to what Jack and I had spoken about, and to a person they thanked me and hoped it would help. We all knew that things needed to change. Jack and I were certainly both happy to help Gina live out her sexual fantasies and work through her inner conflicts, but at least from my point of view, I felt I was adding to her conflict and worsening her own quickly degrading self-image. I had to do something.

It's probably quite clear by now to anyone reading this, but I feel I should elaborate on the fact that we all knew that Gina suffered from some type of mental instability or mood disorder. It wasn't bad enough, obviously, to stop her from holding down a job, raising a child, and staying on top of the comings and goings of four other adults in the house. But she consistently refused medical care or medication, insisting that she wasn't "nuts" and could handle things on her own.

So when Gina asked me to engage in some dominatrix play a few days later, I took the opportunity to sit her down and tell her I needed a break from the violence, that it was affecting my own state of mind to treat her that way -- which was completely true. Her immediate response was not understanding but anger and a call to Jack. If she couldn't get her BDSM fix from me, she'd get it from him. 

She stormed out of the house, only to come home an hour later in a rage, flying into me when she found out that Jack and I had talked about her behind her back. I'd never been frightened of her before, but she was practically nose to nose with me and screaming in my face, saying I had no right to interfere with her relationship with Jack and telling me to mind my own business and stop treating her like she was some kind of "freak." I sincerely thought she was going to take a swing at me.

Mary, overhearing the ruckus, darted out to the living room and tried to smooth over the situation. She pulled Gina into a bear hug from behind to restrain her, explaining as calmly as she could that we were all just concerned for her well-being. Gina was red-faced and hurling obscenties at both of us, and she flailed to get free from Mary to no avail. She did get in a good stomp on Mary's foot, at which point Mary spun Gina around, pressed her against the wall, and leaned in to say something into Gina's ear. It was obvious the two of them had been through this before, as Mary appeared to know exactly how to handle the situation. 

I don't know what was said, but I saw Gina nod, at which point Mary released one arm from around Gina's waist and gently stroked the top of Gina's head. Gina relaxed her head and rested it on Mary's shoulder, at which point Gina broke down into heaving sobs. Mary gently rocked her for a moment, then she took Gina by the hand and led her off where the two of them could have a private conversation.

Only Mary could tame Gina that way. The two of them had met when Gina moved to the area as a young single mum, as I touched on earlier. Mary was working at the daycare where Alissa stayed whilst Gina worked. Mary absolutely adored Alissa, which led to a friendship between Mary and Gina. As they got to know each other better, Gina pushed herself romantically on Mary, whilst Mary, with her gentle and compassionate heart, saw Gina's personal struggles and tried to help her when it was clear that Gina wouldn't seek professional emotional help. As Gina put it quite bluntly to me one time, "I don't need a fucking shrink. I just need stability in my life." 

But Gina, being as persistent and sexually enticing as she was, played on Mary's weaknesses, and they entered into a relationship, to some degree against Mary's better judgement. But then Mary fell in love with her and made it her mission to help Gina be the happiest and healthiest person she could be. 

Mary once told me that though she'd had a relationship with a girl in her teen years, she always considered herself straight -- but when Gina came on to her, she said it triggered something inside her that made her reassess her orientation. Gina had that kind of effect on people. She was by turns dangerous and irresistible, and she could turn your life upside-down if you let her. 

The bottom line was that Gina needed someone exactly like Mary in her life, and I was always grateful that their paths had crossed. 

After Gina had had her screaming meltdown in front of me and Mary, the whole household, plus Cathy, sat down with Gina later that night for what felt like an intervention. Mary and I led the conversation, Mary reminding Gina that we all loved her and I assuring her that I had no intention of abandoning her, but that I did want her to find happiness and balance amongst all her relationships. As much as I'd love to make her all mine, that wasn't fair to the other loves of her life. I reminded her that Mary was her primary and that I had no intention of changing that. I would happily continue sleeping in the same bed with her as often as she wished, but Mary was her first love out of any of us. 

There's a part of the story I can't talk about here that made my relationship with Gina unique but that also made things more complicated than they should have been. But in the end, Gina still elected to sleep in the same bed with me, so I continued to feel like her primary. That left Mary and Scott to continue sleeping in their own bed together most nights. So things still felt a bit off. 

The best I could do was encourage Gina to make date nights with her other partners in the house on a regular basis, which she did do, and even to get back into some fun three-ways, which she used to do quite frequently with Mary and Scott, Scott and Tim, and Tim and Jack. She dropped hints that she'd like to have a three-way with me and Mary, but whilst Mary and I were becoming good friends, the attraction wasn't there to make that happen just yet, not even if Gina was the hinge and Mary and I didn't touch each other intimately during sex. The idea did cross my mind once Gina brought it up, mind you! But when I talked to Mary about it, she admitted that she'd entertained the thought as well, but in the end she said it would just feel "weird" or "too awkward." I agreed, and that would put an end to the discussion. 

