by Paula Mabbel
“A sub or a Dom, sweetie. Do you like being submissive or dominant?”
“Um, I’m not sure…maybe I like both…or neither. To tell you the truth, I’ve never experienced any of it,” Claire admitted sheepishly.
“Nothing to be embarrassed about, sweetie. We all started somewhere, with fumbling experiments to try and satisfy our crazy longings. I like to think of myself as a ‘Versatile’, that way I get the best of both worlds!”
“Both worlds…?” Claire asked.
“Yes, I can be submissive when it strikes my fancy, and I can be dominant at other times. I’m “versatile”, meaning I enjoy both roles. Being that I’m also bisexual, it really opens up the possibilities for me,” she laughed.
Claire raised her eyebrows to indicate what an impression that statement made.
“When you find a great partner, the play session becomes a subtle dance of your energies, almost like performance art, but with an element of passion. I love it! A good session can put me on an emotional high that lasts for days. But it’s not always easy to find the right partner, people tend to come and go. At least, that’s what I’ve found,” Gwynneth continued.
“Wow, that sounds fascinating,” murmured Claire, thinking that maybe she’d like to experiment with this just a little.
“I’m going to a play party later, at a private home in Beverly Hills. Why don’t you come with me? I think you’ll enjoy it. If not, at least you’ll get an education.” Her green eyes twinkled as she smiled at Claire. “I know you have the hots for Felicia, but I’d love you to come.”
Claire blushed. “I…I…um…well, maybe…” she stammered, not realizing her woman crush was that obvious. “I was hoping to see her here tonight.”
“You missed her, but her driver over there might know if and when she’ll be back,” she said, jutting her chin in the direction of the bar, where Claire saw Graham lounging against the bar, drinking a glass of what she assumed to be Perrier.
“Oh, thanks. I’ll just go over there for a minute and ask him. Will you wait for me here?”
“Oh yeah, baby. You’re looking hot,” she responded with a wink.
Several sets of appreciative eyes watched her as she approached the bar. Fresh meat was always welcomed at DIVE, but Claire ignored the stares.
“Hello, Graham. How are you?”
“Well, hello, Miss. You look lovely,” Graham responded.
Claire felt emboldened by his compliment. “I’m looking for Felicia. Do you know when she’ll be back, or how I can reach her?”
“I really can’t say, Miss. But I’ll be glad to take your number and pass it on to Ms. Resden, if you like,” he said, reaching for a small leather-clad notebook in his breast pocket. “Just write down your info here, if you don’t mind, and I’ll see that she gets it.”
Claire scribbled down her name and phone number, and just for good measure, her email address, too.
“Thank you so much, Graham. Please tell her I very much look forward to hearing from her.”
“Will do, Miss. Have a great evening and be careful.”
She walked back to the couch where she had left Gwynneth a few moments before. She wasn’t there, but one of the men told her, “Gwynn will be right back, she wanted to dance to that last song.”
Claire sat down and nursed her drink for a couple of minutes, then saw Gwynneth walking back from the dance floor arm in arm with an Amazonian black woman wearing a Grecian gown and a sky-high blonde wig.
She was now able to observe the rest of Gwynn’s outfit as well. The diaphanous jumpsuit had another strap around the hips, barely camouflaging her pubic area, the sheer fabric clinging down her thighs to where it was tucked into thigh-high black boots. Around each thigh was another strap with a large silver jump ring attached to the outside. Now she noticed that the boots also had jump rings attached down the sides. Curious as she was, she would have to wait to learn what those were for.
The disparity in their sizes was almost comical, Gwynneth indeed looked like an elf next to the tall black woman. When the woman spoke, though, there was no question that the woman was a man.
“This is Claire? Hello, darling, you’re beautiful!” he/she said. “I’m Hubert. So happy to meet you,” and kissed Claire on each cheek.
As surprised as she was, Claire graciously returned the man’s air kisses. “So you’re going to be partying with Gwynney, here?” rocking his knees from side to side like a high school girl.
