with help from Kitty (Irishlass68@yahoo.com)
and John Stuart Mill

Johanna Mill was five foot four and on the pill. When her father saw the pill case drop from her purse, he blew his top. "How could you?" he thundered. "Has all the time and effort that I put into your education gone to waste?"

"Hardly. I haven't had sex yet, and you wouldn't have found this out if my purse hadn't spilled. You are not considering this rationally. Frankly, I don't expect to have sex any time soon; but I know too many girls who had unexpected and unprotected sex. I'm not going to risk that just to preserve your illusions. I haven't needed the pills, but it would cause both of us a good deal of unhappiness if I needed them and weren't taking them. I'm an adult now, and I'll make my decisions in a responsible manner. Don't you trust your years of teaching?"

"I really feel that I should have put more emphasis on sexual ethics."

"Well, it is too late now," Johanna said, "unless you have been instantly converted to the lecture method. I'm not going to discuss my sexual preferences and desires with my father. It is too embarrassing, not to mention vaguely incestuous."

"Would you discuss this issue?"

"With you? Not on your life."

"With someone else who could point out the moral consequences of your decisions," Dr. Mills said. "This is an issue where rationalizing can look a lot like rationality to the person doing it."

"You mean like a man rationalizing his desire to have his daughter remain a little girl into some great ethical principle? Look, if you hadn't engaged in sex, I wouldn't be here arguing about it with you.

"It's not worth discussing" she continued. "If you want me to talk to a doctor or some woman counselor, I will. I'm your daughter, anyway; if I'm rationalizing, I'm good enough so that no one but a logician will find out."

"How about Mr. Bentham? You respect him, I respect him. He isn't a fond papa hating to see his daughter grow up."

"Talk to Mr. Bentham about sex?"

"Why not? He'll talk about anything. And we both respect his moral judgment."

The discussion took another two days, and it took another week to make the appointment. By the time it came, however, both of them were satisfied with the arrangements.

"Come in, Johanna," said Mr. Bentham. "It's nice to see you again. Now let me get the ground rules straight."

"I talk to you, you give me your guidance. What I say to you is private. I don't guarantee to follow your advice, and my father won't know what it is. Neither you nor I tell him anything. On the other hand, both he and I respect you tremendously. I know that you'll be objective, Dad knows that you'll not give way to popular culture."

"I can't express how much James' trust gladdens me, but I really would have expected it. Yours gladdens me all the more because it surprises me. Well, have a seat and fill me in." She took a chair, and he sat on the couch opposite her. "You are what now?"

"Almost eighteen."

"Then you'll be graduating soon."

"I graduated last year. From college. I'm in a graduate program in economics now."

"Oh yes, James' educational program."

"Which makes all of this a little silly. Either the boys won't look at me because I'm too young, or they look at me with horror because I'm too bright. Some of them do both."

"Dissatisfaction with one's looks is more a matter of being eighteen than of how one actually looks. I would describe your appearance as delectable. Are you telling me that a girl as pretty as you isn't asked on dates?"

"It isn't that bad now. But all three college years were a mess. Look, a high-school freshman is awkward. Compared to the freshman boys, however, a girl is a social paragon. I should have been going to the school dance with a boy who hoped I would let him kiss me good night. I was in college at that age, with boys who wondered if their girls would go all the way. I was jailbait. Flat-chested jailbait."

"Neither is true any longer."

"Sure. My second year, I blossomed physically. I was already in class with seniors. They had their relationships worked out for the most part, but I hadn't been kissed seriously. I did start going out in the spring. I dated more men, and had fewer second dates, than any other girl in my classes. We would have a meal or go to a campus event, park a while, kiss a while. He would want to go further than I would. After two or three dates, he would give up and go after another girl."

"And you didn't find that satisfactory? If what you wanted was mild dates, it seems to me you were having mild dates."

"Well, Mr. Bentham..."

"Jeremy, please. We have known each other for fifteen years, even if we haven't seen each other often."

