Chloe’s game: the 21st and final instalment

"Women's Prison II: Night of the Warden": a searing indictment of today's prison conditions and recidivism rates.

“Women’s Prison II: Night of the Warden”: a searing indictment of today’s prison conditions and recidivism rates.

That became our new life. On some weekends we played Naughty schoolgirl and strict teacher. There were other games, of which Women’s Prison II: Night of the Warden was best. (There was no Women’s Prison I.) 

The thing with role-playing was to keep the format stupid, so there could be nothing of interest in the game itself. We didn’t want to develop a storyline or care about characters. The games freed us to explore darker bdsm territory while maintaining normal life the rest of the time.

Serious play was for the weekends. On weeknights Chloe got spanked or I’d take my belt to her as  for the sensuality of it, before and during sex.

Chloe encouraged me to experiment. I became better at keeping our sexual plays moving, and at seeming to control what happened while making sure that Chloe’s pleasures and preferences were well indulged.

I learned to give commands with apparent conviction, and – within these games – without embarrassment or political guilt. I learned to pause impressively, rather than dithering, when I couldn’t think of what to say or do next. It was acting from the William Shatner school but – like Shatner’s acting – it worked well enough.

Libertines at the altar. (Illustration from "Therese Philosophe", 1748.)

Libertines at the altar. (Illustration from “Therese Philosophe”, 1748.)

I sometimes tried earnest conversation with Chloe about how our play could be defended politically, but she thought that my worries about it were my problem. She was merciless when she encountered sexist men, but she had no interest in ideology or activism. Chloe loathed authoritarianism, irrationalism, hypocrisy, stupidity and wilful ignorance, which meant she was not ideally placed to take much interest in political campaigns, except where they touched on science and got in its way.

I suspect that she mildly enjoyed the idea that her choice of pleasure might annoy the more puritanical kind of feminist, in something of the spirit in which eighteenth century libertines might sneak into a local church and have sex on the altar. In any case she played and helped plan our games with the kind of glee that suggested she was subverting something.

It’s not a game I’ve played for years. I don’t do any role playing any more. But it was worth doing at the time. There’s a hell of lot to be learned from it. 

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