The Belt

It was some time before he stopped sobbing. She waited for his weeping to subside, patiently. It was a beautiful morning, with a brisk breeze that rustled the acacias lining her property and rippled across her glittering pool. She could hear clearly the distant crash of waves onto the rocks below the cliffs.

The race the afternoon before had been particularly hard-fought, in tricky gusting winds that followed the morning squall. She and her crew had barely beat their closest rivals, and in the yacht club that evening, seeing as the season was statistically won, she had bought more than a few rounds for them in celebration. The girls were in a particularly boisterous mood, and as the night wore on, they each departed with a squirming serving boy or two in their arms—and in one case, dragging a whimpering boy behind her by his hair to the laughter of the other women in the bar—to the clubs' rooms provided for the members' more private entertainments.

There she was left somewhat alone with this intriguing little thing, many of the other women left in the club bar being similarly entertained. Alan, the head boy, had yet again excelled in his staffing assignments that week, she had mused to herself, as her chosen one ran his soft lips up her thigh.

The Love Nest

In my world, as I've written about here and here, it's very common for women to carry on affairs with multiple men. Many women maintain love nests, apartments in the city where they keep their boys, dropping in for quick lunchtime trysts or even afternoons off from the office. These men are oftentimes secretaries or assistants of their mistresses, but are usually just men with youth and looks on their side, latching on to any chance at financial stability. After all, a nice apartment and a steady income is difficult to come by for most men in my world.

Among the demimonde, competition is vicious and the eyes of women wander quickly to other men. Men in these relationships will do anything to keep their mistress' interest. Perhaps this is what makes women enjoy these relationships all the more, and what drives the jealousies of husbands who would love nothing more than to see this class of men spurned by polite society. Yet in spite of their best efforts, sometimes events and time conspire against these poor creatures, and they find themselves thrown unexpectedly and piteously to the sidewalk, faces streaked with tears, their futures bleak and uncertain. Hold your venomous thoughts awhile then, for the boy pictured above, for while he may be living high for now, providence may yet have a more unkind fate in store for him before long.

What She Wants

In my world, when it comes to relations between the sexes, the female is the aggressor. Men send signals of availability, and women make the choice of whether they are interested in them or not. Sometimes, women make unwelcome advances, and it is impossible for men, being so much weaker physically, to resist them. Furthermore, the legal and economic framework in my world doesn't make it easy for men to refuse. Men have few legal rights even in relatively progressive cultures here. To press a case, they require a female representative, usually a family member or a wife, in court to represent them, and cases of rape and harassment are civil, not criminal, matters. Furthermore, the court testimony of a male requires the backing of a female.

In other respects, the economic situation of most unmarried men is also quite unstable, and the prospect of having a regular female lover who may provide some financial support, even if she already has husbands, can be quite hard to turn down. For men in my world, choices are sometimes very easy to make, but very hard to live with.

Incidentally, the usage of language in my world is not exactly the same as in yours. Words that exist in your English may have a completely different significance in mine. One such word, in this context, is mistress. In my world, it can be used to describe the usually already-married woman in an extra-marital relationship with a single male, usually much younger than she is. Many words exist in my world to signify the male in such a relationship, many of them diminutive and condescending, such as boy, toyboy, hobby horse and side dish.

In the future, whenever appropriate, I will write more about how languages differ between my world and yours.

Update: Made some small modifications to the text, but not the image. Feb 8, 2009

Executive Assistant

It's very common in my world for an executive to have her assistant travel with her on business. It's also very common for a successful businesswoman to be carrying on an affair with at least one male member of her staff. In fact, it's almost expected. So the next time you see a woman traveling with a man who looks more like her secretary than her husband, you can be sure there'll be more than dictation going on in the hotel suite.

Especially if you see her looking at him like a wolf looking at her prey.