"Well, Jeremy, I didn't want to go even as far as I went. But I wanted to want to go much farther. Does that make any sense?" All he did was nod. "So I talked to some of the girls, mostly ones who were in permanent relationships. They were nice. I think that they were happy to have some arena where they were ahead of me. And, after a while, I restricted my requests for advice to those who looked happy about their lives."

"That makes sense."

"What most of them told me was that they had set limits, and then a boy -- not necessarily the one whom they were dating at the time they told me this -- swept them far past their limits. That's when I decided to go on the pill. If I meet the boy who can sweep me over my limits, I won't get a baby out of it."

"I can understand your father's being upset, but it seems a quite rational decision to me."

"That's my problem. I'm too rational."

"How so?"

"No boy is going to sweep me over my limits by whispering in my ear, nor by telling me how he'll die if we don't have sex, nor even by great sexual technique. I've lived all my short life by rationality, and I'm not dropping it now! Even though I sometimes want to."

"But you're unhappy with your present situation?"

"Very much so."

"Tell me. When the boy kisses you, do you enjoy it?"

"Sometimes."

"And when he caresses your breasts?"

"If I let him, I always enjoy it. I don't like to be grabbed." Sometimes the sensations had surpassed 'enjoyed.' She recalled the last date with Howard. Even today, the memory of her ecstasy while he sucked on her breast dampened her center. And even today, the memory of why it was the last date dampened her spirits.

"And do you enjoy the next stage? When does your enjoyment stop?"

"I don't enjoy emotional arguments. That is what comes soon after. I'll be honest with you; sometimes I enjoy being caressed on my legs, even between them. But when his hand gets that far, we are about to have a fight about going to bed. And worrying about that spoils all my pleasure."

"Let me try an experiment. Come over here and sit by me." She did as he asked. "Now, I'm going to give you a kiss. Tell me if a kiss from even an old man is pleasurable."

He kissed lightly over her mouth and chin before settling in for a long kiss. She returned it until he broke their juncture. He kissed her forehead. "Did you enjoy that?" he asked while putting his glasses on the end table.

She was a little flushed. "Let's repeat the experiment to check the result." She had enjoyed it, the pleasure of the sensation nearly matched the compliment of an admired man's attention.

He had to get his chuckles under control before he could. She took the opportunity to remove her glasses and put them next to his. He kissed lightly on her lips before slipping his tongue between them. The taste of his tongue on hers was a renewed thrill. When he withdrew it, it was to explore the insides of her lips.

When he drew her towards his lap, she rose and followed the silent directions of his arms. She was surprised, though, to find herself facing mostly away. He moved her hair aside to kiss the back of her neck, and she shivered. His mouth moved over that area, kissing, blowing, licking her skin from the back of her ear, to the nook where her shoulder met her neck, to the vertebrae. She didn't know where his mouth would land next, but she became certain that she would enjoy it.

His hand traveled up the inside of her right arm, and then down her side. He stopped kissing her when he slid it forward. Given a clear choice, she pulled his hand away and held it in hers. "Father wouldn't like this," she said.

"Would you enjoy it, though?"

"I think so, but we need to consider his happiness as well."

"I am. Would he wish to believe that you would find pleasure from my hand, but that you had refused the pleasure?"

"I don't know."

"I think it unlikely," he said. "A sacrifice which does not increase, or tend to increase, the sum total of happiness, he would count as wasted. So, he does not wish that you sacrifice the happiness which petting would bring you; he wishes that you were still a young girl who would find no happiness in petting at all."

"I think that is close to the mark," she conceded.

"And since that wish is contrafactual, we cannot give him the reality. By being reasonably discreet, however, we can leave his belief undamaged. Or, at least, we can leave it as undamaged as it was after he found your container of pills."

"Is illusion ever a pleasure?"

"Disillusion is often a pain. But I think that concealing the action is neither more difficult nor more dishonest than concealing the fact that you would have enjoyed it."

