Authors: Jade West
“I was just, um. It was ready.”
I flicked through the pages. She’d written a whole fucking tome. “I’ll schedule some time next week.”
“Oh, okay,” she said. I could taste her disappointment.
“Did you expect I’d do it now? I have engagements after five.”
“No, not right now. I was just thinking maybe you’d like to come over at some point. See Bex, and me, and we could do it then, or not. Maybe this weekend?”
“I’m busy.”
“Yeah, of course, sorry, short notice. It was just a thought. You haven’t been over, I thought you might like to see her.” She smiled to lighten her words.
“I saw Rebecca today.”
Her cheeks flushed pink. “Oh? Sorry, my mistake. I didn’t realise.”
“Why would you?”
“I guess I wouldn’t. We don’t really speak outside of work talk. I thought you coming over might re-break the ice.”
“I hardly speak to anyone, Lydia, work or no. There’s no ice to re-break.”
“We spoke in Brighton...”
“Yes, we did.”
“...and then nothing. Did it make you feel awkward?”
I watched her unashamedly, revelling in her discomfort. “Why would Brighton have made me feel awkward, Lydia?”
“I’m not sure.”
“You think I’m embarrassed? That I regret asking if your ex managed to get you off?”
“No... yes... do you regret it?” She smoothed her hair behind her ear.
“No.”
“If I overstepped the mark or anything, I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to apologise for.” Fuck, now my cock was twitching.
“Just, in Brighton...”
“Lydia, we’re colleagues. We work well together, do we not?”
“Yeah, really well. I really enjoy working with you...”
“Good. Then all’s well.”
“I guess there’s no issue, then.” Her tone was too bright, fake. “You never let me thank you, for Rebecca, either, not really. She’s great.”
“No thanks necessary.” I closed her file, sliding it amongst a pile of others destined for my office.
She took the hint, retreating with just a smile and closing the door behind her.
It was only when she was safely out of eyeline that I retrieved her paperwork, placing it safe in my briefcase for the way home.
***
Lydia
I wished the underground platform would swallow me up. Blown out by James Clarke, so totally and utterly. I’d hardly be able to look at him ever again. What an idiot.
Hey, James, fancy hanging out sometime, check out my project notes?
Idiot. I stepped onto the train, wedged amongst all the other commuters battling through rush hour. This crush
thing
, whatever it was, was getting ridiculous. Yeah, James Clarke looked good in a suit, yeah, he was smart, and dedicated, and mysterious, and really goddamn talented and so infuriatingly in control of everything it turned my legs to jelly. But so what? Blown out. Time to let it go. I’m good at that.
I really thought I was onto something, really believed we’d had a
moment
in Brighton, whatever that even means. I figured moving in with Bex might be the start of a friendship, or at least the chance to have a conversation outside of work, but nothing. He barely even spoke to me, no questions, no chat about Rebecca, or how life was going, no anything. He’d asked once.
Once
. Weeks ago. I figured maybe he was awkward, maybe we’d overstepped the mark in Brighton, maybe, maybe, goddamn maybe. Who even cared?
I’d asked him over, he’d said no. Not interested. Not in me, not in a friendship. I’d just have to forget about it, just like everyone else in the office that had ever fancied a shot and got nowhere. Hell, it’s not like I hadn’t got over worse.
It was rebound, of course it was rebound. I probably wouldn’t have even done it when it came to it. Work flings are never, ever, ever a good idea. Ever. Just ask Stuart. I wondered fleetingly how he was doing without me. He’d been round to Steph’s a few times, desperate apparently, begging to know where I was. He was worried, he said, worried I’d be cutting myself to shit, no doubt. He needn’t have been. It felt so far away now, my time with him. Like someone else had lived through the whole thing and I’d been asleep underneath it all. Strange. Maybe one day I’d need therapy, cry it all out and start popping the Prozac. Better to keep it repressed, and keep looking for my perfectly-healthy rebound fling. I mentally erased James Clarke from the list. I’d have to find a new crush now, someone else to capture my imagination.
James had been right in Brighton, Stuart didn’t get me off, not really. It had taken James’ questioning to make me realise, but realise I had. I’d been giving Stuart a helping hand for as long as I could remember, and eventually I’d lost track of what was fake and what was real. I needed more than that, something hotter, dirtier, grittier. Something all-consuming and wild. Something crazy. Something
real.
Something like the James Clarke of my fantasies. The James Clarke who told me he vents in the bedroom. The thought had whirred around my brain ever since. He was big. Big enough to throw me around like a little doll and use me any which way he wanted. Yeah, sure he would, Mr Perfect. Real life James Clarke was probably as corporate in the bedroom as he was out of it. I consoled myself with that thought.
