‘Time for me to say a little prayer,’ said Dan, eyes fixed on the setting sun, having finally found a parking space in the district of winding hills and jumbled cottages in which my friends had made their home.
‘Oh, don’t. They like you.’
‘They hate me. But they like you too much to show it.’
‘Just smile and nod, smile and nod,’ I said, the usual advice in these scenarios.
Dan sniffed the air as we got out of the car.
‘Is that a home-grown blend I scent?’
‘No, you knob, it’s sausages.’
They didn’t have much of a garden – just a tiny patch of walled-in gravel parallel to and behind the kitchen – but they had made the most of it, filling it with bunting and fairylights and all sorts while the barbecue smoked merrily in one corner. The kitchen and living room and hallway and stairs all heaved with bodies, so it was difficult at first to locate either Kez or Gin.
A few old faces, the names of which I’d mainly forgotten, appeared during the search. They greeted me effusively, then switched to guarded mode when they noticed Dan at my shoulder. Once we had passed, I kept feeling eyes boring into my back and hearing – though it was mostly my imagination – the words She’s the one that married the copper. That’s him!
Shifty looks and hands unconsciously patting pockets and purses were the order of the day. The heavy, distinctively sweet smoke of weed wafted on the outside air, and I heard someone hiss, ‘Put it out!’ then Kez loomed in front of me, in a batik turban and massive earrings, smiling all over her face.
‘Pip, wow, so good to see you again, how’ve you been?’
All my anxieties dissolved in her enthusiastic bear hug and I felt twenty-one again, ready for a night of red wine and flirting to heavy bass jams.
I stuck to the red wine, Dan not being a fan of flirtation with anyone but him. Ginnie, whose absence had been rather puzzling me, appeared at ten o’clock with a lank, limp-looking young man and an announcement, after which the reason for the party became clear.
She had gone and got herself engaged to the lank one – who described himself as an unemployed rock star but had an accent that suggested private schooling and a trust fund.
Champagne was drunk and dancing attempted, with much clashing of elbows, then most of the crowd melted away into clubland, leaving Kez, Ginnie, the unemployed rock star, Dan and me to hoover up what remained in the bottles.
‘You never mentioned you were thinking of marriage,’ I exclaimed, rounding on Ginnie with mock disapproval, though, after the amount I’d had, it might have sounded realler than I intended.
‘Ah, you know,’ she said with a fond smile at Rock Star (real name: Piers). ‘It wasn’t a plan. We were just messing around after a gig, had a few vodkas and, I dunno, Piers said wouldn’t it be hilarious to see everyone’s faces if we got married and … we decided to do it.’
I worked to keep the smile on my face, but I think she must have seen something in my eyes because Piers took over the explanation, in defensive mode.
‘Why, what better reasons are there? Why does anyone get married, anyway? It’s just a fucking legal thing, a convention. A piece of paper.’
Oddly enough, he echoed some of my teenage clients during a debate I’d recently chaired on the relevance of marriage in the twenty-first century. They’d barely scraped together enough education to read, though, so they could be forgiven the unoriginality of the sentiment. From him, though, it grated.
‘So that’s why you’re doing it?’ said Dan. ‘To see everyone’s faces? And what about after that? After you’ve seen them and laughed?’
‘I might have known you’d disapprove, PC Copper,’ said Ginnie icily. ‘Perhaps we don’t want to embarrass you by being all loved-up and full of the grand passion. Not everyone’s like that.’
She was having a dig at us. We had been pretty sickening in a Love’s Young Dream kind of way when we met. I didn’t see why I should feel ashamed about it though. At least our feelings for each other had been genuine and honest.
‘You’re in love though, right?’ I asked, confused by the latent hostility in the air.
‘Yeah, of course,’ mumbled Piers, while Ginnie huffed and poured herself another glass.
‘You know my feelings on the subject,’ said Kez, giving me a sympathetic smile.
