by Anneke Jacob
My master unhooked the leash, looped it through the banister rails and locked it back to my collar again. Then he went out the back, carrying twine and some steps.
I sat leashed to the stairs, arms hugging legs, bridled face resting on my knee. Distracting myself with regrets about the chamber pot, the genteel qualities of which I hadn't appreciated sufficiently when I'd had the chance.
As if what I appreciated had anything to do with what happened to me.
My shallow breathing made a warm mist on my knee.
I'd been warned. An animal on a very short tether. And here I was, using a litter box. With him watching. Of course with him watching. He'd undoubtedly have a webcam in there for my weekday afternoons. Would it be any less humiliating when I was ostensibly alone? No, not in the least.
Just an acknowledgement that I really was what he was making me.
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I sat very still, breathing lightly, maintaining the kind of calm that tethered animals acquire so as not to flail around and hurt themselves. My thoughts were looping themselves into painful, twisting knots: Tangles of fear and lust and horrible anxiety. Would he still love this animal thing I was becoming? Would I love myself? I hugged my legs harder.
I could do this, and I could love it – I could so easily sink into it, like an amphibian into its native swamp – so long as there was no contempt on my master's part for the crawling thing I had become.
His step sounded at the back door. From the other end of the house, there were his eyes on me, brows furrowed, his footsteps coming straight for me, as if my thoughts had spoken themselves out loud. He crouched down, held my face with one hand and searched it, while fingertips brushed down my body like sensitive antennae: chest, belly, back.
The contact brought the wrenching tangle inside me almost to a breaking point. Tears started to form in my eyes, the reactive rage of the despised was lurking, and I desperately wanted to prostrate myself at his feet. I also wanted him to fuck my brains out.
"It's all right, girl." The voice was deep, soothing. Both hands were caressing me now. I began to cry. "Shh. It's all right. I told you before. I'd never make you into anything I'd despise." His voice seemed bottomless; a deep pool drawing me in. He held me tight for a minute, my sobbing ribs heaving against his arm, and then he lowered me down as I clung. I ended up on my belly on the floor, his feet before my face. The bit was some impediment, but I licked his shoes as best I could.
Outside in the dark that evening I followed the pull of the leash. He'd tugged me around back there in the late summer evenings any number of times by now, by one attachment point or another; this time it was just my collar. But I knew what must be coming. I'd signalled my need to pee, and instead of being directed to the litter box, the leash had led me crawling to the back door.
It was damp out there, muggy and still warm, smelling of the brief rain that had just passed. I shivered as I crawled across the spongy grass, still bridled, naked breasts swaying between my arms. I was aware of a full bladder, and ass cheeks stinging. The leash at my throat was a living link to the very tall and upright being by my side, a nerve fibre belonging to us both along which messages continually hummed.
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And with a need to obey as basic as my life, I crouched beneath the maple tree in the darkest shadows, and did what I was meant to do.
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Chapter Nineteen
Kryptonite
I knelt in the front hall one October afternoon waiting for Anders, leashed by my collar to the bench. It was his preferred spot for this purpose; he liked me there to greet him there at the door, maybe one time in three.
I'd scrubbed the pots, tied up the newspapers, vacuumed the rugs and polished the chains and bridles. I'd also managed to get through a chapter of The Time Traveller's Wife. Lately Anders had allowed me to sit by my bookcase in the afternoons and read, if there was time between my chores and four o'clock, when I had to be tethered and waiting for him. He'd noticed me lingering as I dusted there, and very kindly put two and two together.
Not that I had been anywhere close to presuming to ask for such a favour, but it was true that I had longed for books.
I wasn't allowed to read on the journey to and from work; he hadn't explained this except to say that it was "too normal." Truthfully, it might have distracted me from private awareness of my harnessed body. Nor when we were together did he want me focusing on anything but serving him. I was very grateful for the little time he did allow, though I found it bizarre enough, sitting naked and bound and reading about normal people with clothes and freedom and decisions to make. Sometimes I wondered what the characters would think of me, or how the authors would feel if they knew what kind of lap their book was sitting on.
