The Pleasant Day

"Three," she says.

"Nope." He attaches a clip to the side of her left breast. He smiles again as she shifts and frowns. "Very attractive," he says, "Both the pin and the frown."

After six more wrong answers, she says with a pout, "You're cheating."

For that, he touches her chin, then her nose, the he closes her lips and clips them shut.

After regarding her a moment, he takes that one off. "A mistake, I like your voice," he says.

"Please stand," he asks.

She does. She bends and brushes from her knees the pebbles that have embedded themselves in her flesh. As she straightens, she says, "I don't like this next part."

"What part is that?"

She frowns again. "Tod has this nasty plastic thing he uses to knock these off." She touches one of the clips. "The thing looks like a fly swatter. It hurts."

"All the more reason to leave the bastard," he says, flicking the clip that grips a nipple.

He slides a finger along her left cunt lip and then all business he attaches a clamp to it from which hangs by a silver chain a little gold bell. She makes a soft gasping "huh" sound. He adorns the other lip the same way.

He slaps her bruised rump and she jumps and the bells chime.

"In case you're curious," she says, "I am feeling very very hot."

"We can do something about that, would you close the fireplace doors?"

"That's not what I meant."

"Precision in speech is important, would you close them."

She moves hesitantly toward the heat, away from his voice. The bells ring.

"More to your left unless you want to get really hot."

He watches her touch the bricks on the side then feel down, bending, presenting her discolored ass to him. She gingerly closes the glass doors.

"Now stand and turn 180 degrees," he instructs. "A little more or you'll come to harm on the coffee table. Now walk."

The bells jingle as she moves cautiously through space.

"A little to the right," he says and she clears the doorway to the living room. "You're about at the stairs."

As she climbs them, she looks intensely excited and not a little worried.

It is only when she feels his bed on her knee that the worry clears, "I was afraid we were going into the other room," she says.

"Maybe later," he smiles, "And remember, it's not far if I should need anything."

He reaches between her legs and undoes the clamps. He holds both clamps in his left hand and swings them idly. The bells ring. He admires her.

"Now lie on your back"

He takes her left ankle and lifts her leg. He takes the rope that hangs from the bedpost and attaches the cuff to the ankle. Soon her legs and arms are lifted and spread. She is entirely open. She sighs.

She realizes she is alone when she hears his footsteps going down the stairs. Shortly he returns. She hears something that rattles.

From the ice bucket he takes a cube and holds presses it against her sex.

"Shit," she says, "That's cold."

"I'm just trying to do something about your complaint," he says reasonably, moving the ice about between her legs.

"You're an asshole," she says.

"You should give me more precise guidance."

"Creep."

He puts the cube on the bone between her breasts. He takes two needle pinwheels and pushes the ice up the firm rise of her right breast. When ice sits on her nipple he waits a moment. It balances and then a movement and sigh from her causes it to sled down and toboggan a little way across the flat of her stomach.

"In case you're wondering," she says, "Your methods aren't working, I'm getting hotter and hotter."

He puts the ice cube on her other nipple. The circle of clips corrals it. He lights a candle, holds it a minute and then tips it just under her neck, on her collar bone.

"Shit," she complains.

"If cold doesn't work, fight fire with fire."

He lays a trail of red lava down her chest, pausing briefly to fill her navel and then down between her legs, letting it pool in her wide up open cunt.

"Shit shit shit," she complains. She pulls on her bonds and lifts herself off the bed and shakes.

"Since I can't do anything about your condition," he says in a calmly reasonable tone, "I'll have to attend to my own problem."

He strips. He undoes the cuffs on her left leg and arm and shortens the ropes that hold her right side, lifting her. He stretches on the bed and spoons in behind her.

She sighs. With her free hand she reaches back between her legs and touches him. He becomes fully hard. "Please," she says.

"Just a moment," he says. He takes a condom from the bedside table and pulls it on. He pushes up from behind. Her hand takes him and guides him home.

He begins sliding in and out. With one hand, the one he's slipped under her, he plays idly with the plastic attached to the convenient breast. With the other hand takes a small whip and idly strikes her chest, mostly to watch the wax as it's swept away.

