by Aya DeAniege
Yanking open the door to the Dom room, I jabbed a finger at Nathaniel, then out the door. Without saying a word I walked down the church and walked into the first open room.
They were taking to leaving the doors to empty rooms open. That way everyone knew which rooms were occupied and which could be used in a passionate moment.
Nathaniel stepped in behind me a moment later.
“What is your fucking problem?” I asked.
“You,” Nathaniel turned and closed the door to the room, then turned back to me. “You signed a blank slate contract. It was very clear in there that we are not sub and Dom, neither of us is submitted to the other. I think this past week has clearly shown that something has changed between us.”
“Changed between us? You took one full look at my scars and ran the other way with your tail between your legs!"
“I didn't run away. I stood there as you ran away and slammed the door behind you.”
A lot could be said about the fights Nathaniel and I had. From loud, explosive, even dangerous, but no one would ever say that we would stay angry at each other for very long. Nothing simmered under the surface for months on end.
That week?
That was the longest we ever went before we started shouting or throwing things.
“Oh, okay, that means we're over because I slammed a door?”
“No, who said that we were over?” Nathaniel shouted back.
“Ezekiel just fucking well did!” I shouted. “And who the hell breaks up with someone at church?”
“I didn't tell him to say that, he said it. That's what he does," Nathaniel said. "Clearly, Isabella, something has changed. You aren't mine, but you clearly aren't his either. Our roles were not defined. We were not given a place. I mean, we aren't—what are we even? Switching back and forth, how do we even tell? Are we switching back and forth now?”
“Maybe you should have talked about it rather than ignoring me.”
“Me?” Nathaniel asked. “Ignoring you? Really? Who could ignore you in that dress without a bra? Tad's almost blind and even he knows it's cold in here.”
I folded my arms over my breasts, aware of what he meant but still furious that he'd mention it.
“I don't like bras,” I said. “They're like cages for my boobs and I don't like tit-torture either.”
“Bindings are fine, but bras? Well, they're just torture. You're clearly showing them off.”
“What? These?" I asked, grabbing them as Nathaniel's eyes went a little wider. "Like I'm some sexual deviant or manipulative woman? Oh, look," I played with them as I had seen women in pornos play with themselves, trying my best to pout. "Whatever should I do with myself?"
“Stop that this moment,” Nathaniel said.
I stopped, but I also huffed out in annoyance.
“Or you'll what? Spank me?”
Furious, I went to leave. Nathaniel grabbed my arm and pushed me deeper into the room. The man made a face as he slid his hands into his pockets, lips pressed into a tight line.
“Obviously we do need to talk,” he said to the air above my head. “We can't visit your family with the way we've been going.”
“That's like... so far away,” I said.
“That's like Wednesday," Nathaniel said. "The condition was within two weeks, not whenever you please. So we're going on Wednesday, we'll be in the slum Thursday morning. I've already sent out the contacts."
“When were you going to tell me?”
“Today after church, I thought I'd let you enjoy it.”
“Enjoy it? Nothing is going normally. Ezekiel didn't even turn on the charm."
“Because he wants to tie Susanne up and beat her until she comes,” Nathaniel said, then raised his voice as I protested. “That's the way he works. He was supposed to announce the barbeque that's happening next weekend and the fact that you are under contract with me—even though you aren't necessarily my sub—so no one else can play with you, but no one would hit me for being near you. Most of the congregation still sees you as belonging to Mr. Wrightworth.”
“Nothing about this day is enjoyable.”
“Not even when you played with your breasts?" Nathaniel asked.
“I wasn't playing with them!”
There was a knock on the door. A moment later Nicole slipped in and cleared her throat quietly. The woman looked at Nathaniel, then over at me. She sighed and scratched the back of her head.
“Look, I get it, you two and your history," she said. "But the Doms sent me in. This is one."
Nathaniel swore. "Explain that to her. I'm headed back to the room."
“That's one?” I asked Nicole after Nathaniel left.
She motioned, and I followed as she explained.
“You know how Mr. Wrightworth says it?" She glanced at me, and I nodded. "Same thing, except all the Doms get a shot in, instead of just Mr. Wrightworth. They don't like when people fuck with their control. Suffice to say. They had to have lots of warning before Susanne was invited, including her full profile.
“The community has obviously seen fights before, but at church is not the place or time to be fighting.”
“He's been ignoring me and then everyone else is ignoring me, and there's Susanne there asking about if this is all normal as if it might be normal?” I said.
“Darling," Nicole said, stopping just outside of the sub room. "You're both in transition. I'm the idiot who put it into his head about you being Domme. What you need is a sign between the two of you that sort of says who is dominant that day."
“Like the 50's dress,” I said.
“Yes, like those," Nicole said distantly. "Why didn't you just toss one of those on, flounce into his study, and bend over?"
“Bend over?” I asked.
“Oh, he has a thing about women bending over in skirts. That's why Mr. Wrightworth had you bend over to tie his shoes,” Nicole hesitated as I gasped. “You didn't realize that? Mr. Wrightworth was checking to see if Nathaniel was still interested and trying to show you at the same time. God, Isabella, you're dumb as a doorknob sometimes.”
