From: [email protected]
Subject: Nurse Jones: My Dinner With Anita
From Nurse Jones,
Okay, this is another Nurse Jones memory dump. It happened last
Summer. I wrote most of it then. It has never been posted.
If it seems like we are bumbling around like the Keystone Tops, we
were.
If you feel that some of what we did was stupidly dangerous, I will
save you some butane: I agree.
If you decide this post is an aimless wander through a badly organized
evening with pointless side trips into my head, it is.
Sometimes reality doesn't organize itself around a story line with a
dramatic ending; sometimes there's no theme, no moral, no lesson, just
a beginning, a muddle, and an end; sometimes there's nothing you can
do to massage reality into anything more than the stupid event it
actually seemed to be at the time, so you just have to tell it and
leave it at that. It was a dumb evening that turned wonderful by
accident at the last minute.
-*-
Summer 1992
Ernest Hemingway once said that if you don't know how to begin writing
about something, start with the first true thing.
The first true thing is that I still don't know where to begin writing
about last Saturday night.
Sorry, that was the First Dumb Thing. Which is rule
1 from *my* writer's handbook.
Okay, another First True Thing: it was a very sexy evening for me. I
guess it was for Anita. The boys probably got something out of it, God
knows what, but I bet they did, the perverts.
Second True Thing: I'm still writing in a vacuum since I lost my net
access, so I can't ask for the advice I would like to have on this and
it's crazy: Anita's therapist is actually recommending bondage as
therapy. Well, not exactly, but sort of almost.
Well okay, not at all, actually.
She thinks Neets should stop being so goal-oriented. Plus, she says
that if Neets won't give up this fringe sexuality, then she should at
least try something that will encourage her to concentrate on feeling
sensations instead of withstanding them. Which Neets interprets as
meaning bondage instead of S/M. So trying bondage is really Neets'
idea, not the therapist's.
I learned a new word, though. We're paraphiliacs. All of us. That's a
medical term. Means you're a sicko.
To Neets, bondage is a kind of low-grade second-rate S/M. A sort of
second choice if she has to give up her whip. So she has gotten it
into her head that she should give bondage a try.
One bit of good news. Her therapist has attached a name to her
problem: Primary Anorgasmia. It means she's never ever had an orgasm.
The good news part is that that's normally supposed to be the most
treatable kind of anorgasmia.
Third True Thing: The four of us had dinner together, and Jay and Tom
kept their pants on. 8)
That's three true things and I still don't know where to start, where
to pick up the thread.
I guess I should go back to Anita's therapist. A few years ago, before
I knew her, Neets tried one and got an authoritarian monster. He
demanded she give up S/M before he would even start treating her.
Guess he doesn't do weirdos.
I wish I could have been a fly on the wall when she walked out on him.
She has a remarkable vocabulary.
A few months ago something happened that made me suggest she try a
therapist; some of you know about that. One of you to whom we are
indebted even knows the therapist. And thanks again. Anyway, that's
when she told me about authoritarian therapists.
She told me that after her last experience she would never go through
that again, so I asked her if I found her one that *wasn't* an asshole
would she try again and she said yes, so I did and she did and then
the therapist wanted to know how she felt about being whipped with a
cat-o'-nine-tails by her husband, which I guess is a fair question for
a therapist to ask, so Anita up and tells her about me and what *I*
wrote about it on ASB: about her going all peculiar before she's
whipped. And during, too. *And* when she's making love, sometimes, if
you ask me which you didn't but I'm telling you anyway she does.
So Neets presented her own warped view of bondage, and she told the
therapist about me.
Which to tell the truth, I did *not* particularly appreciate, since
the therapist said she might want to talk to Tom and me. I would do
anything for Anita, but I guess I'm kind of conservative when it comes
to talking to other people about my sex life. I mean, call me old
fashioned, but what goes on in the privacy of the bedroom ought to be
strictly the business of the four people involved.
And okay, yes, I write about it on the Net, but that's different. I
guess this stuff is just too embarrassing for me to talk about except
over the Net to thousands of complete strangers.
And telling real.life strangers makes me nervous, having been burned
recently by a hyperbaptist sysop. Well, I don't actually know for sure
if she was a hyperbaptist, but she sure did what she knew The Lord
would have done if only He knew the facts of the case.
But that's another story. A dull and depressing one, too.
So anyway, here we are. Neets told us all this news about her
therapist a few weeks ago, but like I said, she thinks bondage is just
watered down S/M and really boring compared to the intensity of a
whipping. Her attitude is that she will give it a try, but she doesn't
expect much. Anyway, it turned out this dinner was the night she got
introduced to bondage -- in a kind of haphazard way. I was a little
slow to catch on.
She and Tom did try a little at home a few weeks ago, but they both
started laughing. She thinks maybe they need more hardware or
something.
I think she just needs to learn to concentrate a little. Like her
therapist said.
She has been a bit awkward and very sweet about approaching us on this
subject. It has been difficult for her. She has dropped a lot of
clumsy hints, and we are equally inept at handling them. It's like a
first kiss: everybody wants to do it but nobody wants to look like a
fool and be the first to make a move. It's weird that she will feel so
at home with being whipped and then she's embarrassed about even
*asking* to try bondage with us. I mean, she gets tied up *anyway*
when she's whipped, doesn't she...? Why am I asking you?
Yes, she does is the answer. It was a rhetorical question anyway.
Sorry to use so many big words, Harlan. If you are reading.
It's funny, but as much as I write about sex, we don't talk about it
much, Neets and I. Whenever we have taken part in their scenes, Jay
and I played very secondary roles. Sort of gofers. Tom always held the
whip. Sex with Neets, for me, is mostly vanilla.
Hmm. If you were reading ASB a year ago, you'll know I'm not
accustomed to using concepts like vanilla and bisexuality in the same
sentence. But that's what YOU all would call it: vanilla.
Maybe I should say 'private and relatively appliance-free.'
Bisexuality is more than enough for me to handle without the added
complication of kinkyness. I'm still getting used to all this.
And Neets doesn't help at all. We went sightseeing in one of those
sleazy adult stores that we ran across on the outskirts of Atlanta
last summer. We just stopped to see what it was like. You know the
kind. Adult shrink-wrapped magazines and videos and glass cases full
of menacing-looking plastic arcana. The proprietor was a seedy and
watchful old character who clearly believed that at best we were
gawking tourists and at worst we were going to try and shoplift a
package of jumbo condoms. I was sniggering and hissing at Neets to
come and look at a monstrous black dildo with veins and testicles. It
looked like something you could have made into a table lamp. She said
it was disgusting the way they exploit ethnic stereotypes but if I was
into that sort of thing she had just the thing for me. A Scottish
vibrator.
So she drags me over to the counter where the proprietor is lurking
and says, "My friend would like to buy that vibrator." She points.
The man looks baffled.
"The plaid one," she explains. "Does it come with batteries?"
"That's not for sale," he says, looking at me as though he were hoping
I was available wholesale. "It's my thermos bottle."
Of course I just stood there turning red and gasping with my mouth
open like a fish stranded out of the water while Neets wanders off to
look at other toys and the shop keeper grins his mouthfull of brown
teeth at me.
Anyway, incidents like that aside, we are NORMALLY pretty private
about our sexuality, Neets and I. I mean, we've only been ... intimate
with each other a few times when the boys were there. And even then
hypnosis helped me a lot to deal with it. Except for twice, one of
which was this scene that I promise I will get around to telling you
about, and the other was an unmitigated disaster of heroic proportions
that some of you already know about.
So anyway: Anita had been hinting around for weeks that she wanted to
try something different: bondage. It really is different from being
whipped.
She bottoms when she's being whipped, so she figures she wants to
bottom in bondage. At least the bottom gets all the attention. Which
is a major factor in bottoming. At least for me.
Although she hasn't really been a proper bottom up to now. I wish you
knew her, you'd know what I mean.
