by Alison Tyler
‘I know something else, too.’
‘Yeah?’
‘I know this …’ She started to kiss him.
‘Let me wash off my war paint, okay?’ He motioned to the stripes of color on his cheeks. He and his band had taken that little bit of their look from Adam Ant.
‘No.’ She wouldn’t let him. ‘I want you like that.’
He grinned at her, seeming surprised. Up until now, he had always been the one to take charge, the one to set the pace and the tone of their interactions. But now, Dori was stalking him. Was moving forward, so that he had to back up against the wall, her hands all over him.
What had gotten into her?
Maybe it was the sexy outfit she was wearing, navy-blue fishnet stockings and an ultra-short skirt that clung to her hips, very like the skirt Bette had been wearing on Dori’s first day back to the 80s. Or maybe the new haircut served as inspiration. She’d worn the short hairdo spiky the way Nina had shown her, so that the cobalt blue tips really popped against the glossy black.
Or maybe it was the new tattoo, emblazoned on her lower back, right below the waistband, where he would see it when he pulled down her skirt.
Or maybe it was simply because Van looked so edible up on the stage. Something you would want to devour. Fuck what Bette said. She was never hungry afterwards. He always filled her up.
Whatever the reason, she found herself pressing her body to his, kissing his mouth, his neck, pulling open his shirt to lick in a line down his chest. She ran her hands along his waist, pulling down the spandex of his pants, and he sighed, guessing her intentions moments before her mouth met his cock.
Still, Van was the one to hesitate. ‘Emma, it’s not private back here. Anyone can come through. Any of the guys in the band …’
She shook her head at him, lips parted as she drank in his cock. She swirled her tongue around the head and then bobbed up and down, licking the warmth of him, the heat of him, wanting to take all of him inside of her. She couldn’t remember being this ravenous for a man before. Had it been the fact that those other girls wanted him? Or maybe just the electricity of watching him prance on the stage.
She didn’t know.
Who was this new Dori?
She didn’t really know that either.
But she had to admit, she liked her.
Chapter Twenty
One day, she’d decide she was dreaming. One day, she’d decide she was dead. But most of the time, she had accepted the fact that she was in the 1980s. The only trouble on her horizon was the fact that soon she would have to look for another place to live. Her parents (and her teenage self) would be back at the end of the month.
She had no idea what that would mean.
Would she have to move?
Would she disappear if she looked into the eyes of her younger self?
Right now, she tried not to let those thoughts worry her, focused instead on the routine set by the women at her workplace. She was finally starting to get used to the schedule. The girls definitely knew how to have fun. Each day was spent getting ready for that night’s party, except on Fridays.
Fridays were reserved for Rocky Horror.
This time, she thought she’d try someone new. Janet, maybe. Or Frank-N-Furter. Frank was the character she’d always chosen while in school. But then Bette came up with the smooth idea to outfit herself more fully like a man, her eyes gleaming as she posed the question to Dori.
‘What do you mean?’
‘There’s this awesome store in the city. A sex toy store. Have you ever been to one?’
Dori shook her head. She hadn’t been to one in the 80s, or the 90s, or ever. But she was willing to go, willing to follow Bette wherever the woman wanted to take her.
‘It’s a gas,’ Bette said. ‘You’ll love it. I swear.’
To Dori’s surprise, Bette was right. Dori had never been to the Mission while in high school. Now, in modern times, the place had become gentrified, with fancy little cafés and high-end clothes stores lining the streets. But in 1988, the place was cool and funky, and maybe just a little bit dangerous. Bette parked the car close to the store and herded Dori inside. Immediately, they were approached by a tough-looking checkout girl. Tattoos, punky spiked hair, piercings. The girl was way ahead of her time, wasn’t she? Dori didn’t remember the piercing craze catching on until the 90s.
‘How can I help you two?’ the clerk asked, and Dori realized that the woman had assumed that she and Bette were a couple. She opened her mouth to speak, but before she could clarify, Bette wrapped one arm around Dori’s waist and held her close. She clearly was enjoying the situation.
