by AnonYMous
He helps me to kneel now and then stands before me. My eye line is on his crotch and I’m breathing hard. He reaches behind my head and pulls my long thick auburn hair away from my face and twists it to form a ponytail down my back. He steps behind me and reaches forward to place a red ball gag in my mouth before buckling it hard against the back of my head.
He circles me twice, before stopping and crouching in front. His eyes are on the same level as mine. He leans forward slowly to bite my left nipple while staring up and into my eyes. I flinch as his teeth increase their pressure. I know not to make a sound, but my slight movement has him on his feet.
He walks behind me, picks up a cane and strikes me on my arse, twice. I groan with pleasure. He walks back and reaches into his pocket for the nipple clamps and watches me closely as he crouches and clips one clamp to my left nipple. I tense as the pressure takes hold and he smiles, hard, at hearing me whimper. He clips the other to my right nipple, knowing that I’m going to take the pain for him.
He stands in front of me, undressing slowly and deliberately, and I am wet with desire. His cock is so hard it stands against his belly. He likes watching the pain I am enduring because I cannot reach out to him.
He moves forward and pulls my head towards him. With one deft movement the gag is unbuckled from my mouth and I am sucking him, licking him, wanting to fuck him. His upper leg muscles tighten and I know he is liking this. My mouth is tight around his cock as it moves up and down, slightly faster, then slightly slower. Then he pulls out and his cock is glistening with my saliva mixed with his pre-cum.
He pulls me to my feet and is kissing my neck. I am shaking. He asks me if I have been a good girl today. When I don’t respond, he pulls the nipple chain down until I shake my head. I have been naughty and need to be punished.
He leaves the room and I know I’ll have to wait for my punishment, my pleasure.
Six weeks earlier
In the garden amongst the white gardenias and huge deep green ferns, I was reading Be Fluent in Mandarin in Twenty Days. Encouraging as the title was, twenty years was more likely the timeframe for me.
I took a break and looked up to admire the tiny waterfall I had created the year before. It attracted all sorts of butterflies and their graceful, albeit erratic, flight provided colour to the movement of the water behind them. I stood up, placed my book on the chair and walked over to break off a dead frond from one of the ferns. There were ants all over the tip of it and I threw it over the low box hedge into the compost behind.
My husband Henry and I had moved from Sydney to Shanghai two years earlier because his textile company was proving a success and expanding at a great pace into Asia, particularly China. We had met in the mid-1990s in a cafe beneath the Brisbane office where I was working for three months on a film set. He had just formed his company and was using the cafe as a makeshift office at the time.
In that time I learned that Henry was younger than me by four years, was passionate about textiles—especially silk—was a regular gym junkie, and had never been married. Once my contract was complete I returned to Sydney and we had continued long-distance relationship over two more years before Henry made the move into my apartment in Sydney.
As film design wasn’t an easy profession to get into in China, I decided to study Mandarin part-time at Jiao Tong University. The students in my class came from all over the world and I delighted in the way we all learnt a little of each other’s native words while we were trying to get a handle on the official language of China.
My Mandarin teacher said it was very auspicious to have a colourful water feature in the garden, as it would help the chi flow and create a hatching place to attract butterflies. I had read that some of the ancient cultures believed butterflies symbolised a rebirth of life after being cocooned for a period of time. I looked at the butterfly character I had painted on the miniature old Chinese hutong door we’d bought at the Russian markets in Beijing, where we’d holidayed in the first month of our move to Shanghai. It was, I suppose, another way of attracting butterflies into my sanctuary.
Moving to Shanghai had a secret meaning for me. I had adopted out my son Ezra when I was eighteen years old and all I knew was that his adoptive parents had moved to Asia. Somewhere.
The agency had linked us together by telephone when he was a teenager, but he’d showed a total lack of interest in my first two questions. The questions to be expected from a mother who had given her son away: What’s your name now and where do you live? He never answered me.
Whenever I thought about him I was reminded of Hemingway’s six words that spoke an entire story: ‘For sale: baby shoes, never worn.’ I hadn’t bought the shoes because I had known from the beginning that I wouldn’t keep my child. And I had never been able to tell Ezra’s father Tomas about his existence, before Tomas died.
My mobile started to vibrate on the garden table and I quickly touched ‘answer’ before the ringtone disturbed the peace.
Henry had just opened an office in Thailand and the new sales manager had not appeared at work for the past two days, so Henry had booked a flight to Bangkok and left home early this morning. It was part of the reason for his success, I thought, as he kept a close eye on every aspect of his business. Henry was the type of person who didn’t accept failure easily.
His distinctively deep voice sounded even deeper on the phone. I could hear airport noise in the background as he asked me to email a presentation that was on his other laptop at home. I could tell he was stressed—he added that it was critical and needed to be done immediately.
I sighed, said a silent goodbye to the peaceful surrounds and walked inside, stopping midway up the stairs to admire the view up the Huangpu River through the glass wall on my left. A mechanical crane was sitting on the edge of the river across on the Puxi side, shifting iron pipes on the riverbank; long low boats were moving up and down the river’s edge, carrying various supplies to designated building sites as far as I could see. A few minutes passed before I dragged my attention away to focus on my task at hand.
