title: Leon Hero author: tim4or5 universe: Paying Attention series part: 6 summary: The end of the first cycle. keywords: MF, mf, M+F+, poly, cons, interr, voy This story contains sexually explicit material. Please e-mail comments to twalden4 at juno dot com with ASSTR in the subject line. Copyright 2004. All rights reserved. Technical note: A gasp is a rapid intake of breath. In this story, it also means a rapid expelling of breath, since it is close to the sound I mean. Sigh, grunt, groan, pant and scream don't work. Leon Hero Supergirl, Batgirl, Wonder Girl, Kid Flash, Arisia, Beast Boy, and Aquagirl. Then Shrinking Violet and Hawkwoman. The Martians are shape shifters, so maybe they are born shapeless and learn to become either sex, only fertile when in the form of an adult Martian male or female, but the Manhunter would always seem like an old guy in drag even if he looked like a girl. Gar is a green shape shifter, and two guys might be ok. He can have strength or fly, and although he can't be invisible or intangible, he can be really small. In one story he turns into a microbe to get through a screen. The girl Green Lantern with the ocher skin and pointy ears is good, but the green miniskirt doesn't work. A legless green and white costume would be better. Hawkwoman is a little old. There is no archer, but that's ok. They're not much use. The problem is, none of the girls would make a good leader. Batgirl is the obvious choice, but she doesn't have enough experience. Maybe Wonder Girl, with her Amazon training, but they're all depicted as more or less flakes, subservient to the boy sidekicks and/or the primary heroes. I wish there was a girl speedster. Maybe someday. I could invent one, and a girl magic worker without the tux, top hat, and dyslexia, and with a cool green lizard for a familiar that Gar gets involved with. But maybe that's too obvious. Terra was a good character, with her skimpy brown briefs below her wide yellow belt, but she's too much like a Green Lantern, moving dirt around like green energy. I have always read comics, or at least I've always looked at the pictures and have read them since I could read. I liked Mickey Mouse and Goofy and Donald Duck. Donald had a hard time, but it seemed like he could be anything. He tried lots of different professions, and his stingy uncle sent him all over the world. He was often short of money, but didn't want to be rich, even though his relative was. He always coped, came up with lots of strange ideas to solve his problems, and no matter what happened to him, he always came out ok. Later, I liked superheroes more, Superman, Flash, and Green Lantern. I was allowed to read my father's collection when I was old enough to be careful and to put them back in their plastic sleeves when I was done. I liked Spiderman and Marvel for a while. They were the first to have the stories connected to each other, and there was lots of action, but I got tired of them because they were all fight scenes with a lot of talking, and the heroes all felt sorry for themselves. The DC heroes had to figure things out, and the stories didn't all have the same plot. When I got a little older, I liked the girl superheroes. They were more fun to look at, and there were enough of them that they could have formed their own Justice League. I drew my own comics, or drew panels to illustrate the stories I made up, often based on those I read, but turning out like I thought they should have, and using my legion of supergirls. They didn't battle just female villains, but the same ones the male heroes did, like Doctor Light, the original male version. Sometimes when their costumes got ripped, their breasts and nipples stuck out through the spandex, not just the their legs or stomachs, but they bravely continued to fight. Some of their costumes were pretty skimpy and the lower part would get torn away, so they fought on bottomless, their pubic hair exposed to view. None of them shaved, and it was never explained how it all fit into their costume. And I actually showed them changing into and out of their costumes, in whatever alleyways and storerooms they could find. I copied drawings from the comics and photos of women in magazines. Sometimes I could get my sister to pose for me in her tights or underwear. She was two years older than I was, and I had always known what she looked like because we used to take baths together. She had a little slit between her legs and sat down on the toilet to pee. Other than that, we looked pretty much alike (though she was bigger and always got her way) until she started to grow breasts. At first they were just bumps, and we were both fascinated by them. By the time I got interested, we were too big to fit in the bathtub together, and she started keeping covered more, but still came into the bathroom when I was there and wandered around wrapped in a towel that wasn't quite large enough or her white lace bra and bikini briefs. She would leave her door open when she was getting dressed and call me a pervert when I looked at the dark brown nipples on her well developed breasts and the curly pubic hair growing on her crotch, without trying to hide them. But only if our mother couldn't hear, who assumed boys