Sottopassaggio Read online

For a while some complex operation of attaching goes on behind me, I can feel the four hands working simultaneously connecting chains and ropes to rings on the straps; it feels like they’re doing some kind of puzzle, or macramé.

  “I knitted it myself,” I think.

  The process takes maybe ten minutes, though with only the sound of my breathing it has becomes difficult to judge time.

  Then suddenly it happens. The weight disappears from my feet. I start to fly.

  The experience is amazing, truly out-of-body. With the weight distribution provided by the complex web of straps surrounding my body I don’t feel suspended by any particular point, I just feel like I am floating.

  I hear vague metallic noises through the hood and slowly I start to lean forwards, to jerkily tilt, a movement that continues until I am horizontal.

  My legs slowly spread, I cannot aid or resist, and a bar is clipped between them holding them wide apart. I can feel the cold air against my arse and, in spite of myself; I start to ache with desire.

  I float like this for a while, maybe five minutes, dimly aware of the couple moving around me, more and more obsessively aware of the state of my dick, hanging free, now hard, now soft, now hard again.

  The dark isolation magnifies the desire for skin-to-skin contact to the point of madness. I feel as if I have taken ecstasy.

  I ache for more. My legs are open and my dick is pointing at the ground and I want more. I start to want anything as long as it’s more. But I can’t ask for it.

  After a few minutes there is a jerky shifting in the chains connected to the hood and my head starts to lift, to point forwards.

  In an unexpected movement that makes me convulse in surprise, Jean rips off the eye patches.

  He peers in at me, mere inches away. “You OK in there?” he asks.

  I nod as much as the chains permit.

  John who is out of sight runs a finger along the crack of my arse as his partner leans into my ear and says, “You want more?”

  I arch against the finger as much as the straps will allow and make an “Um,” noise through my nose.

  John laughs demonically and pulls his partner into view.

  The two stand mere inches from my face and stare at each other.

  They kiss, delicately at first, then deeply.

  John runs his hands down over Jean’s back, down to his arse, peeking pertly from his shiny chaps.

  The two men kiss and stroke each other, pausing to play first with each other’s nipples before moving lower to their pouches. They stroke and rub and caress each other through the leather, before unclipping them.

  In an attempt to generate some sensation in my own body I wriggle and writhe and am rewarded by the slightest sensation as my skin moves against the straps.

  Mere inches from my suspended face, Jean rolls on a condom, turns John around, and slowly, sensuously they start to fuck.

  Occasionally, when John looks up, he stares me straight in the eye. His pupils are dilated and my dick twitches and judders in sympathy.

  Live porn. Never has my frustration felt more complete.

  Jean starts to pulls on John’s harness as he pumps into him and their grunts get louder and start to pierce the material covering my ears.

  As if I am a camera, they pause occasionally and change position so that I get a different view.

  I tremble and twitch. Whoever would have thought being a truly passive observer could be so exciting?

  The grunts and moans increase as the two men slam together, until, in a crescendo of slapping and pumping, tugging and shrieking, they orgasm.

  As Jean pulls out and removes the condom, John casts me the broadest of smiles.

  I wiggle in my straps to remind them of my presence and Jean responds by standing in front of me. He moves so close that I can no longer see his head, only his groin.

  He undoes two zips near my ears. The loudness of the zips after the silence is deafening. He fingers his dick. “You want this now?” he asks.

  Despite the shame I feel at my own desire, I nod and grunt.

  He laughs. “That,” he says, “Is how you turn someone into a sex slave.”

  He steps back and John reappears at his side, an unfeasibly large dildo in hands.

  “You want this?” he asks.

  To my shame, I nod and thrash, desperate for them to touch me, to release me from my enforced voyeurism.

  Jean puts the dildo down on the workbench in front of me.

  “Another time, maybe,” he says. “When you know what you want.”

  The two men move out of sight and I am left alone and suspended. I hang there for what seems a long time, maybe an hour, maybe twenty minutes; it’s really hard to say. Time moves strangely when there is no possibility of action.

  My state of arousal fades to boredom and with it the voice of reason, temporarily silenced by desire, starts to complain anew, asking how the hell we got into this mess, and what kind of a slut I think I am.

  I make some groaning noises but no one responds. I thrash around a little in protest and listen to my own chains clinking, but nothing happens.

  I start to worry about getting home. I start to get angry, even a little scared, but just as I begin to sweat again, the chains clunk and shudder and my head starts to rise and my feet move hesitantly towards the ground.

  As I am lowered, John removes first the hood, then the gag.

