The Red Panties Test Pt. 01

THE RED PANTIES TEST - PART 1

Dani Sweets

One night. That's all it took to send my life off in a direction I could never have imagined. One night in prison.

I knew at the time it was going to change me. How could I not, with my job already gone, career put on hold, and marriage hanging on by a thread? I just had no idea that the biggest change was yet to happen - or how much it would turn on a couple of moments of weakness.

The weakness part, I might have foreseen. It had been ambition and greed that led me to help set up the dubious tax avoidance scheme my law firm cooked up for one of its biggest clients. But when the shit hit the fan and the matter ended in court, it wasn't loyalty that made me refuse to answer the judge's questions about the role played by my senior colleagues. It was weakness.

When I scored a job at one of the city's top legal practices, I was never in doubt about my capacity to do the work that would be expected of me. I had excelled in law school, and I was completely confident in my technical abilities.

Yet in almost every other way I was scared at the prospect of working there. More specifically, I was scared of the people I would be working with. Well, maybe not scared as such. But intimidated, certainly.

Because so many of the lawyers that worked at this particular firm, like the many of their kind I had encountered at university, had the social and physical gifts that I sorely lacked.

They generally came from wealthy families. They had gone to expensive schools, mixing with the right type of people, the very ones they would be courting or advising as clients. They were full of confidence, fast talkers as ready to take whatever further advantages they could find as to dismiss the opinions and fashions of those they considered beneath them.

And they looked the part too. The men were generally much bigger than me. Some - the rugby players - were large of frame, built on a different scale to small men like myself. Sharing a lift with them was like playing Gulliver in the land of the giants. But most were trim and athletic, with tanned skin and corded muscles shown off by their designer casual wear, when they weren't in expensive suits.

The women were even more off-putting, goddesses who could be impeccably dressed and made up for the office, or lounge in jeans and sweatshirts and yet still look the epitome of glamour. Even the nicest among them, the ones without a condescending or bitchy bone in their body, used their beauty as a weapon, whether they realised it or not.

So how was I, a young man slight of build with no sporting ability, from a working-class background and with no connections of any use in the closely linked worlds of finance and commercial law, to make my way in this kind of environment?

By working twice as hard as anyone else. By watching and learning, taking whatever chances I could to gain access to the circles in which I aspired to move, but never, ever complaining about the times I was excluded.

Learning what clothes were considered acceptable to wear, what topics to throw into casual conversation, which sports to care about.

Finding a nice young lady to marry who came from an "old money" family, not so well off that it would seem I was seeking to rise too far above my station, but well enough known and respected to take me a few rungs up the social ladder.

In doing all this, I strove to fit in at all costs. And as far as work was concerned, that meant doing exactly what I thought my superiors would want and expect, whether they gave me explicit instructions or not.

So, when it came to taking the fall for an illegal scheme that had my fingerprints all over it, there was no thought of ratting on the senior colleagues who'd actually designed it. I wasn't in physical fear of what they might do to me if I gave them up the court. But I was worried about the social and economic retribution that might follow. These were the right kind of people and I wanted to stay on their good side.

At first, it seemed like a good decision. Even as I was being sentenced for contempt of court, I was being assured that while my employment was being terminated and my practising certificate was likely to be cancelled, I could expect to return to the fold in some capacity after a period of penance. In other words, I would be looked after. And that would start with an immediate attempt to get my sentence commuted. With luck, I would be out of prison the following day.

That was a relief. But even so, my heart was hammering with trepidation as I was driven to a place that, having firmly rejected criminal law as a career choice, I had never expected to visit.

Not that I showed it, to my driver at any rate. Part of the deal worked out on my behalf was that I could report to the prison myself. Ideally, I would have liked my wife Jillian to take me. But that was... well, a problem I'd have to find some way of resolving when I got back home. So instead, I got a lift from Liam, a colleague who'd become the closest thing I had to a friend.