weren't interested in their sisters and didn't think there was anything strange about the situation. There was a sun deck off the third floor, above the sleeping porch. It had a low plywood railing, and nothing overlooked it, so it could be used for nude sunbathing if we didn't stand up. We weren't allowed to go out there when my parents were using it, but at other times we could. My sister was required to share it with me, and as we got older, didn't like me staring at her, but there wasn't anything she could do about it as long as I wasn't too obvious and didn't touch her, except when she wanted me to put lotion on her back. She refused to let me drive her away. The no touching with out permission rule was originally to stop us from fighting, and we each followed it so the other wouldn't win. If one of us complained, and it couldn't be decided if the touch was accidental, we both lost, so we didn't cheat much. I would follow her when she went out there, and watch out of the corner of my eye as she took off her top and shorts while sitting down, as I was squirming out of my pants while lying on my stomach. Sometimes she had a string hanging out. She spread lotion on her face, arms, shoulders, breasts, belly, hips, thighs, and legs, and lay down facing the sun with her legs spread so her thighs would tan. She closed her eyes or read a book and tried to ignore me, except to make sure I didn't cross onto her half of the deck. She was less overweight than I was, and had fairly large breasts that stood up slightly flattened and spread out on her chest instead of hanging down like they usually did, and jiggled a little when she moved in time to the music of her headphones. She was still taller than me, and had recently gotten more so, her legs lengthening and her hips widening so that her waist went in and the small of her back rose up off the boards of the deck. Her pubic hair stood up so I could see daylight through it. If it was warm enough, beads of sweat would come out all over her body as she lay in the sun. When she turned over, she asked me to put lotion on the part of her back that she hadn't been able to reach, but didn't let me take too long. I breathed in the vanilla and coconut scent of the lotion and the sometimes musky scent of her body, and felt the shoulder blades and ribs under her hot skin, and the hard penis under my belly oozing out fluid onto my towel. Then I scooted back over to my side and had to wait a while before I turned over to get the sun on my front. I sometimes wandered around looking at old brick factories, streets that went up steep hills, and solid black railroad bridges on stone abutments over roads that sometimes dipped beneath them. I made sketches and took pictures so I could use them in my drawings. I took the art classes that were offered at school and judo classes at the Y. One of the men in the judo class was very large, and his idea of breaking someone's balance was to pick him up and set him down. The instructor was more subtle, teaching me how to push back just enough to get a reflex push forward and time my throw to take advantage of it. I learned how to fall on my side or back and break the fall by slapping the mat hard with my arm. I got taller, thinner and stronger. I studied the architecture of Le Corbusier (concrete), Charles Moore (functional), and Roger Dean (organic). I studied domes, shelter, handmade houses, energy-efficient houses, tiny houses, Japanese houses, Japanese gardens, water gardens, and roof gardens. I read science fiction about different and changing realities. The Martian Chronicles, The Nice Girl with Five Husbands, Stranger in a Strange Land, The Crystal World, The Lathe of Heaven, Tales of Neveryon, Persistence of Vision, Earthchild, Panglor, and Wave without a Shore. I scoured used bookstores looking for out of print works by Ballard, Sturgeon, and Lafferty. And I found the strangest bookstore way out in the woods, Tao Book Muffin. The building was a large triangle with flattened corners, one corner facing east and a wall facing west. The door was on the south side, and the entry level was inside. I could hear flute music by Bach or Telemann. The levels in the middle of each of the three walls met at a post in center of the building and were of a different shape from those at the corners, though all were five sided. Ahead to the right, down a few steps, was a room made up of three levels that spiraled down to the left. In the far wall was a small gas fireplace, shelves lined the others with new and used books on tai chi and yoga, and the red, orange, and black floor pillows could be moved out of the way for classes or performances. To the right of the entrance were restrooms. Up some steps to the left, in the south corner, there were corn muffins and cranberry scones on stone counters with herb teas and unmatched earthenware plates and mugs. On this level and the next were a few round wooden tables and some chairs, and on the selves here were books on vegan cooking and bread making. Continuing up past the north corner, which was open to the performance area below, were three levels that spiraled up to the right. The middle one in the east corner had a large bay window through which I could