Over the next few weeks, we all felt that Gina was indeed finding a better balance between her relationships. She was spending more nights with her other partners, which often left me and Cathy alone to get to know each other better, as we were the only ones in the house who were exclusive to one other person. Cathy practically lived with us at that point, being there several nights a week with Tim, but those nights when neither of us had a date and had a chance to talk were what set the foundation for our later relationship. Sometimes the two of us would watch Alissa, which led to a strengthened bond between me and Cathy, though most nights Mary and Scott watched her -- which was one of the big reasons Alissa went to live with them after Gina died. They already felt a lot like a family unit. 

Cathy was of course bisexual, and whilst it was clear to me that Cathy was subtly flirting with me after a short time, I didn't want to make things in the house even more complicated than they already were. So, for better or worse, I didn't encourage her. 

As for Gina, she actually apologised to me for pushing me into doing things with her I wasn't entirely comfortable with. That got me to check in with Jack, and he reported that their sessions were becoming more playful again, similar to how they had been in the beginning. The slapping and choking persisted, he said, because they both got off on it, but he also said he was able to tone down the most extreme of their activity because she'd stopped begging for it. Privately, meanwhile, I thanked Mary for working whatever magic she was able to do on Gina. Mary, as I've mentioned, was always the best at getting through to Gina when no one else could. Though we still weren't ready to consider that three-way with Gina, Mary and I did begin to grow notably closer to one another, through our shared love of Gina and our desire to see her happy.

Then everything changed.

Tragedy, and picking up the pieces

Out of nowhere, Gina told everyone in the house she wanted some time alone that coming Friday. When we asked if anything was wrong, she just said it had been a busy and tumultuous few months, and she just wanted to de-stress and enjoy some quiet for a single night. We all happily obliged. Cathy was scheduled to work at her club that night, so Gina suggested that Scott and Tim head out to the bar and maybe find a girl to share, which is something they'd had fun doing together in the past. Meanwhile, she suggested Mary and I have a girls' night out and maybe take some time to deepen our relationship. I knew what Gina was hinting at, and I took the initiative to turn the evening into a date night for Mary and me, which Mary eagerly accepted. I felt that our relationship was turning a corner and reckoned that a date night would be a good opportunity to talk about things. Even if nothing else came of it, at least we'd be making clear where we both stood. 

So I made dinner reservations and purchased movie tickets. I even surprised Mary with a vase of flowers that I had delivered to her workplace, with a card that read: "Looking forward to our date night! XOXO, Liddy." She came home and pulled me into a firm hug, thanking me for the sweet gesture. Seeing that I was already dressed for the occasion, she went off to shower and make herself up -- and she looked absoutely beautiful when she met me at the door. I actually had butterflies in my stomach when I took her hand and walked with her to the car. 

We had a sincere heart-to-heart over dinner. I told her how deeply grateful I was that the two of us had grown closer when things could have gone so very badly between us. In a way, I felt I was being given a second chance and welcomed fully into the fold, after barging in on everyone's relatonships and helping turn everything topsy-turvy. 

Mary confessed that she had indeed been hurt over having to sacrifice her time with Gina to me, but at the same time she also didn't blame me. After all, part of polyamoury is feeling happy for your partners when they build new relationships. It's just that Mary had gone from an exclusive relationship with Gina to sharing her with Scott, then Tim, then Jack, and finally me. Scott was a bit different, in that Mary was the first to meet him but both she and Gina began dating him, building a three-way relationship amongst themselves. The three of them had bought their house together, and only later did Tim move in when his apartment lease expired and it was clear that he was becoming an intextricable part of Gina's life.

Mary and Scott ended up developing a closer bond with each other than Scott did with Gina, and Mary admitted to me at dinner that she wondered if that's where things had initially begun to go wrong, when she and Scott settled into a relationship and a routine, leaving Mary to divide her atttention between Scott and Gina. 

A side note about how Scott entered the picture: After Mary and Gina had established a relationship, they got a place together and acted as co-mothers to Alissa. As Mary told it, she was deeply in love, things were good for the two of them, and Gina seemed fairly content for a change. Then Mary met Scott, and she felt a deep attraction to him that she couldn't deny, yet she refused to cheat on Gina, so she kept Scott at arm's length. She told Gina about what was happening, and whilst Gina felt very insecure about it despite Mary's promises that she wouldn't stray, Gina herself admitted that whilst she loved Mary dearly, she could understand what Mary was going through because she, Gina, missed being with a man. 

Curious, Gina asked if she could meet Scott. So the three of them got together one weekend, with the understanding that Gina and Mary were a couple and there was no undoing that. Gina said that she liked Scott well enough, and she suggested to Mary that they all go on a date and see what happens. It was on that date that Scott brought up the concept of polyamoury to them. Gina and Mary had heard of the idea of open relationships before, but this was something different -- not just having sex with random people who aren't your significant other when you got an itch to sleep with someone, but building actual networks of loving relationships with multiple people, and not just being transparent about your other relationships, but actually being happy for your partners when they find love with other people. 

