Hard Rain

by Melissa Vayle

Out into the centre of the room was not a vaulting horse but a high medical examination couch, or something, and beyond that, to the right a comfortable-looking leather easy-chair. She was aware at the same time, to her left, on the long wall, of another poster and further on, a glass-fronted cabinet. In the far off left-hand corner was what looked a bit like a double-bed.

  On the back wall was a large full-length mirror with her own distant reflection in it, like an apparition, staring back at her across this unearthly landscape. There were two shuttered windows either side, high up in the wall. Over to the right, in the corner, was what looked like a shower unit or at least something with shower curtains to it.

  Her eyes fell upon the centre of the room and the item of furniture which, at first, had struck her as a gymnastic vaulting horse in the near darkness, then as a medical examination couch but which now drew her closely as its washed-out features in the spotlight became clearer. She moved towards it through the original spotlight which shone on the empty floor. Momentarily dazzled, she emerged into the semi-darkness again, and came before the object illuminated under its own spotlight.

  ‘Oh God!’

  She stopped. She knew at once the nature of what now greeted her and slowly moved forward into the circle of light. Padded black leather. Solidly built wooden legs. The straps hung down limply from the sides, ends and legs. Hesitantly, she took hold of a long one which was dangling from near the top end of the couch and felt the strong, tough leather between her fingers. Instinctively, she brought the end of the strap up to her face, close to her mouth and nostrils. For a fleeting instant, she caught the faint whiff of a perfume she thought she knew. She sniffed the leather. There was nothing. It was gone. She must have imagined it. She let go of the strap at once.

  The thought of who might have been held tight by it seized her and she was already struggling to take in what her mind was now telling her. The thought that he had... he and that woman could possibly...could possibly... She recoiled from the apparatus, almost reeling from the impact of the thought. Her mind went numb. Her feelings swirled in a maelstrom of sensations and, as her stunned being tried in vain to recover its wit, one sense above all held sway over the turmoil within her. How could he!

  Dazed, she remained rooted to the spot as the seconds passed, her eyes riveted once more on the evidence before her. He couldn't! But no matter how hard her thoughts now protested this, a smaller, softer voice was already telling her quietly what she instinctively knew. The posters. This. The interview. And her. That woman... She half-turned from the couch.

  There, in the black backdrop of the full-length mirror on the wall in front of her, stood reflected the still, white ghost of an agonized soul which fixed her with a piercing stare. It said ‘Serves you right’. She spun round away from the mirror seeing nothing new but a gaping black chasm from dreams shattered. Try as she might, she could not reconcile her understanding of the man with this thing in his house. This thing and that woman. She felt like fleeing. She wanted to get away from the hideous room, from its ghastly message, from this thing and what he did to her. And then she stopped her reeling senses. To her. The thought repeated itself, again and again, and as her mind calmed down, something else was stirring inside her and she knew she had to stay. The straps were speaking to her softly and she was listening.

  She was back in the room and there, facing her from the wall opposite, was a narrow wooden cupboard, not much bigger than her. The door was glass-fronted though nothing could be discerned in the dark interior. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the left of the cupboard and there, on the wall, was another life-size photograph, this time of the back view of a woman. She approached the poster.

  The woman was in extremely high heels. Totally impractical, she thought, she wouldn't be doing much walking in those! Black stockings graced her shapely legs and were held by suspenders from her corset. This was tight-laced, black wet-look and it struck her as could be very uncomfortable to wear, but she could not help having a touch of envy at the woman's small waist. The cello at the exhibition came to mind. The juxtaposition of black stockings below and black corset above emphasized the woman's bare buttocks and Catherine was reminded of past boyfriends. Some were boobs men, others bums. It was clear what Michael was. The woman's shoulders were bare and her jet-black hair was pinned in a tight coil at the base of her neck.

  There was something rigorous about the composition, an imposition of strictness upon its subject, and Catherine could not suppress a growing realization that these images of women, like those in the gallery, appealed to her in a profound way. For a moment, she imagined the corset imposed on herself, wrapping her tightly and restricting her breathing, and trying to walk on those heels, mincing steps, as Michael ordered her around...Silly fool! She broke off and turned away, crushing the idea flat.