see the clouds and rain. The floor pillows here were green and gray, the hanging plants were well watered, and the shelves had books on gardens and places far and near. The south corner was open to the tables below, and steps continued up to a small art gallery and a door to the roof garden. Up a few more steps were two more levels, the last of which overlooked the bay window. A small wind chime hung inside a window open to the outside air, the pillows were off-white and different shades of blue, and there were books on meditation and poetry by Blake and Rumi. I found a book I had been looking for, Doctor Mirabilis. In college, I thought about studying architecture or psychology, but it took too many years to get licensed, and I couldn't afford it. The course of study and requirements were designed to allow only rich people into these professions. I knew I wouldn't be able to support myself with art or writing, so I studied history and math while trying to figure out something to do besides computing. History was just stories and analysis of stories. I had been trying to construct a history out of comic stories that didn't always fit together, and had to choose which to keep and which to ignore. With each science fiction story, book, or author I read, I had to learn a new history, and the more detailed ones were the most interesting. So I decided to study a history that was extensive, constant, detailed in places, and more or less consistent. Math was needed for everything. Even art couldn't exist without proportion, nor literature without logic. I tried to sell some of my artwork at a science fiction convention. Some others and I had gotten together and rented a space, and I was taking my turn manning the table. I had painted my face and hands green, dyed my hair blond, and put on a purple costume so I could be Brainiac Five. A girl came by dressed as Supergirl, wearing a tight blue costume with the short blue skirt and red cape. She wasn't wearing a bra, and her nipples poked out into the red and yellow symbol on her chest. I had to talk to her. I showed her some of the pictures of Supergirl and the other girl heroes I had done, that I wasn't actually supposed to sell because the characters were copyrighted. These weren't the ones with the ripped costumes. Their breasts were more realistically proportioned than in the comic books, about like hers. She was below average height and overweight, but not as much as I used to be. Her possibly recently blond hair was short and wavy. She carried herself like a supermodel, as if she really was the girl of steel and proud of it. I was impressed, as smitten as Brainiac Five was with Supergirl. She sat with me, and we talked for a while. I asked which color underwear went with that costume, and she gave me a flash of low cut red panties. Before she left, I asked if I could meet her after my relief showed up. She said she would be at the filksing and would save me a seat. My relief showed up half an hour late, which wasn't much worse than I expected, and I hurried to the auditorium. It was a big place, so it wasn't too crowded, and I found her in the balcony not too far from where she had said. She had a nice voice and knew most of the songs. She sounded good even on the ones she didn't. I struggled to find a note that didn't sound too bad and skipped the songs I didn't know, which were most of them. Afterward, we ate together and went to a couple more programs. We got lots of comments on our costumes, and people who didn't know us assumed that she had made both of them. I asked her if she wanted to spend the night with me, and when it got late, we went to the hotel storeroom and got her backpack. She was only registered at the convention and didn't have a room. I had a room that I was sharing with three other guys. One of them wasn't there, but two others were and two girls. I threw one of the strangers out of the bed with the couple who weren't still having sex, and she and I shed our costumes and got in. I had managed to get most of the green makeup off. The air conditioning was on, but it was still warm in the room, and nobody was using a top sheet. The couple next to us still had their legs intertwined, him half on top, and had looked up when I claimed our half of the bed. The evicted stranger was curled up on the floor. The girl in the bed next to us had been giving head when we came in, and was now on top, sitting up with her breasts bouncing and his hands on her hips. We were all various shapes and sizes. I put my legs around my own companion and kissed her. She kissed me back, and our tongues touched. I put my hand on her breast. It was a soft and pliable handful, and the nipple was already hard. I put my hip against her crotch, my penis against her thigh, and humped her slowly. She humped me back, and I felt the roughness of her pubic hair moving against me. Her lips were wet and sucked eagerly on mine, and I moved my lips and tongue over them. I move down to take her other breast in my mouth and pressed my chest into her crotch. She continued to hump me as I sucked on her nipple and breast and moved it around in my mouth. I moved my hand down to hold it, then moved over to suck on the other soft breast and hard