Chapter Five
Now, just like I figured, they're hanging around me like files around a honeypot. Word's out I'm a nymph and every stud in Bar Harbor's getting his pecker sharpened up—
It was good to be alone for a change, free of his criticisms, his accusations that she was becoming too much like Suzie, free of him impinging upon her life. Of course she missed making love, the warmth of another body beside her in the bed, but he wasn't indispensable for that. No—she was better off without him, she thought. No more distractions, catering to another person's needs. She was free now to explore Suzie, explore the Suzie in herself.
She ran every day at dawn, even harder than before. There were new perceptions of her father to deal with, a whole new life to plan. There was also pain to be purged, the pain of the diary's revelations and her anger at her father for what he'd done. She screamed sometimes as she ran, screamed out her pain and rage. No matter how cold it was she was always soaking at the end, panting, exhausted, her heart thumping wildly, her chest aching, her anger broken, sometimes her eyes streaming tears.
It was in this state that, early one December morning a week after Jared left, she encountered Dr. Bowles. Her landlady was a tall, thin, sensibly dressed middle-aged woman with soft features framed by soft hair, cut short in bangs. Penny was standing just inside the inner door of the brownstone, perspiring and weeping and feeling lost, when Dr. Bowles came down the stairs.
"Oh," said the doctor in a sympathetic voice. "Oh, Miss Chapman, is there anything I can do?" Penny shook her head, trying to smile. "Come, then. Let me help you to your door." She grasped Penny firmly, maternally, and together they walked up the flight.
"Thank you," Penny said, fishing out her key. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to trouble you. I'm not usually like this. Oh, dear—" She was stabbing at her lock, couldn't seem to get the key inside.
"There's something very nice," the psychiatrist said, helping her with the door, "something which Camus once wrote: 'Happiness, too, is inevitable.' Think of that when you're sad, and you'll find you'll feel better right away."
"Oh," said Penny, smiling, "that's a lovely quote. Thank you very much."
"Not at all. Now I haven't seen your young man around for a while, so I suppose the two of you may have parted ways. It's only natural that you should be sad. Nothing's more painful than the ending of a love. But if it's more than that, if it's something more and you want to talk about it, in fact if you ever want to talk about anything at all, remember I'm just upstairs. Call first in case I'm with a patient, but otherwise you're welcome day or night. Now—" she brushed her lips against Penny's cheek, "have a good day. And don't forget Camus." She smiled and then she was gone, leaving Penny suffused with warmth.
Word of Jared's leaving seemed to have gotten around at B&A. She wasn't sure how, but she assumed Lillian was the informant, and the telephone operators, of course—they knew Jared didn't call her anymore. Roy MacAllister, too, she thought, seemed to be eyeing her differently. Ever since she'd given him that memo he'd gone out of his way to be complimentary. But she knew he was a master of favoritism so didn't pay much attention until he asked if she'd have a drink with him one day after work. She said yes, she'd love to join him for a drink, and then she was amused when he took her to the same bar she'd taken Jared that day he'd appeared in the lobby and refused to accept her rebuff.
It was the same bar, but the conversation was different. No moody young actor this time trying to explain why he'd performed in Pussy Ranch, but a mature man exuding confidence and charm, telling her fascinating tales of writers and books. She wasn't "Chapman" anymore; she'd suddenly become "Penny" to him, and from that she sensed that he was interested in her, so even as she listened she thought about what she'd do if he made an advance.
"Look," he said finally, "this is great fun. Let's go on to dinner. I know a place in Soho—no writers, no publishing people. No one will know who we are."
They took a taxi, it was cold, and so they sat close together in the back. She liked the feel of his overcoat, expensive, cashmere. And the restaurant was excellent, not bohemian, no hanging plants against bare brick walls but everything black and white and Art Deco, and the other patrons looked happy and successful, and no one wore blue jeans, and the food was very good. He ordered a bottle of white Burgundy to go with their sole, was even more charming than he'd been at the bar. His stories were even better, she thought, and it was such a pleasure to sit in a good restaurant and laugh.