“Um, I guess so…” she murmured, glancing from Hubert to Gwynneth and back again.
“You’re gonna have fuuuuu-uuuunnn!”, the last part again in a girlish singsong voice.
Claire blushed again, and looked down.
“Ahhh, a virgin!” cooed Hubert.
“Okay, Hubert, that’s enough. Don’t you remember you were there once?” Gwynneth admonished him, as she jokingly elbowed him in his side.
They all laughed.
“Actually, though, we are going to get going now,” Gwynn said, reaching for her little leather jacket on the back of the seat.
With “buh-byes” and air kisses all around, the two women exited the bar, and got into one of the taxis waiting at the curb. Gwynn gave the address to the driver, and it was about a 10-minute drive up into Bel-Air Estates, where the party was being held.
Gwynneth gave her name to the bouncer-dressed-as-a-butler at the door, and a woman in a French maid costume escorted them to the large underground room where the party was being held.
“Soundproofing,” Gwynn confided to Claire as they walked down a long hallway toward the party, with voices and laughter bubbling forth to meet them. Every so often, Claire heard a sharp crack, then an appreciative, “Oooooooo” from the crowd.
Nothing she had ever experienced in her short life prepared her for the scene she was about to encounter. There were people in various stages of undress, some in costumes, some dressed formally, standing and talking, or parading themselves around, accepting appreciative murmurs and comments from onlookers. Waiters moved among the crowd with trays of hors d’oeuvres and champagne. The room was divided into different sections with heavy drapery, and people were walking from one section to another, observing the various “scenes” being enacted in the different areas. In the area closest to them, Claire found out quickly enough what the sharp crack was coming from, as she observed a naked man spread-eagled and securely fastened to an 8 foot wooden X. The sound was coming from a whip expertly wielded by a woman in a ball gown. After every blow, a red welt was immediately raised on the man’s back or ass, and the small crowd murmured their appreciation and praise: “Oooooooo…” He seemed to be enjoying the action because he was arching his ass back toward the woman.
Claire gasped as she saw the lasso tied around his cock and balls that he pulled against with every backward thrust of his hips.
Wow! she thought.
Gwynneth steered her over to a small gathering of people to meet the host.
“So delighted that you have joined us,” said Ian graciously in his crisp British accent. “I hope that you will find the evening enjoyable and entertaining.”
“I…I’m sure I will,” Claire managed to say, her head spinning.
As she looked around at the other guests, it was like being at a very kinky masquerade ball. One woman was walking around with her human pet on a leash in a sensory deprivation suit, completely covered up, except for his large cock and balls exposed in a sack of thin fabric. She was leading him around and encouraging anyone who wanted to do so to fondle his privates, without him knowing whom it was. Apparently, he was enjoying it, because, although he could not see or hear anyone, his erect, engorged member indicated that he could definitely feel everyone’s touch.
In another area, a woman was restrained on a padded bench, the bodice of her milkmaid costume pulled down to reveal her breasts, and the skirt raised over her head to reveal her naked ass. She was being hand spanked by her Dom. Claire thought that the position looked fairly uncom
fortable, as her arms were being held back so far that her back arched, but from the ecstatic moaning and the blissful look on her face, she also seemed to be enjoying herself.
Claire felt her privates moisten as the round cheeks of the milkmaid’s ass jiggled from each blow. Earlier, each handprint had been visible on her white flesh, but after so many slaps both gorgeous orbs were bright pink. She was wearing a blindfold and had a ball gag in her mouth, and Claire shocked herself to realize that she wanted to pinch the woman’s nipples and watch her writhe.
Gwynneth stayed with Claire, introducing her to people she knew, and watching to make sure that Claire didn’t go into shock from what she was observing. She needn’t have worried—Claire was fascinated and enthralled with the stimulating input. She felt completely at home here.
They strolled around, nibbling on caviar and sipping champagne for about an hour, observing the different play scenes, when they heard Ian’s voice over the crowd announcing the Shibari performance to be staged in the adjoining room.