Gina walked away from that evening deciding that she liked the idea of a menage a trois, even though that wasn't quite what Scott was talking about. Mary said it was very tempting, and they both liked the idea of having a man around, as much for the sexual aspect as the simple fact that they both missed the company of a man. And so they brought him home for a three-way "test drive," as Gina put it to me, and soon enough he was moving in with them. As things seemed to be going well, they ended up buying a house together.  

But over time, the balance of the three-way relationship shifted. As I mentioned, Mary and Scott developed a deeper bond than Scott did with Gina, leaving Mary as the hinge but also leaving Gina at loose ends and with with more free time than she'd anticipated. Feeling lonesome some nights, she gave herself permission to play the field, and that's how she ended up in a relationship with Tim. Tim and Scott would become good friends, many nights sharing Gina, which of course made Gina happy -- but Mary and Tim never warmed up to each other enough to advance to intimacy. So now it was Mary feeling alone some nights. 

Eventually Jack entered the picture, and then me, and as these new relationships continued to bloom, Mary found herself getting less and less time with Gina, her greatest love, and she confessed to me that she'd been afraid of losing Gina altogether as the new relationships stacked up -- and all the more so when I showed up. From Mary's perspective, Gina was accumulating more and more lovers, whilst Mary had only Gina and Scott, and she was left feeling like someone on the outside looking in. 

Mary also said she was often left feeling as if she wasn't enough for Gina. For Mary, navigating the intricacies of polyamoury was excruciatingly hard and exhausting work, whilst Gina seemed to thrive amidst what often felt to Mary like relationship chaos. She said that some days she felt as if she'd opened a can of worms by bringing Scott into her relationship with Gina, and whilst she was happy for Gina and still loved Scott, she sometimes wished she could go back to a simpler time when it was just her and Gina happily being co-mothers to Alissa. 

With all that in mind, I understood why Mary admitted that she wasn't happy about my presence at first, when I came on the scene and Gina spent almost all her time with me. But the more she got to know me, she said she realised I had a good heart and wanted the best for Gina, and she remained hopeful that things would work out for all of us. 

Mary and I both acknowledged that our relationship turned a corner the night we had our intervention with Gina, as it became clear that our shared priority was Gina's happiness and well-being. 

Indeed, it seemed that things were in much better balance for everyone. Gina was giving all her partners more time and attention, and it felt as if things were going okay. That made my dinner date with Mary feel like something of a celebration.

Now it was time to be candid. I had a confession to make. I felt my heart beating faster as I looked Mary in the eyes and asked if she'd noticed my lingering glances lately as we sat down around the house to talk.

She blushed and admitted she had.

I hadn't wanted to come on too strong, I told her, but I was beginning to feel an attraction towards her. I admitted that I even stole glimpses at her when I thought she wasn't looking. I told her I was enamored of her hair, her bright eyes, her freckles, and her sweet smile -- and that I especially enjoyed the view when she bent over.

When she giggled and didn't look disgusted, I went on.

I said that ever since Gina had suggested a threesome, I couldn't get the idea out of my head. I wouldn't press the matter if all three of us weren't interested, of course, and I'd be okay if Mary and I didn't have any physical contact, making Gina our shared focal point. But as Mary and I had grown closer, I admitted I fantasised about what she looked like naked, and what she was like in bed. What did she like to do? What were her likes and specialties and kinks? 

I made very clear that if she wasn't interested in the idea, I'd leave it at that, behave myself, and not push things any further. But I wanted her to know that after thinking it over for quite some time, I'd be up for an actual three-way, with physical contact all round, and I asked her what she thought of that.  

Mary's cheeks were bright red when I finished. She thanked me for my honesty, and she admitted having come to the conclusion that if Gina were so head-over-heels about me, then there must have been something quite special about me, and she said she was beginning to understand what it was. 

As she listed off the things she admired about me and went deeper into why she was just as attracted to me as I was to her, I felt myself flushing with excitement. And as far as a three-way went, she said, she'd been thinking about it too, just as I had, with physical contact amongst all the participants. But she said she'd been afraid to suggest it to either me or Gina, so my confession had been a great relief to her. 

I told her I was glad she could get it off her chest. After a brief silence passed between us, I asked if I could kiss her, admitting that I'd wanted to do it for a long time, and as long as we were laying our feelings on the table, I supposed I might as well ask.

She said she'd like that, and I melted at the sight of her adorable smile and her reddening cheeks. I leaned across the table, cupped her head in my hands, and let my lips linger against hers. 

When we parted, I saw the passion dancing in her eyes. 

"That was really nice," I said.

She nodded enthusiastically. "I want more."

I grinned and playfully licked my lips. "So do I." 

She giggled, and I leaned in to kiss her a few more times. With our foreheads touching, we both looked to the side when we could feel other eyes in the restaurant on us. Looking back to each other, we burst out laughing. Then we sat back and just shared a long, quiet gaze across the table.

