‘You've got a new toy, haven't you?’
‘Not so much new, at least to me, but yes, I've got a good toy to play with tonight. New to here. New to most of the things we could probably think of for him to do.’
‘Excellent. What do you have in mind?’
‘Nothing that will make him wish he'd never been born. Maybe enough to make him, very briefly, wish he hadn't met me. He doesn't know much about pain at the moment. I thought maybe that's where you could come in.’
‘Well, it is what I do.’
‘It's what you do best.’
‘I know it.’
The flogger dances across his back, a ballet of pain and lust. I watch the set of his shoulders as I work, can almost feel the gasping breaths he takes to work his way through the pain, working through his urge to beg me to stop, wanting to make me proud. We amass an audience, and I find myself tamping down my urge to perform; the theatre of the public scene has always drawn me in, but I try not to let it draw me in too heavily.
He cannot help but arch his back out to me; his desire to be spanked has transcended consciousness. If I stopped the scene right now and told him to stop presenting his ass unless he wanted a finger up it, he'd probably deny he was doing it, and from his perspective, he’d be telling the truth.
Keeping the flogger going, I beckon Xin over.
‘How do you feel about administering a spanking?’
‘I feel pretty good about it. You think he can take one? You know how I give them.’
‘I think he can take it.’
I slow the flogger down to let him know there's going to be a change, and stop it completely.
‘Xin is going to take over from me for a bit. Are you going to be a good boy for him?’
He nods, and I take his chin in my hand and turn his face to me. I stare into the embodiment of happy subspace; his eyes are dreamy, and a faint, goofy smile plays across his face. I kiss his forehead, and he murmurs a thank you.
Xin nods as I move away, and steps in. He whispers something in his ear, and I see him give a faint nod. Xin begins to stroke his buttocks, then warms them up with quick, light spanks.
The sound of the first hard slap ricochets between the bodies gathered watching the scene; I see a few people who are familiar with Xin's work wince, and I allow myself a smirk of pride.
They don't have much time to recover, however, as Xin's work happens thick and fast. My man is a trooper, and presents himself for the onslaught. His ass pinkens, then reddens, and I can see him bracing himself. Xin works harder and faster than I could, is an entirely different type of top. Soon I can hear him gasping, his breath coming out in little convulsions as his brain tries to deal with the onslaught of pain signals and their accompanying, contrary pleasure. The physical manifestations of this psychological drama are some of my favourite things to watch. The sub's dilemma: one more slap, and I will call the safeword and stop this. One more. One more. One more. And one more, until the idea of the safeword becomes unconscionable, as the pain and lust and joy merge into an all-encompassing world of sensation.
I can see that Xin is enjoying himself immensely. His pain lust supersedes any gender-based sexual orientation; his erection strains against his pants. I alternate my gaze between Xin’s crotch and his work, and feel myself get slick.
His ass is red, and the grunts coming forth are growing louder, and less for show. I give Xin time to finish up, he notes my nod and slows things down, moves back to tenderly stroking his ass cheeks. He leans in, at his back, and speaks again; I see a nod. And then Xin is bringing him over to me, laying him across my lap to inspect his handiwork, and stepping away for us to reconnect as domme and sub.
‘You're mine,’ I breathe, as he sobs and convulses across my lap, both sets of cheeks red, shaken and reborn. I mused on the aftertaste of those words in my mouth. I have never said them to anyone before. I am surprised to find I mean them.
6.
I wait. I don't want to make my presence known yet, not enough to intrude on his space.
As the students begin to pack up and ramble slowly out of the theatre, I watch him watch them, taking in the extent of his audience with a mild, benevolent gaze. If he feels any contempt toward them, any boredom at running through the same lecture and being asked the same questions again and again, he does not show it. He is every inch the twinkle-eyed, leather-patched professor.
The theatre is still a good quarter full when his gaze finally finds mine. I stare him down, and watch him freeze, eyes widening, posture stiffening slightly, like a hunted creature who's just sensed a predator. Holding his gaze, I throw my legs over the seat in front of me so that he can see that I've worn my boots, the ones that he likes, the ones that bite so hard into his skin. I watch him take in the challenge in my eyes. A few remaining students stare at me as they walk past on their way out, most with no real curiosity, some probably wondering who the random goth is and why I don't have black hair or pale makeup. Out of the corner of my eye, I see one girl twig what is happening, staring first at me, then him, then turning to her friend to whisper. No doubt she thinks that I'm seeking power, or a better grade. She is wrong.
I stand up, taller than usual in the boots. The cotton ruffles of my skirt swish against the bare skin of my thighs. I lift my skirt and show him, show everyone, that there is nothing underneath it. He is not the only one who has frozen now; all eyes are on the girl holding her skirt up around her waist, the girl who has no knickers. I can hear little intakes of breath; feel scorn and amazement and disbelief. And I turn and leave the theatre.
I count under my breath as I walk down the corridor, then smirk to myself as I hear his footsteps behind me.
The Window
Alone in her bedroom, Cecilia strips naked. Despite the long, mundane and seemingly endless week, she is horny, prowling through both her bedroom and her mind like a hungry tigress, searching for some inspiration – any inspiration – to feast off.
