Things I Never Told My Wife
True confessions of a Shakespearean actor
Chapter 6
AH, THE SUMMER OF BLISS. I was eighteen, had my own car, and was fifteen hundred miles from home. And there were girls.
With help from my guidance counselor, I found an intern program that was a perfect fit for me and by some miracle, I was chosen to spend the summer at the Colorado Rocky Mountain Theater Summer Camp in Glenwood Springs. No matter how I pushed it, I just couldn’t do the trip in less than three days. Five hundred miles a day was as much as I could handle. I pulled into campgrounds in Missouri and Kansas and pitched a lean-to. The Corvair was just too small to sleep in. Besides, it was loaded with about all the junk I owned. I’d be headed from Colorado straight to Athens for the beginning of school after Labor Day.
I was glad it didn’t rain, but Memorial Day weekend it was still damn cold. I pulled into the ‘campground’ in Glenwood Springs and was welcomed by an elderly woman I later found out was Mrs. Oppenheim, the wife of the camp director. She showed me to an apartment and told me the next few days would be staff days as they had a lot of prep to do before the campers started arriving. Half a dozen of us would be housed in the little efficiency apartments. Plus, there were dorm parents for the boys’ and the girls’ dorms. Those were both married couples. The rest of us were expected to be available for campers to talk to. We were to cruise the dorms and theatres daily to make sure we had pretty constant contact with the campers who ranged in age from fourteen to eighteen.
The theater camp was an adjunct of the Colorado Rocky Mountain Repertory Theater. There was a limited schedule during the winter months that started expanding rapidly for the summer. Those first two weeks were spent pulling scenery and props for the shop, pulling costumes, and scrubbing down just about everything in the ‘Little Theater’ that would be used for the camp. I met the other counselors and interns. In addition to the dorm parents, there was a counselor assigned to each dormitory who was responsible for making sure everyone knew where they were supposed to go, how to practice lines, and generally be sane students studying under the renowned Alfred Oppenheim.
I was going to be working directly with the famous director as his assistant. I soon found out that ‘cream and double sugar’ was part of the job as I ran to get him coffee a dozen times a day. I also discovered he was a lot older than his picture in the brochure. At first, I’d thought Mrs. Oppenheim who assigned my room must be his mother, but no. Alfred was at least seventy-five. What hair he had was white, as was the big bushy beard he wore.
He also gave me a petty cash box and I was responsible for seeing there was a fresh pack of Benson & Hedges 100s on his desk each morning. I bought them by the carton but he insisted that I give him only one pack a day. If it happened that he ran out of cigarettes, he seemed to always have a supply of clove cigarettes that stank to high heaven. He’d come into the office at precisely eight o’clock in the morning while most of the campers were still at breakfast. He’d reach for a cigarette and a swig of coffee. Then, after taking his first long drag, he’d cough his lungs out for about ten minutes before he was ready for anything.
Oppenheim taught the campers two one-hour classes per day and directed rehearsals. Three of us on the staff were responsible for organizing appropriate theatrical activities during all the other hours. Those activities included everything from vocal exercises to improv sessions. It was pretty wild.
When I looked at the brochure, I thought the campers would all be junior high kids. I guess at one time they had been but the camp felt that age group required too much supervision and instead of being half the weeks of the summer, all the weeks were now senior high kids. They could even get high school credit for the classes. Martin, one of the more experienced counselors, pulled me aside before the first week of camp and handed me a huge box of condoms.
“Anybody who asks for one or a dozen gets them with no questions asked. There is no way the twelve of us on staff will keep seventy-five high schoolers from fucking. They’ll go through these like candy. When you need more, let me know.”
All righty then. I figured he was right. I’d been having sex since before my senior year and some of these kids were only a year younger than me.
The camp was designed to be a summer repertory experience. That meant that every two weeks, another show would go into rehearsals and it would be three weeks between openings. The campers were responsible for everything—sets, lighting, costumes, acting. One might be the lead in one show and pulling the curtain on another show. I wished my guidance counselor had found this camp when I was eligible to attend it instead of intern at it. When campers began to arrive, it was pretty evident that there were close to two girls for every guy. And some of these girls were knockouts.
The first three weeks were nothing short of exhausting. Everyone had to audition. From the auditions, Oppenheim would cast all the shows on a complicated chart he had. I sat beside him through the auditions writing down his casting choices. By the end of the first week, all the shows had been cast and scripts were handed out. Rehearsals for the first show started the next week. After two weeks, rehearsals for the second show commenced. I noticed he had cleverly alternated complicated and simple shows. Big casts and small casts. He was opening small with The World of Carl Sandburg, in which four people recite poetry and sing songs from the poet. Not much of a plot, but a fun show, nonetheless.
