Breaking Up With The Hudsons

I hadn’t thought of it at the time, but it occurred to me I had been trying to break up with them for weeks. I finished my cigarette, ground the filter under my boot and fished around in my handbag to find some gum. My lipstick. Neither of them smoked cigarettes and neither did I really. Not often enough to count. Not often enough to call it a habit. I still maintain that I quit about 10 years ago. The entrance to the train station is littered with electric bikes, and I have to negotiate my way past a couple having an argument and a dog wearing a sweater that costs more than mine. I am considering buying flowers. Do you do that? When you break up with a couple who you are not seeing? But fucking? Fairly irregularly really. So are you actually seeing them at all? 

I have no idea how this works. I light another cigarette, ferret around for my phone, text my friend half the world away, one of the few people in my circle who knows about us, about all this. My confidant of sorts. Of course he won't respond in time. I forget about it. Adjust my suspender clips, and walk towards their apartment, fully intending to have the conversation. 

Michelle answers the door wearing faded jeans. Tousled, dark hair and a vintage lace shirt that gives you the impression it might be see-through. Smile wide, and holy fuck what a smile. Like I’ve just brought the summer early. Yes! You’re here! And right on time. James is just faffing about with lunch prep and wine and sort of tidying up. I tell them not to bother on my account. Oh darling I know I know, she ushers me in, a hand on my waist, her lips brushing my cheek. Argh, you smell divine as ever. So does she. Woodsmoke and spice. 

Their home is a collection of antiques and plants and vinyl. Like most in this particular postcode, but there's an authenticity about it, worn in and loved and real. The table is cleared of the weekend’s papers and James’ writing paraphernalia. Tell tale marks of oil paint where Michelle has been colouring outside of the lines. There’s wine and salad and dressing and bread that I suspect Michelle has just taken out of the oven. And again I am pulled into this life where I think briefly I could live. This artisan, bohemian existence. Where we write and paint and fuck and someone else looks after the children, surely. 

James emerges from the conservatory, color in his cheeks and I put two and two together pretty quickly that they’ve been warming up to my arrival already. Or maybe that’s just in my head. The idea of them, James unbuttoning her jeans, fingers slick with spit, whispering what he hoped he would be doing to me when I walk through the door. 

Hey you, he smiles, kisses me on both cheeks. This sort of friendly formality. Because we aren’t dating. The three of us. Are we? How does that even work? We chat. The journey, the weather. I’ve brought some chocolates I picked up on a recent work trip to Amsterdam. We eat. It is delicious because of course it is, this life. This place. These people. We laugh. Anecdotes about politicians and a funny clip on TV and did I hear that new album and yes oh god I need to read that. And we get on really well. The three of us. Michelle lazily leaning her cheek in her hand, tracing the wine glass rim with her finger, watching James regale us with a story of a recent press trip. His whole face lights up when he speaks, high cheekbones and sharp chin adds to the overall drama of him. Offset by a boyish charm, he could be just about any age, but the grey at his temples hints at experience, seems to highlight his wry anecdotes. We are nearly three bottles in already. Lunch a collection of discarded plates and olive pips. My shoes kicked off by the door, I tuck my feet under me, happy and comfortable in a late summer daze of tipsiness and I am enjoying watching James, too. We are both somewhat in his thrall. Although really I am mostly here for Michelle. Which is why it can’t work. I am hooked on the small of her back, the way her incisors catch her lip when she’s thinking. Her cat-green eyes, the feel of her skin on mine.

They tell me again how they met. A party when they were fresh faced twenty-somethings. Before he got stationed in Kenya as a correspondent. Before the children. Before all of this. And all of this? I ask. Because I am intrigued. This perfect life. Is there a risk? Is that the thrill? To invite in another or more and see what cracks, what opens up, what fissures might lead to bigger caverns to explore? They fascinate me. 

I know the main thrust of it. They had been talking about opening up their marriage for years, pre children even. But then there was travel, and family commitments and moving back to London... And you know how it is when the children are tiny, that all consuming nature of it all. I nod. I do. My own would be doing homework in a postcode far across town as we speak. Fish fingers about to go in the oven. James rolls a spliff and lights it. It's now nearly 5pm, that late summer glow setting the stained glass windows ablaze. I have two more days of this before I clock back in. So when James passes me the joint I inhale, long and deep and allow myself to suspend all my disbelief and cynicism for the evening at least. Perhaps there are these pockets of time where things just work. Where it doesn’t need to make sense. 