I was still thinking about the book, and musing about fate, free will and intense relationships with a weird twist. Thinking about the lucky protagonists having sex day and night, and trying to ignore the chronic ache of arousal. I hadn't had an orgasm since the folk festival, and on the question of the next one I remained in ignorance . My butt was moderately sore from a strapping the day before; he'd experimented with an old-fashioned razor stop with me over his knee, not because I'd misbehaved but purely for the fun of it. The fun had been mixed as far as I was concerned, and now I sat gingerly on my heels rather than directly on the floor; nothing new there.
Nikki and I had had lunch the other day, and I'd heard about her planned trip to Boston for the Fetish Fair Fleamarket. "Do you ever get out of that house?" she'd demanded. Did I? I went to work, of course. Anders took me 252
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with him to hear music of one sort or another most weeks, out to dinner once in a while. Sometimes afterwards he'd give me a treat and take me to a bookstore. We'd taken some long walks through parks and ravines to see the fall colours, gone to the occasional movie. But I did spend a lot of time locked up at home. And when it was time to go out I felt a curious reluctance. So much time alone was feeding my introversion. The only company I had any real need for was my master's.
I shifted uncomfortably on my heels, and then took the weight entirely off my rear end by resting face and chest on the floor; another of my usual postures. It was getting late. The one lamp on in the living room left pools of shadow. Anders would be home soon.
It seemed to me that the information centre provided more than enough people for me to deal with. Most of the time I was interacting with strangers or bare acquaintances, and by the end of a few hours I often felt wrung out and ready to be by myself for a while. I was friendly with a couple of the student interns, up to a point. It seemed a bit risky getting close to anyone, given all the secrets I carried around on my body and every other way. But it was better for me to be forced to be among people; in a pure research job I might have become a real recluse. As expected, the centre had become much busier in the fall, but fortunately I'd been able to finish my cataloguing project just after Labour Day and get it out of the way. It had received some positive attention from my supervisor, and had been mentioned at a couple of meetings as a new research tool, with me being acknowledged by name.
This left me feeling reasonably pleased with myself, and reassured that I was more or less competent to do what I was hired to do. I still screwed up on a fairly regular basis, misplacing or mistaking data, forgetting to order supplies in time, procrastinating on unpleasant chores and so on. I'd confess it all to Anders and take my punishment, and try every day to be more organized.
Sharing the work with Vera on the afternoon shift added some frustrating complications. She had her own methods and her own ways of arranging things, and we hardly ever had the time to touch base, as she was never early and I couldn't stay late. Even if we had been able to overlap, the place was usually too busy at one o'clock for us to work together. Vera actually showed up three or
four minutes late now and again, which made me crazy with anxiety. But as an imposition it was so minimal that 253
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complaints would be ridiculous.
My stomach growled. I sat up again. I was getting hungry. It was hard to know for sure, not being able to see a clock, but it seemed late to me.
Sometimes Anders got held up by one thing or another; mostly traffic but sometimes the work itself. Obviously he couldn't phone me to let me know, and he rarely explained unless it was part of some story he wanted to tell. I just had to wait it out.
Time moved on. I tried not to think about my growing hunger, my filling bladder, and a niggling, rising anxiety. Where was he? Delays, accidents…? No. I squeezed down on a hollow little gnaw of unease. My master wasn't subject to the usual risks of human existence. After all, he was more or less invulnerable, made of tougher stuff, more resilient than mere flesh and blood. Wasn't he?
I didn't usually allow myself to entertain this kind of foolishness without at least a barb or two of ironic self-awareness. Tonight for some reason I was diving straight into pulp fiction. My attention fixed itself on the doorway, which stubbornly refused to produce him. There was no mechanical clock to tick; nothing to time but my own breath and heartbeat. Suddenly I was sure it was very late. Fear began to chew my guts in earnest.