She liked him. She didn't think she could trust him, but didn't care, thought he was a magnificent, experienced man. And in her lightheadedness from the wine she knew he was going to ask her to come home. She was receiving all his signals and evidently giving the proper signals back, and she liked that, hadn't done that before, felt very grown-up, very New York and single and free. Yes, she decided, she certainly would go to bed with him if he asked. It would be interesting, would probably be delightful, and why shouldn't she? She didn't have a boyfriend now, she could do anything she liked. Yes, she could sleep with anyone she liked now, and she could keep a diary just like Suzie's, if she felt like it, and grade men on how good they were in bed, and the hell with tears and pain and the family pathology, the hell with living under the shadow of Suzie's death and thinking of herself as a member of a cursed clan.
"Shall I drop you?" he asked as they taxied uptown. "Or would you like to come home with me?"
"Your place," she said with a smile, "so long as it won't change anything at work."
"I can handle it. Can you?"
"No problem," she said.
He kissed her, then told the driver to take them to UN Plaza. His apartment was modern and expensive, a Corbusier chaise longue upholstered in spotted pony skin, couches and chairs covered with soft black leather, the lights dim, wall-to-wall gray industrial carpeting—a powerful man's retreat. It was a little like her father's office, she thought, then regretted making the connection. There it was again, Suzie's hang up, that feeling she so often had now that she was inside Suzie's skin.
Mac was so poised, so smooth, she was worried he'd find her awkward. But she wasn't frightened of him anymore the way she'd been the day he summoned her to his office and bawled her out for being drab. She watched him as he went to a bar, a backlit tortoise-shell étagère, studied him as he poured out two snifters of cognac, checked his body as he handed one to her and then guided her to a couch.
"Why are you smiling?" he asked.
"Just thinking of how you used to frighten me."
"Tell me about it." She did. He was amused, kissed her again, assured her he wasn't scary after all.
"I see that now," she said. "You're just a little lamb."
"You're an interesting girl," he said, looking at her carefully. "I think the papers had you wrong."
"'The 'ugly duckling'? If you'd known my sister you might agree with that."
"I doubt it," he said. "I have offbeat tastes."
"Like whips and chains."
"Something like that." He laughed.
"I guess they have your number," she said.
"Who has my number?"
"The girls at the office. They look at your boots and your black leather jackets and they say, well, you know, watch out for Mac, he's into S&M for sure."
"That's great. A little costuming and people take you just the way you want."
"You're not into it, are you, Mac? I don't want to get into anything weird."
"Relax. And don't be such a tease." He unbuttoned her blouse. "Ah, braless—" He touched her breasts, flicked at them. She closed her eyes, felt the vibrations reaching down between her legs.
He took her hand, led her to his bedroom, pulled back the comforter.
"You must be the only person in New York with white sheets," she said, trying to be casual as she undressed.
"I have black telephones, too." He stood beside her, naked, aroused, then pulled her to him, kissed her on the mouth.
"I used to wonder in e
dit meetings what you'd look like."
"Well—" he stood back. "Tell me—how do I look?"
"Pretty damn great I think." She meant it. He was lean and hard like a much younger man, thinner than Jared, less hairy, more feline.
"And you—you look pretty damn great yourself." They lay down, he put his arm around her, brushed his other hand gently between her legs.
Making it with Mac was completely different than making love with Jared. It was hard for her to define the difference, and she wasn't sure she wanted to. But then, after they finished and she felt satisfied and was falling off to sleep, she thought: That's what it's all about, this man-woman stuff. Of course he's different. That's why people screw around.
