Maggie liked to sleep in late. I didn’t care since it was Saturday. I did not feel like getting out of bed myself. So, I laid there, next to her and watched her sleep. She slept on her stomach, with her face to the side and the blankets crumpled up around her. I could see her body rise and fall slightly with every breath that she took.

The sun streamed in through the picture window. It was an office building so technically speaking all of the windows were picture, but whatever! I was sober finally and with no hang over! Staring at her, I still thought she looked as cute as she had the night before.

I got out of bed to use the washroom. The bedroom had its own three-piece ensuite, the apartment had a full bathroom next to the kitchen. While I was in the bathroom, I brushed my teeth. I hated how my mouth felt the next day after a night of drinking.

When I came back out, Maggie was awake. She looked up at me as I came back to the bed. The look in those eyes said it all. She was ready to go again! And so, we did! But this time I let Maggie do it her way. She liked it rough and fast. She knocked me back in the bed and straddled me. She rode me hard like I was a bronco and she needs to last at least eight seconds for the ride to count. I don’t even think she lasted that long before she got what she wanted. Of course, it was probably more like eight minutes then eight seconds. In the end I was sore and spent. I lay there struggling to catch my breath.

She just smiled at me. At this point we still hadn’t said a word to each other that morning. It had all been stated in our eyes and our body language. Like some dormant animal instinct had just come to the surface. We acted on it impulsively, as animals always do. I have never been more satisfied and neither had she, or so she had told me later on. I’m sure that she was truthful. After such a carnal act, she took her time in the bathroom, but I never knew a woman who didn’t.

When she came out, she was still smiling, but this time it was something craftier. She said. “I used your toothbrush.”

What was she looking for, a spanking? That cheeky witch! I thought playfully. She made it sound so sexy! Externally I just laughed. What else was I going to do? This girl was just too much fun! I mean, did I mention that she was still completely naked? Moreover, she had no tan lines! What a stunner!

“So, what’s for breakfast?” I queried, but I wasn’t being serious, I was just playing with her.

She understood and laughed. “What do I look like, your waitress?”

“Well, now that you mention it…”

“Oh, shut up!” She exclaimed. “It’s your place, you tell me.”

“All right,” I said. “I think I got all the basics. Why don’t you go into the living room and make yourself comfortable? I will see what I can cook up.”

So, she walked right into the living room, still naked, and stretched out on the sofa. She had no idea how to work the television and the automation system was not programmed for her voice. So, I gave a few voice commands and got the TV on. I told her there was a remote there on the coffee table. She could just change the channels from there. There were actually voice commands that would allow you to do even that, but she was already still impressed and bewildered by the home automation system, so I just let her use the remote.

Besides the new technology seem to confuse her a bit. She still used the old-fashioned cell phones. You know, the kind that just had the little five- or six-inch screens. Nowadays, smart phones and tablet had merged. With the advent of the new folding screen technology, a cell phone that was maybe a quarter inch thick could be unfolded into something four times the size, to say a 10- or 12-inch screen. Frank had been one of the early adopters.

I was just getting using AR glasses which I preferred. I only had it for a few months. But if I showed Maggie something like that, I don’t know what she would think of it!

You mean you scroll through Facebook with your eyes!?

Facebook? Fuck that! I bring the metaverse right into the room with me and use an agro app to view everything! I’m afraid it would blow her Kansas farm girl mind!

I think she was also impressed by the television, not the fact that it was a real backlit 16K Truelife OLED model, but by the sheer 98-inch size of it. Hey, go big or go home! It did not come with the apartment, I bought it myself. There were no walls to mount it to, so the stand hung down from the ceiling. It made the TV appear as if it were floating somewhere beyond the end of the coffee table. Since it was the main living area, the chairs and the two sofas were arranged so that every seat would have a view. I thought it looked sweet. Maggie seemed to think so too because she commented on its appearance.

Taking a page out of Maggie’s book, I did not put any clothes on either when I went to the kitchen. Just an apron so that I could do the cooking without getting burned. I made us a basic breakfast, bacon, eggs, toast and some jam on the side. I brought the two plates over. We sat and watched the morning news while we ate our breakfast.