Going to Henry’s home office, I turned on his laptop and while I waited impatiently for Windows to perform its various functions, I decided a fresh pot of coffee would be a good idea. I walked back down the stairs, picking up a dead butterfly on the floor outside the kitchen.
Taking the rubbish outside I thought about my sister Zara in Sydney, who would have been horrified about throwing bottles, plastic and food refuse into a single bin. Apparently, recycling didn’t translate into Mandarin.
Returning to the office, I found the email application had opened automatically without requesting a password; an irony I would contemplate later. Minimising that window I then proceeded to open the presentation and divide the sixty slides into two documents.
While gmail was sending the presentation, the computer’s email application window popped up again, willing me to read unread emails. There were none. However, in the left pane, a folder named ‘Chrystal’ caught my eye and my hands went cold.
Chrystal had been Henry’s PA for three years in Brisbane, but she had moved to Italy with her husband and son the year before we moved to China. Henry was always much more animated whenever he was in her company and I wondered whether he may have been even more animated when I wasn’t there. She had once confided to me before she was married that Henry had paid a lease for an apartment closer to the office so she wouldn’t have to make the 45 minute trip from the coast each day. I suspected that this gesture was him playing ‘hero’, to facilitate a conquest on another level, namely horizontal, but I wasn’t sure and had never confronted him about it.
Chrystal had visited Shanghai last year on her way to Sydney for a brief holiday which at the time I thought rather odd as it wasn’t a normal stopover destination from Milano. I had met her for coffee and had taken a friend of mine, Ben, with me and his words echoed with me now—‘There’s something sly about Chrystal.’ Strangely, both she and Henry had caught the same flight out t
o Hong Kong that evening.
Henry and I had only recently bumped into her husband, Justin, when we travelled to Hong Kong on one of Henry’s business trips. The men knew each other through business ventures and seemed to get on well, but then I never really knew how Henry felt about fellow colleagues, especially if they were male. When we were checking in at our hotel, Justin was behind us in the queue, so we arranged to meet him at the bar in the foyer half an hour later. In the meantime I asked him about Chrystal and he looked down before telling us that he was going through a nasty divorce with her. I remember glimpsing the concentration on Henry’s face.
Justin was waiting at the bar when we got there. He ordered drinks and launched into his story before we had a chance to breathe. ‘I never got the right of reply. I arrived home one day after a two-week business trip and there was an envelope on the dining table. Inside were divorce papers, awaiting my signature. You know Chrystal now lives back in Australia with my son? He is the only reason I go there now. The only reason.’
He looked sad and I heard the determination in his voice, yet I asked him for Chrystal’s mobile number, to lend her some support, somehow. I didn’t know why I felt that way, but I knew there was always another side to every person’s story. I texted her a brief message to say I would call her soon.
But for some reason, since then I had not texted again, nor spoken to her.
I moved the mouse over the email folder, hesitating before clicking it. I saw three email headers to the right. Judging by the date stamps, I figured they were written not long before she had visited Shanghai last year.
I double-clicked the first message and started to read the latest thread.
‘I will be there for the 4th. We are partnering with a small German company to open our opportunities into Europe. I’ll call you at home in the next couple of days to confirm. Henry’
‘Not sure if I can take the time off work because as you know I may be getting a promotion. It would be great tho’ if you’re over here on the 4th of next month for my birthday. I will wear the red set you bought for me! Chrystal x’
‘I said, I want to take you back to Spain. You are in my head every waking moment, I wish you were in my bed instead. Your voice on the phone the other night was making me crazy. I miss your lips, your eyes and your sexy legs. Henry’
I stopped reading and closed the email application.
The phone rang and I let it go to the answering service. Somewhere in the background I could hear Henry’s message being recorded—he was saying something about his old boss. I wasn’t listening; I was immobilised.
Their dark secret was in front of me, on Henry’s laptop, in our home.
I woke from a wretched sleep, switched on the lamp and stole a glance at the old Chinese clock beside the bed, willing it to be night-time, so my pain would be blanketed in darkness. It read 1.31 a.m., four hours before dawn.
Having no energy I felt a dire need of water as the tears had sapped all the fluids from my body. I sat up slowly, planted my feet on the floor and pushed my body up from the bed. Walking unsteadily to the bedroom door I grabbed and turned the door handle—not only to open it, but also for support.
A piercing light suddenly filled the room, making me flinch. I leaned against the door jamb, to make sense of the scene, and glanced back at the clock, which still read 1.31 a.m. The clock had stopped, I realised, and now the harsh daylight had my full attention.
I reached for my sunglasses from the coffee table and squinted at the digital time on the iPod crib. It was Friday noon and the heat of the day was making me sweat. I fell sideways into the leather chair. A red light was blinking on the telephone. I pressed play and heard Henry’s voice saying that Mark—his old boss and a friend of us both—was in town and had invited us to the Face Bar in the old French Concession on the other side of the river tonight. Henry would go directly from the airport and I would meet them at 6.30 p.m.
