Eighty Days Blue

by Vina Jackson

  ‘I’m glad. And you shouldn’t leave – stay and make the most of it. I can’t leave London now either. I’m working on a few projects independently, but I’m contracted at least to the end of term at the university.’

  I nodded.

  ‘It’s not so far, though,’ he mused. ‘A seven-hour flight at worst. There’s weekends, it will be half-term before long, and to be honest . . .’

  ‘I’m not sure it would work between us full time,’ I finished.

  ‘No. There’s still a lot we haven’t talked about. I know you haven’t spent all of your nights alone in New York, and neither have I in London. I don’t think that should change now. We’re not . . .’

  ‘Dating?’

  He laughed. ‘No, not dating. I don’t think it’s as simple as that.’

  ‘But I don’t feel the same way with anyone else. Like I’m giving myself up. You’re the only person I feel like that with.’

  I still hadn’t told Dominik about Victor. That was different, though. I’d allowed Victor to do the things he did to me, but I didn’t want him to do those things in the same way I wanted Dominik.

  There was a time, not so long ago, when I would have thought that Dominik’s expression was inscrutable, but now I knew him better, I could follow that look in his eyes. Lust. Heat. Agreement.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘The same is true for me. I don’t do this sort of thing with everyone, you know.’

  My turn to laugh. It sounded like the sort of phrase that a woman would say in a sitcom, the morning after a one-night stand.

  ‘I mean it,’ he continued, taking my hand across the table. ‘I don’t understand it entirely myself, but I know this feeling. You make me want to . . . do things to you.’

  ‘You make me want you to do things to me.’

  ‘Well,’ he smiled, ‘at least we’re in agreement.’

  ‘So it’s settled, then?’

  ‘You mean, it’s settled that nothing is settled?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ll come and visit again, enjoy the orchestra, make the most of New York. I mean that – make the most of it, in any way that you want to. But you must keep me informed, as we agreed.’

  He ordered another espresso, and I asked for another Bloody Mary. I didn’t plan to get drunk in front of him, but the spice and the vodka took the edge off the wave of misery that I felt rushing closer with each minute that drew us closer to the time he had to go.

  We spent the rest of the afternoon in Caffe Vivaldi, drinking coffee, talking and laughing, listening to the pianist playing Billy Joel in the background. Dominik had already checked out of the hotel, and he only had a carry-on overnight bag with him. He travelled light, like I did.

  When the time came for him to go, I walked with him back to the steps of the hotel on Waverly Place where the limo he had hired for the airport run was already waiting.

  His kiss goodbye was brief, soft, affectionate.

  A lover’s kiss.

  2

  After Summer, Autumn

  The cab dropped Dominik off at the porch of his North London house. He hadn’t managed to get much sleep during the overnight flight from New York: too many thoughts clouding his brain, memories swirling like a personal tsunami of emotion.

  It was still early morning. A slight drizzle was carried by the wind and peppered the swaying trees of the heath nearby.

  He unlocked the door, walked into the hall and, following the customary beeps, cancelled the alarm system.

  Dropping his carry-on bag and his laptop case to the floor, he kicked off his shoes and was awed by the silence now surrounding him. With the door closed, outside sound was banished – bird cries, the rustling of leaves in the trees welcoming the rain, the sparse traffic on the hill and all evidence of day-to-day life.

  It felt like a terrible weight was falling on his shoulders.

  Dominik realised it was the awful pressure of loneliness. Now that he was alone, in his own house, sheltered among the bookshelves and familiar sights, he felt bereft. From the moment they had parted in Manhattan, when the limo had come to pick him up, all the way to JFK and the bustle of check-in, security and airport queues, the presence of others had steered his mind away from the fact that he had left Summer on her own. In another city. Not helpless, but abandoned. With her demons, her contradictions, those wondrous appetites he both craved and feared.

  Would he have been so attracted to her, felt the flutter of romantic intentions had she not been so different, imperfect, dangerous to know?

  Could he have fallen for her if she’d been meek and responsible, like so many other women he had been with?

