by Jamie Knight
Part of the film course going on was a continuation of the in-class discussions. A feat achieved by the imposition of a class forum, where students could post and reply to comments. Everyone had to post a minimum of three comments per film we watched. Those who did ten got five bonus marks.
The only catch was that every one of the comments had to be relevant to the overall discussion as decided by the instructor. An element that made sure everyone paid really close attention to get everything they possibly could.
Most of what I would say was already in the notes I gave to Rachel. Scorpio and Fingered were the first two films in the initial section on ‘transgressive cinema.’ Personally, I would have started with 1947’s Fireworks.
It was reputed as one of the very first films to openly break societal taboos, particularly around sex and sexuality. That was something that Anger could have literally been arrested for at the time. Not in the least because he was gay, which was still listed in the DSM as a mental illness back then. My best guess was that the instructor was going more for the artistic angle rather than social themes, though.
I wasn’t looking for her. At least not consciously. Yet, as though steered by forces from above, or below, my attention wandered to Rachel’s posts. Or, rather, to the lack thereof.
She seemed to be struggling to get to the minimum number, let alone the ten required for bonus points. It was likely that she had fallen into the age-old trap of assuming that, because it superficially involved watching movies all day, Film Studies was easy.
Nothing could be further than the truth. Film was an art form like any other and as with English Lit and, to a degree, deeper forms of History, required a lot of very precise analysis, at least if it was going to be done properly and there were, of course, disagreements about which interpretations were best. Some people went so far as to contend that even what the filmmaker said they meant wasn’t the final word.
I hadn’t really interacted with most of my classmates. At least not in a meaningful way, outside of Rachel, at first, of course. Yet, there they were. Roughly a dozen replies to my posted comments asking if they could chat with me.
Maybe we could study together virtually?
Conspicuously absent from the list was Rachel O’Flanagan. Despite the fact that, in my humble estimation, she needed more help than any of the rest of them. I was a little surprised that she wasn’t just plagiarizing my notes, or even putting them into her own words.
What little she had up at least seemed to be on her own analysis, mostly using my notes as a means to understand what was going on. Like a latter-day Rosetta Stone for film analysis.
She was nothing if not honest, in terms of both facts and fairness, as far as I could tell. That fact alone spurred me to think that she might be okay after all. Despite, no doubt, having a head full of dogma.
I had just poised my fingers over the keys, fully intending to invite her to chat when I thought better of it. Remembering how she had reacted when she first saw me in the dorm, I decided it was probably better to ease into things gently.
Chapter Eleven - Rachel
I couldn’t move. The ropes were too tight. I tried to lift my head but all I could see was the floor. All I could feel was the table beneath me. Cold and smooth.
My wrists and ankles were tied to the tops of the table legs with gentle silk ropes. Dad always said the idea was to hold me, not hurt me. Like a great big hug.
We were at home. I knew that much. Last time it had been in the church. In the basement. I didn’t think the pastor knew but if he did, he never said anything. Ours was a sect that still believed in literal exorcisms, so a bit of light bondage was unlikely to raise any eyebrows.
“Daddy?” I asked, as a floorboard creaked.
It was what he liked me to call him.
“I’m here, kitten. It’s alright?”
“Kitten” was his nickname for me.
“What’s happening, Daddy? I can’t move.”
“That makes it easier, kitten. There’s something Daddy has to do, and it's easier if you can’t thrash about. Remember what happened last time?”
“Yes, Daddy,” I said through tears.
I could smell it. It wasn’t the kind of thing that was easily forgotten. Particularly what happened afterwards. It was a truly terrible thing. To smell your own flesh cooking.
My father said it was just to give me a small preview of what awaited in the fires of hell. I started screaming before the flame touched me.
The scream continued into the waking world. Not thinking about anything other than the terror, I ran into the bathroom, whipping off my nightdress as I went. Stark naked, I stood under the harsh, fluorescent lights, staring at my bare back.
It was fine. I was fine. The dream seemed so real, and I was glad it was over. I looked at the cross burned into my flesh. I wanted it gone. To take the sharpest knife in the well-stocked kitchen, and slice it away, like peeling an orange. Any scar that might form in its place seemed preferable to the current disfiguration.
I gasped audibly, shocked and disgusted by my own self-violence. I’d never thought anything like that before.
Graves.
He must have been getting into my head. Making me think things a good, Christian girl never would. Except how could he? He’d barely said a word to me since I found out who he was.
Did have some kind of mind powers like Dad had said? The laugh burst from my throat. A natural and involuntary reaction to a truly ridiculous idea.
No, it wasn’t him. It was me, finally realizing what had been done to me in the false name of love and righteousness.
It felt like I might vomit. The sheer weight of the realization seemed as though it might just crush me. I settled myself and tried to control my breathing. Everything was fine, I told myself.
