Down The Rabbit Hole Pt. 04

Chapter 10: Henry's Initiation

Henry still wasn't used to being called in to see Julia in what had been his old office. It wasn't quite that he resented the fact that he had been displaced but it still felt strange. Even so, he tried not to show the fact. "You wanted to see me, Ms Fain," he said as she looked up in response to his knock on her door.

Julia had spent quite a while thinking about this encounter. She had chosen her outfit deliberately to set the right tone with Henry and, while it lacked the dramatic impact of Raven Courten's more extreme couture, her charcoal grey tailored suit, starched, pin-tuck-front, yellow shirt and yellow patent leather heels seemed to have the right effect on Henry as he took in her appearance as he entered.

She hadn't been looking forward to the meeting. She was worried about what Henry's reaction might be and how she was going to deal with it if he was resistant to her proposal. It was all very well for Raven to say -- as she had -- 'just grit your teeth and go for it' but Julia was used to taking a more indirect approach to getting what she wanted and this time there didn't seem to be an indirect route available.

"I need to talk to you about sponsorship," she announced.

"Of course, Ms Fain," Henry responded. "I can get the latest figures on take up from the files if you need them."

Julia admired Henry's willingness to help in whatever way he could but she was irritated by his mistaken idea that she was about to embark on some general policy discussion. "No," she said. "That's not needed. This is about you. It's about your current unsponsored status," she could see that Henry was looking uncomfortable at the turn the discussion was taking, "Sylvia has made the point to me that it was rather difficult to persuade younger members of the department's staff to accept sponsorship when the once-head-of-the-department is himself avoiding it."

"But I haven't been avoiding it..."

"But you haven't got a sponsor, have you?"

"Well no.."

"No. Well, it can't go on. The good news for you is that I'm in the minister's black books too. It seems the Minister is quite unhappy that one of her team cannot be seen to be fully supporting Government policy. And I think it was you that told me that a Permanent Secretary should do all they can to ensure the minister has confidence in the advice that they give."

Henry was looking more uncomfortable. Julia was right about the advice he had given her.

"So, I have decided to resolve my position by taking a male into sponsorship and unless you have any alternative proposal I have decided that will be you."

"But I thought you said your accommodation wasn't suitable."

"That's been resolved."

"And there's the work I'm doing for Ms Courten."

"That's been resolved too."

"Oh."

"As you can see." Henry looked puzzled. Julia got to her feet and walked around to where Henry was standing. She pointed to her ankle where a key hung from a slim silver chain. It was clear from Henry's expression he realised what it was. "Don't you think you ought to have a close look," Julia said, playfully, realising perhaps for the first time, that she might find this exercise more fun than she had imagined. "It would be just awful if Ms Courten had given me the wrong one, wouldn't it."

Embarrassed, Henry got to his knees and bent down to get a close look. Sure enough the key had the word 'Bunny' engraved on it. He looked up at Julia. "So does this mean..."

"I don't know what it means yet," Julia said, cutting him off. "We'll have to see how it works out. You'll be moving in to my apartment in Pepper Wharf, though. And I'll need your ident card so I can register your sponsorship. That is unless you have other plans? Be warned though, those 'other plans' had better involve an alternative sponsor or Sylvia is going to be very unhappy indeed."

"No," said Henry, "I don't have other plans." He didn't want to contemplate a very unhappy Sylvia or the problems that a man of his age might face in the current job market. And besides, if he was to have a sponsor, why shouldn't it be the one he had fantasised about?

"Good," said Julia, "that's settled then. Now get up. We've got work to do. The Minister still needs to complete the paper on Ms Courten's proposals and I think you were due to finish your research this morning, weren't you?"

"Yes, err," Henry paused for a moment uncertain what to call his new sponsor. In the end he opted for the least contentious alternative. "Yes, Ms Fain. I'll get back to it now if I can."

"That's fine. Oh and by the way," Julia reached into the drawer of her desk and pulled out a small pamphlet. "You'd better read up on this. I know you always like to have the rules and procedures for anything well organised."

