Authors: Charlotte Stein
I can never be specific, though Lord knows I would love to be. Again and again I want to ask him if the thing that happened really happened. It just seems so staggering to me, considering how he now behaves. He never brings it up. He seems to suffer no ill-effects because of it. He could have poked a lollipop at my mouth for all the shame it seems have elicited.
Instead of fucking me in the arse with a cane he’d just finished thrashing me with.
In fact, the only evidence that any of it happened at all is the sting I sometimes get when I walk. Or when I shower. Or when I stroke my bare backside while frigging myself into oblivion. Seriously, I’ve never masturbated so much in my life. I never really could, before I came here. Everything had to be furtive, usually in the back of some Ford owned by a boy I vaguely liked. Doing it at home was out of the question, with my brothers always crowding around. I barely had a bedroom, and there was no lock on the bathroom door.
There was no door, full stop. Even pissing was a frantic do-it-before-anyone-sees-you affair, so the slow realisation that I can and want to here is something new. I am set free, in more ways than one. If I want I can fuck myself night and day, and when I do I dream of a dozen things he could do to me. I imagine him using a belt, to make welts I can feel with my fingers. Great thick red ones that spark through to the centre of my body when I stroke them, so hot to the touch I feel burned when I pull away.
But that is not the best fantasy. No, the best fantasy is always about all the things I know he will never do. The touching he can never give me and the kissing I know he will never want. All the filthy things that are forbidden to me, made flesh in my feverish head. Some nights I go so far it leaves even me breathless, and in the morning I’m always just a little embarrassed. If he
knew
, I think.
If he knew that last night I imagined him sticking his cock in almost every hole I have, just like he described. Most likely he would be appalled. He certainly seems like he would be, whenever I see him now. His comments are always so careful, and he stays even further away from me than before. He won’t even go down the hall when I’m coming in the opposite direction, as though the very thought of our hands brushing is too much. Too tempting, I think.
Then I try to strike that thought from the record.
He’s probably just disgusted. He thinks he’s filthy or I’m filthy or both of us are filthy for ever going that far. And even if he doesn’t, his behaviour so closely resembles indifference I could almost believe it was. At the very least I struggle to tell for sure.
Until I catch him looking.
And not just once, either. Oh, no, no, no he does it a lot, whenever he thinks I’m concentrating on something else. The first time almost seems like a fluke. I point to a section of bookcase and ask if he wants me to organise his fanciest books by colour rather than alphabetically. It will probably look nicer, I say, then turn a fraction faster then I intended and see his eyes dart away. Could have been the books, I tell myself.
But then comes the second time, when I actually see it before he smothers it. I’m busy brewing tea and suddenly feel a bristling, prickling sensation all over my body. When I glance back, his gaze is resting on me so strangely that I struggle to know what it reminds me of. I think of scientists watching experiments, and of people seeing something shocking, and then on the third try it comes.
He looks at me as though unable to believe that I am real. Like someone seeing the ghost of their long-dead wife, or some member of an alien species, come to tell him he is not alone. There are other worlds out there, that expression says, far better and sweeter than this one. And if you want, you can go there with me. I’m waiting for you, whenever you’re ready.
God, I wish he was ready now.
I wish those eyes did not seem so haunted when I steal a look at them. They are almost vulnerable, and not just because of the light in them. They make his face look suddenly younger, as though all the years he wears are not the product of cigarettes or centuries but of stress. He so desperately wants to keep himself closed that he ages himself to do so. And once he lets go – if only in the moments when he thinks I’m not watching – he becomes a boy again. He becomes even more beautiful than he already is.
I almost stumble the first time I see it.
Nothing in my life has ever been so sweet – or so painful. It won’t compromise you, I want to say to him, but even that might disturb his fragile peace. His guard is up, just waiting for me to get in again. He is watchful and wary, wounded by fuck knows what.
