by Fanny Merkin
He cocks an eye. “What did you call it?”
Gulp. “Room of Doom. Why? What do you think I said?”
He shakes his head. “Nevermind,” he says, removing his smiley-face tie. He pulls me by my wrist into the cabin’s bedroom.
“Take off your clothes,” he orders me.
“Yes, Mr. Grey,” I say. I’m not sure what he has in mind, but I start stripping. I hope he’s not mad about the crack about his Room of Doom. When I’m down to my panties and bra, I realize he hasn’t removed anything except for his tie.
“Not joining me?” I say.
He shakes his head. “I’m not joining you. I’m disciplining you. Now finish undressing and lie down on the bed.”
I do as instructed. I’m lying on my back, naked, my legs bent at the knees and ready to receive Earl. Suddenly, his hands are pinning my wrists against the headboard. He’s fussing with his tie . . . Wait! He’s tied me up! I am spread eagle, naked before him, my arms raised above my head and tied to one of the bedposts.
He steps back and surveys his work. “Nice,” he says. “I like seeing you tied up. So helpless, so defenseless . . .”
His sadistic impulses are in full force this evening. It’s kind of hot to temporarily give up control to him. He’s driving me crazy with anticipation. “Please, Mr. Grey,” I pout. “Please use me.”
“No whining,” he says. “If you do, I will put a ball gag in your mouth.”
“Yes, put your balls in my mouth,” I say. “I want to eat your balls.”
He pauses. “I meant a ball gag, which is a rubber ball,” he says.
“Oh,” I say disappointedly.
“Hold tight,” he says, licking his lips. “I’m going to get something to drink.”
I watch him leave the room, his muscular butt visible through his pants. I can hear him opening the refrigerator in the kitchen. He returns, a filled wineglass in his hand.
“I hope you’re thirsty,” he says, nearing the bed.
He puts it to my mouth, and I sip the carbonated purple drink. It’s chilled, and tastes like a cross between grape Kool-Aid and Miller High Life.
He pulls it back. “You can’t even buy this anymore, you know,” he says.
“It’s delicious,” I say. “What is it?”
“Four Loko,” Earl says. “It has twelve percent alcohol and enough caffeine to wake Paula Deen from a diabetic coma. It’s so powerful that the federal government made them reformulate it to remove the caffeine and herbs. Thankfully, I have cases of the original formulation stashed here in my wine cellar.”
“So it’s illegal,” I say.
“According to the government,” he says. “But this will be our little secret, okay?”
“Okay. Now are we going to have sex?” My lady boner is throbbing in anticipation of his Bilbo Baggins.
“Not yet,” he says. “First, I’m going to have a little fun . . .”
Earl drips Four Loko onto my sternum and it pools between my breasts. “Hold still,” he says.
“It’s cold!” I shriek.
Earl, still fully clothed, bends his head to my chest and begins lapping up the Four Loko with his tongue like a cat drinking from a water bowl.
“How nice does this feel, Anna?” he says, raising his head and looking me in the eyes. My chest is now just sticky instead of wet. I feel some of the cool liquid dripping into my armpits.
“It’s . . . kinky,” I say. Is it supposed to feel good? When he was licking it up, it tickled. Now I just feel gross.
“You want more,” he says, pouring the liquid on my stomach. It trails off into my pubic hair. I can’t wait to get into the shower after this is over.
He laps it up again, and this time the tickling sensation is too much. I squirm involuntarily, accidentally bringing my knee up and into his chin. He drops the glass of Four Loko, spilling it onto the bed. It runs underneath my ass. “Dammit!” I scream.
Earl rolls off me and falls off the bed onto the floor. It’s a few moments before he says anything or moves. Then I see a hand on the bed, and he picks himself up. “Dammit? Why did you say 'dammit’? I was the one who was kicked in the face.”
“The Four Loko is cold. It ran under my butt,” I say. “Sorry.”
He shakes his head. “I didn’t realize you could kick so hard. You surprise me so much,” he says, rubbing his chin. “It’s like I learn something new about you every day.”
