Bob had kissed me everywhere, ending in his favorite place. His hands, lips and tongue had teased me until I writhed in anticipation, then had guided me through spasming satisfaction to exhausted repletion. I recovered in his arms, feeling the hot hardness of his desire on my thigh. Once, I had been embarrassed by his erections; now, at least when we are alone, my reaction is smugness. We had kissed for a long time before I had cradled him and he had entered me.

People joke about the "missionary position" but I had been able to hold him everywhere, in my arms and legs and mouth and vagina. It had been a time of licking and movement and friction and lust but also a time of whispers and pauses and hugs and love. It had not been his exciting me, delicious as that can be. Rather, it had been our exciting us until neither could stand any more. Then I had touched him in the ways he can't resist. The feel of his ecstasy and his seed spraying into me is the ultimate aphrodisiac. I had followed him, and our throes and our collapse were two more pieces of togetherness. I had fallen asleep in my beloved's arms, but I had been the one hugging him after I had come back from the bathroom in the middle of the night. I had hugged him in that bed, for the last time.

Bob (and his whole family) had been dismayed that our marriage meant that I wouldn't be a college student too. The first summer, Bob and I learned only about marriage. Even leaving sex out of it, which we didn't, that is a huge amount to learn. When Bob started back to school, I read along with him in one course. East Asia, The Modern Transformation is a classic, and I got a lot out of it. But Bob wasn't taking a comparable course the next semester. Finding that the pattern couldn't be repeated was the first failure.

My supervisor had told me that I could test for the next opening for data entry technician. That was a raise from file clerk, in both money and status. My typing hadn't been adequate at that time, however. So we had purchased a computer program that taught typing. At first, I had started in the middle. When that hadn't worked, I had started in the beginning and rushed through the first lessons. That hadn't worked either, the second failure. Desperate to justify the program's cost, I had actually followed the directions, starting at the beginning, and going at the suggested speed without jumping ahead. That's when I learned that starting over on something that you almost know can make you an expert. I had ended up getting the data-entry job. Not too much later, I was a match for the best tech in the office.

This had been great, but I had needed -- still need -- some real learning to make me the appropriately educated wife of Professor Brennan. Having figured out that my lunch hour was available learning time, I'd decided to really learn my college French text, starting with the vocabulary.

We had purchased a boxed set of French vocabulary cards in a yard sale and (soon after) a set of blank cards from the bookstore. By pulling printed cards and writing others, I managed to memorize nearly the whole vocabulary from my college text by the time I was through the typing course. Going through the text after that memorization was no great problem.

That was as far as I had planned to go, but there were still lunch hours, and printed cards which I hadn't studied. Besides, I had rediscovered what I had learned from the typing program: Doing the course correctly when you almost know something really teaches you.

This had become my lunchtime game. For a while after finishing the old text book, I actually had spent little time on French at home; but language study had gradually taken over. I had gone back and memorized English-to-French; I had gone only the other direction at first. Bob had found some story collection texts in used-book stores next. Again, I would memorize the vocabulary in the back of the book first -- adding to my little cards -- then read the stories.

When fall came, I had started visiting the language lab one night a week. On Thursdays, Bob and I would each carry two "lunches" and would eat one for supper. He would go to the library, I would go to the language lab. They never checked for student ID. Late in the spring, my former French professor had caught me. "Considering the number of students who should be here but aren't," he'd said, "I am really tempted to shut my eyes. But this facility is for registered students only."

Bob had then written his parents the whole story. He finished the letter: "This going back to beginnings could sound like making no progress. In truth, it means a broadening of the base. Jeanette now has an impressive vocabulary. What she needs to emphasize next is pronunciation. There are language courses on tape which would do that job thoroughly. I think that this is a family educational expense. We decided, on practical grounds, that Jeanette's education should wait; but that was a compromise between the ideal of education and economic necessity. I feel that this little sliver of learning shouldn't wait. What do you feel?"

Bob's parents had brought an entire taped course, rated highest for business people, and a special tape recorder when they came for his graduation. Now I sat with earphones on my head and one of the tapes of that course in the recorder on my lap. I can't read in a moving car, but I can listen.