The first time I met them was on the Southbank, six months before. Late Winter. We had chatted online, a site designed for this set up. They ticked my boxes, I ticked theirs. We wandered down the river bank talking non stop for a good two hours. The conversation was easy and open. I noticed the way Michelle laughs, this intoxicating wide open mouth whooping that is infectious. James’ hands on her lower back, a sort of well worn pride in his smile, they are so clearly in love. Still. After seventeen years. 

Thankfully I am not the first. They have explored a bit before. A girl at a party. A younger man that they saw briefly for a few weeks. A couple they are talking to. We discuss ethical non monogamy and required reading and power dynamics. We are just about aligned. We think. Maybe. 

I wave them off in a cab and flag mine down too. When I get home I make myself cum thinking of James’ hands and Michelle’s wide open mouth.

I am not entirely sure what my role is in all of this. I text a friend who had recently tied me up in a hotel room and bruised me so beautifully and with such care that I now trust his judgement on all things sex positive. He is thoughtful. You are overthinking this kiddo, he says to me. He is not that much older, really, maybe 12 years. But in this arena he is a veteran and I am bambi on shaky legs. Or so he likes to refer to me. He reminds me of The Comedian in Watchman. Without the cigar. His new partner jumps on the text chat, a red head, a sort of Jessica Rabbit figure, all heaving tits and big lashes, everyone just needs to be into everyone else and it's fair game babe, you’ll be grand  

I remain on the fence. When they text me the next day with a variety of dates to meet at theirs— Dinner? Nothing too complicated, keeping it light of course, will you stay?—I laugh. I will come for dinner. I don’t think I will stay. Mornings are complicated. But I don’t say this. I arranged for three days away. To get into my head and out of it. A day to prepare. A day to see them. A day to manage the drop. 

While they are not my first, they are different. A more real possibility of something which I cannot really name and it makes me nervous. Everything else this far has been surreal and almost a hallucination. Late night, fancy dress, fever dream.

When I dipped my toes into this world of vetted parties and apps it was in a rush. It was less of a dip if we’re being frank and more of a high dive straight into the deep end. Shibari seances and nights with girlfriends in underground bars that blasted techno I could still hear for days. Pushed up against bathroom stalls with my g string twisted around my wrist to avoid the floor. Kissing a girl with nipples like hard marbles. On my knees in a dungeon, bent over, misery-stick welts like hot fire kisses on my skin. Leather collars and harnesses and so much fucking fishnet. Parties in apartments where I get clipped into wrist restraints, tortured with feathers and fire. Watching my friend get fucked on the mezzanine level, her tits swinging with each thrust, her pink mesh bra pulled down to her waist. And then home. To add arnica to the bruises and shower off the glitter, lube, sticky bondage tape residue. 

This is a first then, to bring this world—this profane madness—some way into my actual life. Where I have a job. And a surname. Where I wear clothing that is not leather or transparent or latex. Where we have conversations that are not peppered with the various layers of consent, and hard limits and preferences. Where we might be friends. Strange right? I type while debriefing the chat. My veteran friend laughs, No, you’re just off scene. It’s much better here.

It was. Much better. More comfortable. Light hearted. There was no rush. Time to take with each other and figure out what worked or not. I spent the first night photographing her. In a vintage designer night dress. She looks like a 1920s film star. Whiskey in her hand. White lace. The heat of the alcohol turning her cheeks pink. Escalating her laugh. James goes through the pictures on the back of my camera, nervous clicking. Trying to make a link between the conversation and the flow of the day. And we are all a little high on the novelty of it. Quite how do we start? I think I ask this question out loud. Michelle brushes the night dress off her shoulders and James puts my camera down. 

Like this. Oh. 

There is a moment, an hour or so later, where Michelle is kneeling on the bed leaning towards me, cupping my breasts with her hands, her wet mouth, her tongue tracing mine. The softness of her lips and the hardness of her husband’s cock pushing into me makes me cum again and again on a loop when I am alone (and occasionally later, when I am not). But really it's the look on her face, pure joy, watching her lover make me his. Over and over again. 

I gave it six weeks before I saw them again. The comedown is hard. I have to pace myself.   

