One of the things I like about Seattle is how much cross-orientation BDSM play I see. By that I mean, people whose professed sexual orientation doesn’t dovetail with that of their play-partner. A straight man playing with a lesbian, or a gay man playing with a woman. I kid Monk about all the lesbians (and gay men) he’s done BDSM with, but I’ve played with a fair number of queer boys, too. It’s just cool to me that we don’t fuss so much about identities if we like someone.

Like Sunday night at the Wet Spot Bondage Party. I showed up, dressed to hang out and socialize, no toy bag, nothing. I had no plans to play. (I don’t play very much in public anymore.) When I got there, I saw that among my other friends, a gay-man pal of mine, JP, was there, with his cute blonde boy. (By which I mean: a young man. He’s over eighteen!)

We chatted a bit, and I wandered off, and when I turned around, JP had that same cute blonde boy was nicely suspended in a leather harness. JP is a leather-bondage kinda guy, and he’s got quite the collection of straps and rigs. So picture a boy hanging vertically in a harness that looks like it should have a parachute attached to the back of it. He was wearing leather pants, but his shirt was off.

I admired this from an appropriate distance, but then JP waved me over and invited me to poke and prod at his helpless boy a little. He’s generous that way. We both did so, making some playfully threatening remarks, and then JP said, “You know, this boy here, he’s never done needles.” He looked at me meaningfully. “I don’t really do needles.”

“Never done needles?” I said in astonished tones. “No! With this nice smooth skin? What a pity…”

“Did you bring any with you?”

“No,” I said thoughtfully. “No, I didn’t. But I could get some.”

“Oh, you think you could?”

I grinned at him and turned around on the spot. Raising my voice very slightly, I said, “Anyone got any needles I could borrow?”

Instantly a chorus of different voices answered me:

“Sure, I have some.”

“Oh yes, right here.”

“Yeah, what gauge you want?”

“Spinal tap or regular? I got some eighteens.”

Monk waved at me from his scene nearby. “Take my kit, babe.”

“I love this bloody, bloody town,” I said to JP, and went off to get Monk’s case of needles, gloves and alcohol wipes.

So I put a couple of needles in the virgin chest of that very sweet young gay man, and he seemed to like it pretty well. Even when I thumped on them and twisted them and pinched them. JP let another pretty woman do a little light knife-play with him, and that seemed to work well, too.

Just to round out the evening genderwise, I had to push Jae around a little. (Defined as: pin her to the floor, squeeze, twist and pull her labia as hard as I can, and then drive the point of my elbow into her pectoral muscle. With most of my body weight on it.) Hey, she taunted me. That’s consent to be hurt in my book. It’s nice having someone I know I can just leap upon with no noticeable negotiation/foreplay, and to feel confident that she’ll be fine. She’s just lucky I didn’t have the Cobra Stinger in my pocket.