Control

Jerry Myers and I started at World Information on the same day, half a year ago. He to run Accounts Receivable and I to run Accounts Payable. We work for the same guy, but he's in London and we're a small piece of his pie, so we pretty much run things as we like.

A while back, Jerry and I were in the Watering Hole, a place that's become our favorite Friday-after-work bar, having a couple of drinks before heading home for the weekend. Jerry, looking around the bar, said, "So. You going out and get laid this weekend?"

We'd become fairly good friends and I really liked him, so I took a calculated risk. "Nope. Can't."

"Can't? Good looking guy like you? Can't get laid? Come on, Mike."

I laughed. "Oh, I suppose I could if I wanted to but I've been edging for a while and I don't want to... you know, break my run."

Jerry looked at me. "Edging? What the hell's that?"

"It's a technique for increasing self-discipline and confidence."

He grinned at me. "Mike, you are the one person I know who's least in need of more self-discipline. I've seen the way you work... like a dog with a chew. You're going to finish it or know the reason why."

I signaled the girl for another round. "It's a more personal kind of discipline, Jerry." I laughed and set him up for the question he was inevitably going to ask me. "Besides, it feels wonderful!"

"It does? What the hell kind of discipline could possibly feel--he mimicked my tone here--wonderful? Well," he shrugged, "I guess maybe if you're into S&M or something."

"No, Jerry. It's not some S&M thing, not by a long shot."

We were silent for a moment while the drinks were served.

"Come on, Mike. Give. God knows I could use some self discipline and I might actually be able to develop it, if it felt good, too."

"Okay, okay. But you have to realize this isn't for everybody. Some guys just can't... Well, they can't do it."

He looked at me expectantly. "You going to cut the crap and tell me about it or what?"

"What it is, Jerry, is jacking off without the off part. That's it, you get yourself up on that edge--hence the name--and you keep yourself there. You do that for as long as you like but you don't let yourself fall over that edge. You don't let yourself come. That's the real self-discipline part."

I was pleased to see that his facial expression was more one of curiosity than of horror. "Okay," he said slowly, "how long do you do this for? I mean, a half hour, a whole hour?"

"Sometimes. Some guys can stay up there for three or four hours at a time."

"Three or four hours? I can't believe that." He paused, thinking. "Then you come, right? God, that must be like something else."

"No, no, Jerry. The whole point is that you don't come. The longer you keep yourself from having that orgasm, the more self-discipline you develop."

"You don't... For how long? I mean... How long?"

I finished my drink. "Well, this time it's been not quite two weeks for me."

"Since you came? Oh my God."

"Actually, that's a bit of an exaggeration. It's really been only 11 days, 12 hours and--I looked at my watch--48 minutes since my last orgasm. But it's been a damn pleasurable time, let me tell you."

Jerry rolled his eyes. "So let me understand this. You brought yourself up, stayed there for a while and then turned over and went to sleep? And then you haven't... you know, haven't jacked off for twelve days? You must be nuts."

"Why? Being up there on that edge is the most incredible feeling ever. And while I haven't jacked off for twelve days, I've certainly done more than my share of jacking. Just about every night--and a lot of mornings, too."

"But you don't come."

"I don't come."

Jerry's eyes looked a little panicky. "Ever?"

I laughed. "Until I meet my goal. Then, after a long time on the edge, I'll let myself fall over and believe me, it's always a very long fall,"

"So how long until..."

"My goal is two weeks. Monday night."

He whistled and held up his drink. "Another?"

"I don't think so. It's Friday and I promised myself a good, long session on the edge tonight, and maybe two or three more tomorrow." I grinned, letting him know how much I was looking forward to it.

His only comment: "Jesus."

Shortly after I got to work on Monday, Jerry came wandering into my office with a couple of Starbucks containers. He thrust one into my hand and unceremoniously plopped down in one of my guest chairs.

After a couple of minutes of office talk, he looked at me and said, "I tried it over the weekend. That edging thing."

I grinned at him. "And?"

"I couldn't do it."

"You couldn't do it."

"Well, I sorta could. I mean, I got up to the edge all right, and I even stayed there for a couple of minutes, but then I couldn't hold on to it."

I made him say it. "You couldn't hold on to it?"

He blushed just a little. "Yeah, I couldn't... I came."

"More than once?"

"About six times." He laughed. "You gotta give me some credit for persistence."

I got up, went over and closed the door. Back behind my desk I looked him squarely in the eye and said, "You want to? You want to learn how to edge?"

He didn't blink or look away. "Yeah, I think I'd like... Yes, I want to learn."

I put out my hand. "You want me to teach you?"

He shook my hand, sealing the bargain. "Yes. I want you to teach me."

I looked at the clock on my desk. We had a little time before the office would get frantic. "Okay. Tell me exactly what happened."

He took a deep breath. "Bear with me on this, Mike. It's hard... My lord, I haven't talked to anyone about this stuff since middle school, when we all learned to do it. I mean, what do you want to know, which hand I use?"

"I want to know everything. Where you were; how you were doing it and most importantly, what you were thinking." I smiled. "And yes, which hand you use."

He took another deep breath and launched himself into it. "Right hand, dick in my fist. Well, not my fist, I don't grip it that tight." He stopped and looked at me, an odd smile on his face. "You really want to know all this stuff?"