I can't say that I hadn't been warned. When we went for counseling before the wedding, PastorJim had made the point that no one has really thought out a marriage before entering into one. Most planning concerns only a few areas. "You've had your wedding all planned for some time?" he had asked me. I had agreed. "And," he had asked Bob, "you've had the honeymoon thought out for as long?"

"We're going hiking on our honeymoon." I had replied, thinking that I was speaking for both of us. Then I had sat there trying to hold back my blushes while the two males tried to hold back their laughter. Well, I had gone hiking on my honeymoon; and Bob had been beside me every step of the way. Bob had spent his honeymoon in a tent; he's said so since. And I had been in his arms every night.

And every night, he had been thoughtful.

Beforehand, I'd formed my image of sex from the descriptions in books. We, mostly Bob, would do "foreplay" until I was "ready." Then we would have "intercourse" until Bob (and I, if things were done right) had a "climax." Then the books, by changing the subject to the millions of sperm trying to get to the ovum and the reasons to make sure that you prevent that, implied that the people involved were done and could go on to the next task.

Even my wedding night hadn't quite been like that. Bob kissed and stroked me until I had a climax, a blessedly small one. Bob had worried about physical pain, and there had been some, then he had been sorry about that. That concern, that sorrow, had quieted my worries about the commitment that I had just made.

Our fourth night had changed my understanding. My pain had been gone; we were in the tent instead of a hotel room. This time, Bob had stopped his stroking short of my climax. Then he had entered me slowly. Absent the pain of the first night, this had been an indescribably voluptuous sensation. While he had paused at full penetration, I had luxuriated in holding him in a way that I never had before. I had just enough time to decide that I had reached the sensuous limit that explained everyone's fascination with sex before he had begun moving and had proven me wrong.

Gradually, he had completely lost control. He had driven mindlessly within me as I had struggled to meet his motions and contain his passion. Then he had pressed in to the limit, stiff and shaking, while I could see his face grimace in the starlight and could feel his organ pulsing within me. My own physical sensations probably had been exciting, but all I had really noticed was that miracle of emotion above and within me. I had seen the blinding heat of his passion, and it had been directed at me.

After he had wrenched himself from my arms and caught his breath, he had returned to his kisses and caresses. My worries about self-control had melted before the exciting sensations and more exciting memories. After that revelation of his passion, how could I have denied him mine, scary as that might be?

Before I'd met Bob, I had established a pattern for myself. If I didn't care for people and didn't let them see how they affected me, then they couldn't hurt me except physically. (It's strange, though, how much I hurt in those years.) Bob had become my friend, then my boyfriend; but I certainly hadn't intended to allow him inside the stockade. Bob had done things which hurt me. Against my will, I had let him see the hurt.

Bob hadn't told me how that hurt showed selfishness on my part in trying to put my goals before his, as my mother does. He hadn't explained that I was misunderstanding the real situation, as my father and older brother often do. He certainly hadn't enjoyed my pain as my brother Dave does. (Dave is the younger of my brothers, but is older than me.) Bob had been anguished. I hadn't thought that good enough, I had tried to lock him out of my life, my caring. I had failed to do so.

The other side of that, though, was that Bob had become my only pain. I could share almost everything that bothered me, and he felt it, too. After we had begun hugging in romance, I had learned that he could hug in reassurance. I had tried out for the girls' track team depending on his being there to kiss away the sting of rejection. Instead, he had been there to share the joy of acceptance and, later, he had been there to watch me run. If I could share it with Bob, the pleasures of life were worth the risks of life.

When we had been able to be alone after particularly bad times, Bob had held me while I shuddered. "Able to talk about it?" he would ask. I would shake my head. Then, after the movie or whatever, I had often been able to tell him.

This had developed slowly, over two years that also included my completion of puberty. Hugs which had once kept me warm had gone on to make me hot; kisses had gone from being a celebration of excitement to a cause of it. Bob had been well ahead of me; and I, with two older brothers, had always known what that pressure against my stomach had meant.