She broke the silence. "So what do we do now?" 

I shrugged. "Practise run?"

Her eyes widened with anticipation. "Like, tonight?"

I nodded. "I really want to be with you, and I'm curious to know what you're like so we can relax when we're with Gina." I added in a whisper, "And, full disclosure, I'm dying to see you naked and taste your pussy."

She gsaped and covered her mouth. 

I burst out laughing. "Sorry, too blunt?"

She shook her head. "I like your bluntness. And I like the idea of you tasting me." She visibly squirmed in her seat. "I like it a lot, actually."

We held hands on the way back to the car and seriously debated whether to skip the movie. But we decided we already had the tickets, and a couple of hours in a dark theater would only serve to build up the anticipation. She rested her hand on my leg as we drove, and the tension was already thick in the air. She tried calling Gina to let her know what would be happening later that evening, which is a courtesy all polyamorous people offer their partners. But the call went to voicemail. We didn't think anything of it.

I parked in the theatre lot, and before Mary could leave the car, I pulled her face towards mine and presssed my lips hard into hers. In an instant, our lips parted and our tongues met, and before I knew it, the windows were steamed up and we had just a few minutes to catch the opening of the show!

We spent a good part of the film kissing and nuzzling. By the end, the anticipation was killing us both. I teased her terribly by whispering naughty things in her ear that drove her to distraction. She was squirming as I licked her neck, nibbled her ear, and fondled her tits through her blouse. I slid my fingers under her skirt and knickers, sliding across her pubes, lightly scratching my nails along her thighs, coming within inches of her heat but never actually touching her. 

She whispered that I was driving her crazy. 

"Good," I whispered back.

It was like two hours of foreplay, and it was a wonderful way to set the stage for the evening. 

Mary was so horny after the movie, she just wanted to drive to the closest motel for the night and get it on as soon as possible. I was in the mood for something a little more romantic, so I drove us to a place that I knew had fancy suites with nice big beds and jacuzzi tubs. My treat to her. I was going to make this a night for her to remember, in every conceivable way possible. 

With our room key in hand, we were practically jogging down the hall to reach our room. She wasn't the only one ready to go! The instant the door was closed behind us, we unleashed our pent-up passions on each other and didn't let up for a good, long while. We didn't get a lot of sleep that night! When we needed a break, we sipped wine in the jacuzzi... and then it was back to our wonderful evening of passion.

Her pussy was delicious, incidentally.

In the morning we enjoyed a long, sensual shower together, went out for breakfast, and talked on the drive home about how we were going to break the news to Gina. We were both excited about where things could lead for the three of us. Maybe we could surprise her and jump right into action with her when we got there. We were certain she wouldn't say no! 

When we got to the house, only Gina's car was in the driveway, so we kept our fingers crossed that she was still home alone. Apparently, the lads had gotten lucky and spent the night with a lady or two someplace else, and we knew that Cathy would have been at her own place. 

We went inside and found everything quiet. Though it was mid-morning, the lamps and ceiling lights from the previous night were still on. 

Assuming Gina must still be asleep, we decided to sneak into her room and surprise her awake. Holding hands, we stepped through the doorway -- and we instantly knew something was wrong. On the nightstand was an empty pill bottle and a half-drained bottle of vodka. There was vomit on the bed, and Gina was turned on her side, facing away from us, naked, and not moving. 

Mary darted to the bed to try to shake Gina awake, but it was no use. Next to her on the bed was a letter addresssed to all of us in the house. My heart sank as I read the words -- words that I'll never repeat to another living soul. 

Mary was sobbing next to me as she held Gina's lifeless body. I called 911, and I don't even remember what I said. My heart was crushed, and the rest of me was numb. Here I'd been enjoying a night of unbridled pleasure with her primary partner, and all the while she'd been at home planning to take her own life. It was as if she'd pushed us out the door on a date in hopes that we'd find enough in common with each other to carry on without her. I felt like I was going to throw up.   

She'd fooled us all. We thought she was getting better. Instead, it had all been an act so that we wouldn't suspect that she'd given up on life. 

The event took a long time for all of us to heal from. I felt especially responsible, being unable to get it out of my mind once again that I'd upset the balance of the house. I thought I was over that feeling, but her death brought it back with a vengeance, like a searing knife I couldn't pull out of my heart. I kept playing it over and over in my mind that if only I hadn't gotten involved, maybe Gina would still be alive and well. 

But to their credit, no one in the house placed undue blame on me. They all knew how passionately Gina felt about me, and I for her. Gina just wanted to love all of us, but it seemed her own guilt and conflicts had secretly still been tearing her apart inside. When we had our intervention for her, she apparently took it as a deep rejection of who she was. But she held her pain from us and pretended to give us the Gina that she thought we all wanted, withdrawing from us all with an outward smile until the day she took her life.

