Ideally, you could take advantage of an event that might merge the private and professional spheres – or even provoke it. Why not try to get close to them during the annual seminar in the countryside, or ask if they’d like to meet up in another setting? We sometimes need to change space to reveal other facets of our multiple identities: we’re not the same at work and outside. A friend told me they only started to see her handsome colleague in a new light after she accepted his invitation to attend the Dunkirk carnival. Now, they form a happy couple. Obviously, it’s difficult to assess the sincerity of our own desire. Immanuel Kant would probably advise you to ask yourself this question: is the other a means for me, or an end? A test would be to imagine the other naked, stripped of their position in the company, of their place in the hierarchy, their uniform or blouse, and see if the desire remains intact. Imagine your colleague in their simplest form: you’ll see if they’re as attractive as they are when they’re talking in a meeting!

Annabelle, who organises CFNM events, echoes Terry when she says, ‘only once did we do some dominatrix style attire. Usually we don’t wear anything in particular – just normal clothes – nothing that excites the men too much.’ No wonder that desire can arise in such an anchored context, in this enclosed place, subject to such a repetitive rhythm. To get out of it, we can be tempted to bring about “poetry, beauty, romance, love, [...] what we stay alive for”, to quote John Keating, the literature professor played by Robin Williams in The Circle of Poets disappeared (1989). The sexual fantasy about the colleague – a figure of intermediate proximity, both known and unknown – feels like breaking free from the company, which in some aspects is like a “total institution”. The American sociologist Ervin Goffman describes the latter as “a place of residence and work where a large number of like-situated individuals, cut off from the wider society for an appreciable period of time, together lead an enclosed, formally administered round of life” ( Asylums, 1961).This is undoubtedly what feeds our office fantasies: more than sleeping with this or that colleague, we basically want to desire. This is something you have to be patient and understanding about, because sex means different things to everyone, and the conversation shouldn’t be forced. The party was the first time Terry had used a dildo. He says, ‘it was cleaned each time, and a new condom was put on it, but I was very nervous. When it was my turn, I really didn’t want it and I wasn’t sure what to do, but I walked over and one of the ladies helped me get on the chair. My arse was lubed up, then I slowly lowered my bum over the dildo.’ He adds: ‘It was hard to relax, and it hurt, but there was no damage, so I didn’t regret it.’ At Annabelle’s second event, there were ‘hotter men, less of them asking to f*** me, and the ability to tease them without touching – that’s when I knew I love this.’

Be prepared for the discussion to get intimate and frank – if you want to talk about the possibility of engaging in group sex, be aware that your partner may be hurt by this, and you will need to provide reassurance. And so I fell into a routine of mostly being enamored and distracted. Today, like most days he walked in and greeted me. His knowing smile elicited a familiar tug between my legs that floated up through my stomach. I wanted him.

10. Watching or being watched

Have you ever had the disturbing experience of suddenly seeing a colleague in a new light, and finding yourself wanting them? Of suddenly finding their jokes funny, their anecdotes interesting? For Terry, feeling embarrassed is part of the fun – despite being at the larger end of the line-up. He explains, ‘it’s still embarrassing getting measured, and being naked with other people – especially when it’s only the men who are naked. I like the embarrassment of being exposed, and the comments I get from being viewed. I enjoy it and get turned on.’ As a single woman, Annabelle has ‘played’ with the men at these events, ‘as in I’ve got them erect and kept them erect, but not given a hand-job to completion. I like watching them complete.’ When Annabelle is in a relationship, she’ll take her partner to the event, and the only ‘playing’ will be with her partner – who will be off-limits to other women at the event. While we need to be mindful of our partners boundaries and respect their right to say no, there’s no harm in broaching the subject with a sexual partner.

Sex researchers have wondered the same thing. Several research studies have focused on what women fantasize about. A study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, entitled “What Exactly Is an Unusual Fantasy?”, wanted to determine which sexual fantasies are common among women. The researchers asked women living in Quebec to answer the Wilson’s Sex Fantasy Questionnaire. 799 women completed the questionnaire, of which the majority were heterosexual. The fifteen most common fantasies as reported by these women are listed below. Without espousing the totalitarian aspects of those asylums and prisons that Goffman studied in the United States, companies do constitute a unit of space and time where individuals can be temporarily cut off from the world, which follows a rhythm of its own, with its own codes. He adds that, like the first event he went to, it’s the norm for the women to be dressed in everyday clothes, and he’s only been to one event where the women were dressed as dominatrixes.Immanuel Kant would probably advise you to ask yourself this question: is the other a means for me, or an end?’