She slipped out of his bed at six in the morning, careful not to wake him up. She didn't feel up to a shower and breakfast scene, a rush home to change, then the subway ride back to B&A. She much preferred just to slip away, felt elegant riding uptown alone in a taxi at six-fifteen in the morning when it was still dark, thinking to herself: I'll run and eat and go to work, and maybe tonight I'll ball again with Mac, and that way I'll keep myself sane and busy, and I won't think about bad things, won't drive myself crazy anymore.
There was something very erotic, she thought as she ran in the Park, something stimulating about running without having bathed after sex. She thought of her and Mac's mingled sweat heating up beneath her running suit, steaming up in there. She pulled her sweatshirt open and sniffed; she could smell the aroma of sex.
I wonder, she asked herself as she rode to work, does Mac think I'm a great lay? Does he think I've got good tits and a terrific ass? Do I appeal to his "offbeat" tastes?
She worked well that day, better than she had since the trip to Maine, and again she thought: This is the way—to keep busy all the time, to concentrate each moment on what I'm doing. Use sex to obliterate pain. Most important not to brood.
Mac called her in in the middle of the afternoon. They talked about some business for a while, then he said: "It was very chic the way you left this morning. You're really a terrific kid."
"So," she said, "I'm a kid. My father calls me 'kiddo.' Jared used to call me 'babe,' and my sister used to call me 'Child.' People always say 'dear' to me in stores—men and women. Am I all that cuddly? I'd really like to know."
"You're very cuddly, Penny," he said. "Want to have dinner tonight?"
They met at a French place this time, a midtown bistro full of people talking and laughing and eating well. The wine was even better than the night before, and again she found him fascinating.
"I'm learning more about publishing by eating with you," she said, "than in a year working at the house."
He liked her, she could tell. She'd proven herself at the office, been cool with him at work. She could see he respected her for that. She liked the idea of being the cool coworker who could turn tempestuous in bed.
This time he didn't ask if she wanted to go home. He simply took her to his apartment, poured out cognacs, then sat beside her and talked. She found his opinions on people at the office biting and astute. ("Doris Gaff—she's making a big plus out of her menopause"; "Ben Gale—living proof that ass-kissing the critics pays off in the end.") When she asked about Lillian Ryan he said: "Personally I find her repulsive, but there's nothing new about that—some of the most successful people are. She's getting by now on sheer pushiness, but she doesn't touch you, Penny, hasn't your depth or class." Then he smiled. "That's what you wanted me to say, isn't it? Well, I hope it makes you feel good. It's true."
They made love as they had the night before, she following his lead. He was less athletic than Jared, but more forceful, she thought, his rhythms more subtle, his movements more efficient—he was a man who used his body to express his will.
"Ever do anything kinky?" he asked afterwards.
"No. Not really," she said.
"Your boyfriend ever suggest anything?"
"Depends on how you define 'kinky,' I guess."
"Well—like being balled in the rear."
She shook her head.
"You've thought about it, though."
She didn't answer, didn't want to admit she'd ever considered anything like that. Then he did something she didn't expect. He spanked her—not hard, just snapped his hands across each of her buttocks very quickly. She jerked around.
"Oh, Mac, I don't think I'm into that."
"Relax." He massaged her. "It's part of the trip for me that your ass be a little pink."
She let him spank her. He did it very lightly. To her total amazement it made her feel good.
"See—you like it. Tell me," his voice insistent, "tell me it turns you on."
"It turns me on," she said obediently, and saying that also made her feel good.
"You're a good girl, Penny. A good little girl. Now turn over again."
He took her in long, slow, agonizingly slow strokes. She could feel the waves surging across her body, felt engulfed, blinded by the power of sex and her response. "God!" she screamed. She felt herself climaxing. "God. God!" She gripped onto him. When she came out of it she was bathed in sweat.
"Well," he said, "you do get into it. You're not repressed at all."
"You knew that all along, didn't you, Mac? Tell me how you knew."
"Just a hunch."
That morning she ran five miles in thirty-five minutes, and all the time she kept thinking to herself: I'm like Suzie, on a father-trip. I like being spanked, punished. What's happening to me? I like it. Why?
