Carrie's Story: An Erotic S/M Novel (3 page)

Afterward he sleepily unhooked my collar and cuffs,
while I bowed my head and thanked him. He sent me to my
little bedroom at the end of the hall. I fell asleep confusedly
trying to sort out all this owning, buying, and selling business
and the flood of feelings it had loosened in me.

I woke up early the next morning and tried to hurry out to
work. I supposed that Jonathan was still asleep-he's an
architect and owns his own company, and some mornings he
doesn't go in until 9:30 or so. It's better that way the mornings
I'm there-I mean neither of us really wants to run into the
other one when we're trying to pull ourselves together for a
day at work. We're pretty cool about it, but it's hard to know
how to act when we pass each other in the hall. So I'm glad
he can leave late some mornings, because I work as a bike
messenger downtown and I sure can't.

Like most mornings, I pulled on black tights, torn, baggy
khaki pants cut off below the knee, neon orange Converse
high-tops, and a ratty brown leather bomber jacket, with a
T-shirt underneath that said DEAD ELVIS. I was achy and
groggy, which was slowing me down and threatening to make me late, but I was also starving. Jonathan's refrigerator
usually had good food in it-sometimes I wondered whether
somebody was thinking about what I needed to eat for breakfast, doing physical work as I do, or whether Jonathan just
normally liked to eat well. I sometimes made myself huge
cheese omelettes before taking off in the morning, but today
there was no time for that. So I hoped I'd find some cold pizza
or something. I opened the refrigerator and-paydirt! -there
was half a carton of Mu Shu pork. No pancakes, but you
couldn't have everything. I wolfed it down out of the carton
and was out the door.

Mostly, I like my job. I like being loud, fast, tough, and
rude, and buzzing traffic and peds on my bicycle. Today,
however, it wasn't so great, what with my sore ass. And I was
still distracted by vague thoughts of auctions, ownership, and
money, losing my edge and damn near getting killed by one of
those bozos who open their car doors while you're zooming
up beside them.

I hadn't really planned on being a bike messenger,
though. I'd sort of assumed I'd be going to graduate school in
literature when I met Jonathan during my senior year at Cal,
at a party in a fancy house in Pacific Heights.

The party wasn't my kind of scene at all. It was given
by a rich lawyer who seemed to know film people. I was
there because my roommate Jan wanted to be a filmmaker
and was sniffing at the outside of that scene. We'd gone to a
movie in the city and run into some people she barely knew,
and they brought us along to the party. It was the kind of
party you feel self-conscious at if you're dressed as I wasblack jeans and a Mime Troupe tank top. It was a rare warm
San Francisco night in October. Women were wearing fan tastic silky floaty-looking things, and men were looking very
pulled-together, very GQ in Armani jackets. Jan seemed to
be having a good time with the film people. I got a beer and
drifted around, feeling shy.

They were showing videos in one of the rooms, on a
huge high-resolution screen, so I wandered in and sat on the
floor, figuring that this would keep me from feeling too lonely
and at loose ends. I caught the last fifteen or twenty minutes
of Trilulatiozz 99, which was wonderfully funny and made me
glad, for the first time, that I had come to this party. Then
somebody put on an S/M film. It was awful, clearly playing
for camp value. I gathered from the hoots and conversation
attending it that somebody at the party had-when in desperate financial straits years ago-shot it or directed it or
acted in it or something. It was about this dominatrix and
her consort-the dominatrix is big, bleached, and blowsy,
and has huge breasts with hefty rings piercing the nipples.
And the guy-what do you call him, the dominator? -wears
leather pants and no shirt and his skin is pitted from acne.
Anyway, this cute lesbian couple comes to live with them
because they aren't getting it on very well and need to be
whipped into shape, which they are, and it does wonders for
their sex life. It's all very trashy and inept, and the lesbian
couple dissolves into giggles periodically. But 1 got into it.

Actually, it was very embarrassing that I got that deeply
into it. I felt my cheeks get hot and I found myself staring
and sweating a little and going slack jawed. Quickly I shook
myself out of it, hoping nobody had noticed. The lights came
on and I started out of the room, when Jonathan sort of materialized and fell into step beside me.

"They really are in that business, you know," he smiled
charmingly. "I've met them."

"You mean Sir Jack and Mistress Anastasia?" I was proud
that I could answer so calmly. "Are they good at what they
do?"