She stalks to the window and shoves the curtains apart, feeling a vicious thrill as they nearly tear from their rings. She unlocks the window and flings it wide open, letting the world in and exposing herself to the warm night air that surrounds her body. Her nipples harden and she marvels at how the breeze almost seems to suckle at her breasts. The air could be her lover; it moves across her naked form like a hundred tongues, exploring with delight the topography of her body, coaxing her skin into gooseflesh and letting her allow herself to tremble openly from its ministrations. The wind is her most shameless of lovers, worshipping her and wanting to selfishly posses her all at once.
She snaps from her reverie and scans the front garden, taking in the moonlit shapes of the plants and trees that hover among the branches and spread themselves across the lawn. She notices how the path leading to the front gate segregates them. Her garden is bushy, dense and unkempt; messy and wild like Cecilia would be if she let herself. The area near the front fence is particularly concentrated; it looks impenetrable.
Cecilia likes to think that people can see in even though she can’t see out. Cecilia likes to fantasise that someone’s out there, watching her, as she pads around her bedroom getting ready for bed; while she lies on her bed reading at night, naked and carefully arranged to give her imagined voyeur the best possible view. She’s excited when she thinks that just by lying there, she might be the object of fantasy of some silent observer. She watches porn videos with the sound turned right up and the window open and imagines that the man she’s invented, the man who’s out there lurking in the bushes on her front lawn, is watching their own porno inside his head as he masturbates over her.
She mounts the windowsill, dangling her legs over onto the cool brick and allows the air to caress her vulva. She perches with the knowledge that she could be visible to anyone. Slowly, solemnly, and with great relish, she begins to touch herself.
Zack wanders down the street, wondering where his disdain for suburbia has taken itself tonight. All he sees are endless rows of houses
like boxes, trees, shrubs and concreted driveways. Not even a dog shit on the nature strip, for fuck’s sake, and yet he can’t bring himself to feel properly scornful of all the coma-inducing sameness. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him. He’s too old for ennui; too young for a midlife crisis. He feels listless, like there’s no point to anything. Nothing and no one holds his attention for long. He hangs his head and watches his feet walk, convincing himself to be fascinated by the dragging of his footsteps.
He hears a noise coming from the house he’s walking past, and his head turns abruptly. It sounds like an animal crying out, and he wades through the bushes in front of the fence, his curiosity piqued. He is stunned at what comes into his view: a woman perched on a window ledge, legs flung wide, head thrown back, body in total surrender to her fingers as she touches herself, occasionally dipping inside to retrieve the moisture she is producing in plentiful amounts. He feels himself grow hard as he takes in her breasts with their erect nipples, her wide-open legs, and the fingers that play so skilfully with her own body. His cock throbs as the slick wetness on her fingers and pussy catches in the moonlight. He unzips and releases his cock, taking it firmly in his hand for the only time in months that it hasn’t been to urinate.
Cecilia is close to perfect bliss. Her body tenses, waiting for the leaps into ecstasy that it knows is inevitable. She no longer knows or cares if anyone is watching her; all she can focus on are the sensations her body is producing. She trembles, then as orgasm hits her body, rocks hard against the sill, so hard she risks falling into the garden. A howl of release escapes her throat and a dozen neighbourhood dogs reply. Her panting is loud and ragged, easily distinguishable from the front of the garden where Zack comes into his hand, a hot, pent-up jet.
Simultaneously, Cecilia and Zack sigh and come down from their clouds.
Simultaneously, they both accept their normal worlds, each unaware of the great service they have done the other.
Strap-On Sex is So Passé
Sabina was the girl who looked at me and decided I was the kind of challenge she wanted to take on.
We saw each other fairly frequently; she was a friend of my friend Lou, and so group drinking sessions tended to throw the two of us together. She was the kind of woman who generally had the entire room wanting to take her home and do very bad things both to and with her, without her even being conscious of it. Sure, she was beautiful – taller than average, deep olive skin, sparkling black-coffee eyes and a head of thick, glossy corkscrew ringlets. Plus, she leaned towards the voluptuous side of curvy, with a glimpse of soft brown cleavage nearly always visible, and the kind of arse that made a girl want to grab it and take a bite. But it was more than physical beauty. She was one of those people who emanate sensuality and sexiness; never in a way that came across as deliberate, but enough that women would stare longingly from afar and men would trip over their feet walking past her en route to the bar.
I always assumed she was out of my league. In fact, I generally assume people are out of my league and figure if they want me they'll do something about it, which isn't exactly proactive but saves me the embarrassment of rejection. In Sabina's case, though, I assumed she knew everyone wanted her and that there wasn't any point in making myself stand out from the crowd. It wasn't so much a self-flagellating dose of the I'm-not-good-enoughs as it was an attempt to avoid pointless effort. Why waste time hitting on girls who were bound to be unresponsive when I could be focusing my energies on getting drunk, right?