The second show was Inherit the Wind by Lawrence and Lee. There are over twenty speaking roles, though several are one-liners, and Oppenheim cast fifteen extras for the town and courtroom. The third show was Marriage Wheel by Joel Climenhaga. It was a farce with only four men and three women in one setting. You get the idea. There were six shows all told and audience response determined which would be dropped as the season progressed and which would survive.
“Mr. Reichert?” one of the boys asked when I answered my door in the middle of the third week.
“Hey. I’m just Terry. Leave the misters to the old folks. What can I do for you Jim?”
“Um… At orientation they said we could get a condom from any staff. I… You… I mean…”
“Here you go,” I said, grabbing the bowl of condoms I had beside my door. “Don’t ever be embarrassed to ask for condoms. There’s too much weirdness going on in this world to not use one every time. Better take a few. If you’re good the first time she’ll want more.”
“Gosh! Thanks. I was afraid they were just spoofing or trying to catch us.”
“Not a chance. Just never force a partner and always use a condom.”
“Yes, sir. I mean, thanks, Terry.” The condom business picked up after that. Apparently, they’d chosen one lucky guy to test the water and then suddenly all the guys were brave enough to ask for a condom, even if they didn’t need one. I guess just having one proved you were a man.
It was two weeks later, though, that the first girl came to me for a condom. It was mid-July and even in Colorado it was plenty hot. Saturday morning was a lazy time for me and I was lounging in my apartment in a pair of cutoff sweats and nothing else. When I opened the door, I saw Beth. She didn’t have much more on than I did and it looked good.
“Terry, I was wondering if I could have a condom. Please?”
“Sure, Beth. I’m glad to see girls taking the initiative. It’s everyone’s responsibility.” I turned away to get the box and Beth followed me into my apartment, allowing the door to close behind her.
I’d noticed Beth before. In fact, I noticed her the day campers started arriving. She was a fifteen-year-old who could convince you in a minute she was twenty-one. First of all, she was stacked. I hesitate to guess what her bra size was. It was definitely missing under the shortened T-shirt she wore. She didn’t quite show the underside of her boobs with the cut of the shirt, but if I’d been sitting down, I’d definitely have had a view. An acre of skin, including her tight tummy and little innie navel, was exposed before the elastic band of a pair of gym shorts. I held out the condoms for her and she took one and looked at it.
“Um… I don’t want to make a mistake with this. Could I practice? Putting it on you?” She sounded so pure and innocent and looked so much like a devil that I collapsed back in my desk chair.
“Well,” I said, “I’m supposed to help campers with rehearsals. So, of course I’ll help you practice.” She wasn’t going to have much trouble getting me hard to practice on. I was already well on my way. She grinned at me and I winked back.
“Maybe this will help get you ready,” she said, lifting the crop top over her head and letting it drop to the floor. Yeah, that definitely helped. She stepped right up to me and presented a rosy nipple at my lips. I started tonguing it and caressing the other boob with one hand while I ran the other down her bare back to hold her ass. “I knew. I knew,” she whispered. “I knew you’d know just what to do.” After a minute of sucking on her nipple, she leaned down to kiss me. No, she didn’t compare to Sue, but she was enthusiastic and I had both her boobs in my hands. I felt her hands at my waistband and lifted slightly so she could pull my cutoffs down.
I had a feeling this wasn’t going to be a simple demonstration of putting the condom on, so I tugged her shorts down, too. She kicked out of them. Shaving pubic regions didn’t become popular until a few years later, though I thought theater girls picked it up sooner than some. Beth’s bush was trimmed for a bikini and she stood in front of me, giving me a good chance to look at it while she opened the condom package.
“The first thing you need to do is make sure it’s set on right,” I said. “When it comes out of the package, you’ll see the reservoir tip. Hold onto that while you smooth the rest down the erection. If you get it inside out, you and your boyfriend will both regret it.”
“Like this?” First, she licked my cock and then engulfed it in her mouth for a couple of bobs. Then, she correctly placed and rolled the condom. I didn’t think she really needed any practice. “Is that all there is to it?”
“If you want to stop there, it is. But maybe you’d like to know what it’s like when it goes in.”
“Yeah. I’d like that.” She took a step toward my bed and then turned when I didn’t follow. “Don’t we need to get on the bed?”
“Not really. Why don’t you try doing it right here? You can control exactly how far and how fast it goes in.” She walked in front of me and I pulled her toward me, running a finger through the trimmed hair of her bush to find out if she was lubricated enough for this. There was no question that she was. She followed my finger and moved forward over my cock. “You should hold it steady so you know exactly where it is as you put it in.”
I was sure by this time that Beth was experienced sexually, but the range of positions might be limited. Nonetheless, she went about positioning me and started to slide down enthusiastically.
“Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Mmm. You go so deep this way. Can I move?”
