Topping From Below (26 page)
The melody quickens, his long, elegant fingers at a frenzy all over the keyboard. His brow furrows.
“Damn!” he mutters, and stops playing, runs his fingers through his dark hair, then begins again, still not seeing me. He must’ve hit a wrong key, although I did not notice it. His head nods, keeping time.
I leave, not disturbing him, and walk down the hallway to the guest bedroom. Opening the door, I see nothing. It is as black as an underground cave. I feel along the wall for the light switch, turn it on, but nothing happens. Apparently, there are still no lamps in the room and no overhead light. I go into the kitchen to look for a flashlight. Opening a utility drawer, I find Scotch tape, scratch pads, pens, a pair of scissors, and operating manuals for his microwave oven and stove. I close the drawer, then walk over to the broom closet in the corner. Besides brooms and mops leaning against the wall, and a trash can sitting on the floor, I see a red fire extinguisher on the top shelf, and next to that a flashlight. I grab it, then go back through the house, stopping at the den entrance. M. is still playing, oblivious of my presence.
Back in the guest bedroom, I turn on the flashlight. A cone of bright light shines on the wall. I move it to the next wall, and then the next. The room is painted entirely black now, with heavy black curtains that block out the afternoon light. I walk over to the curtains, draw them back, and see that the window is covered with blackout screens. A black oval rug, extending to within a foot of the walls, covers the floor, the hardwood only showing on the perimeter.
A training room, that’s what M. called it. And he said I’d find out soon enough what it was for. Feeling queasy, I turn off the flashlight and back out of the room, closing the door behind me. I return the flashlight to the kitchen and just stand there, listening to the music. It’s different now, funereal, haunting, heavy cords and dramatic pounding. It reminds me of a trip I took along the Big Sur coast in mid-winter, the seascape gray and bleak, fog shrouding the Santa Lucia mountains, the sense of man’s inconsequence illumined in the relentlessly crashing waves. I feel my inconsequence now, and leave M.’s house before he notices my presence.
Several days later, while M. is taking a shower, I get the flashlight and see more of the room. No longer can it be called a guest bedroom, for an overnight guest would never stay here. In one corner, hanging from a set of chains, there is some kind of a black leather sling or harness, with leg straps and foot stirrups. And in the middle of the room, a hoist—with chrome steel pulleys, nylon rollers, and rope—dangles from the wooden beam on the ceiling. I run the light along the rest of the ceiling and see metal hooks secured in various locations. Earlier, M. told me that the room is still not complete.
Yesterday, hearing M. play that bleak music, I understood how hermetic my life has become. I’ve slipped into a world of dark isolation, at the center of which stands M. I had a career. I had friends. But little by little, I’ve lost everything. It’s the middle of June, and I haven’t seen Maisie since February—the month I began seeing M. She was my closest friend before Franny died, and I’ve shut her out as well.
On Saturday, I call Maisie, then, at her urging, I drive to her home in midtown Sacramento. Recently, she bought an old mansard-topped Victorian-Gothic home and converted it into a boardinghouse. For months, I’ve promised I’d come over and see it. I slow down and turn the corner, checking the address. I pull up to the curb in front of a huge, dilapidated three-story home. The street is shady and charming, canopied with tall graceful elms and stout-trunked sycamores, but the house is in a state of decline. Maisie said she was renovating the home, but I wasn’t expecting such a mess: the paint is chipped and peeling, and the porch sags in the center like an old swaybacked horse that’s been ridden too many times; shutters droop off their hinges, the windows smudged and nearly opaque; and in the driveway a dented trash can lies carelessly on its side.
I enter the house. In front of me is a flight of old stairs, creaky I’m sure. A bare bulb, unlit, hangs from the ceiling in the dingy hallway, which has been paneled with cheap wood that is warped and buckling in places. I turn to my right and look into a damask-hued living room—which should probably be called a parlor in an old house like this—filled with stale light. The shades are half-drawn, the floor lamps muted with pink embroidered covers. A table along the wall is covered with heavy linen.
