Storm In Februari

Dear Literotica readers. Yes, I know, it has been a while since I posted anything new. I'm a slow writer, apologies. Anyways, here's another experiment, enjoy yourself -- or, y'know, not, depending on how well it turned out -- and tell me all about it, please! Let me thank my editor TekNight and proofreader Kurokami.

For those of you unfamiliar with my writing style: no quick fixes here. This one is even a bit slower than the others. And darker. Sorry. I promise next one will be happier! This story contains resistance play. If that is not your thing, feel free to read something else. Allyourbase.

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Storm in februari

Sometimes a day at sea isn't just that, a day at sea. A cold storm tortures this remote coastal town as I struggle my way along the boulevard. It's the end of winter, but it feels like autumn. Somewhere, behind one of these housefronts, my love is waiting for me.

I imagine him, in the rented apartment we have both never seen before and will probably never see again after this, slowly unpacking to kill the time. He opens his suitcase to take out some clothes, a bottle of wine maybe.

Casually, between his socks and his shirts, part of a small chain peeps out, glistening, revealing that there's another world hidden under those shirts. I wonder how he feels, seeing that, knowing what else is under there, knowing it's not jewelry. Not the kind of jewelry many would understand, anyway.

I pass by the houses with their living rooms on view behind big windows with open curtains, as apparently is still how people live here. Sand blows in my hair, against my coat. Almost nobody seems to be home, though with this storm I wonder where else everybody would be. While the empty living rooms look out over the boulevard, the empty boulevard looks back in. The interiors are sober, clean and modest. Nowhere to hide, so you better have nothing to hide. It reflects the town's past, and maybe also the present. A hard life, a strict religion, an ingrained idea of being burdened by sin. It breeds ugly secrets. I can't help but feel for these people. I've got secrets too, sinful ones, though I don't believe in sin. Beautiful ones nevertheless. If only they knew.

I count the houses - almost there. The wind lashes my face with freezing salty ocean spray. The sea is a dark, wrathful, unforgiving mass of water, blending with the ominous sky above. Suddenly it feels like blasphemy that I've come here, that we've come here, to this quiet, conservative town of all places, to let our dark sides see the light.

I think back to the trip here, in the train, rereading the sexy, horribly explicit messages he sent me on my phone. Sitting there, between the quiet, sturdy people that live here, enjoying messages that would read like threats to anybody else... it turned me on and made me feel ashamed of myself at the same time. Like I was mocking the lives of my fellow travelers.

In the past, we've picked more appropriate getaways to do the things we cannot do at home, to show each other what nobody else knows about us. We picked places that celebrate diversity, extroversion. Sunny and dark and dirty places. Next time, I think as I take one last look at the darkening sky, I'll ask him for less of a contrast. I also wonder how long we can keep this up.

I ring the bell. I quietly apologize to the empty living rooms, to the burdened hearts that will enter them again later. I wish them a fuller life, a life like mine, one where they understand that having secrets is nothing to be ashamed of.

"Hello stranger... you look gorgeous," he says, in his deep, soft voice.

I smile, because I know I am a mess and he doesn't care. I am wet, cold and slightly out of breath from walking the stairs to this cosy apartment. Thank god it's not on the ground floor.

"Hello yourself, handsome traveller," I say. "What brings you to this lovely coast?"

Smiling, we exchange a knowing look.

"Girls, of course!" He winks. As I wipe wet strands of hair from my cold forehead, he takes me in his arms, carefully.

"Well, that, and booze and gambling..." he says, smiling. Even after all these years, it still amazes me how strong his body is. "...and I might get a tattoo somewhere this weekend."

"So what brings you here?" He asks softly while he plants kisses in my neck.

"Sailors..." I moan. "With tattoos. And an attitude."

"An attitude, huh?" He laughs, but I can feel he's done with joking around.

He draws me close. His hand holds my head, firmly, as he kisses me. He teases and takes, until my breath trembles and my knees are weak. I want more, and he's going to give me more, lots more at some point, but so slowly, so carefully that waiting and begging for it will hurt just as much as getting it. It'll end up to be much more than what I asked for. And that's exactly what I want.

"Are you ready for this, love?" He asks, whispering, with an intimate, apologetic smile.