“Of course you can. Take it at your own pace.” I was happy to have my hands holding her butt and my tongue flicking out to capture a nipple as she lowered herself and raised back up.
“Yeah. This is really lots different than doing it in bed.”
“There are lots of different positions that you can try. Remember there is never a wrong or right position. Just do things that make you and your partner happy.”
“Are you happy, Terry? Are you glad your cock is in my tight little twat? Do you like it when I slide up and down your pole? You’re bigger than the boys I’ve been with before. You’re stretching me. I can feel you pulling at my clitty when I go down.” Her hands were on my shoulders and her eyes were closed as she moved up and down. I pulled a hand around and slid it between us to reach her clitty. “Oh God! Oh, you’re touching me. I… I’m going… Oh, Terry!”
She clamped down on me and her vagina started rippling around my cock. It was too much for me and I started blasting my come up into the condom. That set her off again and she began bouncing up and down. I was softening and on one upstroke I popped out of her.
“Aww. Are we done?”
“Not necessarily. A guy just needs a few minutes to recharge after he comes. Come here and let me help you to another while I recharge.” I stripped off the condom and tossed it in the wastepaper basket and led her to the bed. “Now just sit there and enjoy.” I pressed her legs apart and licked up her slit from her bottom hole to her clit. Then I kept licking and nibbling at her clit until she stiffened and moaned out another orgasm. I took another taste of her juices and got up on the bed beside her to hold her.
“No one ever did that to me. Mmm. Cuddle me and let me make you ready again.” She reached for my cock and began stroking gently. It took a few minutes and we did some nice kissing and petting while I hardened. Beth scrambled around on the bed and spread her legs. “Practice with me some more, Terry.” I stood and grabbed another condom. She watched me roll it on. “Another?”
“Always a fresh condom for each time. Don’t ever miss it.”
“Wow. I should take more than one with me when I finally leave.” I positioned myself between her legs and found the magic spot where I began sinking into her again. Beth wasn’t loud but she was vocal, urging me to speed up or slow down and finding the courage to ask me to touch her, which I gladly did. The rest of the day we intermittently dozed and screwed, petted and kissed. When Beth left my room, it was with half a dozen condoms.
Over the next few weeks, I had a pretty steady diet of young women who came to my apartment for condoms and practice. Only a couple came back after the first time but it was beginning to look like a rite of passage for many of them. And they weren’t all drop dead gorgeous. Theater attracts all kinds and shapes of people. There were a couple of heavy girls who pretty much exhausted me before they were ready to move on. One very masculine chick who didn’t shave anything was still a dynamite lover.
And there was Theresa. She might have been my favorite all summer. There’s a definite time in a girl’s life when she’s ready for that exploration. For most of them, according to my personal records, the age was fifteen or in a few cases sixteen. But Theresa, attending camp between her freshman and sophomore years in high school, was fourteen. Yet, she came to me with the direct confidence of all the other teens at this camp. Teens in theater learn to be assertive, to talk directly to people, and to act with confidence. It’s almost impossible for them to do anything else.
Well, I was eighteen so not that much older than her, but she just seemed tiny. When she undressed, which she did without hesitation, I saw exposed the slight figure that had given her three of the ‘children’ roles in the shows we produced—including the leading role in Oliver!, the one musical we produced. She scarcely had a swelling under the hard nipples she exposed. Her hips were narrow and she had only a sparse sprinkling of pubic hair. But she was utterly delightful. Of all the girls who came to me that summer, Theresa was the one who genuinely wanted to learn and practice. I was her first lover. We spent a weekend together and she came back to me two weeks later, not to learn, but to celebrate.
The toughest visit I had that summer was from Jeremy.
“I’d like a condom and a practice session,” he said when I opened the door. I sighed. He was a nice-looking guy and as flamboyantly gay as any member of the theater camp.
“Dammit, Jeremy. I can give you condoms but I can’t give you practice. I just don’t swing that way.”
“Well, couldn’t you try?”
“Jeremy, I can’t decide to be gay any more than you can decide to be straight.” I thought of my one and only experience touching another guy’s cock and all I could remember was Sue’s pussy and kisses. “I really can’t do that.” The kid broke down crying and collapsed in my arms. “Come on now, I know there are other gay guys in the camp.”
“Yeah, but you understand. Do you know how many times I’ve been asked by boys and girls when I decided to become gay? You’re the first person here who understands that I never decided. I just… I wish you were gay because I would love you forever.”
“Man, I’ve been involved in theater all through high school and I think I’m going to major in it in college. Some of the guys in the theater group I’d known all our lives. I knew they were gay from the outset. It isn’t something that anyone chooses. It’s who he is.”
