The Secret Journey

by Paul Christian

And now we’re going to move you back. When you hear “Attention,” you move your hands back down to your thighs, fingers curled, thumbs back where the seam of your pants would be, back straight, stomach in, tits out. Understand how these positions go together. From Rest you can move to Attention, from Attention you can move to Rest. Each one is a different way to display your body, every one offers a different level of control over your being. Each makes you mine in just one more degree. Be ready to count, one hundred heartbeats. Be ready to give yourself to me.

  Attention.

  Hands in the small of your back, legs shoulder width apart, chin up, stomach in, tits out. One hundred heartbeats and turn the page.

  Rest.

  Heels together, arms straight down by your sides, fingers curled, thumbs running vertically down your thighs. Keep your chin up, eyes focused on that single spot on the wall. One hundred heartbeats and turn the page.

  Attention.

  Very good, honey. Now that you’re getting good at this part, it’s time to learn a new position, and the position is “Kneel.” There are rules to this. You’re told to Kneel only from the position of Attention, and when you are told, you’re going to drop to your knees, right knee going down first, left leg going down last, and otherwise it’s exactly the same as Attention. Back straight, stomach in, tits out. Sound familiar, honey? Head level, eyes locked on the wall. Obedience is what I want from you right now. Obedience is what I’m going to get. One hundred heartbeats.

  Kneel.

  Now to go back to Attention from Kneel is very simple. Right leg up first, then left leg, and it’s still back straight, stomach in, chin up, head level, eyes locked on that spot on the wall. One hundred heartbeats.

  Attention.

  One hundred heartbeats.

  Kneel.

  Very good honey, very obedient.

  Attention.

  Kneel.

  Attention.

  Kneel.

  And now it’s going to get good. The next position is called “Present.” And all that’s going to happen when you hear "Present" is you’re going to bend at the waist, bring your body forward, with your forearms forward and your right cheek on the ground. Think about how it’s going to feel to be commanded into that position, honey. Think how it’s going to feel with your ass in the air and your pussy presented. Think about how exposed you’re going to be. Think about how you could be explored, examined, probed, fucked. Think about how you could be whipped, on your ass, on your cunt, on your rigid little clit, on your tempting little anal ring.

  Think about how much you’re mine. One hundred heartbeats.

  Present.

  One hundred heartbeats.

  Kneel.

  One hundred heartbeats.

  Present.

  And there’s one more command, honey. One more word to complete your obedience training, complete your conversion from independent woman to sexual slave. And that command is “Open.” When I tell you "Open," all you’re going to do is move your right leg eighteen inches to the right, nothing more, nothing less. And you’re going to be so open for me then, your wet and swollen slit parted and glistening. You’ll be on display in the most fundamental way, and the scent of sex is going to waft from your cunt to fill the room. You’re going to be mine so completely, honey. You’re going to be compelled to it, driven to it, you aren’t going to be able to help yourself. And in fact all you wish right now is that I would stop talking and get on with it, allow you to spread yourself, present yourself, to prove to me just how much you’re mine.

  So do it, honey. One hundred heartbeats.

  Open.

  And you’re so hot like this, honey. You’re such an easy, eager slut for me, the total sex slave, put through your paces, obedient and obeying, pliant and compliant. You’re ready for me now, ready for me to put my cock in you, ready for me to fuck you, in your cunt, in your mouth, in your ass. You’re ready for me to tie you, to whip you, to spurt my sperm all over you. You’re ready to be used and abused, anything so long as you’re not ignored, anything, so long as the deep need burning in your womb is satisfied, anything, as long as you know that you're pleasing my cock.

  Anything.

  And so I want just one thing from you, honey, and that is your orgasm in this position, I want the physical proof of your desire. I want you to slide a hand down to your clit in the certain knowledge that moving out of position is going to earn you a slice of the riding crop across your tight stretched ass. I want you to do that because you need the release too much to care about the pain, and I want your fingers going up and down on the rigid, bursting nub of your clit so fast they’d be just a blur on any porn director’s camera.