One spring day, Bob had been able to borrow his father's car. Considering it too fine a day for petting in the front seat, we'd spent the time petting in a grove of trees off a deserted farm road. His attention to my breasts had turned me on even more than usual. I had been standing against a tree with his thigh between mine pressing against my mound. We had been kissing as deeply as we could and rubbing our bodies together. Suddenly, the sensations between my legs had gone from a pleasant, familiar, tingle to a desperate fire. I had panicked and writhed in attempted escape, but Bob had been only slightly more yielding than the tree. The fire had cut through me and shaken me to my core. Then I had nearly collapsed. Bob had actually picked me up and carried me back towards the car before I recovered.

I had freaked. Then, even more than now, control had been important to me. Losing control had frightened me to death. I hadn't been able to talk to Bob about it, much less anybody else. Bob had driven me back home, at my request.

The few days between his return and the beginning of school were bliss. His parents had even invited me for dinner one night ostensibly so that they could see their son. School slowed us down only slightly. One afternoon, his mouth on my breasts and his hand on my thighs had overcome all my usual caution. When he had reached the juncture of my legs, I had spread them instead of clasping them. The climax had been a wave of pleasure followed by a wave of panic, but Bob had been there holding me and crooning. "Lovely Jeanette," he'd said. "Sweet girl. Darling, beautiful, darling. Precious girl. I love you."

"Bob?" I'd asked.

"I'm right here. You're in my arms. You are safe and loved." And I was. My panic ebbed. He tried to be comforting, but there was an underlying smugness; he thought that I had had a climax. The real, frightening, truth was that the climax had had me. The pleasure had been real, but the fright had been much greater. Having another person there had compounded the fright, although having Bob there afterwards had been a comfort. If I was ever to let control go, instead of having it wrenched from me, it had to be in Bob's presence. Even so, I later asked him to draw the line on petting so that he didn't touch me there again. "For how long?" he'd asked. We'd drawn lines in petting before.

"Forever, I think."

"Indefinitely," he'd offered and not brought it up that year.

When Bob had gone off to the university, my parents -- with some support from his -- had extracted the promise that each of us would date others in that separation. In this "cooling off period," I had dated juniors, nerds, and two boys who thought that their romance with each other was secret. Bob had participated in the college dating scene. We had only seen each other on the few school breaks. Deprived of Bob, I had counted the months until we would both be on the same campus away from my mother.

By Bob's spring break, even my mother had accepted that this was the future. On that break, Bob had taken almost full control of his mother's car. We had walked and talked driven and talked and parked and.... Well, we had talked then too. We had needed to catch each other up on the time that we had been apart. Our discussions ran for hours.

That had included a long talk on our past year which revealed that some of his dates had included full sex. I had been devastated. I had hidden myself in my room and cried my eyes out. I had been livid. I had never wanted to see him again. Realistically, though, there had only been three days to tell him what a dog he had been, and avoiding him would have meant wasting them. Instead, I had told him how he had ruined my life. He'd responded that he loved me, that we had promised our parents to try out other relationships before we made a commitment to each other, that he had never doubted the permanence of our relationships, and that I'd never told him that I expected him to fake those dates. (You can take a date to the movies without taking her to bed.)

I had silenced him with a demand that he only listen. For two days I talked myself hoarse. "And never imagine," I'd ended one diatribe, "that I'm going to compete with those other girls."

"Too late," he'd finally broken in. "You've already won."

"You know what I mean. My body isn't the price for a date with you."

"It never was. You haven't even said that you will go on a date with me, much less that you would put out for the privilege." He had a point, but he hadn't been supposed to be talking back.

We had parted with nothing resolved. I had entered more honestly into the school social life, although it had been rather late for that. I had discovered that I didn't like kissing or petting with other boys, and that drawing the line was much harder with them.

Bob had signed up for a third summer of road construction. His brief interim at home had included as much time together as before, but most of it had been spent in recrimination. He had said that he had stopped having sex. I'd told him that this reform was rather late.

"How would you have felt if I had done that?" I had asked.