"I do. You circumcised, Jerry?" I wasn't sure that it mattered but I was curious.

"No." He blushed again.

"Okay, so where were you?"

"In the bedroom. I always do it in the bedroom. I put on some porn, strip off and get on the bed, my head on a pillow so I can see the TV." He laughed. "God, would you believe I bought a 42 inch, high definition TV, and put it in the bedroom, just so I could watch porn? Is that crazy or what?"

I shook my head. "No, it's not crazy. But you're not going to be watching it a lot for a while, at least not porn."

He sat up straight. "What'd you mean?"

"Well, edging while you're watching porn doesn't really work, at least not when you're just learning to do it. Edging, Jerry, takes attention and concentration." I grinned. "And self-discipline."

"So, no porn?"

"Well, not for this week, at least. You have a couch in your living room?"

"Yeah."

"Good. Then here's what you're going to do: Get naked and lay on your couch or any place you don't normally masturbate. Then, jack off. Do it slowly and pay attention to what you're actually doing and what you're actually feeling. You're going to find, and then map in your head, all of your pleasure points and triggers."

"Pleasure points? Triggers? What..."

"The places that bring you pleasure when you touch or squeeze or pinch them. Explore your body. Play with your balls, brush your sack with your fingertips, squeeze your nipples, run your fingers gently over your entire dick, move your foreskin, touch your ass. You get the idea. Do this for as long as you can for the rest of the week."

"Can... Can I come?"

"Sure, when you have to. But make sure you know just where you touched and what you were doing that made you come. Then think about the whole experience. What felt best, what felt next best and so on. Your goal is to learn about your body, what brings you pleasure and what doesn't, what pushes you over the edge and what just brings you to it."

The office sounds coming through my door were getting louder; I thought it was time to get on with the day. "Tell you what, Jerry. Come back Friday morning and give me a report on what you've learned. Then we'll go from there."

He stood, his face a combination of excitement and bewilderment. I wondered if he'd take the rest of the day off to go home and start. "Almost forgot," he said, with a grin, "have a good time tonight. I'd love to know how long you can stay on that edge before you come off."

"You'll probably hear me when I go over."

He grinned and opened the door. I went back to work.

On Friday morning, Jerry came into my office with a bounce in his step. "God, what a week," he said, handing me coffee. "I did everything you told me to and man, did I learn things about me!"

I sampled the coffee, which was perfect, just like I thought Jerry was going to be one of these days. "So what did you learn?"

He closed the door. "A lot."

"Any thing you'd care to tell me?"

He blushed, which I found very engaging. "Well... I found out that my tits... ah... my nipples really, are very..." He ducked his head. "This is hard to talk about, Mike. I mean... well it's hard."

I glanced at his crotch but couldn't tell if he was being literal. "Look, Jerry, if you want to do this, to have the self-discipline this is going to bring you, then you're going to have to tell me this stuff. Otherwise I won't know what's happening with you and where to go next." I grinned at him. "Just think of me as your eighth grade P.E. teacher."

That last made him laugh and broke the tension in him, just as I had intended. "No, Mike," he said, "no way can I think of you as old man Brower. No way."

"Then think of me as the guy who's going to help you find pleasure you never knew existed. Now tell."

He was still a little uncomfortable but that faded as he talked.

"Okay. My nipples. I never knew they were wired to the same place my dick is." He shrugged. "No one, including myself, ever really played with them before. And there's a place on the side of my dick, when the foreskin is pulled back, that will bring me up fast."

"What else?"

He blushed again. "Well, I learned that if I pull my..." He took a breath. "If I pull my foreskin clear down and then tug on it, if I'm anywhere near close it'll push me over every time. And, oh God, does it make me shoot. One time I hit the lamp on the end table behind me."

He'd learned a lot about himself and I figured he was probably ready for the next step. "Jerry? What do you wear to bed? When you're going to sleep."

He looked mystified, but he just shrugged and said, "My underwear."

"What kind of underwear? I mean, boxers? Briefs?"

He stood, unzipped his pants and pulled the fly apart to show me. "Standard issue, white, Jockeys. The same kind I've worn since... I don't know. Since ever, I guess."

I thought I probably knew the answer to the next one but I went ahead and asked anyway. "And when you work-out at the gym? You wear a jock under your shorts?"

Just as I thought, he shook his head. "No, just my underwear. I guess I do have a jock around somewhere; I know I had one when I was in college. Hey, what's this all about? You're not going to take my underwear away from me, are you?"

I never said the boy wasn't bright. "That bother you?"

He sat down again, his fly gaping open. "No, but I'll be running around here with a hard-on all the time. Jesus, Mike, I have enough trouble with my staff; what'll they think if I'm hard all the time?"

I laughed. "They'll think you grabbed the Viagra rather than your vitamin pill." I looked him in the eye, my expression serious. "Mike? Trust me on this. I'll never do anything that will embarrass you or make you really uncomfortable. Especially around here. But I will push you. I'll show you stuff out there that you might never find on your own, stuff that will boggle you with pleasure, and stuff that will make you the strong, disciplined man I know you can be. But I'll never embarrass you and I promise never to push you someplace you don't want to go. Okay?"

He sat up straight in the chair and stuck out his hand. "Deal."