Nurse Jones stands on her chair and shouts:
"Forgive me Neets: you are a TERRIBLE bottom."
Even though she's the one being whipped, she controls the scene more
than Tom. There are no surprises for her. She pushes it until she gets
what she wants, sometimes further than Tom wants. I guess the point
is, she doesn't relinquish control very easily, and she certainly
doesn't do what I do. Whatever that is. At least I can give myself up
to the scene. Swim in it.
And now she's been dropping these awkward hints whenever we are
together. Asking about the things Jay and I do. Pretending she needs
consumer reports on appliances like I was the Ralph Nader of marital
aids.
She's so sweet. She's never once asked for advice in her entire life
and now she suddenly has to know all about our toys and she nods all
wide-eyed and innocent when we tell her. Talk about transparent.
And talk about the stupid conversations we have.
"Do you think it would fit me?"
"We could certainly try it..."
"I don't know... do you think now is the right time...?"
Oh, come on.
I guess for the rest I'll just have to shut up and tell you what
happened. At least she finally decided to take the bull by the, um ...
well, whatever.
-*-
It was hot. The Deep South midsummer heat can take away all your
energy. We had gone to the fitness center that morning and the
instructor had really burned us out, and then that evening we did this
scene I'm about to tell you about. We were both deliciously tired to
begin with, and the weather melted away any energy that was left.
Still, something happened.
It hardly qualifies as a scene, though. From my posts the ASB crowd
probably thinks I'm doing exotic sexy things all the time, but we
don't, really. I just write about the high points. We actually have a
very ordinary life most of the time. We all have full time jobs,
practice regular dental hygene, veg out in front of the VCR.
We can go for ages without doing anything sexy at all.
Well, maybe not *that* long, but one time it seemed like *days*.
8)
Ahem.
Anyway, this turned out to be a scene, but it was really pretty
impromptu and low-tech. So the technicians among you -- the ones with
the tool belts and bags full of accessories with attachments and the
crossed mexican-bandit shoulder cartridge belts full of spare
batteries -- you may not be interested. This is not one of those high
points on my brief sojourn to the fringe, either.
Really, we were all topped by the weather: late July in the Deep, Deep
South.
Once the sun goes down it cools off a little bit, but it was still
humid and sticky. The morning had been sunny and Neets had been at the
beach; she is the most incredibly determined person I know when it
comes to the beach. *Normal* people just don't go when it's this hot.
Plus it had been trying to rain all afternoon; all we got, though, was
distant thunder and hazy white skies that turned grey in the late
afternoon.
Those of you that are from Wisconsin may not understand this. Every
morning, as soon as the sun is up, our yard is filled with a thick,
warm mist, like a steam bath. Every afternoon it rains. Jay says it's
some kinf of meteorological cycle in the subtropics. Yuck. The other
day I found a pair of green fuzzy sandals in the closet.
I didn't really feel like doing anything, especially not dressing up
the way Jay always wants me to for a scene. I told him if he wanted me
to wear anything special then I was going to turn the air conditioning
on and he said No.
I was really steamed at first, he can be such a cheapskate sometimes,
and I get irritable when I'm hot and sticky -- but he said he wanted
it that way for a reason and wouldn't even explain, so I kind of got
interested. And curious.
So we were going to have a scene, and Jay and Tom were going to call
the shots. Actually, what happened had Jay written all over it. I
mean, the scene was wound up at the beginning like a toy and then
allowed to run on it's own, with no guidance. Or very little. Nobody
seemed to know what was going on. Either that or everybody did but me.
Anita and I got instructions on how to dress. It wasn't really kinky,
even. Well, it was, a little. He wanted me to dress like a New Orleans
hooker, whatever that is. I didn't know we had a special look in New
Orleans.
It's funny: after I wrote about this particular evening, Jay read it
and I learned something interesting. He -- and I guess most men --
really like visually descriptive stuff when it is sexy and about
women.
Well, of course they do. Now that I write it down, it's stupidly
obvious, but that's not what I mean.
What I mean is, Jay reads these posts sometimes and I learn a lot from
him about what men like. Otherwise I would never have put in all the
descriptive detail. You'd think I would learn, wouldn't you? I mean,
he literally *made* me put it in when I was writing The List. Maybe I
should take a creative writing course. They teach one at the local
university.
Of course, I'd have to write about something else...
Anyway. Jay likes to read how we were dressed, what we look like, that
kind of thing. I tend to skip over that and go straight to what's on
the inside. So one "improvement" he is always suggesting is that I
give details about what I was wearing and gestures and things that he
thinks are sexy. So now half the time I feel like I have to back up
and wait for the men to catch up with the rest of us and I wonder if
it is really an improvement. The rest of the time it is facinating to
hear him talk about all the details he thinks are sexy, things that
push his buttons. It's like he's telling me about a secret weapon that
I can use on him.
And back in our vanilla days when we made love he used to say he
couldn't tell what I was feeling. I never thought about it, even, but
he was right. So now, after all these discussions about what turns him
on, I let it all show and I can tell it gets to him. Part of it is
that he likes to know that he's having a big effect on me. If he can
see that effect, it has a big effect on him.
The clods back home in Indiana didn't care a hoot about anything but
their own ride. I mean, if it wasn't for beer and television they
would have no earthly idea what to do for apres whoopie, so where
would I learn to show how I felt except from someone who cared to
know? So I guess I learned to keep quiet and have private orgasms, and
I had to unlearn it for Jay.
I mean, this is going to sound really stupid, but I even peeked at my
face in the mirror once (again, way back in our vanilla days) when Jay
and I were making love and discovered how right he was: you would
never have known I was even having an orgasm if you didn't know me
very well. Which I would hope one would under those circumstances.
I had to become an actress to show what I was really feeling on the
inside. Odd. And then I started feeling it more....
I guess the point is that there is almost a kind of science to
learning about the opposite sex, and a lot of it doesn't come
naturally; my natural writing style doesn't automatically include
pushing male buttons. I've been almost taught by Jay, and I learned
from ASB that it works, so I do it. Sometimes it seems like magic, and
I don't understand it any more than I really understand why my
computer restarts itself when I push control- alt-delete.
So anyway, here's some of that descriptive stuff:
I dressed in a microscopic sleeveless black cotton knit mini that Jay
had gotten me last Christmas when we were more deeply into hypnosis.
We stayed in a posh hotel and he had me dress up like a hooker (I
wrote about that already). Anyway, that's what he wanted again: an
obvious, cheap hooker, garish makeup and all. Men are so dumb
sometimes. And Anita just wore a light indian cotton wraparound and a
sleeveless white men's tank-top t-shirt, both of which she borrowed
from me. And, yes, you could see through the skirt with the light
behind her.
Men.
Especially mine.
Well, I guess I can forgive him for treating me like a sex object. But
only because he's got buns you could bounce a quarter on.
Anyway, Neets didn't even wear any shoes, but could I go barefoot on
the hottest night of the year? Of course not. I had to teeter around
on four inch bimbo heels all evening. Actually, what with not wearing
any underwear and all, it wasn't too bad at first for either of us.
But it *was* a strange way to dress on an evening like that. Runny
makeup was the worst part.
It was all very mysterious, going to all this trouble on a hot muggy
night when all you want to do is shower and turn up the air.
So of course I asked him what the scene was going to be, and of course
he wouldn't tell me. So I asked him to at least tell me WHEN it would
be and he said it had already started. He told Anita and me to watch
this simmering pot of disgusting ... cajun stuff ... so it wouldn't
boil over while he and Tom went and changed. You have to change a lot
in this weather. Three showers a day, sometimes.
They came back wearing white cotton pants and shirts like a couple of
plantation owners and I started kidding around calling Jay "Big Daddy"
and using words like "y'all" and "grits" and before I knew it I was
calling Neets "Aunt Pittypat" and Tom was "Oh, Ashley!" and then I
degenerated into Streetcar Named Desire and became ... whatzername ...