"Devastated. Betrayed. But I was always ready for you. I would have felt betrayed that you were ready for another when you weren't ready for me."

So he had gone for the summer, still with nothing resolved. We had started writing again, Bob's letters to me going via his mother. Bob's letters had been simply abject in the beginning. While the later ones all included an apology, he made an effort to include the jokes and insights that had entertained me before. I had gradually realized that I had been even more afraid of losing Bob to someone else than I had been angry about the betrayal.

At the end of the summer, he had begged for my pardon literally on his knees. Unable to resist that, and remembering the times that he had been there when I had needed him, I had forgiven him.

Soon we had been on the same campus together. Bob introduced me to the campus social scene, but we would also meet between classes or for lunch. We'd studied together at the library until he confessed that he wasn't learning anything. It had been fine for me, Bob's presence is the most reassuring environment for anything. We had talked, and talked, and talked. We had reestablished all the physical intimacy denied us over the previous fifteen months. In hidden nooks, he had groped me; his roommate had been willing to guarantee library absences to give us privacy.

Bob had held his breath when he confessed that he really wanted to change his future plans from lawyer to historian. In the truck, I stole another glance at my love. He has huge blind spots and hadn't been able to see that his unhappiness would have made me unhappy.

Ironically, this had been the first period in my life since meeting him -- since long before meeting him, had I known it -- that I hadn't needed Bob. I had one tiny bedroom in a "suite," but that room had a lock. My silent insistence on my privacy had been freely accepted by my suitemates. (They had met, and been mightily impressed by, Bob the first week. Dating a sophomore, I had come across as the one who knew what college life was about.) Mother had been many miles away; classes, my only campus pressure, had never been able to compete with her. In this heady freedom. I had been able to enjoy Bob's presence without using it as a talisman. There had been no need for: "I can take this, Bob will hug me tomorrow."

We had jointly explored the emptier parts of the University while Bob explored my parts. I asked him to honor the old limits. "Until marriage?" he had asked dubiously. At that time, this had still meant two and a half more years.

(That September, we had decided that we would get married when he graduated. On the bus taking us both home for Thanksgiving, we had decided that the end of his junior -- and my sophomore -- year made more sense. At Christmas, we had announced the engagement for the coming June to both families.)

We'd agreed about nothing on the question of limits except to talk later. "I'll trade you," had been Bob's final offer. "We stop where we are. No sex before marriage. You keep your panties on. But if sex waits for marriage, then marriage is about sex. There are no inhibitions after we have tied the knot. You think about that one." And I had.

I'd had to deal with myself honestly. My passion, not Bob's, was what had frightened me, but my passion had also attracted me, especially at the lower intensities. The possibility of those moments had become almost as enticing as alarming. And the more distant the future, the more enticing and the less threatening it had appeared. I had already become nearly as reluctant to say "never" about those climaxes as I was to say "now" or "soon." I had been (I am still) unable to imagine trusting anyone but Bob around when I lost control; so saying "not Bob" was saying "never."

Then there was marriage. I'd always meant to marry Bob someday. Even at my angriest, I'd never quite told myself that I wouldn't marry him. Bob had been wrong, marriage isn't about sex; it is about trust, and forever, and sharing everything. But sharing everything obviously included sharing this thing which was of paramount importance to Bob. And if I said never to this, Bob's "forever" would include a "never"; he hadn't said that he wouldn't make that sacrifice, but he hadn't said that he would. And, finally, my reluctance wasn't about sex; it was about trust.

There were other considerations. Bob had given me comfort when there was no other comfort; I would give him whatever he wanted. He had gone back to his harem with staples in their bellies, but I couldn't expect him to be satisfied with those magazines forever. I had wanted a future with Bob; it could only be secure if his lust reinforced, rather than eroding, his love. I'd been greedy for all of Bob. Wanting a monopoly, I had decided to satisfy all his wants. Then and there I had determined to satisfy all of my husband's sexual desires. I had agreed that "Marriage is about sex."