  “Game Over,” he grins.

  I take a deep breath of fresh air, and start immediately to complain.

  “Hey don’t worry about me,” I complain.

  But I say it unconvincingly, for the censor is back. The censor is looking at the huge dildo on the table and telling me that I got off lightly, real lightly.

  John laughs. “You need to be more careful what you ask for,” he says. “Because round here you always get what you ask for. No more, no less.”

  Past Tense

  I sit dreamily at Owen’s table sipping my mid-morning coffee and thinking about the episode at John and Jean’s house. The whole event has taken on a dream-like quality, as if it wasn’t me who did it at all, or at least as if it doesn’t matter, as if it had all the importance of eating ice cream.

  The similarity of the incident to a near miss I had in New York nearly ten years ago is obvious, and that event became one of my most enduring sexual fantasies.

  This time I went further, and it was truly one of the hottest experiences I have ever had, but why was it so hot? Is it the frustration of non-completion, or is it something else, something unhealthy? Is it the inherent helplessness of the situation I put myself in that was so exciting – the danger of it all?

  And if I do go back and complete – whatever that entails – will it lose its power and become nothing but a sullied experience with a couple of unsuitable partners, something I have done with my sexuality that was simply inappropriate? Or maybe it’s like heroin – maybe each fix just gets better and better; maybe each trip has to be more and more extreme until suddenly you find yourself doing n’importe quoi.

  I sip my coffee.

  And what about sex as an expression of love in all of that? Doesn’t one exclude the other?

  I’m interrupted by something dropping through Owen’s letterbox. I cross the room expectantly hoping for my first batch of forwarded mail, Owen hasn’t lived here for years and his own mail dried up long ago, but it’s only a free newspaper.

  I return to the table and flick through, daydreaming and half-heartedly reading the adverts. I’m surprised not to have received any of my French mail yet.

  I make a “Hum,” noise of reflection, and pick up the phone.

  Isabelle answers immediately.

  “Hello stranger,” she says, discreetly rebuking me for not having called more often. “Your cat is on my lap right now,” she tells me.

  I smile. My cat. Poor Paloma. She seems to belong to a whole different era.

  “So how are you?” I ask. “Are you two getting along OK?”

/>   Isabelle laughs. “Yeah. She wakes me up a bit at night, but I’m getting used to it. It’s quite nice really. Paloma is having a lovely holiday, aren’t you?” she coos.

  “But how are you?” she asks, her voice suddenly serious.

  Me. I pause, thinking about it.

  “How am I?” I wonder. I haven’t asked myself the question.

  “I don’t know really,” I say uncertainly. “I guess I’m fine.”

  “Are you …” Isabelle says.

  But I interrupt her. I don’t know what she was going to say, but I can tell from her voice that it’s on a touchy feely level, and I very much want to stay in the material world.

  “I was wondering,” I ask. “Did you find the time to check my post?”

  Isabelle coughs. “Yeah. Actually I was hoping you’d phone,” she says brightly.

  I frown. “Yeah?”

  “Mm,” she says. “Most of it was just junk. But you did get a cheque.”

  “A cheque?” I repeat.

  I can hear her hunting through the pile. I exhale and bite my lip.

  “Yeah, it’s from Axa,” she says. “Is that Steve’s insurance?”

  I wince in pain at the statement. “Is it Steve’s insurance?” I wonder. “Can it be Steve’s insurance? If he’s dead?”

  “I expect so,” I say.

  “Maybe it should be Steve’s old insurance,” I think, but then, it’s not like Steve has any new insurance. To avoid thinking about the reality of his death my mind is losing itself in a question of grammar.

  “It’s quite a big cheque actually,” she says.

  I nod slowly.

  “Hello?” Isabelle prompts.

  “Yes, I’m still here,” I say.

  “Ah, here it is,” she says. “Yes. Axa. It’s …”

  “Just send it then,” I interrupt. “Or, no … Maybe you could just pay it in,” I say. “Oh, I don’t know.”

  “I think I can do that, can’t I?” Isabelle says. “If you send me your bank details.”

  I clear my throat. “Yes. I think so,” I reply.

  Isabelle sighs. “Well. Do you want me to? You don’t sound sure.”

  I frown. What I’m actually not sure about is if I want the cheque at all.

  “Mark?”

  “Look, I feel funny about it, I mean, should I? Do you think I should? In a way it doesn’t seem …”

  “Mark,” Isabelle interrupts my rambling. “It’s not from Steve. It’s from his insurance. It’s a cheque from a huge company that owes you money for your injuries, that’s all.”