When he swings it between her legs, he himself says, "Damn" as he's hit his own cock.

"Serves you right," she grumbles, then she begins to buck. She cries out and then as she relaxes, she murmurs, "Shit I feel good."

Soon his labors gain force. He grips her hips hard and pushes hard up against her.

"Jesus that's good," she cries, her face tightly clenched in pleasure.

He relaxes after a moment.

"You've cooled me off, thanks," she says.

"No need for thanks," he says, "It was a quite inadvertent and inconsequential side effect."

"Asshole."

He gets up after a moment. He deals with the condom. Then he undoes the remaining two cuffs, pulls the covers up over her, turns out the light and slides into bed beside her.

In the dark she says, "That feels nice what you're doing."

In the gloom, the covers above her waist can be seen to be moving slightly.

"How did you get started with the, well you know, this stuff." She takes his hand and puts it on the breast that still has the clips clinging to it.

"After Jeanne moved in with me, she poked around one evening when I was working late. She found in the back of the closet some books I'd hidden. There was 'The Marketplace', 'Shadow and Light', and of course 'The Story of O'. Do you know them?"

"No," she says.

"Perhaps you should, anyway, a week or so later she gave me a package. It contained 5 dvds. The Brazilian version of the 'Story of O', dubbed in English. The note with the package just said 'Lets'."

She turns around and squirms and goes down on him. After licking and sucking and fingering him, she calls up from the depths, "We're going to need another one."

She takes the offered condom. Caressing it once its on, she says, "Time to start tunneling, brother mole, the world above ground is not for the likes of you."

She sits on him and begins rising and falling and wiggling her ass. She bounces faster and faster. Her face hardens and tightens and she squeezes her eyes closed. "Sweet Jesus," she cries.

He rolls her on her back and begins to do his share.

After an indeterminate length of time he works faster, tenses and then sighs.

"Faker," she says.

"I'm really tired."

"That's OK, would it be too horrible if I confess that I was dozing?" She pulls the condom off him and gets up and carries it into the bathroom. When she returns moments later, he's asleep.

------------------------------------

She wakes before he does. She slips carefully out of bed. Standing, she notices she still has the plastic clips clinging to one breast. She leaves them be.

After showering, she pulls on the green robe and leaves it open in front. She goes downstairs and as the coffee brews, she goes on down into the living room and picks up.

As she lifts the tray with the jar of pebbles, the clamps, the bag of clips and assorted candles and whips, she sees him standing in the entry way.

"Maid service," she says. "These belong upstairs in the study?"

He crosses to her. He gently removes the clips from where the bite her, drops them in the bag with their fellows, then runs his finger along the indents they've left behind in her flesh. He turns her and lifts the robe. "Jesus, I'm sorry." he says.

Her rump is quite black and blue.

She sets the tray back down on the coffee table and turns. She leans forward and grips the bricks of the fireplace.

"Before coffee?" he asks.

"I think you're low on cream," she answers, "And the fire needs lighting."

Sometime later, after kissing her cheek, he steps back from her. "It's been a long time," he says.

"Since last night counts as a long time without a fuck for you?"

"Since I made love in the morning."

Then he asks, "Would you like a fire?" and when she says yes he does indeed start it, though outside it is bright and sunny.

After they have made and eaten pancakes and are on the second pot of coffee, she stands in the bay window looking out at the brightly lit world. He sits at his desk.

She sees that he's going over the proposal.

"Leave it," she says.

"I have other work to do too," he says, then "Kneel here." He points to where the sunlight washes the carpet beside his chair.

She does after taking the pad of paper and a pen from the desk.

To amuse herself, she sketches how the city and river looked from the boat. She sketches him looking at a painting in the museum. She keeps glancing up at him for details. For the painting she relies on memory and invention. She thinks she's improved on the Monet. She sketches herself, alone in the back seat of the black car, seen at a stoplight. She looks at the desk and then at him. She imagines how she must've looked, the night before, bent over it, just another item on the surface, coequal to the laptop and the pens and the pad of paper and the i-phone. She imagines him behind her and the sadness in his face.

"You're quite good," he says. He is standing behind her.

"It's amusement."