And there I was again, with the same thought after how many miles? I hoped that I was driving straight while I was thinking in a circle. That old determination had not reckoned, of course, on the extent of Bob's sexual desires. I darted another glance at my sleeping man. All these memories were increasing my sexual desires. And that was the other half of it.

Everybody had become concerned about the inessentials when we announced our engagement. My mother and I had gone through serious negotiations about how many of my dreams would be allowed in the wedding designed according to her dreams, but that had been totally predictable. The response of Bob's family had come as a surprise; they had kept expecting me to be fazed by Bob's decision to take seven or eight more years to become a history instructor, rather than five more years to become a lawyer. They, and Bob, had been quite upset that my education would be delayed or ended. (Although we never had spoken the word "ended" aloud.) We had gone for marital counseling with the pastor of a church near campus. (He hadn't married us, although that threat had been useful against my mother.) PastorJim had raised all sorts of questions regarding the future, some of them involving sex. Bob had once suggested that I avoid the pain of defloration by stretching myself first.

Nobody seemed to worry whether Jeanette could bear losing self control.

Upon resurfacing from our honeymoon, real life had presented us with several conflicts that needed resolution. In the previous five years, Bob and I had spent countless hours dealing with each other; each of us had spent a significant fraction of our times apart thinking of the other. We had, aside from the abortive attempt to study in the library, never been together while needing to concentrate on something else. We had needed time to learn how to live with each other and still get our work done.

It is one thing to have Bob be an attentive lover walking beside you all day and then holding you in his arms talking for an hour before petting you into a passion leading to intercourse. It is quite another to have him be a vegetable planted in a book for an entire evening until he brings an erection into bed when you are almost asleep.

Even in the summer, even with no money, there had been things to do and places to go around the town and the University. With my internal qualms about marriage allayed, I had been eager to flaunt my husband. Bob, on the other hand, had expressed a disinclination to "share me with others." The compromises that we reached on that had foundered on Bob's expectations that a late evening out would cut sleep time rather than sex time. We compromised again.

Conflicts hadn't been our only experiences, or even our main ones. I stole a glance at Bob. Making your coffee every morning can cover a multitude of sins.

Actually, I'd been happy about all three aspects of the situation, as far as they can be distinguished; being married, being with Bob, and being married to Bob had each been a pleasure.

Between wearing a wedding band and having a full-time job, I had become accepted as an adult, and had enjoyed that acceptance. I had begun running a household, and while I had needed Bob's assent on important matters, much of the daily authority had been mine. (The charm of making out menu plans and shopping lists had passed quickly, but I could still remember it.) Bob had been attending PastorJim's church regularly. I had started accompanying him much less regularly. Those of us under fifty in the church, few enough in the summer, had tended to divide into married and single. Bob and I had been accepted without question into the married group and had socialized with them.

Bob goes away as completely when he opens a book as when he walks out the door. Once I had accepted that fact, Bob -- when actually present -- had turned out to be as entertaining as ever; and his enthusiasm for the latest idea or fact to come to his attention had remained as contagious. He had kept up his outrageous compliments. Having been called "Pudge" by people who "didn't really mean it", I can accept being called "the most beauteous woman in North America" by someone who -- even if will not admit this -- clearly doesn't mean it. It sort of balances the scales. If he had been reassuring and comforting less often than in our premarital days, my need, rather than his willingness, had diminished.

If "the honeymoon was over," we had never expected otherwise. Many particular bumps on the marital road had come as surprises, but we had expected to have some. I, at least, had expected more. Happy surprises, if fewer, had been totally unexpected; each of us, for example, had come into the marriage expecting to do the family laundry. Then there was the result of our switch in birth control.

I had become something of a connoisseur of Bob's climaxes on our honeymoon, his tension, the increasing force and urgency of his thrusts, his grimace at the moment of crisis, his boyish smile and blissful collapse immediately afterwards. When we had switched from condoms to a diaphragm, I had discovered an entirely new aspect. Suddenly, I had been able to feel the actual ejaculation, the pivot of all that excitement. The sensation of his seed being driven into me had transcended the erotic.