“I'm sorry, no one's ever been interested in me before.”
“I thought we also discussed bras while at church,” Nicole said sternly.
“You aren't my Madame,” I said with a shake of my head.
I entered the sub room and glanced at a tight-lipped Susanne. Turning from her, I looked over the subs demonstrating rope on one another.
“Uh, Nicole, are they allowed to do that?” I asked.
Nicole slipped in behind me and closed the door with a thump.
The sound made all the subs stop mid-motion and stare at her with wide eyes, but then, all the subs knew to be afraid of Nicole. Whenever she was at church, she sat in the sub room during the separate times. She was quick with the crop and had no problem reporting nuisances to their Doms.
“Get those off this minute, do you know how dangerous that is?” Nicole demanded, moving around me and towards the subs.
I stepped up beside Susanne as the woman watched Nicole wide-eyed.
“What does she mean, dangerous?” Susanne asked me.
“Everything we do can be dangerous if done the wrong way,” I said. “Think, that event.”
Meaning, what happened when I went to visit Mayfair. Nathaniel had been let off of charges of accessory, but only after a very lengthy debate. I wasn't a part of the conversation, only informed when Nathaniel got out. He had stopped when I had given the safe word. Until that point, he was simply playing a role.
“How was that dangerous?” Susanne asked.
“I'm not familiar with rope," I said. "Oh, but this is how we learn." I moved away from Susanne to Nicole's chair as the woman took her seat. "Nicole, why was that dangerous?"
“Rope is a relatively new re-discovery for the community, but thanks to how we learned about rope, we also learned the warnings. Too tight, in the wrong places, even too long bound up and you can cause nerve damage. Sometimes it goes away, but s
ometimes it doesn't. If you don't know how to play with ropes safely, you shouldn't. It's just like fire and knife play.
“Why, are you interested in rope?”
“I do like bondage, is it like bondage?” I asked.
Nicole seemed to consider for a moment.
“Sort of. Obviously it is in some ways, but obviously, the bindings go over other parts. I'll talk to Nathaniel. He did some rope with Mayfair. So he has firsthand experience, but very little of it. She thought it was too much work and I don't believe he enjoyed being tied up."
“Wait,” Susanne stepped up beside me. “So you give advice on what should and should not be performed?”
“As a registered nurse I know a little better than most, what a body can and cannot withstand,” Nicole said. “I was trained by sadists and have been put through everything that I might ever want to put a sub through. When something new is rediscovered, I am volunteered as one of only two Dommes in the area. Well, one of one now, and as the only one who wouldn't sue the pants off anyone who tried to smack me.”
“But they ask you about things, and you tell them to do it," Susanne said.
“I give them the warnings,” Nicole said.
“It's true. She's a buzz kill," one of the subs muttered.
“If you want to do knife play, you need to have a sterile knife and bandages at the ready. Don't get cum on the cut. You could cause a severe infection," another said, trying to imitate Nicole's voice.
“Ask her about sex,” yet another said.
Susanne blinked at Nicole, ignoring the subs.
“Sex can be very pleasant, but you should wear a condom with new partners and always be aware of who else your partner has been with. Be very careful of what items are placed into orifices. It might seem like fun, but do you know how many people have been brought into the Program building because they thought they could get that potato out themselves?”
The auditor blinked again, apparently taken aback by Nicole.
“We have munches every Wednesday now,” Nicole added. “The church doors are opened, we have coffee and cookies, people who have been on the edges of the community come in and take a look around. We talk to them a bit. We have a couple of new members now because of that.
“You can come in and talk to the members, see some play in action without any fear of being touched. Every third Wednesday we just come in and sit around with coffee. We talk about life outside of play and get to know the members.
“We're not all scary. It's not all about sex and beatings. We are a community, and we care for the subs as well as the Doms. We make every attempt to make certain that abusive relationships aren't allowed to continue, but we can't watch everything and we can't prevent everything.
“The best tool we have is knowledge, and the most basic way to stop a sub from being abused—because it's usually the sub being abused in a relationship given the nature of their position—is to teach them how these things should work so that they know when their Dom crosses a line.
“The second best tool we have are reputations that precede the Doms. Some of the subs don't trust other Doms besides the one who owns them, but you ask them about Mr. Wrightworth, ask them about Nathaniel and Ezekiel. They'll tell you about the man, and they will tell you that those men have stood for subs in the past, no matter what the Dom's reputation was.
“Listening to me might be scary, I might be cranky, as they say, but it's for the best. They don't let people drive cars without telling them the dangers. Why would we play without following the same principals?”
“But you'll only explain at church or in a munch,” Susanne said.
“If I found someone I wanted to play with, I might test the waters outside of the church and talk to them,” Nicole said, looking Susanne up and down. “But if I thought it might be something serious, and that they might be interested, I would bring them to the church as soon as possible.”
“Why?” Susanne asked.
“Because she might lie,” I said. “But if someone was brought into the church, they would hear from everyone else and learn whether or not Nicole was telling the truth.”