I was safe. The pandemic was outside, and I didn’t even have to go to class in the physical sense. My father was far away, back at home. The only thing I might’ve had to worry about was Augustus. Though even that was starting to seem increasingly ridiculous.
Seeing the shower reflected in the mirror, I turned on the water. It wasn’t too early and anyone who might have been woken by the sound of the pipes should have been up already. I hadn’t heard anything from Augustus, but I also wasn’t really paying attention, either.
The warm water felt like a blessing as it came cascading down, cleansing my exhausted and scarred body of filth and tension, if not the wages of sin. Sins visited upon me when I was too young to understand them, nonetheless getting the effect of the intended correction.
I shivered as my hands grazed the raised ridges of the scarring. Dad had meant them to be a reminder. Though he likely hadn’t meant it in the way that was beginning to develop. I remembered alright, and it made me want to stay far away from him.
It made me want to follow my own path and do what I felt like doing.
Moving down my hands down body and back up my legs, it came time to wash my lower region, something that had always held an odd type of tension. I knew it needed to be done, while ever conscious of the effects that could be caused by even the lightest friction on my pussy or clit. I was really sensitive, and sometimes even a light gust breeze, while I was naked, was capable of making me moan.
Bracing a hand against the wall like I had before, I touched myself, running my fingers along my tender pink lips. The tensions were rising up inside me. I spread my lips, letting the water get at me, before gently massaging them in a slow circular motion.
A long moan escaped me before I could stop it. Ordinarily, I would have clamped my hand over my mouth, mildly shamed, and worried that someone would hear. That Augustus, my new roommate, might hear.
At that moment, though, I officially stopped caring. My notion that pleasure was okay and, if anything, was created by God for us to enjoy, was quickly becoming a full-fledged conviction.
I started going faster, plunging two fingers into my aching pussy, vocalizing openly as I worked myself to orgasm. I
t was a rebellion, I suppose. Though, more than that, it was a reclamation. A way of saying my body and my life were my own and not for anyone else to be compromised.
I thought of Augustus and went back to wishing he could take my virginity. As I imagined him holding my ass cheeks and squeezing them while he put his cock all the way inside me, I came. I was so happy I cried. Gentle tears were rolling down my cheeks as my body shook with sweet release.
After my shower, swaddled in my robe, still gloriously naked beneath, I pushed two PopTarts down into the eight-slice toaster that came with the kitchen. It was an instance of flagrant excess that would surely turn my father’s face red. I smiled at the image while waiting for the time to tick down.
Despite having always been taught to eat at the table, ‘like a proper lady,’ I damn well kept doing as I pleased now, taking my plate of processed, sugary goodness into the living room and sitting down on the couch, fully intending to watch something on the flat screen TV hanging unobtrusively on the wall.
Neither Dad nor I had noticed it when I moved in. I wasn’t sure about Dad, but I’d taken it as some kind of post-modernist painting, commenting on the void, as well as the obvious nod to Yves Klein.
My very selective powers of observation also made it so that I’d completely missed the sheaf of paper on the coffee-table. It was partly covered by the plate. The pages were held together with a staple in the upper left-hand corner, just like the notes that Augustus had given me.
Of course they were! What else did I think? Some invisible tutor had broken in, slipped in during the dead of night and placed a fucking study guide on the table, right where I would see it in the morning?
I blushed at my mental profanity. It was another step in my reclamation process. I had no intention of becoming a potty-mouth or someone with a dirty mind. Though it was a relief to know I could use such words, even mentally, when and where they were called for, there being some situations, usually involving absurdity, pain, or terror, when only cuss words would do.
When the initial shock wore off, it was replaced by a sense of wonder, coupled with confusion. Even after our last meeting and my obvious efforts at avoiding him, Augustus still went out of his way to try and help me. I wondered for the moment how he knew I was having trouble before remembering the online discussion group.
I knew I hadn’t done well, hardly coming up with the bare minimum in terms of comments. I wasn’t happy about it. I’d always prided myself on being a good student but that had only been in areas I knew.
The curriculum at Convent school was not really very broad when it came right down to it. Of course, they were pretty traditional. Most of the girls graduating from there expected to become wives and mothers, with no aspirations for careers outside the home.
Moved by forces unseen, which could have come either from my Lord or his, I stood straight up and marched to Augustus’s room. I was hellbent on having it out with him. I knew almost for a fact that I’d misjudged him and had the sneaking suspicion he had done the same with me.
We had to talk if we were going to have any chance of a co-habituation that wasn’t extremely awkward, with the two of us constantly tiptoeing around each other. He had made the first move. It was only right that I try and reply.
His door was closed, as it often was. Though I somehow doubted that he kept a chair wedged under the knob. It was unlikely that I might try to baptize him in his sleep.
If half of what I’d heard about people like him were true, it would not be a pleasant experience. Steam would start to rise from his skin as soon as it was touched by Holy Water. Fuck, my dad used to talk about Satanists like they were fucking vampires.
