Beyond Conventional Morality

Karen's mind was in a bit of a fog. She'd been so stressed out that she couldn't sleep, but couldn't bear to take any of the prescribed drugs. Instead, she just wandered around until she happened on Athena's house. She rang the doorbell, expecting not to get an answer, but Athena answered it wearing nothing but a bathrobe.

"Hi Karen," she said. "I'm glad you came."

Karen was speechless. Even though this was her friend since middle school, it felt like such a violation of privacy to have her open the door with just a bathrobe on and let Karen into her home. Her cheeks flushed as she tried to find something to say.

Athena poured them each a glass of wine and they sat on the couch together.

"How are things with you?" Athena asked tentatively.

"Oh, I don't know..." Karen responded quietly, taking a sip from the wineglass and avoiding eye contact with Athena as much as possible.

"It looked like you two were having some trouble there for a while."

"Yeah..." Karen sighed. "We've been fighting more."

"What kind of fights?" Athena asked softly, putting her hand on Karen's knee and squeezing gently.

Karen felt a twinge in her groin as Athena touched her and then suddenly went cold when she realized what had happened. She pulled away from Athena immediately and stood up. All the blood rushed to her head and she swayed back and forth as she tried to steady herself by grasping at anything nearby that would hold her up.

"Are you okay?" Athena asked worriedly as Karen fell against the wall and slid down it until she was sitting on the floor rather than face-planting onto the hardwood floors of her living room. She took deep breaths trying to regain control over herself, but kept feeling dizzy as if all ability to regulate body temperature had disappeared from her body entirely.

Athena rushed over and sat down next to Karen on the floor, grabbing hold of one of her hands in both of hers and rubbing it rhythmically as if trying to warm up frozen meat for dinner by rubbing it vigorously with hands warmed by a fire at suppertime. The warmth that started at their hands quickly spread through Karen's body and filled her with warmth despite being indoors at night in January in Pennsylvania in front of an unheated wall. She leaned forward into Athena's shoulder and put her arms around Athena's neck while still propping herself up against the wall behind them with one hand while Athena continued caressing their hands together gently between theirs palms pressed together tightly enough that they could feel each others' pulse beating against their skin as they stared into each others' eyes deeply before leaning close enough to each other that their lips met softly again before parting slowly as they felt what could only be described as electricity coursing through their bodies starting where their lips met and shooting straight through them until they felt like they were being shocked by lightning bolts directly into their hearts filling them with joy beyond measure until finally they pulled away from each other slowly after several long minutes when they simply no longer could resist the urge to breathe anymore air into their lungs and needed to pull apart for air for each of them before struggling for breath trying not to inhale too deeply because breathing deeply would lead them back into kissing each other again once more deeply than either one had ever kissed anyone before in their lives...