I entered my marriage fully confident in the common-sensical axiom that a woman's past, her sex life before meeting and becoming sexual/romantic with me, doesn't matter very much as long as there was nothing too crazy, like she did sex work or bestiality or something. My wife-to-be hadn't given me any indication of an unusual history, and she didn't seem the type to have any notable records for the big books. I hope I'm not mistaken for a misogynist who goes around talking about mileage, checking the odometer, or getting the carfax. I once gave a work frenemy a good shaking for drunkenly spewing precisely that repulsive stuff at a cookout.

On the other hand, her little sister was on her 30-somethingth boyfriend by her second year of university. It occurred to me that she was breaking up with the last guy and onto the next guy like every month. I swear each time we met her and "her boyfriend," it was a different dude: Greg, Manuel, Jason, Keith, Jerod, Sam, Warren, Keyshawn, Isaac, Darren, Owen, another Owen, and on and on. After leaving brunch with my wife's little sister and Owen the Second, while driving, I mentioned it to my wife, "She's met quite a company of boys, hasn't she?"

Without hesitation, she sighed and replied, "You have to kiss many frogs before you find your prince."

She meant that with affection, and in the moment, I returned her smile. After all, she was talking about her little sister, and not herself, right? And that's where I started to unravel. Over the course of a week, I kept waking up with these thoughts: frogs? Many? How many? Kiss? You mean fuck. How many frogs did you fuck then? How many is many? And I couldn't turn off this voice in my head. It got more and more intrusive. It was so persistent that when my wife and I were in bed, she initiated, and I hardly responded. My erection was semi-flaccid, and my movements were sluggish.

She finally asked, "Hey? What's wrong?"

I play-slapped a pillow and exhaled. How was I going to word this without sounding like a complete asshole? "I don't know how to ask, babe. I don't know if I should ask. I don't know if I have a right to know or if I want to know. I've been trying to suppress it and let it pass."

She furrowed her brow, taking it extra-seriously. "OK. Pause. Something is really bothering you then. I need to hear it."

I swallowed. "Don't be upset. I don't mean it in a bad way. And if you don't want to answer, then obviously that's cool. Alright?"

She looked at me in silence and then nodded. "Alright. So what is it?"

I exhaled again. It's so awkward to ask a woman this. When you're with other men, your friends, it's easy. But to ask a woman this question is more uncomfortable than asking her weight, her age, her bra size, or if she masturbates. "This is me asking as politely and not-weirdly as I can; how many men did you have sex with before we became a couple?"

She rolled her head back, craning her neck, looked at the ceiling, and made a little grin that might mean amusement but might also mean disappointment, or both. She allowed her gaze to fall back on me, she blinked, smiled a little wider, and let loose the words, the number, "Forty-one."

My chest tightened, my feet found the floor, and I let myself out of bed. I walked autonomically across the hall and into my office and shut the door. She was right on my heels, and I shut the door in her face, softly but rudely, and locked it.

"Hey!" she shouted through the door.

"Yeah, give me a minute," I answered, as if I needed to wash my hands or something.

"Hey! What are you doing?" she called through the door.

I was quiet, but inside I was screaming. Why!? How!? I didn't try to rationalize it, contextualize it, talk myself down, or cool off. There was only the overwhelming internal conflict, regret, dilemma, disgust, insecurity, and I could just about jump out a window. And yet she wouldn't stop; she had gone to get the standard screwdriver and used it to pop the latch. She had entered my office and found me sitting at my desk, rocking in my swivel chair.

"I didn't lie. Should I have lied?" she justified herself. I didn't have space in my brain for justification.

"No," I answered.

"Good. They were all before I had met you. Do you think I cheated?" she continued justifying.

"No," I answered.

"How many women did you have sex with before we met?" she equivocated.

"One," I answered, honestly.

She winced. "Really? Erica?"

"Yeah, Erica. Then I met you." I was frank about it.

"So through all of high school, university, and after, it was only Erica?" She seemed stunned that a person could be boyfriend & girlfriend for so long.

"Yes, I didn't need forty-one other women; I tried to make it work with one." It came out very spiteful and self-righteous.

"Well, OK, good for you and Erica. Think how that makes me feel. You had something very special with another woman, something that endured. Who should be upset here, you over my number or me over your number?" I have to admit that it struck me how logical the notion that having a spouse with a lower body count on a longer timeline was the scarier pair of shoes to be in.

"You have nothing to worry about regarding Erica," I told her, and it was true. I had no lingering positive feelings for my first and only other woman. Nor did I regard my wife as my ex's inferior in any meaningful aspect.

My wife clasped her hands, "And you have nothing to worry about regarding my past either!"

I took a pen and tapped it on my desk. "Alright. I'm not worried."