  I want you to give it all up for me, honey, in this most submissive of submissive positions, and I want you to be saying my name when you do come, screaming it out, begging for it, begging for it harder. Just think about how you look to me right now, honey, face down, ass up, wet and spread and pleading for it, obedient to whatever I say. Just think about how hard my cock is right now, honey. Think about how much you’re mine, and think about how good it’s going to be when your climax hits.

  And it's going to hit. Right now.

  Now!

  Good girl, such a good girl. You can relax now, we're done. But I want you to go over this exercise until you know your positions by heart. I want you to go over them every night, before you go to bed. Strip, rest, attention, kneel, present, open. Every night, honey, because you're mine. And at the end, when you're naked, kneeling, presented, open, I want your climax, offered up like your pussy is now, a ritual supplication of your body and your mind. I want that, honey, because I want you to be ready for me, whenever I want you, however I want you. I want that because there's nothing I want more than you. Right now, and always.

  The Writer

  The train wheels pound steadily in the darkness and cold rain streaks the windows, blurring city lights into a semi-surrealistic landscape. The car is almost deserted. Across from me an expensively dressed businessman pores over no-doubt important files. A few seats down a young woman in a dress skirt and a jacket that was probably warm enough this morning is immersed in a book. My reflection stares back at me, half mirrored over the cityscape, showing a man I somehow have trouble recognizing. My journey is almost at an end, three planes, two trains, and a continent ago. I have two more station stops and a cab ride left. I’ve been traveling sixteen hours, grabbing sleep where I can, eating overpriced and under-nourishing food, occupying my time with books, with shallow conversation with people I’ll never see again, with the idle contemplation of the world seen from far, far above.

  I had intended to put some work into my book, but my laptop remains in my carry-on bag, untouched since takeoff. In sixteen hours of enforced idleness I can produce ten thousand words of undying prose, given only inspiration. Inspiration was lacking for the trans-ocean flight, for the entire journey, has been lacking for a year now. My production file remains as empty as the house I’m returning to. The reason is simple. Emily is gone, gone so completely it sometimes seems she was never there at all.

  It has never been easy, this past year, but it’s not quite so hard when I’m away. Because of that I’ve made a point of being away, I tell my publisher I’m promoting my previous book, but in reality I’m avoiding the one I should be writing now. This last trip has been six months living out of a suitcase, forty cities, twenty-four thousand frequent flyer miles. I’ve signed autographs and given lectures, gone to launch parties and reading circles. I’ve shaken hands, been interviewed on every form of media the modern world allows. The only thing I haven’t done is forgotten, and the only problem is away never lasts, and the hardest thing of all is coming home to an empty house.

  Everyone loved my last book, everyone wants to know when the next one is coming out. “Soon,” I tell them, which I know is a lie. I’m supposed to be done by now, and my agent calls me weekly for updates. My publisher has given up calling.

  The train s
lows, glides into the next station, they announce the stop. The businessman closes up his briefcase and gets off. Outside snow is starting to blend into the rain, heavy wet flakes sticking to the window to melt there, to slide down and away and off the bottom edge of the window to vanish into the darkness. I consider pulling out the laptop and at least going through the motions of writing, but there’s no point. The empty screen, the beckoning keyboard, these are an exquisite form of self-torture that I'm simply too tired to indulge in right now.

  The doors close and the train slowly accelerates, the wheels beating against the rails in a rising rhythm. I watch as we start to outrace cars on the highway that parallels the tracks and I think about their drivers, each isolated in their own metal and glass cocoon, each immersed in their private thoughts as they drive. All of us are sharing this slice of the night in total anonymity, all of us are united only in our desire to be elsewhere, quickly.

