A Small Misunderstanding

Mine is a story of misunderstandings and misinterpretations, leading to mistakes of life-changing proportion.

I'm 52 years old. My hair, of which I still have plenty, has turned silver - nearly white. I am of average height, still standing 6 feet tall, down from my peak at 6' 2". Like many my age, I have let myself go, and developed somewhat of a pot belly. My belly, however, is the only fat on my body; although at just over 260 lbs, it's easy for me to give the impression of general obesity. I suppose it's only natural, if you see a guy with a pot belly, to assume that those large biceps (18 inches) and thighs (28 inches) are just more flab. In my case, they aren't. They're very hard, very strong muscle.

You see, although I am now viewed as somewhat of a nerd, I grew up doing hard physical labor, and my body responded to that stress by putting on muscle at a young age. As I grew older, the work got harder, and my body grew larger, putting on even more muscle. That process continued until I got my first office job at the age of 21. Sitting at a desk eight or more hours a day, when you are used to constant motion and heavy lifting, is a sure-fire way to pack on the pounds. So my work environment changed in a way that reduced physical stress, while increasing mental and emotional stress, and my body still demanded that I eat as if I were moving the proverbial 16 tons every day. I never could find a way to reduce that demand, and the only way I could fight it was exercise. For that reason, I spent many long hours in the weight room at the local YMCA, trying to control my weight. It didn't work to reduce my waistline, but it did help me maintain my strength and muscle tone.

So I have a big belly, and I'm sort of big all over, and people who don't know any better figure that I'm just another fat, flabby schmuck. It's a false impression, but it, in combination with other errors of fact; it nonetheless encouraged more than one person to make one of those life-changing mistakes, as you will soon see.

I have lived with, and been married to the same woman for 30 years. She's a year younger than me, and together we've enjoyed many good times and weathered a few bad ones. Along the way, we took the time to have and raise three children, two girls and a boy. And yes, the boy is the youngest, and wasn't really in my wife's plans. I was thrilled, however, and after giving me the son I wanted, she had her tubes tied -- to prevent further accidents.

The children are all grown now, my son having graduated four years ago, from the University of Florida. They've all moved on and found others with whom to share their lives and adventures, so now it's just me and Molly.

Let me tell you about Molly.

She stands about 5'8" in her bare feet, and weighs about 130 lbs. She has auburn hair, in which I've begun to notice one or two grey ones every now and then. Sparkling green eyes, with long lashes and eyebrows that she has plucked meticulously to arch in a way that always makes her seem surprised. Great legs... what else can I say about them? Perfect ass, womanly hips, narrow waist and a bust that perfectly balances a figure - a true hourglass - that still captures the attention of men of all ages, and makes other women jealous. And even if you got close enough to kiss her, her face could still pass for 30! Yeah, she's a looker, even at 51, and I enjoy showing her off.

Molly wasn't a virgin when we married, but then, neither was I. Even before we met, we had both already decided that being someone's "first" was less important than being right for each other. After six months together, we were convinced that we were, so we formalized it in a medium sized wedding for which her parents footed the bill.

After graduating from college, me in business administration, and she in social sciences, and we both lucked into pretty good jobs. Early on, however, it became clear that my job was going to bring home the bigger slice of bacon, and when my company moved the next year, we were faced with a choice of Molly keeping her job or us moving with mine. It was no contest. At first, she flirted with the idea of trying for work in the new location, but then decided it was time to get on with starting our family, and so she became a mother, and for the next 23 years, a homemaker.

I gradually moved up in the company, due mainly to the original owners being bought out by a multinational. Had that not happened, nepotism would have eventually forced me to look elsewhere for advancement. But it did happen, and three years ago, just as I was just beginning to think about a possible early retirement, I was offered the position of Chief Operating Officer for a territory covering the Eastern United States, from the coast to the Mississippi River. I figure to stay on for another year or two, and then retire with a much bigger nest egg.

Molly had a number of part-time jobs while the kids grew up, and after our son entered college, she had short stints with full-time work as we moved around the country with my job. For the last few years, though, we haven't had to move, so she's been with a company that provides contract support for Employee Assistance Programs, funded by the Human Resources departments in various local governments and industries. Her employment with Sam Hill Services, LLC, was also a factor in those life-changing mistakes.

-------------------------------------------------

As often happens in a marriage, the flames of romance and lust that raged at first, diminished with time; what started out burning brightly, became reduced to embers. This happened for all the usual reasons: the needs of the children, the demands of the job, other responsibilities, all of the mundane things that consume more than their fair share of the few available hours, leaving little or no time for two committed people to interact as lovers. As a result, one or both partners may develop feelings of unattractiveness and neglect. At the same time their self-image is taking a major hit, their sex life is becoming more predictable and reactive, feeding into the growing yearning for more excitement and a more fulfilling relationship.

One tragedy of that circumstance is that it doesn't end when the kids move out, especially if, as it often happens, the career of one partner or the other has just peaked, and the rewards of long years of labor have just started flowing in abundance. Just at the time that primary caregiver has reached the end of a long commitment of time and energy, and is feeling the least important, and most vulnerable, the other partner suddenly has even less time to be sympathetic and supporting. Is it any wonder that many marriages break up at that point? When that doesn't happen, it's usually because the former caregiver finds employment outside the home, and diverts all that excess emotional and mental energy into making the new job a success.

