The hands, strong but delicate, lifted me and guided me in the direction of their design.
I heard nothing from Phil. They must have got him, too.
And the thought of that—the thought of someone besting Phil in that way, made me feel an ultimate sensation of powerlessness.
I struggled against their grip, but it was fruitless. I didn’t know how many of them there were; how many we were up against. Was it the whole circle of hooded figures? Was it only two of them? It was impossible to tell.
There was fumbling—a lot of it—as they guided me across the farmyard.
All I could think of was Phil. Was he okay? Were they taking him to a different place?
Because if we ended up in different rooms, separated, I didn’t know if I could handle it.
My heart thundered in my chest, pumping pure adrenaline through my veins.
I didn’t know where I was.
Worse: I didn’t know where Phil was.
I was alone; alone in this moment in time, alone in all moments in time. Along in the universe. And it was a kind of loneliness you don’t feel until the person you didn’t realize you trusted the most was taken away.
Phil.
I didn’t care if he tried to pretend like he was a manipulator or whatever at this point in our lives. It was only one segment out of all the time I’d known him; all the time I’d called him my friend. It was something that was only temporary.
He still had a heart of gold.
I struggled against the grip of the multi-handed monster handling me, unable to shake myself free.
“Let me go!” I cried, but it came out as, “MRFPHURFAH!”
Then, I heard a chuckle next to me.
Like this was funny.
All I felt was a human emotion so primal and pure that I couldn’t help but let it cloud out all my senses:
Terror.
Pure Terror.
And, if I had a moment to reflect on it, I would have thought it was curious that I didn’t feel terror at the situation itself, but at the fact I was separated from Phil.
I could have been rotting in hell, and everything would have been okay as long as I had Phil by my side.
But he wasn’t there.
I couldn’t feel him next to me; they must have taken him in a different direction.
Because that static excitement that I usually felt when he was nearby? That was gone.
Gone.
I was alone.
“MRRRPH!” I cried.
“Shut up,” said a stern voice nearby.
I couldn’t help but think that voice sounded familiar…
Too familiar…
I smelled the change in the air when they took me into the barn. The scent of bat droppings flew into my nostrils—that smell that’s so ancient and raw and unmistakable—
The hands around my arms shoved me into an empty space and even though I was blindfolded, I could tell darkness descended around me.
“W-wait!” I cried.
I heard the deep roll of a barn door shut.
“Stop! Don’t leave me—!”
And then they let me go.
Clack. The barn door latched into place.
9
Phil
The hands released me and I heard a sliding door shut.
My first instinct was to call out for Kyle, but I bit my tongue.
I tore the blindfold off, panting.
Where was Kyle? Was he okay? What did they do with him?!
Stop. Focus, my inner manipulator urged. What do you see?
I blinked a few times, trying to blot out the fear and raw emotion threatening to cloud out my vision.
Clarity. Get a clear head, he commanded.
I drew a slow breath in through my nose and let it out of my mouth.
In, out.
In, out.
Just like that guy in the middle of the seance circle…
I shook my head, trying to erase the thought.
Okay, think. They’re not doing that to Kyle—they can’t be.
Use your senses, my inner manipulator urged.
Then, with no rhyme or reason, the Lao Tzu quote popped into my head:
“Love is of all passions the strongest, for it attacks simultaneously the head, the heart, and the senses.”
No. I didn’t have time for love.
I whipped around and tried to take in my environment:
I was in a dark room with a concrete floor, encased on all sides by wooden walls. There were a few openings in the walls, but vertical bars caged me inside.
This was an old horse stall, I think.
The air was quiet in here; tingling, but absent of that feeling I craved.
That warmness.
I didn’t even have to call out Kyle’s name to know he wasn’t here.
All I could smell was the musky scent of basement and bat droppings.
And what does that tell you? My inner strategist asked with his hands on his hips, waiting for me to detect the obvious.
Old. It told me this place was old.
And?
And… and it was unused for a while.
Unclean.
What else?
I blinked a few times, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness.
And… and it was a turn of the century barn…
All of the information I was gathering tangled upon itself as I leaned against one of the wooden walls and slid down, cupping my face in my hands.
None of it mattered. I couldn’t think clearly; all I could think of was Kyle.
Was he all right? Had these… these people gotten their hands on him?
What if he was the one in the center of the circle, getting pounded by that weird guy in the cloak?
Anger surged through me.
I couldn’t bear the thought of him… of Kyle with all of his goodness and innocence and… and…
He’s the angel of good. You’re the prince of darkness.
I had to save him.
Think.
I looked up and took stock of the room again, forcing all of my emotions to recede to the back burner. There would be time later to stress out about Kyle; for now, I needed to devote all of my mental faculties to saving him.
So. I was locked in this room… how to get out?
Or… did I even want to get out?
I knew without even making a sound that Kyle wasn’t nearby. Why? I could feel that he was gone; that distinct warmness in the air that he brought with him whenever he entered a room was absent.