Blanche DuBois. You know: Stanley Kowalski's sister-in-law. The one
that was always fainting and going on about how she "always relied on
the kindness of strangers." The one Karl Malden thought he wanted to
marry. Anyway, Jay told me stop clowning and besides you have a lousy
southern accent. Well, I never. *I* thought I sounded *just* like
Vivien Leigh.
I harrumphed to Aunt Pittypat that men are all alike and she drawled
back that, "Men are awl Ah like, too, Miss Scarlett," so then Jay had
to try and put a lid on her as well, and the evening almost got out of
hand right there.
Anyway, the boys started out dressed in crisp white which became damp
white within minutes. Actually, Jay is pretty sexy in white. Even damp
white. Especially now with a tan.
In fact, I am the only one that doesn't have a tan. I wear stucco-
grade sunblock at the beach. And a hat that Jay got me with a solar-
powered propeller in it. He says that my pale skin with that hat makes
me look like the bizarre result of genetic experimentation involving
mutant mushrooms and Bernadette Peters. Very witty, I'm sure. Ha ha.
Ha.
I wear a towel over my shoulders and white stuff on my nose and I hog
the umbrella. Folding chair, book, sunglasses, sandals, cooler ....
The beach is nice, too.
Well, I like to be fully prepared.
Anita, on the other hand, brings her swimsuit. She's just hoping the
hole in the ozone layer makes it this far north in time for her to
enjoy it.
I keep telling her she's going to ruin her skin. Last time we were at
the beach together she went without any sunblock at all until I nagged
her into letting me put some on, and what does she have but this oil
of dubious value but a really fun nozzle for squirting, so I really
soaked her in it, suit and all. She retaliated later by leaving
sunblock off my ass. (Yes, it was one of *those* suits.) She's such a
bitch. I should have been paying closer attention, but I fell asleep
while she was putting it on. She has such strong hands. Luckily for
her she told me after about a half hour, but I still got pretty rosy.
Back there.
Anyway, she's going to ruin her skin, but will she listen? No. She
never listens to anybody.
Jeez. I just realized I am becoming my mother.
Okay, it's partly jealousy. I will admit she looks pretty good all tan
and oiled the way she was. Jay keeps describing her as magnificent.
Well, she's practically eight feet tall, so what else would she be?
There wasn't a man on the beach that didn't notice her. The bitch. I
guess I have to accept it: the summer is hers. The winter may be mine,
but the summer is hers.
Now she says that if I'm going to keep my skin so pale I should dye my
hair black. For effect.
Artists. They're all alike...
Um, where was I?
Oh, yeah.
So anyway, we cooked dinner.
Like I said, Jay had this spicy cajun dish he wanted to try.
Gumbelijah, or something. I can't even spell it, nevermind eat it. I
don't even know for sure what it was. It was brown, that's what it
was. Jesus, what a thing to pick for a night like that. We should have
had cold salads and fruit. Cajun food is so *heavy* and *hot*. Bleah.
It's awful stuff. You can eat all you want and you're hungry again in
just a few weeks.
And I do *not* like crayfish. Or anything with that many legs.
Especially when you have to squeeze the heads and suck unspecified
juices out of them. I mean, who *knows* what's in there?
What is it with men and food? Before we got married, Jay subsisted on
burgers. Haven't they ever discovered fruit? Salad? Not only does it
taste good, and it's good for you, but you don't have to cook it. And
I really haven't figured out this cooking business yet.
My father won't eat greens either. He eats steak. Period. For him
vegetables are baked beans and orange soda pop. I think he secretly
considers chicken to be a vegetable. The four major food groups are
Rare, Medium, Well Done, and Fries. Parsley is something you flick out
of the way with your finger. Or put on your daughter's plate. Plenty
of vitamin C in catsup. Ketchup? Catsoup? See, I can't even spell it.
When we got married I cracked my knuckles and flexed my fingers in
preparation for the traditional midwestern Complete Husband Overhaul,
and I almost had Jay trained to eat balanced meals, but then Tom and
Neets turn up, and now whenever the boys get together and cook
something it has to be some macho dish that is always brown. We went
camping for a week, and we ate brown food the whole time. And I didn't
know what *it* was, either. Is this some kind of man-rule? Where is it
written that meat has to be red and/or black and everything else has
to be brown? I *hate* baked beans. And hash browned potatoes. I'll
tell you about that camping trip sometime.
Anyway.
It may have been the food, but it seemed like the evening only got
hotter. We have those big, lazy ceiling fans, but they didn't help
much. There was summer lightning and some distant thunder; the
lightning outside would occasionally illuminate the trees outside the
windows. It was somehow surprising for the darkness to dissappear and
remind us of the trees so big and so close to the house; it was as if
they had snuck up and surrounded us.
But no breeze. The air was dead.
Even with a fan right over the dining table everyone's clothing was
sticking to them. My arms stuck to the table. Jay took his shirt off
and put on a white sleeveless t like Anita had. I love his arms. And
shoulders. Not to mention ... well, I already mentioned those, didn't
I.
When we sat down to eat, the candles were blowing and melting in the
breeze from the fan so Jay lit an oil lamp with a glass chimney --
which is something every house has down here because of hurricaine
season. The smell of the burned oil just made the room seem more close
and oppressive.
And then he turned off the stereo, and suddenly we were in the Old
South. The insects are nearly deafening. Cicadas, tree frogs,
katydids, crickets. If you listen to it it begins to sound like an
auditory hallucination. Like mother nature has an electrical fault.
Almost hypnotic, sort of like a salon hairdryer.
Later, out on the porch, it was a conversation stopper, but who wanted
to talk. Anyway, that was later...
"I checked ASB today," Anita said, and waited. She knows I like to
hear about what's going on on the Net ever since I lost my access.
"Well? So tell me!"
She fanned herself with a folded newspaper and leaned back against her
chair, taking a rest from the cajun torture. She knew I was dying to
hear about ASB, so she was pretending it was too hot for
conversation. "Oh, it wasn't much... Somebody mentioned you. Or rather
Nurse Jones."
She must have been saving that for dinner. And she was going to make
me drag it out of her. "Well? So tell me! Who was it? What did they
say?"
"Somebody said you're a virtual personality. Which I knew all along."
She smirked, something she does really well.
"Is that all? Just that? A virtual personality? Pass me that
croissant..."
"It was part of some thread or other. I didn't read the rest. I did a
search for the word 'nurse' -- just like you said -- and there you
were." She fished an ice cube out of her glass and ran it over her
throat, head tilted back. Melted drops ran down her front.
"Great. A virtual personality. And I used to be a Net Queen. How 'bout
some butter down here. Please." I watched her play with the ice cube.
"I always knew you had a virtual personality disorder..." Jay slid the
butter toward me without looking away from Neets. That was a very
interesting ice cube.
"Oh, ha, ha. Very funny."
"God, you're disgusting..." Neets said. She flicked icewater at me.
"What?!? What?!? What did I do?"
"The way you put butter on that thing..."
Jay said, "Ignore her, Neets. Otherwise it'll just get worse."
"Hey," I said. "It's just butter..."
"Just stop playing with your food and eat it..."
"Oh God. Not like that..."
"What?! What now?!"
"You're worse than a fratboy. Gawd. Virtual personality would be a
good career move, I think," Tom said. He was watching the ice cube,
too.
Neets popped it in her mouth and smiled at us. She knew we were all
watching her.
"Phooey." I threw the croissant onto my plate and leaned back.
"Phooey?"
"I can't eat anything. Besides, I'm supposed to be a Net Queen and I
can't even get an account. I might as well be a virtual personality.
And I especially refuse to eat *this* stuff." Three bites of cajun
delight and I was full and hot and icewater was the only thing light
enough to drink. Even cold beer was too heavy. It was just too hot.
I wiped the perspiration off my face and my mascara turned into a big
smudge on the paper napkin.
Anita smirked again. "You look like a raccoon."