‘We’re looking for …’
Dori’s eyes widened as Bette pointed to the devices she wanted to buy. A strap-on and a harness. God. What did the woman expect from Dori? Why did she think that Dori would be able to wear something like this, that she could pull this off?
Because Bette knew something about Van that Dori didn’t.
That’s what this was all about.
‘We have a wide array,’ the salesgirl said, showing off the display. Bette was in motion in an instant, offering Dori a pink one first, then a black one. ‘What color do you think is best? What are you going to wear?’
Dori’s head spun. What was she going to wear? What color was best? She had no idea. Dazed, she let Bette choose several and lead her over to the dressing room – an orange tie-dyed curtain draped across a shower rod in the corner.
‘You can try them,’ she said.
‘Seriously?’
‘Yeah. Over your clothes. Just to make sure you like the way they feel.’
Dori started to pull the curtain closed around her, but Bette ducked in with her.
‘You don’t mind, do you?’
Did she?
She thought of that Bon Jovi dream, her own dream in which he’d chosen Violet over herself. She wasn’t going to let that happen again, wasn’t going to say no to the chances that presented themselves to her.
‘I don’t mind,’ she said, making space for Bette.
‘Good. Let’s see the blue one first.’
On the train ride home, Dori was in a daze. She’d ridden the train often enough as a teenager, going shopping in the Castro with Violet so that they would have the coolest accessories in school. Nobody else seemed to have discovered San Francisco, even though the city was only an hour away from the suburb where she’d grown up.
Thinking back, she remembered some of her most treasured finds. A white T-shirt with the word boy in bold black letters on the front and a UPC code beneath it. Like a generic boy. She’d worn that for the hell of it. For the looks it got her.
She’d had cobalt-blue stretch pants emblazoned with black widow spiders. She’d had high-top sneakers covered in thin, floss-like colored ribbons. And armfuls of funky bracelets, some made of Lucite and filled with liquid and baubles that moved when you shook them. Others made of pounded metal painted different colors. She’d always jingled when she walked.
Now, she thought about the way she dressed in 2008. Yes, she worked in a creative industry. She could get away with showing attitude in her outfits, but aside from her white Juicy dress, she’d become reliant on an all-black wardrobe, like so many of the New Yorkers she knew. Black was easy. Black went with everything.
The 80s were filled with color. Bursting. Electrifying. When had she traded in her rainbow world from one of black and white?
She stared out the window of the train and told herself that if she ever got back to her real life, she would replace her wardrobe immediately. She’d pour the color back in, splash it around, mix it up.
She’d never settle for a black-and-white world again.
Chapter Twenty-One
When Van was on X, something happened to his eyes. The light in his beautiful ocean-hued irises appeared muted, as if he were looking out at the world through a shiny film. Dori found that she wished he wouldn’t get high quite so often, and yet, she liked the sex w
hen he was in an altered state. Fucking him while blasted was amazing. When Van was up, he loved everybody.
Or, at least, he wanted to.
They had a regular pattern now. Friday nights or Saturday nights – depending on whether or not Van had a gig – they hit The Majestic for the late show. Sometimes Nina and Bette would be there. Sometimes not. But on this night, Dori had a surprise. She couldn’t believe she actually had the harness and tool underneath the suit. But she did.
Bette had assured her that Van would be into it. That he would be blissed-out fully from the experience.
And what about her?
What would she get from the experience of fucking him?
She’d had an eye-opening encounter with Luke. She thought that maybe, just maybe, she could get into this Top Dom shit. Bette said the thing suited her. How strange to finally be admitting to herself the things that turned her on. She thought of the few times with Bryce that had really been amazing. Each time, they’d been drinking, and she had felt slightly more at ease in that relaxed state. Pushing him down on the bed. Climbing on top of him. But she’d never let him into her head. Never let him know what she needed to think about in order to get off. Where her fantasies led her.