I shook the offered hand. "Deal." I grinned. "Now zip up and get out of here. We both have work to do."

He looked down and blushed again. He awkwardly zipped up and went to the door. "See you at the Watering Hole after work?"

"I'll be there."

The day went by fast, especially since I had a little shopping to do in the afternoon, but I was at the bar by five forty. Jerry arrived ten minutes later and seemed a little breathless.

I handed him the drink I'd ordered for him. "What kept you?"

He ducked his head in that way I find so engaging. "I... uh, had to take care of something personal. You know..." He looked up and I immediately knew what had kept him but I made him tell me.

"What?"

He sighed but he looked me in the eye. "Well, the truth is..." It came out fast, like he was afraid it would get away from him. "The truth is that I figured you were going to tell me I couldn't come for a while so I went down to the fourth floor men's room and gave myself a last blast. A kind of good-bye shoot." His face was very red by the time he finished telling me.

I laughed to cover his embarrassment. "Sounds like something I'd do. You get an A plus, Jerry, for perceptiveness. But actually, you didn't have to rush it. You've got," I looked at my watch, "maybe six and a half hours before you have to give it up for a while." I could see him calculating the time in his head.

"Midnight," he said, with a laugh. "I can do it, all I want, until midnight?"

"Sure. But like you've been doing it all week. You have to make sure you've learned all those pleasure spots and triggers. Then we're going to try something new." I put my little shopping bag on the table.

"What's that," he asked, warily.

I signaled the waiter for another round. "You were right this morning, Jerry. You're going to lose your underwear. But not at work. You can do whatever you're comfortable with there, but otherwise, no underwear."

He smiled. I thought that perhaps he'd begun to think he might enjoy being underwear-less. "What about the gym? Can I wear my jock? That is, if I can find it?"

I pointed to the shopping bag. "No need."

He looked inside and, heedless of crowd in the bar, took the items out one by one. The first was a pair of sky blue gym shorts, followed by a white tank top with On The Edge printed on it. He started to pull out the jock but stopped when he realized what it was. "Hey, thank you, Walt. These are a lot better than the stuff I have, left over from college. But what's this?" He held up the white plastic cup I'd bought. "It looks like..." He quickly put it back in the bag.

"It is, Jerry. It's a hard cup which will hold your vital equipment. It goes inside the pouch of the jock. I wasn't sure just what size your, ah, equipment is so I got a large.'" This wasn't altogether true. It was actually an extra large,' so that, unless Jerry had a really huge endowment, which I doubted, his equipment would move around in the cup as he worked out and bring him occasional, unexpected flashes of stimulation.

He laughed. "I'm very flattered but I have to tell you that a `medium' would have been fine." He put it back in the bag, with a grin. "But I'll wear it anyway."

As I said before, the man's bright.

"So, what now?"

"Until midnight, you can do anything you like. After midnight you cannot touch your self. Not your dick, not your balls, not your nipples, not your ass. This week you learned the places that bring you pleasure. Now you can't touch any of them."

He raised an eyebrow in question.

"At least you can't touch any of those places for pleasure, Jerry. You may, of course, use them for their more basic functions and you may wash them, too. But you have to be careful. In the shower, for example, you may pull your foreskin back to wash, but you may do that only once. Twice is playing with it. You may pull it back when you go to the bathroom, too, if you need to, but again, just once. And you'll lose your underwear. You'll take it off as soon as you get home and not put it on until you leave for work. Over the weekend, none at all."

"You mean I have to sleep naked? Mike, I'm not sure I can do that. I'll be hard all night. And I can't touch it?" He got a very pained look on his face. "I don't know if I can do that."

I laughed. "That's where the self-discipline part comes in. It's there. It's hard. It's begging for just one little stroke, and you can't do it. You are master of your dick, Jerry. Or will be. This is going to help both of you find that out."

"'Till when?"

"Until you've passed the test. We'll leave that open for now."

He sighed and drained his drink. "I gotta go, Mike. I've only got," he looked at his watch, "six hours of manhood left. I want to make the most of it."

"You're wrong there, Jerry. This is going to make you a man."

He was back in my office first thing Monday morning. With a grin on his face.

"You, Mike, are a sadist," he said, handing me coffee. "That was the most frustrating weekend I've ever spent." He dropped into one of my guest chairs. "In bed, naked, and I couldn't touch it? Or anything else? Jesus, Mike!"

He said all this, but he said it with a smile. "So how did it go?"

"I just told you," he said, with some exasperation in his voice. Then he grinned. "It was hard."

I grinned back. "I imagine so, much of the time. But you made it, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I made it. I even got some sleep, last night. But yesterday at the gym, now that was something else again. That damn cup you gave me to wear? It's way too big and my dick just flops around in it when I move. I was half hard for my whole work-out. And the guys in the showers, after..."

He sat forward and put his elbows on the desk, pushing his face in close to mine. "You ever gone into the showers with half a hard-on? You know how those guys look at you? What they're probably thinking?"

I shrugged. "No. But if I did, I imagine I would strut just a bit, show it off. What the hell, those guys were probably just a little envious. I'll bet you were bigger than any of them."

He sat back in his chair and smiled. "Maybe. I didn't look."

I couldn't let that pass. "Sure, you didn't."

