Chapter 38: Texas II

When Ginger and Dave awoke the next morning, he discovered a text on his phone from Ashley from the night before. ‘Arriving late Friday morning with entourage. Rehearsal starting at 2:00 p.m. Meet in our hotel suite. I love you. Ashley.’

Dave showed the message to Ginger. “Oh, my God, this is becoming so real. I’m actually going to meet a star.”

“The star is just as nice as you are.”

“Huh? I will feel so inferior to her.”

“Don’t. If you’re willing, stick around and we’ll all make love together. I should warn you the band gets involved, too. It will be the kind of open Circle-environment I described to you. If you want out, we can create an ‘off limits’ zone with you in it.”

Ginger looked awed, “You’re kidding. By the way, last night ... was ... spectacular. I’d heard that term – Tantric – but I never knew it was so powerful.” Even as she spoke her eyes misted over with tears again. “I never knew love so pure. I hope you felt my love was for you, because it was. I’ve never connected with someone like that; I never knew you could. I’ll never forget learning that.”

Dave told her, “We connected with a very pure river of love. You and I do have something special.”

She threw herself into his arms and they kissed, and then just held the hug to feel the closeness with each other.

After a thoughtful pause, Ginger said, “Let me think about the sexual encounters. Right now, I’m inclined to participate. If that’s what’s acceptable in the Circle and with the members and pledges, I should start to think and behave that way.”

“How about some breakfast?” he said. “I need an omelet. Those are special for me, because I make them for my friends in the Circle on weekend mornings. I left a special friend in charge of them while I’m gone – Odessa. She’s from St. Croix on a scholarship on her way to becoming a doctor.”

“You said you had chefs in the Circle. Don’t they do all the cooking and stuff?”

“Come on, I’ll tell you over breakfast.”

Once they’d ordered in the hotel’s breakfast and casual lunch venue, Dave told Ginger about the Service aspect of the Circle and the reason the practice was encouraged. “This is one way we each show our love for the others we’ve chosen to live with. We do something to support the common operations and not just for ourselves or our own family.

“Before I started this trip, I did several things of a service nature. I was on the board of directors, and we mainly oversee the physical resources – buildings, land, and such, as well as be sure the infrastructure is there in terms of people to preserve our culture and keep things operating smoothly for everyone. I was also on the security committee and once in a while the social committee. I help run the Circle Flying Club – that will interest you, I’m sure. We should get you jet rated. I did the weekend omelets as something special for my friends, and then I found a beautiful girl on St. Croix that shared that skill, as I mentioned. I also tended bar three or four nights a week before dinner at our social hour.

“The service jobs give each of us an opportunity to work with others in similar work, and even better we get to interact with everybody in some of the jobs, such as bartending. We also have waiters and waitresses, kitchen help, shopping help, website help, home-schooling help, lifeguard help for the kids, then there are various committees that do landscaping, keep our land neat and nice, security, social events, finance, insurance, and all sorts of other things. Our core common building got rebuilt due to a sudden destructive event and is now about twenty-five thousand square feet. There are some temporary apartments, classrooms, living and social areas, indoor dining area, kitchen for all of us, a recording studio, art room, hobby rooms, and more. We still have some unused space, but we’re ready for when the next great idea comes along.”

Ginger said, “But the main idea, especially of your cocktail and dinner hours is for people to interact.”

“Exactly. We won’t put up with hermit-like behavior for very long with somebody we love. We gently pry them out of their shell if they’re hiding to find out what’s wrong. Everybody does get plenty of private time, but sooner or later, they have to interact with the rest of us. We worry about them otherwise. We are a very social bunch – and very caring.”

“You’ve used the term exhibitionists about the Circle. Tell me about that. I already know it’s relevant to what will happen this evening.”

Dave smiled, “That may take some getting used to, and yes, I suspect you’ll see some of that tonight in our suite. When we have sex, many of us like to be watched or at least have the potential for being watched. Hand-in-hand with that, we’re all voyeurs and love to watch each other make love. Of course, we may also join in.

“On many nights, particularly, Friday and Saturday, the younger children have a special sleepover at one of the homes away from the core. This frees up our public space for us to make love to multiple people in public, often on one of the many chaises on our large pool patio, or on a sofa in the core living room.”

“Do you usually do multiple people in a night?”

“Some people do, and some specialize on just one person for an entire evening and night. There’s not a pejorative in doing either. I frequently will do three or four rounds on a weekend night, versus only one or two on a weekday. Some of those may involve multiple women at the same time, in that case there are fewer rounds.”

“Are they all as intense as what we did last night?” She smiled at Dave in a loving way.

“Not always; seldom, in fact. Depends on how lusty we are or how spiritually-inclined we are. I will tell you that I haven’t felt like I did last night with anybody for a very long time. I think the last time was when I met Sue Gaylord, the pilot for Atlantic Airlines that I mentioned. She and I connected in a similar way to what we did last night. I’ve had other similar experiences, many with women that are my wives. From the way you reacted, I felt it was a first for you.”

Ginger shook her head and smiled, “I felt like I lost my virginity all over again.” She laughed. “Seriously, I felt like I’d just relegated all the other sexual encounters I’ve had with other men to the mediocre category, because our first night and last night, and all the times in between have been star-studded and spectacular. You are a lover like no other. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I love you. I hope I was as good for you as you were for me.”

“Ginger, I love you, too. You were and are a great lover.”

After breakfast, the couple took a ‘speed walk’ around some of the downtown streets for exercise. As they walked Dave asked Ginger to fill him in more on her background.

