The Slippery Slope
Tuesday morning, March 19, 1974
It started out as a normal day, but Eric and I were both expecting that that would not last. But we were wrong.
Once we reached the high school campus, we both did get the feeling that there were disapproving glances and looks, that judgemental eyes were weighing us, and finding us wanting. But, had we been asked to swear, beyond any reasonable doubt, that that was the actual reality, and not just our “guilty” (metaphorically speaking) consciences making us see what was not actually there, we would have had to admit that we might have just been seeing what we expected to see, and not what was actually happening.
That said, Eric did get questions about the altercation the previous day, although I did not: Eric had far more friends and acquaintances than I did. Even so, the questions that Eric got were neither adversarial nor accusatory. They all seemed to be just honest attempts to get more information, and to understand what had happened.
To this day, I’m not sure why things turned out like that. My best guess is that the true nature of the relationship between myself and Eric had already been known—or at lest, strongly suspected—so the implications of the previous day’s altercation regarding the relationship between Eric and myself were not news. Eric’s hypothesis was that the result of the altercation had been so strongly in our favor, that the homophobes, and the opportunistic bullies, were thereby discouraged from challenging us. I’ll just note the the two hypotheses are not mutually exclusive.
Eric and I had strong reasons to just accept the fact that we hadn’t become objects of derision, ridicule, teasing or hate, instead of trying to ask anyone for an explanation for that result.
The Principal did call the gang (me, Eric, Brandon, Misha and Greg) to his office about 10 minutes before second period was ending, to inform us that the three bullies had declined to press charges or to file any legal claims, and that the three of them had been suspended for the rest of the week. He also informed us that the three would have been expelled, had they not agreed to sign confessions regarding what had actually happened—and that those signed confessions would be made available to our lawyers, should that be needed. We were also asked to not reveal any of that to others. Afterwards, we all headed to 3rd-period PE, since we were all in that class together.
After the last class of the day, I went to see my counselor—I had made the appointment to see him the previous day, just before the altercation—and he promised to get me in to the next available SAT test, and that I’d be notified regarding the time and place.
When Eric and I got home to Eric’s house that evening (Tuesday,) we both spent the afternoon working on our homework; we had fallen behind on that, thanks to recent events—and Eric’s father (Liam) would be checking up on us (well, on Eric, at least.) When Liam returned home that evening, before he could inquire about the status of Eric’s homework, I informed him of my progress towards taking the SAT. He asked me what progress I had made on the application for admission, and on the applications for scholarships and grants. I had to tell him that I was still working on those. Only then did Liam ask about Eric’s homework status.
Over dinner, Eric mentioned to his father that, given the fact that he and I had been targeted by bullies, that he wanted us to both start martial arts training. Liam just said that he didn’t want to deal with that until after my admission to the university had been handled. At least that wasn’t a ‘no.’
I spent the rest of the evening after dinner reading through the instructions for applying for admission to the university, and also for applying for scholarships and grants. I also started filling out the application for admission. But it wasn’t until Wednesday afternoon/evening that I had all of that completed. Once Liam had arrived home from work Wednesday evening, all that paperwork was ready, so I handed it off to him.
The rest of the school week—Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, went by without anything happening of note at the high school. But Eric and I were both just too busy with homework—or, in my case, also with applications—through Wednesday evening, that we just didn’t have time to engage in our normal after-school sexcapades; nor did we have time to use Eric’s bench press to do weight training. But by Thursday, we did finally get back to our regular schedule and patterns of behavior [see the previous chapters.]
However, a notable event did occur the following Saturday: After completing or usual sexual marathon on Saturday afternoon (at my apartment,) Eric suggested that we walk to the mall downtown: There was a book he wanted to show me at the bookstore there. I agreed: I loved bookstores (and I loved Eric, too, of course.)
At the bookstore, Eric led me to the fantasy and science fiction section (I was a big fan of both genres, by the way,) and showed me the “Gor” books. I had seen those on the shelves before, but had never read them, and didn’t know much about them. He explained that the focus of the series is an alien planet called ‘Gor,’ and that the most important thing to know about Gor is that its culture is very male dominated, that slavery is legal, and that female slaves are often used for sex.
Eric then picked out one of the books of the series, "Captive of Gor,” and handed it to me. He said that it was the book of the series that had been the most recently published, and that it also happened to be his favorite of all of the Gor books. He explained that it was about a woman who gets abducted from Earth who is then made into a Gorean sex slave. He wanted me to read it, and that he would buy it for me.
“Why?”, I asked.