He blushed. "Well, maybe a little. All the guys do." He looked up. "No, really."

I let him off the hook. "Of course we do. It's part of being a man."

He relaxed and drank some of his coffee. "Is this the way it's going to go--all week? No underwear at home and getting hard in the gym showers?"

I nodded. "That's pretty much it. Oh, but you can go back to watching porn on that wide-screen TV of yours." A little smile began to play around the corners of his mouth; I quickly wiped it away. "But no touching. And no rubbing against anything, accidental or not."

The smile went away. "So I can watch porn and I can look at my hard-on but I can't do anything about either one of them?" He sighed. "Oh, well, there's always the Disney Channel."

I looked across at his crotch. It was fairly evident that he'd taken my out and worn his underwear to the office. "And Jerry," I said, "as soon as you teach your dick who's boss, lose the underwear, okay?"

He stood and held out his hand. When we shook, he looked me in the eye and said, "A deal's a deal."

It got kind of crazy for a couple of days and I didn't have a lot of time to think about much of anything except keeping the chaos organized. Then, on Wednesday afternoon, one of the mail guys came into my office.

"Special delivery from the fourth floor, Mr. B."

Odd. We don't have any people down on the fourth floor. As far as I know, the whole floor is just small, independent offices. "Can't be for me, Alex. I don't know anybody on the fourth floor."

He handed me a manila envelope. "Must be for you. See there?"

The mailing label had my name on it as well as Personal and Confidential. The return was listed as Fourth Floor M.R.

"Okay, Alex. Just toss it in the In box with all the other stuff."

A little later, it hit me, what Jerry had said that evening when he was afraid I might tell him he couldn't get off for a while. I laughed out loud and grabbed that envelope out of the In box. Sure enough, inside was a pair of standard issue, white, Jockey shorts. No note of explanation, none needed. The man was learning control.

I sent him an e-mail: Received. Will sleep on it. That last was a lie. I slept in them.

Friday, after work, Jerry got to the Watering Hole early so drinks were already on the table when I got there. Jerry looked anxious and I figured I could guess why.

"You're the early-bird, Jerry. What's up?"

"You know damn well what's up. It's been up most of the day."

I looked at him innocently. "Why's that? I mean, why especially today. After I got your... uh, souvenir from the fourth floor, I thought everything was under control."

He laughed. "You liked that, did you?" He ducked his head and blushed in that engaging way he has. "Me, too," he said quietly. "It feels good, not to be caged in."

"You're learning the lessons well. I'm proud of you." I toasted him with my drink. "Here's to lessons learned, all of them."

He touched his glass to mine. "All of them?" His face fell. "Does that mean I... you know, I can't... Tonight?"

"No, not tonight. But you will be getting better acquainted with yourself."

"What's this, another test?"

"Of a kind. You'll be finding some new limits, learning more about control and who has it."

"I need another drink," he said, signaling the waiter.

"You're almost there, Jerry. Just one more little test."

He sighed and didn't say a word until the drinks were served. Then he took a large swallow and looked at me. "Okay. What do I do? How do I get better acquainted with myself--which, I take it to mean, with my dick."

I smiled. "That, and your brain. When you go to bed, get comfortable and then take hold of yourself. Loosely, but tight enough that it doesn't slip out of your hand."

He brightened considerably. "And then?"

"That's it. You sleep with it in your hand. If it slips out, you take it back."

"I'm supposed to sleep with my dick in my hand? All night? Mike, I know I'll just let go of it when I fall asleep."

"You probably will, at first. When that happens, you know where to find it. Just take it back."

"All night?"

"All the time you're in bed."

He grinned at me. "Even watching TV or reading?"

"All the time you're in bed, no matter what you're doing. And speaking of doing, that's all you're going to be doing, holding it. Not playing with it, not squeezing it and, of course, not stroking it."

"How long? How many nights?"

"Come see me Monday morning. We'll talk about it."

I hadn't even gotten my door unlocked on Monday morning before Jerry was there, a grin on his face and coffees in his hand. I held the door for him.

"You son-of-a-gun! You knew that was going to happen, didn't you?" He handed me a container of coffee.

I went around, behind my desk. "Well, I didn't know for sure it was going to happen but I thought it might."

He couldn't seem to wipe the grin off his face. "I haven't had one of those--a wet dream--since I was ten or eleven."

"When did it happen?"

His grin, if anything, grew wider. "Which one?"

That caught me a little off guard. "You had two wet dreams?"

"Three. Two Saturday, one last night."

I sat down and sipped my coffee. "You going to tell me about them?"

His grin faded and was replaced by what I can only describe as a look of awe. "The first one, Saturday night, came--and I use the word advisedly--with no warning. I was hanging on to my dick, about half asleep. You know, that sort of twilight state, just before you slip off to dreamland? I felt it coming but I just couldn't do anything about it. I think I did try, you know, to clamp down with those muscles down there, but it just kept coming and then it let go. With a gusher, I might add. Lord, it was all over the place." He paused for a beat. "So was I."

He sipped his coffee, that goofy grin blooming on his face again. "What'd you do?" I asked.

"What could I do? I enjoyed the hell out of it and then went off to sleep."

"And the second one?"