Now, in the bathroom, she waited, as always, primping in front of the mirror. When Van came in, she turned on him immediately, pushing him up against the wall, grabbing hold of his fine, tight ass. She thought he’d give in to her power, but he surprised her, flipping her around so that she was the one facing the wall, then jerking her belt open and yanking down her slacks.
What the fuck?
He’d been too quick for her.
She struggled for a second, but he applied more pressure and she held still.
She was embarrassed by the harness now, but he didn’t say a word. He had her pressed up against the wall, and she could feel how hard he was. Maybe he simply liked the threat of being fucked. Maybe this is what he fantasized about. Bette hadn’t been clear enough. Dori wished she’d asked her boss more questions, that she’d done her research. Because now, she was lost.
She felt him shove her Jockeys aside, reaching between her legs and under the harness to feel the wetness awaiting him, and she sucked in her breath when his thumb brushed her clit under the dildo. The mere touch of his slightly calloused thumb made her want to come. Oh, God, he knew how to touch her, didn’t he? She was always surprised by that. How an eighteen-year-old could know, just know so well how to turn her on.
He slid inside of her fast from behind, working her hard from the start, and she groaned at how good it felt. God, yes. No pussy-footing around. Just good old-fashioned fucking. That’s what she thought, at least, until he slid out and started to press the head of his cock against her asshole.
‘Wait,’ she started, but he didn’t pause.
‘Wait, I have lube –’ she begged, reaching for the small bottle concealed in the pocket of her shirt. The small bottle was accepted, and she felt the slickness over her tender skin before his cock pressed there once more.
She wanted to tell him to go slow, to give her time, but when she tried to talk, he put one hand over her mouth and began to press harder. She couldn’t get free. Not even if she wanted to. There was something unbelievably sexy to her about the fact that struggling was futile.
‘Oh, God,’ she said again, but this time, her words were muffled by his palm. He wasn’t stopping. He was going slow, as she’d begged him to, but he wasn’t stopping. She felt him push forward, and suddenly he was in, made ready by her own slippery juices and the glossy river of lube.
Oh, God,’ she said again, louder, as he started to fuck her there, fuck her in earnest, and then, ‘Oh, God!’ more of a yelp than a moan, as the bathroom door opened and Van strode in.
Van.
What the fuck? she thought again. ‘What the fuck?’ she managed to say out loud. If Van was walking into the bathroom, then who was behind her? Who was inside her?
Dori’s mind whirled, but she couldn’t fathom what had happened. Couldn’t understand what was going on. She just stared, seeing Van come forward, seeing him as he tilted her head up so that she was kissing him. His eyes had that look again. That glazed look that told her he was in love with her, and that he was in love with the bathroom, and with the mirror, with the soap dispenser, and with the man fucking her ass.
When Van was on X, he was in love with the whole fucking universe.
‘What’d you bring me?’ he asked, fist wrapped tight around her cock. ‘Oh, sweet baby. What on earth did you bring me?’
Dori couldn’t think. She couldn’t speak. Some stranger dressed to the nines as Frank-N-Furter had just fucked her. And not just fucked her, but taken her ass in the ladies’ bathroom of The Majestic. And her new boyfriend – if that’s what she could call Van – seemed to have no trouble at all with this concept. Instead, he was now down on his knees on the bathroom tiles, fellating her rubber cock, an act that seemed almost unspeakably dirty to Dori.
And Dori herself was in a daze.
There were two Frank-N-Furters in the bathroom, and she was sandwiched between them. When she looked at the mirrors on the wall, she saw that there were an infinite amount of characters from Rocky Horror. Twice as many Franks as Brads, though. The look on her face was one of total shock.
And yet, as she looked down at Van, getting the toy nice and wet, and as the false Frank-N-Furter kissed the back of her neck, she felt a shiver rush through her.
