Gilliflowers (38 page)

Manfully overcoming an urge to gouge out her eyes with a fork and serve them up as exotic canapés I sweetly smiled and told her she was looking well, she’d put on weight since I’d last seen her and it suited her. She’s prideful of her figure. She gave me the evil eye and coldly informed me she was the same weight she’d always been.

She passed on the rich chocolate torte I’d made for dessert. A small point to the houseboy I felt.

No sooner had the Midlands trio departed than a couple of Shane’s business

associates arrived. It was a working visit and I was run ragged providing bed, breakfast and evening meals, not to mention teas and coffees on the days they held conference in the house. Shane expected me to be on hand at all times. I was the household servant on twenty-four hour beck and call. I seriously considered calling in tresser Jay to style me a forelock to tug.

One of the businessmen was a stocky Norwegian vegetarian, a vegan, who’d

obviously had his sense of humour surgically removed. Preparing a separate menu for him was a chore and a half. I wouldn’t have minded if he’d been smiley and pleasant with it, but he wasn’t. He was a picky poker faced pain in the arse. He also spoke English with a heavy accent. Once or twice I had to ask him to repeat something. He took it as a personal affront, snapping my head off. I was glad when he packed his bag and shipped out.

To top it all Leo had a domestic crisis towards the latter end of the month when his house was invaded and used as a squat by billions of black ants. He had to call in pest control experts to evict them. He ended up staying with us for a few days with Genevieve while the house got fumigated. He was worried the stuff they used might poison his beloved pussy and wanted her well out of it until he was sure it had cleared.

I didn’t mind Genny, but he was a bloody pest. He all but took over my kitchen. I couldn’t move without tripping over him. He was forever advising me. I lost my rag one evening after he tested some pasta I was cooking and told me I’d let it boil too long and it was soggy when it should be al dente. I threw the whole lot in the bin, pan and all and then huffed off down to the summerhouse saying he could cook the fucking dinner seeing as he was so perfect. So he did.

It was a relief to wave him and Genny off to their fully fumigated ant free home and get back to being just three.

And so here we are on the last day of August. Summer has crossed the bridge and her sweet flowers are set to fade and fall. September beckons. Swifts and Swallows have already left for warmer climes signifying the turning of the year and the first step to winter.

In the biopic film, blah, blah, blah, you know the script, my August days would play out to a song by one of, wait for it, Leo’s favourite bands. They’re called Fairport Convention. He has a ton of their stuff on vinyl. The song is called ‘Who Knows Where the Time Goes.’ It’s a beautiful song if you like folksy music. There’s a kind of twisted relevance in my choosing it. The composer and original singer of the song, Sandy Denny, died from a cerebral haemorrhage after falling down stairs and hitting her head. She was thirty-one years old.

I’m hoping my first stair plunging experience will be my last and I’ll have a much longer innings than Ms Denny. My life has as yet cast a short shadow behind me. I would like it to be longer. I have some growing and plenty of laughing and loving still to do.

The men folk went off to a dungeon do at Leo’s yesterday afternoon. Dick, bless his kinky heart, was really looking forward to the event. He looked as sexy as hell in tight black leather trousers. He has a gorgeous arse and the fine leather pants emphasised it, as well as his cock ringed frontal equipment. He was also wearing a white silk shirt with a laced front and black leather wristbands with metal rings attached. It didn’t need much imagination to guess what they’d be used for. I got a hard on just looking at him. I felt a sharp twinge of jealousy as I watched Shane collar him. There was a real flow of energy and excitement between them. I asked if I could go to the party too, but Shane firmly said no, arrangements had been made and they didn’t include me.

He softened the refusal by collaring me just before they left. He doesn’t always do it. Maybe it was his way of rewarding me for all my hard work lately. It’s a beautiful collar. It’s made from soft strands of intricately woven leather and it fastens with a pewter clasp engraved with my initials. The boyfriends presented it to me last year. I grumbled earlier about it not being a love token in the same sense as the bracelet Dick got for his birthday, but I still adore it. I’m not allowed to put it on or take it off myself. Only Shane as head of the house can do that.