"Have you thought of doing something with it?"

She shrugs, "I have no burning desire to. I'm going back to architecture school in a year," she says. "I'm hoping to get into Northeastern."

"You have a burning desire to be an architect?"

"No," she admits, "But it's the path I'm on."

"Jeanne and Andy, he's the fellow you sort of met will be by shortly. We're going to lunch."

"Their kids?"

"I gather my ex-mother-in-law is taking them to the Children's Museum."

"I'm invited?"

"To the Children's Museum? I'll call and ask."

"You are a jerk."

"Of course you're invited."

"How much will, what's your friend's name again? have told her?"

"I won't venture to guess how much Andy told Jeanne about your arrival. You'd better go up and get dressed, they'll not let you in the restaurant looking like that."

Jeanne proves to be an attractive woman, slightly shorter than Ella. There are crows feet around her eyes and streaks of gray in her black hair. She has the comfortable athletic form that regular well considered exercise will bring.

She greets Ella with a friendly, "Hey, I heard Charles was bringing a friend. It's been a long time coming. I'm Jeanne."

Ella visibly relaxes, though she blushes when she shakes Andy's hand.

After lunch in Chinatown they go to a concert in a museum. Ella is nervous during the former and hardly says a word. She sits through the concert, a flute sonata by Rameau and a Shubert sonata arranged for flute and piano, with still politeness.

Charles sees this and smiles.

On the way out, she says, when Jeanne asks her how she liked it, "No drums and it wasn't half loud enough."

They go to a bar with outside tables. Enjoying possibly the last warm sun of the year, the women drink wine and the men beer.

The conversation is easy. First it mirrors the conversation she'd had with Tod at the restaurant it seems like years before. They talk about the scandals in Washington. The other three have quite different opinions from Ella and they argue amiably. Then they talk about the 'Age of Thrones' and the 'Mad Men'. Then the conversation shifts to things only other three know of. The upcoming visit of a college friend and what he's been doing and then what they've heard from others. Ella watches the passers by. She imagines how she would draw them.

Charles glances at his watch, "The Patriots game is in an hour."

"Did you see how badly their defensive ends got burned last Sunday against the Rams?" Ella asks suddenly focused.

"Not the Patriots," sighs Jeanne. Now it's her turn to watch the street scene.

In the ladies room as they are preparing to walk home, Jeanne washes her hands at the sink next to Ella. "I've not seen Charles this happy in a long time," Jeanne says.

"You're not upset?" Ella asks.

"So you know?"

Ella nods.

"Of course not," Jeanne says. They pause outside the ladies room door. "It's been a mess. At first I think I mostly wanted to have my cake and eat it too. Maybe I needed it too. One can feel so trapped.

"For a long time, I've wanted to stop, but I've been unable to decide whether it would make things better or worse for him. He's much better today."

"I doubt this is for more than the weekend," Ella says, "You know about how...?"

"Yes."

"Jesus," says Ella, "I can't believe I let it happen."

"And I'm surprised you're so nice."

Ella smiles, feeling pleased.

As they make their way back to where the men somewhat impatiently wait for them, Ella adds, "The jerk didn't even have to ask. I sat there in that car, outside the restaurant. He just looked at me and I took my clothes off."

"You're instincts are sound," Jeanne comments, "You'll do well with Charles."

"Oh, this is just for the weekend," Ella says.

Back in his place, the two of them watch football. During half time he mutes the sound and they fuck in a companionable unpassionate fashion.

Even though the game is about to start up again, he says, "You'll have to go back soon. I signed the agreement." He hands her the manila envelope.

"I hope you didn't because of..."

He stops her, "No. You've the better proposal and I'll be paying you less. What're your plans?"

"I'll deliver the good news, pack my stuff and descend on my parents. They'll be glad to put me up while I find a place. They've never cared much for Tod."

"You could move in here."

She's quiet, then "I'm not sure that's a good idea."

"Well, think about it. You've given me the best weekend I can remember," then "When you're ready, I'll give you a ride."

"After the game, oh shit!" On the flatscreen a guy wearing the wrong colors races down the field with the ball. "Look at what we missed! Where're your priorities?"