I had a real dream with that one. I was with somebody, I don't know who, and we were both..." He stopped and looked at me. "Jesus, here I am, telling another guy about a wet dream I had. Do guys really do this? I mean, I never have and no one's ever told me about one. Is this weird or what?"

I shook my head. "Nor really. Friends tell each other all kinds of stuff. Now what happened?" I really wanted to know.

He finished his coffee. "Well, like I said, I was with somebody and we were both naked." He paused, thinking. "Funny thing, I don't have any idea who the other person was or even if it was a man or a woman." He grinned. "You'd think, being naked and all, I would have looked. Anyway, we were naked, walking through some sort of jungle and he took my hand, leading the way. It was night. No, it must have been real early in the morning. Whenever it was, the sun was just coming up and we both felt it's warmth, creeping along our bodies. It felt so good, that warm light, filling us. It was slow and very pleasurable and somehow I knew both of us were feeling it and that made me so happy."

He paused again, and dropped his head. "And then I exploded. A long, slow explosion." He looked up and smiled. "That's it. That's all there is to tell. Except maybe that when I went to get up in the morning my hand was glued to my dick with come and I couldn't let go of it."

I was very glad I was sitting at my desk so my crotch was hidden from view. Jerry wasn't so lucky and I could easily tell that he was underwear-less and he'd made himself hard.

"I suppose you want to hear about last night, too," he said. "Well, I've gone this far..."

I smiled. "As you say, you've gone this far. But, Jerry, if you don't want to share..."

"Oh, I want to share." He laughed. "Everything."

He had an odd tone in his voice but I ignored it. "Last night?"

"Oh, yeah, last night. Well, actually it was early this morning, almost time for the alarm. Anyway, I was naked and standing in the sun. Someone, I think it was the same person from the night before, was holding onto my dick, very gently but firmly, you know? A really gentle touch but one I knew I couldn't get away from. The longer he held it, the more I didn't want to get away from it and the more I felt that pleasure taking me over, becoming part of me. I remember thinking that I shouldn't let him do this to me, but I knew I would. He was too powerful. And then," he smiled, "POW, my hand was glued to my dick again."

We both sat in silence for a minute or two, him seeming to relive his dreams and me wondering whether or not he knew who it was that was leading him by the hand in one dream and by the dick in the other.

"So," he said, "what's next?"

I smiled at him. "Well, you've passed all the tests and, I think, learned enough to start, to begin edging."

His face fell. "Does that mean no more coming?"

"For a while, yes. But all is not lost, Jerry. There's great pleasure leading up to an orgasm, as I think you're beginning to learn. It's that pleasure you're going to appreciate now." I smiled at him. "You know the phrase, `Getting there is half the fun?' Well, for the next week or so, getting there is going to be all the fun."

His body slumped in the chair and he sighed.

"It's going to be better than you think," I said, quietly. "A lot better."

He sat up straight. "Okay, what do I do and how do I do it?"

I laughed. "Oh, I think you already know how to do it. Remember all the places you found that excited you and were pleasurable? Explore them again, Jerry. Feel the pleasure they can give you. But remember, too, the triggers you discovered. You want to stay away from those, at least for now, until you learn how to control them. Uncontrolled, they'll do you in."

"So I can play with myself, get right up there on the edge, but I can't go over?"

"Exactly. And when you get up there on the edge? Stay for a while. Learn to play along that edge; be careful, but play. You'll be surprised at how much pleasure it will bring you."

"How long? How long before I can come?"

"A lot of that will depend on you, Jerry. Until Friday night, that's sure. We'll talk about it Friday, at the Watering Hole."

He stood, stacked our coffee containers, threw them in my wastebasket and turned to leave.

"Oh, Jerry?" He turned. "Your pants? They're really looking good on you. Keep the look."

He smiled. "Yeah. I will. See you at the Watering Hole."

The first thing I noticed when Jerry came into the Watering Hole was that he was wearing underwear again. He also had a grim expression on his face. "Hi, Mike," he said as he sat down. He looked around and then said, "Have you noticed that there's nothing but waiters in here? All the women are gone. What do you suppose is going on?"

Just then a waiter served the drinks I'd ordered. When he left, I grinned at Jerry. "Are we engaging in this discussion of the wait staff so we don't have to have one about your underwear and why you're wearing it again?"

He sighed and took a big swallow of his drink. "Yes."

"Well, then, we won't talk about it. We'll talk about business. What are you doing to get ready for the big computer conversion?"

He looked at me for a long time and then cracked up laughing. "Okay! Okay! I give. We'll talk about the underwear."

"What about it?"

"Damn it, Mike, I just can't seem to get him under control."

"Him? Who him?"

He rolled his eyes. "My dick, Mike. My dick." He drained his drink and signaled the waiter. "You ready?" he asked.

"No, I'm okay."

He ordered a double and then looked down at the table. "I can't believe I `m talking about this with another guy," he said, just a little shyly. "Not even when I was a kid would I have told someone this. But here I am, an adult, a man, and I'm talking my head off about stuff that everyone else thinks is so private that it doesn't even happen." He paused, then looked up at me and smiled. "Well, except for you, of course. Does this happen to other guys? Like to you?"

"I can't answer that, Jerry, mainly because I haven't a clue as to what we're talking about."

"Okay, here it is. I've been doing this edging thing for a week now..."

