favours on her wretched, quivering subjects. This was what David had revealed to her as her soul’s greatest delight, it was what he had given her with a patience and skill that might have been insane, but was also thorough and convincing. He had rarely given her quite enough pleasure to make her come, so that in the end she was taken over the brink by pain.
Pleasure and pain until Mary was torn apart by orgasms of sickening force, orgasms that were not so much a delight as a psychic devastation. David had given her this addiction. After that, what use could simple fucking and sucking be to Mary? Now, in David’s bathroom again after so much time had passed, what else could she do but strive in solitude to recreate past pains, pleasures, and horrifyingly exquisite humiliations?
‘Do you know what your trouble is, you stupid cunt?’ she said to herself quietly, her other self there in the mirror. ‘You’ve always been afraid that you’re different from other people. And you are! But stop being afraid of it.’
She glanced at the ceiling, seeing the two small mirrored panels and thinking of the cameras that David had sometimes put there to film secretly through the two-way mirrors. Was he filming her now? Mary doubted it, but she wondered if, despite his manner, he could still show some interest, some redeeming remnants of voyeurism and sadism.
Lust renewed itself in her strong and healthy young body, as she looked at all the great stuff in David’s collection. So many strange items for her to play with!
Looking up from the leather, rubber, plastic and metal items designed for the sexual subjugation of human beings, she saw through the window how the vivid green trees moved tremulously in the light wind, their branches shivering, as if chilled, as birds came and went with their hungers and disputes, while overhead sailed huge fluffy white clouds like mountains in flight to an unknown paradise.
How beautiful all the world was if seen in the right light, thought Mary, her body and soul still suffused by her own inner light of ecstasy. Why was it that nearly everybody was bad, stupid or confused, even though they were living in a world where every tree, bird and cloud could show its own radiance that sang of beauty and goodness?
After thinking about it for a minute, Mary decided she did not know, so she might just as well masturbate.
Two
By the time she was satisfied, the sun was setting, and the tops of trees burned golden green, such a delicious light that she felt she could taste it on her tongue, a warm sweet and sour. She emptied and cleaned the bath, then carefully dried all the gear she had used with such pleasure. She got dressed and she left that haunted bathroom where she had both exorcised and exercised her personal demons.
Mary carried three bags of domination gear back to the living room where David was still watching TV, or at least was sitting in front of it. Even the half-eaten sandwich at his side had an air of apathy and defeat. As for the fourth bag of gear, Mary carried it outside and put it in the boot of her car. From her bag she took a hairdryer, and then she went back into David’s kitchen and dried her hair. After that she knew she had to leave even though she would rather have stayed until David lost his temper, if he still had one to lose.
‘I’m going now,’ she told him, making herself sound casual and bright. ‘I’m sorry if I disturbed you. Though you don’t look very disturbed. Unfortunately. I was in a bad mood, but I feel much better now after masturbating in your bath and playing with some of your gear. We could go out to dinner now if you like.’
David shook his head slowly.
‘OK,’ Mary continued. ‘I can see you want me to just go away now. But despite that, I’ll just go away now anyway.’
David stared at her, and the faintest hint of a weary, sad smile appeared in his eyes and mouth. It was nothing really, hardly even the ghost or the memory of the radiant,