Eighty Days White

by Vina Jackson

  ‘Wow,’ he said in shock. ‘You’re stronger than you look.’

  I grinned. ‘Close your eyes,’ I instructed him. ‘Until I say so.’

  He complied and I leaped up and raced to the wardrobe. Right at the back I had hidden the bag of toys and other paraphernalia that I’d collected during my last few months in London and half-heartedly brought along here. The restraints were one of my favourite bits of kit, as I was still unsure of my rope-tying prowess and I found it hard to appear dominant when my fingers were fumbling and I had to refer to a bondage guidebook every few minutes to get the knots right.

  Neil hissed in anticipation as I wrapped a padded-leather cuff around each of his wrists and ankles and spread him out over the bed, spread-eagled, attaching the other ends firmly to the bed posts and tightening the slack so that he could squirm and wriggle a little bit, but was otherwise trapped exactly where I wanted him.

  His cock was dead straight and pointed into the air like an arrow seeking a target. I fished a condom out of my bedside drawer and then crawled towards him across the covers, cat-like, with the wrapper between my teeth, although he still had his eyes closed. My domme character was taking over. It was like slipping into another skin, putting on another mask, but not as a way of hiding. Just an easy transition into another version of me. Like taking the lid off a Russian doll and finding another replica underneath, virtually identical yet different in some infinitesimal, vitally important way.

  I bent my head and blew softly onto the head of his cock, without allowing my lips close enough to touch it.

  ‘Hmm,’ he murmured. His eyelids flickered.

  ‘Keep them closed,’ I barked.

  His skin broke out into goose bumps in response to the harsh tone of my voice.

  I tore the wrapper open on the condom and Neil shivered.

  ‘What do you want?’ I asked him. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Anything,’ he said. ‘I want anything, Lily. I want everything. I want you so bad.’

  ‘That’s good,’ I replied, ‘but can you be more specific? What do you want right now?’

  I balanced the condom on the head of his cock so he could feel it.

  ‘Shhhiiiit, fuck me. Ride me, I want you to ride me!’

  ‘Please,’ I reprimanded him.

  ‘Please. Please, Lily, ride me, ride my cock. I want you to ride my cock.’

  ‘OK then,’ I said breezily and smiled as he arched his back and lifted his hips in invitation.

  I rolled the condom down with my lips even though I hated the taste of latex. It was a trick that Liana had taught me in the kitchen of our Brighton flat using a banana as an ersatz penis and the idea had always appealed, although I checked over it with my hand to make doubly sure that it was secure.

  He slid into me easily, like a knife slides through honey.

  ‘Fuck, you’re so wet.’

  ‘Open,’ I commanded, and immediately I was looking straight into Neil’s eyes. Right into his depths. His expression was so full of longing and wonder and something else – love? – that on any other occasion I might have been unnerved by the overwhelming intensity of it all but then and there, with his cock filling me so fully, the look on his face just made me more aroused.

  I resolutely met his gaze and ground into him harder and harder and harder. He strained against the bedposts so hard that I thought he was going to tear them straight off the frame and injure us both, but the bedhead held, along with the cuffs, as I pumped back and forth and back and forth and Neil screamed in desire and frustration and I screamed along with him.

  Damn the neighbours.

  ‘Tell me what you want.’

  He didn’t reply. His eyes rolled back in his head. He was lost in a whirlpool of sensation.

  I brought my hand up and down on his face with a slap.

  ‘Oh fuck, yes!’ he cried. ‘Do that again. Do that again.’

  I slapped his other cheek and he bucked harder against the bed as I bounced up and down on his length, riding him, dominating him, pleasing myself. I ground down harder, rubbing my clit against his stomach.

  ‘I want to see you. I want to feel your tits,’ he moaned, hypnotised by the sway and fall of my breasts beneath my T-shirt as I moved. He pulled uselessly against the cuffs again and then relented and put all of his struggle into moving his hips up to meet mine.

  ‘You’re not getting free until I let you,’ I advised him.

  ‘I don’t ever want you to let me free,’ he said. ‘I want to be yours. Your pet. Your toy. Your anything.’