“Maybe it’s because we’ve only known each other for a week,” I say.
“There is that.” After a pause, he adds, “But let’s get back to our little game, shall we?”
“Please,” I say. My arms are getting tired and now my butt cheeks are sticking together; I don’t know how much longer I can take this. If we ever do get around to the actual sex, perhaps I’ll quickly fake an orgasm so I can get to the shower sooner.
He kneels between my legs, and spreads them even farther apart. He’s in his suit still, and I can see the Four Loko getting his pants damp. I hope he has a dry cleaner on this island. I’m sure he does—he has everything.
“Now it’s time for me to drink you, Anna,” he says, lying down on the bed and positioning his head between my legs.
“Shoot!” I yell. There’s something I forgot, something that’s suddenly a very pressing matter.
He looks up at me. “What is it?”
“Well . . .”
“Tell me, Anna. You can tell me anything.”
How do I say this delicately? There’s no easy way, so I just launch into it. “I was spotting blood this afternoon after all the sexy time over the past few days,” I say. “I’m supposed to get my period this week, so I thought I might be getting it early. I wasn’t sure. I put a tampon in to be safe.” I leave off the part about knowing I’m not on my period because I’m pregnant with his child.
“It’s okay, Anna,” he says. “I’m no stranger to blood.” The way his gray eyes suddenly light up when he says “blood” worries me a little. Like he’s thirsty for it . . .
He reaches a hand between my legs and, using his long fingers, grasps the tiny string at my heavenly gates. “Hold still,” he says, tugging gently on it. The tampon slides out easily; much to my relief, there’s very little blood on it. I should have used a panty liner, but I didn’t have any with me. Oh well. No harm done.
Earl tosses the tampon into a short trash can beside the bed. “Now back to business,” he says, diving back toward me.
He furrows his brow. He has great, attractive eyebrows that lend themselves to brow furrowing. They’re like two animated caterpillars doing the Hokey-Pokey above his gray eyes. “Hold still,” he says. “There’s something else . . .” He reaches his long fingers back into my womanly chasm and—
“Aha!” he says, relaxing his puzzled look. He tugs gently on something inside me, and slowly draws a yellow handkerchief through my mud flaps and into the air. What a trick! He winks at me; I smile back. He’s not done, though—he keeps pulling, and a blue one, attached to the first, follows! And then an orange one! He continues pulling, and ends up with a string of twelve handkerchiefs, all tied together. It’s the sweetest magic trick anyone has ever done using my Katy Perry. I would clap, but my hands are still tied up above my head.
Earl raises his index finger and smiles wickedly. One more thing! What will he “find” inside me next? I look at him quizzically. No way in hell is he pulling a rabbit out of me . . . He inserts two of his long fingers back inside me and begins feeling along the upper wall of my mantrap. He presses his fingers into an area rich with nerve endings. It feels . . . delicious. “Look what I found,” he says, registering the look of pure bliss on my face. “Your G-spot.”
For the next fifteen minutes, Earl works on me with his long fingers. The tie keeps my hands held in place firmly above my head, so I can’t interfere or guide him. It’s maddening yet oh so erotic. I get wetter and wetter the closer I get to climaxing, until I’m certain I will die of dehydration. But I don’t die. Instea
d, my body shudders in one final bout of ecstasy. My climax seems to last for several minutes, to the point I simply can’t take it anymore. I collapse, his tie digging deeper into my wrists. I’m exhausted yet fulfilled. Also, my hands may need to be amputated.
“That was . . .” I trail off, unable to complete my sentence. I gaze at him dreamily.
Earl slowly pulls his fingers out of me, and as he does he pulls something else out: a white dove!
“Presto!” he says, cradling the dove in his hand. The bird coos, and then spreads and flaps its wings to shake off my love juice. Earl lets the dove go, smiling as it soars to the heavens and—
—into the ceiling fan. We are both sprayed with feathers. The bird’s lifeless and mangled body is thrown against the wall.
“That certainly didn’t go as planned,” Earl says, stepping off the bed and untying me.