The third night he took her to a Japanese restaurant. They sat on tatami mats, were kidded by the waitresses, drank sake until they were high. Back at his place he asked if it would turn her on to be tied down while he went down on her. When she said she thought it might, he tied her hands to the headboard, allowing her to writhe and thrash as much as she liked while he tormented her with darting probes of his tongue. She loved it, and afterwards she thought: Now I know what Suzie felt at that orgy in Great Neck.
They drank their cognacs after sex that night and talked about the psychology of writers. "Basically they want parental love," Mac said, "but you must give it to them subtly, because they're very sensitive, and if they suspect you think of them as children they're apt to get annoyed."
He was congenitally manipulative, she realized, a gamesman who would have done well in the movie business or the diamond business or the rag trade—anywhere he'd chosen to play. He was playing a kind of game with her, too, she thought, though she wasn't sure what his objective was. She was worried that their sex might affect their professional relationship. He was offended when she brought that up.
"Really, Penny, I told you—one thing has nothing to do with the other. I'm editor-in-chief and that's a power trip. What we do here is something else. I'm a sophisticated man. I keep my sex life and publishing life separate. Believe what I say, and please don't worry about it."
She liked him more and more, felt aroused by his kinky sexuality and wondered what sort of a man it was who had to dominate and what sort of a woman she was to crave his domination. She decided it all came down to being released. It didn't matter how one got it on.
He spanked her harder the second time while she lay across his lap, struggling, giggling, kicking the air with her legs. He squeezed the back of her neck while he sat back on one of his leather couches and had her service him on her knees. Sometimes when he lay on top of her he set his teeth in her neck. He held her gently but with the unspoken implication that he'd bite her if she tried to twist away.
Breaking his rule about the separation of work and sex, he told her to write him a memo on B&A stationery telling him a fantasy she'd like him to enact. She thought about it all day, didn't know what to write. Be his slave girl; play a prostitute—everything she could think of sounded silly and trite. Finally she wrote that she wanted to be treated like a little girl, as if she were his daughter and they were having incest. She handed the memo to him in a sealed envelope ("that report you wanted,
Mac"). He winked at her. The secretary didn't notice. Late that afternoon she received a letter in the interoffice mail. She went to the ladies room and ripped it open. "OK," he'd scrawled. "Will do this weekend. Mac."
They spent the entire weekend in his apartment. He bought all sorts of cheeses and delicatessen meats and fresh breads and smoked salmon and wonderful wines. They didn't go out for meals, didn't leave the building at all. He called her "little girl." She called him "dad."
"Oh, daddy," she'd say. "what a great big thing you have down there!"
"All the better to skewer you with," he'd reply, "in your virginal little pussy, my dear!"
They laughed a great deal. He showed paternal affection. Sometimes he spanked her a little and told her she was bad and would have to stand in the corner until she improved. At other times he caressed her and told her she was the best little girl in the hole world. When he kissed her good night he implored her to have "sweet dreams."
On Sunday afternoon he broke the spell. "We've gone as far as we should," he said. "It was good for you to live it out."
"I really got into it."
"I saw that you did."
"It was, I don't know—something I've been thinking about a lot."
He walked away from her, went to the bar, and made himself a drink. Sensing he had something important to say she braced herself when he turned around.
"Sex is so complicated, Penny. There're all sorts of fine lines you cross. Perhaps the finest is the one between games and deviations, playing kinky and really getting weird."
"Why are you telling me this, Mac?"
"Because I sense something in you, in myself, too—something that makes me think we could cross that line if we go on.,"
"Are you trying to let me down easy? Is that what this is all about?"
He smiled. "You can put it that way if you like. I'm very fond of you, Penny. I don't want to lead you across any lines. Also I want you to be my assistant, help me with my books. I want things to be tender between us. That might not be possible if we go on."
Punish Me with Kisses Page 18