  His eyes were great depths of green and brown swirls with an endless well of emotion and affection in them. That was when I knew for sure that no matter what I did to him, Neil would love me unconditionally. For ever.

  I stopped suddenly and kissed him.

  ‘I want to be yours too, my darling,’ I whispered.

  He shuddered and came inside me.

  ‘Fuck. Sorry,’ he said. ‘I was trying to hold on, but you just … pushed me over the edge.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ I laughed, leaning over to undo his cuffs. ‘We’ve got all night. And all day.’

  We barely left my flat for a week other than to pick up food and drink. I spent most of the time reclining in bed as Neil brought me plates of cut-up fresh mango and papaya and fed me slices with his fingers.

  ‘You’re only here for such a short time,’ I said to him, ‘I should at least show you around Darwin, even if you won’t see the rest of the city.’

  ‘Fuck Darwin,’ Neil replied. ‘Fuck everything. All I want to do is fuck you, Lily.’

  I’d never heard him swear so much in all the time I’d known him, but he was true to his word. We made love in every possible variation under the sun and more besides. I tried all of the kit that I had on him. The rope, the flogger, the paddle, my fur mitt, even an electro stim kit that Lauralynn had given me, which scared me even to look at. Neil was open to just about everything, but what gave us both the most pleasure was skin-to-skin contact. He loved it when I spanked his arse or wrestled him under me and then climbed on top of his cock as though he didn’t have a choice. He liked to be taken.

  ‘Just imagine that you’re a highwayman,’ he said, as he tried to explain what it was about being overpowered that turned him on so much.

  ‘And you’re a fine young lady with her bodice ripped?’ I asked. I couldn’t keep a straight face after that and ended up falling on top of him in fits of giggles.

  ‘Why do we do this?’ I asked him one night after I’d whipped his back until my arm was sore and then we’d made love like animals on the hardwood kitchen floor.

  He held me tight in his arms like he always did and stroked my hair.

  ‘Because there’s more to sex than fucking,’ he said sagely. ‘As much as I do love fucking you. There’s more to it than that.’

  Neil then convinced me to come back to London with him. He was still employed by the PR agency and had just taken a short leave of absence to come to Australia.

  ‘I would have quit in a heartbeat if you wouldn’t come back though, Lily. Nothing matters if I don’t have you.’

  I felt exactly the same way about him, and was only surprised that I hadn’t known it before. Australia had been nice for a change, but I was made for the cold, not the hot weather. I was too melancholy to live by the beach, even if it was so full of dangerous creatures that it was impossible to swim in.

  We managed to arrange a one-way ticket for me to match up with Neil’s return flight, with a stopover in San Francisco. I had never been there before and it was a city that had always held a spell on my imagination. The inhabitants were made out to be so wild and carefree, and any place like that I was sure to feel at home, I felt, and if not at home then at least we could be assured of a good time. We planned a stopover for forty-eight hours so we could explore the city.

  I’d emailed Lauralynn that I was on my way back to England and shared my excitement about the few days we had managed to fit between the l
ong flights involved. She was American and had once lived in San Francisco, so I asked her to recommend some places to visit, besides the normal tourist traps of Golden Gate Bridge and Haight Ashbury.

  The hotel the travel agent had found us was downtown, in the shadow of the Coit Tower, one of the more boring, business-orientated parts of town. One of our first destinations was the Bay, where parades of stores guaranteed we would find a pearl inside the oysters they allowed us to pick and chose. As the oyster I’d ceremoniously picked was opened in front of me, I was as excited as a little girl on Christmas morning, holding Neil’s hand in a tight, nervous grip, and yes indeed there was a pearl, albeit a miserable and minuscule black one with no shine or spark whatsoever. The pearls in Darwin had been so much prettier. Next came Chinatown, and it was yet another disappointment, nowhere near as large or colourful as London’s and even the meal we had in a busy emporium of a restaurant, lacked the flavours and diversity of Gerrard Street.

  By the time evening came, I felt jaded and unenthusiastic at the prospect of roaming further afield.

  ‘Come on,’ Neil insisted. ‘We have to make the best of it.’