nipple. It filled my mouth. I continued down past the bottom of her ribs and swirled my tongue around in her navel. Her belly was soft on my chin and tongue, like a huge breast. I nuzzled through her pubic hair, and placing a hand on each of her thighs, spread her open. I licked up from her vagina and sucked her clitoris into my mouth. She growled. I massaged it with my tongue and lips, and moved a finger to her opening. She was very wet, and it slipped inside. It churned around and pressed against the back of her clitoris while I sucked on the front. She wanted my penis in her mouth, so I turned around and straddled her face. She took my penis in her hand and licked off what had oozed out. She ran her lips and tongue up and down the underside, then put it in her mouth and sucked while she stroked the shaft up and down. She was getting more and more excited with my work and her own. Her breathing got faster and louder, and my hands held on to her buttocks as she bucked against my face. Her groans were muffled since she refused to let go of my penis. I turned around again, put on a condom, and entered her. Our neighbor in the next bed was now face down and getting it up the ass. I couldn't see which target he had found, but that was what they had said. It sounded like her sensations were pretty intense, but I couldn't tell whether it hurt or felt good. The couple in our bed was watching them and us. She was stroking his now erect penis slowly up and down, and he had his two middle fingers inside her vagina. I kissed my partner again and stroked slowly in and out, feeling her around me. She was tight and wet, and rose to meet my thrusts. I held the back of her shoulders and kissed the side of her neck. Our movements gradually got faster, and I felt the sensation start to move inside me. It built up, and I came inside her in several spurts as I gasped. I kept going, and she gasped out as she came again. I kissed her and held her, then went back down on her to get some of the fluids she had produced, managing to give her another orgasm. I turned her over and entered her vagina from the rear, my legs on either side of her and her buttocks pressed against my belly. The couple in our bed were now having sex, him on top and her with her legs spread thrusting against him. The couple in the next bed had finished and were curled up together. I was having fun pounding away, but didn't know if I would get anywhere. I watched the couple next to us. Their arms were around each other and her breasts were flattened by his chest. All of us were shaking the bed. She started to groan, and I heard them both come in succession. I felt movement start inside me again and soon came, ending the show for the night. When we woke up it was light, and there were people in various states of undress wandering around the room. We showered and got back into our costumes, and I followed her to the programs she wanted to see. Before she had to leave for the airport, I asked if I could call her. She said she had a boyfriend. The Supergirl costume had been fun, and she was glad she had found someone with a matching outfit, but she wouldn't be wearing it at another con. The next day it was as if she'd been retconed out of existence. Just some discontinuous memories and the hope that a merciful editor would one day change his collective mind. When I finished college, I got job at a software house working on website design for different businesses. I hadn't been able to think of anything that didn't involve computing, but I did get to use my artistic skills. The owner of the Tao Book Muffin was a thin old man who had designed and built the place himself. Maybe he stayed in shape going up and down all the stairs. He liked to talk, and I had told him about my drawing, so when he held an exhibit of his customers' artwork, he asked me for something. I brought in several pieces, and he selected a drawing of a large blue frog clinging to tree with one leg hanging down. The store wasn't very large, and the opening of the exhibit was crowded with the artists, their friends, and some of his regular customers. There was even an old lady in a wheelchair, a former customer who was carried up and down the steps by a team of four volunteers who had practiced in advance. There was a small group with fiddle, guitar, and drum playing Celtic and other types of music in the performance area. Not many people could fit into the gallery area at the same time, so people were wandering around the different levels of the store with their cookies and ginger ale. I was looking down on the performance area from above, when a black woman with dark wavy hair and very good posture spotted my name tag and asked me which picture was mine. It turned out she was with the band. Their name was Polymorphous, and hers was Diane. She asked what else I had done, so I told her about my drawings of mushrooms and spiders, of old buildings and city streets, of people moving in ways they weren't aware of, and how the soft skin of an amphibian was more expressive than the scales of a reptile. She seemed interested and listened well, and I ran on a bit, but she kept looking at her watch and over toward the bay window room, up two short flights