“Yeah. I’m sorry I’m so weepy. It must be my time of the month or something.” We laughed a little at that. “Really. There are other gay guys here and we’ve gotten together. Have you heard about AIDS? It’s just whispers. Somebody in Africa then somebody here. We hear the story but there are still guys who figure it’s all a big scare tactic to stop them from being gay. Nobody even gives or gets a blowjob from me without a condom. And then people still think we can just decide one day not to be gay. Terry, it’s ripping us up.”
“Jeremy, I’m not gay but I’m a supporter. I want you safe and healthy. What I can do is provide condoms. Will you take them and stay safe and healthy?”
“Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for listening and being here. Sorry I came at you so out of left field like that. It really helps to know you understand.”
The full impact of what he’d said didn’t hit me until fifteen years later. We’d stayed in touch and actually worked together at a couple of theaters. I got a call one night from his long-time partner to tell me Jeremy had died of AIDS.
We were two weeks from the end of camp when I answered the knock at my door and was almost knocked over backward by Liz walking into my room. Liz was my historic redhead. Anytime I think of redheads, Liz’s image comes to mind. She’d once told me at lunch that redheads get a freckle for every soul they eat. I sort of believed her. She was tall and thin but her hair was wild and her face was covered with freckles. She had green eyes that absolutely sparkled. She stood there inside my door with her hands on her hips.
“So, do you only offer condom practice sessions to the younger girls?” she demanded. We’d celebrated her eighteenth birthday a couple of days before.
“Uh… I guess they’re the only ones who think they need to practice.” Her lip twitched a little and I had a feeling I was going to add a freckle to her face by the time she was done.
“Maybe you’re right. But… Hell! Do you know I’m the oldest camper here? No one can believe I just turned eighteen and am still going to be a senior. If my parents hadn’t kept me back from starting school because I’d be the youngest in my class, I’d be here counseling with you instead of being a camper.”
“You can’t be too upset about being a camper. You were fantastic in Marriage Wheel.”
“Yeah, thanks. We closed it already. It’s not in the final repertoire.” She looked really dejected, but Marriage Wheel just wasn’t drawing the audience of some of the other shows.
“What about Midsummer? It’s going to finish the season.” We had one Shakespeare in the repertoire and it was my first. I totally fell in love with A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Liz played Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons.
“I’m also the tallest woman in camp. Don’t get me wrong. I love the part and I love being in the show, no matter how much makeup they use to cover my freckles. But I feel so… so much like a freak here.”
“Liz, don’t get me wrong because I’m not making a pass. I think you are one of the most beautiful and inspiring campers here. When you walk on stage, you own it. Just like you owned me the moment you walked through my door.”
“I don’t freak you out?”
“Huh-uh.”
“You think I’m beautiful?”
“I certainly do. I think you are awesome.”
“Would you give me condom practice?”
“If that’s what you want, I’d love to.”
Liz fell into my arms and we kissed. I’d been kissed a lot in the past year, and especially this summer. Liz was one of the most intense. From the moment our lips met, she kissed with passion, not just skill. She kissed with hunger to be kissed again. I wanted to kiss her more.
Our lovemaking progressed from that first kiss and lasted the last two weeks of camp. Liz pretty much moved into my apartment with me. And I was damned happy she did. Since we were both eighteen, nobody on staff objected. Magically, people quit coming to my door for condoms, though Martin told me he had more requests than ever. He never said if they were from boys or girls.
Liz’s freckles extended down her neck and onto her chest. Her breasts were perfect and her nipples were incredibly sensitive. I loved the wild tangle of bright red pubic hair that I parted with my fingers in order to tongue her clit. She whined out her orgasms, only preventing screaming by clamping her lips together. And I gave her as many orgasms as she could stand. My efforts were rewarded by having a condom slipped over my raging erection and sinking slowly into her hot depths as we kissed some more.
We didn’t make love every night. Performance nights were difficult and she came home exhausted. I just held her in my arms and petted that glorious mop of red hair. And often, the morning after I would awaken to her sucking on my cock—sometimes to completion and sometimes just until I was awake and she could get a condom on me. Whether I was on top, under, or behind her, making love with her was one of the best experiences of my life.
I wanted to drive her home to Chicago, but she had too much stuff and I had too little a car. We delayed departure, though, until Monday the 30th of August. I kissed her for as long as I could on the train station platform before she had to get on the California Zephyr to Chicago. Then I waved until the window she was leaning out of was out of sight.
I didn’t push so hard getting from Colorado to Athens. I stopped for a day at my parents’ over Labor Day weekend in Lima. There had been a fire at the house in Prairie and they moved into the city. But that’s another story. I got to Athens the day after Labor Day and moved into the residence hall. Classes started the next day.
But that was my summer of bliss. Twenty-two girls aged fourteen to eighteen in thirteen weeks.
Of course, I never told my wife about that.
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