That is exactly what happened to us. Molly went through a series of employers before settling with SHS, but when she did, she put everything she had into it, quickly becoming their best-performing, highest-paid Counseling Specialist.

On the surface of things, it might seem that her career achievements had no down side, but pay attention: I had just reached a point in my career, at which I could begin to relax somewhat. I no longer had to prove myself - I had already done that - and I could afford to rest on my laurels.

I had finally reached a point in my life where I felt secure enough that I didn't have to put in hours upon hours of unpaid overtime, just to insure the future financial security of my family. I could finally go home at quitting time, or even earlier if I wanted, and spend time with my beloved wife.

Unfortunately, it came at a point where she was just hitting her stride in her new career, and now it was her job that was demanding extra hours, and business travel, and attention that I had expected would be devoted to me and our relationship. In other words, just when I thought we might be able to add new fuel to the fire and fan those old embers back into new flames, I found myself alone much of the time, with only my own imagination and impulses for entertainment. Not a good situation, from my perspective.

Upon giving it due consideration though, I had to admit that Molly deserved my understanding and support. She had, after all, supported me in my career for many years. Trying to be fair, I bit the bullet, thinking that at our ages, she would soon tire of the rat race and be willing to fly away with me. Besides, I still had some time before I intended to retire, and I didn't figure that there would be any major change in our relationship before then.

Those assumptions on my part also fed into the growing cluster of misunderstandings, and ultimately, into the coming life-changing mistakes.

-------------------------------------------------

Since I had an unexpected abundance of time on my hands, I tried to fill it in a number of different ways. At first, I began to accept invitations from my work associates, to meet at one of the many local watering holes for after-work drinks and conversation. I kept this up for a few months, but it was clear from the start that the invitations had been made for reasons politic, rather than any desire to actually be friendly with me.

I'm not dumb. Most of these people worked for me, and probably thought I was the root of all their problems, but for a while I entertained the notion that if I spent some time around them, just being me, I could turn them around. It didn't work though. The invitations didn't stop, but it became clear that there was little or nothing I could do to assuage the adversarial feelings, so eventually I stopped accepting the invitations. Oddly, everyone seemed to breathe a little easier after that.

Occasionally I would stop at a bar of a different kind, on my own. You know the kind I mean... one where pretty young women dance on a stage naked, or nearly so, while drinks are served by other pretty young women with scarcely more clothing. No, I didn't go there to buy sex. Even at our worst, Molly prided herself on satisfying at least my carnal urges, and she knew exactly what I was doing. I'd never made it a secret that I liked looking at pretty, naked women. She didn't really approve, but she knew that I wouldn't go beyond looking - and by the way, the only lap dances I ever got were the ones she gave me, herself, back when we were newlyweds!

Most days, though, I would go on home, and if Molly was there, we'd go out for a nice, but not necessarily expensive, meal. Otherwise, I'd fix myself a drink, and nuke whatever was waiting for me in the 'fridge. Usually it was one of those microwaveable things that are supposed to be somewhat dietetic. Sometimes there wasn't anything easily prepared, and I would order something delivered. After that, I'd usually ditch my work clothes and lounge around in my boxers and a T-shirt, reading, (rarely) watching TV, or surfing the Internet.

On one of those late, lonely evenings, I found this web site, Literotica.com, which hosted sex stories... remember how I said that people yearn for excitement? These stories were exciting! They talked about people doing things that I vaguely remembered hearing about, as a young man in high school and college, but never believed anyone really did! I certainly never even imagined doing them myself, nor did I know anyone who could believably claim that they did! Anyway, this web site had enough stories to keep me occupied, and titillate my imagination for years, if need be.

I started out reading the new stories, and soon realized that I could zero in on those types of stories that held more interest for me than others, so I started investigating the story categories. It quickly became apparent that even the smallest category contained too many stories for me to be able to read them all, so I decided to limit myself to 20 consecutive stories in a category, and rather than go straight through each category in alphabetical order, I decided to use the "story spinner" link, which selects a story at random, from the category.

My limit wasn't hard and fast... that wouldn't have been fair to either myself or to the many authors. You see, Literotica treats individual chapters as if they were complete stories, so pretty often, the "story spinner" would come up with a "story" that was a chapter out of the middle of the longer, "real" story. To make sense of that, when it happened, I had to go back to the author's "submissions page," and begin reading at chapter one.

On other occasions, it happened that I became keenly interested in stories by a given author, and I would read a number of those before moving on with the "story spinner." At other times, perhaps the stories in a particular category would tickle my imagination, and I would read more than my preset limit in that category, sometimes going back to it again after having moved on to the next one.

The bottom line: I spent a lot of time on the Literotica website, when Molly had to work late, and I'm not ashamed to admit that some of those stories inspired some very satisfactory masturbation sessions.

-------------------------------------------------

It was about four months after I found Literotica, plus or minus a few weeks, when the important events of my story, happened.