Relentlessly upbeat and incapable of taking anything seriously (or at least of being seen to do so), Liam kept up a barrage of puns and jokes about the idea of being in prison, referencing everything from The Great Escape to the Prisoner of Azkaban and even Con Air. It was completely crass and yet at the same time really did help keep my more baleful thoughts away.

As we got out of the car and I tried not to look too hard at the facility I was about enter, Liam creased his face into a mock frown. "So, Emile," he said, "how are you going to cope with, you know, playing 'pick up the soap' in the shower?"

I shrugged. "Well, if I have to join in the gang rapes and fuck some poor dude, so be it. Go with the flow, you know?"

He laughed. "Just as well you're only in there overnight, I'd hate to have to break the news to Jillian that you'd found yourself a toyboy."

I smiled back, ignoring the chill that went through me as I shook Liam's hand and then walked as steadily as I could to the jail's man entrance.

My fears subsided somewhat as I went through a lengthy process of admission. Bureaucracy was the same everywhere, it seemed. But they reignited as I was taken to a holding room and forced by two burly guards to strip off all my clothing. My pleas for privacy were ignored.

Awkwardly clutching my genitals in one hand, I reached with the other to accept a pile of drab green clothing - and then froze at what I saw on top.

It was a pair of red panties, made of what looked like satin and with panels of flower-patterned lace. Under the harsh fluorescent lights, the bold colour seemed somehow threatening, even as the soft texture hinted at seduction.

I stared at them for a second, then up into the smirking face of the guard. "I can't wear those!" I exclaimed, with all the outrage I could muster. The effect was spoiled by the first half coming out as a squeak rather than the roar of defiance for which I was aiming.

The guard's face twinkled with amusement. "Course you can Emily," she said. "We made sure they're your size." Her colleague gave a bark of laughter.

"No way," I said, withdrawing my hand and backing away from her. "And my name's not Emily."

Her face instantly darkened. "Stop there," she barked. She was a tall woman and much heavier built than I was. It seemed pretty clear who would win any physical confrontation.

I did as I was told and found the clothing being thrust into my chest. The guard tapped her baton meaningfully. "Do you really want to find out what happens when you disobey orders here?"

In the face of her threat, my opposition crumbled. I shook my head miserably and accepted the pile. The guards forced me to get dressed in front of them, commenting lewdly on my slim body and smallish cock.

I was almost glad to pull on the wispy panties, just to restore a semblance of decency, but that simply prompted demands that I twirl around and then do a little dance, shaking what they insisted on calling my booty. The female guard in particular kept stroking my bottom and pinching me, all while calling me Emily.

Once I'd finished dressing, face burning with embarrassment, I was taken off to a cell. On the way I was warned that I must wear my panties at all times and that if I was inspected and found without them, I could expect to be severely punished.

Fortunately, I saw no one else for the rest of the day. I had no cellmate, and my food was brought to me, which in the circumstances I was happy to accept. But I kept my panties on, as instructed.

They felt very strange at first, and the thong at the back kept slipping into the crack between my buttocks. But I gradually came to enjoy the way they clung to me. And as I lay in my bed that night, struggling to sleep, I found myself stroking the soft fabric, almost for reassurance. By the time I gradually succumbed to exhaustion, not long before dawn, it almost felt like they were part of my skin.

I was still wearing the panties when I was ushered into a busy hall for breakfast the following morning, although to my great relief nothing further was said about what I was wearing. Even in just a few hours, I had somehow become used to how they felt. Yet I couldn't be comfortable in them. Because they were a reminder of just how weak I was - which I assumed was the whole point. And I was terrified that someone would look at me and work out what I was wearing.

The prison clothing was loose fitting enough that there was no real possibility of that happening. Nor was there any gap between my tee-shirt and pants, and the pullover would have hidden them even if there had been. But I found it hard not to keep checking.

Ignoring the stares from the other prisoners, which I told myself were only natural given that I was a new arrival, I took a tray and headed for an empty table off in a corner.

But any hopes I had of a quiet meal were quickly dashed when two older men came and sat either side of me, then slid along the bench until they were pressed hard up against me.

