Irresistible

by Rachel Kramer Bussel

  Karin and Jan made a big show of deciding which implements to use while Matthew looked down at me from above.

  “Be brave,” he whispered. “I’m so proud of you.”

  “I love you,” I mouthed back.

  He winked then looked up at the others, who were signaling their readiness to begin. They both wielded suede-tailed floggers, favorites for a lengthy erotic spanking, and I relaxed my body, preparing myself for the first stingy swish.

  Jan and Karin alternated strokes, laying them hard and fast so that my bottom heated up rapidly. I panted and puffed into Matthew’s face, my legs struggling but held firm in his grasp, my hands tempted to stray down and shield my bottom as the burn grew.

  Matthew sensed this, I think, and ordered, “Touch yourself.”

  “Touch…ooooh…myself?”

  “Yes. Make yourself come. And don’t shut your eyes. I want you to look at me.”

  “Oh, nice touch,” said Jan admiringly, flicking the fiery suede tails back and forth across my bottom.

  I reached down and thrummed my clit, keeping my eyes fixed on Matthew, who had put on his particularly stern face, because he knew how that always spurred me on.

  Jan and Karin, at the whipping end, chatted to each other, complimenting themselves on their technique, discussing the particular colors of my flogged bottom and the way I was dripping onto their table.

  “You’ll lick it off afterward,” Karin warned me and I groaned, working my fingers faster, watching the corners of Matthew’s lips curl slowly upward.

  I’d been ordered to make myself come, but it is always hard to concentrate when I’m taking a whipping; the pain and pleasure bounce around in my brain, crossing each other, colliding, becoming one, then dividing again.

  “Harder,” hissed Matthew, his eyes narrow, his lips stretched over his teeth. “Whip her harder.”

  My ass was throbbing now and my clit was fat, round and red, like the Edam cheese I’d sliced earlier. Jan and Karin flicked the floggers in between my bumcheeks, finding the most sensitive spots, ensuring that I would not be able to escape the feeling of soreness for a day or two. The pain became pleasure, every part of me captured and used and taken, and I flooded with orgasm, my eyes trapped open under Matthew’s, forced to have every second of my shameful rapture watched and assessed.

  He leant down and kissed me again, a kiss of triumph and love and pride, before releasing my ankles and climbing off the table. The three of them lolled in their chairs, drinking coffee, while I serviced each one orally, starting with Karin, finishing with Matthew.

  Then, face smeared with juices, mouth tasting of semen, I was sent to the piano to sing again.

  Later, standing on a bridge over the canal, Matthew and I stared, hand in hand, down at the water and the pleasure boats that rippled it on their carefree voyages.

  “You were brilliant,” he said. “Outstanding. What did you think?”

  “It was amazing. Really, such an incredible rush. Not sure I could do it all the time though. It’s one of those things that’s probably best in moderation.”

  Matthew nodded sagely. “Yes. I think I agree with you. A special treat, for high days and holidays. And choir tours.”

  “How many of those do we have booked?”

  He grinned down at me rakishly.

  “How many would you like?”

  We’ve been on a few since then. They are an ornament to our relationship rather than integral to its function—we are, essentially, a duet rather than an ensemble. The desire for ornamentation in life has led to many wonderful things, all the same: The Night Watch, choral music, kinky sex.

  And I never think of tulips anymore when Amsterdam is mentioned.

  PREDATORY TREE

  Craig J. Sorensen

  Dawn sunlight made cookie-cutter outlines of the arts and crafts window on the green blazer from Cathie’s new job at Jack Harkin Real Estate.

  The alarm was not ringing. Sean tried to calculate why he was awake.

  Brappa!

  His head lifted from the satin-wrapped pillow.

  Brrrappa! Brrrrrappa bzzzzzz!

  He looked back to Cathie for a reaction. Her pale blue eyes looked through his skull. He waved his hand in front of her face. Nothing. He remembered the first time she had done this so many years before. It was the morning of the rose-flooded cathedral wedding that her father had taken out a second mortgage to provide. Sean had been sure something was wrong and grabbed her shoulder. The memory of her blood-curdling scream put a chill up his spine even now as the sounds outside the window consolidated.