The happy household of polyamoury was no more. Tim couldn't be in that house anymore; he left the day after the funeral and moved in with Cathy until they got their own place, which is the same place the three of us live now. Mary and Scott opted to keep the house, took in Gina's daughter, and closed ranks around themselves. Feeling quite uncomfortable, like the odd one out, I opted for an extended-stay hotel until I could find a little studio apartment where I could be alone to pull myself back together. 

It was for the best, even though I worried for Mary. She felt as responsible as I did over the whole event. As the one who had originally pulled Gina out of despair before any of us came along, she felt she'd personally failed in her mission to save Gina. But Mary and I felt quite awkward around each other, having shared our passionate evening together whilst Gina was home overdosing. Being around each other was just creating way too many powerful emotions that neither of us could untangle. 

Cathy was very kind to me the whole time; she tried to console me and offered to let me stay with her and Tim, but I just couldn't. I needed a break from anything that reminded me of Gina.

Memories and new beginnings

From here I'll fast-forward through a number of topsy-turvy years. I engaged in a lot of soul-searching and went through a lot of therapy in the years after Gina's death. There were destructive and extremely inappropriate relationships as I attempted to sort things out. I suffered through the death of another girlfriend, holding her hand in the hospital as she slipped away. There was a trip out of country to drown my sorrows in the arms of an old flame. There was even a failed marriage to another woman. Now, here I am living in a relationship with Cathy and Tim. Cathy had long wanted to be with me and never gave up on me, even though the effort to win me over took her literally years. That's why I love her so much. She believed in me when even I didn't.      

Last I spoke with you, I told you that I'd cut my hair, given into wearing prescription glasses, and felt content settling into my forties as I looked back on a lifetime of adventure. Well, the reason I've been telling you about Gina is that it feels as if her ghost has been haunting me lately, in a manner of speaking. 

Towards the end of last year, I was beginning to question my own lesbianism. You may recall that Tim and I became sexually intimate, going back to when I spontaneously helped Cathy suck him off on his birthday a few years back. That one time turned into a bit of a cocksucking obsession for me, which led to full-on sex, both vaginal and anal. I'd held on to my gold star till I was 41, but the temptation to try something new was just too great.

Cathy is still my number one love, and that won't change. But Tim was originally her boyfriend, and she was the hinge between us. That dynamic changed when Tim and I started having sex -- and what began as an occasional romp between us soon turned into something that happened several times a week. 

I especially developed a fondness for getting fucked in the booty, after not being so sure about it at first. I've always loved rimming and anal fingering with other women, both giving and receiving, so I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised that I eventually took to having a cock stuffed in my back door. In some ways I prefer it to vaginal sex -- sometimes, for me, the orgasms are a lot more powerful, especially when I get Tim to pound me good and hard.

And the other thing I discovered is that I am absolutely obsessed with male spunk. Whilst at first I wasn't certain about the flavour, now I love tasting it on my tongue. Not just that, but I seriously get off watching it spurt out from a hard, throbbing cock. I think my obsession began when I'd watch Tim shoot his load into Cathy's mouth. Once I got accustomed to the flavour and the texture, I enjoyed putting on a show for Tim as the two of us would snowball his cum. Things went to another level one day when he shot his load on her face. She and I had talked beforehand about what to do the next time he gave her a facial, and I gave Tim a coy smile as I licked Cathy's face clean and drizzled his juices into her mouth from mine.

Now I'm to the point where I love seeing him pull out at the last moment and splatter either me or Cathy. Whether it's our face, belly, tits, back, booty, or feet, just the act of watching Tim's dick wildly releasing its load over one of us really turns my crank. Cathy calls it "getting marked," as in marking his territory, but I don't really think of it that way. I just love knowing that Cathy and I get him hot and bothered enough to make him cum all over us like that. To me, it's a sign of a job well done by one, or both, of us. Cleaning it off is even more fun, and I know for a fact Tim loves watching us do that. I think he's living every straight man's dream right now.   

In all the years that have passed, I'd never really had a conversation with Tim about his relationship with Gina. But as he and I became more sexually active together, and as our encounters grew more rough and intense, I couldn't help asking him once, as we lay in bed after the act, if any of this reminded him of Gina, knowing that she'd liked it rough too -- and was also quite fond of anal pleasure.

I thought it was an innocent enough question, but he said he didn't want to talk about it, or make comparisons. That was fair enough, but I couldn't get the thought of Gina out of my head the more Tim and I had sex. I think I wondered how I stacked up in comparison, which I guess was silly, but as a lesbian having straight sex for the first time, I think a part of me wondered if I was sexually adequate for him or if he was just fucking me to humour me.  

I didn't feel comfortable talking to Cathy about any questions I had involving sex with Tim, as I already felt I was encroaching on her relationship with him.

If this sounds like the begining of a repeat of Gina's tragic story, I should make it clear that I was never despondent over the situation, just anxious. But again, thinking of Gina, I got it in my head to call Jack. Who better to talk to about the finer points of male-on-female sex? If anyone could give me some pointers, it would most certainly be Jack. 