  I growled, my mood growing more brattish by the minute.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Let’s check out some of the places you told me Lauralynn had recommended,’ he suggested.

  I’d printed out her response shortly before we’d left Darwin. It wasn’t a long list. Two items and addresses caught our attention, both, it appeared, within a reasonable walking distance of where we were staying, as we had no energy to travel to the other side of town. One appeared, judging by the map I’d called up on my mobile phone, to be close to the famed City Lights bookstore we had visited that very morning, a stepping stone on San Francisco’s traditional places to go and see. I’d even found an interesting second-hand book there which I was hoping to begin reading on the flight to London.

  All Lauralynn had provided us was a name, the House of Bamboo Dolls, and an address. The other place recommended was an Italian restaurant called Bucca di Beppo, where she insisted we should dine in either the Pope or the Madonna room. Neither Neil or I felt hungry, so our choice was made.

  ‘So what is it?’ Neil asked.

  ‘I haven’t a clue, but knowing Lauralynn it can’t help being interesting.’

  He gave me a dubious look. For reasons unknown, Lauralynn was not his favourite person.

  The House of Bamboo Dolls was an anonymous redbrick building just a block away from Chinatown, on a steep hill not served by any cable cars.

  There was just a number on the stark wooden door: 19. No name or sign to indicate what lay inside.

  I rang the bell.

  There was a shadow of movement as the light shifted on the other side of the peephole.

  ‘Yes?’ a hushed voice behind the door queried our presence.

  ‘Is this the House of Bamboo Dolls?’ I asked, self-consciously turning to look at the street behind me in case anyone was listening. It all felt ridiculously melodramatic.

  I couldn’t determine whether the confidential tones of the voice belonged to a man or a woman. ‘Invitation only,’ it replied.

  Neil gave me a nudge, suggesting we move on and give up.

  ‘Lauralynn Wilmington recommended we come,’ I said. ‘We are friends of hers.’

  There was a moment’s silence, and then the door finally opened and we were allowed in. It was a woman, tall and long, wearing a man’s black tuxedo, dress shirt and a raffish Homburg hat, standing in a long, badly lit corridor.

  ‘It’s OK,’ she said, and with a wave of her impossibly long arm she gestured for us to walk down the corridor to a set of stairs where the lighting was more helpful.

  There was another door at the top of the stairs. I could hear music on the other side. I pushed it open, and we walked in.

  It was a medium-sized room and it looked just like a private club, with a long bar at one end, and an assortment of bottles and all types of glasses aligned on shelves on the wall behind.

  The barmaid wore a French beret, an impeccably white T-shirt, and she even looked a little like me, pale-skinned, short, looking younger than she probably was. Because of the bar counter and my distance from it, I couldn’t see whether she was wearing a skirt, trousers or anything for that matter. She did not have a teardrop tattoo, but her resemblance to me was uncanny. So much so that as she turned her head towards another customer, I didn’t immediately notice the colourful spiral that ran from her right ear all the way down to her shoulders before snaking into the white material of her T-shirt. I could only imagine how far this reptilian tattoo went, and I guessed from her manner that she was the type of person who would have one all the way down her flank to her feet. I was almost jealous. Talk about a manifesto of rebelliousness.

  Tearing my eyes away, and oblivious to Neil tugging my hand, I surveyed the rest of the room. An assortment of low-slung tables and, along the walls, a set of red alcoves, occupied by silent drinkers, most of whom were now examining us.

  It was only then I realised they were all women.

  A voice greeted us.

  ‘Welcome to the House of Bamboo Dolls.’ It was an older woman in her forties, I guessed. She was dressed in a tight-fitting kimono, black with thin filigreed streaks of gold, through a slit of which a dark-stockinged, taut and shapely leg emerged. She wore Christian Louboutin high heels. I’d know those red soles from anywhere, not that I could ever afford any. ‘Your first time, I gather?’

  I nodded.

  She gave Neil a dismissive glance.

  ‘The young man is yours?’ she asked me, indicating him, as he stood nervously, visibly feeling out of place.

  I acquiesced, although I was curious as to why she had used the possessive as opposed to ascertaining that he was with me, which was obvious anyway.

  ‘It’s allowed,’ she said.