It was just me and my dark thoughts—
No. Think.
My eyes slid to the left. An ancient barn door—the sliding kind, laid heavy against one wall. There was no latch on this side.
I was locked in here like a wild animal.
Shitty safety design, I thought to myself.
Then my eyes slid to the right: one singular window opened up to the stall next door.
Might as well investigate…
I stood up and walked toward it.
What do you notice? My inner manipulator asked.
Sawdust. I noticed sawdust all over the floor, muffling my footsteps.
But I didn’t know how I could use sawdust to escape—
Don’t think about it. Just notice it, the voice in my head commanded.
All at once, an immense calm came over me.
I knew on an intuitive level that I’d get out of there. That my path converged with Kyle’s. That he was free from harm—for now.
I frowned. Why had we noticed the barn across the field? Why had we even walked towards it? Didn’t we know it was a dead-end? Dangerous?
Why did we have to revisit the past like that?
I peered through the bars into the next stall.
There was a man in there, laying across the ground.
I staggered back from the window, my hand cupped over my mouth.
Was he… was he dead?
“I seen you there,” the man slurred.
“No need to be ‘fraid. I’m drunk.”
I slowly walked closer to the window and peered through again.
Sure, the man was splayed across the floor like a starfish, but his eyes gleamed with the fire of life.
It was such a shock to see him there like that, all splayed out, that I couldn’t think of anything to say except, “What’s going on here?!”
He belched, the sound echoing throughout the empty space. “Welp. Couldn’t tell ya. All I know is that they put me up in here, and I’m not gonna worry about anything until I’m sober.”
And the guy had such a deliriously happy look on his face that I knew he fully intended every word that came out of his mouth.
“Yerp. Just gonna lie here…” he said with a chuckle. “Don’t really care one way or another.”
“What?! How can you say that?!” I cried, wrapping my hands around the bars. “You know they… they rape people out there, right?”
“What?” The guy said, furrowing his brow. “They’re not raping anyone—”
“I just saw it,” I stated fiercely. “I saw it when I was a kid, too.”
“Oh, all those folks out there meet up once a month to do that sex stuff. It’s been going on as long as I’ve lived in this town—and let me tell you, Sonny, I’ve lived here a long, long time!”
I scrunched up my face. “What do you mean ‘sex stuff?’”
He rolled his eyes, then made an exasperated sound. “I mean, they all got their own preferences and everything—meet up with other folks who like the same thing. They’re nice fellas… I’ve talked to the leaders a few times—
“Wait, so you’re telling me that’s some kind of sex cult?” I asked, my face twisting with disgust.
The man shrugged, his shoulders pushing some of the sawdust like he was making a snow angel or something. “I guess. I do know it’s all consensual, though.”
I blinked a few times, remembering what Kyle and I saw when we were kids.
The scene was identical to the one we walked in on tonight, only that guy…
The guy in the middle was trying to get away…
I narrowed my eyes. “What I saw last time sure as hell wasn’t consensual.”
Another voice boomed from outside the stall. “It sure as hell was.”
I turned to the wall as if with enough eye strain, I could magically see through it.
But I didn’t have to try too hard. I could see through the bars from this angle.
One of the hooded figures leaned against the wall on the outside, presumably standing guard.
“Who are you?” I called through gritted teeth.
“You don’t recognize my voice, Baron?” the hooded figure said.
I strained my eyes, trying to see the face inside the hood—
But the figure stepped forward toward the bars, raised his hands, and unhooded himself.
Simon.
That weird kid Simon, that I’d seen at school hanging out sometimes with that weird kid Victor.
“You!” I said.
“Me,” he said with a smirk. Then he pushed up his glasses.
“What did you do with Kyle?!” I shouted, shaking the bars like a wild animal.
“Shh. That’s no way to behave,” Simon said.
There was something different about him in this space; something that altered him. It made him seem… more confident. Like he was fully in control of the situation, fully in his element, and he knew it.
I narrowed my eyes, reassessing him.
It was as though here in this barn, Simon ceased to be who I saw him at school.
At school, he was a nerdy kid. Someone who stayed quiet; let me and my three friends—Jon, Terry, and Kyle—run the school. For the most part, Simon was just some nerd in robotics or something that flew under the radar.
Come to think of it, I didn’t even think I’d heard him speak until recently…
His expression darkened as a wicked smirk spread across his face. “You seem surprised.”
“Well, fucking yeah I’m surprised,” I said, sweeping my hand over my face. “You…”
“I’m here to tell you that everything that happens in this barn is one-hundred-percent consensual.”
“Told ya!” The guy hollered from the stall next to me.
Simon’s glasses glinted as he glanced at the other stall. “Thanks, Benny.”
“Wait, so—”
Simon looked me in the eye. “So everything he told you is true, yes. We meet up once a month here. Everyone is here only because they want to be—”
“But you’re not even eighteen yet,” I argued, leaning against the bars. “You’re not the age—”
“I don’t participate. Yet,” he said with a wicked grin. “I just watch.”