I stared up at the webcam as if I could find him there. My eyes searched the shadowy room beside me, as if he might already be home after all, as if I'd mistaken the hour or the day. I held my breath and listened: silence. The top of the faceless, blank outer door was visible through the glass of the inner one. Neither opened. My invulnerability fantasies were cracking at the fault lines; someone had gotten out the kryptonite. Awful visions burst over me: Anders lying broken under a pile of fallen bricks. Anders crushed on the road on his way home to me. Anders doubled over somewhere with a knife in his guts, having tried with superman altruism to protect the weak.
I squeezed my eyes shut. No. Not so. Stop it. Stop it! None of this is true! But unbidden came the image of my own body, discovered months from now, skeleton and hide, neck bones rattling in their collar and chain. I was completely helpless where I was. He took such good care of me that I'd never before doubted my safety. My stomach gripped more sharply, with hunger or terror or both. Then I forced myself to settle back onto the floor with my face on one arm, gnawing on a knuckle and trying not to think.
I listened to my breath, and felt the fast-growing panic divide and 254
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multiply in my guts, felt it spill into my bloodstream, infuse itself into all my cells, sublimate into the air around me in a dense cloud till I was breathing it directly, painfully into my lungs. From there it returned to my tissues in ever increasing concentrations. Please…please be all right. Please come home.
More time passed.
A rattle. The key in the door. I reared up as if I'd been shot. Thank god!
But my eyes searched higher than the face that came in. The figure behind the glass was too short. The vestibule door opened, and a man stepped through. My heart thudded to a stop. It wasn't my master; it was no one I'd ever laid eyes on before.
Appalled, I stared up at this stranger, clutched myself tightly and backed up to the end of my chain, unable to breathe or scream.
"Maia, it's okay," the man said. "Anders sent me."
My heart started again, pounding like a jackhammer in my throat and ears. The back of my neck hurt where the collar was digging into it. The man stayed by the door, concern and embarrassment evident on his face.
I tried to speak, and managed on the second try. "Who…?"
"I'm Graham. Did he tell you about me? I'm a friend of his. Sorry to scare you. Anders called and asked me to come; he's had a small accident, and had to wait for the police.”
“Oh, no," I whispered. The grisly visions gathered for the leap. "Is he –
?"
"He's fine. Someone ran a red light and hit him at an intersection. The truck's banged up, but he's not hurt." He pulled out a phone and pressed buttons. "Here, you can talk to him." A pause. "Anders? I just got to your place. Sorry; I got here as fast as I could. She's okay, but she's pretty scared; here."
He handed the phone to me.
"Hello?" My voice shook.
"Hey, sweetheart."
"Are you all right?"
"I'm fine, love. The truck's a bit of a mess, and I lost some buckets of fixative at Don Mills and Sheppard, but it's nothing the street cleaners can't scrape up. Are you all right?”
“Yes."
"I should be home in an hour or two. Graham will look after you. Don't 255
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worry; he's a good guy."
"All right."
"Give the phone back to him now."
Graham listened and made 'mm-hmm' noises, his glance flicking at me and away.
The relief had made me break into a sweat. Anders was all right. He would come home. The world hadn't ended.
I stared covertly at the man in front of me. Stocky, medium height. A face all circles and bumps: short blunt nose, cleft chin, dark hair in curly rounds all over his head. Trustworthy looking, for whatever that was worth.
Anders had mentioned him. He'd helped make my chastity shield, for god's sake. I hugged myself, trying to distance from the humiliation of being seen like this. My master was okay; nothing else mattered.
Pocketing his phone, Graham said gently, "He asked me to look after you till he can get here. I'm going to unlock you, okay?" Dumbly, I nodded.
Unfamiliar hands fumbled with the padlock under my chin. "I got here as soon as I could; sorry, you must have been getting worried."