"You are right," she said, and placed his hand on her breast. He kissed her neck again before moving his hand. They sat like that for a while: he stroking, nuzzling, licking her ear, hefting her breast, blowing across her hair, tickling her nipple through blouse and bra. Her feelings went from pleasant excitement to desire, and then to need.

She pushed his hand away and half rose. Before he could react, she returned to his lap, facing him as much as the couch would allow. "My turn!" was all she said. Not bothering to copy his gentle approach, she drew his head forward and pressed her lips onto his. She waited a moment after she opened her mouth; but, when his tongue stayed back, she stretched hers to find it. The kiss was long and dizzying, especially since she could hardly breathe in that position.

"And when is it my turn again?" he asked when she broke for air.

"It might be better if we both participated."

"So it might," he said. He pecked a kiss on her chin. His hands caressed her side and back before coming around to find the buttons on her blouse. He wasn't grabbing. She knew that she could stop him, but did she want to? Apparently not, since they sat there staring into each other's eyes until the blouse was undone to her waistband. She pulled it out and unbuttoned the last button herself.

This time, he held her face in his hands and drew her into his kiss. He nibbled at her nose for a minute, and brushed her lips with his before licking them. His fingers played with her ears while his tongue explored her mouth. He pushed her back gently and gazed into her eyes again before brushing her blouse off her shoulders. She had to unbutton the cuffs before she could remove it completely.

While her hands were doing that, she pushed her shoes off and moved her feet onto the sofa. When they kissed again, she was facing him even more directly. In that position, she could feel his erection against her left thigh. She hoped briefly that he wasn't going to press it against her like an importunate undergraduate. When he had unsnapped her bra, he cuddled her to him and deepened the kiss. His other hand tickled on her stomach before it reached her breast. It soon tickled there, as well.

Her left breast was beginning to feel lonely when he broke the kiss and urged her up. He moved forwards on the couch until she was standing between his knees. After removing her bra completely, he buried his head between her breasts and kissed her sternum. After a long period of that embrace, he kissed both breasts and then kissed a line up her chest and neck to return to her lips. He rose during that kiss, and ended with a little peck on her forehead.

Standing, he towered over her. "This will really work better, if you lie down here," he said. "Where should we put your clothes?" She moved the blouse from the couch to the end table that didn't hold any eyeglasses. For an instant, she wondered if he wanted her to take off the rest of her clothes, and whether she should if he asked. Instead, he helped her lie down on the couch and gave her a throw-pillow for her head. He knelt on the floor next to her.

Touching the crown of her head with one hand and her chin with the other, he moved her head from side to side as he scattered kisses over her face. He brushed across her eyebrows, and her ear, and her nose before settling down at her mouth for a serious kiss. While his tongue played with hers, his hand passed over her arm and torso before settling on her left breast. This he clasped for a long moment before his finger rose up to touch her already-turgid nipple. "Oh Jo-jo!" he sighed. It was the first time that she had heard her baby name in years, but she liked the sound of it coming from him.

Now her right breast was missing the attention. After a long kiss and a trail of kisses down her cheek and throat and chest, he finally reached it with his mouth. The nipple strained for his attention while he licked lightly over her areola, then slipped gratefully into his warm mouth.

His hand went on another journey while he sucked her nipple and blew on it and rubbed it between his lips. It went first down her side and her left leg, then over to her right knee. He broke his play with her nipple. "Could you rise a little," he said. "I think that your skirt is too tight." She lifted her hips and pulled the skirt towards her waist. He pulled the top to tighten the material under her. She thought that ought to give enough room for his hand, but he said: "Do that again."

When she did, he ignored her skirt to kiss her taut abdomen. She collapsed down in laughter. "It's not funny," he said. "Your belly looks adorably sexy when you lift yourself like that." He blew across her still-shaking navel. Then his kisses strayed upwards, passing her lowest ribs on his way to the bottom of her breast. Instead of returning to that nipple, he kissed the bottom of her left breast. By slow degrees, his lips climbed it until he reached that peak. Only then did his hand begin stroking upward over her panty-hose. The palm warmed her right thigh as it approached the juncture, and then his nails lightly tickled her left as he returned downward. Meanwhile he teased her nipple with tiny licks, light breath blowing across it, and the gentlest of sucks.