Somehow he looks a little vulnerable, but it adds to my admiration of him. Whatever he wants, he can take it, but he doesn't. He earns my respect by giving me respect. He demands my surrender, by letting me choose for it. And I don't say no, I never do.

"Well then: unpack, dress up," he says. "We're going for a walk."

"Aye captain!" I joke. He chuckles, but I know he doesn't like it much. He doesn't like anything remotely like that. No titles, no names, no roles. He always says he wants the real, raw us or nothing at all.

The stiff housefronts follow us with their glass eyes. They now approve of us as we pass by. Nobody will notice the small things that feel like foreplay to us. The light touch of his hand on my back, that looks innocent, but feels utterly possessive. The way he stops me at the curb because he wants me to feel he's the one who decides when we cross a street. The fact he hasn't told me what restaurant we're going to. He hasn't told me anything.

I see myself reflected in the glass gaze of the living rooms. Shocked, I realize that right now, right here, there is no difference between me and those obedient, pious wives that clean those houses, those women I pity and look down on at the same time. Women who have to ask their husbands whether it's O.K. to spend money on a vacuum cleaner, or tennis lessons, or a dress. Women who have to ask their husbands for money to be able to live, period. Women like my mother. Embarrassment wells up inside of me. This, exactly, is the hardest thing for me of all of this.

And he knows it. It's why he does it. It is the reason he brought us here, and it's the reason he hasn't asked me to wear anything special. There's no spicy stuff beneath my clothes, no symbolic jewelry. I'm a woman obeying her man and nothing more. I could've known, when I told him, that he'd use it one day.

I think back to other times, in other places, when we were more playful and innocent. Like the one time he asked me to bring a turtleneck sweater. I hadn't given it a second thought. It was early autumn, but the forecasts were sunny, so I brought a thin, elegant, fitting turtleneck shirt. He was very amused when he saw me take it out of my luggage.

"You're so going to regret you didn't bring a real sweater..." he grinned. I remember him taking something from his suitcase, as I stripped to my bra, ready to wear the shirt he asked for.

"And I'm so going to love this," he groaned, holding up a big, black leather collar with a shiny leash.

How the lust just dripped from his face, watching my shock as I realized there was no way this shirt could effectively hide that collar, especially not with that leash. And oh yes, he was going to make me wear it anyway.

Slowly, he wrapped the leather around my neck. With his hard cock pressing into my hip and his lips brushing against my ear. He chuckled and whispered how much it turned him on when I blushed, how he couldn't wait for the looks of people in the street, in the restaurant, how I was going to be his kinky little princess on a leash for the entire weekend. It made my heart flutter and my stomach clench.

I remember frantically wondering whether this was really such a good idea, as he led the chain around the curve of my breast, around my waist, and tucked it in the back of my jeans. I liked how the smooth metal, quickly warming to the touch, slid across my skin seductively, as I put on the shirt. I remember his lusty gaze while he watched me fidget with the tiny turtleneck and the huge collar in front of a mirror, softly cursing him. This was as arousing to him as big tits in a tiny bikini top could be to any other guy.

I still don't know, back then, how I survived that trip to the restaurant and back. People must've seen the collar. The waitress at the restaurant sure did a good job hiding the fact that she did. I tried my best to ignore all of it, block it from my mind, but he wouldn't let me. I remember the same possessive hand on my back, whenever it was possible for him to do that. He'd casually play with the leash on my lower back, where it entered my jeans. Carefully, when nobody was looking, he tugged it a little, making the chain snake across my naked body under my shirt. It drove me insane, and by the time we got back to the apartment, the arousal had soaked my jeans, the fear and embarrassment had melted my mind, and his hand on that leash could make me do absolutely anything.

Tonight will end the same in some way, I know this. It's why we are here. But it will take far more to get there. I feel raw, vulnerable, edgy. He's touched on something, and he knows it.

A woman in a long, dark raincoat approaches us and asks me directions. He squeezes my elbow to silence me, and he answers her. Suddenly, I feel the sting of rage. I want to tell him he's an asshole, tell him to fuck off, that I'm not playing this game. But I am playing this game, I promised before we left the door.