I dipped another napkin in my icewater and tried to wipe more off.
God, I felt seedy.
"You still look like a raccoon." Anita pushed her plate back too, and
took an apple from the fruit bowl. That's right, fruit bowl. Go ahead,
laugh. I even put cut flowers around the house. I'm going to start
cooking for real any day now. No more microwave miracles. Real soon.
I'm becoming domesticated.
"And what in God's name is this?!?" Anita found a ball gag in the
fruit bowl and was holding it up by the strap like it was a dead rat.
Well, maybe not completely totally domesticated.
"Um, I guess it's a ball gag..."
"No! Really?!? Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather. A
ball gag? Imagine that...a ball gag. Right here in the fruit bowl.
Well, I never." She shook her head in amazement.
Wiseass. That was her first hint of the evening, though.
"Very funny. I'm going to get cleaned up." I stood up. The seat of my
dress was stuck to me.
"No, stay; don't wash it off," said Jay. "It's part of the scene."
"You and your scene." I pulled my dress away from various anatomical
features. "At least lets turn on the air."
"Yeah..." Good ol' Tom. He agrees with everybody.
"Uh, uh. Just pretend you're Scarlett O'Hara. Back before they
invented air conditioning," Jay said. "And could you pass that
carafe?"
"Maybe. If I could swallow it."
"Oh God. Just fucking pass the fucking ice water."
Neets stuck her lower lip out and blew a limp strand of hair off her
forehead.
I pulled the neckline of my dress away and let the fan blow down my
front. "Well, mom always wanted me to stick to my knitting."
Tom groaned and put his forehead on the edge of the table and rolled
his head back and forth. "Please, somebody make her stop..."
"Humor her. She has a knife. And she isn't very strong on
etiquette..."
"Well, excuuse me Miss Manners. It's only a butter knife." I put it
back. The butter had slumped into a puddle.
Tom stopped rolling his head back and forth, but he left his forehead
resting on the table edge. Without looking up, he said, "Yeah,
lookout: she might butter you."
"Well, it's not like it would be the first time," I sniggered.
"I don't even want to *talk* about that," Neets said.
"Besides, it's too hot," I said.
"Thank God."
"What I need is a slave with one of those big feathery fans. I bet if
I were really Scarlett O'Hara..."
Neets stands up and says, "Here. Try this, Scarlett..." and she dips
her hand in the pitcher of icewater and runs it over my chest and down
inside my front. I was already slippery from perspiration, but her
hand ...
"Think I'd make a good slave?"
"Um," I quipped, my mind shifting instantly into high gear. I was
concentrating on her hand. Missed another hint, too...
Neets turned to Jay. "That what you had in mind for a scene?"
"Sure."
She stood there with her hand down my front and smirked again. "Well,
I know one thing."
She waited for me to rise to the bait. I wouldn't.
She smiled innocently, encouragingly.
Jay couldn't resist. "What's that?"
"Nothing virtual about these." She grabbed my boobs with both hands
and gave them a lecherous squeeze.
"Neets! Cut it out..." I swatted her hands away.
"I think maybe you meant virtuous." Jay's another wiseass.
"Let's just check..." She hooked the front of my dress with a finger
and pulled it out, looking down.
I slapped at her hand again. "You get out of there. You're worse than
Jay."
She pulled the front of her own t-shirt out and looked down; she
smirked again and shrugged. I keep telling her she is perfect for
someone with her build, but will she listen? No. She thinks she's too
small and that's all there is to it.
She is awfully insecure for someone with all her self-assurance.
She put one foot up on her chair and her wraparound skirt parted to
reveal several yards of very brown leg. She's so competitive. Jay was
watching, naturally. The swine. She pulled an elastic tieback out of
her ponytail, shook her hair out, and pulled it up in a bun. I'm
always mesmerized by her hair. She knows it, too. The bitch.
In fact, what the heck: in an old post that we wrote together, Neets
described me and how she felt about me. I'm going to do the same right
now about her.
Jay is always saying she's magnificent but he's just a man so what
does he know, but really, she is. He just thinks she's magnificent
because she is so tall and has long hair and can repair her own truck.
Men. They *are* all alike.
But she IS tall. And she's strong. Strong willed, strong boned, strong
emotionally, and strong physically. She's vibrant and graceful. And
she's blindingly talented. She's an old-school artist in a university
where her teachers all want something new and different and avant
garde and groundbreaking and noone values her kind of gift and she
doesn't care one damn bit what they think.
She gives the impression that she can stand alone, and does.
She's not pretty. Her face is too strong to be pretty. Strong
cheekbones, strong nose. Not that she's unattractive; I think she
would actually be less attractive if she were merely pretty. But I
guess men generally prefer pretty. With a little makeup she's a
knockout; what Jay calls a drop-dead looker. But her strength shows
through and it makes beauty seem irrelevant, and somehow that can make
her beautiful. But not pretty.
Anyway, she gets impatient when I try to tell her she's beautiful. She
doesn't believe me and it wouldn't matter to her if she did.
She gives the impression that there isn't anything you could take away
from her that she can't do without. Or anything that you have that she
wants.
And yet -- and this is important, so pay attention -- she makes it
clear she wants something I have. But it's almost as though I, the
real Margaret, am not part of the package. As if I were in the way,
almost.
Did you follow that? It's as though she is negotiating with me for
something I'm unaware I have and she won't tell me what it is for fear
I'll jack up the price.
Almost as though *I* was an irrelevant broker, unnecessary to the
transaction. Maybe I *am* a virtual personality, just lucky to be
attached to whatever it is she wants.
The thing is, with all her strength she isn't hard. She has the
strength to open herself up and pour out her soul and then zip back up
so life is back to normal except that now you have seen the inside.
Men never do that. I don't know if that's from strength or weakness.
Probably both.
She's everything I'm not, come to think of it. She's everything I
admire. I feel stupid writing love letters that almost everyone BUT
Anita will read; she never even sees most of my posts. She DID read
most of The List, though, thanks to TheClone who reposted it last
Spring.
That was an experience: hearing from Neets that The List was scrolling
by once again for everyone to see -- almost on the anniversary of the
time Jay and I did it. And to know that Neets was reading it and there
was nothing I could do to stop her. And after I had made excuses for
months every time she asked me to let her read it. It was
embarrassing. Topped long distance by TheClone. Talk about reaching
out and touching someone. It was a sweet gesture. ThankyouClone, if
you are still out there, for Doing The Job. Did you know you were
topping Nurse Jones?
Neets once said that when she sees me the very first thing she thinks
of is that she has to have me and the next thing she remembers is that
she can't have me. That was back when she and Tom were on the outside
of our relationship looking in.
Now, when I see her, I'm glad she wants me. I want to be hers. Hers
and Jay's. I want to be owned. Not "owned like a slave" in the sense
of the bondage play that we write about on the Net, but possessed and
protected by someone possessive and protective. The way Jay feels. I
like that. It makes me feel safe.
And that's how I feel about Neets.
-*-
So there we were, sitting at the dinner table trying to decide if it
was worth the effort to try and have a conversation. The insects were
thrumming outside.
Anita said, "You know, now that I've read The List it's weird sitting
here..." She leaned back in her chair and fanned herself with the
newspaper again.
"Why's that?"
Anita covered the half-melted butter to keep a suicidal moth out of
it. We watched it throw itself at the lamp chimney instead and
wondered if it would find it's way to the flame and something icky
would happen to it.
"...And it was weird reading The List, too. I had already been here,
and it was weird reading about things happening in a place I had
already been. Now it's weird being in a place I have read about. Like
this table." She looked straight at me. I knew immediately what she
meant; Jay had done things to me there that, according to Miss
Manners, shouldn't be done on a dining room table, and I had written
about it in The List.