of steps. Finally, someone over there signaled her, and she signaled the performers below. They ended the instrumental piece they were playing, and the lights not in the gallery were slowly lowered and turned off. Light from the newly risen full moon flooded in through the large window across the open bay from us to light up the wall above the heads of the performers and fill the room with a pearly light. The crowd murmured at the spectacular display. A high thin line of fiddle music entered this magical space, and something fluttered across the window, its shadow moving across the wall inside. As the crowd quieted, the drum player lifted her voice in song. She sang of the selkie, of a woman who fell in love with a human man and had her seal skin stolen so she couldn't return to the sea. The guitar and drum entered softly, beneath the fiddle line and voice. The woman bore him a daughter, whom she loved, and who had the sea in her eyes like her mother, but on nights when the moon was full, she would stand with the babe in her arms at the top of the cliff looking out to sea with tears in her eyes. As the woman grew thinner, the man at last relented and returned her seal skin, after extracting from her a promise to return. But she didn't, until the next full moon, when the man was out on the cliff watching the sea. He returned to his cottage to find that his baby daughter was gone. The music faded until there was only the sound of the sea, provided by a rainstick, and then silence. When the lights came up slowly, I don't think Diane was the only one with tears in her eyes. The man who had signaled her came over and put his arm around her, and she introduced him as Frank. I said if the man had really loved her, he wouldn't have stolen her seal skin. Diane gave me a funny look, and said people sometimes made mistakes. He had done what he could to correct his. They took me down and introduced me to Linda, the singer and drum player, who had written the words of the song, and to Judy and Jose, the fiddle and guitar players, who had helped write the music. I asked if the name of the group referred to the human sexual state, and Judy, a tall Asian woman, said yes, and also to the fact that the group took different configurations. There was something about the way these people interacted with each other, an acceptance and trust, so I took a shot in the dark and asked if it also referred to polyamory. They looked surprised, and Linda, who had short red hair, said it was too crowded to talk here. I should come over for dinner sometime. Diane agreed and asked if I could bring some of my other drawings, and maybe the stories they went with. A couple weeks later I showed up at the apartment Linda, Judy, and Jose shared with Paul and Mark. Diane and Frank were there with Karen and Stephen, their other partners. I had noticed Stephen helping out at the opening, and he told me he had only recently joined the group, expanding it to four, and they were looking for a fifth. Everyone oohed and ahed over my drawings, and Linda was particularly interested in my stories. Diane studied the fight scene I had brought and asked if I practiced a martial art. I told her I had studied judo off and on since high school. She asked why I had picked judo. I said judo and karate had been all that were offered at the Y, and judo had looked more interesting to draw, since there was more variety of body contact with the throws, hold downs, chokes, and locks. Mark had made vegan moussaka with eggplant, potatoes, tofu, and soy for dinner, but it tasted good, and there was vegan Greek salad with tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, onions, and olives, but no lettuce. Diane had made an orange glazed carrot cake. We all sat down and joined hands to thank the goddess, then started in. Linda said the song about the selkie was partly about polyamory. The woman felt cut off and isolated when she was in a monogamous relationship. The man felt a need to control her. He was able to save the woman by returning the seal skin, but it was too late to save the relationship. I said I liked the idea of a woman who had a boyfriend being able to maintain a relationship with someone else, and had read about poly in Stranger in a Strange Land and other science fiction, but it hadn't talked about the disadvantages of monogamy. I could see in this group that the whole sexual tension of who was interacting with whom and what did somebody else think about it was gone. It felt like a great weight had been lifted off. Where was the catch? Karen said the catch was that with more people, the likelihood of misunderstanding and conflict rose, so people had to be willing and able to communicate and understand what was going on. It took a lot of work and maturity. People had to genuinely care about the happiness of the other people in the group as much as they cared about their own. Most people couldn't do it and didn't want to. I said I liked how it felt, but didn't think I had the maturity. Diane said it could be learned, and suggested I read The Art of Loving and Games People Play. The discussion continued after dinner. Then Diane said she studied karate and some of the others studied tai chi. Would I show her