All during that time, I worked and came straight home, and if Molly was there, we enjoyed a meal together and, pretty often, had wonderful, loving sex before we drifted off to sleep. If she had to work late, I did my quick meal thing, and jumped on the information highway to read sex stories. If I was horny, I jerked off, cleaned up, and went to sleep. Sometime during the night Molly would come in and slip unnoticed under the covers. We'd enjoy a quick breakfast and try to catch up on our schedules before we both headed off to work. A pleasant, if not very satisfying, routine. Then one night, things changed.

I arrived at home at my usual time, and was pleased to find Molly's car in its place in the garage. I knew that something was up the minute I walked into the house: the lights were low, soft music played in the background, and a single candle burned on the dining table, which had already been set for two. Oddly, the place settings were not in their customary places: there was one at Molly's chair, which was to the right of my normal seat, but the other setting was not at my chair. Rather, it was to the left of my normal seat, opposite hers.

As I observed this, Molly entered the room and took my breath away. My pulse quickened as she approached me wearing a diaphanous gown, which wasn't really transparent, but clearly covered only her nude form. She kissed me sweetly, and I returned it to her with passion.

"Looks like it's going to be a special night," I commented, fondling her body.

"You have no idea!" she responded, giggling as she pushed me away. "Now sit down so we can get the show on the road!"

I started around the table to the place setting opposite hers, but she stopped me, saying, "Not there honey... I want you to take your regular chair while I put on the finishing touches."

As I pulled my chair away from the table, she advised "Why don't you go ahead and push it up against the wall, so it won't be in the way when the festivities start?"

I complied with her request, seating myself in the chair, which was then some two feet away from the table. As I did, she disappeared momentarily, returning shortly after I'd seated myself.

I hadn't noticed immediately, but when she returned, she'd brought with her a roll of duct tape - the cheap plastic kind. Before I realized it, she'd taken two wraps of the tape around my left wrist, binding it to the arm of the "Captain's Chair" in which I sat. I'd never appreciated being tied up, and her actions were beginning to upset me, so I asked her, "Just what the hell are you doing?"

"It's a surprise," she responded, "and if you don't want to spoil it, you need to calm down and let me finish this job!"

It hit me then, that she was probably, for the first time, setting up one of our few mutual sex fantasies -- the one in which she invites Linda, our lovely, single, next-door neighbor over for some girl-on-girl action, as I watched. Molly wasn't gay, or even bi, but she likes how talking about the fantasy excites me, and inspires my sexual performance.

She'd mentioned our little perversion to that neighbor, on at least one occasion. After Linda got over the shock, she confessed that she had some curiosity about those kinds of situations, as well. She'd never admitted an actual interest in doing it, but she had made the comment that if it ever did happen, she wouldn't want me to join in, and that I would have to be restrained somehow, in order to insure that I didn't. Oh well. I guess I can't be all things to all women.

I never thought it would really happen, but Molly's actions had all the earmarks! So, letting my imagination run away with me, and wanting to make things as easy as I could on my wife (and presumably, Linda), I ceased my arguing and let Molly bind me to the chair. It wasn't too uncomfortable, and looking at the bindings, I knew I could break them, if need be. Molly probably didn't know that, but then the bindings were more for Linda's peace of mind than anything else (I thought.

After Molly taped my wrists to the chair arms, and my ankles to the chair legs, she tore off a strip to place over my mouth. Looking at her with concern, I asked, "Is that really necessary?"

"Yes," she nodded, "It was specifically requested. If you want this to happen, this is the way it's got to be."

She waited for my reply, and after a few minutes of consideration, thinking that she'd let the cat out of the bag, I nodded. "Okay, but I don't like it."

"I know sweetie, but I hope that this evening makes it all worthwhile for you." she said, as she applied the tape, effectively sealing my mouth.

Sitting there in uncomfortable anticipation, I watched her walk into the kitchen and out of sight. I heard her pick up the phone and dial a number. Someone must have answered, because I heard her say, "Okay, it's on," followed by her hanging up the phone. She puttered around in the kitchen, doing who knows what for awhile, until the doorbell rang.

An understanding some of the layout of our house is necessary, in order for you to visualize the events that follow. We have a formal living room and a family room, on opposite sides of the main entry. Our dining room is moderately large, and open to the family room. One can clearly see the sofa and chairs, as well as the spaces between them, while sitting at the dining table.

My Molly flowed out of the kitchen looking like one of those classical marble statues you see in an art museum - you know the kind, the ones that display an unimaginably beautiful feminine body, draped with sheer, clingy fabric. How do they make marble do that? Anyway, as she moved gracefully across and out my field of view, going to answer the door, I noticed that she'd set up our video equipment in the family room.

We have collected a fairly large amount of video equipment, due in part to my being a techno-junkie, and in part to Molly's obsession with documenting our family life in pictures. We have no less than five handheld digital video cameras, and on this occasion three of them were set up on tripods, covering pretty much every part of the family room. Thankfully, none of them were aimed at me. The possibilities intrigued me. It appeared that Molly planned to create a movie of the evening's activities that we could enjoy in the future, reliving them even if her partner in the endeavor declined to repeat the experience.