When he finally reached her groin, however, he clasped it while he sucked the whole top of her breast into his mouth. She gasped at the thrill that ran through her. He stroked her through panty-hose and panties while alternately kissing one breast then another. She grew hotter and hotter until she couldn't keep her hips from moving under his hand.

He made one of his rare excursions to her mouth while clasping her again. Her movements now provided the friction. "Darling girl," he asked, "if I promise that we won't have an emotional argument, could I remove these impediments to my hand?"

If he didn't remove them soon, she would have to do it herself. She nodded. His erection was obvious when he stood up, but neither of them mentioned it. He pulled down her panty-hose while she lifted her hips. Surprisingly, the panties didn't go with them. He whipped the pantyhose through the air to straighten them out before placing them on her other clothes. She pushed her panties down to her knees while he was doing that. He smiled as he removed them the rest of the way. "Touch but don't look. Is that the rule?"

She had actually been trying to speed the process; but considering it now, that rule appealed to her. She nodded.

At least he didn't repeat the stroke-up-and-down delay now that she was open to him. His hand brushed up her thigh once, and then he clasped the junction again. "Oh, Jo-jo," he said. He kissed her mouth deeply and then licked each nipple once. "Let me tell you how silken your hair feels. And the delicacy of the tiny slick edge of your inner lips. I would like to see their beauty, but I can feel enough beauty to satisfy any man." She knew that he was feeling it. One finger ran very lightly between her outer lips and just tickled the sensitive rim of her inner ones. She wanted to pull his hand against her until he crushed those lips. In place of that, she pulled his head against her breast. He responded by sucking there, but his hand still brushed her very lightly.

Finally, he parted her labia and inserted one finger. Starting at the very back of her valley, he stroked upwards. He paused in the middle and returned via the sensitive outer edge of her lips. Each stroke moved slightly higher until she was moving her hips to bring her center of sensitivity across his finger. This failed of its intent, and the failure left her in an agony of need. Finally, he sucked hard on her nipple just as his finger crossed her clitoris. She moaned.

He kissed her mouth briefly but fiercely. Then he moved to her other breast as his finger resumed its slow strokes. By now the motion of her hips was beyond her control. Then they rose and stayed off the couch as every muscle in her frame tightened. His finger circled her clitoris as she shook in delight. Then he held her there as she gasped for breath. "Oh Jo-jo, sweet Jo- jo," he said.

"Just Jo." She could have bitten her tongue. Such a sweet man, such a sweet moment, and she had to spoil it over a detail of name.

"What?"

"My name is 'Jo' now. Or 'Johanna, ' but I'd rather you called me 'Jo.'"

"Then I shall. Lovely, lovely Jo."

"It's I who should be praising you. I never felt like that. It's not at all so strong when I do it to my..."

"Darling girl! You are blushing. I know that you do it yourself. Otherwise, you would not be half so responsive to my hand. And I love your responsiveness. Don't be ashamed. It certainly gave you pleasure; the results give me pleasure. Who was hurt?"

"I've thought that out for myself. Not the part about you. I'm not really ashamed of doing it, but having others know about it makes me ashamed. And then I'm ashamed of being ashamed. And..."

"Well," he said. "If it is any comfort, I enjoyed your blush. Which might be selfish of me, but maybe you won't be ashamed of being ashamed if you know that your blushes increase the happiness of at least one other person."

"If we're going to talk instead of ... If we are just going to talk, I think it would be better if I got dressed."

"I won't stop you if you insist, but I don't think that we are finished with our other forms of communication."

"I'm not sure that I want to ... I don't think I'm ready yet for..."

"Actual intercourse?"

"Yes. I mean, that is the word that I was looking for."

