- Erotic Couplings
- Fringe Benefits
- Comments
All Comments on 'Fringe Benefits'
by Swampcooler
- 8 Comments
Comentarista8212 months agoI was glad to see you'd written another story, and eager to read it; you've had some really good past entries, so I took the plunge here.
Interesting idea with Max, as it was clear you employed the story to set him up to fix things and to be good at it. Nothing wrong with exploring Max's angst over trying to find his field, and you guided his personal exploration to end in the perfect predicament (for him, at least). The story didn't feel rushed with him dashing about to find his particular calling, and you invested sufficient detail to lay out his path. All told, you constructed the tale with a solid start.
Can't fault his initial "play the field," where he basically sampled the "cuisine," and this part didn't feel rushed either, as while you kind of plowed through some ladies, you slowed down to describe Haley, and I appreciated that decision: to show Max had learned and applied that knowledge proved at that point he wasn't just a "horn dog" out to have sex with everything female that moved. You took your time to develop Haley's and Max's relationship, and although usually the 2nd date isn't expected to be the one the girl "puts out" on, you'd invested enough to make it work. Where the story started to lose me was Max basically losing his head over Mona. Now, nothing wrong with him checking her out...BUT once the tale devolved into swapping at the jacuzzi, the narrative ditches keeping Haley and Max together, and instead posits Haley WANTING to sample what Dick offered? This despite Haley KNOWING he desperately wanted to get into her panties and despite the fact it creeped her out? Mona even commented similarly at the jacuzzi, but then both couples part with a different guy??? This development threw all logic out the window: Haley hated how he roughed her up and Mona has the nerve to be offended? Very non-sequitur and completely unexplained; you even set up Dick for failure because attentive readers would have associated his name as how he would behave--and so he did! Then to have Haley basically blame Max for Dick's behavior AND for the story to end Max's and Haley's relationship so capriciously...really? I liken that to hitting a brick wall 3-feet thick at 60 and expecting passengers to survive the impact without seatbelts and no airbags. The only logical conclusion would have been to create a story space to have Max and Haley discuss what happened (with Max mostly listening and forgiving, because this backed the idea of them communicating and listening to each other well before), then having them reconcile, with them later reconnecting and reuniting stronger. Before they reconciled, Mona could have consoled Max, won him over, then started a "fling" with him, with then Haley returning, wanting to patch things up: such an ending would have flowed well and added up; the one here skidded to a screeching halt, with Max and Mona riding off into the sunset, to have more sex and to hell with Haley? It's almost like you stretched yourself thin, then just wanted to conclude it, everything be damned. I've enjoyed many stories you've written before, and I cannot think of a single one that ended like this.
Had the story continued tracking with the positive comments above, it was heading for a 5; with the abrupt and illogical ending, those items lowered the rating to 3. It really left me scratching my head.
Sex4lf5712 months agoI love Swampcooler stories! Though the ending felt a little rushed, the story was awesome! Five stars and a favorite point!
6King12 months ago⭐⭐⭐ This story was ok until the end of summer jacuzzi. Max and Haley hadn't made any long term plans to this point, but if Haley wanted to end it by fucking the creeper, Dick, instead of Max that should have been Max's clue to bail. He could also have payed Mona the compliment of offering to call her the following week if they were both interested. Haley had insolently pulled her name out of the hat by fucking creeper, so no lines crossed after that.
