Feminine pleasure: the ultimate taboo? #Taboo2sday

In the just-released The Second Notebook of Emily Orn Wilkes, Secret Countess of Wessulk, the taboo is framed by the repression of Victorian culture. Where Taboo Tuesday is concerned, that lets me explore once again what I think of as the "front edge" of taboo--the stuff just over the border. I often wonder whether in fact the most universal taboo, in a traditional society, is the possibility of feminine pleasure. In this scene, Victorian Emily is having her picture taken in some very naughty poses; it causes some very naughty feelings. To her surprise, she has been given permission to pleasure herself.

I returned my gaze to the mirror. The stillness of the scene was remarkable; all, incredibly, waited upon my pleasure. I watched the fingers of my left hand work their way inward. My body began to shake, and I began to cry out, shamelessly. My middle finger-tip touched there, where my bottom’s heat was centered; in the mirror I saw a young bride, justly punished for her lewd immodesty, trying even more immodestly to find within the forbidden valley of her posterior a lewd balsam for her agony. My climax was like nothing I had known in my life to that moment: it seemed to explode outward from my loins until my whole naked body was a quivering jelly. I swayed, and almost fell. 

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mrs. Harrah shoot Mrs. Smith a look under raised eyebrows. “Remarkable,” she said.

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When the door of the coach had been closed by the footman, and I had waved out the window to my receding family, and then sat back, looking down at my hands, folded in my lap, I began to weep, very softly, with the sheer excess of emotion. Edmund reached over and took my hand in his. I turned my head to look into his eyes, and to my great surprise found them kindly. 

“I realize,” my husband said, “dear Emily, that I won your body with my cheque-book. It is now my fondest hope that I might win your heart with my affection. You are the loveliest creature I ever saw.” With his right fore-finger he lifted my chin, gently; he bent his head, and our lips met for the first time. His kiss was tender, but somehow commanding, too, and it made me shiver. “Thank you for making me the happiest man in the world today.”  

Despite myself (for you will not be surprised to hear that I had decided he was a monster, and had not been dissuaded from that view by his pleasing demeanor all that day), I was touched by his words, which seemed sincere. Given the utter invisibility of the great drama from the conventional world to one who is not party to the different reality beneath, it had not seemed strange that Edmund would be perfectly pleasant in his address when my family were present; but now, I had supposed, the next scene of the drama was to begin. I will confess that a part of me was impatient. “Why then have you degraded me in this manner?”  

In this notebook, imagined as passed down to me from my great-great-grandmother, Emily Orn continues her initiation into a great drama of BDSM in Victorian England. Under the stern instruction now of her bridegroom, Emily at last learns what it means to serve his pleasure. 

Now go read all the other taboo posts, you wicked thing!