Author’s note: This story is fiction with a twist. In the days before email, much less the Internet, meeting like-minded people was generally much harder than it is today. People then were much more circumspect about their kinks, and most contacts were tediously made via snail-mail as a result of personal ads in magazines. On the other hand, people were more likely to be honest about themselves when they had to provide real addresses for pre-meeting correspondence.

Back in 1988, which was the dark ages electronically speaking, my then-girlfriend and I agreed to explore the possibility of playing (the term used for participating in a BDSM scene) with another male-dominant/female-submissive couple. I then initiated a correspondence in response to an ad placed by a couple living in a suburb of Columbus, Ohio. My girlfriend and I were D/s novices at that point, and neither of us had never played with anyone else, but we eventually drove to Ohio and met this couple at a hotel.

The twist to this story is that the activities described as present-time events are completely fictitious, but the flashbacks in the story are my actual embarrassing experiences from the meeting with that other couple. Needless to say, the quality and effectiveness of my experiences since then have significantly improved.

As suggested by the copyright notice above, I wrote this as a standalone story a long time ago. But after finishing Resuming My Lifestyle I realized that this fitted perfectly as part of Jason’s back-story, so I changed the names of the original characters and incorporated it, otherwise unedited, as the third entry in the series.

It really is a small world.

I hate to do poorly at anything, even when lack of knowledge or experience is the real culprit. Once in a while, I get lucky; as in the book Replay or the movie Groundhog Day, I get a second chance, the opportunity to correct an earlier fumble.

U.S. 17 is a hypotenuse that bypasses the DC metro-area gridlock to the west, so it carries a lot of traffic between Interstates 95 and 81. The stretch between Warrenton and I-66 is lightly traveled after nine at night, and I was nearing the end of a long day-trip, fewer than 25 miles to go in a round-trip of around 380. Flicking my high beams onto a long, empty tangent, I saw a car’s emergency flashers off in the distance, their tempo slow and their intensity dim. Some instinct told me that this time, unlike my normal practice, I should stop and offer help.

I pulled up behind the stopped car, dimmed my headlights, and grabbed a flashlight off the back seat before walking ahead. When I was just behind the driver’s door, I switched on the torch, aimed not through the car window but up at myself. The reflected light revealed an attractive blonde, hunched forward with her right temple resting on the steering wheel. Her eyes were closed and there were tear-tracks on her cheek. I raised my free hand to rap on the glass, then froze in stunned recognition.

I know this woman! my brain screamed, and suddenly I was a dozen years removed from real-time, my mind’s eye filled with a stored memory-clip of a younger version of this woman walking toward me. She wore a bustier-top dress, the black fabric an erotic contrast against her golden skin, and her hips swayed seductively, moving the knee-length skirt and drawing my gaze down shapely calves to tiny feet shod in backless sandals with four-inch stiletto heels. Other remembrances began flooding my consciousness, and I suppressed them vehemently. After only a couple of seconds, I continued the arrested movement and tapped my fingertips against the car window.

Her eyes popped open, and they moved wildly as she snapped to awareness with a startled, furtive expression that changed quickly from outright fear to wary caution. I kept the torch focused on myself and said, as gently as I could, “Are you all right? Can I be of some assistance?”

Her hands gripped the steering wheel tightly, knuckles whitening from the pressure, and then she relaxed slightly, shrugged her shoulders, and cranked the window down a couple of inches. “I’m at the end of my rope,” she whispered. “I have to be in Winchester to start a new job in the morning. I don’t have any money, the car up and died on me, I just don’t know what to do...”

“It’s all right,” I told her. “Bring what you’ll need for tonight and tomorrow, and we’ll worry about the rest later. How long since you’ve eaten anything?”

She started crying again, sobbing softly, and her shoulders shook. Then she seemed to take hold of herself; she reached for a tissue and dried her eyes, smearing dark circles of makeup under them. When she spoke again, her voice was firmer; only a slight quaver betrayed her exhausted and depressed state. “I had something sometime yesterday, not very much. I was saving what money I had for gas.”

“We’ll fix that problem first,” I said. “Now come out of there and let’s get moving; it isn’t getting any earlier, and you need food and rest.” I reached for the door handle; she rolled up the window and unintentionally flashed me a glimpse of sleek thighs as she slid out from behind the wheel. I locked the doors and she led me to the back of her car, opened the trunk, and pointed to a suitcase. I heaved it out, closed the lid, and gestured for her to precede me to my car. She started walking, unsteady on her feet, then stopped abruptly and turned to face me.

“Why are you doing this?”

“It’s a long story, and explanations can wait,” I replied enigmatically. “Now let’s go.” I moved forward, taking her arm, and she let me guide her to the passenger-side door of my car. After getting her seated, I threw her suitcase onto the back seat and started driving up the road. She sat huddled against the door, head bowed, and I made no attempt to engage her in conversation. Thirty-five minutes later I parked in front of a motel that had a 24-hour restaurant. One good thing about a Jewish upbringing is that I know how to safely break a fast.

“Bring her a slice of melon right away,” I instructed the waitress who seated us. “I know it’s off the menu at this time of day, but then get her a couple of scrambled eggs, some toast, and a large orange juice. Just coffee for me.” She looked for a moment as though she wanted to argue, then shrugged and headed for the kitchen. My guest made a brief pretense at civilized table manners when the melon arrived, but she was ravenously hungry and before long she was literally attacking her food. Aside from telling her to slow down and not overload her too-long-dormant digestive system, I sat back and silently sipped coffee while she devoured her meal.