Van’s sea-change eyes glowed at her and he stroked her legs as he continued to suck on a cock that would always be hard, a cock that could never come. The man behind her bit into her shoulder, and Dori moaned and squirmed. God, she ought to be yelling, right? She ought to be screaming at this stranger? But she couldn’t – it felt too good.
‘Don’t dream it,’ the man whispered, ‘be it.’ Then he pulled away from her, tucked himself back into his shiny black panties, and left the restroom.
She ran a hand through Van’s long hair, pushing the curls out of his eyes, and he pulled off her. The toy was nice and wet, but was it wet enough?
While she watched, awestruck, he stood and turned around, gripping onto the sink, offering himself to her. She knew exactly what to do. She pulled at the corset he was wearing, tugging it open, and then ripped down his panties. He was wearing black satin ones, and thigh-high fishnets. She poured lube into her hand and wet the space between his rear cheeks, and then, fisting her cock with the excess lubrication, she pressed the head of it to his asshole.
Van groaned, and she realized that Bette was right. This is what he wanted. This is what he liked. She was almost disappointed in the fact that she didn’t have a real cock of her own. That she couldn’t fulfill his entire fantasy, be the boy he sometimes craved. But she wouldn’t fail him. She started to fuck him in earnest, watching his body, seeing his arms tighten, knowing that he was getting more aroused by the moment.
Inspired, she put a hand around his body and gripped onto his cock. Van groaned harder, pushing himself back on her, impaling himself deeper with her toy. She’d never had sex like this before, not with anyone in real life, not even in her mind, but oh fuck, it turned her on.
Van whispered something under his breath, and Dori strained to hear. What was he saying? Not words. Not actual phrases. Just nonsense muttering about how good she was, how hard he wanted her to take him.
No, she’d never fucked a man before. But she understood the appeal. The way it felt to be in charge. Playing those kinky sex games with Luke had taught her that she actually liked being in the driver’s seat. Now, with her hands on Van’s hips, she reveled in the sense of power that flooded through her.
The fact that she could see his expressions in the mirror turned her on even more. He was clearly in heaven, or ‘blissed-out,’ as Bette had said. A thought flickered in her mind – had Bette fucked Van like this? How else would she know that the boy liked it?
And then Dori realized that Van was watching her. Even throu
gh the haze of his pleasure and the daze of whatever drugs he was on today, he was watching her. And for a split second Dori saw recognition in his eyes. That he’d realized she wasn’t some cousin of the girl he knew at the shop. But that she was the actual girl in the shop.
He knew. She could tell. There was an understanding between them, something she would remember after. The way he looked at her. The way his lips mouthed the word ‘Are you …?’
But that didn’t make her stop fucking him. If anything, she slammed harder against him, driving the cock deep inside. And now, when she looked back into the mirror, all she saw in Van’s eyes was the impending climax making him breathless.
She reached her hand in front once more, pulled again on his cock, and felt him stiffen, then buck as he came into the white porcelain sink.
After, she wondered if he would remember, if he would sense that she was lying about her identity. But he appeared to be focused on something else entirely.
‘Who was that?’ he asked, as he tried to redo his lipstick with a shaking hand. ‘Was it Robby?’ he asked, naming one of the other delivery boys from the band.
Dori, hiked her pants back up, then buckled her belt. ‘I don’t know,’ she said softly.
He didn’t seem to hear her, or perhaps he didn’t believe her. ‘It was Robby,’ he grinned. ‘I know it.’
Dori shrugged as they walked out of the bathroom together. She thought she knew the man behind those curls, but she couldn’t be entirely sure.
Chapter Twenty-Two
‘So, do you like Van?’ Nina asked. ‘I mean, do you like him, like him?’ The question was sing-songed in Nina’s classic way. She didn’t just dress as if she had been plucked from the 1950s, she employed the mannerisms she’d picked up from watching those old movies endlessly. Rebel Without a Cause was her favorite. Once, in high school, Dori’s parents had gone on a weekend getaway and Dori remembered Nina coming over to her house with a stack of videos and watching a marathon of the classics together.