  Bzzzzz chhhrrrr! KHHHRRRRT!

  Blood rushed between Sean’s legs. The grinding sound seemed to stroke the core of his spine like a strong hand on a cock. He reached to within a micron of Cathie’s warm arm then eased toward her shoulder. They hadn’t made love in so long. He needed to feel her.

  Woodchip spittle hissed like a fountain amidst the chainsaw’s belching motor. Cathie remained still as death except for the almost imperceptible rise and fall of her chest. He finally curled his hand into a ball and retreated.

  His cock ached. He leaned close to her ear and whispered. “Close your eyes, Cathie. Please?” She was motionless, staring.

  He folded his hard-on into his underwear and got up as the chainsaw’s sounds became more insistent. He looked one more time into Cathie’s blank, open eyes, then went into the bathroom to get an early start on the workday.

  Cathie stood, hips against the counter, with the whisper of a potato peeler tossing brown curls in the stainless sink. “Hi, honey, how was the traffic?”

  “Sucked. Getting worse and worse.” Sean hung his keys on the peg next to a photograph of Samantha when she was a little girl. It didn’t matter how many times he looked at the photo, his heart always raced as if it was just yesterday that he walked into the backyard to see Cathie, her camera pointed toward the tree. Samantha was so high in the huge maple that it made him dizzy. He almost screamed out, but fear that he might startle the girl and send her plummeting silenced him. He squeezed Cathie’s shoulder. Samantha’s scabbed knees clung to the branch as she grinned upside down. Sean pleaded with Cathie to get her down. “She’ll be fine. Like mother, like daughter.” Cathie rolled her shoulder from Sean’s grip and shot a couple more pictures. Sean held his breath until Samantha scaled down the tree like a squirrel.

  Sean shook off the memory and leaned with his back to the counter. He brushed Cathie’s long hair from the side of her face. “You did it again.”

  “Did what?”

  Sean widened his eyes and cocked his head like he was sleeping.

  “Stop it, Sean, I don’t sleep with my eyes open.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “I don’t!”

  He wretched out a crackling snore.

  “And I don’t snore!”

  “No, you don’t snore,” he agreed with a bob of his eyebrows. He turned around and looked into the backyard.

  “I had a long day, Sean.”

  “Mmm?” He squinted. Something was missing. Something big. Huge.

  Cathie continued, “I’m not sure about—”

  Sean leaned toward the window. “Holy shit!”

  “What?” She followed his eyes.

  “It’s that beautiful old oak in Gary’s yard they were cutting down this morning. There isn’t a goddamned thing wrong with that tree.” Branches and limbs were scattered knee deep across Gary’s manicured lawn.

  “Maybe he’s pruning it.”

  “You don’t cut a tree like that to prune it.” Sean felt like a WWII vet looking around the empty ballroom at the sixty-fifth reunion. He rushed out and positioned himself on the fence near where Gary surveyed the carnage. Gary shrugged. “Look, the way it hangs, if lightning were to hit it and it fell over, it might—”

  “That tree was older than we are, Gary.”

  “Yeah, and its time had come.”

  Sean lurched back on the fence like taking a .44 slug. The
re were a thousand things he wanted to say. His jaw fell slack. He climbed down from the fence and walked slowly back to the house.

  Cathie’s ease with herself sometimes made her easy to overlook, like walking through a beautiful garden every morning, or seeing a beautiful tree out the back window every evening. Sean stepped from his morning shower and draped a towel on his hips. She stood casually, her long nude body still a bit damp. She combed her silver-tinted, bright-red hair, then slathered face cream on her fingers. He set to shaving as she rubbed the cream on her freckled cheeks then wiped the remainder over her silky stretch marks, the last bit deposited beneath the border of her vibrant pubic hair, as she had done for years.

  She smiled then walked into the bedroom and he heard the closet open. He continued his routine.

  Brappa.

  Sadness filled Sean.

  Brappa, brappa.

  Mourning to desperation, he bit his lip so hard it hurt.

  Brappa bzzzzzzzz!