He and I hadn't spoken since Gina's death, and he was quite surprised to hear from me. I caught him up to date on what was happening in my life, and I asked if he wouldn't mind getting together sometime so I could ask him some questions. 

We met at his place a few days later, and I revealed that my concern was to make sure I was making Tim happy sexually, and if there was anything I could do to improve my techniques, Jack got right to the point: He led me to his living room and pressed me down on my knees, whilst he pulled out his cock and told me to suck it, the same way I suck Tim's. That was direct! But this is what Jack does, and I honestly didn't mind doing what he was asking. I half-expected it to happen when I accepted the invitation to come to his house anyway. And his authoritarian, take-charge manner actually rather aroused me! This would certainly give me a chance to see if my budding oral skills were actually as good as Tim had led me to believe they were. 

As I pleasured Jack with my lips and tongue, I could tell he was resisting the temptation to be rough with me. He did put his hand on the back of my head and nudged me deeper onto him whilst getting me to increase my tempo, but that was as far as things went. And he honoured my limits when he was about to trigger my gag reflex. I looked him straight in the eye and held up a hand, my safe gesture that I'd agreed to, to indicate that he needed to stop. Without hesitation, he relaxed and backed off. Quite a gentleman in that regard, I thought. 

Soon I heard him groaning my name, and he squeezed my head between his hands, digging his nails into my scalp, as he unloaded into my mouth. When he finished, I pulled away, swallowed his spunk, and opened wide to show him my clean tongue. He called me a "good girl," seemed happy with my performance, and added that whilst it's fairly simple for a woman to pleasure a man, Tim should still count himself lucky to have such a talented cocksucker as me. That gave me a nice boost of confidence. 

He cooked us an elegant dinner for two, and over wine and dessert, he confessed that he'd always been very attracted to me -- but for some bizarre reason he said he felt I was always "out of his league"! I laughed and told him he was being silly. He insisted it was my accent and the way I carried myself. In his mind, I was this proper British woman who had a naughty side that he reckoned he'd never have a chance to see. I joked with him that it was a pity we'd wasted so much time, and I said I was more than happy to show him my naughty side whenever he liked -- and I was indeed. I was quite intrigued by him, and more than a little attracted.

He immediately said he was happy to take me up on the offer. When he got up from the table, he extended his hand and led into his bedroom, so I could show him how I fuck Tim when I want to be the one in charge. He lay in bed, waiting for me to make my move, and told me not to be shy. I decided to treat him to a bit of a show. He kept his eyes fixed on me as I gave him a little striptease, and I could see the bulge growing in his jeans. I felt a rush of excitement as I climbed on the bed, straddled him, kissed him, teased him, stripped him, and mounted him. He was thick and rock hard, and he felt incredible. I remember just exhilarating in the feeling as I took him all in. I got right to work, bucking him hard and letting my tits dangle in his face to let him reach out and play with them as he pleased. 

After I came the first time, I took some glee in edging him a bit. I waited until he was about to cum, and then I suddenly pulled off him and leaned down until my lips were inches from his. I pinned his hands above his head as I teased him with kisses on his cheeks, neck, and chest and playfully asked him if I should leave him hanging or finish him off. When he said "finish me off" in a husky, breathy voice, I stuck my tongue in his ear and then whisperered, "What's the magic word?" When he didn't respond straight away, I got the sense that he wasn't used to having the tables of domination turned around on him! 

"Tell Mummy please," I whispered, until I finally had him begging for me to finish him off. Once I got what I wanted from him, I took my time mounting him, reverse cowgirl style, and looked with a smile over my shoulder as I took long, slow strokes, teasing him along until he finally couldn't hold back anymore and shot his load inside me. (I've been on birth control since the second time Tim and I fucked, just to make that clear!) 

Being on the verge of my own second orgasm at that point, I climbed off his cock and mounted his face. Clutching his headboard, I ordered him to eat me until I came. He hungrily obliged as I ground my hips, and he was very good at what he did.   

After I came and collasped weak-kneed beside him, he smiled and asked if I was sure I hadn't secretly been fucking men for years. I laughed and took it as a compliment. He said he felt he had nothing to teach me, as far as turning men on and being an excellent fuck partner. He also said he wasn't used to having women try to dominate him and admitted he rather enjoyed it when I teased him, but he added that I should come back and see him if I wanted to experience how to let the man turn up the intensity, if I ever felt like backing off and taking a more submissive role. Given how much I enjoyed getting pounded in the ass by Tim, I felt like I was up for some submission lessons and made a date to see him. And the unspoken truth, I think for both of us, was that we just wanted to fuck each other again. At least for my part, that was very much the case.