‘Don’t start, Kez. Nobody’s forced me into this. Piers and I have an equal partnership. We going to make marriage mean whatever we want it to mean, so neither of us is perpetuating ancient oppressions.’
Both Kez and Ginnie gave Dan a daggers look, silently translated as unlike him.
‘Unlike me,’ said Dan, brightly but unhelpfully. ‘I can’t get enough oppressing, me. It’s what I live for. I wake up every morning looking forward to another solid day of oppression. It keeps me young.’
‘Dan.’ I nudged him too hard and he spilled red wine on the carpet.
‘Not everything’s about you, Dan,’ said Kez coldly. ‘This is Gin and Piers’ night. Don’t try and turn the focus to yourself. Typical of you.’ She spoke the last words in a mock undertone.
‘Why are you having a go at Dan?’ I wondered, only slightly drunkenly. ‘Dan is a brilliant husband and an amazing advert for marriage. I say go for it, Ginnie. Being married is fantastic. I’ve never regretted it and I bet I never will.’
Dan looked a little stunned, as if he thought I might have drunk far more than he’d realised.
‘D’you mean that?’ he said.
‘Yeah, course I do.’ I lurched towards him, puckering up. He obliged me with a kiss, if not the full-blooded snog I craved. ‘You’re fucking lush, you are. I love you so much, oh, my God, so much.’
‘Yeah, I think perhaps the wine … we ought to go to bed, maybe. C’mon, soldier. Let’s get a pint of water to take up with us.’
He’d stood and was pulling me up by my elbow, but all around us a cacophony of protest seemed to form a circle, unintelligible but no less vehement for that.
‘Who do you think you are, telling her to go to bed?’
‘She’s a grown woman, she can make her own decisions.’
‘Tell him to piss off, Pip. He’s not the boss of you.’
I knew that they just wanted Dan to go to bed so they could skin up in peace. I’d told them numerous times that Dan would turn a blind eye just so long as they didn’t try to get him to smoke, but they seemed convinced that he was looking for any excuse to clap them in irons, so they continued in their obstinate practice.
‘Look,’ I said unsteadily. ‘I’m sick of this. As far as I’m concerned, Dan’s proved himself the right man for me over and over again, but you won’t hear a word in his favour. I’m sick of the way you treat him and I’m sick of being pitied and fussed over as if I’m some kind of … oh, forget it. I’m not staying. I’m leaving. Let’s find a hotel. Good luck with married life, eh?’
I made a dramatic exit, slightly marred by tripping over a stray ashtray, and ran out into the street, a storm of blether at my heels. I think Dan was behind me. I hoped he was.
I got to the car and realised I didn’t have any keys and turned to look for him.
But Kez had given chase first and was jogging up behind me, entreating me to wait and come back and listen and nobody had meant it that way and it was all a misunderstanding …
More phrases of this nature were pouring from her lips when she chanced to look in at the back window of the car.
She stopped short and uttered a small scream.
The lights in the upstairs windows of two cottages went on.
‘What the fuck’s that for?’ she demanded, pointing at the back seat.
At first I couldn’t think what she meant, but then the Cabernet fog cleared a little and I remembered what was in there. Oh.
‘What?’ I stalled for time.
‘That! A cane. Like they used to have in schools in Victorian times.’
‘More recently than that, actually, it wasn’t abolished
formally until nineteen –’
‘Whatever!’ she shrieked.
She seemed to remember where she was then and lowered her tone to a confidential murmur.
‘Oh, God, Pip, please tell me … look, there’s a place for you whenever you need it … let me find the number of the local shelter for you … Is it because he’s a cop? You feel you can’t get out of it? It’ll be OK, Pip, I swear. I’ll get my group behind you. We’ll all stand beside you. I’ll blog about it.’
It was only then that I realised the assumption she was making.
And she was right, even though she was also atrociously wrong.
And I had no idea how to even begin to explain. Indeed, my explanations would probably only make things sound very much worse.
‘No, Kez, no, you’ve got the wrong end of the, uh, well, the stick, so to speak.’