She came and knelt behind my desk, placing her hands on my lap, looking up at me. "I long ago promised myself that if you asked me something about myself like this, that I would be plainly honest because I don't want to be loved for someone I'm not, and I think you deserve to hear the truth."

I felt that in my gut. "Honey, I do love you. Forever."

She laid her cheek on my knee. "Me too. What do you want to say? Don't hold it in."

I brushed her hair through my fingers. "I don't know. I'm not doing too well with that number.  It sounds like a lot. It really does sound like a lot of men. I didn't expect that. I was bracing myself for anything over five being tough."

"Five?" She looked at me, cocking an eyebrow like that number was so small for her it would be pitiful.

"I know there are women who've had sex with hundreds of men; they lose count. But I didn't imagine you could've been with more than a handful. Forty-one seems excessive. It does. I'm shocked, to be totally honest. I'm a bit dizzy. I.. I.." and I began to spiral right there. It truly was overwhelming to think that forty-one men had penetrated her before me.

"Wait. Calm down. I should've told you differently. Listen. You're the only man who matters to me." This consolation wasn't getting through. Meticulously my brain was constructing all manner of coping perspectives far beyond anything she could offer; an angel on my shoulder told me I had won a grand tournament against forty-one competitors, that I proved my alpha wolf status and masculine quality to eclipse such a field of opponents, to catch the prize fish after she had swam up a river of testosterone and sperm, to come out the star-player lined up against dozens of men and their dicks made me outstanding, made me special. But there was a devil on my other shoulder who effortlessly dragged me down; that I was getting sloppy forty-seconds, that I was the hand-me-down kid, that I was no alpha wolf but rather the whimpering, begging dog getting scraped leftovers, that I was the forty-second simp in line holding a bouquet and a wedding ring behind a penis platoon taking their turns in her. I got nauseous, and my wife could see me zoning out, then the color in my face leaving. She slapped my thigh, "Hey! Stop! You're overreacting! Please!"

Then I asked the singular question I wished against time would dissolve this knot and give me relief. "Why though? Why so many men?"

She looked away, as she did when she answered the big question earlier, and then her gaze returned. Looking me in the eye, she said it, plain honest, just as she promised herself she'd be, "I loved having sex. I had fun meeting different guys, the flirtation, the pick-up lines, the compliments, and the attention. I was thrilled to get a room with someone I just met, and then by morning, never having to see him again. I delighted in intercepting other girls' crushes and letting them seethe with envy. I was euphoric going out with my girls and rounding up cute guys, vying for the hottest in the crew and winning. I felt butterflies meeting men I matched with on hookup sites and deciding even before they said a word that I'd have sex with them. So that's what I did because that's what I enjoyed."

Hearing her detail how she racked up such a tally made me enter another realm. It was... hot. Could that really have been her? Could she really have had sex so frequently and with such abandon? Did she really have a phase when she was fucking for sport and leisure? "How could you do that?" I asked in awe.

"It was my choice. I would never take it back for anybody. If I hadn't indulged in that phase of my life, I would carry a void, wondering what I missed out on. Sleeping with those men was experimental, bucket-list checking, YOLO-spirited, and it allowed me to grow up and begin to want a committed relationship."

I nodded along, whether it made sense or not, "You didn't think about finding a soulmate?" I sounded almost childish asking that.

"No. I didn't believe in that. I believed in experiences and considering a man for husband-material when I was ready. I can apologize that I didn't tell you sooner, but you didn't ask, and I assumed that you'd rather not know, like don't-ask-don't-tell. I can apologize that I didn't ease it on you better, but you might've taken that for trickle-truthing. I can't apologize for living that life, because it is my life and my right. I won't be judged for it. If you ever want to ask about details, if you're sure you can handle details, I'll tell you without any filter. If you decide you just can't deal with what I've already told you, then we don't have to be married. I can respect your limits and preferences, and I won't be married to someone who has lost respect for me..."

She stood, legs between my knees, and leaned over onto me, hands on my armrests, forehead-to-forehead. "... someone who doesn't want me anymore."

She was so beautiful. No, she was hot. "I do want you."

"You do? Are you sure?" She leaned in and kissed me, folding onto my lap, her legs curling up onto me.

"Yes. I'll always want you." And I moved her hair out of the way to kiss her neck.

"What if I told you now that I lied and it was really fifty, would you still want me?" She emphasized fifty like it was a body count someone she knew and admired had, a number you respect when you speak it aloud.

My dick inflated instantly. Fifty. That's not that much higher than her initial claim, and yet it is. Fifty sounds heavy, fifty sounds bad! What a lustful vixen she would be!? My wife? With fifty men? "Yes. I would want you."

"What if I told you it was more than... I don't know... say one-hundred men who'd fucked me and that I couldn't remember an exact figure for you? Would you still want me?" This time she emphasized the word more, as if there were women in her life who had crossed over into that layer of the firmament, women who had fucked their way well past one-hundred men and were no longer sure of the quantity of dick they'd taken, except that it was into triple digits!

