Eighty Days Yellow (14 page)

I came in a rush, wonderful spasms coursing through my pussy and then the resulting aftershocks warming the rest of my body nicely.

I had always been that way, now that I thought of it. I remembered how Mr van der Vliet had turned me on, the pleasure I had taken in adhering so closely to his lessons, though he wasn’t good-looking in any traditional sense. How I had been so aroused when my swimming coach told me that he wanted to see how long I would swim for if he didn’t tell me to stop. The way I had felt as the dungeon master had slapped my arse at the fetish club.

What did it mean?

I lay down on my bed and tried to banish these thoughts from my mind, falling into a troubled slumber.

I awoke in the evening, still troubled. And still horny. I tried to push the feeling away but just couldn’t seem to think about anything else. Even playing with myself again did nothing to ease my frustration.

Thoughts of Dominik’s imperious tone, his habit of providing such precise instructions ran through my head. Even the way he had given me the address of the crypt had turned me on. I considered calling him and disregarded the idea immediately. What would I say?

Please, Dominik, tell me what to do?

No. Aside from the ridiculous nature of such a notion, I had more power this way, not letting on how much he had got to me. I knew that he would call, eventually, that brief flash of hunger in his eyes; he wouldn’t be able to resist coming up with some new scheme. And though it irked me a little to be on the back foot, I would enjoy it when he did.

For now, I would need to find some other way of satisfying this new urge.

Again I considered calling Charlotte, but I still wasn’t ready to share this portion of my life.

The fetish club. It was a crazy thought, but maybe I could go alone, check it out again, just to see. I wasn’t sure what had come over me, this new sense of fearlessness, on the one hand, frightening, but on the other, exhilarating. I could always leave if it didn’t work out.

I had felt safe there. Not that I couldn’t look after myself, but West End clubs were tiresome, full of drunken, groping lads in packs closing in on every girl who tried to make her way solo to the bar or the ladies’ room.

Despite, or perhaps because of, the open-natured crowd at the fetish club, the patrons had seemed respectful, not sleazy.

Yes, it was the sort of place that I could go alone.

A quick Google search indicated that the club I’d visited with Charlotte was only open on the first Saturday of every month, and it was a Thursday night. None of the larger fetish clubs was running, but I found a link to a small club, not far from Whitechapel in a taxi, that boasted a dungeon space and elusive-sounding ‘play areas’ as well as an intimate, friendly vibe. It would do. The dress code indicated that certain strict rules were enforced. I would have to find an outfit that would fit the bill. I didn’t want to seem out of place.

It was now 11 p.m. The party would be just getting going. I booked a cab, then hunted through my wardrobe and pulled out something that I thought would be suitable, put it on and surveyed my reflection in the mirror. I had chosen a high-waisted, form-fitting navy pencil skirt, with large white buttons at the front and back that held in place thick braces, with straps that criss-crossed at the back and, at the front, ran in a straight line over each of my breasts. I’d bought it on sale from a 1950s-styled boutique on Holloway Road in North London and worn it with a high-necked white blouse, a cheap, though not tacky sailor hat and red velvet pumps to my neighbour’s uniform-themed fancy-dress birthday party earlier that year.

Tonight I was wearing a red bra to match the shoes, and no blouse. Would that pass as fetish wear? I remembered the outlandish outfits from the night I’d been out with Charlotte and thought, Probably not. I wanted to fit in, and in this case, I would attract less attention if I had fewer clothes on. I took one final look in the mirror and ditched the bra. The braces sat tight against my breasts, holding them in, and covered my nipples, and besides, I’d already spent a good part of the day in the buff, hadn’t I?

I wore a jacket in the taxi and felt a rebellious, heady rush of freedom at the thought that I was half naked beneath it.

A young, friendly dark-haired girl with a pierced nose took the small cover charge at the front desk. I noticed she had a tiny teardrop tattoo under her left eye as she asked for my wrist, then applied an entry stamp. I wondered what other secrets she might have hidden under her long-sleeved tuxedo-style latex jacket.

