Amazing what a vote can do. One upvote on this story and I re-read it, made a new image - at the end - and added a thousand or more words, making it much richer. It too quite a while, so I decided to re-publish it and get it some attention. You can find the upgraded version here - it’s more than twice as long.
Picture: Beaten
It comes down to this.
This is the central fact of her existence now. Not the actual beating, so much as the fact that they both know that he can beat her. That he will beat her, whenever he feels like it. That whenever he wishes, despite her desperation not to be whipped, she will strip naked for him and present herself in whatever horribly vulnerable position he asks … and let him hurt her.
He told her he wanted to do it to her when they first met. She had laughed, tried to sound less un-nerved than she was, as she said;
“Yeah, right, like that’s EVER gonna happen!”
There was a silence; he smiled, almost sweetly, as if waiting to see what she would do.
And she knew she should do something — really, she should walk away — just turn her back and leave him.
But he seemed so kind, so comforting to be with, and most of all, so genuine — she hadn’t met anyone like him before — let alone in the years since she had split with Ethan.
And so she stood. She may even have smiled back, but she said nothing; she couldn’t speak, in fact. She felt her heart beating.
At last he spoke;
“I will always be honest with you.”
And he was looking calmly into her eyes, so directly. A quiver ran through her. But still she couldn’t speak. More silence.
“More than that, I won’t let you be dishonest either. “
She was quivering now — how did he know what to say to her? He looked at her for a few seconds longer, then took her slowly, gently into his arms and held her, so that she could feel his strength.
She was never sure what their relationship was, at that point — he never made her any promises, and she never asked for any. But she loved seeing him, loved being with him, found herself waiting for his calls.
The fifth time she saw him, they were at dinner, in an intimidatingly expensive restaurant with high ceilings, dark wood paneling and armies of staff.
After the waiter had taken their orders, there was a little pause, and then he said;
“I’m going to beat you tonight, before I fuck you. Use my belt on your buttocks. It will hurt. They have a room here — it will happen there. The staff here will know.”
She had, once or twice, tried to imagine this moment — but never like this. ‘Laugh at him’, she had told herself — ‘- that’s the way to make it clear to him without losing him.‘
Or; ‘Just leave without saying a word. If he wants you, he’ll call and apologise.‘
But here, now, in this swanky restaurant, with him looking so calm — so relaxed — and with this terrible knot of panic in her chest, she finds that none of this means anything at all, none of it makes any sense. What had she been thinking?.
She feels so weak.
Why doesn’t he look nervous? Is he so sure of her? Or does he not care if she stays or goes — she could make a scene — shout at him, embarrass him in this posh place…
The silence is unbearable. She should leave. But her legs won’t carry her, she knows they won’t — her knees are like jelly. Eventually, desperate for something to be said, she hears her voice, soft, husky, tentative;
“No … no I … I don’t want that. You … you can’t…”
More silence, stretching out, unbearable, him just watching her, interested, that sweet look again — until she cracks;
“Please … why … why are you? Don’t!”
Silence again, during which she realises she is losing all perspective — her outrage unsustainable, her inability to imagine a future where she has resisted this … this . And then she is all but whispering;
“I … I don’t understand…” .
At last he leans across the table and takes her hand, That wonderful feeling of his gentle, reliable strength. Without meaning to, she relaxes;
“You’ll find it makes sense, after a few times, I promise. And you will understand what it means to let go — to give yourself over. To rely, completely, on someone else.”
Somehow, she pulls herself together, forces a brave little smile onto her lips;
“You’re crazy. H … Hurting me won’t make me rely on you — the … the absolute opposite will be true.”
Now her voice is shrill and desperate, but his strong hand still holds hers, and she holds his, her chest rising and falling as she finds herself panting — feeling her breasts rise and fall in the low-cut dress she has worn for him (bought last weekend with this dinner in mind). He smiles a little, reaches out and strokes her cheek with his other hand.
“We’ll do it three times, over the next week or so. After that, you tell me. Ah — here’s the wine!”
And then, remarkably, they are having a normal conversation, enjoying each other’s company — just as always.
Except … except that in her belly now is a strange, building fear. Fear. He’s going to beat her. She’s going to let him. Somehow she can’t see a way out. It’s going to happen. And again … and again. He’s told her. And he never lies.
And each time the fear gets too much, and she stops listening to him, instead stares, desperately almost, into his eyes, hoping to see some hint there that this is a strange joke, that he doesn’t mean it, he understands, catches her gaze, and smiles at her; encouraging, and devoid of doubt.