“That’s sick,” I said.
I really didn’t think it was that out of the question; my inner manipulator was more aiming to shame him so I could gain the upper hand.
A smile curled across Simon’s face. “Didn’t seem so sick when you and your jock dude-bro boyfriend were watching us outside the window, did it? You sat there for a good ten minutes, watching our sub of the night take a pounding.”
I stepped back from the bars as if electrocuted.
“Oh yes. We were watching you.” He took a step toward the bars. “And you liked it.”
“Cut the Stanford Prison Experiment bullshit and let me out of here,” I said coldly.
Luckily, Simon couldn’t see my fingers twitching at my sides. But from the look on his face—that delighted fucking gleam in his eye, I knew that he was reveling in the fact that he had the power.
A Dom, a voice in the back of my head uttered. That’s right—in all that weird BDSM stuff, Doms were the ones that had all the power and played with it. Made the subs do whatever they wanted. They were addressed as Sir…
Benny called from the stall next door. “Just let him outta here, Simon. He’s… (hiccup) not into it. I don’t think he’s gonna tell.”
An evil smile curled on Simon’s face. “That all depends.”
“Depends on what?”
“Depends on whether or not you keep this quiet.”
“Of course I’m not going to tell,” I said on the wings of relief. “First of all, who would believe me if I told?”
“You have a point,” Simon said, beginning to pace outside the stall. “If there was only one person that witnessed our little… playroom out there, I might be inclined to believe you and let you go. But. There were two of you.”
I gritted my teeth and thought of Kyle.
Was he safe? Did they have him in another horse stall like this? Or…
Or was he in the center of the circle?
Make him say his plan, my inner manipulator urged, leaning back in his Captain Kirk chair and interlacing his fingers. Ask him what he plans to do. Make him feel smart and important.
“So what are you gonna do? Just leave us in here?”
Simon shrugged. “Not against your will, no.” He turned on his heel and began to pace, his dark cloak billowing out behind him like a Death Eater.
“Well, I’m being held against my will right fucking now,” I snarled. “How do you reason that away?”
“It’s well within the rules of this place,” Simon said. “During the ceremony, we have the power to imprison. But once the ceremony’s over, you’ll be free to go.”
“The ceremony meaning… that guy getting fucked out there?”
“The collaring ceremony, yes,” Simon said. He tilted his head and his glasses gleamed like an anime villain. He rushed toward the bars and his face became serious. “But once we let you go, you cannot tell anyone.”
I stepped away, not from surprise of his closeness, but from the seriousness of his expression.
In that moment, Simon didn’t look like a dweeby high school kid.
He looked like a man. A man with a warning; powerful and frightening.
A man of his word.
I gritted my teeth, trying to thi
nk ahead. Trying to plan and plot how things would shake out from here, but my inner manipulator was curiously silent.
A sound drifted through the air—it sounded like music. It echoed around the barren walls of the barn, bounced off the concrete floor.
Satanic music.
Simon tilted his head to listen, then said, “Ah. They should be almost done now.” Then he turned to me. “I have to be going, now.”
“Why, is it your turn to get fucked?” I asked.
Simon chuckled. “No. When the time comes, I’ll be the one doing the fucking.”
I blinked a few times and pictured Simon as the one obscured in the robe, his pink cock poking out and slamming into the supple ass of some twink.
Desire swirled in my gut, thick and heavy like molasses. My cock pressed against the front of my pants with need.
But then I thought of what Kyle and I saw through the window all those years ago. That guy… how he was trying to get away. How the others surrounded him, held him down on that shabby mattress on the floor while one of them shoved his cock into his ass…
Simon turned to leave.
I felt the questions simmering under the surface of my thoughts like black oil swirling underwater. They would not mix with the quiet calculations I tried to pull over myself like a security blanket.
“Wait,” I said.
Simon paused, then turned to me, his glasses flashing in the dim light of the moon.
“I have to know…” I said. My mouth suddenly went dry. I felt vulnerable at having to ask a question, let alone one like this. It felt like I was poking at something locked deep in my mind; pulling out a tangled mat of hair from a shower drain.
But on an intuitive level, I knew Simon had the scissors to cut it.
“Years ago,” I began, feeling my lower lip tremble. I tried my best to stiffen it; to not show any signs of vulnerability. “I looked in that same window. And I saw someone—a guy, getting raped. Raped by all of your friends in the cloaks out there.”
Simon’s face was unreadable. “There’s no rape here.”
“But I saw it,” I said, almost begging.
Simon’s tongue poked out of his mouth and he licked his lips. “Sometimes the subs act like they’re being raped—it’s a complicated sexual thing, and I don’t have time to explain it to you. But it’s all pre-agreed upon, there’s a safe word and everything that will make everyone stop. And this club—this gathering—has always been that way, since it started in the seventies.”
Kyle From High School Page 9