“Because there are ideas and concepts in the story that I want you to be aware of, and to understand”, he replied. “And I want to know your reaction to what the abducted Earth woman experiences as a slave on Gor.”
While I considered the implications of that, I just looked at him. My silence got him to add, “Please, John. This is important to me. If I know you—who you are, what sorts of things would interest and entertain you—and I think I do, pretty much—then I think you’ll really, really like the story.”
So, because of how important he was to me, because I loved him, and because of how important my reading this book apparently was to him, I agreed. He bought the book for me, and I took it home. He wanted me to start reading it right away, so I found something for him to read, too: the first book of e.e. “doc” Smith’s “Lensman” series. I gave that book to him that to read, while I would be reading “Captive of Gor.”
By the time bedtime came around, I had read almost the first 180 or so pages of the book (I’m a fast reader.) That was enough of the story to give me sort of an idea why Eric wanted me to read the book, but I didn’t comment on it, yet.
Sunday, March 24, 1974
The next day (Sunday)—after our now-traditional sex session—I completed the rest of the book. Eric had read about half as many pages of “First Lensman” as I had read of “Captive of Gor.” He really liked it.
As for me, my reaction to “Captive of Gor” was mixed: I was not a fan of the writing. I did not like the main character (Elinor Brinton.) However, I nevertheless was rather titillated (sexually aroused) by the book’s portrayals of sexual dominance and submission, by the denigration to which the main character was subjected, and also by the book’s portrayals of the sexually-charged indignities to which the main character was subjected—practices that I later learned are what we now call “BDSM” (bondage, discipline, sadism, masochism.) I learned a lot about all of that by reading that book, although the author had invented his own terminology for it.
But I knew, without asking, that learning about such things (by whatever name,) and seeing it play out in my mind’s eye while reading the story, was one of the reasons that Eric had wanted me to read the book. So, once I had finished reading it, I informed Eric that I had read the whole thing, and then straight up asked him:
“You want to know what my feelings are about the sorts of things that were done to ‘Elinor Brinton’ (the main character,) right?”, I asked him.
“Of course”, he said simply.
So, I told him: “Being subjected to the sort of treatment to which the main character was subjected would not be anything I would want to do in real life…but, in spite of that, it will probably be something I will be fantasizing about”, I told him.
“Interesting”, he replied. “Why would you fantasize about doing things that you wouldn’t really want to do in real life?”, he asked.
“Good question”, I answered. “I guess…I just get off on being dominated sexually…and, well, the stuff they were doing to Elinor Brinton somehow enhances that feeling of being sexually dominated—it emphasizes the feeling. But I absolutely would not want to actually be in her situation, where there was no escape, where it wasn’t just a pretend game being played out, like in a dramatic presentation. Life—and love—are about far more than just sex, and sex is about more than just being dominated.”
“Does that mean that you’d be OK with it, if it were just play-acting? Like acting in a movie? Such that, when the director yells ‘Cut!’, life returns to normal, and nothing bad is actually happening?”, he queried.
“Hmmm…Maybe. I don’t think I could really know, without having actually tried it”, I told him.
“You do realize, I hope, that that’s pretty much how you felt about letting me fuck you, when we first met?”, he asked. He was absolutely right, of course.
So, in reply, I asked, “What do you have in mind?”
He replied with a question of his own, “Why do you think I like that book so much?”
“Because you get off on sexually dominating your partner?”, I answered—again, with a question of my own.
“Exactly. That’s why I would like to try taking our sex sessions to ever more extreme levels of domination. I want to own you—body and soul—when I fuck you”, he said.
“Hmmmm… I can’t deny that the idea of what you have in mind excites me sexually. On the other hand, the specifics, the details, matter. I might approve of specific ideas..but I’d need to have the option to veto them in advance”, I stipulated.
“Of course, Babe: I love you—far more than I would have ever thought possible, just a month ago. I would never actually harm you. In fact, i’d have to beat myself up, were I to ever even try.” He paused, then added, “I think we could do the same thing we did to get you comfortable with the things you now not just accept, but actually enjoy: Escalate gradually”, he suggested.
“I’ll at least listen to whatever you propose”, I replied. “But now, it’s time for us to walk to your house, and enjoy one of your mother’s fabulous dinners.”
So that’s what we did. After dinner, we spent 2 hours doing weight training using Eric’s bench press. We both realized that getting in shape—ripped, even—might be a good idea, given the events of the past week. We also were hoping that Eric’s father would agree to fund martial arts training for us.
We went directly to bed after completing the weight-training session, too tired to do anything but sleep.