I tried to be cool and pretend it didn't bother me, but she kept
looking at me and I ended up looking down and blushing furiously. She
did that deliberately, making me blush. Plus she had this little smile
of satisfaction when she saw she was successful. She is always poking
at me to make me blush. She says it's only fair because I'm always
doing it to other people; she says I'm a psychic vampire, always
stirring other people up and feeding on their discomfort.
Well, I'm sure I have *no* idea what she's talking about.
She shifted her attention. "Is that the chair? The one by the
fireplace?"
"Um, yeah..." At least my associations with that chair aren't as
embarrassing as with the table.
She got up and walked over to it. "That was your first night..." She
touched it lightly, experimentally.
It was my first night. Jay had taped me to it with black plastic
electrical tape and ... well, you know the sort of thing. She had read
it all. I was amazed she remembered that much of it. In fact I had
been half hoping she had forgotten all about it entirely, it's such an
embarrassment. At times like this I think I should never have written
that stuff down. I should have let that experience go instead of
trying to enshrine it. I should have erased the files when it was over
and I had the chance...
She picked up the chair and wrestled it over to the table before Jay
could even get up to help her. She plopped it down heavily at her
place and droplets of her perspiration spattered the table. Any effort
is too much in this weather.
She sat up straight and put her arms flat on the arms of the chair the
way Jay had taped mine. She looked across the table at me. Well, it
was obvious what she was thinking, but she didn't say anything.
"I take it the jumbeliah [whatever] was a bust. Who's for desert?" Jay
said. He didn't finish his either. Well, it WAS a bust. I mean,
really: cooking that stuff when it had been 99 all day. Temperature
AND humidity.
"How about hot coffee?"
"Very funny," I said. "Do you think we could fit four people in the
refrigerator?"
"No kidding. Coffee. Anyone?"
Tom and I looked at Jay like he was crazy. Anita was preoccupied,
fiddling with the ball gag again.
"In case you hadn't noticed, it's not only a bazillion degrees but
it's so humid the mosquitos can stay airborne without flapping their
wings. I'm having ice cream."
"Yeah. Ice cream." Tom can always be counted on to be sensible when
everyone else is acting flaky. Coffee. Sheesh. I went and opened the
refrigerator.
Anita put the ball gag back into the fruit bowl and asked what flavor.
"Vanilla," I reported, basking in front of the freezer.
"Is that it?"
"Yep. Vanilla."
"I'll have coffee, too."
"What?! Coffee? What's the matter with you?"
"Me too," said Tom. The traitor.
Jesus. What's the matter with vanilla? I didn't care if the only
flavors were corn, liver, and wood. The *point* was that it was
*cold*. I marched back out to the dining room.
The three of them were just sitting there. Anita and Jay were looking
at each other like they were sharing a secret.
"What *is* the matter with you people? Coffee on a night like tonight?
What is going on? Have I missed something or ... or something?"
"I guess it's just not my night for vanilla," said Anita, still
looking at Jay.
"Okay, okay, so I'll boil water for your coffee. At 212 degrees.
Fahrenheit. Unless that's not hot enough for you? Would you prefer
centigrade or Kevin or something?"
They just looked at me like I was speaking chinese or something.
"That's Kelvin," Jay said.
"Well, I am going to eat the *vanilla* ice cream. All of it." They
still didn't react. They were serious about having coffee. Okay, so
I'm a bit slow sometimes, but I still hadn't figured out what was
going on yet. Actually, I still haven't.
Anyway, Anita fanned herself with the newspaper and they all watched
me stuff my face while the water heated up.
I was pretty hungry after all, as long as I didn't have to eat forty
pounds of chili pepper and tobasco sauce. But after a few minutes I
noticed they were watching me and I started losing momentum. Well,
maybe it was a pretty big bowl of ice cream, but they *did* say they
didn't want any.
The kettle whistled and Jay started to get up, but Neets put her hand
on his arm and said she would get it.
"You sure you don't want some?" Jay said to me.
"Um." I looked from Jay to Neets to Tom for a clue. No clues.
Something funny was going on, but no clues. What the hell. I didn't
have to actually drink it. I sighed, "Cream and sugar."
Anita smiled to herself and left for the kitchen.
I whispered fiercely at Jay, "What's with this coffee business?"
He shrugged and said, "It's a scene, I guess. Just go with it and see
what happens."
A scene ... a scene that involved drinking hot coffee and eating hot
spicy cajun food in humid 95 degree weather without an air
conditioner. Aha. Now it all made sense.
I could get into that.
I stirred my ice cream soup. I had lost my appetite, and anyway it was
melted. Then a moth plopped into it and got stuck and by the time I
had made Jay rescue it Neets was back with the coffee.
She settled in with both elbows on the table and the coffee cup in her
hands under her chin and leaned toward me like she was ready for a
good gossip. She took a drink. I took a drink. Gradually it turned
into a really stupid drinking contest, except we were seeing how hot
we could stand to be rather than how drunk.
Along the way, Neets asked me about the first time I had tried bondage
games with Jay. She wanted to know what the very first thing was that
we did that made an impression on me. I told her it was when I came
out of the bedroom that first time dressed the way I was. I was
mortified.
"I can't do that now. What next?"
Oho. I Can't Do That Now. That statement said a lot. She wanted to Do
Something. Now. Comprehension dawned. Aha. Oho. She has an agenda.
This was a sort of free form scene and she was taking advantage of it
to do what SHE wanted to do. I looked around at Jay and Tom and
realized I had been the last one to figure this out.
She was persistent. "Come on, what was the next thing you did?"
"It was so silly."
"No, go on, tell me," she said.
"But it's going to sound so stupid..."
She just sat there looking at me as if to say, "Well? are you going to
tell me or not?"
"Okay: Jay told me to do something sexy."
"Yeah? What?"
"Just something. Anything. He didn't specify."
She squinted at me, her expression implying disbelief. She can be so
dense sometimes. "Why does that bother you? You do sexy things all the
time."
"I do not. I don't know why. I guess doing something like that on
demand bothered me. It seemed so contrived."
"But lots of the things you do are contrived. Almost *everything* you
do is contrived."
I hate it when she asks perfectly reasonable questions that drag me
out into the open like that. "Yeah," I said, "but he was asking me to
act -- like an actress -- and he would know I was acting. And if I
felt, well... sexy, he would know I had made myself feel that way. It
was almost like, um, masturbating..." I cleared my throat; it was hard
saying this in front of Tom. "For, ah, him," I croaked, ending in a
whisper.
"So? That would bother you?"
"Jeez, Neets, of course it would! Wouldn't it bother you?"
I could see she was thinking about it. She was looking at me like she
was trying to estimate my dress size or something.
She got up and walked over to the picture window. "Just 'Do Something
Sexy?' That's all?"
She looked at Jay and then back at me, and raised her tumbler of
icewater to drink, but as she drank she tipped it up and up and it ran
over her chin and down her face and neck and soaked the front of her
her t-shirt. And still she kept pouring until the only thing left was
ice cubes. She put the glass on the table decisively, wiped her face
on her bare arm, and looked at the three of us sitting there like
idiots.
Of course, she might as well not have been wearing a t-shirt at all,
with it all wet like that. The boys were gawping, the perverts. And
they both swear they've never seen a wet t-shirt contest. They're
terrible liars.
Do something sexy. Well, she had done something sexy. She has no
trouble at all knowing what turns men on.
She put her hands on her hips. "Well, what's the matter with you
people? Are you just going to sit there with your mouths open?"
Actually, yes, that was all I had planned for the next few minutes.
"Sit down, and maybe we'll give you lessons," said Jay.
She came back to the table and sat.
"It seems to me you've been asking for a scene all night," said Jay.
She smiled innocently. Ha. Innocently.
Ha.
"So are you just kidding around, or are you serious? Because first of
all..."
"Stop, stop, stop," I slapped at Jay's shoulder to shut him up.
"You'll ruin everything. She just doesn't understand yet."
Jay raised his eyebrows at me.
I turned to Anita. "The trouble with you is, you try to control
everything." I love giving advice. Plus I admit I was a little excited
at whatever was going on, even though I didn't know what it was,
exactly.