I was throbbing and kissing along her collar under her necklace, which I had given her when we were dating years ago. I murmured out unconsciously, "I'd want you more."

"More?" She was surprised, and I was as surprised as she was. Did I say that I'd want her more? I did!

"You're such a loose, promiscuous..." I was caressing her all over. I stood with her in my arms, her legs wrapped around my waist.

"Such a what? Such a what?" she gasped.

"You're such a slut!" I accused. I stood, carried her, and marched over with her to our bedroom. I fell with her onto the comforter with a bounce.

She pulled my shirt off over my head. "I'm a slut? But you married me. So you married a slut. Does that make you sad? Angry?"

"It makes me furious and despondent!" I confessed.

"Oh? Poor baby. But you can't help wanting me anyway?" She taunted now?

"I can't help it. You're too... you're too seductive." I pulled her tight jeans off, then yanked her purple panties down and off her ankles. I spread her legs, pulling her knees apart, and got sight of what I was after. I looked upon her pussy with new eyes. It wasn't the same orifice it had been. The realization now that forty-one men had been within gave it a daunting, intimidating aura. The possibility that she lied and it was really some astronomical multitude of men caused her pussy to glow with naughty, defiant mystery. She combed my hair with her fingers gently, and then more forcefully locked them together behind my head and pulled my mouth into her pink hole. I drove my tongue as deep into her warm, wet cavern as I could.

"Taste me!" She gyrated her hips, and I swirled my tongue around her walls and swallowed that acidic flavor to the back of my throat. So, so, so many cocks had stroked this well-used passageway I now wriggled my tongue into.

I bathed her pussy, licking her clit, her labia, and I wanted to drink from her. She gestured for me to stand, and she undid my pants, dropping them and my briefs to my feet. She started jacking my cock, but I was impatient. I pressed her down and slid into her. It was easy, too easy to enter her. No traction, no grip, only the wet clap of my pounding into her until at last I managed an angle that produced penetrative pressure. My glans was tickled as it strummed the folded, swollen walnut-texture of her G-spot, and she grasped my arms as they flexed on either side of her waist. I drove it into her hard.

Her hair was a mess; it radiated from her head like rays, an aureole or nimbus. "Do you like it that your wife was prolific?"

The thought of a rotation of men, with quick turnover, between her legs before I had found her was maddening and intoxicating. The idea that younger me was in the world blissfully unaware, studying, playing, eating, sleeping, shitting, bathing, driving, working, watching TV, and doing whatever all those times my future wife was fucking some random man was darker than anything I had considered regarding her. And yet it made my phallus so hard!

"I can't handle it!" I buried my face in her chest, rolling in her soft cleavage.

"You can't handle it that tens of men handled me?" She arched her back up, offering her left tit for me to suck.

"Did you use protection?" I sounded so lame to ask that, as I panted, sucking her nipple.

"You mean like condoms? With my first boyfriend, I did, but then I guess I didn't worry about that after him. No, I didn't." She drew circles and spirals in my back with her fingernail, lightly scratching my skin.

Then I had my most pathetic question yet. I asked it as I kissed down her neck, humping and humping her desperately. "Please tell me. Am I your best?"

"My best? Best what?" She must've known what I meant.

"Am I your best lover?" As I kissed her lips, she pulled away to speak. I hoped against hope she would have mercy enough to say yes. It didn't have to be true; it could just be true from a certain point of view. Beneath the wish, I knew I wasn't the best lover against forty-one other men. At least one would have surpassed me as her favorite, probably several, but definitely one, the one she never spoke of but never forgot, the one all other men were compared to and came up short in the duty of giving her the ultimate womanly, bodily pleasure.

She pressed her lips to my ear and gave me her answer, "You're a good lover."

I understood that crisp and clear. She meant NO!

The demotion, the revelation that she had gotten fucked better than I had given her my best fuck, the carnal images that entered my mind of my wife in her age of glory getting absolutely sexed by man after man after man after man after man... and I embraced her tight, our sweat mixing, her foamy cream dripping off my balls, pumping my cum into her, to make her mine, to remind her and myself that she was my wife NOW! I seized up, shook, shuddered, and ground it out. She embraced me also, caressing my shoulders, down my waist, to my ass, and back up again.

In the days since, my mind has run laps to exhaustion. My neurons are fried, my eyes are bloodshot. My erections are frequent and stiff as a board. I'm not over it, learning her body count. I'm still shook. I'm still wordlessly dazed and privately entranced by the entire inescapable fact of that number of hers, that number that can't be reduced, those encounters, trysts, and one-night stands that live inside her wherever she goes with me, marking her memory and making her... her. I'm not over her body count, but better than that, I'm not over her. Between you and me, learning her past has imbued her in my eyes with a strange, fiery allure.