"Hello cutie," said the one on my left. His mouth was smiling, but his eyes were hard and unforgiving. His forehead and bald pate seemed to be one of his few patches of exposed skin that were not tattooed.

"You new here?" I nodded, trying to ignore the chasm that had opened in my stomach. "What's your name, honey?"

"Nash," I managed to say. "Emile Nash."

"Emily?" said the man on my other side in a gravelly voice. "Pretty name for a pretty girl, don't you think Rob?" He was taller and thinner than his companion, with a scar that ran right across his face.

"I'm not a - ow!" I squealed as the man named Rob grabbed my wrist, giving it a painful squeeze.

"Listen sweetie," he growled, "if the real men say you're a girl, that's what you are, get it? But there's a simple way to check. Are you wearing your lovely red panties?"

I glanced around, but nobody was paying us any obvious attention, and the hubbub in the room masked my new squeal as the grip tightened once again on my wrist.

"Are you going to tell us, or do we have to go to the bathroom to find out? Because you might not like what happens when we take them off you. Or maybe," Rob concluded with a leer, "you might like it very much."

I weighed up my options. There were no guards nearby - and they'd been the ones to give me the panties in the first place. So, it was up to me to look after myself - but how could I do that, against men like this? The menace they exuded was palpable and I felt powerless to resist.

Intellectually, I had plenty of confidence. But physically, none whatsoever. I'd grown up terrified of any form of violence and the mere hint of it was enough to turn me into jelly.

"Yes," I admitted in a small voice. "Yes, I'm wearing them."

My assailant stared at me, as if wanting something further. "Sir," I added miserably, feeling one more scrap of self-worth slip away.

A broad smile cracked Rob's face, this time one of genuine appreciation. "Now that is good news, sweetie. For us and for you. Because that means you get a real man to take care of you. Here, just have a little feel."

With no effort at all, he took my hand and pulled it under the table and into his lap. Before I knew what was happening, I found my palm pressed down into his groin - and my eyes widened at what I felt there.

Surely that couldn't be his cock? It was far too big, almost like the tube of a baseball bat had somehow been crammed inside his pants. But as I involuntarily felt it's girth, it throbbed and grew a little under my hand.

My yelp of surprise prompted a chuckle from the scarred man on my other side. "Found something you like, did you princess? I bet your little clitty is getting all excited just at the thought of playing with it, huh? Let's see, shall we..."

He plunged his hand into my own lap and grabbed my genitals through the fabric of the loose sweatpants I was wearing.

"Where is that cute little thingie?" he mused as I feebly tried to pull his hand away. "Ah, there we are..."

I issued another yelp as he traced the outline of my cock, before pinching the head between one large finger and thumb. Then he started to rub it through the layers of fabric, first gently and then with increasing force.

To my consternation and absolute chagrin, I felt a tingle and then a swelling as I started to come erect.

No! I wanted to protest, feeling the blush spreading downwards from my face and neck. I'd never once thought about men the way I did women and I'd have sworn there wasn't a gay bone in my body. Yet here I was somehow responding to the touch of a man - and an ugly old one at that.

But worse was to follow, as I realised that my own hand had started mimicking the thin man's motion - only the cock I was rubbing was far, far bigger.

A soft moan escaped my lips. I wanted to believe it was one of fear and distress - and it really was. But even to my own ears, it could just as easily sound like one of pleasure.

The two men looked at my reddening face, then at each other - and burst into raucous laughter. "Oh ho," chortled Rob. "We're gonna have some fun with this one!"

"No," said a cool voice. "You're not."

The two men and I swung our heads round to look at the fresh-faced young man who had taken a seat across the table from us.

He flicked a strand of his shoulder-length, bleached blonde hair away from his face, then glanced first at one of my new "friends," then the other. "You can leave him alone," he pronounced in an even tone that held no suggestion of request.

I waited for the explosion. It didn't come. Instead, there was a sullen mutter from Rob that sounded something like "Not your business Nicole."

His thin companion's protest was louder. "Not Billy's neither."

The young man arched an eyebrow. "Do you want to tell him that, Geno, or shall I?"