I wonder how I will manage to keep my composure in the restaurant. The waitress will ask me what I want to order, and he, he will order something for me without asking what I want. The waitress will try and catch my gaze for confirmation, but I will avoid it. She will take his order, and it will be the dish he knows I find too expensive, or not healthy enough. He will have a mischievous look on his face when he forces me to indulge in it. I know this, because it has happened so many times before, and all those times, it has been a mixed pleasure. But this time, I'm not sure I can handle it. This time, it's not fear that's wrecking my mind, it's anger.

We turn some corners, cross some more streets. The longer we walk, the darker it gets, and the more he wears down my boundaries. Outside of me, the icy storm tugs on my coat relentlessly. Inside of me, my hot anger gets triggered, again and again, by the constant, small demands he makes, the continuous strain of obeying him, like poking an animal in a cage until it's exhausted and numb. Until I yearn to just let go, mechanically follow his lead, stop struggling, go with the wind.

I know what happens when I do that, what comes after: the space that opens up in my heart, the addictive, melancholic kind of joy that comes out of nowhere, the tears - those silly, silly tears he enjoys so much. But this time, something in the back of my mind is repulsed, bangs the walls, kicks and screams. It gives me the persistent feeling of making a big mistake, of being close to reaching the point where it will say: I told you so.

And then we turn another corner, and we're back at the boulevard again...

I don't get it. I feel a pit in my stomach. The housefronts become increasingly familiar. This is the third time I cross them in a couple of hours... I look at his stoic face for explanation. There is none.

And then we're in front of the door to the apartment again. My anger flares up. He doesn't notice. I don't understand why we're here, and why it infuriates me so much, but in the back of my head something is urging:

I told you so.

"We are back..." I say. The sky behind him is dark. He doesn't react.

"Why are we back?" I ask.

"Since when do I have to answer your questions?"

He still doesn't look at me. He opens the door. I expect a rude, sweeping statement, an explanation that blows me off my feet, with him all smug, amused by my shock. It doesn't come.

He doesn't make me go first on the stairs. Usually, he does, so I can feel his eyes on my ass with every step. I stare at his ankles as I follow him up. He is different this time and I am not sure I like it. I feel a bit lonely. His shoes leave sandy prints on the steps. I am worried about what awaits me at the top.

He takes off his coat in the hallway and dumps it in my hands. As he walks away to the livingroom, the explanation comes, carelessly, like a sidenote:

"Go to the kitchen. Make me dinner."

I. told. you. so.

My hands tremble.

Meat. Carrots. Onions. Potatoes. A potato peeler.

An apron.

My legs feel like rubber.

A cookbook. Op top of it, a piece of paper. Instructions.

'Follow recipe 519 on page 256 to the letter.'

'Wear the apron.'

My hands are now shaking with indignation.

The cookbook is achingly familiar. C. Wannee, Kookboek van de Amsterdamse Huishoudschool. It's the same book my grandmother gave to my mother. It's the popular, old fashioned cookbook that was once used in domestic science schools. A book with a condescending tone and bland dishes. A book for pious wives.

I am not here. I am not wearing the apron with the floral pattern. The hands holding the potato peeler, they are not mine, because they're peeling potatoes. Fingers, tracing words on a yellow page. Hands, holding pans, wooden spoons. I wonder why they are shaking so much. Someone is having a hard time feeling their legs.

But smells have the nasty habit of dragging memories out of graves. I sear the meat, and sadness rushes in.

Thoughts of my mom, my grandmother well up inside. I see fragments of their predefined lives, the knitwork, the dishes, the laundry. The tedious tasks, the dreary clothes, the functional shoes, the bathroom without beauty products. Their passive aggressiveness in arguments. The phonecalls that they took but that had to be passed on to the man in the house. The food they cooked that was never their own favorite. The undefined guilt they made us feel as kids, like us misbehaving was somehow proof of their incompetence. The way they were supposed to be a flawless mirror reflecting their husbands in the best way possible.

Their silent resistance to the men in their lives fills the kitchen.

The wind batters the house. Water boils between carrots and potatoes, pieces of onion swirl around hypnotically.

I would never become like that. I promised myself I wouldn't. I wouldn't devote my life to reflecting a man. I would never wear an apron like that, cook dishes like that. Obey a man like that. Like this...

In the livingroom he's reading a magazine.

He sits down first. We eat silently. He cuts the meat and takes the biggest part. He makes me wear the apron at the table. Now and then he comments on the food. He silences me when I want to reply. Poke, poke, poke.