Latex. Perhaps I’d save up and invest in some, if I was going to make a habit of this, though I wasn’t sure that the shiny rubber was really my thing. Charlotte had found it terribly difficult to get in and out of her dress, and an inability to undress would be problematic for me and my desires, I felt.

I prefer to face new and uncertain situations sober, but stopped at the bar for a drink to get my bearings.

Bloody Mary with just the perfect touch of spice in hand, I strode straight across the small dance floor, occupied not by dancers but just a few patrons chatting, and headed for the dungeon. The entrance was open, another room off the bar, without a door, but hidden from view of the dance floor by a couple of green medical screens, the kind you find round hospital beds. Interesting.

Most of the patrons were in the dungeon. Some, sitting in seats round the outside, were talking quietly; others were standing closer to the action but a few steps back from the participants. A few signs, printed on plain A4 paper, were dotted around the walls of the room. ‘Don’t interrupt a scene,’ read one, and another, just two words, said, ‘Ask. First.’ The signs made me feel strangely comforted.

Several pairs of ‘players’ and one trio were engaged in acts of varying degrees of, I assumed, consensual violence, involving different instruments and pieces of equipment. My attention was immediately caught by the sounds in the room, the steady thwack of a cane, the softer slap of a many-stranded flogger, like the one Mark had used, the way that the sound and rhythm changed according to the movements of the wielder and the ferocity applied by each individual.

I didn’t even realise how close I had moved to the trio, two men beating a third person whom initially I thought to be a man, due to the person’s square body and completely shaved head, but then I thought I noted the curve of breasts pressing against the padding on the cross, and heard the higher-pitched sound of a feminine moan. Man, woman, perhaps neither, perhaps a bit of both. A beautiful creature, and what did gender mean, anyway? Not a lot here. I forgot the signs on the walls and crept in for a closer look. It was still shocking to me, in a way, but utterly engaging at the same time.

I felt a hand stretching forward from behind me to very gently touch my shoulder, then a voice in my ear.

‘Lovely, aren’t they?’ whispered the voice.

‘Yes.’

‘Don’t get too close. You might snap them out of it.’

I looked again at the trio. They did each seem to be lost in some other dimension, a place that was somehow still in the room, but not quite a part of it. As if each of them was in the middle of their own private journey.

Wherever it was that they were, I wanted to join them.

The owner of the voice perhaps sensed my desire.

‘Would you like to play?’ the voice said.

I hesitated for a moment. We hadn’t even been introduced, and he, or she, was so direct. Then again, perhaps this was exactly what I needed, and no one would ever know.

‘Yes, I would.’

A hand took mine and guided me over to the one vacant piece of equipment in the room, another cross.

‘Undress.’

My body responded to the command immediately; it was almost the same instruction Dominik had used, and in response I was flooded with desire, straight-out lust, but also the desire for something more than that. What, I still wasn’t sure.

I snapped off the braces, freeing my breasts, and eased down my skirt, feeling once more the thrill of knowing strangers were watching me, enjoying the show. I spread my arms and legs out on the cross, fully naked again for the third time that day. This was becoming a habit.

A leather strap was buckled round each of my wrists and pulled tight, though not uncomfortably so. No ‘safety word’ or gesture was given to me this time. Oh well. My mystery partner seemed experienced enough if confidence was anything to go by, and if it got too much, I would cry, ‘Stop’. I’d had only one drink, my mental faculties were fully functioning, and I was in a room full of people who could intervene if necessary.

I relaxed against the cross and waited for the blows to rain down.

Which they did.

Harder this time, much harder than my last ‘spanking’, and without the reassuring caress on my arse that Mark had made with each strike, muting some of the pain. I gasped, my body jolting under each burst of force that arrived not just on my arse but the sides of my back too. He, or she, I wasn’t sure which, and hadn’t tried to find out, preferring to keep this experience anonymous, must have been using a device, an instrument of some sort, but I couldn’t be sure what. It sounded like a flogger but felt so solid and hard, much harder than the soft, limp lengths of leather looked on the short handle.