When he fastened it around my neck yesterday he told me it was to remind me I belonged to them and while I might not be with them physically I was with them spiritually. It was an unusually sweet and rather poetic thing for him to say. He was severely hugged as a result. He brusquely called me a silly boy, but ruffled my hair at the same time.

Okay, brace yourself, dear diary, as I enter search mode yet again. I often question what Shane really feels for me. Perhaps he also questions what he feels for me and maybe that’s why, as yet, he has never said the three little words I long to hear from him? Maybe he feels saying them would somehow be a betrayal of the love and loyalty he very clearly feels for Dick? Maybe he’s still growing into his relationship with me and has yet to work out exactly what I mean to him? Maybe all he’ll ever feel for me is a kind of exasperated affection along with sexual attraction and a duty of care for a much younger man? Does it, should it matter? I don’t know.

I’ve previously said something along the lines of love not being equal, it isn’t uniform and how or why you love one person isn’t how or why you love another.

Maybe a bond of affection is as much as he can give to me and maybe it represents love in its own way?

The boyfriends often say I’m a greedy needy boy. They say I must learn to accept what’s on offer, instead of yearning for more than my due. They’re right of course. I know it.

Getting back to yesterday. They both petted and kissed me before they left and I was told not to touch anything until they got back. I spent the day in a pleasant state of anticipation, alternately getting jealous and turned on as I imagined what they were up to and who was watching them. The thought of it being Jak brought a surge of anger followed by a surge of anxiety. He was better than me at so many things. I wasn’t an instinctive scene player or an excellent sub. Shane might respect me more if I learned how to do the dungeon thing properly, but even as I thought it I knew it was impossible. It isn’t me. I’m not cut from a single sheet of leather. I’m a patchwork kind of guy.

Once I’d gotten over my spark of jealousy I wasn’t bothered about not going to the party. I prefer to be played with in private and I don’t get off that much on watching other folk play, though it can be interesting to say the least. There’s an amazing range of fetishes out there. At one dungeon do I attended there was a bloke encased completely in a black rubber suit, which left only his nostrils exposed. He spent the entire evening lying on the floor while his high heeled Mistress periodically walked all over him, and I mean that literally. It was bizarre. Judging from the muffled sounds issuing from the suit he obviously enjoyed being walked over. I stood well back, fearful in case his excitement got to the stage where his suit couldn’t contain it all and subsequently exploded like an overfilled condom. I didn’t fancy being spattered in whatever blew out of it.

Another thing I don’t like about scene play is that having a good old gossip is discouraged. It’s deadly serious stuff. There’s no room for swapping recipes in between the restraining, caning, whipping and fucking. There are protocols to be observed. Subs are not allowed to talk to anyone without their Master’s permission and no one is allowed to talk to them without seeking permission first. There’s no wandering around casually asking folk where they bought their leather Y-fronts from and asking to try them on. As a lifestyle it’s imbued with a lot of solemn ritual.

The first time I attended a BDSM party as my Daddies protégé, I ended up getting a spanking, and not an erotic one. It was my own fault. I’d been well schooled in what to expect and what was expected of me. There was a guy there about my own age. He had a host of piercings. They fascinated me, especially the row of them he had across his shoulders. Without thinking I went over and began asking him about them. Next thing I know I’m embroiled in a situation.

The guy’s Dom did not appreciate some unknown brat asking his sub inquisitive questions about his body art, certainly not without the usual courtesies being observed. I was shocked by how seriously the incident was viewed.

Shane apologised to the indignant Dom and assured him my behaviour would be addressed. The Dom in question wanted to witness my punishment, but to my huge relief Shane refused. He said he’d given his word I’d be disciplined and that should be enough. I was subsequently taken home in disgrace. I felt terrible and was in tears even before Shane’s hand began contacting my backside for breaching accepted etiquette and showing him up. He was obviously disappointed with me. The incident illustrated I’m not cut out for serious scene play.