The waiter interrupted with Jerry's drink. Jerry nodded at me. "We'll both have another. Make his a double, too."

When the waiter left, Jerry smiled and said, "You were right, Mike. Getting there is half the fun. And staying there? That's way more than half. It's pretty much the whole thing except that you can make it go on and on and on." He grinned at me. "But you know all this, don't you, Mike?"

I nodded. "The underwear, Jerry. The underwear."

"Oh, yeah. Well, my dick just..." He looked at me and blushed. "You know, since I started this thing, my dick has sort of become, I don't know, like a pet or something. Oh, don't get me wrong, I haven't gone off the deep end. I know it's just another part of me, like a hand or an ear, but it's different."

He stopped, thinking. I didn't see what this had to do with his underwear but I decided to see where he was going with it.

"This is hard to explain, Mike. Always before, my dick was just another part of me, one that gave me good feelings but still, just another part. Since I started learning about him... There, see? I'm talking about him like he was something else, like a dog maybe, fun to pet and play with, but something you have to train to make him do what you want him to. And I just can't seem to get certain things through his head."

He stopped, dug into his pocket and handed me his cell phone. "Okay, here. Call 911 and ask them to send someone from the psycho ward to take me away."

I took the phone and put it down on the table. "Like what, Jerry? What can't you get through his head?"

"To stay down, for one thing. It seems like he's always up, wanting attention and then, if I give it to him, he wants more, then he wants to come. It's getting so he's demanding to come. And my balls, too. They ache sometimes, telling me they have to get rid of their load." He laughed. "Next thing you know, they'll actually turn blue."

Jerry finished off his drink as the waiter appeared and served the new ones. I asked him if we could have something to eat. He said we could, and he'd bring us some menus.

"Look, Jerry," I said, nodding at his drink, "don't go too fast with that stuff. You get enough alcohol in you and he'll take over your life and you'll have no control over him at all. You'll be thinking with his head."

Jerry took a deep breath and sighed. "Doesn't matter. I told him, they'll all get their wish tonight, or tomorrow morning. We'll go up to that edge and just jump over." He smiled at me. "By the way, which is it? Tonight or tomorrow?"

The waiter came with the menus. Jerry waived his away and said, "Burger, rare, with bleu cheese. Fries. And a beer since my friend here says I shouldn't have another drink."

The waiter looked at me. "The same."

When the waiter left Jerry said, "Well? Tonight?"

"I've been thinking about that, Jerry. I'm not so sure it's a good idea to get off the run just yet."

His expression was worth the price of dinner. It was a combination of disappointment, frustration and little boy anger. I thought for a moment that he might cry.

"Not... not a good idea? Then when, Mike? I can't go on like this for very much longer."

"Think about it, Jerry--and think about it with your own head. You've made it this far and, you have to admit, it's been a very pleasurable run. But you still don't have your body--at least not the him and they parts--under control. Jerry, you've got to make your body bend to your will, not the other way around. You're learning to do that but you're not there yet. Let the run go another week, until next Saturday."

He winced. "Saturday? A week from tomorrow?" He looked down, evidentially at his crotch. "Can we go that long, guys?" He looked up at me and said, with a perfectly straight face, "Do you ever do that? Talk to them I mean, out loud?"

I was spared having to answer that by the arrival of the waiter and our food.

The conversation turned to movies and gym routines while we ate; the meal was good and we both enjoyed it. We each had a second beer, I paid the check and we left. It had been a good evening. A little frustrating for Jerry, perhaps, but a good evening nonetheless.

"I don't live far from here," Jerry said. "I think I'll walk it. I need to, after all those French fries."

"Me too."

It turned out we both lived in the same direction so we walked along together in companionable silence. When we got to the cross street where I turned left and he turned right, I said, "You can do it, Jerry, I know you can. And it'll be far more than just worth it. Trust me on that."

Monday morning Jerry breezed in with not only coffee, but Danish as well. "As always, you were right, Mike," he said, putting my coffee and Danish on the desk.

"You worked it out?"

He arched his back and stretched, showing me he wasn't wearing underwear. "Baxter and his boys and I had a long talk Friday night when we got home. I got us up on that edge and kept us there for nearly an hour, telling him to enjoy it because it was all he was going to get. I had a goal and I was going to meet it, regardless. And you know what? He gave in. He just gave in and quit pushing me so hard to let him come. Do you believe that?"

I nodded. I wasn't going to get into it, but that's pretty much what happened to me when I started edging. "So he... what did you call him?"

He came up with that engaging blush again. "I know it's kind of adolescent to give your dick a name, but it just... I don't know, it just seemed like the thing to do. I call him Baxter."

"So Baxter's going to back off on his demands to come as long as you give him the pleasure of edging?"

"Not exactly. He still wants to come but at least he's not going to get all demanding when I'm in a staff meeting or something."

"Hence, no underwear."

He nodded and drank his coffee. "Look, Mike, I know all this sounds like the ravings of a maniac, but it's not. It's simply a convenient way to deal with what goes on in my head. I've learned that getting my brain to work in a particular way is much easier if I can give what I want a name, or put a face on it." He laughed. "It doesn't mean that I think my dick actually talks to me or that it really has a mind of its own. But, for me anyway, it's much easier if I pretend that it does and that I figure out just what it would take to get... well, Baxter, in this case, to do what I want." He looked up at me and laughed again. "Hey, it makes sense to me. And it works."