When she’d finished, I took out my cigarettes and offered her one. She started to reach, hesitated, then shrugged and took it. As I lit hers and then my own, I watched her looking at me with intense curiosity, doubtless wondering whether I really knew that she smoked. She exhaled heavily, then said, softly and tentatively, “Thank you, ah...”

“Jason,” I supplied, my face composed, unsmiling. I searched her eyes for any hint of recognition and found none.

“Thank you, Jason.” A pause, then, “My name is Donna.”

“I know.” I glanced pointedly at her ring-less left hand. Her eyes followed my look downward, then rose to meet mine in a level gaze. “What last name are you using now?” In other words, do you want to tell me what happened between you and Jeff?

She tensed, then relaxed. “For the moment, it’s still Mason.” Whatever it was, I thought, it must have been recent, and she’s not ready to talk about it yet, at least not with me. I remained silent, neither asking further questions nor volunteering information, and she didn’t initiate any conversation. Five minutes later, we stubbed out our cigarettes and left the restaurant. I got her suitcase and checked her into the motel with my credit card, then escorted her up to the room. I opened the door, and after she entered I set the bag down inside and waited on the threshold. After several steps, she turned back, clearly surprised that I hadn’t followed her into the room.

There was an overstuffed chair in the far corner of the room, and another memory flashed by, still vivid despite its age. She was standing in a hotel room in another state, her back to me, leaning forward, her hands resting on the arms of a similar chair, her skirt flipped up onto her back. My hands moved to squeeze, and swat, and then caress the firm rounded globes of her behind, tautened by her bent-over position and framed by a black thong, and her flesh was warm and yielding to my touch.

I savored the recollection for a few seconds, then let it fade away and restored my composure. I held my hand out toward her and said, “Give me your car keys.”

She fumbled in her purse, then walked back toward the doorway and held them out. I let her drop them into my palm, then took out my wallet. “Here’s some money,” I said, retrieving my emergency 100-dollar bill from its secret place and handing her the cash and the half-full pack of cigarettes from my shirt pocket. “You can stay here as long as necessary, and charge meals to the room as well. Take cabs tomorrow, and I’ll get your car fixed in the morning. Meet me in the lobby for dinner at seven, and I’ll answer your question then. For now, get some sleep; you look like you’re about to fall over from stress and exhaustion.”

Her lovely features were contorted in confusion when I swung the door closed before she could respond.

Over dinner the next evening, after we’d started to unwind with a glass of wine, Donna thanked me for dealing with her car, told me about her first day at work, and then broached the subject of how she happened to be where I’d found her.

“I knew Jeff had started fooling around on the side, in addition to the games we played together,” she said, “but then the bastard took on a full-time mistress, a 24-year-old, and I couldn’t handle that. I confronted him, saying he had to choose, and he chose her. He had the photos of me he’d taken over the years...” A flush rose from her neck to her cheeks and she averted her gaze, then hurried on, “ ... perhaps you’ve seen some of them, and he told me if I left the state by the end of last month he’d divorce me quietly and destroy the negatives.” She shrugged. “I don’t know if I can trust him to do that, but I didn’t think I had much choice. When I agreed, he took my checkbook and credit cards right away. I gave notice at work, networked with friends and read some out-of-town want-ads, and found this job. When I got my final paycheck, I cashed it, loaded the car, and left.”

I nodded, hoping my face mirrored my sympathy, and then it became true-confession time. “You said you knew my name,” she continued, “but I don’t remember meeting you.”

You did a lot more than just meet me, I thought, and my memory replayed the sight and sensation of her bending over from her kneeling position beside my chair to capture my stiff cock between her full, sensuous lips. But my guilt overrode the pleasant recollection, and I struggled to keep my voice steady as I responded honestly to her implicit question.

“There’s no reason you should, except maybe in a negative way,” I told her. “Twelve years ago, I corresponded with Jeff, and then my girlfriend at the time and I met and played with the two of you. It was our first time with another couple; I misread a lot of signals and generally botched the whole scene...” Donna had been watching me intently during this recital, and my words trailed off when a spark of recognition in her eyes was followed by a slight negative head-shake.

“I remember you now,” she said gently, “and you were really sweet.” I winced at her choice of predicate adjective, and she reacted immediately. “I don’t mean that in a derogatory way,” she said carefully. “You were nervous, and you were kinder and more considerate than I was used to, but everybody has to have a starting point.”

“It was more than just consideration,” I said quietly. In my mind’s eye, that younger Donna was at the head end of one of the two queen-size beds in the hotel room, an exquisite vision of natural-blonde femininity. She reclined into stacked-up pillows, keeping her legs spread to avoid squeezing the spring-closed plastic clips that Jeff had placed on her labia a few minutes earlier. She was complaining about the discomfort they were causing, and I, too naïve to know this was all part of the head-game, leaned forward and removed them. At the time, I thought her thanks were sincere; only later did I realize that the look in her downcast eyes had been disappointment.

It was harder, this time, to recover my equilibrium. Even after all the years, and all my growth, the flashback to failure still hurt. I shook my head once, both to clear it of retrospective self-criticism and to emphasize my disagreement with her well-intentioned rationalization. “It was inexperience and a conditioned reflex rather than a reasoned decision. It was the difference between an intellectual appreciation of consent and the emotional acceptance of myself as a dominant.”

She reached and gently stroked my cheek. “You don’t have to be cruel to be a strong dominant; some of the best are also some of the most caring people I’ve known. You must have learned that by now.”