My experience of sexuality had changed from the steady upward progress of one careful seduction after another on my honeymoon to something of a plateau with ups and downs. Far from being a disappointment, this had seemed quite a high plateau. The ups and downs had created a situation in which I had to decide whether my desire for that degree of sexuality was greater than my remaining fear of it; it was. What I had resisted was Bob's occasional attempt to bring the Kama Sutra into our bedroom.

Being married to Bob, aside from living with him or just being married, had exhibited it's own advantages. There had been Bob's family. The Brennans stand by their own, and I have always been sure that they consider me one of their own. Bob's mother, Katherine, had already become the woman that I most respected. We are both "Mrs. Brennan"; and, silly as it sounds, that had helped my self confidence.

Anne, PastorJim's wife, had participated in our counseling. Somehow, she had taken a great liking to the two of us; her favor had given us cachet in our narrow circle, especially that summer when she had been so conspicuously pregnant. She'd once asked an instructor who complained about not having the money to replace his car, "Why don't you tell the Brennans about your money problems?" presenting us, not as ciphers due to our low income, but as notables due to our coping with low income. We had been making progress coping with our conflicts, as well; if we hadn't made that public, it had become a source of pride for the two of us.

Going into our marriage, I had wanted structure for our family. Feeling my way, I had made a series of suggestions to Bob. He had interspersed an occasional "of course" with his usual "Let's try it." Some of it worked, some of it felt clumsy; Bob had never criticized an experiment. When a particularly artificial attempt at scheduling significant conversations fell flat, I'd berated myself for the silly idea. "Nonsense," said Bob. "You suggested an experiment. We tried it and learned that we don't want to do that. A successful experiment is one you learn from. Besides you aren't allowed to talk like that about the woman I love."

One Friday, towards the end of the summer, Bob had asked for a family meeting after supper. He had started with a list of several of my ideas which had been abandoned. "We said we would try these," he had said. "I move that we tried them and decided against." That had been clearly so. The next list was of things that I had thought settled. "We said we would try these," he had said. "I move that we adopt them until we both agree to change them." That had made perfect sense to me. "Third," Bob had gone on, "are you content with my saying all the graces?" I had been unused to having grace at meals; but it is structure, Brennan structure at that, and clearly important to Bob. I had nodded.

"Fourth and last," Bob had continued, "I would like to introduce a new structure. You and I obviously disagree about sexual experimentation. We need some compromise. I move that we limit experimentation to one night a week, Friday would be appropriate for many reasons. So that Friday evenings will be scheduled for sex games beginning a week from today." This is archetypical Bob. He could have suggested it and answered my protests with a list of all my experiments that he had tried. Instead, he had dealt with all my ideas in an objective fashion and then sprung his. He let me see for myself that I wanted all sorts of things for us, and had received his support. His two areas of concern had been prayer and sex.

My sense of jealousy supported my sense of fairness on this one. I had once sworn to myself to make sure that Bob didn't have any libido left to direct at another woman. I'd already found that draining Bob's libido was incompatible with his functioning in the outer world, but I could see a danger in his wandering around with special desires he would never satisfy at home.

With all these reasons against me, I hadn't considered saying a flat "no"; but I had made an effort to moderate Bob's plan. I had suggested cutting out the Fridays during my periods, and allotting half the remainder to my experiments. Bob had accepted both revisions.

Bob's "games" had come as something of a surprise. Besides the experiments with new positions, they had included a higher form of seduction. With me reasonably happy about my sexuality, he had sought to evoke my sensuality. Candlelight and kisses had marked these games. I, who had quailed at the possibility of one climax a few months before, was led to two, and sometimes three, in a single hour.

Or, maybe, in a period of two or three hours. Bob had been perfectly serious about scheduling "Friday evenings." One part, maybe the center, of his sensuality is that it is a long excursion taking much more time than the direct route. We often had started soon after dinner, and no alarm clock had threatened to turn a late night into a short one. Bob had heartily enjoyed the slow build-ups, but I think that he had planned them for me. An hour of being kissed everywhere else, had overcome much of my aversion to the idea of a kiss on my genitals. (The first minute of that kiss had eradicated all the remaining aversion.)