Henry looked at the pamphlet. "Guidelines for Sponsored Males" it said on the cover. Julia was right. He would want to make sure he knew what all this involved in detail.

"You can move in this evening. Don't bring too much stuff with you. I'm afraid I haven't got a lot of space for you. There's a single wardrobe and three drawers in a chest and that's it."

"Very good, Ms Fain. That shouldn't be a problem."

Julia was about to call an end to the meeting when Sylvia Atterbury appeared. "Ah Julia," she said briskly, "I wanted to tell you I think we should plan a press announcement about Ms Courtney's project."

"Of course, Minister." Julia was concerned. It seemed to her far too soon to be talking about the project when they really didn't have a feel yet for how successful it might be and Sylvia hadn't even seen the briefing paper. "Don't you think it might be better if we hung on until the trials are further on, though?"

"Frankly no. I'm very keen to have something to talk about in Cabinet on Friday and this is likely to have the most impact by far."

"I can see that, Minister, but I really think we would be well advised to hang on until we can be confident about what we are saying."

Sylvia was unprepared to listen to Julia's advice, "I'm sorry Julia, ........" she began but was interrupted.

Henry spoke up, cutting across Sylvia's determined words. Julia was quite taken aback. "I think Minister, that on this occasion, Ms Fain's advice is sound. It really would be quite, ah, courageous, to pursue any other course."

Sylvia's eyes narrowed in anger at the interruption and she pursed her lips. Julia anticipated a furious response but it didn't come.

Julia cut in with a proposal, "Perhaps I could provide you with a briefing paper that would allow Cabinet to see just how far along we've got and what our plans for public announcement could be, provided they fit in with other departmental projects."

She appeared to think for a moment and then said to Julia, "I suppose that would be an alternative. All right. I'll take your advice." She scowled at Henry. "Well, well. Goodness me, a man expressing an opinion. You certainly don't expect that sort of thing these days. Whatever next? Julia you are certainly going to have your work cut out sponsoring this one," and with that she swept out again. Henry, for his part, breathed a sigh of relief, he wasn't sure why he had stood up for Julia like that. It could have had dire consequences. "Still," he told himself, "Julia was right and she deserved to be listened to."

At the end of the day, Julia thought about the sponsorship discussions. She wasn't sure if she had expected Henry to object or even refuse but he had seemed not only accepting but almost enthusiastic. Perhaps it would be all right after all. Julia was pleased with how the discussion had gone and she was especially pleased by Henry leaping to her defence. She found herself admiring the may he had spoken up. While he might be submissive, he certainly wasn't spineless.

She said as much to Raven Courten when they met for a drink after work. "You're right," Raven replied. "It's a common misconception. Sometimes it takes a great deal of courage to face up to your desires. That's true for both sides of the fence. It's quite difficult for man at the moment. They are having to row back their expectations of decision making and taking control and accept that others are going to take on that role. Of course, in some cases there's asexual arousal associated with that which makes it easier but for those that didn't feel that way before it's a big step to accepting the current status quo. It's like the five stages of grief; denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. Maybe we should encourage sponsors to work out where their men are on that scale as a way to managing their progress."

"I think Sylvia hopes we'll move them beyond that. Something like 'whole hearted enthusiasm' seems to be the response she's targetting."

"That may be a little ambitious. I think the men are going to have to learn to crawl before they learn to grovel."

Julia smiled. One thing she liked about Raven was her refusal to take the project too seriously. Yes, it was important, but unless sponsors felt they were going to enjoy what they were going to be involved in the whole thing would degenerate into a box-ticking exercise and that would be worse than useless from the Government's viewpoint, even if it did keep Ms Courten's associates happy.

Chapter 11: Seventh Floor, Thames View

Henry was standing in the hallway of Julia's flat at Pepper Wharf feeling a certain level of trepidation. He'd put almost all of his belongings into storage and now the suitcase he was carrying and the small box of books that he had brought with him was all that he had for his new home.

He hadn't been sure what to expect from Julia when he arrived, although he was pretty certain that she wouldn't be clad as he had imagined in his fantasy the night before. A sleek evening gown in black latex was too much to hope for, Henry knew.