"What do you mean, control everything!? Tom whips me. He's the top --
he's the one doing the controlling." She gave the impression that she
was trying very hard to take me seriously. She thinks bondage is a
little trivial.
Yeah, so why did she want to try it?
I stood up and leaned over the table, my face close to hers, with my
hands on either side of her plate. I invaded her space. She leaned
back, a little surprised. Jay told me that little trick. He says that
if you do it intentionally, unexpectedly, it really keeps the other
person off balance. It's a good thing to know. I guess that's what
they call 'getting in someone's face.' Ha. It works, too.
So I said into her face, "But you control the pain, don't you?" As if
that was really significant or something.
She looked from side to side at Tom and Jay as if to say, Who is this
crazy lady? "Well, yeah," she said.
"Yeah, you do. And you think that's the right way to go, don't you.
Control."
I started pacing around the table, warming to the subject.
"And who went and got that chair you are sitting in? And who was
waving the ball gag around? Well?"
"I was just..."
I interrupted. "And who's trying to start a wet t-shirt contest? If
that's not controlling things, I don't know what is."
I whispered in Jay's ear to go and get his roll of black plastic tape
and the blindfold and some toys. The insects were a blessing: she
couldn't hear a word I said to him.
He looked at me like I had all of a sudden turned into a different
person, taking charge like that, but he smiled his quirky little smile
and went.
"Plus you can't have Tom here to protect you," I went on. "That won't
do at all. Think about how I felt my first night out here in the
middle of the woods. I was completely dependent on Jay." I whispered
to Tom to come back after we blindfolded her.
She said, "but Tom..."
I interrupted again. "Do you want to keep trying to control things or
what?"
She smirked again. "Oh, yeah, right. Like, what am I supposed to do,
say, 'No, Mistress,' and bat my eyelashes?"
"No." I picked up the ball gag and put it against her lips. "You're
not supposed to say anything."
She rolled her eyes at the ceiling, being cute and trying to
trivialize the gag.
"Well?"
She opened her mouth a little.
"Wider."
She opened wider. I could tell she was trying to smirk at the same
time, the showoff. But her attention shifted to the gag and she had to
open her mouth still wider to accomodate it.
In it went.
She looked a little surprised. I could see her attitude shift from
showing off and smirking to suddenly noticing this object in her
mouth. She didn't like it. She raised her hand as if to take it out,
but changed her mind. That would have been admitting it bothered her.
Instead, she tried to look cool.
And learned you can't look cool wearing a ball gag. It can't be done.
Your mouth is open. Too open. And everyone else knows you aren't in
control of one of life's basic functions: talking.
And smirking.
She looked around at the three of us; I could tell she was realizing
she couldn't say anything to anyone. You would think that would be
obvious, but no: up to that point she had been thinking about how a
gag is nothing compared to her whip; suddenly she couldn't wisecrack
anymore.
Nobody said anything. The insects thrummed outside, but she couldn't
break the sudden silence.
She was cut off from us.
She looked over at Tom with this shocked look on her face. I said to
him, "Are you still here? Go on, scram. Out."
He did.
"Buckle it."
She did.
"Really," I lectured, "One shouldn't have so many people around;
there's safety in numbers, and this isn't about that kind of safety:
it's about trust."
I'm telling you, it was great, the feeling of sudden control. If
anyone (especially me) tells you women are temperamentally unsuited to
topping, don't listen. Months ago, when I tried to top Jay, I thought
I hated it, but this night when I said to Anita, "The trouble with you
is..." I realized that topping for me is different: I get to give
advice and they not only Have To Listen, but they Have To Do It.
Giving advice. That puts it on terms I can identify with. And Tom and
Jay played along with me.
For those few minutes I loved it. It's a little embarrassing to admit,
but I did.
And I used to wonder why anybody in their right mind would want to be
a top. I guess we each find our own path. Mine lasted about five
minutes...
Jay brought back the entire drawer from the bedside table. Perfect. I
rummaged around and found one of those tiny paddlocks.
"Turn the chair around and tape her. Ankles and wrists." Jay did. I
was topping everybody. Four minutes to go as a top.
As he was doing her left wrist, her right hand went back up to the
buckle on the gag. I grabbed her wrist with both hands. She is strong.
She wriggled loose and went for the buckle again and I had to catch
her a second time. She really wanted to say something.
"Neets! Stop it. Do you hear me? Stop it!" She relaxed for a second.
"Here. This is going to be your safeword." I showed her an orange from
the fruit bowl. "Drop it and the scene is over. Understand?" She
nodded, but she didn't take the orange. Instead she tried again to get
at the buckle, but I was ready for her.
It was terribly sneaky of me, and the ASB crowd will probably accuse
me of violating a nonconsensuality clause of some sort, but I grabbed
her wrist again and told her once more to stop it, and that all this
wrestling wasn't going to get her anywhere. She relaxed again but she
looked so desperate I asked her if she really really really wanted the
gag out. She nodded, and I told her I would unbuckle it.
Instead, I put the paddlock in.
I betrayed her. Tricked her.
I stepped back from the chair to wait and see what she would do, and
she realized right away I had done something sneaky. Her free hand
flew to the buckle and her fingers scrabbled over the lock.
When she realized what I had done, she let out a screech of
frustration behind the gag and pounded her open palm against the arm
of the chair. She tried to stand, and almost made it. Jay had only
managed to get her ankles and one wrist taped to the chair, and she
was so slippery from the perspiration that the tape didn't stick to
her properly, but she couldn't get free without actually breaking the
tape and it was too strong for that. The only thing she could manage
was to half-stand so awkwardly she nearly fell over and took the chair
with her. Thank God Jay was there to get her sat back down. Things
were rapidly getting out of control, and I was feeling a little less
like the bigshot I had been a minute earlier. Ding! End of my try at
topping Neets.
Once he had her sitting back down, he knelt in front of her and took
her free hand in his. She must have thought he was going to tape it or
something, and tried to pull back, but he held on and got her
attention.
"Neets! Listen to me!" She was staring right at him, breathing heavily
through her nose and making faint whining noises in the back of her
throat with every breath. Perspiration was running down both their
faces and there was a big wet stain down the back of Jay's t-shirt. "I
know you can hear me, so settle down." She continued with the heavy
breathing, but she stopped fighting him.
"Do you need to make a pit stop? I don't want to start this on a full
bladder..." Which made perfect sense. I didn't even think of that. Of
course, Jay's been there before.
But she shook her head. That wasn't the problem.
"Okay, then. Look. This is the way it is." He wiped the perspiration
off his face with the tail of his t-shirt. (He has great stomach
muscles.) "I'm going to give you that orange. I'm going to put it in
your hand. If you drop it, the scene is over. Right then. That's your
safeword, just like Margaret said."
I handed him the orange and he held it up in front of her. "This is
the only choice you get. Keep going or stop. That's all. You don't get
to choose anything else."
He kissed the palm of her hand and put the orange there, but she
didn't close her hand on it.
"I don't know what you want to say, but if it's that important, you
can drop your safeword right now and we'll stop everything." He curled
her fingers around the orange. "Decide," he said, and took his hand
away.
The orange stayed there.
"Good."
When he kissed the palm of her hand, that was the first time Jay has
ever kissed Anita except to say hello or goodbye. It kind of bothered
me, a little. I don't know why; I love them both. I guess I'm just the
jealous type. It's not fair, really, I know: Jay lets me have a
relationship with Anita, but I want to keep him all to myself.
And they call us the fair sex.
He took the roll of tape and pulled off a length. Immediately, she
made a noise as if she were trying to speak and pulled the hand with
the orange away from him. She reached around in back of her shoulder
and pulled awkwardly at me with the orange hand, trying to move me
around into her field of vision. I stepped to her side and she
plucked at my dress with a free finger, pulling me closer.