“Shibari? What is that?” Claire asked, assuming correctly that Gwynneth would fill her in at least a little bit on what to expect.
“Shibari, or more correctly, Kinbaku, is a Japanese term for the ancient art of erotic bondage. You know how crazy the Japanese are about packaging things. Well, techniques that were once used for restraining prisoners have been subtly altered and eroticized to address the concept of how pain becomes pleasure. The original intent to torture has become an erotic, consensual element of BDSM. It’s been highly stylized to the point where it’s performance art in itself,” Gwynneth explained.
“You’ll see that the man tying her up, the rigger, will be binding the woman artistically with straps or rope. For him, it’s an art form, and for the person being tied, if the rigger does it properly, it can be very relaxing and freeing. The experience of letting go during the bondage is not unlike the high that people get from turning pain into pleasure from a release of endorphins, sort of like a runner’s high.”
As the two women crowded into the circular room with about fifty others, they found a place on the floor in front of the couches, immediately in front of the circular stage. There was a dais for the three musicians, a drummer, violinist, and flutist, who relaxed waiting for the performers to come out.
Claire could hardly contain her curiosity about what was to happen on the small, circular stage, with various hinges and pulleys attached to the ceiling. Lighting from small spots in the stage and larger spots above shone down on the variety of coiled ropes which were set out around the stage.
A beautiful woman in a silk kimono emerged from the anteroom and sat down gracefully, resting on her shins with her hands on her thighs. Her silky black hair was chin length, and her brown skin, fine features and high cheekbones suggested that she was Ethiopian. She did not look at the audience, but vaguely focused her gaze downward. There was a smattering of applause, then silence fell over the room. The musicians started to softly play an exotic, sinuous melody.
Then a man came out, dressed in black silk slacks and shirt, with a blue cummerbund exactly the same shade as the silk kimono the woman wore.
He knelt down and embraced the woman, whispering a few words in her ear, then commenced to bring her arms behind her back, as she obediently and passively allowed him to tie them there with the rope. He moved around her rapidly, using the rope under and over her breasts, around her shoulders and waist, binding her tightly. He took out a blue silk blindfold from his pocket and put it on her.
The woman was totally compliant in his hands as he expertly wove and knotted the ropes around her, tugging here and there to check the restriction of the bonds. He leaned her back against him and her head lolled on his shoulder, as he tugged the kimono away from her breasts, leaving them exposed. He kissed her neck and she moaned softly. Claire was hypnotized by the intimacy of the gesture, and felt moistness growing between her legs.
The man looped a rope over the pulley above, and tying it to the front of the rope already on the woman, hoisted her up until she was standing on her tiptoes. She hung backwards limply from her harness, allowing the ropes to hold her up, making no attempt to help or hinder him in his ministrations. He pulled the kimono back and away from her hips, exposing a blue silk thong just covering her pubic hair.
He continued to wrap ropes around the woman’s body, including one that Claire thought must have painfully pressed against her clitoris, from the front to the back. As he tugged on that particular rope, the woman gave out a moan, halfway between pain and pleasure. You could see her body stiffen, then she would make a conscious effort to relax into the pain.
He looped another rope around her ankle, then hoisted her leg toward the ceiling at a forty-five degree angle. She lolled in her harness, a look of pleasure on her face. Her other thigh was bound tightly to her calf, with her leg bent, and looped over another pulley. He then lifted her completely off the ground, and she dangled there, legs wide, breasts and crotch fully exposed, obviously in a form of ecstatic trance. She sighed as the drums beat out their insistent accompaniment to her pleasure.
Then the man picked up a short piece of bamboo from the stage and slapped her on the bottom of her foot. She cried out and there was a collective gasp from the audience. But immediately, she again relaxed into the pain, and moaned softly in ecstasy. The man walked around to her ear and again gave a few intimate words of encouragement.
Claire was sure that everyone in the audience was getting as turned on as she was, and furtively glanced around. Gwynneth reached out and grabbed her hand and held on as if they were about to go over the top of a roller coaster.