No shit, Sherlock. It occurs to me what an apt metaphor the bird’s death is, though: a poor, innocent, virginal white dove clubbed to death by the sadistic ceiling fan. Can Earl and I ever have a normal life together? Or will his dark desires drive him over the edge? It’s a question best left for another time. For now, covered in feathers and Four Loko, I sleep.
Chapter Twenty-two
I WAKE UP AGAIN TO AN EMPTY BED. Sunlight streams into the cabin. Where is Earl? I hear the toilet flush and he saunters out of the bathroom. He is completely naked, and his skin seems to sparkle in the sunlight. Just like a—
“Good morning, Anna,” he says.
“I thought you’d left me,” I say. “No work today?”
He shakes his head. “I called in sick,” he says.
Oh no. “Do you feel ill? What’s wrong?”
He laughs. “Oh, Anna,” he says. “I’m love sick.”
Did he just use the L-word? “Are you in love with me, Mr. Grey?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” he says. It’s hard to concentrate on his words when his James Franco is flopping about between his legs.
My inner guidette hesitates. If he’s in love with me, then that begs the question: Am I in love with him? He’s so attractive, and so rich—but on the flip side, he’s a moody bastard whose fifty shames constantly threaten to overwhelm him and anyone he comes into contact with. It’s a lot to process this early in the morning.
“What time is it?” I ask, changing the topic.
He smiles. “It’s the dicking hour, baby.”
After we have sex three times in a variety of interesting positions, Earl says he has a surprise for me.
“Can I take a shower first?” I ask. I still have feathers stuck to my body.
“Of course,” he says. “Mind if I join you?”
We bang twice in the shower, once using a loofah and once completely upside down. After I have my fifth orgasm of the morning, we step out of the shower and towel off. Most of our sex so far has been fairly normal. It pleases me, because I don’t have any interest in being caned or Tasered or whatever. But could it ever be enough for the sadistic Earl Grey?
I ask him what the surprise is.
“You’ll see,” he says, bending me over the sink and doing me again.
After we dress in matching Hawaiian shirts (“aloha shirts” in Hawaii, according to Earl, who is practically a walking and talking Wikipedia), we mount an ATV and cruise through the jungle. Earl instructed me to wear a skirt and leave my panties at the cabin. Sitting behind him, my legs spread around him, with my pubic hair whipping in the wind: This is so perfect.
We stop at a large set of wooden doors that have to be at least a hundred feet tall. They’re the only entrance through an enormous wall that seems to run for thousands of feet in either direction.
“What is this?”
Earl presses a button on his keychain and the doors swing open. “Welcome to Triassic Safari,” he says.
“Is this like Jurassic Park?” I ask. I may have been only a baby when the movie came out, but it’s one even I’ve heard of.
“Mine came first,” he says.
“You weren’t even ten when the movie came out,” I say.
“I had the idea when I was five months old. I didn’t have the money and expertise to execute it until a few years ago. Michael Crichton scooped me, but there’s one major difference here: my dinosaurs are real,” he says.
“And the ones in the movie weren’t?”
He shakes his head. “Oh, Anna,” he says. “Your sense of humor is what makes you truly beautiful.”
I don’t think I have a sense of humor, but whatever. He drives us through the gate, which swings closed when we’re safely on the other side.
“So are any of your dinosaurs dangerous?” I ask.
“No more dangerous than me,” he says.
Uh-oh.
Earl slows the ATV to a halt beside two dinosaurs eating berries and leaves off bushes. The dinosaurs are the size of school buses. They look like gigantic rhinos, except with more horns. One of them is outfitted with a saddle.
“You ready for the ride of your life?” Earl asks me.
“I thought that’s what we did earlier.” I smirk.
“Touché, Anna. Touché.”
We hop off the ATV and approach the dinosaur with the saddle. “These are Kosmoceratops richardson,” he says. “The world’s horniest animals.”
“Excuse me?”
“Count the horns, Anna,” Earl says. “Fifteen full-sized horns on her head, plus sixteen smaller horns along the ridge of her skull. The horns most likely evolved as a mating display, but much like their cousin, the Triceratops, both males and females have similar horns.”