She pushed the orange at me and said something. She repeated it, and I
could tell she was saying the same thing over and over, but she was
completely unintelligible. After a couple of tries I realized she was
trying to get me to take the orange from her.
"No," I said. "I can't take it. It's not right -- it's your safeword -
- you have to keep it." I pushed it back at her. "No, please."
"Take it," said Jay.
"But..."
"Just take it. It'll be alright."
I did. I took it and squeezed her hand for a second. That really is
quite a gift, you know, giving away your safeword. I planted a kiss on
the side of her mouth where it was stretched against the ball gag.
That kind of turned me on, for some reason, kissing her lips when they
were held open that way and feeling the gag against my own lips. She
tasted salty and of coffee, and I smelled the rubbery smell of the
gag. I got more than a little preoccupied with her while Jay finished
taping her other wrist.
And her elbows. And her knees.
I got out the scissors and snipped down the front of her t-shirt and
made it into a vest. Well, it was my shirt.
The trouble was, we didn't know where to go from there. If Jay had
actually planned the whole scene we wouldn't have had that problem,
but the chair we had taped her to was just a big clunky oak armchair.
Office furniture. Even after I had cut away her shirt and unbuttoned
her skirt and she was completely nude it was nearly impossible to do
anything interesting with her. To her. The seat of the chair should be
removable or something. So I tried a few clothsepins and learned that
it's not easy being a top. Even an assistant top. You need a lot of
imagination and forethought.
Jay makes it look so easy. But he plans everythiing.
Jay saw the problem right away and told me to give it a few minutes,
then put my wrist and ankle cuffs on her, and bring her out to the
hammock on the porch. He said he would fix the hammock for me. He
whispered to me to keep the key to the ball gag handy and *never* take
my eyes off her in case she threw up. Which scared the hell out of me.
Then he disappeared and left me all alone to keep things going. I was
tempted to take the gag out right then. Throwing up under those
circumstances is scary. Being a top is no fun if you have to be *that*
careful.
At least I had a goal: get her to the porch hammock.
Really, I think the worst thing I did was to let a mosquito bite her.
I was trying to think of something to do that would make the
clothsepins more interesting when it landed on her thigh and she tried
to twitch it off. She was looking at me and gesturing with her head
for me to brush it away and I automatically started to swat it -- I
really did -- I even raised my hand, but then I thought wait: it's
only a mosquito. There are no horses or chickens within miles and
miles of us. She's not going to get encephalitis. It's only a
mosquito.
Instead of swatting it I redirected the gesture and brushed a strand
of damp hair off her face.
Oh, the look of outrage on her face.
Her head snapped up and she looked at me like I was a criminal when
she realized I knew it was there and was letting it bite her on
purpose. I just watched her face. The mosquito had the same effect on
her that they always have on me. The minute I hear one whining I
instantly become a bog of sweat. I don't know why that is, but I
always do, and she did too.
She made a frustrated-sounding noise and broke out in a fresh sheen of
perspiration.
She blinked against the sweat that ran into her eyes and tossed her
head to clear the droplets away.
I kissed her eyelids and said, "I hate seeing you uncomfortable that
way. Here: let me do something about that." I put the blindfold on
her.
But I took pity on her and wiped her with a towel. Her hair was stuck
to the side of her face; I brushed it up and away from the gag and
pulled it back so the blindfold held it.
I put my collar on her and announced I was going to take her for a
little walk. I put my leather wrist and ankle cuffs on her, and as I
cut the tape away I snapped a short chain between her ankles and
clipped her wrist cuffs together. I didn't use locks, and just hoped
she wouldn't notice.
I helped her to her feet. While she got used to standing with a
blindfold on and before she decided to try taking it off, I clipped
the leash to one of her wrist cuffs, pulled it between her legs and up
her back and tied it to the back of the collar. That kept her from
lifting her hands to the blindfold. She didn't try. She had decided
to be docile, I think.
I guided her out through the kitchen and utility room to the porch.
She walked very cautiously, afraid of running into things and
tripping. It was quite a change to see Neets helpless. She depended on
me to keep her upright and to direct her; she could only take tiny
steps and it was obvious she was very unsure of herself. I wonder
what was going on in her head. She could have gotten away if she had
tried to get the blindfold off when she had the opportunity, but she
didn't.
Knowing her, I would expect her to be humiliated by her dependance on
me rather than by the restraints. But she seemed to accept that
dependance with grace and even dignity, and allowed me to help her.
When I got her to the back porch and opened the door, I had to step
down onto the porch floor to help her down the step. She stood above
me, backlit by the lights in the house, lifted her head and listened
to the suddenly-loud roar of the insects. She turned her blindfolded
face back and forth as though she were scanning a distant horizon in
the blackness.
Tom and Jay stood behind me on the porch, ready to catch her if she
fell on the step. I don't know why, because it makes no sense,
especially with a brightly lit utility room full of major household
appliances forming a not-very-dramatic backdrop, but we all stood
there and admired her. We were standing beneath her, below her
eyelevel, while she looked blindly out over out heads, past us at a
nonexistent landscape. She looked somehow magnificent. We just stood
and admired. The way you might admire a mountain goat if you chanced
to see it on a cliff above you.
She was unaware that the three of us were watching her. She just stood
there, wrists locked together, waiting for me to help her down the
step. I dunno. It was just one of those moments. You had to be there.
The roar of the insects was overwhelming. Everything changes when you
go out on the porch at night. You can get used to them when you are
inside the house, but if you go outside they dominate everything. They
sound almost life threatening, they are so loud. There are so many
different kinds of noises and rhythms.
You just have to resign yourself to the idea that it is pointless to
try and hold a conversation. Especially anything romantic. You would
have to shout.
But it was cooler. Not exactly cool, but cooler than the house. There
is a fan on the porch, and a big rope net hammock. The kind where the
ropes go through holes in these boards at either end. Natural spreader
bars.
Funny I had never seen the possibilities before.
It was dark out there when Jay turned out the light. So dark I
couldn't really see Tom and Jay. They were there, sitting in the
rocking chairs that look out on the lawn, but they were little more
than shapes unless there was lightning.
The thing is, I made love to Neets there on the hammock, sort of. This
is where the evening turned really miraculous, at least for me, and it
was because of the weird southern weather -- that summer lightning
(some call it sheet lightning) combined with the chorus of the
insects.
There must have been thunder, but it was drowned by the roar of the
insects so that the flashes of sheet lightening seemed to come out of
nowhere, unconnected to any sound at all. There was just this
insistent electrical-sounding hum; a twittering, whining, screeching
roar that obliterated all thought. It seemed there was nothing but the
physical sensations, the sound, and the sudden flickering images of
the porch, the trees outside and later, of our sweating bodies.
It was eerie.
I backed her up to the hammock and sat her down in the midst of this
roar. On the hammock Jay had clipped four of these mountain- climbing
gizmos called beaners (don't ask, I don't know. They don't seem to
have anything to do with beans. They're kind of like a big spring-
loaded link from a chain.) He had clipped them to the ropes above the
wooden pieces at the ends of the hammock. The lightning was frequent
enough to help me see/feel to hook them through the rings on Neet's
cuffs.
The hammock was too short to do a proper eagle, and she could have
released the clips without help if she had really wanted to, but she
didn't try very hard to get away, even during the moments when she
could have. Her legs were almost straight, but her elbows were bent so
that her hands were held just barely above her head. She's too long
for the hammock.
I bet I would fit...
Ahem.
I fumbled around in the dark and unlocked the gag. It was silly
anyway, and I didn't want to have to worry about it. She held still
for me. No doubt she was glad to get rid of it. I know it hurts to
wear it too long.
But I left it in for a moment longer, unbuckled, but in. I bent over
in the darkness and kissed her one last time before I took it out. It
smelled of rubber. It always does. And after the gag was out I kissed
her still-open mouth. She still smelled of suntan lotion -- her breath
was coffee and cajun spices and her skin was warm and slick and salty.