I (and probably Bob) had regarded my Fridays as merely a cutback in the schedule. My first game had been labeled "Missionary." Bob's only resistance had been one comment, "You're cutting off your nose to spite your face, you know." I'd really made my point, and that was important. Just because I've forgotten the point in the intervening years doesn't mean that I hadn't needed to make it back then.

My second game had been labeled "Honeymoon." I'd brought the kitchen timer with me. "For the next hour," I decreed, "we will only talk." We had talked; mostly Bob had talked about the biography he was reading. The hour afterwards we had kissed and hugged and talked. We had petted and talked until nearly our normal bedtime. The sex after that had been totally vanilla, but totally different from "Missionary."

"Sweet darling!" Bob had said when he finally had reached my moisture and felt its extent. I'd lain there and let his fingers work their magic until I feared my release would be all alone. I had tugged at his shoulder then.

"Beloved," he had asked while climbing between my legs, "do you want me as much as I want you?"

I'd nodded. "Lonely," I'd said. He'd replaced his fingers with Junior, smoothing my juices over both of us until I thought that I would explode. "Now," I'd said.

"Now," he'd agreed, and stopped at the entrance. After shifting his weight, he'd entered slowly and smoothly. I'd been stretched and rubbed and filled. I'd felt his smoothness and thickness and firmness and heat. My body had tensed under his before he'd quite finished. "Oh love," he'd said, "I can't describe how wonderful you feel when you surround me." I'd felt a preliminary tremor, and he must have felt it too. He'd gasped and started his motions. These had quickly carried me over and I'd gone soaring away without ever leaving the sound of his voice or the sensations of his strokes within me.

"Sweet, sweet, girl," he'd said. "Oh wonderful darling. Gorgeous ... Oh!" Then, after a pause. "God! God! God! God! God!" I had returned enough to feel his ejaculations after each of those oaths. He'd collapsed then, but it was a long time before his weight had felt too heavy.

"Can you move?" I'd asked.

"Barely," he'd said; but he had. "You misheard. I promised that I'd never lie to you." The giggles had taken me.

After the messes were mopped up and the candle was out, we'd cuddled into sleep. "Poor dear," he'd murmured. "Have I been ignoring you?" Not quite, but I've enjoyed the talks we've had in bed since.

My games had become a time of letting him know what I would prefer, then what I would like to see sometimes, then which of his experiments I had accepted. We had invented "rain checks" first to allow us to go out on Friday nights, then to free me from the mechanical burden of the calendar. In theory, I had a number of times saved up; I could call upon those when I wanted to specify our activity. In fact, we soon lost track of that number; my husband welcomed any statement that I wanted something specific in the sex department. His one rule was that any wish of mine for extra gentleness and cuddling wasn't a game. He was perfectly willing to ease in bed whatever bumps had been handed me in life. It just couldn't be deducted from the by-then- forgotten number; he said that he is duty-bound to cherish me in every way. As for me, wed to a man who always sought my sensual enjoyment, I preferred to let him call most of the shots while I lay there and enjoyed his program.

One exception had been oral sex. Since my first surprise at the glorious pleasure that Bob could give me with his mouth, I had been ambivalent about whether I had wanted to reciprocate. Aside from whatever pleasure I might give Bob, there had been the possibility of my own. Bob's face looks so cute just before he climaxes that I'd really wanted a way to see that without my own condition interfering. On the other hand, the idea had seemed doubly dirty, unhygienic as well as obscene. Bob was ambivalent, himself. He had enjoyed it with another woman, but had been adamant that I never do it to "serve" him. My curiosity had tipped the scales.

Well, the taste is not something I would seek out. On the other hand, all of Bob looks cute as every muscle tenses, and his eyes screw up (if you'll pardon the expression), and his mouth grimaces, and his arms press down on the bed, and he starts panting. Then he lifts his hips up, and Junior swells and tenses just a bit more. I control all that and can look him over as he teeters on the edge. Then he convulses and bobs his hips while Junior jerks and spatters in my mouth. He usually says things then, affirmative if not particularly coherent. A minute later, he regresses to a baby; all that strength and tension disappears. And he is so sweet to me afterwards.