"Actually, yes," he said. "They're not very glamorous,
but, yes, they are good at what they do."

I had no idea what to say next, it suddenly occurring to
me that I was talking about S/M with the most gorgeously
Armani-ed man at the party. Thin, tan, intelligent-looking.
Little black pearl stud in his ear. He wore the loose, elegant
suit as though it were no big deal, and those wonderful, animal
brown eyes were sexy, friendly, and cool enough to pretend
he wasn't having to put me at ease.

Oh, my goodness, I thought. Wow. Middle, maybe late,
thirties. Rich. Straight, or mostly so, anyway. And beautiful.
I'd never said it before about a man, even to myself, but there
it was, there he was. I felt gawky and somewhat sweaty. And
tongue-tied. But I didn't take my eyes off him.

Which he had the good manners to accept as a compliment. And continued chatting, pleasantly and intelligently,
not following up on Sir Jack and Mistress Anastasia. We
went out to the balcony and sat on a stone balustrade overlooking the bay. And pretty soon I was telling him about
school and literature and what I was actually interested in.
Which was troubadour poetry, which got us talking about the
south of France. He was smart and well read and he seemed
to know everything about medieval architecture. Not that I
really care a whole lot about medieval architecture, but I'm
sure he'd picked up on how I'm an incredible sucker for
expertise-of any kind, really, short of maybe earned run averages and runs batted in. I thought he was terrificI mean, I was charmed and flattered and, face it, he was certainly the oldest and classiest person who had ever shown any
romantic interest in me. I felt that maybe I actually liked him,
too, but truthfully, I was so infatuated-and turned on, first
by the porn movie and then by him-that I couldn't really tell
and didn't entirely care. I wanted him to take me home with
him, though. I knew that I cared a lot about that.

Until finally he put his hand on my arm and took a deep
breath. Oh my god, he has AIDS or something, I thought
wildly. But...

"Look," he said, "you're pretty and very bright and I like
you, but that's not why I've been talking to you for the last
hour. The thing is, I'm got something much more serious in
mind. I want you to be my slave."

Oh. My. God. If I'd said it out loud I would have
sounded like a refugee from "Beverly Hills 90210." Oh my
god and ee-ye((,, gross. Talk about your conversation stoppers,
I thought -this certainly gives a whole new meaning to what
they call "meeting cute." I just stared for a minute while
I carefully considered whether there was any chance I hadn't
heard him correctly. But Jonathan has wonderful diction and
it was quiet out there on the balcony and my hearing is just
fine, so there was really no mistaking what he'd said. I slid off
the balustrade and turned to go. "Uh, well, it's been nice talking to you," I stammered. Damn, he had seemed so fantastic,
and it turns out he's just majorly sick. But it would make a
great story. I could already imagine telling it.

"Hear me out," he said. He seemed so unflustered that I
found myself stopping and turning to him again. "Look," he
said again, patiently, "we were watching an outrageously tacky and stupid porn film in there and you could have mopped the
floor with those jeans." His matter-of-fact gaze rested on my
hips a heartbeat longer than it needed to, I thought.

"So," he continued, "I don't think you're nearly as
shocked and scandalized as you'd like to think you are. After
all, it's not as though you haven't thought about these things
before. And at some length, I bet. In fact, my guess is that
you've been jerking off to S/M porn since you found a copy
of Story of O when you were a twelve-year-old baby-sitter. But
I don't think you've ever done more than read and jerk off.
Which is a shame. Because I think you'd be good at the real
thing. I'm good at the real thing."

Thirteen and a half. Almost fourteen. I mean that's how
old I actually had been when I found that copy of Story cat' 0.
Of course, that's typical of Jonathan's almost pathological
politeness -one of the little things I learned from him is that it
never hurts to give the other guy credit for a little more charm
or precocity than he or she actually possesses. So probably
he knew he was flattering me a little, in a perverse way, but
he obviously also knew that, in all the ways that counted, he
was dead-on right. S/M porn was one of my secrets. I didn't
understand why I liked it, but I knew it was important to me.
It seemed to occupy a space in my head next door to the more
typical romantic passions -little-girl crushes on actors and
rock stars and even some English teachers, the silly sweeping pleasure I always get reading Jane Eye. And -Jonathan
had made it so embarrassing-the romantic feelings I'd been
having talking to him before the conversation had taken this
disquieting turn. I felt very frightened and exposed.