some judo? She didn't have her gi, and tai chi didn't use uniforms, but I said I could show her some throws that didn't need it. Since this was a demonstration, I would do them slowly, and she should cooperate. First, I showed her o-goshi, major hip throw. We stood facing each other with my left hand holding her right elbow, and my right hand near her chest as if I was gripping the lapel of her gi, and she held her hands the same way. I pretended to pull her forward with my right hand and asked her to step with her left foot. I put my right foot in front of her left, then turned around on my right foot while sliding my right arm around her back, crouching down, and pulling her belly against the back of my right hip. When I straightened my legs and bent forward, I was supporting her on my right hip and balancing her with my right arm behind her back. If I had pulled her right elbow forward with my left hand, she would have landed on her back in front of me. I set her back on her feet gently, then demonstrated it a couple more times. Then I showed her ippon-seoi-nage, one arm shoulder throw. It starts the same, but instead of sliding my right arm around her back, I turned farther, slid it under her right arm, and hooked my elbow. Then I pulled her onto my back with my right arm and left hand both gripping her right arm. When I stood up, she rose into the air with her breasts pressed into my back through her thin cotton shirt. If I had done it faster and pulled harder, she would have gone flying over my right shoulder onto her back. I did at again, slowly. She thanked me, and I said there was something she could do for me, but it was a larger favor. Would she let me draw her? She said yes. Not having any skill as a cook, I took Diane out to dinner the following week. We had Chinese, scallion pancakes, won ton soup, vegetable chow foon, and chicken with broccoli. I said I had read The Art of Loving, and not having to worry about holding on to the feeling of having fallen in love would make things easier. I liked the idea of love being care, responsibility, respect, and knowledge. Except for maybe knowledge of a particular person, they sounded like the heroic ideals that were espoused everywhere, even comic books, not just for love. She said she hadn't thought of the word heroic, but could see what I meant, and maybe it applied in this case since the role they were looking for someone to fill in their group was leader. She smiled at my reaction, and said it wasn't quite what it sounded like. The plan was for Stephen to be manager and keep track of who did which chores, Karen to monitor relationships and make sure no one felt put upon or left out, Frank to see that things got done around the apartment (after they moved in together), and her to do the books. The leader's only job would be to make decisions when people couldn't agree, and if things ran perfectly, he would have nothing to do. It was the role nobody else wanted, since if someone didn't accept his decision, the group might breakup. She said at this point, people just wanted to get to know me and see if I was interested, but she thought I should know what I might be letting myself in for. I thanked her and said I was interested, but it was a lot the think about. It sounded like a lot of structure. She said yes, it was, but it worked well for Linda and Judy's group, so they wanted to try it. We finished and went back to my apartment. I got out my pencils and sketch pad, and she asked me how I wanted her. I said I would be happy to draw her just as she was, but she could take off anything she felt comfortable removing. She promptly stripped naked. I pretended this sort of thing happened to me all the time and asked her to find a comfortable position on the sofa. I was relieved when she lay down and stretched out. Her breasts were large with dark nipples covering the front of them, and her hips full. She was in very good shape and had a grace in everything she did, even pulling her shirt over her head and taking off her underwear. Her hair was wavy and short, and her skin, while not exceptionally dark, was darker than anyone else's I had tried to draw from life. Her pubic hair didn't contrast with her skin nearly as much as most white women's, but blended in like a natural blond's. I sculpted the muscles on her arms and legs, trying to suggest how dark they were. It wasn't the best drawing I had ever done, but Diane liked it. I tried another which came out a little better. We sat together, and I offered her something to drink, but all she wanted was water. She seemed in no hurry to get dressed. She was my model, and I felt I shouldn't take advantage of the situation, but she leaned over and kissed me. I put my hands on her naked back and held her to me. She climbed up into my lap, with her feet pressed against the arm of the sofa opposite to where she had been and without breaking the kiss. Her arms went around my shoulders, and we sucked on each other's lips. I felt the muscles in her back holding me, her breasts pressed against the front of my shirt, and her buttocks on top of my trapped penis. I slid my hand down the smooth skin of her back and buttock and out along her thigh. I turned to lay her down on