  ‘Allowed?’

  ‘There are rules,’ she added, a faint smile spreading fast across her lips. She looked Neil up and down as if he was cattle. He fidgeted uncomfortably in place.

  I must have appeared quizzical, so she continued. ‘Is your sub for general or personal use?’

  It then dawned on me that Lauralynn was playing a mischievous joke on me, having heard that I would be travelling with Neil. I had confided in her about the ambiguous situation the two of us were navigating. This was all a game for her.

  Neil shot me a despairing look, as he also began to size up the situation. His eyes pleaded with me.

  ‘Personal,’ I quickly said. ‘Is that OK?’

  If she was disappointed, the woman in the kimono didn’t show it. ‘Of course.’ She paused. ‘In that case, may I have your assurance the young man is properly marked?’

  My eyes opened wide.

  ‘The Network insists that personal property should be marked,’ she reiterated.

  ‘Marked?’

  ‘I take it he isn’t, then?’

  ‘Hmm … no.’

  ‘Otherwise, he may be used freely for our entertainment and pleasure. Did Lauralynn not advise you?’

  ‘No, she didn’t.’

  ‘Very naughty of her, but then she was always was. It has always been an obligation for anyone who attends the House of Bamboo Dolls to bear a tattoo, as a sign of recognition.’

  Neil and I looked around the room. Indeed, all the women here displayed one as our gaze travelled freely. Facial ones, shoulders, arms, elbows, some fully visible, others just peering out from material and clothing.

  Neil swallowed hard. Whispered in my ear that there was no way he could be tattooed across his face.

  The woman overheard him.

  ‘A sub’s mark must be on the body, so only his or her owner is aware of his condition,’ she indicated.

  Neil looked at me, and then back at her.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ he said firmly.

  ‘What?’ I replied. ‘No, we’ll leave. This isn’t the right way to get something so permanent.’ />
  He glanced pointedly at my teardrop tattoo and raised his eyebrow. Neil was right. On this count, I could hardly protest or offer advice.

  ‘I’m yours, Lily. I want to always be yours. I want to be marked.’

  ‘We have an excellent inker on the premises,’ the woman said. ‘Follow me.’ She didn’t seem in the least surprised by Neil’s response.

  We were led to a backroom.

  ‘This is Nibbles,’ the woman said, introducing us to a short, gamine, razor-cut-fringed young woman with a nose ring sitting there at the computer. She had pale-blue eyes and tattoos of flowers running all the way down the side of both her legs. She looked up at us, mildly curious.

  ‘The boy,’ the woman in the kimono declared.

  Nibbles’ expression didn’t change, remote, businesslike. She rose from her chair and walked out of the room to fetch her equipment and was back within a minute, during which time neither of us had said an additional word.

  ‘How rude I’ve been,’ the older woman said to me, breaking the ice. ‘I didn’t introduce myself. I’m Madame Violet.’ She didn’t even look at Neil, as if he was barely worth addressing.

  ‘I’m Lily.’ I didn’t introduce Neil, as I knew she did not expect me to. Some of the rules of the House of Bamboo Dolls were becoming clear to me.

  Nibbles returned from the side room, carrying a medium-sized metal-framed flat Samsonite case. Her equipment.

  She followed the direction of Madame Violet’s gaze and turned to Neil, sizing him up. There was a deep streak of cruelty shining through her translucent eyes.

  ‘So?’ she asked, speaking directly to me.

  Madame Violet helped me out. ‘Where do you want him marked, and how?’ It was to be my decision.

  I deliberated hard and fast, ignoring Neil’s panicked expression.

  ‘His butt,’ I said.

  Madame Violet, Nibbles and Neil were all hanging on my next words.

  ‘My initial. L for Lily.’

  I noted a faint tremor of disappointment running across Nibbles’ scarlet-drawn lips, as if she had been hoping for both something more profoundly humiliating and a more degrading location. But it passed quickly and she puffed her cheeks up and opened the large flat leather case and laid out her instruments on a low-slung table. Some I recognised; others appeared as if they had sprung from a medical horror movie or the brain of David Cronenberg. Neil swallowed hard and held his breath.