Ginger said, “I sort of gave you the here and now about me, but not my history. I’m from Hutchinson, Kansas; my dad repairs farm machinery and has some other guys that also work for him; mom works in his office taking calls, booking the jobs and his travels around the nearby counties, talking to the guys via the radio, and keeping the books and billing. I graduated high school there without a whole lot of intervention by them. They’d focused on my older brother and sister, and I was an after-thought, which worked out well, because I had infinite freedom to come and go.

“Fortunately, I was motivated enough to get on the college track and stay there. I had an older boyfriend that was an instructor at a nearby airport. To be blunt about it, if I fucked him, I got free flying lessons. We fucked a lot, and I got a lot of lessons. I still try to ignore the labels that could be applied to that transaction; we did like each other a lot.

“I went to community college there for two years and did a lot of math and science courses, preparatory to getting into an engineering degree program. I worked on campus and also at the small airport where I was getting my lessons. The boyfriend had a house trailer on the airport property, and I’d often stay over so we could get some hours in on one activity or the other when he wasn’t busy with other stuff. As I told you, I ended up with a commercial-instrument rating, but haven’t done much with it but a few charter flights and a couple of sightseeing flights around the county.

“After I ran out of classes to take at the community college, one of the profs who’d graduated from Wichita made a few calls and bingo I was ‘in’ without really trying. I got a little in the way of financial aid and the university helped me get a job. I found Martha to room with based on an ad she’d placed in the campus paper. To supplement what I was making on campus, I applied for and got the intern job at Cessna; I’ve been there two years. They were paying me two-thousand a calendar quarter if I put in two-hundred hours. I always did, and there used to be the prospect of a full-time job after graduation, but that evaporated recently. People aren’t buying as many small planes as they used to. I think they’ve priced themselves out of the market, so to speak.”

Dave questioned, “You know enough about the Circle lifestyle based on our conversations that I can ask the next question. What will your parents or siblings think about you joining?”

Ginger laughed, “I probably won’t be the most popular daughter in the county, but they’ll get over it. As I said, I had a lot of freedom growing up. Whenever I had an issue that I brought to one of my parents, their response was often to ask whether I’d thought through all of the details and whether I’d be happy with the result in the long run. Junior high and high school boyfriends were often the issue. My siblings were next to clueless about my life. We didn’t share much. My sister is six years older and my brother a year older that her. I think I was a surprise baby.”

“So, they won’t come unglued and come gunning for me for luring you into our den of iniquity?”

“No, not at all. They’ll ask me about my long-term happiness and maybe my reputation. I am not worried.”

“What do you want in the long term?”

Ginger said, “A career where I can contribute in some way to society and make things better for some people, a family of some kind, a couple of kids, and I guess to be making enough money to keep the wolves from the door. From what you described and what Steve Reagan said, I seem to be headed in the right direction by following you home.”

“So, more tactically, what will you do after Dallas?”

“Take the big step to go to Sarasota. I’ll go back to Wichita, finish the semester, graduate in December – next month, and work out the details of packing up and heading south. I’ll give notice at work, but they’ll consider that a blessing. Come late December, I’ll pack up my few things in my car and drive to Sarasota. If I can convince Martha, I’ll bring her, too. You kind of indicated that would be all right. I guess, I’m asking if it is really okay to have her as a tag-along.” Ginger looked hopeful

“It is, but you’d both better read and understand that book I gave you so that you’re coming into this with your eyes wide open. I’ll get all the videos of the TV show sent to you, too. Those will help give you more of a flavor of what life is like in the Circle and you’ll see a lot of the members and pledges so have a feel for how people interact. Of course, most of the pledges on the TV show have now become members by the time the episodes air.”

“That’d be super. We have a month and a half before classes and exams end. I’m doing well in everything, so that should help in the transfer. I assume I can call you, Steve, Tatiana, or somebody to help get us situated in Sarasota?”

“You can. I’m skipping motorcycle travel in the winter, so I’m heading back there after the show in Dallas, so I’ll be available, too. I might even find a place to leave the motorcycle and reconnect with it and restart my trip come next summer so I can finish traveling through the lower forty-eight states.

“At the airport, I’m sure,” she said. “Cessna has a repair facility at the old Dallas airport – Love Field. I can get you an ‘in’ there. You could park it safely in a locked-up area, cover the bike to keep it clean, and all that. All I’d need to do is spend a few minutes on the phone to make that happen for you.”

Back at the hotel, Ginger got on her phone right away and within fifteen minutes had arranged for Dave to park the motorcycle at Signature Flight Services at Dallas Love Field, only a few minutes from the hotel. They had an unused tool crib where the bike could be locked up, all Dave needed to bring was the bike and a padlock.

Dave quickly made a call to see whether anybody from the Circle was flying up the next day with the jet to attend the concert. As it turned out, Alice was flying six others up in late morning. They hoped to connect with us at the Ritz in the afternoon. Of course, Ashley was flying in with her entourage in a charter flight from Nashville.

Alice was surprised that her husband was cutting the trip short, but Dave reminded her that he’d always talked about NOT doing winter motorcycling. Snow or ice and two-wheeled vehicles were a very bad combination. She was happy he was coming back to the Circle.

Dave checked on Find Friends and discovered that Ashley was on the ground at Love Field. He showed Ginger her picture, and then pictures of each of the band members. He also filled her in on the small orgy the group had shared in Minneapolis. Ginger’s eyes got the size of saucers as he told about the bouncing around between partners, Ashley right in the thick of things. Ginger appeared nervous but eager to start to participate in what she called ‘the Circle way’.

She’d just recovered from her shock with a smile, when Ashley walked in the door followed by Kyle, Robby Nixx – the band leader, and Ally – one of the back-up singers.