  No, if this was love, it was the sort of love that is unconditional. He had to accept her waywardness. In fact, he wanted her to be a free spirit, a sexual adventuress.

  For the first time in five days, Dominik had time to reflect.

  And it didn’t make him feel any better about the situation and its paradoxes.

  He checked his diary. His next lecture was the following day. He had only missed a couple of tutorials by dashing so impulsively to New York. He knew there would be no problem rescheduling them, with all the time still left before the students’ finals.

  He needed a shower. Shedding the clothes he had travelled in as he walked up the stairs to the bathroom at the end of the long corridor, Dominik tried to order his mind.

  He stood still under the water rivulets, watching the sweat invisibly pearl down his body all the way to his feet. He washed away his exertions and unknown sins, purposefully blanking out the world. He focused on the way the hold-ups had left a pink band across Summer’s pale flesh when he had finally released her from their bind just thirty-six hours ago in New York. As they’d trekked back from Grand Central, he had had thoughts of tying her up, but the revelation of her hold-ups and the beautiful way their shade of pale beige had contrasted with the milky landscape of her upper thighs even after he had unveiled her bottomless state, with both appreciation and a mild element of surprise.

  He tried to recall the way she sometimes held her breath when he fucked her, as if trying to conjugate the rhythm of his thrusts with the rise of her desire. He had noticed it before, those first times in London, but now realised it was an integral part of her sexual make-up, an unconscious inner mechanism to assist her in settling on the same wavelength as her partner. No doubt she did so with other men, had done many times.

  He looked down at his body under the flow of the warm water from the showerhead. His cock was at half mast, in homage to Summer and the sweet memories she evoked. The circular ridge beneath his glans was redder than usual, a witness to the frenzy of their recent dalliance.

  He had been telling the truth when he said she made him want to do things to her. Things bad and sweet, things daring and dirty, revealing and tender, things that many women would resist. But Summer was not many women. His cock hardened, breaking the flow of the shower’s cascade.

  The day before yesterday, as they walked arm in arm along 42nd Street, they had passed a sex shop on Broadway going south, one of the few left in the city since the recent clean-up. Summer hadn’t noticed, but Dominik had for a brief moment experienced the urge to walk in and buy something he could use on her – handcuffs, some form of restraints. It was just an impulse, but there was something seedy about the shop’s unwashed window and its dubious contents, and something proletarian about using handcuffs on a woman. He had resisted the impulse and refrained from taking a detour into the shop, but the idea of tying her up had taken seed in his mind, and the revelation of her hold-up stockings later had been all too perfect, as if she’d read his mind and presented herself to him in full readiness for whatever the darkness of his imagination demanded.

  It had been the same with Kathryn, the young married woman so many years ago now, who during their brief affair had helped Dominik realise his attraction to dominance.

  Like Kathryn, Summer had this power to evoke his secret ghosts, draw them out, whis
per disgraceful things to him and assure him she wouldn’t mind, would not be shocked or disgusted. She awoke the dominant side of his personality, invited the worst of Dominik in the secure knowledge she could handle it. To the point of making him wonder who was actually in charge.

  His mind rushed forward and a mass of thoughts raced to the surface.

  He certainly wanted more than just dating – that curious euphemism – or fucking Summer. He wanted her fully, her body and her mind, but not in a possessive manner, this despite those surprising pangs of sexual jealousy he had experienced when seeing her with Jasper or imagining her with others. It was not a question of ownership. Something powerful inside him just wished to see how far he could take her, take himself, whatever the pain and mixed emotions it would unearth. She craved his domination; that much was obvious.

  So that was the way he should continue to act with her. He would be someone who could control her, lead her on that journey. And why should feelings be excluded in the process?

  Yes, in his way he already knew he loved her, but it was an all-encompassing love, a terrible love. It said to him that one day he might wish to see her with another man again, but this time specifically instructed by him, not just a whim or an accident.

  The thought made him uncomfortable.