Julia opened the door. She had only got back from work some ten minutes before. She was still wearing the dark grey skirt-suit that was part of her collection of conservative business outfits for the office. "Come on in," she said.

Julia tried to put him -- and herself -- at ease. In different ways it was a big step for both of them. "Come through to the living room. Leave those there and I will show you your room later. I think we have a few things to talk about first."

The chrome and wood Scandinavian design furniture in the living room wasn't really Henry's taste but he could tell Julia had a good sense for what made a home stylish and comfortable. Julia sat on the couch, stretching her legs out and taking amusement in Henry's unguarded and definitely not Respect-Agenda-compliant look as she did so. "Do sit down, Henry," she said. "I'm not going to keep you standing up or kneeling on the floor all the time. There might be a time and place for that sort of thing but I'll tell you when, all right?" She wondered if he looked just a little disappointed. "Look, I'm not Raven Courten. This is a sponsorship arrangement not a 24x7 lifestyle femdom scenario. Now have you got the sponsorship agreement?"

"Yes," said a chastened Henry pulling a folded form from his inside jacket pocket. "I've signed it and you'll need my ident card to register it too."

"Good. I see you've read your introduction. You understand that allows me to transfer responsibility for your credit cards and bank accounts to me? You'd better let me have those cards for now until we sort out how we're going to manage your finances. I'm hoping there's no surprises there?"

Henry shook his head. He pulled out an envelop with half a dozen bank cards in it. "Here you are."

"You're very thorough."

"Well, I do like to do things the right way first off." That was something that Julia had learned from Henry when she had first started at the Department. It had meant that her learning curve was less steep than it otherwise might have been.

"Right. Well your room is through there. As I said, there's not a lot of space but you haven't brought too much stuff so it should be OK."

Henry nodded.

"The room can be locked, as Raven suggested, but I won't lock you in unless I have to. You'll be expected to deal with the domestic work around the flat. I assume you're happy with that?"

"Yes, of course, it's what I expected. I'll do what I can to pull my weight."

That, at least, was encouraging, Julia thought. She was working longer hours at the office now and Henry's job was much simpler. He'd have more time to deal with cleaning, laundry and the other tedious realities of everyday living than she would. She hoped things would work out to both their benefits.

"Well," said Julia. "You had better put your things away. I'll let you get on with it."

Julia headed back to the living room and Henry unpacked his bag into the wardrobe. He was feeling a little flat. Julia's blunt words that "this is not a 24×7 femdom scenario" was, he knew, a statement of reality but even so he had hopes of how things might work out in that direction and he was disappointed that Julia seemed to be ruling out taking a dominant role in addition to her acting as his sponsor.

He went to push his suitcase under the bed but found that there was some sort of obstruction. Getting on his knees to peer underneath the bed in order to see what it was he recognised the metal mesh of a fold-flat dog cage like the one that Raven had sometimes forced him into. He took that as a sign that his hopes for his situation at Pepper Wharf weren't entirely unfounded. If Julia had gone to the trouble of getting it, she must have some expectation of using it. And she didn't as far as he knew, have a dog.

He put his case in the bottom of the wardrobe and went back to the living room. "Thank you," he said, "It's fine. I'm sure I'll be comfortable. And the Minister will be happy too, I guess."

"Well, hopefully this will satisfy Sylvia. You have a sponsor and I'm enrolled on the sponsorship programme. Sylvia can add our names to her list and show that her staff are thoroughly committed to the government's programme so everything is all right isn't it."

"You sound a bit unhappy with things?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. Look, it's OK really. I suppose I just felt backed into this a bit by Sylvia. I'm sure we'll make it work."

"Well, I'm sorry if you found my enthusiasm off-putting."

"No, it's not your fault. I'm just finding it difficult to adapt. I'm not really used to having anyone sharing my home with me and you'd have to admit this isn't the most usual of circumstances even if it's become common lately."

"Would it help if we made things more formal, somehow. For example, what should I call you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, in the office 'Ms Fain' seems right but I wondered if you wanted anything different here."

