In the beginning.

I can feel my spine starting to arch. Her body is tucked safely under mine, my thighs wrapped around her hip bones, making it so easy to squeeze. There is a power in climbing on top, wrapping my thighs around, pushing her down squarely by the shoulders, and holding her there… It is a delicate movement, sliding over her, but when she tries to buck against me, I throw the weight of my hips down. I pull away from a kiss, and her eyes become fierce. I know this stubborn woman isn’t going to let me take her down so easily. But in her own bed, squarely in her own comfort zone, I am tempted to push her limits.

“So,” she whispers into my ear when I bite her neck. “What is it that you like?”
I seek to quell the question with a kiss. Her lips are much softer than I would have expected.

But I can’t cop out on this one.

I pull away and bite my lip. It’s my standard thinking response. Oh, fuck. It’s been years since someone directly asked me what I like, what I want. What do I like?

She takes advantage of my temporary dissonance. Gently she flips me, and I find myself laid out flat, sinking into a mess of down and cotton. Such a clean, white bed for this woman who plays with pinwheels and knives.

She has spread my thighs apart, my long dress now swirling around my hips. If she was packing right now, she would be in the perfect position to fuck me so hard my head would go through her wall. But instead, she is pinning me on a question.

“Tell me, Elle, what do you like?”




I like long cotton dresses. I like piercings. I like my hair long enough to graze my shoulders.

I like foreplay. Foreplay in the form of dark humor and sarcasm, teasing, and intellectual banter. Foreplay in the form of wet kisses. Grazing my teeth across her bottom lip. Smooth hands sliding across my thighs, nails dragging down my back.

I like my clit licked softly so that I can feel every rough patch of her tongue.

I like to be fucked from behind with a big strap on. I like to top on kitchen tables. I like to masturbate on my couch.

Strappy sandals. Especially the four-inch, black satin kind. Garter belts, though you’d never catch me in stockings unless I knew someone would be taking them off. Corsets – the real ones, not see-through-cheap ones, but the kind that bind my waist. Heavy necklaces. I have a thick black cross, hung on a black ribbon, that is just enough symbolism to get me wet. I like the sacred, the profane, the grotesque. I like the way my moans would echo in a church.

I like challenges. A lot.

Women with curves. The sparkle in the eye of a flirty girl. History – social history, personal history, sexual history, memory. I like beginnings, and sometimes endings.
I like to pound a woman with her arms and thighs wrapped so tightly around me that I start to lose circulation.

Penetration. Heat and cold. A cold Maraschino cherry on the tip of her tongue as she licks my clit.

I like seduction. But I like seduction as a slow process, an intellectual and sensual and sexual process, a teasing dance that mirrors burlesque. I fucking love burlesque.

I am a dancer at heart. I like to watch the movement of steps – slow, quick quick, slow. Spin. Stop. Dip. Slow, quick quick… pin her against a wall.

I like dripping wet and messy. I like feminist sex shops and playing with new toys.

Watching her masturbate. Pulling her into my lap, sitting up against the wall, touching her as she gets herself off. I like to feel her buck against me as she rides her vibrator, and when she comes, I can feel her whole body shudder.

Feathers.

I like to be restrained, tied down, held back, pushed and pulled. Handcuffs. I like resistance, but I am not a passive participant. I am strong and stubborn and, at times, controlling. I like to play with those power dynamics sexually, just as I love to play with gender.

I like pressure bordering on pain. It’s a fine line, but a fucking fantastic one.

I like experimenting. I’ll try most anything once. There are a few exceptions – turn offs that will never become turn ons, if you will.

Queer theory. Feminist theory. Destroying sex roles. Fucking with gender roles and expectations.

Music. Dancing – take your pick. Swing dancing, two step, line dancing, swaying. Though I have to say grinding on the dance floor can be one of the best forms of foreplay.

I know these things. I love these things. I know what makes my heart race, my mind focus, my toes curl. But I have become rusty in my expression. I have not forgotten what gets me off…just how to explain what I want. What I like.




I don’t cop out.

“Tell me… what is it that you like?” I gently close my thighs around her waist and swing her down. She complies, and slides down to lay on the bed next to me, propping up on her side.

I’m not shifting the conversation away from me. Well… that’s an added bonus. I’m genuinely interested in her. We’ve talked toys and general thoughts about sexuality, but never specifics.

“I’m easy. I like everything.”

Now there’s a cop out.

She leans in to kiss me, but I pull away and sit up, barely out of her reach.

“No, seriously. What do you like?” I’m challenging her, gently. I stop myself from physically restraining her, too. I don’t want to push too hard. I want to pull.

“I’m malleable.” Her eyes turn soft steel. “It changes with each person. I like to play with whatever gets them off.”

Even the most “malleable” have desires. The wheels are spinning in my head. I’m often attracted to strong women who like to keep other people happy. I respect that pleasuring someone else – whether sexual or otherwise – can be a genuine desire. But
I don’t want the surface, the easy answers. I don’t want you to get me off. I want you to get me off while I get you off. I like to give and to take and to give and to take and to… I get off on making someone else happy, too.

I’m not content with her answer, and she knows it. “I won’t be that easy.”

At least, not in the beginning.