  My problem is, I never get to elsewhere, and that desire never goes away. I’ve been running from myself, running from my memories, and I’m running out of places to run. An industrial park slides past, tanks and hoppers and pipes at a chemical plant, thousands of concrete highway barriers ranked with military precision at a huge industrial building where, I presume, they make highway barriers. I’m somehow surprised that there’s a market for them large enough to support a plant this big, but the evidence is in front of me. It’s a thought I’ve had before, I’ve taken this train on this same route dozens, maybe hundreds of times. I recognize the landmarks, I know that the level crossing comes after the lumberyard, and then we’re into a mile or so of semi-suburbia before the bridge over the ravine where the park is, and yet if you asked me to describe any of it when I wasn't looking at it, I'd be able to give only the vaguest description. The mind is a funny thing.

  If you asked me to describe Emily it would be different. Every detail of her is burned into my heart. I can close my eyes and feel the texture of her hair, and see the cluster of freckles on her lower back. I know about the tiny, odd bump on the back of her right ear. I can hear her voice, see her smile, taste her kiss. Could she only have been my imagination, so real and so detailed? There have been other women since Emily. None of them have been as real as her. None have done anything more than highlight the place in my life she no longer fills. It isn’t her fault that she’s gone, it isn’t their fault they aren’t her. Could I really have dreamed her, when my imagination can’t conjure a single word?

  The night slides by with a million strangers out there in it. Surely, somewhere in that teeming multitude, there must be another woman as brilliant, as beautiful, as alive as she was. I sometimes wonder if it’s even possible to love, truly love, more than once in your life. You can dream of love, but can you love a dream? The mind is a funny thing.

  The wheels pound, the miles pass, and then we’re rolling into another station, the last stop, my stop, end of the line. I collect my baggage and get up when the doors open. As I stand up I notice the woman looking at me. She’s attractive, mid-to-upper twenties, well dressed in conservative style. I give her a polite smile and go out onto the platform, leaning against the wind as the sleet whips into my face. I hurry into the warmth of the station, get out my phone and call a cab as I walk.

  “Excuse me?”

  I look around. It’s her.

  “Yes?”

  “Can I ask your name?”

  I tell her.

  She smiles. “I thought I recognized you.” She holds out the book she was reading and a pen. “Can I get you to sign this?”

  I take the book. It isn’t the one I’ve been signing for the last six months, it’s another one, with another name on the black and red cover. I look at her. “This isn’t me.”

  “No, but it’s your pseudonym.”

  My eyebrows go up. “Not a lot of people know that.”

  “It’s an open secret.”

  “Only if you care to do the research.”

  She nods. “I saw your talk at the university, last year.”

  “Who should I sign it to?”

  She tells me.

  “Is there anything in particular you’d like me to write?”

  “Anything you want.” She smiles.

  I think of something clever, sign the book and hand it back. “Did you like it?”

  She hesitates. “It was… intense...”

  Intense. Yes, it was intense. There’s a reason I used a pseudonym, used a different agent and a different publisher. This is the only thing I’ve managed to write since Emily, and unlike what I’m supposed to be writing, the words in this book came spilling out of me like blood from a mortal wound. It doesn't fit in with anything else I've written. It doesn't fit in with anything anyone else has written. I don’t want friends and family knowing that I wrote it. Some things are so personal you can only share them with strangers.

  “But did you like it?” I ask.

  She blushes, looks down, her voice dropping a few decibels. “Yes. Yes, I liked it very much.”

  "I'm glad." I allow myself a smile at her embarrassment. I know as much about her as she knows about me now, perhaps too much for strangers to know about each other when they’re standing face to face. A cab pulls up in front of the station. "This is me,” I say. “It was nice meeting you."

  “Listen, are you… I mean… Where are you going? Maybe we can share…?”

  “I’m going to dinner,” I say it as I decide it. I don't want to go back to my empty house, not yet. "Anywhere downtown works for me."

  "I live downtown."