"Oh? I thought that it was the word that you were avoiding. Dear girl, you are blushing again." She could feel the blush. It was bad enough that he could see through her words. Having him see all her skin was too much. She pushed against his chest, and he let her up. She draped her blouse across her front.

"Could I go somewhere else to get dressed again?"

"If you insist, but there is much more that we could do without penetration. I think, in any event, that our conversation is not over."

"Compromise," she said and slipped the blouse on. She buttoned it over her unencumbered breasts. The blouse stuck to her nipples, and she realized that they were still wet. He looked away when he saw her embarrassment.

"Another compromise," he said. "I shall not look at you, but I'll sit like this." He faced forward with his hand stretched across the back of the couch. "You remember that I would rather have you closer to me. When you feel comfortable with doing so, move closer."

"I decide how close to sit? Why is that a compromise?"

"Because, dear Johanna, you are an honest person. If you say that you will do it, you will come as close as feels comfortable, with no false modesty. Now tell me your objection towards full sexual intercourse. It can't be pregnancy; is it the fear of disease?"

"That is part of it with some of the boys I date." She wasn't being as honest as he'd credited her with being. "But not any large part. I talked with many classmates. Women, I mean. Almost none of them had stopped sex for very long periods after they had begun. Some did because they didn't have anyone, some did because they were committed to someone who was elsewhere, but those talked of the unhappiness of that absence. It's almost a one-way street. I want to be very careful before I take it."

"Let me see if I understand what you are saying. Is it that most of your female classmates who have experienced both intercourse and abstention prefer intercourse?"

That was a marvel of understatement. "Something like that."

"Yet, that very observation could argue in favor of 'taking that street.' What means are there of determining which is the intensest of two pleasurable sensations except the general suffrage of those who have experienced both? What is there to decide whether a particular pleasure is worth purchasing at the cost of a particular pain, except the feelings and judgment of the experienced? In this case, the experienced seem to have voted heavily on one side without persuading you."

"I believe that the intellectual pleasures are higher, if not so intense."

"And I believe this as well. But are you forced to choose? Some of the women that you consulted chose the pleasure of loyalty over the more intense pleasure of intercourse, and I would not try to gainsay them. But are you gaining that pleasure? To whom does your continence demonstrate loyalty?"

"Well, there is always my father. He would prefer me a virgin."

"And a virgin, moreover, completely devoid of desire. Is that your reason for abstinence? That doesn't match the discussion which led to your coming here."

"No, it does not," she admitted. She liked to think of herself as one who acted on rational decisions, but she wasn't showing that side of her today. Suddenly remembering her earlier promise, she moved to his side and pulled his hand down to her shoulder. "I used to consider myself too rational, and not emotional enough. Now I'm not sure."

"If it's any consolation," he said, "one can't be entirely rational. Rationality can provide means, but not ends. First, one must have desires to be satisfied. Once the brute needs of food, drink, and warmth are supplied, the ends tend to be the satisfaction of emotional needs. The rational person meets as many of those ends for oneself and for others as possible. Now the only question is what are your ends." He gave her a hug.

"I think that they are incompatible."

"That is close to a description of the human condition. So what are your preferences, your priorities? Let's stick to this arena."

"You mean: would I prefer to think of myself as moral or to have the sort of pleasure that you gave me ten minutes ago?"

"Are those incompatible? I would think not. The moral ideal is to have the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Certainly, your own happiness is one part of that. Indeed, the times when any person has it in his power to multiply happiness on an extended scale, in other words to be a public benefactor, are exceptional; and on these occasions alone is he called on to consider public utility. On every other occasion, private utility, the interest or utility of some few persons, is all he has to attend to. I was very happy with our actions. If you were, which I have reason to believe, what other persons were affected?"

"Wouldn't this apply to any clandestine activity? This moves us perilously close to rationalization."

"Whichever side one takes on moral issues, one risks rationalization.

"As for clandestine activities," he continued, "many of them affect others even if they are not found out. If we were to plot together to burglarize a neighbor, then the neighbor would be harmed. So mere secrecy does not guarantee that an action -- even a discussion -- will affect only the participants. Would you like it if I were to tell a confidant that you were still a virgin?"

