Thyme II Thyme (12 page)

'Are you okay with this?' It was Anne-Marie asking, close by my elbow.

I smiled at her and nodded.

'Carmen has the hots for you,' she informed me. 'I knew she would.'

'But—'

She raised a finger to my lips to silence me. 'But nothing,' she said. 'If she wants you and you fancy her, then go with it and fuck whatever anyone thinks. This isn't that sort of place, anyway.
Do
you fancy her?'

'She's very attractive,' I replied hesitantly.

'She's fucking gorgeous and we both know it. Andrea would crawl on her hands and knees to the ends of the earth for her and so might I, under the right circumstances.'

'Have you—?'

'Been with her? Oh yes, but don't worry about it. You must know that people like me have a different slant on things like that. I go where and when I like, and so does Carmen and so does just about everyone else who comes here. Otherwise they wouldn't come here, would they?'

'No,' I admitted, 'they probably wouldn't.'

'Look, if you'd rather go, if all this is a bit much for you, then say so. I shan't mind, although Andrea will probably stay here till the death.'

'No,' I said, 'I'll stay.' After all, what could this place offer that could frighten someone who had been helpless in the hands of mad Meg and her motley crew?

I was about to find out.

Unlike a lot of clubs, both back in the seventies and nowadays in the new millennium, the volume of the music was kept at a level that enabled people to talk to each other without recourse to shouting. When we took our drinks off into an empty alcove we were able to talk quite normally while we watched the steadily thickening crowd.

As I said earlier, more than half the clientele were dressed much as we ourselves were, definitely not for walking the shops but nothing outlandish by clubbing standards of the day. However, interspersed amongst this show of normality were a growing number of blatant fetish outfits - rubber, leather, the shiny vinyl we call PVC nowadays, high boots with high heels, long gloves, masks, feathered headdresses, metal jewellery and chains.

'How do they have the front to travel here like that?' I asked, agog at the spectacle.

Beside me, Anne-Marie laughed. 'Some of them are out-and-out exhibitionists,' she said, 'but not all of them arrive dressed for action. There are changing areas and even a wardrobe here of things for people who can't afford to buy their own stuff outright, or who worry about keeping that sort of thing at home. We can go through and see if there's anything that takes your fancy, if you like?'

'I... I'm not sure,' I replied. 'Maybe later.'

'Well, if we want to go into
Sanctum
then we can't go unless we're appropriately dressed.'

She had said
Sanctum
in a way that made my eyes narrow. 'What's
Sanctum?
' I asked.

She smiled. 'It's the real club area,' she explained. 'This is just a sort of reception room, though some people are happy enough to stay here and just watch and dance a bit later on. The proper action takes place down below and you either have to be a member in good standing or have a suitable sponsor to go down there. Plus, you have to be dressed properly, as I just said.'

'I take it that means rubber or leather?'

Anne-Marie tapped the side of her nose. 'Or nothing at all,' she said, 'apart from the necessary chains or what-have-you, of course.'

'Of course,' I echoed and felt myself shiver slightly, especially as at that moment a tall girl in a tight-fitting leather cat suit and towering heels strode by with a chain looped around her wrist. This chain led back to a collar about the neck of a shorter girl who wore nothing but a silvery bikini bottom and matching long gloves over which wrist manacles were locked and connected together by means of a short chain link behind her back, so that she was forced to parade her naked breasts as she walked through the throng.

As the minutes ticked by and we moved on to a second round of drinks brought by a waitress in the briefest of French maid outfits, I saw that the percentage of costumes in the club that left the wearer nearly naked was overtaking the more normal dress code. Either the later arrivals were the more adventurous or, as I suspected, people were beginning to slip away to take advantage of the wardrobe and changing facilities. I knew at that moment that we would be joining them soon, especially when Carmen appeared and beckoned Andrea to follow her. Andrea, with a flickering smile back over her shoulder, trotted off obediently in the tall brunette's imposing wake.

'She seemed keen enough,' I observed.

'I told you,' Anne-Marie replied breezily, 'Andrea will do anything for Carmen, even to going back to being Andy, if necessary. Carmen knows she can make the silly bitch do anything she wants. It'll be interesting to see what she has in mind for her tonight.'

'Carmen knew we were coming?'

'I phoned ahead from the hotel earlier and said we might be,' she admitted.

'And what did you tell her about me?'

'Only that... only that you are a very special friend and share certain interests. I didn't mention anything about... you know, the other thing.'

'Good.' I didn't really want anyone else knowing about my inter-century exploits just yet. Anne-Marie and Andrea had accepted my story readily enough, but I wasn't sure how many other people would believe me. Besides, there was enough going on around here without further complications.

'I think it's best if I'm your mistress for tonight,' Anne-Marie announced suddenly as the third round of drinks arrived.

I turned to her, my eyebrows rising.

'If we're going down into
Sanctum
, I mean,' she added. 'It'll be easier for you for your first time, otherwise you'll have to pick up on any spare subs, or else some other dom will hit on you.'

'Don't I get any say in that sort of thing, then?'

'Well, yes, but there's all sorts of complicated rules and rituals and it takes a bit of getting used to. You wouldn't want to trip up on your first visit, would you?'

'Well, no, but—'

'We don't have to go down there, not if you don't want to.'

There was a long pause as I hesitated, but I knew what I was going to decide as surely as if the decision had been cast in stone for me a century earlier. 'No, I'd like to see,' I said at last. 'But don't rush things, please. Let's finish these drinks first.'

'No hurry, sweetie,' Anne-Marie said, laying a reassuring hand on my arm. 'We'll finish these and order another round. There's plenty of time yet.'