"What time is it?" This was definitely the weirdest normal conversation I'd ever had, with a stranger whose hand was hovering above my naked, harnessed breasts. "Seven-forty."
Not as late as I'd thought. Terror does strange things to your head. I saw a bunch of keys like my master's, but on a different keychain. They had little tags on them. Unlocked, I got hesitantly to my feet. Graham backed away to give me space, but I couldn't help noticing the bulge at his groin. I felt a little panicky at this, but at the same time oddly relieved; evidently he wasn't completely disgusted at the sight of me. Pride clutches at weird little straws.
"Anders said to let you use the toilet and then to feed you." The wording suggested that I didn't have to use the litter box. Surely this concession was for Graham's benefit; there must be some limit to what Anders wanted him to be subjected to. I walked to the bathroom, aware I was displaying the welts on my rear, and actually shut the door behind me. A new experience, being in that room with the door closed. If this got me in trouble, so be it. I looked up at the webcam, and thought about my masters' protective eyes all over the house; at least this man couldn't do anything to me without Anders knowing eventually. I peed (and peed and peed), and then rinsed my face and hands with cool water, trying to recover.
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When I emerged, arms across my chest, he looked away politely. "I'd give you a blanket or something, but Anders said not to. Said we'd both survive." I shook my head, wiped a hand across my face and blurted a little laugh. He gave me a glance and joined in. Then he turned to the kitchen. "I –
would you mind if I waited – I can't eat right now – "
Graham looked at me with concern. I was still shaky with adrenaline.
"Sit down," he said. I sat on the rug. He went to the kitchen and came back with a glass of water. "Drink this." Slowly I sipped, and began feeling a little better.
I was turned a bit away from him, using my knees to hide my breasts.
At least his shield was providing a tiny bit of decency. Should I be trying to make conversation? Making him coffee? I huddled where I was; the poor man was probably turned on enough by my helplessly extravagant display.
"Have – have you eaten
?"
"Oh, yes. I was just finishing when Anders called."
"How bad is the truck?"
"I don't know. I haven't seen it."
"But – his keys – how did you…?"
"Oh, I had those already," he explained. "That's what took me so long; I had to go back to the shop to get them. Anders gave them to me back in May, in case something like this happened. He's, um, got me in his wallet as his emergency number. So, you know, I'd be notified if…. I'd know to look after you, just in case." Tears came to my eyes at the bare thought of Anders making these arrangements: gratitude, and a vivid imagined grief. How close we'd come. "You didn't know?" I shook my head, and hurriedly wiped my eyes.
My colour apparently looked better; Graham began rummaging through the fridge, looking through the Tupperware. Resignedly I saw he had the red bowl out; instructions had evidently been detailed. Apparently he could also survive the way I ate. He even locked my wrists behind me and put the bowl down in the usual corner. To my infinite relief he didn't watch me; he went back into the living room and sat down.
By the time I'd finished it was eight-ten by the oven clock. Graham approached me cloth in hand, looking hesitant, but swabbed my face competently enough, like a parent with a toddler. Something told me he had kids.
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I was helped up with a hand on my arm, my wrists still locked, and taken back to the living room. No more huddling for me, evidently.
Mortified, my eyes tried to drop to the floor, but instead were caught by my tits bulging through their harness, nipple rings glinting. I gave up; there was nowhere to hide, literally or figuratively. My glance flicked to the man holding my arm. He tore his eyes away from my breasts and moved them to my face, looking flushed.
"He wants me to lock you up again, to some ring under the rug…?"
Wordlessly I pointed my toe at the spot, and knelt by it on the floor. Graham unlocked the chain from the hall bench and didn't fumble this time; a locksmith, after all. Though the bulge in his pants was visible, he made no move that wasn't required for the job. But once back in Anders' chair he looked me over, frankly now. "Anders said you'd feel better this way; is that true?"