So I have to be even more skilful than I was the last time. Just let him come to me, somehow, though it takes time to hit on the right way to go about it. I finally find it almost by accident. I put his extensive and ancient encyclopaedias in the wrong order, and as soon as he sees he turns into the withering, sarcastic arsehole I’ve come to know and adore. ‘Honestly, Molly, do you really think M follows K? Did L suddenly cease to exist? I can see we are going to have to have a talk,’ he says, but something happens just before he finishes. He seems to catch himself on that final ‘to’, as though holding back some other word that wants to come out.
Then he simply substitutes ‘talk’ at the last second.
But I don’t think that was what he intended to say. I can almost smell the scent of punishment in that sentence. I can even guess what word it was going to be – something about
correction
,
I think, but of course correction is far too telling. It could lead him back down that terrible path of temptation. He might suddenly find himself with something swishy in his hand again, and I can see that the idea disturbs him. That indifference was just a ruse, a cover, and now it’s starting to peel back. One more push and it might disappear altogether.
Though still I proceed as carefully as I can.
Especially now that I know how to go about it. He can hardly resist a mistake, and there are so many I can make. I can forget to put milk in his tea, and remove bookmarks from important pages. He likes the ornaments on the mantelpiece to face forwards, so I just turn them a quarter of an inch. Not a lot, but enough to drive him to distraction. Soon after I’ve done it I see him standing there, hands in pockets, one foot tapping and tapping, as though he can restore them to their positions just by being supremely irritated.
The second I step into the room I know he’s going to say something.
So, when he doesn’t, I feel momentarily confused. I watch him sweep into his favourite chair with a great flourish and take up his paper, without a second glance at me. And when he finally acknowledges me, it’s only to say, ‘So what did you make of Nabokov?’
Which is fine, I have to admit. I like the fact that he randomly asks me about books I’m reading. It means three things: that he is different from everyone I’ve ever known, that he thinks I’m worth having a discussion with, and, more importantly, that he
notices
.
He never enquires what I might be looking at. He sees the open books sitting on one of the tables in the library, or left over the arm of the chair. Details about me are so important to him that he pays attention, even if only offhandedly. When I answer his question about Nabokov with ‘beautiful but offputting’, he says, ‘Yes, I felt he was a tremendous pervert too.’
He knows what I mean before I mean it.
A fact that should probably tell me something about his failure to react to the disturbed ornaments, though it takes me a while to get it. I have to pretend to be reading while really I am watching him carefully – and then, suddenly, there it is. One furtive glance over the top of his paper, as though checking whether his ploy worked. Then, when he sees me looking at him steadily, he tries to act like he just wanted to mention some item of news. ‘It seems as though birds are flying into a lot of buildings,’ he says.
But immediately realises that is a ridiculous thing for him to have mentioned. His face crumples, as though the words have turned bitter and gross in his mouth. They don’t suit him, and he knows it. He knows I know that he doesn’t give a flying fuck about birds. That he hates tedious trivia and will be annoyed they thought to write about it in his precious
Guardian
.
So that leaves only one possibility: he is really trying not to care.
And failing really fucking badly.
‘Look, I know you’re doing it on purpose. Put them back.’
‘I haven’t the foggiest clue what you’re talking about.’
‘Yes, you do, you despicable creature. Turn them the right way.’
‘Or you’ll do what exactly?’ I ask. Then there is a silence so deep I could use it to thicken gravy. It stands between us like a third person, made more intense by the look he gives me. His gaze is unwavering and almost lightless, the blue of his eyes almost too frosty to bear. I nearly break and run for thermal underwear and a furry overcoat.
But I’m glad I stick it out, because after an interminable silence he does actually speak.
And what he says was totally worth that moment of excruciating torture.
‘You are a very, very wicked girl.’
‘I know. You should probably do something about that.’
‘That will never, ever happen again,’ he says, but I can see he knows he made a mistake. He shouldn’t have said ‘again’. ‘Again’ implies that there was a first time, and he would obviously like to pretend there wasn’t. He did not do that filthy thing to me. He is utterly above it, and proves it now by turning back to his paper. He even lifts it so I can no longer see his face.