Back in his office I stared without expression at the computer screen. I opened the file manager and found the entire email application database file, which included all Henry’s emails, calendar meetings and contacts. I copied it onto the new memory stick that had been lying innocently in the desk drawer, and then put it amongst my other memory sticks in a black velvet bag in my satchel. I was a stickler for keeping copies of everything digital, in case I lost everything.
It seemed like only minutes had passed, but my watch told me otherwise. It was now 6 p.m., and in the intervening time I had somehow managed to make up my face and fashion my body into the green silk dress we had bought in Tahiti five years before. I accessorised it with a long Swarovski crystal necklace, worn back-to-front to emphasise the low back of the dress, which was cut to the base of my spine.
The doorbell chimed. A taxi had arrived to take me to Shanghai French Concession Building Four on Ruijin Er Lu, across the river in Luwan. I slipped into a pair of high-heeled cream Jimmy Choo shoes, picked up the house keys and casually brushed Henry’s favourite Ming vase backwards from the high wall shelf in the foyer to the marble floor below, shattering it into a million pieces.
My anger had just begun.
It was raining hard as I stepped from the taxi, narrowly missing a cyclist who had swerved to avoid the open car door and me. I looked down at my cream shoes, which were fast becoming a muddy brown from the water gushing up over the gutter and splashing onto an uneven footpath.
I ran to take cover under a huge plane tree and took off my shoes to tip out the water that was squelching under foot. The beauty of some of the original French residences of the early 1900s in this district, with their mansard roofs and shutters, always took my breath away, no matter how many times I visited.
Between the umbrellas passing in front of me, I got an occasional glimpse of the old red building opposite, where I was heading. But, attempting to cross the street amidst the cars, bikes and occasional dog—in bare feet—I began to wonder whether this was a mad suicide attempt to escape my impending soirée.
Finally reaching the other side, I walked into the gardens and savoured the ever-changing scene before me. Lots of different people from many places, casting shadows in the candlelight in front of the backdrop of old and new Shanghai. The whole scene softened by the changing autumn colours of the leaves on the plane trees.
Slipping into my shoes, I faltered. I didn’t want to go further but, before I could escape, I saw Henry sitting on a chair inside the bar with Mark, who was waving and directing me over to them. I felt sick, and very tired, and I made my way across the garden towards the old red building.
Henry was wearing the Canali suit I had bought him for Christmas and his athletic physique was visible when he stood up as I approached; my smile froze as he kissed me on the cheek. I pulled my wet hair back from my face as I leaned over to kiss Mark before sitting on the pink chaise longue beside Henry. I ordered a pinot gris and listened to them talk about their past employ while I began to prepare for combat.
Henry was trying to encourage me to talk about life in Shanghai, but I was too angry to speak. I was in a very dark place and answered in cold monosyllabic answers. Suddenly Mark’s attention switched to me and he asked, ‘Whatever happened to Chrystal? Do you still keep in touch? Where is she now?’
Mark had just fired the first bullet and smashed my darkness into a vicious white. Turning to Henry I could hear the strain in my voice as I replied, ‘Why don’t you answer that, Henry? After all, you’re the one who’s been screwing her for . . . how many years now?’
An old myth states that sudden silences mean it is twenty-past or twenty-to the hour, and that an angel is flying above. I glanced at the antique French clock in the corner, which read 7.20 p.m., and I smiled, because there were no angels in this place.
The look on Mark’s face was one of shock; he quickly stood up and suggested he should leave. He kissed me on the cheek and shook Henry’s hand, and then quickly walked away, actually half-ran out of the building and across the grass.
> Henry was smiling with a strange almost lunatic look in his eyes. Despite the fact that I could feel his fury, I asked him how long he had been sleeping with Chrystal and whether there were other women in his hoard.
His wineglass exploded against the mirror behind me and its contents splattered the left side of my back. Before I could react, he had exited the bar and left me in a soaking mess.
Ignoring the intense scrutiny of the other patrons, I walked with a white face to the bathroom and looked into the mirror. My embarrassment and anger had heated the tips of my ears to a fiery red. There was a trickle of blood on the back of my left arm, where a splinter of glass had struck. I washed away the blood, smiled at my reflection and said out loud the end of one of my favourite quotes:
‘. . . it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.’
I applied bronze powder to my cheeks and a neutral gloss to my lips before walking out of the bar, through the gardens and into a thick fog.
It was nearly 10.30 p.m. before I was able to find a vacancy in a tiny boutique hotel down on The Bund, the old financial district of the 1920s that had been converted over time into a street of six-star hotels and restaurants, exclusive bars and designer shops. Sitting in my room at last, on a large cane chair piled with cushions to the side of a kind of windowed alcove, I watched the river below, reflecting the colours that divide the east and west of modern Shanghai.
Suddenly I felt tired. I stood up and drew the curtains on the scene before me. I always looked forward to the solace of sleep, as a sort of prolonged pause in events and as a time of remembrance. Tonight I returned to the very beginning of my adult life.
Tomas
You were kneeling on the floor at the end of the bed and playing with my toes in your mouth. I was giggling, as I always did when we were together.