How Casual Sex Altered My Ultimate Relationship Fantasy

My desires are changing as I fulfill old fantasies

Several months ago, I began constructing a new sexual fantasy that became almost a fixation for quite a long time. In it, I would meet someone I barely knew in a hotel room and we’d have sex all night. The kind of sex that I could instruct, that I could lead, that I could demand. The kind of sex where my voice, my wants, my pleasure was paramount.

These two factors were the most important details of the fantasy: the stranger in the hotel room, and the complete authority of my own pleasure. The former makes the latter possible, because in real life, I had never been able to center my own pleasure in the bedroom. I was too afraid to assert myself within a relationship out of fear that I’d push a lover away with my requests, with the assertion of my voice and my needs.

With a stranger in that hotel room, I’m removed from my life, from my past, from all the old constraints. I can do and say what I want with a stranger without worry. I can destroy the person I thought I was (“Good Yael”) and replace her with the woman who wants to be able to make demands, to insist on her own needs being met, to instigate strong boundaries.

But now that I’ve (sort of) realized this fantasy, I have learned that I was maybe a little off the mark. I’m glad I got to experience it, but I’m constructing a whole new fantasy now…

He comes to my door. He has a bouquet of flowers. Not dyed carnations from the grocery store, but a bouquet of wildflowers he picked himself or maybe a bunch of daisies, tulips, or sunflowers tied with a piece of twine. Or maybe one, perfect red rose.

He notices that I — yes, feral Yael who lives in her lady lumberjack plaids — dressed up. I put on a dress and did my hair and wore extra makeup. And he tells me how beautiful I look. He shows me that he notices the effort I put in to please him, to be extra beautiful.

And he kisses me. Sweetly and gently, winding his arms around my lower back.

I have never had a man come pick me up for a date before. I’ve always met them at the theater or park or restaurant. Or we were living together and therefore traveled together.

I’ve never received a bouquet of flowers from a man before, with one exception: on the first Valentine’s Day of my last big relationship, I knew my boyfriend wouldn’t acknowledge the day and so I attempted to preempt my own disappointment by asking him to buy me flowers. He did what I asked and left a bouquet of dyed blue carnations on my bed.

I didn’t see him that night. He was busy gaming with his friends.

It doesn’t matter where we go. A walk in the park. A restaurant. A concert. I honestly don’t care.

What matters is that he is thirsty for me. He’s focused on me, on our conversation. He asks me endless questions about my work, my family, my life. He wants to read the entire Book of Yael.

What does it take to inspire a man’s curiosity, I often wonder. To command his attention?

The sex is endless. And selfless. And incredible. And healing.

And it is followed by pancakes. He makes them. Homemade pancakes. Not from a mix. And he feeds them to me, maple syrup dripping down my chin. And he does the dishes and then comes back and fucks me again.

Because I want and I want and I want. And I have had so fucking little. I have starved for too long.

It is so hard for me not to apologize during sex. Not to utter, “I’m sorry I’m taking so long,” as if my orgasm is being a total diva, coming late to every party.

It is so hard for me to believe that I deserve time. Time to unfold. Time to be undone. Time to wind into a tight coil, ready to spring into the most perfect release.

And so hard to believe that I deserve someone to take care of me. To take care of me like I take care of my partners. To cook for me. To put effort into my comfort and pleasure. To take time to lovingly give me something sweet and satisfying and delicious.

And to clean up the mess, afterwards.

He keeps in touch every day. This is the most important part, I think. Not the flowers. Not the sex. Not the pancakes.

He shows me how much I matter by making me a part of his day. Every day. I matter to him. I matter to him so much, he cannot imagine a day that I’m not a part of.

He asks me how my day went every night. He wants to know. He wants to be part of my day, too.

He needs me. He wants me. He cares.

That means everything to me.

“How was your day?” gets lost so quickly. So soon. It’s such a little thing, but so important. Too important to be lost.

Nothing good ever came from, “I’m too busy right now. Maybe we can connect another time.”

He runs to me. He is always coming for me. Always moving in my direction. Always with his arms open.

He doesn’t need me to come to him. He doesn’t wait to see how favorably I respond.

He just comes for me, no matter what. Because he knows exactly what he wants.

And what he wants is me.

The truth is, this isn’t a new fantasy. It’s a very, very old one. One that I have carried with me throughout my adult life.

But I put it away. I locked it up in the back of a closet.

I didn’t believe a fantasy like this could ever come true. In fact, I still don’t.

I replaced it with a sanitized, emotionally-stripped fantasy — the stranger in the hotel. No feelings. No fucking love. Just fucking.

I wouldn’t have to wonder why he suddenly pulled away afterwards. Why he didn’t seem to want me anymore.

I wouldn’t have to love someone who didn’t want me. I wouldn’t have to feel that disappointment yet again that there is no one out there who will fuck me like a champ…and love me like a champ. No one who will make me pancakes.

Sometimes, it feels like asking for love — simple love, the most basic need a human has — is just too goddamn much.

So I learned to stop asking.

I still don’t want to ask. It’s too hard. Too scary.

But I’ll let myself fantasize.

© Yael Wolfe 2021

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