‘Are you telling me he doesn’t beat you? I need the truth, Pip. The truth.’
‘The truth is, it’s a, um, a kink. Fetish. You know.’
‘He doesn’t beat you?’
Christ, she was tenacious.
‘Nothing happens that nobody wants,’ I said obliquely.
‘The snivelling little git,’ she said, suddenly alight with a different variety of indignation. ‘He makes you dress up for him, doesn’t he?’
‘Oh, well … now and again.’
‘Don’t tell me. PVC, leather, thigh-high boots. I’ve heard that men in positions of unwarranted power like to pretend to relinquish it to women they pay. Or women who can’t say no to them. Like their wives.’
‘Well, that’s … not quite it …’
‘Oh, I don’t want to hear the details, Pip. God. He makes you whip him, does he? Kisses your feet and all that?’
I had no idea what to say now. I was at sea and adrift. Kez had made her supposition and it was less dangerous to me than the other one, so I suppose I just … let her go with it.
‘It’s OK, Kez, we’re both one hundred per cent cool with what we do. We’re happy. We’re well matched.’
She stared at me.
‘You like hurting him?’
‘I like what he likes.’
‘Christ, you’re so co-dependent. I despair of you. But look. I wanted to say, come back in.’
‘I’m not going anywhere my husband isn’t welcome.’
‘It’s OK.’
Dan’s voice. He was behind Kez on the pavement, in company with Ginnie and Piers.
‘Dan.’
‘Come on, we can’t go anywhere now,’ he reasoned. ‘I’ve had a drink and so have you. Let’s just go to bed and everything will be better in the morning.’
‘But don’t you mind?’
‘As long as we’re welcome …’ He looked at Kez and Ginnie, who both offered a shamefaced nod.
‘All right then. But I’m serious.’ I wagged a not-very-steady finger at my old friends. ‘Love me, love my cop.’
Somehow we all made it back into the house without falling over, until I fell into bed. A futon, to be precise, on the first-floor landing, but anything would do at that point.
Ginnie and Piers cooked brunch the next day (I can’t really say morning) and we all sat around the table speaking to each other with exaggerated courtesy, except when the other three stopped to exchange meaningful looks, or Kez muttered stuff under her breath about sexual servitude and marriage being slavery.
It was quite horrible and I was glad to get away.
‘What was all that about?’ Dan wondered aloud, once we were safely back on the motorway.
‘What? Kez and Gin being idiots?’
‘All those weird comments. Have you told them something? You haven’t, have you? No wonder they hate my bloody guts. Jesus, Pip.’
‘I didn’t! I didn’t tell them … what you think.’
‘Philippa.’ He looked away from the road for long enough to give me a goosebump-inducing hard stare.
‘I might have twisted the truth a little,’ I admitted.
‘Tell me now. Services are ten miles away. If you want me to use the facilities again …’
‘No! I was trying to protect you. You can’t punish me for that.’
‘OK, so explain. What did you say?’
‘I might have let Kez believe a conclusion she jumped to. I didn’t say it myself.’
‘Stop covering your arse, my dear. You know it’s futile when I’m around.’
I blushed and felt a burning between my thighs.
‘She saw the cane in the back seat. I didn’t know what to say. I let her make up her own mind about it, and her own mind came up with an interesting alternative explanation.’
‘Which was?’
‘That it’s me who canes you.’
‘Oh, God.’ He laughed out loud for quite a while. ‘I think I’m going to need those services after all.’
‘It’s not my fault!’
‘No, no, I’m not blaming you. You couldn’t have done much else under the circumstances. It was a smart move to let her carry on thinking that.’
‘I thought she might try and report you for assault or something if she knew the truth. We know why we do what we do, but it’s quite hard to explain to someone on the outside. I just didn’t know where to start. So I didn’t start.’
‘And why should you? It’s our private life, babe. None of her business. But oh, dear.’ He chuckled again. ‘I’m just picturing myself in tight rubber trunks and a gimp mask. Not my style at all.’