Perhaps it is too intimate. Or rather it is the illusion of an intimacy that I don’t really share. This heightened state of pleasure, yes, this sharing and exploring and arriving at some wholly new place. But not a place I have access to unmitigated. It’s theirs really, they are the gatekeepers. Something they have built that I am visiting, like a celebrity guest. I was beginning to worry I may be intruding. Or overstaying my welcome. But curled up on the wooden bench eating fennel and feta salad, half drunk on a Wednesday afternoon, I could not have felt more at home. 

And that scared the shit out of me.

The initial appeal of the set up had been fantasy. Very clear boundaries about who gets involved where. What the limits are, and we discussed it all at length, as grown ups in the space are encouraged to do. Make it less messy. Make it feel safe. Testing for STIs regularly, checking in on consent, discussing hierarchies. A good thorough debrief of what worked and what didn’t and what we wanted more or less of. We are efficient at this. We are doing this ethically and politically correctly and safely and my god we are going to congratulate ourselves on our open mindedness at every opportunity. On paper, this is clear. And straightforward. And feels good. I learn a blueprint for talking openly about desire. One that will serve me well later. 

But I know, when the early evening light is hitting Michelle’s face like that, while she lazily runs her fingers up and down the inside of my thigh, toying with my suspender clips, that it’s messy, and risky, and terrifying, because most really good sex is. The blurred lines between pure desire and the vulnerability of love threaten to disappear completely. What is it I want? I take another sip of wine. Swallow away the question. 

James has slid onto the bench behind me, offering me another puff from between his fingers. So I lean back, into his chest, let the weight of the question go, while he plays with the necklace on my neck. And Michelle unbuttons her jeans. We are easier with each other now. Six months in. 

I want to watch you from the beginning, she slides her hand into her underwear 

James smiles, crushes the last of the spliff into the ashtray, both hands free now, to pull me in closer on the dining bench, my body between his legs, supporting my weight, his hands on my thighs, gathering my dress inch by inch. I thought these were tights, he laughs, letting his fingers slide into the tops of my opaque stockings… Full of surprises aren’t you. I smile, turn my head to kiss his chin, his mouth, that space below his ear and Adam’s apple where I can feel his pulse.

Michelle’s breath is quickening now—Touch her.

I can feel how wet I am already. I have been since she first placed her hand on my thigh under the table, filling up my glass, giving me a reassuring squeeze and then leaving it there. It's been over an hour of gentle caresses and the lightest of touches and I have been aching for more.  James follows his wife’s instructions. He pulls my dress up to my waist in one move, giving her the view she wants. I can feel how hard he is behind me, pushing up against me…. Fuck.. I bite my lip. I rock my hips back and forth, willing his hands to touch me, where I’m slick and open. He looks to her, and offers up his fingers for her mouth, before pulling aside the sheer material. I let out a gasp when he touches me, her spit circling my clit—groan, as he pushes them inside me, and I can’t help wishing they were hers. I haven’t taken my eyes off her yet. 

I let myself go for the moment. The last time I tell myself, after all. I should savor it. Slowly. As James lifts my dress over my head, his mouth on my neck. Her eyes on his. As he pulls my tits from my bra cups, pinches my nipples, teeth now on my shoulder. His breath quick and hot.

Is she ready for you? 

Michelle asks, her voice sounds lower. Thick with the need of it. She has removed her jeans, her long legs spread wide in her seat, one hand in her underwear, I can see where the seams have touched her skin and left their indentations, outlines from the day’s wear—I want to trace each of those lines with my tongue. But not yet. I need to play this role. She needs this first. This warm up, to watch. 

James bends me over in front of him, my pussy on display for him, his fingers caressing me, teasing my g-spot, making me squirm and moan and drip down my thighs. He leans forward and tastes me, his mouth taking me in, his tongue inside me, then toying with my clit. 

Just about, my love. 

I can hear his jeans buttons pop open, but I’m watching her reaction. Her panties damp, she’s just as wet, just as needy—but she has the self control I seem to lack. As I lay prone, waiting, needing to be fucked and filled and used up. For the thrill of it. The tear and pull of a condom wrapper, then his hands on my waist, and before I can take a breath, he pushes his cock into me, hard. Jesus Christ, this fucking cunt he moans, pushing in again, and again. I surrender to the rhythm of him, his thumbs digging into me, his cock stretching me wider, the ache as he plunges deeper with every thrust. 