And each time this happens, the bubble in her belly gets a jolt, and each time it is harder and harder to distinguish the fear from sexual excitement.
So that when, after a tiny, almost astringently perfect little dessert, he stands and moves behind her chair, she lets him pull it back for her to stand also, then lets him lead her to the Maitre d’ (blushing hotly, unable to look at the man), fails to hear exactly what is said in a low but confident tone, and follows him through the lobby to a discreet side door, up a narrow stair to a large, simply furnished room with a couple of leather chairs, an armoire and a heavy bed with strong wooden posts at the corners.
Suddenly she can’t breathe. This can’t be real! But it is, this kiss is real — wonderful! She clings to him, trembling, needing reassurance, dreading the certainty of his resolve just as much as she needs it, moulding herself to him, feeling sexual tension mounting inside her, hoping against hope that if she holds him, he will change his mind, knowing he won’t.
At last, unable to bear the tension any longer, she stands back from him, looking at his feet, tears in her voice;
“If … if you’re going to do it, please … please do it now.”
But he doesn’t. In fact he steps back, away from her, and sits into a heavy chair.
“Strip, pretty girl. Strip yourself naked for me.”
They’ve never done this, and she has never felt like doing it for any other lover, but at this minute it makes a crazy sense and she strips — not lewd or flamboyant, but not shyly either; slow, elegant, sombre, increasingly aware of holding herself just so to show her breasts, her thighs in what she hopes are attractive shapes for him, until at last she is in nothing but suspender belt and stockings, grateful to be allowed, to be made, to offer herself to him as she discovers it is a throbbing joy to do.
“Stop.” He says; “Put the shoes back on. Kneel on the bed. Ass up, face down, hands out wide, palms up. Legs apart. Open your wet little pussy for me.”
He’s never spoken like this before, but again, it seems totally appropriate — and her pussy is wet for him, she realises with a shudder, as she wordlessly obeys, trembling, almost desperately concerned, now, in this humiliating pose, to appear desirable, sexy, elegant. Positioning herself with fierce attention, so that she is vulnerable — ready to be beaten, she suddenly thinks to herself. But there is no black humour even — just urgent need.
And indeed, being beaten leaves no space at all for irony, she discovers. There is nothing, nothing at all, but the directness of the experience — the humiliation, the abjectness of her position, that terrible anticipation, the sound, the astonishing reality of the blow as it lands, the mental devastation that results from forcing herself, against all instinct, to hold herself open for the assault — all this is utterly extraordinary; searingly, demandingly, urgently more real than any experience of her whole life.
And the sex afterwards is yet another unprecedented experience. Sex with him had been a revelation already, but this was something else — to be fucked so masterfully by the man who had just somehow dominated her so thoroughly that she had held herself open for repeated blows from his belt was at the same time powerfully degrading and wildly liberating. She made noises she had never heard herself make before — after a while lost all inhibition, grinding herself back into him, almost relishing the pain from her sore buttocks as he drove into her, spreading her thighs yet wider, sobbing, begging, teeth chattering.
And now?
Now, he is the man who beats her. The man whom she thinks about being beaten by. The man by whom she is completely consumed — the man who has rendered every other aspect of her life irrelevant. The man who beats her, whenever he wishes to; the man she allows to beat her, despite desperately, urgently begging, each time, in low, careful, polite words, that he might let her off (he never has).
She used to think she might love him, but now she knows that she never did — that somehow she had known that this feeling was coming — this knowledge, this iron reality, knowing that it would shape her destiny.
It is strange, so strange, to be grateful to have been thus transformed by such cruelty. She has no more doubts. All is clear, simple, there is nothing to worry about. Tonight they are meeting his foreign investors, two chinese men, and she is going to be fucked by both of them, in the private rooom — after he has whipped her for their entertainment. He’s told her this. He never lies.
The thought of being whored to strangers by him is at once terrible and wonderful; that she — such an ordinary, boring person — could experience such wildness and intensity is — just remarkable.
Shopping for a skimpy dress and the waist cincher corset he’s asked her to choose, she finds herself laughing out loud — ever so softly, a fizzy feeling in her belly. Laughing — and crying, too. He’s told her that one day, she’ll discover what it is like to extinguish a cigar with her wet sex, grind herself into the glowing tip, not flinching as it sears her, and she suddenly knows that it will be tonight, that she will do this for the strangers, and she almost swoons with the intensity, the sadness, the astonishing wonder of it all.
Picture: Whipped, tied, about to take a cigar
She smiles at the sales clerk so sweetly, so softly, that the young woman looks after her as she leaves, yearning, filled with deep emotion for no reason she can imagine…