the sofa and get on top of her, holding on so she wouldn't fall off the edge. It wasn't a large sofa, and my bare feet hung over the arm. I kept my arms around her, but she slid the end of my leather belt out of the keeper, pulled on it to free the metal tongue from its hole, and slipped the end out of the buckle. She undid the brass button of my jeans, took the tab between her finger and thumb, and slowly pulled open my fly, the slider making a ratcheting sound as it bounced over the teeth. Her hand wormed its way into my underwear and around my erect penis. Her other hand pulled down on the elastic so she could take out the oozing tip and place it against her belly. Then her hands started to pull my shirt up from where it was trapped between us. I raised my arms so she could pull it off over my head, then put them back around her. When I stood up to finish taking off my pants and get a condom, she asked me for a towel and placed it under her. I didn't open the sofa up into a bed because its thin mattress and hard springs were only suitable for sleeping. I could have moved the sofa cushions onto the floor, but we seemed to be doing ok where we were. I put on the condom and slipped inside her. Her warm slippery flesh was tight around my penis as I slowly moved in and out of her. One of her thighs was crowded against the back of the sofa and the other hung off into space, but her legs were locked around mine. Her soft brown eyes looked up into mine as her hips rose to meet each of my thrusts, and continued to hold my gaze as the sensation built and our tempo increased. The building urgency in her eyes matched that in her thrusts, and she held her focus as she gasped out her orgasm. I watched her eyes as it flooded over her and felt it moving inside me. I let it build until my cum gushed out. The next week we had pad thai, and I did action sketches of different karate kicks, strikes, and blocks from various angles. I worked rapidly so she won't have to hold a pose for too long, and learned a great deal. Having someone demonstrate the fighting techniques was much different from seeing them in pictures or movies. Later, after we had made love and before she left, Diane told be about the saturday night ritual she, Frank, Karen, and Stephen had started, and asked if I would join them next week. I said I would be honored, and in response to my question, she told me they had moved it to sunday, the day after the opening. Frank made macaroni and mushroom salad, Stephen made baked falafel with green salad, pita bread, and tahini, and Karen made Black Forest brownies with whipped cream. After dinner, Karen dimmed the lights, and she and Stephen sat on the floor by the bay window playing some unstructured modern sounding music on flute and guitar. I sat on the love seat and watched. In the middle of the room, Diane and Frank started dancing in their baggy green and brown tee shirts and shorts using moves from karate and tai chi. Then Diane started reciting a passage from one of my stories while she danced, about a dying sun, dancing girls, and a lizard. Frank continued the passage, and then Stephen, while Karen put down her flute and started dancing with Diane and Frank. Karen finished the recitation, and the piece ended. I was impressed and flattered, and Diane said it had been Karen's idea. She came over and sat between Frank and me, while Karen and Stephen played a couple slow pieces by Bach. Diane started kissing Frank, and then she turned and kissed me. When Karen and Stephen finished, they put away their instruments and went into the bedroom. Frank followed while Diane and I explored each other. Several minutes later, Diane stood up, took my hand, and led me after the others. Karen was naked on the bed, and Stephen and Frank, also naked, were kissing and fondling her various parts from either side. We stood amid the clothing scattered on the floor, and Diane removed mine and hers and added it to the confusion. She lay down next to Frank on the rather crowded queen sized bed and pulled me to her side. It was a platform bed with a very firm mattress, so at least we didn't all roll toward the center. We kissed again, and Diane stroked my erect penis up and down. Stephen unrolled a condom over himself while Frank kept Karen entertained, then moved on top of her and inserted himself. They moved slowly together, and Diane's hand matched their rhythm. I kissed the side of her jaw and neck, and down to her breast. I felt its softness with my mouth and its hardness with my tongue. It was a wonderful breast. I held it with both hands and sucked. She gripped me tighter and started moving against my thigh. I moved one hand down over her belly and into her pubic hair. My fingers combed through it, and the tips opened her folds. They stroked down to her opening and slid back up to her clitoris. She pressed upward against them. My tongue followed my fingers, and I sucked her clitoris into my mouth. I moved down briefly to get her fluids, and the taste nearly made me come. I stuck my fingers inside and felt her firm slippery flesh. I pressed her clitoris farther into my mouth. She started moving faster under me. Frank had his arms around both Karen and Diane, and held Diane as she