  Further along from the cabinet was another full-length mirror in the wall and beyond that, placed amongst an array of metal rings set at various heights in the wall, was yet another poster. The thought came to her: men do like pictures. She moved up to it and, for a moment, was perplexed. The woman was standing before the camera in a crystal-clear plastic raincoat. It struck her that the portrait was posed by a professional model as the composition was, without doubt, poised and artistic. Her posture was simple. Left arm extended, forearm bent slightly upwards and palm of her hand open, as if catching raindrops. Holding with her right hand an open umbrella, likewise of transparent plastic, casually over her shoulder, she was smiling. The plastic of the coat and umbrella was edged with a band of black and without these lines, Catherine thought, it would be virtually impossible to see these props.

  The woman's gaze was upward, off-camera, distant. The mac, and what was under it, drew Catherine's attention. It was knee-length, totally see-through, open wide at the neck, and fastened at the waist by a wide belt of the same material, tied tightly. The garment hung stiffly from her hips in folds. Under the mac, she wore what looked like a black V-neck, sleeveless sheath dress, stopping at mid-thigh. To complete the theme, she had on a most unusual pair of knee-length stiletto-heeled boots, also in matching crystal-clear plastic.

  As Catherine studied this odd couture, she found the overall effect rather appealing, if slightly bizarre - even tasteful maybe. The image of Anne in a mac which she had seen the other day flashed through her mind. What a contrast. Somehow, looking again at the picture in front of her, the use of light and texture in the image gave this woman a distinct sensuality without a hint of crude sex. She was beginning to approve Michael's sense of taste. She moved on.

  The bed in the left-hand far corner caught her attention. She moved closer towards it, almost tip-toeing edgily as she was drawn deeper into the room. As she went through alternating light and semi-dark, something - a flash - occurred up above in the play of light and, automatically, she looked up. For a moment nothing registered with her and she almost resumed her gaze at the bed. Then she saw them. Four huge hooks set into the large wooden beam in the ceiling, in a line. She stopped in her tracks and stared at this ensemble. The ends were rounded and they sat solid in the blackened wood. Nothing struck her further but though she turned her eyes back to the corner and the bed, something in her remained fixed on those hooks.

  The double bed was a stern-looking object, iron-framed with neo-Gothic detail, draped in black with none of the warmth of a bed meant for sleeping in. She stepped up to it and gazed down for several moments, almost forgetting the setting it was in.

  She touched the smooth, black silk sheets and ran her hand across the nearest pillow. The bed was surprisingly soft and inviting, out of all keeping with the rest of this room and its contents. She fought off the impulse to lie on it, though a warm feeling of pleasure came upon her. Not a rack but a wide luxury bed, she thought. Not a bondage couch but a cosy, rather gorgeous veritable love-nest. Almost. Boudoir came to mind. Did he make love to her? How often? Her spirit sagged with the cold blast of this thought. She stepped back and startled when she saw it. Hal
f-hidden in shadow at the far end of the iron headrest was dangling a pair of metal handcuffs. She studied them for a moment then turned away from the bed towards the opposite corner of the room.

  She passed a high aluminium step-ladder propped against the back wall and approached what looked like a shower unit in the corner. The curtain was drawn around the outside and, in the two brilliant spotlights trained on it, a dazzling sheet of light blinded her momentarily as she drew near. The curtain shimmered in the lights, giving scintillating flashes as the angle of her eye changed and, for a moment, she was enchanted by the spectacle of light. Up to it, it was, she saw, very glossy PVC, crystal clear, which she could see through. The woman and umbrella poster flashed through her mind. The shower was bare and she lightly pulled back the curtain. Bone dry. The thought flashed through her mind of him showering with her. That woman ... She let the curtain go and turned round to the room once more.

