Sophie and Mark by Twisted Smile

[twistedsmile]

Thank you for the kind words, anonhandle, I'm genuinely moved
I'm glad you're enjoying the series and have gotten so much out of it.

I'm only sorry that there will be a bit of a wait before chapter 16 (don't you just hate when work gets in the way of your hobby  )
But in the meantime there will be more commentaries (and a couple of non- Sophie & Mark stories) to hold you over...

[twistedsmile]

11. "Stroll" Commentary

This was one of those stories that started with an S-word. Alternate title, "Saunter".
Stroll implied doing 'something' in public, some exhibitionism or outdoor sex/bondage. The tricky thing was narrowing that down to something specific.
Then I remembered a line from chapter 2: "Jeans helped to flatten and obscure the cage's bulge, but even so I didn't want to be out in public with it" But walking around in a chastity cage isn't a very exciting story on its own, so I heightened it by putting Mark in a dress. But then the bulge was a problem again. So the question was, why would he be wearing a cage in the first place, and why would Sophie allow him to remove it? He wasn't wearing it as a punishment, it was serving a practical purpose - erection management. That became the through-line for the story.
"The chastity cage was creating an obvious bulge in my dress." - He's saying this rather casually, which kind of implies that Mark has gotten quite comfortable with cross-dressing AND wearing a chastity cage - and in public, no less! This is meant to suggest that Sophie and Mark's kinky games have continued escalating in the intermission between chapters 10 and 11

"Wig in a Box" - The section titles are all songs from the musical "Hedwig and the Angry Inch". Is there a meaningful connection to this story? Eh. Mostly I'm just a fan.
"I found a cream cardigan which matched the dress well" - I spent way too much time trying to figure out what colour cardigan would go well with a white and green floral dress. I tried a google image search but the results weren't very helpful. Plain white was the obvious choice, but maybe too obvious. And given what happens on their stroll, it would have gotten very dirty.
"videos to learn some 'cross-play' tricks for making my face look more feminine" - something I learned about from 'My Dress-Up Darling'
"It wasn't entirely successful." - I'm a boring realist who can't imagine Mark looking like a plausible woman with a bit of make-up
"It was late summer" - I'm only vaguely keeping track of when each story happens. In this case, I actually trapped myself by making this story intersect with Brett & Darren, and had to handwave away the whole 'wearing a face mask in summer' thing.
"during the pandemic, there was this micro trend.." - I don't know if it was actually a trend in the kink community, but there was a sub-reddit for it. But yes, these stories take place in a world where COVID happened.
"the gag didn't have the usual saliva leaking problem" - this line is for the annoying voice in the back of my head that says 'wait, didn't the gag make Mark drool in chapters 1 and 5?'

"The Dog and Pony" - if you've read Brett & Darren you will recognise this pub name. Yes, it's the same pub. The name is obviously a reference to pet and pony play, and just happens to sound like a British pub name. Not sure that anything in the story counts as a 'dog and pony show'.
"young man who was clearly in high spirits" - did you figure out who this is? As mentioned, this story overlaps with a scene from Brett & Darren 1; where Brett mentions someone walking past his house singing 'a football chant'. Fun fact, Sweet Caroline is sometimes used as a chant at England football games.

"I'm Eileen." - you can probably see where this was going... which is exactly why I didn't do it. Don't get me wrong, I was very tempted. But in the end it felt too crass.
"The man seemed more interested in me" - funnily enough, this isn't the last time Darren will find himself attracted to a woman that is actually a cross-dresser.
"joggers" - this is set-up for the later 'midnight runner' joke
"smeared lip gloss" - I didn't explicitly call it out in the getting ready section, but I think it was implied in 'natural' make-up
"her denim shorts" - when Mark is cross-dressing, Sophie usually dresses more 'masculine' (or maybe less 'girly', at least)

"We didn't discuss this." - there's a subtle evolution over the series. In the first 5 chapters, Sophie always gets explicit consent before starting a game. In the next 5, consent is not explicitly shown 'on screen' (did you notice?) In those stories, nothing particularly extreme happens, so consent might reasonably be assumed. But assumed consent is a dangerous precedent - as we will see in this 5 chapter arc.

"pulled my arms behind my back, around the tree" - at a young age, I saw an episode of "Gimme Gimme Gimme", in which a guy gets handcuffed to a lamp post in drag. I think that was a classic bachelor party prank. Anyway, the image of this guy in women's clothes, handcuffed in a public place, helpless, scared... I don't think that had any sort of lasting impact on me

"Think about... Brexit" - if that doesn't kill your erection... In retrospect, putting an intentional boner killer in the middle of a pornographic story is a weird move
"she was joking, right?" - so... this is pretty fucked up, yeah? You could read this as revenge for chapter 10 (after all: "that one likes to hold a grudge"). I'm not sure that makes it any 'better', tho.
"what other option was there?" / "I tried to follow her voice." - from the song 'Wicked Little Town': "If you've got no other choice, you know you can follow my voice"
"turalura turalura laaay..." / "A midnight runner!" - Come On Eileen, Dexys Midnight Runners. This is Darren again - "a drunk that got lost on their way home"
"if I said the safe word ... would she come back" - this is another theme for this arc: the limits of safe words; what if you're unable (or unwilling) to use it?
"It was so quiet." - sometimes I have this thing where I get so stressed out that it kind of burns out and I feel weirdly calm instead
"I felt a ghostly hand REACHING OUT, TOUCHING ME on the shoulder..." - TOUCHING YOOOOOOU
"My heart burst out of my chest and scurried away into the night" - chest-burster, chapter 9
"She got down on her knees ... and she drank me deep" - I was planning on doing a full BJ scene, but truth be told when I got to it I couldn't be bothered
This is where the "cum on Eileen" joke would have happened; tho realistically, there's no way Sophie was going to be walking about in public with cum on her (even if she maybe deserved it).
"The good times never seemed so good." - SO GOOD! SO GOOD! SO GOOD!
"I noticed her necklace hanging loose... Had she always been wearing that?" - in case it wasn't clear, yes, she had the handcuff key around her neck the whole time. Mark was never in any danger, and Sophie was probably hiding behind a tree, a few feet away, keeping an eye on him.