Our episode title is also a line from Cyndi Lauper's ♫Time After Time♫
The wedding was beautiful. Small, but perfect.
The bride and groom's friends and family, at least the ones that actually mattered, were there.
When the minister said, "I now pronounce you man and wife," she swore there was a tear in her new husband's eye as they shared their first marriage kiss.
The reception was typical. Lots of food, music, dancing, and all the rituals.
Their first dance as newlyweds. Sharing the first slice of the wedding cake. Tossing the bouquet. Throwing the bride's garter...
Was he actually blushing while reaching up my dress to pull it off my leg? she wondered.
But now came the big event they had both been waiting for.
The honeymoon!
It was a simple affair. Just time alone in a rented cabin along the crescent shaped shore of the town's namesake.
He insisted on carrying her over the threshold, despite the fact that she was much stronger than him at the moment.
Soon all that would change.
She smiled seductively before blowing her new husband a kiss. Then she grabbed her bag and went to the bathroom.
She took her time getting ready, knowing there was no rush. Both wanted tonight to be as romantic and special, let alone as intimate as possible.
When she came out, the groom stared at the lovely vision before him; with her fur well groomed and covered in what had to be the sheerest negligee he had ever seen that did absolutely nothing to hide her beauty.
She was totally shocked to see he was still fully dressed. The man hadn't even kicked his shoes off yet.
"Something wrong honey?" she asked in a concerned voice, even as she sauntered toward him in such a way that left nothing to the imagination as to what was on her mind.
"N-no," he gulped. "You look as beautiful now as the moment I first saw you."
"That's sweet of you to say," she replied, smiling while putting her furry arms around him lovingly. "You're not afraid, are you?" she asked, concerned. "You knew that to have me the way a man and woman should be together, you'd soon be furry too."
"I know," he replied, before his human lips kissed her furry muzzle. "It's just that..."
She stared at him, waiting for her husband to say whatever was on his mind.
"It's just that... I'm still a virgin."
"It's okay darling. I knew that going into our engagement," she said, while moving closer to him so bare fur was pressing against his clothing. "But now..."
And then they kissed.
It wasn't just a normal kiss.
It was a kiss composed of all the suppressed passion and emotions the two of them had been holding back until now.
It would still be over an hour before the first strands of his fur began to sprout, but then Mrs. Ginger Harper would smile and cry tears of joy as a new weretiger roared in unbridled passion as her husband joined were society and claimed his mate.
In her bedroom, Ginger O'Toole woke up with a start.
Parts of her weretigress fur were matted with sweat, while the more intimate area between her legs was very damp for another reason.
Oh John! I know you're so mixed up and confused right now because of how your parents raised you, but I hope someday you see how much I care about you, let alone want to be with you, she silently said, thinking about the young Harper boy just a few houses down from her. I'll give you all the time you need, and I hope I'll be your first. My heart keeps saying that I will spend the rest of my life loving you, but I sincerely hope it will be as your wife and not an unrequited love.
MEANWHILE...
He felt like Daniel walking into the lion's den.
Then again, tiger's den would be more appropriate, for everyone John Harper passed as he walked down the center aisle of the assemblage was proudly displaying their orange fur and stripes.
Except for the robe he was issued before the ceremony began, John was completely naked as he walked up to the center stage.
"John Harper," began the weretiger standing before him. Except for a gold sash around his neck, there was really nothing to denote this man from any other weretiger present. "You have come to us of your own free will to answer nature's call and become a proud weretiger of not only Moon Lake, but of Mother Earth as well. Is this correct?"
John just nodded affirmatively, but was wondering why the Head Tiger was staring at him.
Upon realizing his mistake, John said, "Yes sir. I want to be a weretiger."
"To bear the stripes and fur of our species proudly for the rest of your life?" asked the Head Tiger.
"Yes, sir."
"Very well. Then all that is left to do is to choose who will have the honor of initiating you into were society," announced the Head Tiger, before stepping aside to present John with his possible options.
Behind the Head Tiger were standing two teenagers John's age. Until now, the Head Tiger's large and commanding presence had hidden them from John's view.
The first John recognized immediately as his neighbor Ginger O'Toole.
She stood there, showing off all her furry feminine charms as John just stared at her. The lights within the building seemed to catch the sparkle in her feline eyes and increased it a thousand fold.
But standing next to her was someone else.
He was about the same height and displayed the same striped fur pattern as Ginger, but that's where the similarities ended.
While she was all fur and sleek curves that seemed the zenith of what a weretigress should be, the boy was definitely the masculine prime example of what a weretiger should be with his muscled limbs and tight chest.
John just stared at the two of them. Undecided about what to do next.
His first impulse, the very reason he wanted to be a weretiger to begin with, said Ginger. While he had quickly accepted the concept of weres in his early days of arriving in Moon Lake, it wasn't until he saw Ginger in her fursona that fateful night* that made John decide that he wanted to join were society, let alone what branch to be a member of.
Yet there was something about the boy that made him long to experience what it would be like to be with a man, and not just because it would totally go against his father's strict upbringing and religious beliefs.
The young weretiger next to Ginger smiled at John and turned slightly so that Harper could see the proud organ between his legs start to expand even more at the thought of making the new initiate roar.
Ginger, seeing her rival's move out of the corner of her eye, subtly projected her bountiful bosom more and slightly opened her own legs to show a hint of the pleasures that lied within.
Until now, John had been so nervous about joining were society, that there had been absolutely no physical reaction to seeing all these people—male or female—technically naked but covered in fur. Their physical attributes on display for all to see.
Now John's own penis began to twitch too, growing stiffer and more needy by the moment, but was it because of Ginger or the weretiger?
What am I? Straight... gay... bi...
His father would be shocked that John knew these terms and their definitions, let alone didn't share his hatred and bias against those who were not like him.
But how do they apply to me?
"I—"
And then John Harper woke up with a start.
His body was covered in a cold sweat.
He had somehow kicked off the blankets that covered him while he slept but his pajamas were still soaked with perspiration.
Yet there was also no denying the stiffness of the organ between his legs.
For whatever reason (to adjust his borrowed pajama bottoms, to actually do what his father always preached against and self pleasure himself, John didn't know) he started to reach down.
But the moment his bare hand brushed up against his hardened cock, it released the second massive (to him) load of young semen in less than a day, let alone his lifetime!*
John quickly looked around.
From what he could see in the dark, his younger sister Janice was still sound asleep in the other bed within the guest bedroom of the Jenkins household, where they were staying while their older sister Jennifer Harper-Jenkins was working on having the kids emancipated into her custody.
What the hell is wrong with me? John wanted to yell, hoping for an answer, yet knew that would just wake everyone up and he'd have to answer questions he wanted to totally avoid.
Instead, ignoring the mess between his legs, he grabbed the discarded blankets and pulled them up until his body was completely covered well past the top of his head.
Then John Harper cried himself back to sleep.
TO BE CONTINUED...
(With special thanks to my girlfriend, her brother, and his boyfriend for their input and advice.—tmw.)
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*During the previous episode: "Close Encounter Of An Interesting Kind".—tmw.