“You’re here!” I hear Maisie say loudly, and turn around. She’s a large woman in her late thirties, bespectacled, with pointy eyebrows and thin, thin lips. She’s wearing a white dress with big bold roses. I’d forgotten that Maisie always wore dresses decorated with huge floral prints that made me want to scream. I’d also forgotten about how, in order to compensate for her scanty lips, she would exaggerate her lipstick, using bright reds and painting the lip line fuller than it really was. As a result, whenever she grinned her smile seemed to rove all over her face in a very sloppy way.
“I’m so glad to see you finally,” Maisie says, rushing up to give me a big hug.
“Me too.”
She holds me at arm’s length, peering at me over her enormous lavender-tinged wing-shaped glasses. “You look like hell,” she states matter-of-factly.
I shrug. There’s not too much I can say to that.
“Come on,” she says, taking me by the arm. “Let me give you the grand tour.”
The grand tour turns out to be not so very grand. The banister needs to be fixed, the walls painted, all the plumbing fixtures replaced, the back door repaired. I try to think of something positive to say, and finally comment on the ceiling. “I like the curlicues painted on the coving,” I say. Fortunately, Maisie’s chattering makes up for my lack of enthusiasm.
She takes me into the nursery—the only room halfway decent, painted yellow with a ceiling trim of red and blue clowns—and checks on her two-year-old boy, who sleeps soundly in a white wooden crib, lying on his stomach, thumb in mouth. I reach into the crib and rub his back gently. He’s wearing a blue T-shirt and a diaper printed with dinosaurs. His arms and legs are chubby, his hair curly red, and he has a ski-jump nose that turns up at the end. A rash of light freckles bridges his nose.
“You’ll want one soon,” Maisie whispers. The boy’s lips pucker around his thumb and he makes a soft smacking sound. Ever since Maisie had a baby, she’s tried to convince me to have one also, saying that single motherhood isn’t so very difficult.
“I don’t think so,” I say, and I brush the hair off his forehead and touch his cheek. He has that soft, plump skin that only babies have. When Franny and Billy were young, loving them so much, I knew I would be a mother someday. I’m not, obviously. I watched while I was in my mid-twenties and then thirties as nearly all my friends, one by one, got married and had children. But I had a career—and wasn’t that even better? Men seek divorces; children grow up and leave. All you have left, in the end, is your career. Anyway, that’s what I told myself and everyone who asked, and it almost sounded convincing.
We leave the nursery, and Maisie shows me her boarders’ rooms. The boarders don’t seem to mind our intrusion when she knocks and asks permission to see their quarters. She takes me through each room, delighted with her old house.
“Oh, I know it needs a lot of work,” she says, leading me back into the front parlor. “But think what it’ll be worth a couple of years from now, when I get it fixed up.”
I smile. “I think it’s great,” I say, meaning every word. The house is a mess, but I’m envious of Maisie’s passion, her determination to build something of value out of ruin. Since Franny died, I have little passion for anything except exposing her murderer. I sit on the sofa, a garishly red piece of furniture with tufted velvet fabric. Maisie stands over me, suddenly quiet. I hear an occasional thud or scrape coming from an upstairs bedroom. I fold my hands in my lap, frowning at them.
“Maisie,” I begin slowly, then hesitate. I begin again. “I’m sorry,” I say.
“What for?”
“For not returning your phone calls. For disappearing.”
Maisie waves her hand as if she were waving away my apology. “Don’t worry about that,” she says, sitting down next to me. “But when are you coming back to work?”
“Soon,” I say. “Soon.”
Maisie raises her pointed eyebrows at me. “You’ve been saying that for months. Don’t you think it’s time to come back?”
“No. Not yet. I’m still …” I pause and shake my head. I can’t tell her about M., about Franny’s involvement with him and now mine. “I need more time,” I say. “I’m still struggling to make sense of all this.”
“All what, Nora? There is no sense to how Franny died. But she did, over a year ago, and now it’s time for you to get on with your life. You need to get some help. Look at you. You look like you haven’t slept for weeks. No makeup, and your hair’s a mess. And look what you’re wearing: torn jeans and a ratty T-shirt. You never used to dress like this. You look like you’ve been to hell.”
I gaze down at my T-shirt. There’s a milk stain where I spilled my cereal this morning. “There’re lots of ways to go to hell,” I say quietly, thinking of the black room in M.’s house, the leather sling and the steel hoist. “It’s getting back that’s the hard part.”