"That's all that matters, Jerry. You've gotten yourself... that is, Baxter, under control again and I'm proud of you for that. Very proud.

He blushed again, and ducked his head. "Thank you," he said, very quietly.

"You're welcome. Now get out of here, I have work to do."

When he left I thought about what he'd just said, and wondered if he was aware that Baxter was just one letter off from Baxler, my last name. And whether or not he was, what did it mean?

When he walked into the Watering Hole on Friday it was fairly obvious that he still wasn't wearing any underwear. It was also fairly obvious that he was about half hard. "You anticipating something?" I asked him as he sat down and I pushed his drink over to him.

"Yeah. Tonight's the night," he replied with a grin. "Well, not tonight, but tomorrow. And tomorrow starts promptly at 12:01 a.m. and I'm gonna make Baxter and his boys very happy."

"Really?"

His face fell. "Uh... Yeah, I thought so. You mean..."

"No, no. Saturday's good. But right at midnight? Come on, Jerry, stretch it out, make it last."

He ducked his head. "I... I don't know if I can."

"Sure you can, Jerry. And the first thing you have to do is relax. You look like you're going to come apart, any minute now."

He finished his drink in a gulp. "I am." He signaled the waiter for another round. "Mike, I'm so strung out I'm about to scream. And tense. Every muscle is... But I don't care. In another," he looked at his watch, "another five hours I'll have the orgasm of my life and when it's over I'll be calm and relaxed as a new born baby."

"No you won't. In your state, your orgasm is going to be like a water balloon. You'll burst, spray all over the place, and feel almost nothing. It'll be little more than simple relief, like taking an aspirin when you have a headache."

He seemed to think about this while the drinks were served. He drank some of his and then looked up at me. "So what do I do?"

"Relax, Jerry. Take your mind off of it. Think about something else."

He sat perfectly still for a few moments and then suddenly grinned. "Okay, you're on." He thought for a moment. "So what do you think about this so-called upgrade of our computers? Are we really going to be able to convert all that data we have now?"

He was serious. We had another drink, we had dinner and we had an after dinner drink, all the time talking about work. By eleven I thought he was in pretty good shape and when we stood, to leave, it looked to me like Baxter had pretty much gone to sleep.

"We going to walk?" I asked as we left the restaurant.

"I think so. I think I need the exercise. You, too."

We walked in silence for a while. Then: "What time is it?"

"A little after eleven. Why?"

"I'm all tightened up again. And it's going to get worse, I can tell."

"I tell you what, Jerry. Let me go home with you and give you one of my patented backrubs. Guaranteed to make you relax."

He stopped and turned to look at me. "You'd really do that? Help me relax?"

I laughed. "Of course I would. This is the end of your first run and I want to help you make it as good as it can possibly be."

We started walking again. "Oh, man, there's nothing I like more than a long, hard backrub. You'll really do that, Mike?"

"I'll really do that, Jerry."

When we were in his apartment, he looked around the living room. "Where?"

I pointed to the couch. "Take off your shirt, Jerry. I'll do the same, if you don't mind. Backrubs are hard work. Lose your shoes and socks, too. Get comfortable."

I sat on the couch, my legs spread wide, and patted the space between them. "Come sit here, where I can get some leverage."

He complied, sitting between my legs and wedging himself back, tight against my crotch. I rubbed my hands together, to give them some heat. Then I started at the shoulders, kneading the tight muscles until they began to relax. As one area loosened, I moved on to another. As I worked, I could feel him beginning to relax all over."

"Jerry?" I said quietly. "Now I'm the one cramping up here. Let's go into the bedroom where I can sit on the bed and have more room to work."

Without a word he stood and nodded towards a doorway. A look at his crotch showed that his pants were in danger of being split open so when we got to the bedroom I didn't ask, I simply undid his pants and let them fall to the floor. Looking at him I had the fleeting thought that the guys in the locker room showers had reason to be jealous.

I sat on the bed but he pulled me up again. "Hey, no fair. I'm the only one without his pants," he said, and reached down for them.

"No, you don't need those for now," I said, taking them out of his hand.

"Then you have to take yours off. Fair is fair." He reached for my belt.

"Okay, Jerry. Whatever you want. Here, I'll do it." I stripped off my pants and put them on a chair. Then I turned and faced him. "Okay?"

He nodded, climbed up on the bed and lay on his belly. "Okay."

I climbed up with him, sat on his butt, and started rubbing his back again. He let out a great sigh and put his head down on a pillow.

As I worked my hands down his back I slowly moved off his butt, until I was sitting just below it. By this time I was very hard so I pulled his buns apart and let my dick ride in the crack.

"I didn't tell you about that, did I?" he said in a quiet voice. "I guess I was... embarrassed.

"Tell me about what?"

He lifted his head and twisted around, so he could see me. "About my butt."

"What about it?"

"When I was exploring myself. I told you how sensitive my nipples were but I didn`t tell you about my butt. How sensitive it is."

I moved back just a little, still rubbing his back. When I did, he let out a little groan.

"See? Oh, God that felt good."