Julia wasn't sure that Henry's thoughts were actually helping. "Oh, I suppose you were thinking 'Mistress' or something? Is that what you called Raven?" Julia saw Henry's eyes widen but she wasn't sure she wanted to give him the satisfaction of defining their relationship in that way. In fact, the way her thoughts were running at present she was feeling that something a lot more low key would be her idea of a good way to set things up. "No, I don't think that's what I want. You can call me 'Julia' here. If I need you to use something more formal I will tell you at the time. Is that all right?"

Henry nodded. "Yes, - Julia," he said hesitantly as though the words came with difficulty. Julia was quite satisfied. Raven had told her that it would be good if she could keep Henry off-balance at first. There would be time enough for him to settle in once Julia had decided how she wanted the arrangement between them to work. And besides, she wasn't sure that she was on-balance herself yet.

"There was one other thing." Henry seemed reticent about whatever it was that he was about to discuss.

"What's that?"

"Well, my room. I see there is a lock on the door."

"That's right. I know it's hard to believe, Henry, but I suspect there will be times when I would really rather not have your smiling face intruding on my life."

"Of course. That is your prerogative but if it is going to involve any extended period of confinement, I wonder if there are any arrangements that we should make regarding, err, matters of personal hygiene."

Julia smiled. Henry could always be relied on to provide an appropriate administrative euphemism. "Yes," she said, "I had thought about that. I am sure we can solve it for the most part by establishing a routine. You will be allowed use of the bathroom immediately before being confined to your room and of course for washing each morning. You've always said most things respond to a regularity in process. And for those occasions when, shall we say, the normal procedures fail to provide for the actual situation, you will find, in the cupboard beside the bed, a canister with a sealable lid. You'll need to add the emptying and cleaning of that to your schedule of other household tasks. That should allow us to avoid any risk of rabbit droppings, don't you think? Thank you for raising it though. It's very important we discuss these practical issues."

Henry felt embarrassed. He had half thought that Julia would respond by saying that she didn't intend to lock him in his room. Instead it seemed that she intended a closer supervision of his behaviour than he had expected.

Chapter 12: Plans For Training & More

"I've got a detailed set of proposals from Ms Courten," Henry announced to Julia as he brought her coffee into her office. "I thought you might like to go through them so that you can brief the Minister."

"That's very helpful, Henry," Julia responded. In spite of the fact that she'd deprived him of the amusement of being Raven's demonstrator, Henry had kept working on the project with no less diligence. He didn't seem to have been disturbed by the start of their sponsorship arrangements either, even though it had mainly consisted of him keeping the flat clean and tidy. She sat back in her chair and folded her arms. "Off you go," she said.

"Well, Ms Courten is proposing a series of nine, two-hour sessions -- that way they can be fitted around normal work schedules. She is suggesting that she authors a work book for each of them and sets a series of practical exercises. Each of the sessions would be on a specific topic focused on society's requirements from the programme. She hasn't really looked at the personal issues relating to sponsorship but my own view is that would be too broad a view for a programme like this. If the basics are covered then students will be able to apply the principals to their particular circumstances and their particular expectations. This programme is designed to produce men that can function in today;'s society not household servants or bedroom playthings. The sessions that she proposes are, 'Why New Order - The Legacy of the Patriarchy','The Regulatory Framework and Restriction of Male Freedom', 'Helping The Man Understand The Respect Agenda', 'Setting & Meeting Behaviour Targets','Meeting Targets at Home and at Work' 'Sanctions & Corrections', 'Sexual Appetite Control As An Aid To Sponsorship', 'Identifying, Discouraging and Dealing With Dissident Interests'. The later sessions would start with a review of experiences from the previous sessions. The final session would be creating a personal sponsorship plan for each of the attendees that they can use to track their own progress after the courses."

Julia nodded. She could see how the sessions together made up a comprehensive set of guidance for just the sort of things she had been bothered about. The political stuff she could do without, she felt, but she supposed it was needed to give context and to explain what was hoped to be achieved as a result of all this.