We sat for a while longer watching and listening and in its own way this was even more surreal than being back in eighteen thirty-nine with Meg and her crew, for I guessed that most of these strangely garbed creatures were almost certainly quite normal people who by day worked as accountants, engineers, builders, secretaries, shop assistants, etc. I suspected I was probably among the youngest present but that was no more than a guess for exotic make-up and masks obscured more than just identities, so that I began to feel increasingly exposed sitting there in my disco party dress wearing nothing more than a bit of eye-shadow and lipstick.

'I'm ready,' I said abruptly and gulped down my nearly full glass in one very unsophisticated swallow. I stood up, tugged my hem down into place and took a deep breath. 'Now or never, I think!'

Anne-Marie nodded, appreciating that I was hovering on the brink of indecision. She took my hand as she rose and squeezed it reassuringly. 'Come on sweetie,' she whispered. 'Let's go give you a whole new identity.'

The door to the rest of the club area was set back in its own curtained alcove. Although it appeared to be unguarded, a masked face looked out at us from a glass-fronted kiosk window. Whether the face was male or female I could not tell for nothing was said and no attempt was made to stop us.

We walked down a short corridor beneath more red lamps and between the same black walls before turning left into a much longer and wider passage lined on both sides by doors set at intervals of perhaps eight or ten feet.

A girl with white-blonde hair that fell in a straight cascade over her shoulders, which were enticingly bare above a tight red corset and a matching mini skirt, walked towards us. 'Number twenty-two is empty,' she informed us, smiling with carmine lips to reveal one gold tooth amidst a row of perfectly white ones. 'Do you need any help with wardrobe?'

Anne-Marie assured her we did not and we moved on until we arrived at number twenty-two. The small room was rectangular, with a bench running along one side and hooks set into the opposite wall from which hung black plastic sacks with drawstring necks. Some of these were clearly full but the majority hung flat and empty.

'Get stripped off and put your things in one of these,' Anne-Marie instructed me, indicating the sacks. 'Don't worry about security. Nobody here would dream of stealing anything. The consequences would be awful for them and they'd never be allowed back in the club, which would be the worst punishment of all.'

'What about you?' I asked uncertainly. 'Aren't you—?'

'Of course I am,' she replied, 'but first I need to get us some suitable things. Don't worry, the wardrobe room is just a few doors down and I think I know what we need. I'll only be a few minutes.'

In fact, she was gone less than five minutes but it was the longest few minutes of my life. As I stripped, and I wasn't wearing much that required a lot of time to complete the process, I kept looking up at the door certain it would open to reveal some complete stranger. Yet at the same time I was wondering why I was worrying about that and what I was doing there if I was so worried. My mind, as you can imagine, was in something of a turmoil but then that's a situation I've since come to regard as being perfectly normal, insofar as anything in this, or any other world, could ever be described as normal.

I placed my things inside one of the empty sacks and closed the neck with the drawstring noticing that there was a small golden tag on it into which had been engraved the letter
H
. I checked the next empty sack and saw that the tag read
J
and the one after that
K
. I presumed there were similarly lettered sacks in all the other changing rooms and committed my own letter to memory as I sat down now, naked and quivering with growing apprehension, my hands in my lap in what was a laughably defensive pose.

'Right, I think I've got everything,' Anne-Marie announced as she pushed open the door with the large plastic crate she was carrying. 'Here, budge up and let me put this down. This stuff is heavy.'

The
stuff
to which she referred was mostly rubber, which as any devotee of the fabric will tell you is indeed a dense material; even the flimsiest looking latex dress is surprisingly heavy when weighed in the hands. As I peered down into the box I saw that none of this looked at all flimsy and the first stocking that Anne-Marie passed to me felt as heavy as any boot I had ever worn.

'You'll need this,' she said, passing me a small tin. I saw that it was talcum powder, unscented according to the label. 'Everything is properly washed and then pre-powdered before being put back into wardrobe,' she went on, 'but I find it pays to just sprinkle a bit of talc on anyway and rub it over. That way the rubber slides on like it's oiled. Lovely,' she added, winking at me.

It was, indeed, a feeling I've since come to agree can be lovely, and whilst rubber can be awfully hot and uncomfortable in the wrong circumstances, in the right circumstances it can be a very sensuous experience and there's something about being dressed in it that always makes me feel a bit special and very, very wicked.

Even with the added talcum, I found that putting on latex stockings was a skill that did not come easily the first time out and required a great deal of patience from me and no little help and advice from Anne-Marie, to whom rubber was plainly not a mystery. Eventually, when I had smoothed the second stocking up to the top of my thigh, she produced a corset of the same black colour but made of much thicker rubber. I peered at it and saw that it was moulded into an hourglass shape as extreme as anything I had ever worn, except perhaps that awful dog suit.

'Too much for you?' Anne-Marie asked me tentatively.

I swallowed hard but shook my head.

'It tightens with straps at the back, rather than laces, see?' She turned the garment around for my closer inspection. 'You just lift your arms up and leave the rest to me, okay?'

She had chosen well, at least as far as my natural measurements were concerned, for although the corset was a tight fit the bra cups lifted and supported my breasts beautifully, leaving just the top halves of my pale mounds and the merest glimpse of my dark aureoles showing. However, as I peered down I saw that each cup had a vertical zip running down the centre and understood that my nipples could easily be accessed by this means when the time came.

'Comfy?' Anne-Marie asked as she fastened the final buckle behind me.

'Not quite the word I'd have used,' I joked nervously, 'but yes, it's not bad, considering. Shall I do the suspender straps now?'