Let's just say that both of us had resolved our ambivalences.

Bob's classes had started soon after the games had, and the games hadn't dominated our sex life, let alone our life. Many nights in the two years after the games began, we had come home from a meeting or party together six or seven hours before the alarm clocks would ring. Many more nights, we had gone our separate ways from dinner (or breakfast) until we met in bed. Those nights, we had enacted the scenario of the old sex manuals: a little desultory conversation in the dark to dissolve the armor that the day requires, a few kisses, Bob's hand stroking Jeanette into "readiness," Jeanette's hand checking or even inducing Bob's "readiness," a slow, then fast, pistoning to a sort of climax -- mutual more often than not. Sometimes, and who can blame us, we skipped most of that and fell asleep before the conversation was done.

But even those times were infused by the love, and -- yes -- the lust, carried into our marriage from the best times; and the best times depended on what we had learned from the games. We had celebrated Bob's acceptance into the grad school he'd preferred by his carrying me around the apartment, transfixed, before placing me on the bed for a quieter celebration; we couldn't have done that the first time we tried to make love standing up. The time in the chair bidding goodbye to the apartment had been sweet love partially because we knew the results of motion in that situation.

They hadn't all worked, except by Bob's criterion of teaching us something. I hadn't seen the point of sixty-nine and still don't. Bob hadn't been particularly eager to repeat it either. We'd tried "doggie style" with my kneeling on the mattress and him standing or kneeling behind me two times each. "Nice names don't help?" Bob had asked after the fourth try.

"I don't think that is the real problem," I'd replied. "Is this really important to you?"

"Not that important," he had said. "How about lying down?"

"The spoon? Different category. Besides that one is important to you."

"I still remember the time in the forest."

"So do I," I had said, neatly avoiding the point that it his favorite memory of the honeymoon but not in my top ten. Well, I like almost every memory of the honeymoon. "Anyway, that is not experimental, much less rejected."

"I love you," he'd said. And I love him, not least because he could respond that way to a "yes" while not commenting on the "no"s. "How about both of us standing?" We'd done that only once. I had bent over the dresser, and he'd come into me from behind.

"Hmmm?" I couldn't remember any distaste about that. "Let's keep that experimental." And so we had.

Months later, he'd tried a variation of that experiment. We'd kissed standing until I was light-headed, then he'd undressed me ceremoniously, kissing every place as it had been bared. When my labia had turned dewey and my knees had turned weak from his ministrations, I'd started towards the bed. Instead, he'd turned me towards the dresser. Catching his intent, I'd bent over with my elbows resting on the dresser and my hands pressed against the wall. He'd spread his legs wide behind me. While kissing my neck and shoulders, he'd rubbed Junior up and down my cleft and had positioned him at my entry. Then he'd held a breast in each hand while penetrating me slowly. Eager for him, I'd dropped my belly and thrust back against him, closing my legs as I did so. He had needed to grab the edge of the dresser to steady himself. With his other hand playing with the front junction of my labia, he'd only had that arm available to pull me against him.

I'd been moving more than he had when I felt my body stiffen as it neared its climax. I'd shifted my left hand to balance the whole force of his thrusts, while I'd spread my legs slightly. I had reached between my legs to hold his scrotum. It had tightened away from my fingers. I had felt him pulse inside me for just a split second before my own climax rolled over me and swept me away.

His arms had been on the dresser beside me, and his lips had been between my shoulder blades when I had next noticed things. He'd been trying to kiss me but his having to breathe interfered with suction. Despite the tickling, it had all felt like love. He'd finally managed a deep breath and babbled "I love you, Iloveyou, Iloveyou, Ilove," until his breath had failed again.

"Love you," I had managed. Junior had long been outside and the mess all on the floor before we had been able to sort ourselves out. In bed afterwards, we had cuddled and consulted. "Any time you want," I had said, "so long as the room is warm." (Bob is half polar bear.) He'd hugged me and I'd hugged his arm back.