Though I have no idea what protection he thinks that affords him.
‘I also put all your black socks in with the white, and took all your left shoes and put them with the wrong right ones. You can’t tell, because your shoes are all the same, but I bet just knowing will drive you mad,’ I say, and this time there is no hesitation. He snaps the paper closed and tosses it aside, as though he somehow no longer cares about trivia like litter on his floor.
He’s not even bothered that it creases his immaculate copy of today’s
Guardian
.
All that matters is dealing with me and my disobedience.
‘Right, stand up then,’ he says.
He even claps his hands, the way teachers do when they want to start a class. Though Lord knows what lesson this is going to be. The second I do as he tells me I feel weird inside, like he poked a hole in me with a pin and now everything is running out. No wonder my feet shift around and legs are bending at the knee.
I have nothing solid inside me holding me up.
And even less than that, once he starts unbuckling his belt.
I swear I stop to check that I’m not hallucinating. I had no idea that he wore a belt. When I think back I can’t remember one. Which means that he probably put it on
specifically for this purpose.
He knew what would probably happen, and was prepared. Worse than that, in fact – he knew that this would happen and so
went out and bought a thing he possibly finds plebeian
. I know he did, because once he has it free I can smell the leather
.
I can see that his trousers have no goddam belt loops.
Good God, I am in so, so much trouble here.
Deliriously exciting, delightful trouble, because this is what he tells me as he loops the belt around his fist: ‘I should probably tell you now that begging will make no difference to me. I care nothing for cries of “stop” and “please” – only something truly disgusting could ever grant you a reprieve from this punishment. Such as, for example, my first name.’
And of course I know exactly what he means. How could I not? His suggestion has all the subtlety of a brick. Oh, he tries so hard to keep it just this side of sexless, but anyone would know the score. He just gave me a safe word. That was a fucking safe word dumped in the middle of all that scary stuff. If I want out, all I have to do is say ‘Cyrian’.
But the chances of that happening are slim to fucking none. I think I would sooner poke out my own eyeballs than call this off. My body is fizzing at the thought of it, and not just because of his conscientiousness, disguised as something else. There is also the act itself, and everything that comes with it. The way he lets the belt end trail on the floor, a second before he tells me to turn round. The tone of his voice, so steely I could almost believe he barely cares.
Though the waver in his next sentence says otherwise.
‘Palms flat on the ground, if you please,’ he says and I know, I just fucking know, that he has thought about this before. That is the reason his voice falters on ‘flat’, though he does his best to hide it. He makes his ‘please’ sound like a punch, then follows it with what could well be the sexiest sound known to mankind.
The snap of the belt, as he tests it between his hands.
Man, oh, man, I could live off that for the rest of my life. Probably I’ll hear it in my dreams, if the bit before dreaming doesn’t get there first. You know the one – when your mind starts wandering, and so does your hand. Suddenly you seem to be doing some really filthy things, even though a second ago your only thought was sleep. Though I doubt my thoughts will ever be on sleep again. If this is anything to go by, my future is going to be nothing but masturbation.
Even the stretch of my thighs when I bend over sets me on fire.
And the sting of that first strike…oh, I can hardly stand it. I want to do something the second it happens, but I resist. Then he hits again, and this time I can’t help it. I don’t care if he wants it to be a certain way or not – I just need to touch myself. I need to stroke my bursting clit and finger my wet and wanting hole, and, if that blows the whole thing, so be it. I don’t see how it can, though, given the things that have happened. He fucked my arse and is currently spanking me with a belt he bought for the purpose. The jig is up, I think, and then I just go right ahead.
I lick my fingers and slide them over my stiff little bud, though once there I don’t know why I bothered with the licking. I’m all sticky and slippery, from the seam between all the way over my swollen lips to my thighs. My fingers barely make contact. I just glide over and through everything, in a way that shouldn’t make any impression.