Earl puts a hand on the side of the Kosmoceratops and pets its scaly blue skin. The animal purrs at his touch.
“She’s so cute,” I say.
“That’s because I splice their DNA with genetic material from kittens,” Earl says. He pulls himself up onto the Kosmoceratops’s saddle and extends a hand down to me. I take his hand and climb onto the saddle with him, sitting in front this time. Before I know it, I’m riding around Earl Grey’s private island on a freaking dinosaur!
“Have you ever had sex on dinosaur-back?” Earl asks, his arms wrapped around me.
Oh my. I shake my head.
His hands crawl up my shirt and he feels my party favors up. My nipples are rock hard again. It’s suddenly obvious why he wanted me to wear the skirt and go commando . . .
“Lean forward,” he says. I do as I’m told, holding on to the reins of the Kosmoceratops. The animal trots gently through the jungle at a leisurely pace, blissfully unaware that two people are getting busy on her back.
Earl hikes my skirt up, exposing my bare bottom to the cool island breeze. If I had any panties on, I would have soaked through them by now. Instead, the saddle has turned into a Slip ’n Slide. I hear the unbuckling of Earl’s belt and the unzipping of his pants. I feel the heat radiating off his throbbing wand.
After Earl sheathes himself, he guides me onto his lap. I ride him for the next half hour as the Kosmoceratops carries us across the island under the gorgeous midday sun. He wasn’t lying when he said it would be the ride of my life.
On the helicopter flight back to Seattle later in the evening, Earl finally brings up the one topic we avoided while on the island. “You read through the quiz again on the boat, but still haven’t filled it out.”
Uh-oh. “I know, Mr. Grey.”
He pauses. “I don’t think it’s necessary any longer,” he says finally.
“Really?”
“You’re not like my other LARPers, Anna,” he says. “What we have together is different. It’s more like . . .”
“Love?” I say.
“Exactly,” he says, beaming at me.
Instead of being reassured about our relationship status, however, I’m worried. Can someone change so completely over the course of a few days? Is that how love works? Maybe if we were in a romantic comedy. To me, it feels more like we’re in a tragedy.
“What if you’re not the freak,
Mr. Grey? What if I’m the freak?”
“Did you like being tied up last night?” he asks.
I shrug. “It was fun, except for the dead bird.”
“It’s just a taste of what you can expect in the world of erotic live-action role playing,” he says. “Except for the dead bird, of course.”
“That makes me feel a little better,” I say.
“I’d still like to do a BDSM scene with you,” he says.
“Fine,” I say. Can a role-playing scene get any stranger than any of the other things we’ve done this week?
Earl shakes his head. “I’m afraid you won’t accept me once you see how deviant my tastes are . . .”
“I would prefer to see the real Earl Grey, not the Earl Grey you think I want to see,” I say. “You’re right—we don’t need the quiz. I’m not just some random woman you’ve met through Craigslist. But I don’t want you to think you have to change for me.”
Earl stares at me with his gray eyes for what seems like an eternity. “I love you, Anna,” he says. “Unconditionally.”
He’s just too good looking to say no to. I can’t quit him, even if I tried. Mostly because he would stalk me to the ends of the earth, but still.
“And I . . .” I know the words, but I’ve never said them out loud to anyone before. Not even to my family. Earl’s eyes are transfixed on me. Instead of giving me the confidence I need, they’re making me nervous. It’s okay, Anna. You can do this. “Mr. Grey . . . Earl . . . I love y—”
Before I can finish my sentence, our helicopter crashes into the Space Needle. Everything goes black.
Chapter Twenty-three
I OPEN MY EYES, and find myself eye level with my mother’s bare mammaries. It’s like being born and going straight for the teat, only I’m twenty-one and WHAT THE HELL?
“Mom?” I whisper.
She and her husband are standing by my bedside. They are both stark naked. Of course it’s because they’re nudists, but it still shocks me every time I see them. It makes getting through airport security a breeze, they always joke.
Then what has happened rushes back to me. The helicopter crash. No!