As a finale, he knotted another rope onto the one traversing her crotch, turning the big knot towards her clit, and moving back several feet, began jiggling the rope, allowing the vibrations to stimulate the woman. After about a minute, the woman began to orgasm, the spasms rolling through her body, making her strain against her bonds even more strongly. Her body began to quake and quiver, as he relentlessly teased her clitoris with the knot. She arched wildly, twisting against the ropes, moaning and sighing.
Claire was completely aroused by the scene, not only by the brazenness of the performance, but well, because it was so unbelievably erotic!
The man lowered her to the floor, rapidly removing the bonds, and gently massaging the rope impressions on her skin. The woman was languid, totally relaxed, as he removed all the ropes, pulled her robe closed and again embraced her, murmuring to her. She raised her lips to his and they kissed passionately.
The audience broke out in applause. The couple was German, and traveled all over the world displaying their art and teaching the Shibari discipline. Ian had paid ten thousand dollars to bring them here to the total delight of his guests. He was well pleased.
Claire and Gwynneth looked at each other. Wow, mouthed Claire silently.
“That was a real treat, wasn’t it?” Gwynneth agreed.
By the time they had thanked their host and said their goodbyes, it was well past one a.m., and Claire had work the next day. Friends of Gwynneth’s dropped her off at her car, and she drove home, her imagination aflame. She spent a lot of time at work the next day, envisioning herself in a variety of roles, and enjoying every delicious bit of her fantasies.
Who knows, she said to herself, maybe I’m a “Versatile.”
*****
A few days later Felicia finally called her and asked her what she wants. Claire knew the moment was now or never, and after stammering out a few false starts, finally tells Felicia that she wants to learn how to be a dominatrix like her, that she and Gwynneth went to a play party and how happy and excited it made her.
Felicia tried to dissuade her. “You know, this lifestyle is not for everyone, and it certainly is not for dilettantes. To be a professional, you really have to know what you’re doing, or you can actually harm people. You have to know that there’s a big responsibility in being a Dominant. And, unlike some newbies might want to bel
ieve, it’s not torture for the submissive. The sub is the one actually running the scene. You have to make it safe enough for them to let go.”
Claire was persistent. “This is what has been missing in my life. I can’t go back to my vanilla lifestyle, always being a good girl, and minding my parents. The idea of learning how to be a dominatrix more than excites me, it gives me something to live for. Please, Felicia, pleeeeze!”
“Plus, I don’t know you well enough to know if you could even withstand the training. It’s very rigorous. You need to experience everything, from being a submissive, so you know how much punishment you can give out eventually, to learning how to be a compassionate Domme. I might consider taking you on as a protégé, but you have to be willing to do that. Are you?” she demanded.
Claire couldn’t deny the flip-flop her stomach did when Felicia asked her that.
“Yes! Yes, with you…of course I would be,” she immediately answered, not really knowing what it might entail, but eager for any chance to be with Felicia.
“Then meet me at the studio next Tuesday. I’ll text you the address. Don’t be late.”
Felicia was secretly delighted to take on a complete BDSM virgin like Claire, being very turned on by innocent young college girls. If they were trained properly, they made excellent playthings. She thought about how much fun she would have during Claire’s training, and if Claire ended up dropping out at some point, Felicia would have had her fun. Most of the young ones in the past who professed to wanting to learn the trade were just dabblers, and didn’t really have the guts to dominate. So Felicia had nothing to lose in agreeing to “train” Claire in BDSM, and oh, so much to gain.
*****
The following Tuesday, Claire showed up at the studio warehouse address that Felicia had texted to her, and was greeted at the door by a scowling Kiki, the butchy dyke from the tattoo parlor, who lived on premises as the caretaker. As unremarkable as the building looked on the outside, the interior was lavishly furnished. Kiki brought her into a small living room outfitted comfortably with overstuffed furniture, soft lighting and modern art, and offered her a glass of wine. In the background, jazz music played softly.