  All of a sudden, he had an urge to jump out of the shower and make a beeline for the nearest phone and call her. He wanted to scream at her down the line, tell her all the bad things he yearned to do with her, to her, and be soothed by the balm of her acceptance. It would still be the middle of the night back in Manhattan, though, and she was probably blissfully sleeping like an innocent following the inevitable strain of their few days together. Besides, Dominik had never been a fan of phone sex. As a man who lived by words, it carried no emotional charge; it was just too easy!

  He extended his hand to reach for the soap and began washing.

  Days went by in a daze.

  Life unfolded on automatic pilot through lectures, tutorials, marking, research, drafting lectures and papers. Dominik didn’t see the time go as he busied himself with mundane matters, the business of his civilian life.

  His communications with Summer were sparse. Like him, she was uncomfortable with the politics of lengthy telephone conversations, so much of their contact was through emails and text messages. Impersonal, almost businesslike, to the point.

  It was a cruel game. When she expected him to be tender, he was remote or demanding. When she begged for his instructions, he was vague. Dominik wanted to keep her on edge. He wanted to be always in charge. Dominant. A role he was growing into.

  A handful of days later, Dominik was walking out of the university on his way to the Tube, lost in a daydream full of inconsequential digressions, when he heard his name being called.

  ‘Dominik?’

  It was Lauralynn, the blonde cellist he had hired to perform with Summer in the crypt all those months ago. He’d entirely forgotten about her since their brief telephone conversation when he'd first arrived in New York.

  It seemed she had been waiting for him to complete his lecture. She was standing in the street outside the grey-bricked building, wearing a black pencil skirt cinched at the waist, which highlighted her voluptuous curves, towering heels and a white blouse through which her red bra was all too much in evidence as it strained against the outer material in an almost aggressive fashion. A calculated portrait of sin if ever there was one. Her yellow locks fell to her shoulders, carefully bisecting the oval of her face à la Veronica Lake.

  Dominik was annoyed by this interruption to his routine, his mind already absorbed by an article he had been planning to tackle as soon as he had reached his desk at home.

  ‘Back from New York, I see,’ Lauralynn said.

  ‘Yes,’ he answered. He couldn’t quite remember if he had told her he was going, but who cared?

  ‘You hung up on me last time. That wasn’t nice.’

  He looked her in the eyes and detected a strong sense of predatory mischief. He decided to play this by ear, see where it might lead.

  ‘You saw her in New York, didn’t you?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Our violinist friend, of course,’ Lauralynn said. ‘Still your little plaything?’

  ‘I wouldn’t put it that way,’ Dominik responded, slightly taken aback.

  ‘I’d be fascinated to hear how you do put it, Dominik,’ Lauralynn remarked.

  Dominik was about to walk away, irritated by both her uninvited familiarity with him and her mistaken assumptions. How could she know anything of what existed between Summer and him? Then he remembered how she had been connected to Victor, and her too-eager involvement with the scene he had directed in the crypt, an involvement he now knew was orchestrated by Victor. Although he had not raised the subject with Summer in Manhattan, he had strongly suspected she had held certain things back from him. The fact that Victor had also been in New York could not have been coincidental. The man was duplicitous and cunning. Surely Summer would not have succumbed to him.

  He held back his impatience and asked her, ‘What is it you want?’

  ‘Just a chat, nothing more.’ She smiled impishly. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not into guys.’

  Dominik agreed and they made their way to a nearby wine bar with an upstairs room where, at this particular time of day, one could still enjoy a quiet conversation without too many eavesdroppers hanging around to interrupt the flow.

  ‘So what’s this all about, Lauralynn?’

  ‘I liked your style, at the crypt.’

  ‘You saw it all?’

  ‘Not quite. The material of my blindfold was loose enough.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘I know Victor. He had a good inkling of your plans for Summer and engineered it with me that myself and the two other remaining members of my quartet would make ourselves available for your scene.’

  ‘So you all knew?’

  ‘No. Just me, and Victor . . . I had to report back to him,’ Lauralynn revealed, an awkward smile stretching her lips.