------------------------------------

"Well?" Tod asks after she's let herself into the apartment.

She says "Here" and hands him the bulky packet.

"It's signed?"

"Yes," she says. She ignores his whoop and heads for their bedroom.

"What the fuck!" Tod yells from the living room. He rushes in, "What the fuck is this?"

"I'm moving out," she says. She's tossing things from the closet into her suitcase.

"What is this shit," he waves the agreement, "You are one nasty scheming bitch."

"What?" she turns to face him.

He waves the packet at her, "Don't play the fucking innocent!"

"Let me see," she takes it from him.

Her eyes widen. What Charles signed'd been modified so that she is in charge of the development. She is to oversee everything.

"You bitch, I'm having nothing to do with this."

"That's fine," she says calmly, "This means a lot less to me than to you. I'm going back to school soon anyway."

He raises his hand.

"You hit me," she says calmly, "And that's it. No money, no reputation boost, no step closer to going it alone."

"You are a piece of work."

"I don't see how it matters to you," she says, "It'll save you effort and you get the same result. I suggest we split the profit 90/10. 90 to you. The 10'll put me through school I figure."

"Suppose you screw up. You've never done this kind of thing."

"Neither have you. And you'd better use your superior education to make sure I don't."

"You're a bitch," he says.

"And you're repeating yourself. Agree or not," she says, "I'm out of here. I'll come back for the rest of my stuff tomorrow."

Its only as she rolls her suitcase through the living room that he realizes. "Hey what the fuck are you doing Ella?"

"Moving out," she says, "I'm sure we can manage to work together in a professional manner."

Out in the parking lot, Charles waits by her car. The hard parking lot light makes him look tired and older. "Did you like the sweetener?" he asks.

"Is it right to bribe the bribe?" she asks.

"Look," he says, "I shouldn't've said that. I put the agreement together this morning, before, you know, before I asked."

"I know," she says.

"It's not conditional in any way."

She looks at him consideringly.

"You'll be heading for your parents' now," he says.

She says, "I'm thinking about the issues around you're being so much older than me."

He sags a bit. He looks sad. He looks away toward the busy street beyond the parked cars.

"What if I should want kids?" she asks.

He looks down at the pavement.

"Look at me," she says.

He does and says in reply, "I don't know."

She's quiet, then, "I'm gonna do what I want. I'll follow you back into town".

------------------------------------

Some years later, our imaginary observer watches 4 people, two couples, enter an expensive hotel. In one pair both are in their late forties, the woman still slim and pretty. In the other the two are disparate, the woman is in her late twenties and quite beautiful.

They'd gone to an art gallery where the young woman is exhibiting some paintings. They've had an expensive dinner and've been to the theater where the young woman was quite bored.

They've reserved two rooms but go together to one of them. The observer watches as the four disport themselves.

At one point the women are made stand back to back in front of the mirror that hangs over one of the dressers. They hold their arms over their heads and the cuffs on their wrists are connected, similarly the cuffs on their ankles. A strap connects the chokers they wear around their necks. A double ended toy is pressed up their assholes. They look like some kind of exotic chimera, a creature engineered for but one thing.

One man takes a clamp and attaches it to a nipple. The other man mirrors his actions. One takes a pinwheel of sharp needles and navigates it across the landscape before him. The other mirrors. They amuse themselves while the chimera moans and complains with its strange double voice, until it's covered with obscene decorations.

Each man enters as best he can the cunt that belongs to him. They lift the creature and carry it to the bed. They play about lying side by side but soon nature demands better access.

The chimera is disassembled, a kind of asexual reproduction results in two very different chimeras rocking and writhing and groaning side by side.

Later, burnt out for the time being, the men watch as the older woman dons a strap-on.

Through it all the young woman's expression is quite intense, intent on what she is feeling. The imaginary onlooker notes with some sadness that her stomach is not as taught, nor her waist as slim as it was before. On her left thigh there is now a tracery of blue veins.

Later, when the clock shows close to four, the four loll about on the bed, finishing the second flask of martinis.

The young woman's head rests tiredly on her partner's shoulder. He says, "Look how we have to flee our homes to have a good time. I was right the first time. Just say no to children."