Bex was already in when I got home, propped in the kitchen with the stereo on, playing thumping tunes I didn’t know.
“Hey, Lyds, good day?”
I gave her a sigh. “So-so.”
She eased me aside for a path into the fridge, pulling out a bottle of cold white. “Just what the doctor ordered.”
I took a glass, let her fill me a large one. “Good idea.”
“So what’s with your shitty day? James being a nit-picking asshole?”
“He’s not that bad,” I lied. “He mentioned he’d seen you today.”
“That’s a turn up. Getting anything from that guy’s like milking a rock.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Don’t take it to heart.”
I drank my wine. “I don’t get him.”
“Nobody does.”
“You do.”
“Sometimes,” she smiled. “Did you give him your super-duper project file?”
“Yeah, he said we’ll look at it next week.”
“Next week?! So much for beavering like a crazy to get that done.”
“It wasn’t compulsory.”
“I hope he was grateful.”
“Can you even imagine him with a grateful face?” I grinned at her, loosening up. “It’s my own fault, working too hard on something that doesn’t mean anything.”
“Are you talking about the project file, or about James?”
“The project file!” I said. “Have you been drinking?”
“A few in the studio earlier.” Her eyes glinted at me. “He’s hot, right?”
“He’s attractive.”
“And a weirdo... He likes you, Lyds, or he wouldn’t work with you.”
I finished my drink. “He’s private, I get that.”
“Sheesh, yeah. It’ll take a bloody lifetime for you two to get to know each other, Private and Privater hanging out in Private-ville.”
“We aren’t hanging out anywhere, it’s all about work.”
“All work and no play makes James and Lydia very fucking dull indeed.”
I laughed. “Am I dull? Really?”
“Nah, just...
focused
.”
“That’s dull, isn’t it?”
“No... yes... a little. But hey, if it floats your pretty little boat.”
“It doesn’t. I need to get out.” I rubbed my temples, willing the blow-out memory away. I left Bex to it, all ready to go ditch the work outfit and veg in my PJs but she called me back.
“Say, Lyds. I’m off down the Dev tonight, if you fancied coming. It’s cool there, they even pour pentagrams on your Guinness.”
“Pentagrams on your Guinness? Doesn’t sound like I’d fit in too well.”
“You’d be fine.”
I pondered in the doorway, my bedroom cold and still and empty without that bloody project file to keep me occupied. “What would I wear?”
“Little black dress, I’m sure you’ve got one.”
I weighed it up, back and forth in my mind, empty room or goth pub, empty room or goth pub. “I could come for a bit.”
The smile on her face told me she hadn’t expected it. Was I really that dull? Maybe I was.
Time to put dull, boring Lydia in the bin where she belonged.
***
Bex had a nudity habit: the constant desire to wander around with little to no clothes on without even the slightest hint of self-consciousness. I’d grown surprisingly used to it, and didn’t even flinch when she appeared stark naked and dripping wet, holding up two almost identical looking dresses for my opinion. Her tattoos stopped at her shoulders, leaving her pale skin untouched and unblemished to the belly button, where a Celtic pattern swirled down to her pubic hair, if she’d had any. She didn’t. I pointed to the dress on the left, a black PVC number with spikes all down the front.
“You sure?” she said. “Spikes not buckles?”
“Spikes. Definitely. You wore buckles last week.”
“Well remembered.” She looked me up and down, then scowled at my feet. “Lovely dress, wrecked by the footwear. What size are you?”
I looked at my cute little heels, wondering how they could possibly be so offensive. “Seven.” She threw me over a pair of obscenely tall knee-highs. “Really?! I’ll fall.”
“I’ll hold you up. Trust me, you’ll look hot.”
“You going to try and set me up with some sexy, goth stud?” I laughed.
“If you want.”
I sighed, bending down to zip up the new boots. “I’m not sure quite what I want.”
“You
want
sex. A filthy fuck is a tonic for almost anything, I find.”
“I wouldn’t know. Things went a little stale with Stu after a few years.”
“Then you definitely want sex.” She shimmied into her dress, pulling it up tight. Her cleavage looked amazing, like some kind of porn star rack. She layered on her make-up and laced up her boots, then checked and re-checked herself in the mirror from every angle. The doorbell rang, a noise I’d never actually heard. “That’ll be Cara.”
“Your girlfriend?”