For some reason something had changed. Before, in the house, it had
been too hot and sticky to even contemplate more than the shortest
most ginger physical contact. But her taste and her smell when I
kissed her .... I wanted to feel her against me.
We had changed from hot and sticky to warm and wet and steamy.
She started to speak and I could almost make out her words, but I put
a finger on her lips and shushed her.
I kicked off my shoes. Standing flatfooted on the cool bricks was a
relief after those heels. I stripped my dress off over my head and I
was wiping the sweat off my face with it when silent lightning strobed
the porch; I could see Tom and Jay down at the other end in the
rocking chairs. Tom was watching the trees. Jay was looking directly
at me. Neither of us moved. Then it stopped and he was gone.
I had been about to use my dress to wipe the perspiration off my body
but something about seeing Jay made me think twice. I don't know why,
but I decided to leave the perspiration. It seemed like part of the
scene, I guess.
The cooler air felt wonderful on my skin. It was still too hot for me
to feel clammy. I was just slippery and warm. I picked up the
vibrator, ducked under the rope, and eased myself into the hammock
beside Neets. I put my lips right next to her ear and whispered that
the boys couldn't see or hear us from where they sat. I told her she
was all mine; in response she turned her blindfolded face toward me
and in a flicker of lightning I caught a glimpse of her parted lips,
waiting to be kissed.
The moist warmth of her cajun-spice breath on my face was too much to
resist. I dived into her.
There was something -- I don't know -- sort of biologically intimate
about those moments. I'm one of those people that usually has to have
everything so perfect: with Jay I want to be fully showered, powdered,
perfumed and prepared. But that night with Neets, something happened
when I got in next to her and smelled her skin and felt the moisture
and slippery warmth of her body next to mine.
I lay beside her, twined myself around her, my thigh across her
stomach, my body pressed against her side, my hand caressing her;
midwestern thoughts of talcumed hygene went out the window and I felt
an uncharacteristic hunger for the flavor and smell of her skin. As I
say, I dived into her. It sounds like a cliche, I know, but I "kissed
her deeply." It was one of those sloppy, juicy, openmouthed kisses
that I'm always saying I don't like from men. (Okay, so maybe
*sometimes* I like 'em...) I licked perspiration from her face, her
body. I drank her in. I slid myself against her and our bodies melded
in a kind of warm, fluid dance.
The pulsating roar of the insects excluded every other sound but an
occasional threat from the thunder -- even the sound of our own
voices. A few times, when the thunder rumbled, the insects would fade
briefly, faltering in their rhythm and then recovering.
In my memory, the rest of the evening is a series of disjointed
flashes: brief stark illuminations held together by the tactile
continuity of our sweating bodies.
The lightning flickered and I saw two shades of black on the
blindfold: the shiny satin and the darker stains of sweat. And
her mouth, lips parted, waiting for me, she is looking in not
quite the right direction.
Lightning flickered again and I was looking down the length of
our intertwined bodies, both equally colorless in the intense
glare despite the depth of her tan and my paleness.
It strobed again: her head is tossing back and forth, her hair
wet and matted against her cheeks, her mouth open. I hear only
the roaring silence of the insects.
And again: her head is thrown back and I am about to kiss her
throat. In the washed-out glare the perspiration makes her neck
seem like glass.
Again: her face is turned away from me, pressed against her own
shoulder, avoiding me; perspiration on her neck below her ear
where a curl of hair is stuck to her. She is holding the
hammock ropes above her head, pulling against them.
Again, and I see the banana trees lit beyond her upthrust
elbow. My fingers hooked like claws through the wide mesh
of the hammock.
Again: a strand of her hair is caught between her lips ... and
between mine.
And again and again: our intertwining bodies knotted together
like a nest of pale snakes, seeming to writhe in spasmodic
jerks while the strobing light played mind-tricks.
And all the while, the heady, heavy, spicy, sweet, suffocating
moist warmth of her breath and skin.
That is how I remember it.
Making love properly in a hammock is nearly impossible. It sags too
much in the middle. It didn't really matter, somehow, that the
vibrator was the only practical -- or graceful -- option.
And grace is so important, don't you think?
I couldn't even hear the vibrator when I turned it on, the insects
were so loud. As I played with her, pressing it against her, now and
then sliding it deep into her, I watched her face, waiting for the
lightning to show me her reaction. She tossed her head back and forth,
and after a few moments of watching and waiting for the lightning to
show her to me I realized she was saying something softly under the
roar of the insects. I couldn't hear unless I put my ear near her
lips. She was writhing against me, squirming halfheartedly, trying and
not trying to get away, but I kept at her, pushing her further and
further. Gradually I realized that she was saying faintly, over and
over, "No... stop ... no ... please ... don't ... stop ... no,
Margaret... no ..."
She kept rocking her head back and forth, and over and over she was
asking me to stop.
But I don't know if she meant me to hear her.
Of course, anorgasmia reared its ugly head. Miracles like her first
orgasm just don't happen on cue. It would have been the proper thing
for her to do, according to my sense of dramatic timing, but she
didn't. Poor Neets gets everything right but that.
There was a miracle of sorts, though. The thunder became louder and
the lightening sharper and nearer, and within the space of a few
minutes the insects stopped their chorus; her moans and inarticulate
panting noises became abruptly audible in the silence that followed,
and I think the suddenness of the silence distracted her. She made an
unintelligible but desperate sounding noise and managed to pull away
from the vibrator. She was knock- kneed, her thighs pressed together;
she wanted to stop. We rested, my body knotted tightly around hers...
The absence of the insects left a humid, heavy, oppressive, expectant
silence that was punctuated again by the approaching thunder.
It's funny: in a proper storm you can tell which flash caused which
peal of thunder, but with this weather a distant crump or muffled
rumble of thunder will come out of the darkness all by itself, and
sometimes a series of silent flashes will illuminate the porch and the
trees outside. There doesn't seem to be a connection between the
lightning and the thunder.
The insects seemed to be waiting for something.
I took off the blindfold and used it to wipe perspiration from her
brow, her chin. The flashes of lightning showed me her face; she was
looking up at me, almost expressionless but still breathing hard; she,
too, was watching me and waiting for the lightning to illuminate my
face.
I loved her so much in those moments. I held her close while her
breathing gradually returned to normal, and we turned and looked out
through the screen together, cheek to cheek, watching the trees
silhouetted against the sky by silent lightening, waiting with the
insects. I loved her, this woman that cannot see the way. I'm used to
her not having orgasms, but still ... well, sometimes it hurts a
little when you love someone and you can't help them.
That was the miraculous part. The perfect timing.
We laid there for what seemed like hours and listened to it running
off the roof and spattering on the flagstones around the porch; the
air turned cooler and a faint breeze picked up.
The next thing I remember was Jay waking me up. The rain had stopped
briefly and the insects were completely silent. There was a light on
somewhere in the house and it was time to go to bed. He left the oil
lamp on the porch table and I roused Neets.
We sat side by side on the hammock for a few minutes, in a welcome
intimacy forced by the sagging hammmock. Hips and thighs pressed
together, her arm was around my shoulders; our bodies radiated a moist
warmth and we were bathed in the odors of lovemaking.
As we sat there trying to find the energy to get up and go to bed, the
rain started again; Neets grabbed my hand and pulled me to my feet.
"Come on..."
She led me out into the warm rain and we stood together on the grass
while she kissed me; we stood pressed face-to-face under a heavy
stream of water coming off the roof and the water washed our bodies.
Where the light from the house fell on the yard the rain droplets made
a kind of mist just above the grass.
We stayed until I started shivering, then we went in to a hot shower.
I lost a damn contact lens somewhere out there. Maybe the rain washed
it out. I didn't notice until I went back inside. No wonder I felt
disoriented ...
There isn't much more to tell. Just a bit about the next morning. I'll
put that in another post.
Nurse Jones,
Swiiiingin'
in the rain...
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