“Why don't you just tell the Program heads that?” Susanne asked.
“Because one of them is a part of the community," Nicole said. "Thus, they might think that he's lying. It's not a lie, though, this is our lives. If one of us is hurt, it affects the whole community. We were reeling over Darling being kidnapped and are fully participating with law enforcement. Several of us will be testifying at the trial. Do you have any more questions for the community?"
Susanne looked over the room, then turned back to Nicole. “No, I don't.”
“Okay, then,” Nicole said with a small smile. “You come see me when you get curious.”
Chapter Four
We didn't talk about it. Stupid, I know, but... I didn't even know where to begin.
In the end, I convinced myself that it was Nathaniel's problem and he had to talk to me about it because I had done nothing wrong.
He probably convinced himself of the same thing.
Wednesday morning we left his estate with little in the way of possessions besides the clothing on our backs. Going to the slums wasn't dangerous for us, but had we gone in rich people clothing it probably would have started something. The riots were too fresh in everyone's minds. Nathaniel wasn't even close to moderately wealthy, he and his father co-owned the family business and then he had investments and projects on the side.
We flew to the Program building I had first been accepted into. There we were given clothing and Nathaniel spoke with them a bit before we left the building and headed to the hotel Nathaniel's business owned.
As they would say pre-collapse, it was a five-star hotel. Nothing was left out. I walked in and already knew my way around, I had visited my brothers as they had built the hotel. It was almost amusing to tell Nathaniel that he had the wrong way, and to take him to the actual elevators.
It was so bittersweet.
For I knew a young man had fallen down the elevator shaft and died during construction. I doubted Nathaniel knew that, or any of the guests and workers. The workers may have been from the slum that the hotel bordered, but that didn't mean they knew what went into building their workplace.
The 'room' they had given us was huge. Larger than my room at Nathaniel's.
It was a set of rooms. There was the bedroom and living room, which had a connecting balcony attached to them, and the bathroom off the bedroom. Everything looked rich, from the thick, soft carpet to the silky upholstery on the furniture right on up to the mini-chandelier in the bathroom.
Our room looked out over the slum. By the time we arrived it was fully dark out, so I went out on the balcony while Nathaniel made a call. I could look down and see the drive, where the vehicles came up to pick up and drop off rich folk. Looking out, I could see the steel fencing that separated them from the slum, but there was no denying what was over there.
The fencing was new, and it wasn't all that high. It wasn't even electrified or anything, just a type of chicken wire stretched between poles to remind the poor folk where they weren't allowed to walk.
Nathaniel joined me on the balcony. I knew because I heard the door open and close. He came up behind me, setting a hand on either side of me on the balcony's edge. The heat of him to my back didn't help the edge I was riding. I wanted to cry, but I also wanted to scream.
I certainly didn't want to go back to the slums, or have to face my family.
“I'm sorry,” he said.
“About what?” I asked.
I hoped this was it, that he was finally apologizing for being a jerk about my scars. Like I had a choice whether or not to wear them.
“If I had recalled that your brothers had worked on this building, I would have paid to have us stay somewhere else,” he said.
Moron.
At least he was apologizing for something, though it wasn't the something I wanted him to apologize about. You couldn'
t throw a rock in the slum and find a building not constructed by my brothers. There was only one local company that did work outside of the slums for rich folk buildings, and my family had worked for them for two generations.
“They've worked on almost every building,” I said, shaking my head. “You can't avoid my family.”
“Funny, that's what Mr. Wrightworth said,” Nathaniel murmured. “In fact, he's going to come join us for a day or so.”
“Why?” I asked.
“So that you have someone to talk to about all this,” Nathaniel said with a motion to the slum. “And I may have told him that we still haven't spoken.”
“So he's coming to beat our heads together?" I shook my head and watched as a vehicle came up, and a rich woman climbed out. Her nose wrinkled, and she stiffened as she turned to look at the slum. Clear surprise played over her features. "Why did you build by the slum?"
“Just to get that reaction out of people," Nathaniel said, sounding amused with himself. "They always come back for more, however. I employ all sorts of contracts here, not just from this slum but others as well. It's a bit of a fantasy hotel. Very popular, but very few hold the necessary licenses to contract people out to another building.
“Come shower, we're eating in the dining hall tonight, but tomorrow we are supposed to eat with your family.”
Nathaniel left me on the balcony then, giving me a moment to collect my thoughts. I was happy he did. I needed that time.
Standing on the balcony, I breathed in the scent of the slum, brought to me on the wind. The dirt, the slight sweat smell. It smelled of poverty and hopeless despair, yet somehow it lifted my heart. I didn't want to go home, I never wanted to go home, but there is no denying that the smell of a slum did something to a person.
Pushing off the balcony's edge, I glanced up and smiled just slightly.
“Hello, Orion,” I said to the stars, and walked into the hotel room.
Yes, it was almost winter, though the cold months in the slum resulted in little more than a slight drop in temperature and more rain than during the summer months. I was told that we had something called global warming to thank. Even two hundred years earlier that area received snow in the winter.