I'd told Tim and Cathy ahead of time that I was going to see Jack, and I told them afterwards what had happened, but I neglected to say why I felt the need to go in the first place. I eventually came clean, but at the time I just said I was thinking about Gina and went to see Jack to reminisce, and that things ended up happening. Tim knows Jack, from the days when they had three-ways with Gina, and "I ended up at his house and we fucked" was a totally plausible thing if you knew anything at all about Jack.

The thing to understand about Tim and Jack is that they're cut from two wholly different cloths when it comes to intimacy. Tim's a gentleman who'll start off easy, letting the moments linger, and only pick up the pace if you tell him to. He wants sex to be laid back and enjoyable, but he'll give you almost anything you ask for. Jack is just the opposite, and it's clear why he and Gina were so compatible, in that they were both into rough and extreme sex. That's Jack's baseline, but he'll tone it down if you ask nicely enough -- or use your safe word, of course!

I'd actually enjoyed bossing Jack about, but that was something I'd never feel comfortable doing with Tim. I'll ask him to go harder or faster, but edging him and making him beg? I just couldn't see myself doing that. I still felt like I was borrowing -- or, worse, nudging in on -- someone else's boyfriend. So who was I to make demands? 

The S&M was a non-starter for the two in my triad anyway. Tim wasn't the kind of person who'd haul out the handcuffs or walk you on a leash. Neither was Cathy. She has her kinks, but whips and ropes aren't amongst them. It's just not her thing, and that's perfectly fine. After all, part of polyamoury is accepting what your partners can give you and keeping your options open for other partners who can, for lack of a better way of stating it, fill in the gaps. 

So, all things considered, I was looking forward to see what Jack had in store for me on our second date. He handed me a beautiful bouquet of flowers at the door and had a delicious dinner ready on the table. After we ate, we snuggled up on the sofa with some wine, and he told me what he had in mind for us that evening. He asked me what I'd be okay trying, and I told him. We went over everything, we established my safe word and gesture... and then he handed me a package with shiny paper and a bow. I opened it to find a sexy nightgown and underwear in red and black, exactly in my size! This was a man who paid attention to detail. 

I went off to the bath to change and met him in the bedroom. I saw an assortment of lubes, toys, restraints, and other devices on the nightstand, and a plastic sheet under him on the bed. Exaggeratedly swaying my hips, I made my way to the bed and straddled him. When I tried to kiss him, he shook his head and gently pushed me back with the fingers he'd put over my lips. Having established who was in charge, he lowered his hand and gave me a mischievous grin, and I saw his eyes light up and suddenly felt his arms tighten around me. Not knowing what to expect, I felt a rush of excitement as I waited for his next move, feeling like I was at the top of a roller coaster and waiting for the downward plunge. I remember letting out a squeal as he suddenly flipped me over and climbed on top of me. The domination had begun, and things heated up quite quickly after that. 

I considered going into detail here about our evening together, but it's hard for me to sum up the totatlity of emotions I experienced. It really was like being on a roller coaster. I liked it very much overall, and it opened up whole new avenues of sexuality for me, but at the time I was left rather unsettled by how the experience caused pain and pleasure to overlap, taking me to a place where I was left feeling quite emotionally vulnerable. 

But to summarise, I didn't mind so much the vaginal and anal pounding he gave me, and I did get a bit of a thrill from the rope restraints, the ice cubes, and the candle wax. He ate me out like a champ, and my only disappoitment with the facial at the end is that Cathy wasn't there to clean me up and snowball it with me. What I didn't like were the choking, slapping, spitting, and demeaning language. The hair-pulling as he fucked me in the ass... kind of a love-hate thing, honestly.

In short, I enjoyed the rough sex, but not so much the humiliation.

He did leave me with a bruised cheek, which he felt terribly about, and he held an ice pack on it during aftercare whilst I lay on the sofa with my head in his lap. It's an understatement to say he gets carried away and quite aggressive during sex, and I had a new appreciation for how extreme things must have gotten with Gina if she was begging him for even more than he gave me. As it was, he pushed things right to the limit that night, and I had to use my safe word once and my safe gesture another time. I felt like a BDSM loser for having to do that, but he didn't make me feel bad about it at all, and he stopped what he was doing immediately each time, comforting me till he was 100 percent certain I was ready to go on.

Would I do it again? Well, I have done it again, actually. I think you have to be of a certain mindset to be seriously dedicated to these types of kinks -- as in something that informs your entire sex life -- but I have to say, as bizarre as it sounds, that I don't mind getting a bit roughed up in the sack once in a while. It's weirdly exhilarating, and in some ways I find it cathatric. I feel like I'm working through some issues that I didn't even realise I had! 

So, long story short, I think Jack and I have found our sweet spot, and I love that he lets me take charge and edge him once in a while, whilst he kicks back, relaxes, and enjoys rather than putting in all the hard work for a change. That wouldn't happen if we didn't have a healthy and trusting relationship, which makes me a feel a bit special, if I'm honest.   