It was pretty cool. I was really liking Maggie. This was comfortable. It appeared as though she felt the same. I was having a good time, but of course, it couldn’t go on like this forever. At some point Maggie would have to return to her apartment. She came here straight from work. She had nothing on her, but her purse and the clothes on her back. Besides she would have to work that evening. But her shift did not start until three that afternoon. Therefore, she did need to get back to her place, but not until about one o’clock. Fortunately, she did not live far away.

We had enough time to make love once more, at her insistence. I was already tired and sore, but what was I going to do, say no? Unthinkable! I was embarking on a new relationship. I did what I had to do for the third time in less than a day and I loved every second of it.

Finally, when one o’clock rolled around, I drove Maggie back to her place in my brand-new Rivan pickup. I did not need a pickup for any reason. I just wanted to look down on Frank’s car when I parked next to it. I don’t know if it was the Rivan that clinched it, but she definitely wanted to see me again! So, I told her I would pick her up after work. She insisted that if I did, we would come back to my place. She claimed it was so much better than her own, which I’m sure was true. Not to belittle her, but I’m pretty sure I had one of the best apartments in the city, after Frank’s, of course!

I picked her up again Saturday night after her shift and we embarked in this new relationship of ours. I don’t know what it is about new relationships, but once you start having really great sex, there seems to be this lust that just comes out! It’s like you both just come across the desert and had no water the entire time. You were so thirsty and now you come into this oasis and there is just water everywhere! So, you gorge yourself! That’s what it’s like or at least that’s what it was like for me a Maggie.

It went on like this for an entire week. I had a couple of vacation days banked, so I use them. And Maggie had a couple of days off during the week, so I could see her after my shift. It all came together so beautifully! I don’t think I really saw or talked to anybody else that week. It took the whole week of having sex, maybe three times every day, before we got this whole lustfulness out of our systems. During the whole time, she always came over to my place. I picked her up from work and would drop her off at her apartment the next day. She didn’t invite me in. From the outside, the triplex seemed plain and minimally maintained. But it wasn’t covered with a lot of graffiti, and there weren’t thugs waiting outside or in the lobby. So, I guess it was better than most places in this area!

I think she was embarrassed by her place. Especially after seeing mine. Maybe she felt like she was dating somebody above her class. I didn’t feel that way, but big cities can make you feel that way. No one will say it but there is a class system here. It’s just something you grew up with and you become used to, then eventually you just accept it as part of life. But outwardly you always maintain to anyone who’ll listen, that there is no class system. Not that I’m belittling anyone’s country here in North America, I honestly believe that it’s like that pretty much everywhere. There is always an unspoken class system. That’s just how humans are.

I did not want her to feel embarrassed about where she lived. So, one night after we had vaporized some of Jacob’s THC droplets, I asked her if the next night, maybe we could go to her place. She agreed reluctantly, but she told me not to bring my car. They didn’t really have parking at her apartment. She didn’t totally trust the neighborhood. Especially if I was driving something fancy like a Rivan.

So, the next day I went to Maggie’s work. I had something to eat, something to drink. When her shift was over, we went back to her apartment together. It wasn’t a very big, but I was surprised to find that it was a two-bedroom.

It turned out that Maggie had a roommate. Something she had never mentioned. It was another working girl, a waitress like herself, but as Maggie had put it, this other woman had a side business where she earned extra cash as an escort. She used an app on her phone that let her arrange her dates. Maggie said that her roommate, Cheryl, was better looking than her and use that to her advantage. So, I need not worry, Cheryl was off hooking and wasn’t going to be there tonight. Maggie didn’t keep tabs on her too closely.

It seemed like they were essentially sharing this place and not much more. It was hard to tell if Maggie was relieved by this or disappointed. After all she didn’t have very many friends here in Chicago. She had only been here less than a year and she was far away from Kansas.

I felt bad for Maggie. Everybody needed friends. I don’t think I would’ve survived here in Chicago without Frank. At least for the first few weeks. I thought about how easily I had made friends. I had assumed it was like that for everyone, but some people like Maggie, were a bit more introverted and had trouble meeting people, creating friendships. She probably grew up in a place where there wasn’t many people to talk to outside of family.