  ‘The bastard,’ Dominik said.

  ‘Not really,’ Lauralynn remarked. ‘He’s just a player. Like you. Like me.’

  ‘I’m flattered you’re willing to accept me into your circle.’

  Lauralynn took a sip from her glass of Beaujolais. The wetness of the red wine shone across her full lips.

  ‘Oh, but you are, Dominik – you’re one of us. More than you know. To some it comes naturally, to others accidentally. It’s just that you don’t always realise at first. Doms, subs, it happens gradually, almost without your being aware of it. Until the day comes when you assume it fully, accept it, banish the personal doubts. It’s nature, not nurture, you see.’

  ‘An interesting perspective on things,’ Dominik admitted, still curious about her intentions. ‘So is Victor behind you now getting in touch with me, by any chance?’

  ‘No, not at all,’ Lauralynn replied. ‘This is just me putting out feelers. We haven’t been in contact for ages, in fact. I’m on a solo mission, so to speak.’

  ‘Tell me more,’ Dominik said.

  Lauralynn shuffled in her seat and sat back against the brown leather of the alcove armchair, facing him with a flirtatious look spreading across her attractive features as she brushed away a strand of blonde hair from her eyes with an imperious gesture.

  ‘No, you tell me, Dominik. How do you feel when you’re commanding a woman, getting her to do things that common mortals would disapprove of? Does it give you a kick, provide you with pleasure, or do you feel detached, like a spectator? I’m interested in finding out, in determining exactly what you are. Or could be.’

  ‘That’s a lot to consider,’ he replied, standing to fetch another round of drinks from the downstairs bar.

  ‘I like to use people,’ Lauralynn had said, later that day, as they had continued their conversation over a meal in Chinatown. ‘It brings me alive.’

  She hadn’t been trying to justify herse
lf; it had just been a matter-of-fact statement in which she took no pride or vicarious enjoyment. An explanation.

  Dominik’s initial reaction had been one of denial. Surely this didn’t apply to him too. He loved women. He wasn’t cruel to them, was he? In the act of seduction, there was not only sexual enjoyment at play, the naked pursuit of pleasure, but also a deep desire for closeness, empathy, a determination to understand what made a particular woman tick. Even down to wanting to know how she felt.

  Later, tossing and turning in bed that night, equally aroused and fascinated by the can of worms Lauralynn had opened, he couldn’t help thinking back to Kathryn and the new cravings she had triggered inside him.

  And, he reflected, also within herself, which had shocked her to the extent that after their break-up, Dominik knew, she had not only remained with her husband but in reaction to the affair embarked on a complete new life, leaving the area and giving birth a couple of years later to twins, following IVF treatment. She who, in his presence, had always professed a profound disdain for the idea of ever having children. Could the discovery of her own submissive streak and the perception that it made her a new woman, the dangers it unveiled, have caused her to flee from him? From his clutches?

  Maybe, he decided, and sighed.

  It couldn’t have been his fault, though, surely. The kernels of dominance and submission had already been there, buried deep inside both Dominik and Kathryn long before they had met each other. Like embers waiting for the soft breath of an unknown deity to come back to life and burn afresh.

  Had they not come across each other, their lives would in all probability have continued their untroubled flow along more . . . normal roads. Vanilla ones, he realised.

  Once the cat had been let out of the bag, however, there was no closing the lid on those feelings, Dominik knew. At least as far as he was concerned. He just didn’t know what self-discipline and heartbreak it had taken Kathryn to reject the siren call and turn away from him so decisively and return to the straight and narrow. The abnegation.

  He couldn’t find sleep. Stray sounds of birds in the garden outside his bedroom window reached him, amplified, deafening in their quietness. In retrospect now, he admired Kathryn’s resolve, the way she had sacrificed herself. Sadly, Dominik knew he didn’t possess such fortitude. He had been bitten, for ever contaminated like some sexual form of vampirism, and had abandoned himself willingly to the embrace of the ghosts of lust without a second thought. He had found them set ablaze again when he had first encountered Summer.