“What happened to your afternoon classes?” I ask M., wondering why I’m here, feeling grumpy from too little sleep. He called me from campus earlier today and said to meet him at his house. The kitchen seems too bright and shiny, the afternoon light beaming through the window, reflecting off the appliances, the chrome on the stove and refrigerator glaring—even M.’s cheerfulness grates on me. He’s leaning against the counter, and he looks like an ad out of a male fashion magazine, every hair in place, his clothes wrinkle-free, fastidious beyond reproach.
“I canceled them. I wanted the afternoon free.”
I push up the sleeves on my blouse, which is rumpled from being rucked up in the dryer all night long. “What for?”
“I have something special planned for today.”
I wait for him to continue, but he doesn’t. “So—are you going to tell me?” I ask, getting annoyed. He only smiles, but it looks more like a sneer to me.
“Come with me,” he says, and he walks out of the kitchen. I follow him down the hallway and into the back bedroom, the training room. The room is dark, with lit candles everywhere—some of them thick and squat, others tall and thin, some in candlesticks, others on flat disks. They flicker around the room, and they must be scented, because I smell the faint, spicy-sweet odor of nutmeg.
I look around the room. The leather sling in the corner I’ve seen before. Likewise the hoist and the hooks in the ceiling. But now there is a bed shoved up against the far wall, and a padded bench of some sort is placed in the middle of the room. A heavy set of shackles dangle from one wall—far enough apart for outstretched hands—and thick leg irons are bolted to the floor. And displayed on the south wall, hanging from hooks, is M.’s collection of whips, belts, and paddles. In the middle of the display, mounted on two hooks, is the steel cutlass M.’s father used in World War II.
I jerk when I feel M.’s hand on my neck. “I want to leave,” I say.
“Not yet. I’m going to fuck you first.”
“In your room,” I say.
He holds my arm. “No—in here.”
I look up at him and see the determination in his eyes. We are going to fuck in this room. He unbuttons my blouse and slides it off my shoulders. Then he takes off my jeans and underwear. I notice the television and VCR, and next to them a tall chest of drawers. In the corner, a camcorder is set up on a tripod. I glance back to the leg irons bolted on the floor.
“That’s all I want to do,” I say. “Just fuck.”
M. sees me looking at the leg irons and he smiles. “You can trust me, Nora. You know that.”
“Just fuck,” I repeat.
“Okay,” M. says, and he takes me to the bed. I lie down, feeling the soft sheets beneath me. I watch the candles burn. Flame shadows flick in fluid patterns off the black walls. The candles would be romantic in a different setting; now they just look eerie, menacing in a medieval way. I feel the danger in this room.
M. sits on the bed. He’s wearing a dark blue shirt, and it’s a good color on him. It makes him look sexy. He leans over and kisses me, long and sensual, then runs his hand along my body. I smell the faint scent of his cologne, spicy, woodsy, and I kiss him back, touching his hair, feeling its softness, pulling him closer. He removes my arms, placing them above my head.
“Keep them there,” he says. “Don’t touch me.” He leans down to kiss me again. I feel the urgency in his tongue, in his chest rubbing against mine, and I want him desperately. His hands move all over my body, first my thighs, then up to my breasts, then along my arms.
He whispers, “I’ve been thinking about the discussion we had last week—when you said you’d never let me tie you up or bind you in any way.” He pauses for a moment, then adds, “I’ve decided not to indulge you any longer.”
I look up at him, feeling apprehensive. “That decision isn’t yours to make,” 1 say.
“But it is my decision, Nora. You’re missing the basic principle of submission. It’s quite simple: you do whatever I want, whenever I want it. I don’t know why you’re having trouble understanding this concept.”
I feel something cold and hard snap around my left wrist. Then, quickly, before I can react, M. holds my other arm and snaps something around it.
I twist my head around to see what is binding my arms, then panic at what I see: handcuffs around my wrists, and short chains welded to the cuffs and bolted into the wall. I feel my heart pounding, then tell myself to calm down. Fear only makes everything worse.
“Let me go,” I say.
M. ignores my request. He kisses me lightly. “You brought this on yourself,” he says into my ear. “If you’d trusted me I could’ve tied you up, had a little fun, then released you.”