  Before her was a leather armchair on a swivel stand, something more appropriate to an executive suite, she thought. Strange. Only one chair. But no sooner had this thought come to her when she froze on the spot and gazed upon the long wall now to her left. The import of what the spotlight had in its beam was immediate and unmistakeably clear. She drew nearer the wall rack slowly, half as if like a moth attracted to the light, half as if in dire dread of being caught in it.

  The dark mahogany complemented the awesome display before her. Whips, straps... The words formed instantly in her but were not thought, more like felt. A quiver went through her as her chest tightened, her pulse quickened, her breathing became shallow. The stuff of nightmares, or was it? Like props in some theatrical production, they hung there awaiting the appropriate scene. Still, silent, innocuous. Props like, say, pocket watches, tea-pots, walking-sticks. Canes. There was a row of them not three feet away, and her mind was riveted on what it was that now confronted her.

  She had envisioned straps and whips many times in those private moments of fantasy but like so much that filled her imaginings - the props of her fancied scenes - they had always been vague and indistinct and she had never, ever seen a strap before, that is, a strap meant for whipping someone with. The thought appealed and appalled. Unlike the leather straps on the bondage couch yards away, these were crafted differently. They demanded pain. Vicious. The word sprung to mind as she gazed upon the collection, then, absorbed, she reached out and grasped one particular strap.

  Tawse, she told herself. It's a tawse, and took it off its hook. Thick black leather, several inches wide, a foot or more long, she grasped it by the end shaped for holding and was taken in by its springiness. Without thinking, she raised her hand and brought the strap down tentatively on the palm of her left hand and registered the feel of its rap. But it was more a light brush. A caress, she thought, as she stroked her palm with it momentarily.

  On impulse, she repeated the act, this time with more force and the sting in her outstretched palm jolted her. Almost at once, she brought the strap down on the back of her right leg and gave a muted cry at the sharp pain from her skin. She hissed through clenched teeth as the intense smart diffused through her leg. That hurt! came a voice within, and she looked down and examined her calf. In the brilliant spotlight there was nothing to be seen by way of a mark, or was that a washed-out streak of pink forming on the taut, curved flesh? She straightened up with the conviction that flagellation was not pleasurable after all. She knew instinctively that her fantasies might now be difficult to sustain. That hurt, repeated the voice, and she returned the strap at once to its hook.

  Her eyes moved from item to item in a steady gaze as she took in the full contents of the rack. Straps of all kinds, long, short, narrow, wide; some with metal studs embedded in them, some multi-tongued and looking vicious; canes, thick and thin, straight or with curved handles. School came to mind. There were crops for riding and beating. She recognized a dressage whip and immediately saw the image of a gymkhana on a beautiful summer's day, then a parade of women led out, naked and harnessed with halter and bit, being put through their paces by men wielding these whips.

  She scrubbed the thought from her mind as she saw the ping-pong bats or implements similar though in a variety of shapes. Why not a cricket bat? she thought, and go the whole hog? Then she realized she was being flippant and was surprised she was not as shocked as she had been earlier. Is this corrupting? The thought was hardly out before the answer came back: yes, bloody yes! Another voice now raised itself. Let it go! Get out! it urged her, and the thought of Michael doing things to that woman promptly brought on a feeling of revulsion. Get out! The voice was now more insistent, but she remained rooted to the spot.

  Straps, whips, canes, handcuffs, corsets, high heels, suspenders, bed, shower ... a whole plethora of things reeled off through her mind, and, agitated, she grabbed the strap she had earlier hit herself with and, for an instant, hovered on the spot as if to try it again, only this time harder. Let go! Stop it! The voice was now loud and shrill and, shaking, she struggled with it and a compelling urge to thrash herself hard to once and for all put an end to this grotesque nonsense and get it out of her system. But the thought of the searing pain pulled her up sharp and she suddenly returned the strap to its hook. She was now, however, truly agitated. The room had got hold of her and she knew, half frightened by the idea, half roused by a terrible flush of excitement, she knew all this that she had witnessed and that had happened to her could not be undone. At once, she resolved to go and turned for the exit.