As for Maggie’s apartment, it was basic. Probably built in the 1970s or maybe even a little earlier. The common living area and the kitchen were more or less one-room with the counter separating the two. All the furniture looked second-hand, like the kind of thing you’d find at Goodwill or the Salvation Army. Not that there was all that much furniture, the place looked pretty spartan. The kitchen counter was covered with dirty dishes, utensils and other refuse such as papers, bills, personal items, etc. The two bedrooms were small. I didn’t see the other bedroom but judging from Maggie’s room it could not have been much bigger. Again, Maggie didn’t have much in here, just a double bed which took up a majority of the room, a dresser and a desk.

It was a weird night. Maggie didn’t seem herself or at least she wasn’t the fun-loving Maggie that I knew from the week before. She seemed somewhat depressed but didn’t let on about it to me. I spent the night with her in her bed where we had sex. She never got completely naked, and she never appeared comfortable. It was also the only time I ever spent the night at her place. For the rest of our short-lived relationship, she would always come to my place.

Over the course of the next week, I never got a chance to spend as much time with her as I did that first week. However, that Friday she wanted to go to the club, the masquerade ball. I agreed, even though I wasn’t all that impressed with it the first time. Maybe I just hadn’t given it enough of a chance. I agreed to go, but this time I wanted to use my own mask and Maggie wanted to get one as well.

So, Wednesday after work, Maggie had the day off. We got together and drove over to the costume store to find the masks that we could wear. I found a replica mask from the saw movies for that crazy doll with the red spiral circles on his cheeks. It was perfect because I hadn’t seen anyone else wear that mask at the club. Of course, I had only been to the club once so who knows? For all I knew Dominic already had one! But what the hell! I thought. It looked cool so I bought it.

Maggie got a furry white cat mask that covered a majority of her face down to her mouth. I thought it looked pretty cute, but cute isn’t usually what people go for at this event. I thought something more seductive like one of the Venice carnival masks might work, but then again, they are also very popular with the ladies at the club. I might loser her in the crowd and never find her again! I had to give it to Maggie that she had picked something unique. Consequently, I bought the mask for her.

Dominic said he wanted to meet up with me at my apartment before going to the club. He said he had some special for us. I agreed. What did it matter, we were only going one floor up? I thought. He hadn’t said anything about the last time, when I had essentially ditched him at the party. It was not as if he cared all that much. At the time, he had his hands full!

Maggie had traded shifts with another girl at work to get the Friday night off. So, she met with me when I got off work at five. This gave us time to do a little exercise before getting ready to go out. When 8 o’clock rolled around I got my mask on and I found an outfit that was similar to what jigsaw would’ve worn in the movies. All I needed was a knife and I would’ve passed for some sort of psycho killer! Maggie had dressed all in white and had a pair cat ears to match mask. She had a short frilly skirt and I have to say that she looked pretty sexy!

Of course, when Dominic got there, he was wearing this crazy looking steampunk gas mask, complete with a pair of brass goggles and an aviator jacket that look like it was from World War I.

“How the fuck do you find this stuff!?” I exclaimed. Yet again, he had outdone himself. His outfit look simply amazing!

“I’m involved in some interesting online communities,” Dominic explained slyly. “I get to see some crazy stuff that people are working on. This is just a small sample. I could have gone all out with, say a Gatling gun for an arm or some other crazy ray gun contraption. But then I thought, I still want to be able to hold a drink, right!?”

I laughed and said. “I know, I know, I’m familiar with subculture. You just didn’t seem like the type that was into it.”

“Type?” He replied almost offended. That is assuming that Dominic can be offended. “There is no type. This kind of shit is for anybody.”

“Okay,” I said. “So, what’s the big deal? Why were you so anxious to meet me here at my apartment? We could have just met at the club.”

Dominic pulled out a little pillbox. He opened it up and he produce three pills. “I thought since you didn’t have such a great experience last time,” Dominic explained. “That maybe this time we would start off with something that will make the whole experience a lot better.”

I could see the little E imprinted on the pills. “Ecstasy?” I looked at him questioningly.