‘Hmm, the gimp mask, no, but tight rubber trunks …’
‘Don’t go there. Unless you’d like a pair. Tiny little shiny rubber hotpants. What do you say?’
‘Uncomfortable.’
‘Exactly.’
Oh, no. Now I could see his mind whirring down a new path. Canes, butt plugs and now rubber. All I’d asked for was a bit of spanking. But I seemed to have created a kinky monster.
‘Anyway,’ I said, anxious to redirect him from this particular route. ‘The point is, I saved your bacon, so you should be grateful to me. And by “grateful” I mean gearing up for cooking me dinner followed by giving me a full body massage. Don’t you think?’
He conceded this point and we had a lovely post-hangover evening of smooching and snacking on the sofa before the scented oils came out.
‘So,’ he said as I lay beneath him in bed, my legs wrapped around his waist while he thrust slowly and rhythmically inside me. ‘You made me into your submissive. I feel I need to redress the balance. How shall I do it?’
‘Mmm,’ I said, grinding my hips to increase the friction. I was in no mood for a discussion. ‘Fuck me.’
‘I already am.’ He sped up to illustrate the point. ‘But I feel the need to reassert myself within the relationship. Show you I’m not your whipping boy.’
‘You know it,’ I gasped. ‘Oh, God, right there.’
He’d put his finger on my clitoris and I jerked upwards to meet the pressure.
‘Are you going to come for me?’ he whispered.
It wasn’t too long before I did, twisting beneath him while he pounded into me, preparing to lose control.
‘Mmm, you like that, don’t you?’ he panted. ‘But wait until tomorrow. I’m going to give you something to remember.’
The thought of it obviously excited him, because he spilled straightaway, his face stretched into a mask of rapture.
‘What?’ I yawned, enjoying the limp weight of him on top of me before he began to crush the breath from my body. ‘What are you going to give me?’
‘Wait and see.’
The three worst words in the English language.
7 August
He wouldn’t give me any kind of clue over breakfast, though he did bring the cane in from the car in a manner I’d describe as ostentatious. Or even threatening.
‘Don’t keep me in suspense,’ I begged, but he shook his head and waved the damn thing at me.
‘Suspense is good for you,’ he said. ‘Concentrates the mind.’
‘What shift are you on today?’
‘I’m back at nine. Don’t worry about cooking for me. I’ll grab something at the canteen before I leave.’
‘I won’t be able to eat,’ I said, with woeful visage. ‘I’ll be too nervous.’
‘If you don’t eat, you know what happens,’ he said.
I felt a strange sense-memory twinge of the buttocks.
Yes. I knew that all right.
As it went, I didn’t feel tense at work at all. I felt excited, the way I used to before a big date before we were married. After all, this wasn’t real punishment. It was fun kinkiness with a pretendy layer of punishment on top. Perhaps that was what I wanted all along, and the ‘for your own good’ stuff had been the precursor. I wouldn’t have enjoyed it, or felt half the thrill of anticipation, though, if I didn’t have the experience and the undertone of ‘real’ punishment. ‘Let’s play whipping tonight’ just wouldn’t have worked for me – and yet that was what this was, essentially.
I had plenty of time to wonder what would happen when he got home.
I picked at a baked potato and flicked between TV channels, but nothing went in – mouth or brain, really.
I tried to get The Book back out of its box file, but it wasn’t there any more. Dan had re-hidden it, which was a bit stable door and bolting horse, but it still annoyed me. I wanted to reread some of it, for preparation.
I didn’t know what to wear and texted him after washing the few dishes.
‘Your short PJs will do,’ he texted back. ‘Wait for me in the bedroom.’
I found The Book in his bedside drawer once I’d changed into the cotton short pyjamas. He had a bookmark in it. It was the chapter on Anal Discipline.
I shut it quickly and took a few breaths.
Just because he was reading that chapter, it didn’t mean he was going to do anything about it. Did it?
Confessions of a Kinky Wife Page 8