As things turned out yesterday my anticipation came to nothing. I was looking forward to Dick showing me his marks and describing how he came by them, but he and Shane came home much earlier than expected and neither looked happy. In fact they both looked tense. Shane unfastened my collar and told me to put it away. He also sent me off to bed, saying he and Dick needed to discuss something. I was naturally curious and asked what was wrong. Shane said it was nothing for me to be concerned about. It was a private matter between him and Dick. I was to go to bed immediately. He had his not to be argued with face on so I did as bidden.

Dick was quiet at breakfast this morning. He refused to be drawn on the matter of the party. I asked if something had happened, but he patted my hand and told me it was nothing for me to fret over. It simply hadn’t worked out. The atmosphere had been wrong and the right mood proved elusive. It happened from time to time.

I went to visit my mother this morning. I usually go on a Friday, but she’s got a hospital appointment tomorrow. I haven’t seen much of her lately. The last time was the week after Dick’s birthday and Kelly was there. It was the first time I’d met her in the flesh, and there was a lot of it, flesh I mean. She’s a big girl. She had a muffin top spilling over the top of her jeans that a Master Baker aiming for a Guinness World Record in the biggest cake stakes would have been proud of, which sounds a tad bitchy I know. (Excuse me why I sharpen my claws) I didn’t stay long. I felt like I was in the way, which may or may not have been paranoia on my part. Mum looked tired. Kelly kept fussing around her. I would have liked to fuss round her and make her cups of tea, but I didn’t get a look in for Kelly.

She seemed right at home in the house, more at home than I’d ever felt. She also kept gushing about what a great stepfather Frank was back in the day and how she had missed him when he and her mum had parted and they moved away. She told me I was lucky to have him for a stepdad. It made me feel uncomfortable and again perhaps it’s paranoia on my part, but I felt it was meant to. Maybe Frank has been versing her in what a horrible stepson I was. I said nothing. Mum made a comment about Frank and me not being compatible. I left soon after.

The encounter disturbed me. I almost missed my station on the way home because I was dwelling on it. How could two people have such different views of the same man? Maybe my mother is right and Frank and I are simply incompatible

personalities or maybe I’d messed up an opportunity to have a good father/son relationship with him because I was too selfish and too possessive of my mother to want to share her.

I didn’t like Frank from the first. We didn’t hit it off at all. As I recall he didn’t make a lot of effort to win me over. He had no patience with me. Mum said I was a daydreamer, sensitive and imaginative. He said I was gormless, soft and silly. Maybe if I’d been a girl it might have been different? Maybe he saw me as being as much a rival for mum’s attention as I saw him? Perhaps he and I might have had a better relationship if the spectre of my father hadn’t been between us? Perhaps I created a fantasy about my dad no one could possibly live up to, least of all Frank. Maybe my ‘gayness’ wreathed me like an aura and put him off wanting to build a relationship with me in case it compromised his masculinity? Or maybe he didn’t want to risk trying to build a relationship because of what had happened with Kelly? I’ll never really know. The fact remains. There’s no love lost between us.

To my relief Kelly wasn’t there today. Mum told me she’d gone away with her

boyfriend for a few days. I felt a bit better when she confided she was glad of the break, as Kelly had been dropping around a bit too often and she was beginning to feel crowded.

We went out for a pub lunch. I insisted on it being my treat. Mum wanted to buy me a pint in return. If only. I used the excuse that drinking at lunchtime ruined me for the rest of the day. I let her buy me a coke instead, which is no substitute.

We ate and chatted. I ventured to ask why she and Frank had never had kids.

She’d still been young enough when they married. She shrugged and said they’d tried and then abruptly changed the subject, making clear she didn’t want to talk about it in any detail. Maybe it’s another reason why Frank doesn’t like me? I’m evidence of her previous marriage and its fruitfulness.

I seem to be in a questioning mode lately. It’s ridiculous. Not all questions have answers, none you want to hear anyway. Some things just have to be accepted. It’s time for me to shut the fuck up and sign off.

Dick has been off work most of this week with chronic pharyngitis. He

succumbed last weekend and could barely swallow or speak. His doctor prescribed antibiotics, rest and painkillers while I prescribed TLC and offered my services as a human hot water bottle, something to hug and cuddle while watching distracting DVD’s, an offer Dick gratefully accepted.