It was an unseasonably balmy night in April – Melbourne's weather hadn't realised it was meant to be in autumn – when Lou next organised drinks. We met up in an intimate little bar in the depths of an alley in the CBD. It was a Friday night and I'd worked late, so I was the last to arrive. The others were obviously well past their first drinks already and Sabina was the only one who didn't seem to be well down the road to tipsy. I gave everyone the usual greeting hug. I came to Sabina and paused. I'd never hugged her before – I didn't consider us that close –but since everyone else in the group was a good friend, everyone else had received a hug from me. I didn't want to seem rude by not hugging Sabina too.
Okay, so I wasn't entirely concerned with altruism and etiquette. I desperately wanted to touch Sabina, feel that soft warm body pressed up against mine. I have this thing, though, where I'm terrified of getting found out when I fancy somebody. Completely irrationally, I worry that they'll be able to tell I'm interested if I touch them or stand to close to them, like I think my pheromones will give me away or something. And since I'm not the most socially or emotionally adept of people, you can see why that would cause me anxiety.
Sabina solved the problem for me by standing up and wrapping her arms around me. I returned the gesture and found myself involved in what I can only describe as a full-body hug; she pressed her body firmly against mine, our curves complementing each other, our breasts flattening to rest against each other. I had the interesting mental experience of trying to simultaneously enjoy the moment for what it was, take in everything so I could remember it later on, and desperately hope that she couldn't tell I was enjoying the hug a little less platonically than I should have been. For the thousandth time in my life I was thankful I was not a man – only this time, rather than being grateful for not having to, you know, be a man, I was grateful that I didn't have a penis, because if I did it would have been making its presence felt against Sabina's lower belly, and that would have blown my cover. As it was, I felt myself discreetly moistening the crotch of my knickers.
She held on for longer than she needed to, which was fine by me. I was trying to breathe deeply and quietly by now, partly because she'd brought on a major case of the butterflies and partly because she smelled so good and I wanted to savour her – the faint chemical but pleasant odours of hair product and makeup mixed with the natural, vaguely musky smell of her skin. If she was wearing perfume, it was subtle and underscored her natural smell perfectly.
She pulled away, and I had to fight the urge to wrap my arms around her more tightly and not let go. She smiled at me as she sat down, her eyes twinkling. I retreated to the other side of the booth, taking a seat between Lou and Kelly, who rested her head on my shoulder.
The conversation was flowing as freely as the alcohol and I took small but quick sips of my beer, unsure of where I wanted to be on the sobriety scale, not wanting to be the sole sober person at the table but not wanting to join in the drinking spree just yet. Sabina sipped a glass of white wine and sat back, taking in the conversation with the amused eyes of one who loves her friends but is well aware they have the ability to make complete idiots of themselves in public. The topic turned to the girl Lou had just started seeing a couple of weeks ago, whom none of us had met yet but who intrigued us, if only because she quite obviously made normally sedate and emotionally cautious Lou go weak at the knees. We started pumping her for information about this new woman.
‘Does she have any really annoying personal habits?’ asked Kelly.
‘No!’
‘That just means there’re none you’ve found out about yet.’
‘Does she have good taste in music?’ That was Sarah, our resident music snob.
‘Yeah, if by that you mean, does she share my taste? We’re aaaall about the acousticky lesbians, baby.’
‘I said good music, you walking cliché.’
‘And what might that be, Madame?’
Kelly could obviously see where this was going as well as I could – any argument about music was never a good idea around Sarah, lovely as she was. Kelly leaned forward and said, ‘look, Lou, I think what we all really want to know but are pretending we’re too polite to ask is – what’s she like in bed?’
Lou blushed, just slightly. ‘She’s good.’ She paused. ‘Very good.’
‘DETAILS!’
‘That would be tacky.’
‘Because we’re none of us here tacky. Nooo, not at all.’
I put my arm around her. I knew Lou wel
l enough to sense that, despite her embarrassment, she did actually want to share with us, and was going to. You get used to reading someone after being friends with them for a while. In the case of my friends, I learn to tell when they really don’t want to talk about their partners, and when they’re being coy. Lou was being coy.
‘Oh, I’m just not sure I should. What happens if one of you lets slip when you meet her?’
‘So we’re definitely going to meet her?’ I butted in.
‘I didn’t say that…I just don’t want her being uncomfortable that you guys know so much.’
‘I’m sure we all know how to keep our mouths shut, Louise,’ I said, doing my best fake stern voice. ‘Now spill.’
‘Okay. What do you want to know?’
‘Everything!’
‘Well.’ Lou paused and took a swig of beer, considering what to tell us. ‘She’s very skilled in bed. A great kisser. Wonderful with her hands. And she works a strap-on like nobody’s business.’
I’d been taking a sip of my drink, and nearly spat it out.
‘She what?’ I said. ‘You mean you actually do that? I thought one of the advantages of fucking girls was that you didn’t have to put up with dicks in at least part of your life?’
Kelly turned to me. ‘That’s a little bit retroactive, isn’t it, Bree? You’re always on about how important it is for people to express their sexuality however they need to.’
‘Yeah, but do we have to do that by aping heterosexual people?’
‘Ooh, how very seventies of you. Perhaps we shouldn’t be having sex at all, what with it being an expression of power over another person and all.’
The Mercy of Strange Men: Erotic Stories Page 5