Daniel Stern - Swingland: Between the Sheets of the Secretive, Sometimes Messy, but Always Adventurous Swinging Lifestyle

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While the stories that follow are based on actual events and real people, names and locations have been changed to ensure discretion.

But most of us dont use our real names, so it doesnt really matter.

However, in the event that by changing your name I have given you your real name, know that it was purely coincidental.

The Lifestyle

NOUN. A global community whose members (swingers) engage in sexual relations as recreational or social activity.

Vanilla

ADJECTIVE. Lifestyle slang. NOT of or in the Lifestyle.

The first car arrived. From it emerged a husband toting a small gym bag and a wife bundled in a full-length raincoat buttoned to the top with just a flash of fishnet escaping at the hem. They scurried up the walk to the house that was every other house on every other suburban street, slipped through the front door, and shut it quickly behind them. Another car arrived. Then another. One by one they parked and two by two their occupants dashed inside with equal parts urgency to avoid detection and eagerness to escape the outside world and dwell, if only for a little, in the one inside.

I, too, walked up the path and knocked on the door on the designated night at the designated time as a month prior while cooling down post-play at a GB that ended up MFM, Gerard, the other M, extended a rare invitation to a couples house party.

Respectful single males are insanely hard to find, he admitted.

And skilled ones all but impossible. Rose, Gerards wife and the star of our MFM sexual sandwich, winked.

I thanked them for the compliments and gratefully accepted their invitation. However, I knew the odds of a single male receiving a legit invite to a couples party. Slimmer chances have been overcome, I suppose. Like winning the lottery twice or experiencing spontaneous stage five cancer remission, but thats about it.

Three weeks later, I received the email, downloaded the attached file, and clicked play to view an animated pinup girl reclining atop a martini glass kicking her stilettoed foot into the air. Bannered overhead in red balloon letters:

That instant, everything became about preparation. Diet, grooming, lighter workouts to preserve energy. Regimented, early bedtimes for proper rest. Suspension of all playtime and masturbation to charge my libido. There was no way I wasnt going to be able to perform.

As Sarah pulled back the door, she informed me that Rose and Gerard were running late. But they said feel free to start without them.

In black nylons, heels, and a bustier one deep breath from exploding, Sarah belonged on the fuselage of a World War I bomber. Along with her red lips, talcum powder skin, and Bettie Page bangs.

Hows about the tour, sweetie?

Like the homes outer facade, its living room was standard suburbia, except the furniture was moved to the walls to clear space for a jigsaw of sheeted sleeping pads that stretched to the far wall. Everyday life pushed aside for tonight.

Here we have the group area.

Having shed their raincoats, wives floated around in rainbows of lingerie trailing exotic fragrances and clutching wineglasses with tips of brightly colored nails. Husbands reclined in baggy shorts and Tommy Bahamas, taking in the view. On every flat surface candy dishes teeming with condoms twinkled in the candlelight.

Back heres the dining room.

A constellation of a chandelier hovered over a dining table offering two rows of silver chafing dishes. Beside it, a fully stocked bar glistened like a resevoir of liquid courage. Scattered nearby were chairs and fold-out tables arranged in groups accommodating four, perfect for intimate conversation.

Private rooms are this way...

A short hall let out at a pair of bedrooms, each with a bed stripped to its fitted sheet. Wall-mounted flat screens broadcasted muted porn, the light from which painted the mattresses like the adrenaline-producing lead-up to a wrestling matchs main event. Folded washcloths and bottled waters perched on nightstands, waiting dutifully to serve.

And, finally, the restroom.

A basket of rolled hand towels rested on the lip of a deep-soak tub across from a vanity sink circled by an impressive offering of single-serving toiletries. Mouthwash, breath mints, floss, individually wrapped toothbrushes, nail clippers... A tuxedoed bathroom attendant wouldnt have seemed the least bit out of place.

Every single male in the Lifestyle has heard countless myths of these parties, but only a chosen few can claim to have witnessed one.

Oh, Sarah chirped. I almost forgot the hot tub.

I was one of the chosen.

Before playtime commenced, everyone did their homework. Huddled on couches, crowded around tables, and clustered in corners, guests discovered who the voyeurs, cuckolds, the soft swappers and hard swappers were... which couples were after threesomes, foursomes, or moresomes. STI results were exchanged like business cards.

I was partaking of the buffet when a stegosaurian-size shadow laid claim to me. I looked up, way up, across the table and up still more where, behind the rising plumes of chafing-dish steam, materializing like a pagan god, a face perched atop an Everest of man smiled down at me.

Im Bob, the goliath identified itself, then inserted what looked to be half a barbecued chicken into its oral cavity.

Graft one of those Easter Island heads to a body of proportional size and that was Bob. A horizon of shoulder the width of my field of vision. Arms strataed with petrified muscle. Torso thick as a continental plate. And draped over it all was a tarp of a red silk kimono that was probably meant to diffuse Bobs level of physical intimidation, but instead detailed every peak and valley of muscular topography.

Im a boring, straight male was how I introduced myself to Bob. Its how I always introduce myself because it usually gets a laugh and lightens the mood, the ideal atmosphere when trying to sleep with another mans wife.

Bob removed the flesh-stripped skeleton from his jaws and I thought I heard him chuckle at my boring, straight male comment. But his response was at most a slight grunt, so it may have just been a gob of meat detouring down the wrong pipe.

Want to grab a table? he commanded more than asked me.

We sat across from each other with the intensity of competitive chess players and, within minutes, Bob had queried about my turn-ons and turn-offs, fantasies, and experience. The only information he betrayed was his name. His first name. None of us have last names in the Lifestyle, when we have names at all.

Limits? Bob asked as he tore into another hunk of dead bird.

No kids. No animals. Nothing toilet related. Those first two are given, but that last one... If Ive learned anything in the Lifestyle, its that its better to be safe than sorry.

What about condoms?

The questions are always the same: Condoms or bareback? Favorite positions? Whats the body hair situation?

I told Bob yes to condoms.

That negotiable?

I told Bob it was not.