I even had a reason to haul out my leather bodysuit and riding crop thanks to Jack -- not to use on him but on someone he introduced me to. After telling him how I enjoyed light BDSM with women but couldn't find a willing partner, he had me talk with a woman he knew who had a kink for being a sub with women, and she couldn't find any willing female partners. 

Linda, as I'll call her, is the most unlikely person to be part of this scene. She's an accountant who wears glasses, she has three kids, she's rather plump (in a quite pleasing way, mind you), and she always has a cardigan on when I see her, with her hair done up in a ponytail or a bun. She lives a quiet, conservative suburban life, but she and her husband both have kinks that they consensually go outside of their marriage to fulfil. 

When Jack relayed to her that I had experience as a femdom and was looking for an occasional female sub, she rang me no more than 10 minutes later, asking when I was free for lunch! We learnt about each other's stories, we decided we quite liked each other, and things unfolded from there. She was itching to get into some mischief -- but I decided to engage in some mischief of my own and string her along for a bit, just to build up her anticipation once the real thing finally rolled around. Would you expect any less from a femdom? I have to say she's great fun and a lovely person, and I'm quite glad Jack connected us. 

Closer to home, I was over the moon when Tim and Jack agreed to a three-way when I suggested it. I felt like a queen being the centre of attention of two sexy men. For them, it must have felt like old times with Gina... but I knew enough not to ask about that. I just enjoyed being ravished. We've done it a few times more since, and I have to say I'm up for it whenever they are.

As far as Jack goes, I'm well aware that I have to share him with other women, and I'm not so naive as to think I mean more to him than the dozens of other women he's no doubt been with. I know he has at least a couple of regular subs at minimum. But on the other hand, most of the other women in his life that I'm aware of are strictly BDSM partners and not people with whom he builds loving relationships that extend beyond rough sex. Perhaps that places me in some kind of elite category in his mind, but I don't really know and I'm not prepared to ask. 

All I can say for certain is that we've actually been out on a couple of dates, completely removed from any S&M context, and each time he's introduced me to people as his girlfriend -- which I find incredibly sweet. He definitely knows how to flatter a girl. He always tells me how beautiful I am, and he's commented more than once on what he calls my "rockin' yoga body." At 44, I think I still look pretty good -- and he does quite like my yoga-enhanced flexibility in the sack. He seems especially fixated on my thighs and ass, and I don't really mind. He's pretty yummy himself, when it gets down to it.

I have to admit I really, really like him. He's a handsome gentleman but also dangerous. He knows how to treat a lady, but he'll push her to her limits if she asks. No slight on Tim, whom I love dearly, but Jack is the first man in my life I actually have deep romantic and sexual feelings for, the way I always have with women. 

And this is precisely why I've questioned my lesbianism of late. Whilst I still feel a much deeper emotional connection on the whole to women and find their bodies amazingly luscious and beautiful, I do quite enjoy the animal physicality of fucking a man. I'm not much on labels, though, so I don't sit up at night wringing my hands over it. I'm either bisexual or a just a lesbian who enjoys some occasional penis... and what spurts out of the penis.

The future

I swear I'm starting to actually feel like Gina. Not only am I still in regular contact with all of Gina's partners, but two of them are now my partners! I now have five female partners and two male ones overall, where she had three guys and two ladies. I still count my ex-wife among my partners, even though it's been a while since we've been together. She's been trying to move on to some new relationships, but when we do get together, it seems inevitable that we end up in the sack together.  

Mary and I got past our awkwardness around each other and are good friends now. We have been intimate again on a couple of occasions, fuelled more by nostalgia than by any interest in exploring long-term romance. We like each other, obviously, but relationship-wise, we're better suited for other people. We make better friends than lovers, and that's okay -- especially if the friendship is flexible enough to allow for some good sex if the mood strikes.

Our second encounter had the odd effect of clearing the air between us, allowing us to move forward together in a healthier way. That was evidenced best, I think, by our third encounter, which happened last summer when I brought Mary and Scott along with their kids to the ranch in Arizona. Mary and I were out riding horses, and the romance of it all just overtook us. Next day, we were back to being good friends, with no awkwardness to speak of. Which makes me very happy! 

Best of all, our friendship means that I get to see Alissa quite often. She's my closest living link to Gina, and I absolutely love seeing her grow up. She's a young adult now, and fortunately, she seems to be fairly emotionally balanced, which I felt would be a concern given her genetics and the chaos of her early childhood.  

I never used to understand how Gina could juggle so many relationships, but being in the thick of it myself now, I find you get used to it. You get into a rhythm where everyone gets a fair share of your time. And it helps with prioritising when you have a primary partner who lives under the same roof with you. Cathy will always get the majority of my time, but that doesn't mean I love my other people any less.

I do dearly love all my partners and am so grateful to have them in my life. But Gina will always have a special place in my heart, above all others. I miss her dearly, but I think she'd be happy if today she could see all the people who were part of her inner circle. We've all gone on to have successful relationships with each other, and in our own way I think we all honour her memory.