"You promised not to discuss this."

"And I certainly shan't. But the point is that you would be damaged if I did, even if that conversation never got back to you. I did use the subjunctive, after all."

"All right."

"And the other point is that any knowledge of one's sex life is an intrusion into one's privacy. You wouldn't want our latest activities known far and wide, and you wouldn't want your masturbation known; but you wouldn't want your virginity known either. It's less a matter of shame over the particular state of your sex life than your sense of privacy regarding all of it. And you are not alone. Just because a couple is married does not mean that they are indifferent to voyeurs."

"That is one reason that I moved back home after a year in the dorms. I overheard too much."

"That is the other side of the privacy issue," he said. "Not only does another's knowledge of my sex life invade my privacy, but so does my knowledge of his. The law punishes both the voyeur and the exhibitionist. And in that matter, if not in all, the law is perfectly correct."

"It would seem to me that people would seek out more privacy than my roommates did, though."

"Were any of them rubbing their dates' groins in the public lounges?"

"Heavens no! Not even in the central room of the suite. But I could hear them making love."

"That was probably all the privacy that they could achieve, or at least all that they could afford. In an earlier day, men weren't allowed in women's rooms and vice versa. Students did engage in mutual masturbation in the public lounges. Like your dorm-mates, they substituted a pretense of privacy for the real thing. Everybody pretended that they didn't see, as students today pretend that they don't hear. Never assume that something is not a value to a person just because another thing is a greater value to her."

She could see where that argument was leading. Her roommates valued the happiness of the sex act above the pain of being overheard. And, for that matter, above the pain caused by the embarrassing intrusion of overhearing two others. If she had been sexually active, would she have traded the freedom of that dorm room for the privacy of her home? Or would she have found some way to combine both? Sneaking a boy into her father's house would have been dishonest, but would she have done it? Whatever the behavior of her experienced friends, she couldn't imagine beginning her sex life in either situation.

"I see where you are going," she said.

"Is not that where logic is taking us, given your observations?"

"I suppose so. You did promise me that you wouldn't make an emotional argument."

"I took it that emotion was the essence of your objection. Argument, in the sense of debate rather than acrimony, was a predictable part of any discussion with me."

How true. For that matter, any discussion of hers was likely to be a debate. "It was the only predictable part. Thank you for the rest." And, truly out of gratitude, she kissed him. The last hour, however, allowed scant room for kisses of mere gratitude. Her passion rose as his tongue explored her mouth.

Soon their arms were entangled in an attempt to hold each other in that clumsy position. He broke the kiss and rose. Before she could protest his absence, he pulled her up into his arms. In this position, he needed to bend over to reach her face with his. When he straightened and pulled her into a tight hug, the feel of his stiffness against her stomach was a pleasure. She pressed herself against it while he kneaded her buttocks. After he broke the hug to give her another deep kiss, he led her down his long hall.

On her way, she wondered if she were going to yield to him. Everything so far had been fine, indeed luscious. But he seemed to take her consent for granted, and she hadn't consented. This conflict faded when he gave her another kiss in his bedroom.

"Sorry for the mess," he said. "I hadn't expected this." The room was certainly fit for company by dorm standards. Only two books were on his bed, and the three on the floor were closed and piled neatly. Most of the books not shelved were on the night stands, and the only clothing in sight was a bathrobe. It even smelled clean.

When he resumed the kiss, his hands went to the buttons on her blouse. His mouth followed his hands. He was kneeling in front of her, kissing her breasts, when her knees sagged. He gently helped her lie down on the bed.

He kissed all of her face before returning to her mouth. Then he kissed her ear and neck on his way to her breast. With her left breast in his hand and her right breast in his mouth, he seemed to have reached a plateau of contentment. At least he made no move to go further until her own need made her clutch his arm. He raised himself from her breast, which was not what she had wanted, and looked her in the eye. "How do I undo this skirt," he asked.