But I had to say something. Enough about me, let's talk
about you. "You got good at it hanging with Sir Jack and
Mistress Anastasia?"

"I hang with a much better class of pervert. Well, they're
richer, anyway, and they're a lot prettier. But you're right, in
a way. I do respect those silly-looking guys from the movie.
It takes passion to act out your fantasy when you're going
to look so graceless. I'm good at spotting passion-sincerity,
maybe. I spotted you."

He reached into his pocket, found a piece of scrap paper,
and scribbled his name and address on it-in predictably
tiny, superlegible writing. "For a good time," he said, "come
by, tomorrow at three." And then he wandered back into the
party.

A star is born, I thought insanely, noticing that my jeans
would mop up the whole terrace, at this point maybe the
whole mansion.

And the next day at 3:00, reader, I went to his house. I
didn't tell anybody about it and I'd even shaved my legs and
underarms. His house was a little unusual for San Francisco -
brown shingle and set back from the street among evergreens.
I rang the doorbell, and he came to the door in jeans and a
sweater. He was as friendly and charming as he'd been the
night before, and he looked even better. He hadn't shaved, I
realized. I guessed that this made us even, in some odd way,
and I liked the way the stubble brought out lines and shadows
around his mouth. Behind his pampered thirty-something
look, there was just a touch of wildness. Yves Montand, I
thought, in The Wage.# of Fear. The look contrasted with his
calm, polite good humor. "I'm glad you're here. Come in."

He led me down the hall to a very beautiful book-lined
study. There was a low fire burning in the fireplace, and he
stood me in front of it. And very efficiently, neither of us
saying a word, he took off my shirt and bra, helped me out
of my jeans and underpants, took off my shoes and socks.
He handed me a pair of very high-heeled shoes and told me
to put them on and walk around until I got the feel of them.
They fit pretty well, though I'd never worn anything nearly
that high. Then he put a leather collar around my neck, buckling it in the back. He guided me by the shoulders, stood me
near the fireplace again, and picked up the remote from a
little table. He pressed a button on the remote, and a chain
descended from the ceiling over my head. He put leather
cuffs on my wrists and hooked them to the chain. Then he
fiddled with the buttons on the remote again until the chain
retracted back enough to be taut, and I was almost standing on my toes, hardly using the spike heels at all. Hardly
breathing, either.

Jonathan sat down in a nearby armchair, leaned back,
and surveyed me placidly. "I was right," he said. "You like
this. Now answer my questions, and always address me as
Jonathan when you do. And keep looking at me-no turning
inward toward your own fantasy version of what's happening. No talking out of turn, either. You're here to tell me what
I want to know. You can ask me questions later."

His questions were cold and clinical, though of course
enunciated with the most careful civility. Age, height, weight.
My family. Schedule and time obligations. Diseases, allergies.
Sexual experience, in minute detail. He even scribbled down
a few notes. It was hard to take a breath and find my voice, to keep looking at him, to remember to use his name. The fire was
warm at my back, but I had to fight to keep off the shakes.

"Turn around," he said, finally. "I want to see your ass."

This was tough, given the shoes and the tautness of the
chain. But-"Yes, Jonathan"-I did it. He leaned over and
grabbed me-thumb up my ass, middle finger up my cunt, and
held me as though I were some yard goods he was considering
buying. He used the other hand to trace the shape of my buttocks. I could feel their roundness below and the two dimples
above, as though he had drawn a picture for me. I thought
of buying grapefruit at a supermarket. All the images that
flashed through my mind, in fact, were of buying things.

Keeping hold of me, he used the hand that had been fondling me to slap me, hard. I gasped. What had I done to make
him do that? I opened my eyes and looked around to see what
he was doing. But he didn't respond, except to hold me a little
tighter with those fingers that were up me. Mostly he was) ust
looking at the spot he'd hit, at the bright pink color, I guessed.
It seemed to me he liked the way it looked, and I realized that
this had very little to do with me, or who I usually thought of
as "me." This had to do with the texture of my skin, the shape
and heft of my flesh. I had been right when I'd flashed on
supermarkets and such. He was shopping. And god help me,
I wanted him to want to buy.