  She made for the way out with a determination that put more vigour into her with each step but as she passed the cupboard on her left, her steps faltered. One last thing. The one last thing in the room she had not examined. She hesitated before the door to the room. A second. It'll only take a second. She turned and went up to the cupboard. It was long and fronted by two large sliding doors. She stepped up to the left one, paused, and braced herself. Then she slid the door open.

  For a moment, she could not grasp what now greeted her eyes. The floor was covered by yards of assorted rope and cord. Before her, arranged on two shelves, one at waist-level, the other slightly above eye-level, was a range of items, the nature of some of which she did not comprehend.

  The top shelf was obvious. To her left was a video camera and next to it, a still camera, a tripod and photography stuff. In the centre was a selection of vibrators and dildos in a range of sizes, shape, style and colour. She had once seen similar ones in the supplement to a saucy lingerie catalogue but was not tempted. Give me cock with a good man on the end, anytime, she had thought, but where are they? Over to the right were various sorts of obvious gags and blindfolds, some in elaborate arrangements of straps with buckles or even locks which shocked her, and rolls and rolls of wide black, shiny tape.

  The lower shelf was more cluttered. Over to the right was a stack of candles, several already having been burnt. Next to them was a collection of small metal devices adjustable by a kind of screw-clamp mechanism which she fiddled with but was at a loss as to what they were. There were cans of aerosol spray, labelled Rub-Dubba-Dub. Mystified, she picked one up. Latex, she read. The thought of actually polishing one’s clothing struck her as ridiculous and she put the can back. Next to it was a large, tangled heap of leather cuffs and straps. From the appearance of the leather, many had been well used. Finally, there were two stacks of photographs in colour.

  She picked up the first few off a stack and gasped in amazement at the first two. They depicted what seemed like a woman suspended off the ground from a trapeze, the bar of which was pressed into her back and kept in place at the elbows by her arms looped under it and held rigid by her wrists cuffed to each other by a chain in front of her. The woman, or so Catherine presumed it was from the physical shape of the person, was tightly bound from head to foot in shiny black garb, some kind of hooded mac perhaps - Maybe rubber, she thought, the way it was stretched tight - shiny black nylons, or rubber-like stockings - How weird! - and patent high heels. The victim – she w
as sure that was the right word - was gagged with black tape wound round the lower face and one particular close-up shot showed, from the look in the woman's eyes, the extremity of her plight. Catherine recoiled instinctively.

  Another photo showed a dark-haired woman, taken from slightly behind her, on her knees in a colourless, semi-see-through plastic raincoat which glistened dramatically under the camera’s flash. On her feet were black stilettos. Her wrists and arms were bound with rope, so tight in fact, that her elbows, incredibly, were nearly touching each other and Catherine winced at the thought of such stricture. Each ankle was strapped to either end of a very short bar that would clearly allow her still to walk but hobbled by the resulting very short mincing steps that she would be forced to take.

  Though her face was turned away, she was evidently gagged as a large black scarf covered her lower face and was knotted at the back of her head. It was obvious that she was naked under the mac as the cleft of her buttocks could just be discerned through the tight plastic. The final detail of her appearance left Catherine in no doubt that the woman’s role was purely as a sexual prop in a bizarre production to feed one man’s lust. The top part of her mac was unbuttoned and open and she could see, unmistakably, the tip of the woman’s left breast protruding. Sex object, she thought. So utterly demeaning! Catherine turned away.

  It was clear from the background of some of the photographs that the pictures were taken in the room in which she now stood. A chill came over her and she sensed a dark presence. The urge to flee the room was intense and the adrenaline was now flowing yet she remained rooted to the spot, fixed by the dazzling glow of the spotlight on the cupboard. She moved on to the other pile of photographs.

  This time there was a picture of a woman tied up in a wooden chair or rather to a chair as Catherine was taken aback by how much rope had been expended to restrain her, from shoulders down to ankles, pulling her in tight to the chair, making her sit bolt upright. The thought struck her that men who enjoyed tying up women must have considerable reserves of patience and be very painstaking: admirable qualities normally, but in these circumstances, attributes that only heightened the perversity of dark urges.