“This is the real deal,” said Dominic. “It’s from the company. And it is 100% pure MDMA.”

“Wow!” Maggie said breathlessly. “I don’t know if I have ever had real ecstasy before. The stuff you find the club’s these days isn’t even close to the real thing!”

Dominic offered her one. She took it from the box and immediately swallowed it. Then Dominic took one. He offered the last one to me.

All right, I thought. This is going to be one hell of a trip! I took the pill and put in my mouth and let it dissolve. I pulled my mask down over my head and said. “Okay, let’s do this!”

The club wasn’t much different than the last time. There were some different masks, couple of different people working bar and a different DJ. But otherwise, the place looked the same and there were just many people. They played the same crazy sort of rave music mixed in with some down tempo ambient music, but this time I didn’t find it quite as annoying. Maybe it was the ecstasy that was kicking in that was making me feel this way. It seemed to be coming on quite fast, but that could have been the purity of it. Whatever it was, it seemed to make the music more suitable. Instead of hating it, I found that I actually kind of liked it.

Maggie and I got some drinks in the bar. I got a bottle of beer. She got some sort of vodka cooler. Whatever we had it was in bottles, so we were less likely to spill it. Given what we were doing, that was a good thing. Within the hour, the ecstasy really started to peak. I felt higher than I’ve ever felt before. The feeling wasn’t just in my head, it was a complete body experience. Jacob’s weed, even at its best, couldn’t even touch how good this was. It was the ultimate high! I looked at Maggie and I could see she was feeling it to.

Dominic found us a booth. We spent some time sitting there and chatting but the urge to dance was just too great. Maggie and I had to get on the dance floor! Of course, Dominic didn’t have a woman with him, so he went around to other booths chatting with people he knew from other departments.

As the music pulsed, I was already starting to see the psychedelic images. It was like I could see the electricity flowing through the air out of the speakers, vibrating and twitching to the beat of the music. It was the craziest visions. The electric colors changed with tones of the music, everything from white to pink, blue and the deepest purples! And I could see tracer images, from Maggie as she danced, from my own body, from the people around me! It was a really incredible experience. Dominic wasn’t kidding when he said he had the real stuff. It was definitely lab made quality. This wasn’t conceived in some lunatic’s basement, although I was dressed like I could have been that lunatic!

Maggie and I held each other closely. We danced with an intensity that made it seem as if our souls were completely mingled. It was an incredible feeling of singularity. I felt love, although I was not in love. I felt bliss, without being blissfully unaware. I felt myself spinning at a hundred miles an hour, even though I was standing fixed in one place. It was an odd dichotomy.

We must have spent an hour dancing before we returned to the table. Dominic was off someplace else, with God knows who else, but Jaz had found our table. I had not seen Jacob or the others, but I had not been looking for them either. I was too much into my own thing that night. This night was for me and Maggie alone. Everyone else just blended into the background.

I can’t remember now what Jaz was saying, but I remember everything that he said seem funny. Maggie and I couldn’t stop laughing. We got more drinks. The night continued. Dominic came back to the booth with some woman he knew. I don’t even remember her. The night continued. We use them THC drops in our vapes. The world became a chaotic kaleidoscope of random images. The night continued. Maggie and I must have stood in front of the Pollock painting for almost an hour. We talked about all of the images that were jumping out at us the longer we looked at it. And yet the night continued. Finally, around midnight, Maggie and I decided it was time to leave and go back to my apartment. We wanted to relax in bed before the experience finally began to wear off. I’m glad we did. We were four hours into our experience, and the drug typically lasts about six to eight hours, especially in its pure state.

The intimacy of sex on MDMA was just incredible! There were simply no inhibitions. We did everything and anything at least once. If I had to describe it, I would’ve said it was one of the most beautiful, life affirming, incredible, sensuous, empathetic, slow, slippery, exploratory, loving, and intense experiences I had ever had! Maggie assured me that it was the same for her. I don’t doubt it. Dominic definitely knew his drugs!

Hours later, we fell sleep in each other’s arms, completely naked. Blissfully dreaming. The bed sheets crumpled around us.