  The driver opens the trunk and we throw our bags in. I hold the door open for her as she gets into the warm darkness of the back of the cab. I give the driver my destination and she gives him hers, and we talk about the miserable weather, and then the political situation, and a few other trivialities. We're well enough acquainted by the time the cab pulls up in front of my restaurant that it seems natural for me to invite her in with me, and natural for her to accept.

  We go in, are seated, and continue talking about everything, about nothing. She is, perhaps, just one more passing travel acquaintance, a person who'll fill a few hours of my life and then vanish without trace. Still, she is pleasant and intelligent company, witty and articulate, and there is, unspoken between us, the inherent possibility that there might be more to come. Dinner is ordered, arrived, is eaten, dessert follows, and then coffee, and then she asks me a question.

  "So is your book based on real life?" She almost manages to be casual in asking.

  I smile. "Real life is all I have to base it on."

  "I mean, have you done... any of those things?"

  I nod. "At some time or other." I watch her face, watch her eyes as she tries to ask the next question. I save her the struggle by turning her first question around. "Have you?"

  "No."

  "Would you like to?"

  She looks at me, our gazes lock. She bites her lower lip and it seems to take forever before she answers. I give her points for what I see in her face while I wait. There is excitement, but also cool calculation. She wants what I can give her, but she's also not going to rush into something based purely on desire. She’s a smart girl, and that just makes her more attractive. Eventually she nods. "Yes."

  I beckon the waiter, give him my credit card and get him to call a cab for us.

  "Are we going to your place?" she asks at the door while we wait for another cab.

  "Yours is closer."

  "But don't you need..."

  "Everything I need is already in your mind."

  Her eyebrows go up at that, but she doesn't say anything. The cab ride is short, it would have been a pleasant walk in better weather. I put my hand on her knee and open her legs, slide my hand up her thigh, under her skirt to find her panties soaking wet. I smile to myself. It's going to be a good night. I make idle conversation with the cab driver while I explore her cunt and she squirms on the seat, biting her lip to avoid gasping and moaning. We pull up in fron
t of her building and I tell the driver to wait.

  "Are you going to be that fast?" she asks, half teasing, half questioning.

  "We'll see."

  She's practically skipping with excitement as she leads me in, leads me up a flight of stairs to a small but well appointed two bedroom apartment. I kiss her at the threshold gently, briefly, not nearly enough, and then let her show me her space. It's nice, hardwood floors, slightly messier than I would have expected, breakfast dishes still in the sink, books piled on the coffee table and on bookshelves against one wall, an expensive stereo system and racks and racks of compact discs. She's a book lover and a music lover, and I take a moment to glance at the titles in her collection.

  The second room is her study, and her desk is there with her computer, and as she's showing me I take her hands and guide them down so her palms are flat on her desk. She stops talking, and her eyes are big and wide. I undo my belt. It sounds like a snake as I slide it out through the loops. She gasps, looking back over her shoulder to see what I'm doing.

  "It works like this," I say, pulling up her skirt. "You're going to get twelve with the belt. You keep your hands on the desk. If you take them off, we're done."

  "Done?"

  "Done. I'll go home, the cab is waiting. No fault, no blame, no hard feelings."

  She nods. "Okay." There's a tremble in her voice.

  "You're going to count them."

  She nods again. "Yes."

  "Yes, sir," I remind her, because she expects to be reminded.

  "Yes, sir."

  Her underwear is basic black, no obstacle to the belt. I raise it and pause to admire the curve of her luscious buttocks, her trim waist. There have been other women since Emily, but there hasn't been this. I haven't had the emotional strength. Do I have it now?

  I bring the belt down to snap across her ass. She yelps, gasps and almost brings her hands off the desk in sheer reflex. At the last moment she manages to keep her fingertips down.

  "One. Sir."

  I slash the belt down again. "Two, sir." The pain is clear in her voice, but her hands stay flat this time.