I spread his buns and moved forward, my dick sliding over his sphincter. He bucked and almost threw me off of him. "Enough of that," I said, and turned him over. His dick was standing up vertically, pointing at the ceiling. "I think maybe this has gone far enough, Jerry," I said. "I think maybe I should go, let you do this yourself. It's after midnight and you're a pretty relaxed man."

He lifted his head and grinned at me. "Except for Baxter. Look at him. He's still pretty tense."

Time for a showdown. "Look, Jerry. If this goes any further, it's going to go all the way. You want that? You want another guy to see... well, what he's going to see?"

He shrugged. "you know it all anyway. Well, except for the butt part. What secrets do I have?" He smiled. "And like you said, it feels wonderful."

"Jerry? You want this? Or do you want me to go. You have to say it, out loud."

"This," he said firmly. "Whatever this is. If you can dish it out, I can take it. Only..."

"Only what, Jerry?"

"I have to come, Mike. You have to promise me I'll get to come." He grinned at me. "Or Baxter will be pissed. Which he's very good at."

I ran my finger across his belly and chest, up to his neck and then across his chin. "You let me worry about Baxter. Your job is to lay back and enjoy it all."

He put his head back on the pillow and I ran my finger down, across his chest and then over one nipple. He'd told me they were sensitive. He hadn't told me just how sensitive they were. When I touched it he arched his back and groaned. When I lightly squeezed it he let out an "Oh, yeah." When I leaned down and took it between my lips he became suddenly still but put his hands on the back of my head and pressed down while pushing his nipple upwards. I gave it a little nip and he backed off some, but not a lot.

I moved on down, kissing my way to his belly button and then sticking my tongue into it. He didn't react much and I couldn't recall him saying anything about it being sensitive. But then, he hadn't mentioned his sphincter, either.

Lower, his pubic hair was soft, long and loosely curled, not like mine which is wiry, with stiff curls. He liked it tugged, though, and moaned quietly when I did it.

I ran my finger across his ball sack to the base of his dick, then up, across what little of the head there was showing, and down. Then I did it the other direction.

"I'm going to come, Mike. Baxter told me."

I moved up the bed and whispered in his ear. "No, you're not. Tell Baxter for me that he's going to have to wait. Tell him to trust me. The longer he waits, the better it'll be."

Jerry smiled. "He knows. He'll wait, but I don't know how long."

I moved back down the bed and very slowly ran my fingertips up and down the inside of his thighs. Baxter flexed a couple of times and spit out some lube, but nothing else.

I blew a stream of cool air on Baxter's head and watched the foreskin retreat a little. It never got below the upper half of the head, though.

I played with him for nearly two hours, until a little note of pleading came into his voice. Then I lifted him onto his side, and pulled him back against me. I held my hand to his lips and said, "spit." I added my own to his and coated my dick with it. Then I pressed gently against him. He sucked in his breath and slowly began to open to me, like a flower in the morning, opening to receive the day's sunlight.

He made a little sound in his throat as the flare of my cock-head passed into him but otherwise he was perfectly silent. When he had all of me inside him, I took Baxter gently in my hand; in Jerry's ear I whispered, "It's time, now. You may come."

I thought he would take his dick from me and stroke it, but he didn't. He lay perfectly still. I moved in him, a short, gentle stroke, just to see if I could. I couldn't. I lay still, feeling his warmth, both inside and out.

Then Baxter began to quiver and I felt him swell in my hand, becoming harder. We waited, just a few seconds. Then it all let go. He came for a long time and I almost didn't notice my own orgasm, I was so wrapped up in his.

When the spasms began to subside I stroked him--and in him--prolonging it for both of us. After what seemed a long time, we stopped. "Go to sleep," I whispered in his ear as I felt myself succumbing to it as well.

I don't know how long we slept but when I woke I was still inside him and he was slowly rocking against me. I smiled when I realized that my hand was glued to his dick. I took over, stroking in him and moving his foreskin along his dick. I don't know which he was referring to when he quietly said, "Oh, yeah, like that."

When I came up to my orgasm I pulled his foreskin back, stretching it tight so it would pull at that little groove under the head. He'd told me this was one of his triggers and it worked magnificently. He arched his back and came, making me come inside him at the same time.

Afterward we slept.

When I woke there was sunlight coming through the bedroom window. I found that I'd slipped out of him sometime in the night but we were still lying spoon fashion, his back pressed against my front. My dick was lying somewhere between us and felt like it was probably glued to some part of one of us. When he rolled over I found that it was him.

"Hi," he said, turning onto his other side and looking at me.

"Hi. You okay?"

He stretched. "Yeah. But I need a shower, And I'm hungry."

He used the shower first and then made coffee while I used it. We didn't talk much while we were sipping our coffee and getting dressed. When he collected our cups he said, "Lincoln Grill?"

It was down by the river and had truck-driver breakfasts. "Sure."

We walked to the restaurant, still not talking much.

After breakfast he said, "You want to take a walk? Maybe talk?"

I nodded.

We walked for a while and then settled onto a bench which looked out, over the river. Without looking at me, he said, "I've never done that before, you know. Been with a man."

"I know. Did I take you someplace you didn't want to go?"

He ducked his head. "I don't know." Then he looked up at me and smiled. "But come on, we have today and tomorrow to find out, before we start another run."

He pulled me up and I found myself happily being led down the path to domestication.