came. I collected as much of Diane's wetness as I could with my tongue, and then she gave me a condom. I put it on, knelt between her legs, and lined up the head of my penis with her vagina. I had left enough wetness to push into her easily, a little way at first, and then the rest. We held each other and moved slowly together. I felt Diane around my penis, as I had around my fingers and tongue. Karen started moving faster on the other side of Frank, and he held her as she gasped out her orgasm, followed shortly by Stephen. Stephen moved to her side, and Frank moved onto her and into her. Diane let go of me with one arm and reached over to take the hand Karen had extended toward us. The two of them coordinated their movements, taking in deep breaths as they pulled back, and letting them out as they thrust forward. They seemed to be breathing mostly with their pelves, and the normal rise and fall of their chests had stopped. Frank and I matched their movements, and I found my breath falling into line with theirs. We all moved together for a while, but then Diane's breathing and thrusts started to outpace Karen's. As they got faster, I felt something start to move inside me. Diane climaxed in a series of powerful breaths, and then so did I. Diane let go of Karen and kissed me, and I moved to the center of the bed, between them. Stephen came around and lay down next to Diane, and she turned toward him. I turned toward Karen and Frank. She had her arms and legs around him and her head next to his with her eyes closed and mouth open. Her hips were driving the air in and out of her lungs. She started moving faster and grimacing, and Frank responded. Just before she came, she turned her head to look at me and smiled. Frank came, then kissed her shoulder, the side of her neck, and her lips. He moved to her far side, and she pulled me to her near side. She kissed us both, and I held her breast. It was warm and damp, and when she turned to kiss Frank again, I put it in my mouth and sucked. My hand wandered across her ribs and belly, up to her hip bone, and down to the inside of her thigh. It was slippery with overflow. I rubbed my penis against the side of her leg. When it got hard again, she pulled me back up to her lips, then handed me a fresh condom. I sat up and unrolled it over myself. I moved between her legs and slid all the way into her. I put my arms behind her shoulders, she put hers around me, and we moved together. After we heard both Diane and Stephen gasp as they came, Frank walked around to join them. And then the bed was covered with ivy, and Stephen was making love to a goddess who wore a necklace of blue and red stones. There was a red glow, and two huge white swans were hissing and flapping their wings. I looked back down at Karen, and she had ocher skin and pointy ears, and wore a white costume with a green micro skirt bunched up around her waist. A green glow was coming from behind me, and we were making love in a mountain of whipped cream, with foam squirting out from between our thighs every time we thrust. An opera singer was trying to fit another bed in here, and Diane was making love to a young black man who had a golden glow around him. Karen grasped a branch of ivy that was growing toward us, and it was Diane's hand, which she had extended beneath Stephen while she and Frank made squishing noises as they thrust together. Karen squeezed Diane's hand and increased her tempo. Her breathing got louder, and she held me with her other arm, thrust violently against me, and cried out as the orgasm washed over her. It kept going and pulled me along in its undertow, and I held on until I was gasping out on top of her. Karen let go off Diane, and Stephen rolled to her side. I slid off to her other side, and she held both of us. The bed still rocked with the motion of Diane and Frank making love. I kissed the salt from Karen's shoulder and the corner of her eye. She turned her head, and our lips and tongues met. Her breast on this side was warm and damp, and when she turned to kiss Stephen again, I put it in my mouth and sucked. It deserved long, slow, serious attention, which I gave it. When she felt my penis get hard again, she just smiled. We listened to Diane and Frank gasp out their orgasm. A few months later, I received the package I had ordered after consulting the others. The following saturday, when we were all naked for the start of our ritual, I opened it and handed it to Frank. He sorted through the contents, took Karen's left hand, placed on her third finger a four band gold puzzle ring, laid her back on the bed, and placed his penis into her vagina. I put a ring on Diane's finger and my penis into her. When the four of us were done, Karen slid a ring onto Stephen's finger, laid him back on the bed, and slid her vagina onto his penis. Diane placed a ring on Frank's finger, him back on the bed, and herself around him. After they had finished, Karen took the fifth and final ring with its four interlocking gold bands, slipped it onto my finger to represent my commitment to each of my four partners, lowered me to the bed, and slipped my penis into her to reconsummate our relationship. Diane and Stephen celebrated theirs to complete the ritual.