“My sub. She’s heard all about you. I’ll leave her waiting awhile, she knows the drill.”
“Your sub?”
“Submissive. She’s kind of like a girlfriend without the girlfriend bit. Sex, basically. She likes me to hurt her.”
My mouth turned dry, images of her bedroom flashing before my eyes. “Hurt her, like spank her?”
“Spank her, whip her, paddle her... make her cry then kiss it all better again,” she laughed. “Never tried it?”
I shook my head. “Stuart wasn’t really that way inclined.”
“And what about you?”
“The avenue never really presented itself.”
“Shame.” She waited a few more seconds, fastened up a studded collar. “Oh, by the way, Cara calls me Raven. Most people do.”
“Raven... right.” I assigned it to memory.
“You can be Cat. You have cat’s eyes.”
“Can’t I just use my own name?” I said. “Is it some kind of special code or something? Is Cara’s name really Cara?”
“No, it’s Penelope, but don’t tell her I told you. You’ll soon get into the name thing. Cat suits you anyway.”
My stomach lurched as I recalled where I’d heard that before.
***
Cara was pretty little creature, with gorgeous dark hair and chocolate brown eyes. She stood waiting in the doorway, knees tight together and head slightly bowed. She had stockings on under her black dress, high enough to see the lace tops. Her skin was goose-pimpled from the cold, arms wrapped tight together under her bolero.
“Cara, you can look up now. This is Cat. Cat, this is Cara.”
“Pleased to meet you, Cat.” Cara pulled me in for a hug, delicate and light, as she was herself. I smiled at her, trying to think about anything other than her naked ass getting a spanking. I joined them on their way down the street. Rebecca took hold of Cara’s hand, a possessive gesture with rough twisting fingers. I couldn’t take my eyes off the way they moved together, Cara drifting along so meekly at her side.
The Devonshire Arms was a teeming sea of black. We eased our way to the bar, and while Rebecca whispered not-so-sweet somethings in Cara’s ear I stared up at the mosaic of band posters on the ceiling, a mass of colour at odds with the rest of the place. I laughed at the idea of Steph and Stuart finding me in here. Straight-laced Lydia, workaholic, hanging out in a goth bar with two fetish-loving bi girls.
“What’s so funny?” Rebecca asked, leaning in close over the music.
“I can’t even imagine Stu’s face if he saw me now.”
“Would you swap? Old life for new?” she asked, fluttering long fake lashes at me.
I pictured myself back in my old apartment, curled up on the sofa in front of the TV, psyching myself up for the weekly, lights-off sex session.
“You know what?” I said. “I’m not so sure I would.”
***
I relaxed into the ambience of the pounding tunes and the theatrics. Hair and make-up I’d never seen before, Mohicans and back-combing, and crimping and undercuts. Piercings and extensions and white, white faces. Rebecca disappeared to the bar to catch up with friends and Cara sidled a little closer, pulling me to her by my elbow.
“What do you think?”
I nodded. “It’s pretty cool.”
“We love it here,” she smiled. “Are you a sub, too?”
I felt the first blooms of a flush. “No... well... I don’t know...”
“Never tried?”
“My ex wouldn’t have been up for it...”
“You got stuck with vanilla, hey? SUCKS!”
I turned to her, wine-confident and curious. “How long have you been into this stuff?”
“About six months serious. I met Raven in here, and she took me to Explicit. She introduced me to the scene.”
“Explicit?”
“Our scene club in Soho. We go every week.” Her eyes shone full of enthusiasm, and mischief. “You should come! You HAVE to! You can see for yourself!”
“I’m not so sure about that,” I laughed. “What is it? Some kind of sex club?”
“A BDSM club, and yeah, people have sex, you know, but it’s not creepy or anything, I promise, nobody’s going to hit on you if you don’t want it. Come on! Say you’ll come!”
I remained non-committal. “Why do you do it? The pain thing I mean.”
“Endorphins... adrenaline... fear... trust... the pleasure in letting go... submitting totally to another person. There’s nothing else in the world... just you... and them. It’s hard to explain. The right dom will know you better than you know yourself, like a God, playing you right on the edge, in the beautiful part of pain. There’s this rush, when it hurts, and then a peace. It’s so beautiful.” Her eyes glazed over as she spoke, disappearing into another world. “Sorry, I’m probably making no sense. You’d have to try it to understand.”
It made more sense than I’d like it to. Spidery itches and razorblade kisses. I took another swig of wine. “So Raven’s your dominant?”
“She’s my mistress, yeah. There are a few others in Explicit I play with, but I belong to her.”