When there was no answer, he jerked his head. "Off you go now."

The men hesitated, then stood up, though not before Geno gave my semi-erect cock one last squeeze.

They stalked away angrily, but as he went Rob gave me a hungry look that was somehow as disconcerting as anything he'd said or done. It was all I could do not to stare at the lump in his crotch.

I let out a shuddering sigh of relief, then looked across to the young man. "I'm not sure how you did that, but thank you. I owe you."

My rescuer gave a half smile. "Incurring favours in prison isn't a good habit to get into, sweetie." His voice was cultured, evoking the social circles in which I aspired to move. "But no matter. As you may have gathered, it's not me those two meatheads are afraid of."

He leant back and gave me an appraising look. "You put the panties on."

It was a statement, not a question. I nodded. Then a thought struck me. "It was a test!" I exclaimed.

"It was a test," agreed the young man. "The screws like to keep some of the more, ah, predatory inmates happy by feeding them some fresh meat now and again. So if they see a likely candidate, they insist the new guy wears a pair of red panties."

He gave a dry chuckle. "Not sure why they're always red, to be honest. You'd think pink or lavender would do the job just as well, but there you are. It's a tradition, apparently."

"So I failed - I should have said no, and taken a beating, I suppose."

"Or taken them, but then thrown them away later. Despite what you're told, there's never an inspection. As it is, you've effectively been walking around just begging to be intimidated, bullied or raped. And not necessarily in that order."

As his words hit home, I felt chills shoot through me. With a sympathetic frown, my saviour reached across the table and patted my hand.

"I failed too, you know. But - how can I put this? - there are different ways to fail. And some of them don't work out too badly."

He stood up. Seeing the alarm on my face, he held out his hands in a calming gesture. "Relax. I have to go and see my lord and master, but you'll be taken back to your cell soon and you should be okay for a few hours at least. How long are you in for?"

"Hopefully I get out today." I tried but failed to keep the quaver out of my voice.

"Yeah? Well good for you!" The young man gave a lopsided grin, but then his expression turned serious.

"A word of advice. If you don't get out, make sure you find yourself a man. A nice strong one." He started to move off, but then turned back. "Or, you know, maybe do that even if you do leave today? Just a thought."

And with that he walked away, hips undulating in a slightly disconcerting way. More than a few heads swung round to watch him go, though it was noticeable just how quickly they snapped back too, almost as if afraid to stare too long. From what I'd heard, it was not hard to guess why that might be.

Within two hours I was out of prison, the red panties discarded along with the rest of my outfit. But as I walked out of the gate, there was still no end to the shaking that had taken hold when Nicole - or whatever the young man was really called - told me about the consequences of failing the panties test.

And I was still trembling when I got home.

Jillian had been on the verge of leaving me, so disgusted was she about the way I'd behaved - and in particular my insistence on protecting an employer that had shown no compunction about firing me when the heat came on over the tax scheme. But she took one look now at my face and postponed the tirade she'd doubtless composed to mark my return. I was hurried straight off to bed, and all phone calls were ignored.

So began a period in which my career was predictably put on ice, but my marriage somehow survived - though neither of us could take any joy from it. With me unemployed, Jillian had to scale back her work as an artist and return to her former role as an office manager, a job she was good at, but detested.

Our sex life more or less evaporated. A combination of guilt at what I'd done to my wife, and the lingering fear about what my brief experience at prison seemed to suggest about my sexuality, sapped any capacity to sustain an erection, even on the rare occasions I felt like trying to make love.

I was reduced to using my fingers or tongue to satisfy her. Nor did I masturbate at all, so fearful was I of finding out what might now turn me on.

The dreams didn't help. Or dream, really. There were variations, but they all involved me being dragged into a prison bathroom by Rob and Geno and forced to play with their monstrously large cocks.

The dreams always ended before anything worse happened. But more than once I woke up coughing and choking, as if I really had just taken their rampant organs all the way down my throat. And sometimes I was stiff myself. Just a morning wood, I told myself. But I didn't always believe it.