  His towel rose like a drawbridge. He felt that strange, desperate desire again. He tilted his torso and looked into the bedroom. Cathie was an exception to the widely held notion that women take forever to get ready. For once, he was disappointed in this. She was already fully dressed, making final adjustments to the green blazer. She fanned her wet hair out. She looked back at Sean and blew a kiss, then started for the stairs. “Have a nice day, sweetie.”

  He wanted to yell, Wait, Cathie! It came out, “Have a good day.”

  Her high heels clacked down the oak staircase. His cock throbbed as the chainsaw continued to churn. He stroked his rod a couple of times and thought about bringing himself off, but the clock informed him that he had no time for such luxury. He couldn’t afford to be even ten minutes late these days.

  Cathie brought a second helping of spaghetti. He never had to ask. She ladled the extra sauce he always wanted over it and pushed the grated parmigiano-reggiano closer to his hand. Sean seasoned then twirled the pasta and scooped extra sauce. “Thanks, Cathie.”

  She smiled and nodded. Her smile faded slowly as she traced down one lapel of her Jack Harkin blazer. “You’d think selling houses would be easy the way the town is growing and—”

  Sean took a bite. His mind drifted. Ivy League tuition for one daughter, the other now ready to marry a man he hated. Skyrocketing real estate taxes, a dot-com bust alumnus boss, nicknamed “the kid,” who wore flip-flops and nu metal T-shirts, firmly convinced that youth and unspeakably long hours were the only answer to success. This, combined with the threat of draconian layoffs and not another job in sight. Sean shook his head to clear his thoughts momentarily. “What was that?” He twirled another bite of spaghetti.

  “You okay, hon?”

  “Oh, yeah, I’m fine.”

  Cathie stroked the stubble on his cheek. “You sure?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine, Cathie. What were you saying?”

  She smiled. “Nothing. What’s wrong?”

  “Today I became absolutely sure ‘the kid’ has it out for me…”

  Cathie leaned forward and rested her chin on her palm. She nodded for him to continue.

  Sean and Cathie sat out on the back porch, he in sweats, she still in her outfit from work. He pointed to the heap of rough-cut limbs and trunk pieces in the neighbor’s yard. “Cathie, if they keep taking the trees down, this neighborhood will look like one of those popcorn cul-de-sacs out by the freeway. I mean, they’ve taken out seven trees this year, and every goddamned one that’s been cut down was perfectly healthy. Seven fucking trees!” He methodically pointed at the spots where the trees had once been. “You’d think they were all plotting to get us. Fucking predatory trees!”

  Cathie laughed and cupped her hand gently in his. She turned her head deliberately at the thickening stripe of bare limbs in the center of the old maple in their own backyard. He followed her eyes. “It’s perfectly healthy.” He didn’t want to go there again.

  Cathie tilted her head sympathetically. “Sean, it looks like hell. We can always grow a new tree. Trees are good like that.” She laughed, but her voice trailed off when Sean didn’t join in. She drew a deep breath. “Really, we could plant a new one,” she offered softly.

  “Sam loves this tree, Cathie.”

  “Sam loves to climb. She climbs anything that will stand still for her. And she’ll have trees of her own soon enough after she marries…him.” Cathie sighed and rolled her eyes. “Anyway, is all this really about trees? I never knew you cared so much about them.”

  “Oh sure. I mean, I love trees, you know?” Sean’s mind again faded into worries. “But speaking of climbing, ‘the kid’ really pissed me off today. He doesn’t know shit about the business. He thinks he’s smarter than everyone around him. He proposes ideas that we’ve tried a dozen ways and proven won’t work, and still everyone just licks his fucking boots. ‘Great idea, Brad!’ Fuck, I just don’t know.”

  Cathie’s expression invited him to continue. He opened his mouth. The strange sensation he’d gotten looking in her eyes, wide in sleep that first chainsaw morning, swelled in the back of his mind. Cutting: the sound of cutting, of severance. Loss.

  It was rare that Cathie slept with her eyes open. Those times played in his head: That time Sam’s fever spiked so high. The day Cathie wrecked her car. The flooded basement and all those precious books her grandmother had left her. When her youngest sister’s husband died so suddenly.