I wanted to knock but something stopped me. He sounded really busy, the sound of his keyboard audible through the door. I didn’t want to disturb him. It might have seemed like a pathetic excuse, but it was true enough. Before I left, my ear was caught by the song he was listening to.
He is/ He’s the shining and the light without whom I cannot see. And he is, insurrection, he is spite, he’s the force that made me be.
It sounded like church music, but, knowing Augustus, it was about Satanism.
How odd.
Now I was really curious and determined to find out more about him and his beliefs.
Chapter Twelve - Augustus
I was okay. It was the first time in a long time that I hadn’t woken up screaming. So, in that sense, it was a nice change, really.
Lifting my head, the keys that were on my pillow not wanting to let go and leaving their impression in my skin, I noticed the record player was still spinning. The needle was thumping in effectively against the label.
Rallying all my strength, I arose like Lazarus and limped on my snoozing right leg to the player, putting it out of its misery.
Slipping the record back into its sleeve, returning the precious, vintage, vinyl to its alphabetical spot in the row on my nightstand, I selected my next outfit from the free-standing closet and headed for the bathroom.
I did a quick sweep of the common space, making sure Rachel wasn’t around. If she was, then I would retreat and give her space. The coast was clear, and I booted it to the bathroom, suspending the hanger of fine, secondhand clothes on the hook set into the back of the bathroom door for this expressed purpose.
No sooner had I sat back down at the desk, showered, and dressed, with breakfast in hand, then I saw a message come through on my email system. An instant message, it stood out against the white background, in hues of pink that were close to red but not quite there.
Rachel: You up?
It was technically possible that I was still logged in from the day before. I decided to be nice.
Me: Very much so. Just had a shower.
My words came up in dark blue. The color and font selection were meant to be default as well as random, so I didn’t look too far into it.
Rachel: I thought I heard you.
Me: Who else might it be at this time of day?
Rachel: Noon?
Shit, it really was, too. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d slept that long. Nearly nine hours in a row. There was definitely something different about Rachel. Something that managed to soothe my savage mind.
Me: That’s late for me.
Rachel: Figured, I mean, I usually hear you much earlier.
Me: So you can avoid me?
Rachel: At first.
Me: And now?
Rachel: Reconsidering.
That was a surprise. Not that I wasn’t happy to hear it. If nothing else, everything would be a lot more pleasant for both of us if we didn’t act like we were walking through a minefield every time we left our rooms.
Rachel: I was going to knock yesterday but you sounded busy. I heard your music. It was nice.
Me: Ghost.
Rachel: What?
Me: The music. It was a Swedish Metal band called Ghost.
Rachel: Metal? Like, Heavy Metal? It didn’t sound like it.
Me: They do things differently in Europe. ;)
I could hear her giggling through the wall. It was beautiful.
Rachel: It sounded fascinating. I loved the instrumentation, particularly
at the beginning. Oh, and the choral sections. It almost sounded
like something I would hear in church. Particularly with the Latin
in the chorus. Was it about God?
It would have been the perfect time to lie. I don’t know what else I would have said but I knew that the worst possible thing would be to tell the truth. That the song was about Lucifer. Or at least the idea of Lucifer. Using it the way most LaVeyans, particularly in the later period, did, as a metaphor. A symbol of rebellion against absolute authority.
We could very well use someone like Voltaire, who did the same thing with the royalty of France and suffered for it. In the name of freedom and personal autonomy. Lucifer just had a bit more chutzpa.
Me: The truth?
Rachel: If you don’t mind. :P
>
Me: It’s actually about the devil. Or more accurately
Lucifer. How the idea of Lucifer is portrayed in Pop
Culture taught the singer, Tobias Forge, to think for
himself and be independent. The light that helps me
see? A reference to Lucifer as the bringer of light.
In this case meant metaphorically in terms of shedding
light on the truth in the darkness of lies.
There was a long pause then and I could tell she was thinking. I was a bit anxious as I awaited her response, wondering if she would go back to hating me. The ‘Rachel is typing….’ coming up several times at the bottom left of the messenger window. Finally, I received a response.
Rachel: Meet me in the living room?
Me: Of course.
It was like an old-school comedy skit, both of us coming out at once, nearly bumping into each other on the way to the couch. Rachel was the first to laugh at our silliness. Seeing her relax helped me to, also.
“Couch?” I asked.
“Certainly.”
“Ladies first.”
I watched as she went to the couch, and sat down, pulling one leg up under her. The hem of her dress, a cute, light, summery thing swishing as she walked.
She really was my opposite in most things, at least on a superficial level. Though, as we were both beginning to learn, there was a lot more to life than that.
I sat down on the other end of the couch, still not sure about her comfort level and not wanting to freak her out.
“So, Lucifer is a metaphor?” she asked.