I don't know how much more I can take. I stare out of the window to alleviate the unbearable feeling building inside. The sky is black and purple and green, like a bruise, like my mind. I can't look back at him. I don't see what I saw before. I see my own fear of having made a mistake, years and years ago, the mistake of deciding to share my life with him, thinking he wouldn't make me be like this. Thinking he would not be like this. Like my father.

But my trust is gone. I am scared, unlike I have ever been. I feel tricked. I have been gullible. A stupid, stupid girl. My life, my entire life is a mistake.

The storm is almost at full force. I yearn with all my being for the filthy kind of submission. That, I can handle. That would save me now. I hope, in a couple of minutes, he rewards me by making me kneel at his feet and bare my tits for him to spank. I want to be forced to undress and sit on the dinner table, legs spread. I hope he grabs my hair and makes me suck his dick under the table for desert. Anything. I need a sign.

In stead he says:

"Go do the dishes."

This can't be true.

He looks at me, seems genuinely annoyed.

"Is there a problem? Take the dishes to the kitchen."

Something inside me breaks.

It's almost physical. The kind of dry crack that is seriously alarming. Like breaking a bone, a heart. You hold your breath, numb for a second, but you know it will start to hurt so, so much so very soon. Inescapably, a painful rage rises up in me.

I want to break something.

And then the storm is inside the house. I don't know how it got here, but it's howling around us, screaming on the top of its lungs, deafening, maddening. It's blowing the dishes from the table. They crash against the wall, burst in a million loud, shrieking pieces, raining down like razor blades. It's ripping everything apart, it's shredding us to pieces, smashing me until until I'm nothing but sharp shards. I hope they will draw some blood somewhere. No more me to mirror my man. Good riddance.

Suddenly it stops. One of my cheeks is burning. I see his hand hovering over me threateningly. His eyes shoot fire. Slowly it sinks in.

He has hit me.

"Look at what a mess you made", he hisses. "You are such a silly cow."

"Fuck you!" I scream. It sounds hollow, useless, it falls to the floor between the broken dishes like an afterthought.

"Stop it." He grabs my chin, his fingers digging in my cheeks. He makes me look him in the face. It is stern, forbidding. "You are making a fool of yourself." He draws out the words, dripping with contempt.

Furious, I rid myself of his hand. He fights me, succeeds in grabbing my hair.

"Obey me, hm? That is what you would do, wasn't it? That's why we're here. Or am I mistaken?" His tone is full of pent up anger.

"No, it wasn't," I spit out, my body still full of adrenaline, my jaw clenched, my hair in his grip, head tilted backwards. "We're here to FUCK."

He smirks.

"You think this is some game I play? Nothing but a way for me to get some sex?" He snarls. "That I pay for dinner, for this apartment, just to be allowed into your pants?" His nose curls up in disgust.

"Sex. All you think about, isn't it?" He grabs my hair a little tighter. "Isn't it?"

I can't answer. Because it's true.

His eyes travel down my body, and up again. He brings his face close to mine. He can tell.

"Slut."

I hate it, but the insult, the contempt, it stirs all kinds of contradictory feelings. I want to kill him, I want to fuck him. I don't know what I want anymore. I've been trained to get off on this kind of stuff for so long...

I'm frozen. He pulls me by the hair, drags me through the living room, to the hallway, opens the bedroom. He pushes me in. I tumble on the bed. Without a pause, he follows me onto the bed, climbs over me, pulling his shirt out of his pants, unbuttoning his pants.

No. No no no. This is not how it's going to be. He pushed me, but he pushed me too far. He hit me, for god's sake. He hit me. Fast, I get back to my senses, and my rage returns.

"Get off me, you asshole", I grunt.

I push him away. But he's stronger, so much stronger than me. Under that formal shirt he's hiding an impressively muscular upper body. Being overpowered by that torso, like this, would arouse me in other circumstances. But now I'm angry. I must stay angry.

With a maddeningly calm air about him, he fights off my attempts. I shove and kick, scream and curse at him, but it's no use. One strong, large hand pins down my two wrists. He has done this so many times before, but then his face would be smirking, lust would be like electricity between us. Not this stone face, this cold, hostile atmosphere.