My eyes watered, tears ran down my face, and I realised that the more I tensed my body, fought the impact, the more it hurt.

So I relaxed. Tried to find that place, wherever it was that the others seemed to go. Imagined my body melting into the hand, or the flogger, or whatever it was striking me. Listened to the steady whack, whack, the rhythmic beat of my partner’s music, and eventually, the pain dulled, a sense of peace descended as I became a part of my player’s dance, not a victim to it.

Then the buckles on my wrists loosened. Gentle caresses stroked the beaten parts of my skin, stinging a little with each touch.

A soft laugh, another whisper in my ear, and then the voice was gone again, into the crowd.

I stood there, stretched immobile on the cross for I don’t know how long, until I finally managed to peel myself off, dress and call a cab home.

I’d got what I came for.

Hadn’t I?

That sense of peace, of disappearing into another dimension, this other consciousness that had been my refuge, my home one way or another, for as long as I could remember.

Back in my flat I fell into bed and, despite my throbbing skin, slept better than I had in weeks.

It wasn’t until the next morning, in the bathroom mirror, that I noticed the bruises.

An almost beautiful pattern of marks in varying shades lined my lower back and sides, and closer inspection in the full-length mirror in my bedroom revealed the faint outline of a handprint on one of my buttocks.

Fuck.

I hoped Dominik left it a good few days before he called again.

6

A Man and His Lust

Dominik drove in a daze, his mind journeying back on a loop through every single moment of the afternoon. On automatic pilot, he navigated the grey BMW through the labyrinth of roadworks surrounding Paddington, inching his way towards the Westway.

The colour of her skin.

The supernatural pallor. The thousand shades travelling at sub-atomic speed between white and white, with microscopic shades of pink, grey and a dull form of beige calling out in unison to be allowed their day in the sun. The intricate geography of moles and minor blemishes scattered across the landscape of her skin. The way the artificial light of the crypt had highlighted her curves, dancing over her surface, highlighting the areas of darkness, the shimmer of her muscles under the thin protection of her flesh, the sinews in her calves as she shifted imperceptibly to reach another note, the way the rounded edge of the violin ground against her neck, the speed of her fingers navigating across the strings while her other hand vigorously deployed the taut bow as it attacked the instrument like a warrior in flight.

He almost missed the exit and had to switch his memories off for a brief moment as he took a sharp turn, attracting the klaxon of a nearby Fiat driver who disapproved of his last-minute manoeuvre.

Dominik had always been told he had something of a poker face, seldom betraying his feelings in public, let alone in more intimate situations. He had watched the recital in a state of silent prayer, his face a mask, watchful, attentive to the music and all its subtle nuances. Recording the movements of the musicians as they went about their exquisite business, clothed in black and white and, of course, unclothed. Summer.

It had been like a ritual. A symphony of contrasts between the dark evening suits and formal white shirts and the audacious nudity of Summer’s body as she literally fought with her instrument to extract every note, every shard of melody from the music, riding it, taming it. At one point, a tiny bead of sweat had rolled down from the tip of her nose, cascading past one of her hard, pale-brown nipples and then ending its brief lifespan on the hard stone floor of the crypt just a few inches away from her shoes, the high heels he had ordered her to keep on.

Maybe the ritual would have been even more arousing, Dominik thought, if he had asked her to wear a pair of hold-up stockings. Black, of course. Or then again, maybe not.

He had watched it all with a mixture of fiery desire and restraint coursing beneath the shield of his own skin. Like a grand inquisitor at a special feast, supremely detached in appearance had you asked any hypothetical onlooker, but feverishly involved, his mind racing in all directions, his thoughts a mad, unformed jumble, gazing, examining, probing, wondering. All to the gracious accompaniment of those immortal melodies the improvised quartet had been so good at playing, evoking both visions and words as the best music always does.

The shape of her breasts, the delicacy of their size, the ever so slight valley separating them, the crescent of darkness below their underhang like a promise of further secrets, the miniature crevice of her navel, its vertical cavern pointing like an arrow to the territory of her sex.