My love, here is something I want you to do. Please follow these instructions exactly. I want you to pleasure yourself tonight, but I want you to do it in a particular way. To begin with, plan everything very carefully. Decide when and where you would like to do it. Decide how you want to pleasure yourself in minute detail. Prepare everything you will need. Perhaps you will need some lubricant or something to insert into your vagina or anus? Perhaps you will wish to light a candle? Perhaps you will feel like a glass of champagne afterwards? Get everything ready for the greatest pleasure you can imagine getting out of yourself. That is your aim for tonight—the greatest possible pleasure. When the time comes, imagine that I am with you and that I am taking pictures of you with my digital camera. Imagine that I am peering between your busy fingers and capturing your silky wetness; that your stiff nipples are glowing pink in my camera; that I am capturing your face as you are going through convulsions of orgasm. This is precisely what I will do the next time we are together, I promise. And then, when everything is over, and when you have wiped yourself dry and taken a little rest, sit at your computer and write down everything you remember about this experience. No detail is too small to skip it. When you are finished, send me everything you have written by electronic mail. Tomorrow morning I will read it at the crack of dawn. And I will be the happiest man in the world.

Addendum (June 13, 2003)

I was in my office at the crack of dawn, as I promised. Anita’s message was waiting for me, too. However, she only explained why she could not do what I had asked her to do. Her husband returned from a business trip a day early. They had an unpleasant evening. The exercise had to be postponed. Until last night, as it turned out. Once again, she was alone at home, and I reminded her of the whole thing. This morning’s message from her was the one I expected nearly a month ago.

Anita prepared herself carefully. She had a leisurely bath. She took some champagne, which we drink so often when we are together. She dimmed the lights in her bedroom and lied on her bed naked. It was hot outside. Trying to visualize me in her presence, she started touching herself. It did not take her long to see and feel herself in my bedroom in Reading. She felt transported. I sat with her and gently urged her to do what she was doing. I watched her as she touched her clitoris. She wished to touch my hands, though. It was painful for her not to be able to do so, but she gradually got in her stride. She listened to my voice. She became moist. At that moment she felt the smell of our lovemaking. This is a smell that comes from the inside, she explained. She rubbed herself with one finger at first, and then with two. In the end, she rubbed herself with three fingers. When she reached for the mouth of her vagina, she was already wet. She brought her juices to her clitoris and continued caressing herself.

Then she saw me getting up and going down to the kitchen to bring my camera. She kept rubbing herself, knowing that this was what I wished her to do. When I returned, I spread her legs a bit, knelt between them, and started taking pictures. After a few shots of her crotch, I started moving around her and taking pictures from all sides. As I was doing this, I spoke to her gently: “That’s the way, my pussy. That’s the way, my love.” The closeness between us excited her ever more. She asked me to kiss her. And then she felt that I really came to her. I was behind her. She felt my lips. She felt my tongue in her mouth. At the same moment, she felt that I was entering her vagina, as well. The kiss and the penetration made her come. She did not yell or scream, she added. But she was not quiet, either. Her voice reminded her of the way we sing together when she is having an orgasm.

It was a joy reading Anita’s words. I wrote back to her immediately. This morning we have exchanged many messages already. As soon as I finish writing this addendum I will send it to her, as well. Our closeness is at the highest pitch. We love and desire each other in the purest way imaginable. The exercise has brought us closer. One day soon we will do exactly what she has experienced. This will round off the exercise, as it were. It will make it twice real. Or is it thrice?