  “Go on, Sean.”

  He focused. “So how’s your new job going?”

  Cathie leaned back. “What?”

  “How’re things at Jack Harkin?” He smoothed the lapel of her blazer.

  “Oh, that’s fine.” She gave a dismissive wave.

  “Really?”

  “Oh, you bet. I mean, there are always growing pains. You were saying? About ‘the kid’?”

  “What growing pains?” He patted her thigh.

  She tilted her head softly. “Well, I guess it wasn’t what I expected, or maybe I didn’t know what to expect. I—I really don’t know if I’m cut out—” She held up her wrist to her forehead like she was checking for a fever. “Look, I’m fine. It’s all good.”

  “Keep going.” He stroked her cheek, then rubbed her lip with his thumb like it was a magic lamp and this was what he needed to do to get the genie out. His eyes drifted to the yard.

  “What was that about ‘the kid’? His name is Brad? Didn’t know—”

  He forced his eyes away from the naked middle of the tree back to Cathie. “What about your job?”

  Cathie’s carefully crafted smile washed out like low tide. “Oh, Sean, I don’t think I’m going to be able to cut it. I’m not making sales. I’m so afraid of letting them down, worse still, letting you down. I know you’re having troubles at work and…well…anyway…” She left a gap for him to speak. It was a long gap.

  To Sean, this silence, where not even a bird song could be heard, spoke volumes. “My work is fine. Keep going.”

  A tear trickled down each of her cheeks and she dried them up quickly with one thumb. “I’m fine.” Her lip quivered. She turned away.

  All the years she had been there for him. She never seemed to worry, never seemed troubled, but he wondered how many times he’d really listened. He’d never seen her cry, even when she broke her leg or when they set it. He recalled the mornings along the way, looking into her occasional blank sleeping stares. Through them all, she always listened. Her earnest listening seemed to make life so much easier.

  “I’m here for you. We’ll work it out.” He placed his palm delicately on her forearm.

  “Oh shit, Sean.” She turned back and grabbed ahold of his neck. She pulled her chair up on two legs as she drew close to him.

  “What?”

  Tears gushed down her sharp jawbone. Her sobs were loud, like a chainsaw.

  “What?”

  She held tight to his neck and continued. She cried so hard he knew he’d made a huge mistake. The only thing he could do was hold
her tight while she soaked the front of his shirt. She finished and stood up. He stood up with her and she held up her hand. “I need some time alone.”

  She was already asleep, curled in the fetal position, still in her work clothes right down to green high heels when he found her in the bedroom. He cupped tight to her back and held her. She slept on. She was sleeping so deeply. He lay awake half the night wondering what he had done, hoping that by holding still and cradling her he could make it right.

  A strip of pale light brought sparks of color to the bedroom. Sean listened to a breeze that made whispers of the defiant leaves that soldiered on in the old maple in the backyard. He didn’t know what awoke him.

  No chainsaw.

  He turned over toward Cathie. Her body was sprawled atop the covers in the clothes she’d worn last night. She faced the window, eyes wide open and fixed. Sean sighed. He leaned up on his elbow and looked closer. That distant gaze. He reached his hand toward her cheek, then pulled back as he replayed that shrill scream deep in his mind. He felt so awful about what he had done to her last night. He still wasn’t sure what it was, but he felt plenty awful.

  She winked. “Gotcha, baby.” She gripped Sean’s hand and eased it up her skirt, then down her panties. He slid one finger inside her and she said, “That’s nice. It’s been too long.” He massaged her clit. She suddenly pulled his hand out and jumped from the bed. She raced down the stairs like a kid closing on Christmas presents. Sean put on his sweatpants. His hard rod formed a tent at the front, and he decided he’d best wait for it to soften.

  “Get your ass in gear, Sean! You gonna sleep the day away?”

  He descended the stairs and followed an ant-crumb trail of clothes: one shoe on the bedroom floor, one in the hall, blazer on the top stair, skirt midway down, blouse on the living room floor, slip draped on the cold TV, panty hose in front of the open back door.