Michelle stands and steps out of her underwear. Lifts her shirt, braless and perfect, and trails her fingers along my spine, lingers over the curve of my ass, moving in to kiss James, deep and long.

That good, is she? Will she make you cum?

Her voice, the feel of James pushing harder and deeper into me, I reach between my legs, feel his cock hard and wet pushing into me, then my fingers on my clit, swollen and pulsing. 

Make her cum first. 

And that’s all I need, I open up, shudder, and release waves of pleasure so intense my vision blurs for an instant. My thighs slick with it, my fingers soaked. 

It's now later in the evening, our clothes in the kitchen, the living room. I’m propped up on a cushion on the living room floor, smoking what’s left of James’ weed and trying not to fall asleep there. Naked and covered in sweat, and each other, time has slowed.. A momentary pause. I am in no rush to finish. Especially as I know I won’t be back. James is pouring another drink, plus fixing ice and lemon in a pitcher of water too. The ultimate host. Michelle is twisting her hair around her fingers and absent mindedly tracing patterns on my stomach, my thighs. She is a tease, I can feel that familiar ache blooming, making my pussy clench. Remembering what she looked like riding James, her head thrown back, throat exposed, and her nipples in my mouth, just moments before. Then holding her face in my hands as I drink her in as she cums, biting down on my lip. It will be bruised tomorrow. I hold her hand still on my lower abdomen, lean over and kiss her. She moans softly, moving her hand between my legs, finding the soft edges of me slick and swollen where her husband has ruined me. I need to taste you, taste him on you. I open my thighs wider, her fingers still inside me, her mouth now tracing the line from my throat to my cunt. When her tongue finds my clit I gasp, her lips taking all of me in. Her fingers pushing into me deeper, a third following the two already working every inch of me. She moans deep and long, sucking me in, all of me. James returns from the kitchen, as I arch my back, my hands in her hair, thighs shaking, I feel my whole body tense and release again and again and again, and she drinks me in until I stop trembling. 

Well, I clearly chose the wrong moment to leave, he laughs.

I blush behind a cushion before throwing it in his direction, the vulnerability I feel sometimes in their presence leaves me raw. He kisses me, tender and sweet. The effects of the smoke and the wine and the sex all conspire now to make me feel heady with something I do not want to name. Perilously close.

What is it about them that leaves me wanting more, all the time? 

It's getting late, I say pulling my dress over my naked body. It's warm enough not to need a coat, and I like the idea of my nipples on show, if there is breeze. I start making a move to find my underwear, under the dining bench. My stockings on the table. Suspenders in the living room, my bra seemingly evaporated into thin air. James rummages behind the sofa and playfully tosses it over, No souvenirs then? He teases. I smile, I’ll send you the polaroids—an ongoing joke. Although there are one or two. And surreptitious phone pics here and there, taken and deleted and taken again. 

Dates? Michelle says, raised eyebrows, tapping at her phone. With the autumn term starting up soon we should sort something before it all gets crazy. She's wrapped herself in a thrift store kimono and is both at once devastatingly beautiful and horribly efficient. Her hair trussed up in a pin. Tapping at google calendar. James groans, God can we wait on the admin? I'm still post-fuck brain dead and a bit high. She pinches his arm, smirks. We wouldn't have any fun at all if I left the organizing to him. 

And with that I know I am right to go. I am the fun, the fantasy, the escape—which has had its benefits. The no-strings. No context. No consequences. The perfect way to move through this moment in time, where I am anchorless and changing. But not sustainable, the candyfloss-melted moment. I don’t commit to a time. The precipice too close. There is too much on the line. 

When I get to the station I see I have time for a cigarette before my train arrives. I can gather my thoughts and compose what I am going to say in my message. It’s almost dark now, in the way that it is in August. The heat of the day still remains, the pubs are flooding into the street, the smell of lager and jasmine and smoke. The promise of autumn in the cooler breeze, late summer sale posters in the windows, back to school ads on the train. I think about summer holiday homework that needs to be checked. Reports that need to be filed. Solicitors that need to be chased. My real life is calling. I type out my message, wait for phone signal as the train rushes under a tunnel on the overground taking me to the other side of London. 

I press send. Once the double tick arrows turn blue, I delete their numbers. 

Photo by Alexander Krivitskiy