  The accident rips through my mind. I feel sick. My chest feels tight. I shudder.

  “I …” I say.

  I jerk my foot up and down on the floor and bite my bottom lip and nod at the receiver.

  “Just say yes, Mark,” Isabelle says. “Just say, yes please, pay it in.”

  “OK, yes please,” I say. “Pay it in.”

  “Good. So how have you been?” Isabelle asks again.

  “Fine,” I say.

  “And your knee, how is it?”

  “Fine,” I say, my voice rasping slightly. “I keep forgetting about it actually,” I tell her honestly.

  “And the scar?”

  I pull my sweatshirt forwards and glance at the scar on my shoulder.

  “Fine too,” I say. “So, anything else? In the post, I mean.”

  Isabelle clears her throat, audibly switching back into business mode.

  “Nothing much,” she says, leafing through the envelopes. “Oh, yes, there is one I didn’t open. A proper letter.”

  I frown. “A proper letter?”

  “Yeah,” she says. “You know, handwritten.”

  I rub the bridge of my nose. “Who’s it from?” I ask.

  “Well, I don’t know,” she says. “I didn’t think I should … Shall I open it then?”

  “Sure,” I say. I can hear that she’s already ripping the envelope open.

  “Oh,” she says.

  “What is it?”

  “Maybe I should just forward this,” she says. “Maybe you should read it alone.”

  “No, it’s fine, honestly. Who’s it from?” I ask.

  “It’s from Steve’s parents,” Isabelle says.

  I slowly run my tongue across my front teeth.

  “From his parents,” I repeat.

  Isabelle mumbles as she skims the text.

  “Oh, I see. Look,” she says. “I’m sorry Mark. I shouldn’t have opened it.”

  I shrug. “Just read it?” My voice sounded unintentionally irritable so I add, “Please?”

  “Well, they’re having a remembrance service it says. It’s on Steve’s birthday. Just his friends and family.”

  I clear my throat. “A service,” I say.

  “Do you want me to read it to you?”

  I sigh. “No, just, um, send it on will you?”

  “OK, if you …”

  “Actually, just keep it,” I say.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “Whenever it is, I won’t be able to go.”

  “It’s the 5th of June.”

  I swallow. “Really?” I say.

  “Humm,” Isabelle says, apparently still reading.

  “That’s the day before my birthday,” I say.

  “Yeah,” she says.

  “His birthday was the day before mine,” I say.

  “Yes, I just realised. So you’re not going?”

  “No,” I say sharply. I clear my throat. “I can’t go.”

  “Maybe you should, you know. It might do you good. Will you actually be back by then?”

  “I don’t really know,” I mumble. “Look, I’m sorry Isa, but I’ve got to go now,” I say. “I’ll call you later in the week, OK?”

  Isabelle coughs. “OK Mark. I’m sorry,” she says.

  “Yeah,” I say. “Never mind, eh? Any others like that, just, you know, post them on.”

  “OK. Bye then,” she says.

  I drop the receiver onto the base. I stare at it numbly for a moment, and then, for some reason I start to feel angry; for some reason I start to feel furiously angry.

  I pace to the window, and then I pace back again and stare angrily at the telephone. Then I return to the window and stare at the sea.

  “Steve’s,” I mutter. “Steve’s insurance, Steve’s birthday, Steve’s friends, Steve’s family.”

  I shake my head. “Doesn’t anyone know? He’s dead.”

  Past Imperfect

  Steve’s telephone resurrection stays with me for a few days, haunting my sleep with tortured nightmares and making my days silent and thoughtful.

  I battle along the windswept seafront and walk along the pier. Looking through the wooden slats at the murky depths below, I ponder his death and his unexpected continuing existence.

  The more I think about it, the more absurd it seems that someone can simply cease to exist, and the stranger it seems that everything that defined them, everything that defines them, from the jobs they did, to the clothes that they chose, from the holiday snaps to friends and family, and above all our memories, our opinions of them, should continue obstinately to exist.

  Within a few days I am feeling chronically lonely again but the call has been useful in at least one way. I’m now certain that I’m not ready to go back. I’m not ready to face the concerned glances, the sympathetic pats on the shoulder.

  In fact the only people I can even envisage talking to are those who know nothing of this. That I realise, means meeting new people, or delving into the distant past.

  Right now through the bay window, I can see a beautiful orange VW camper-van which I think could be Jenny’s. Something tells me that only an old hippy like her could have enough respect for the iconic VW camper van to keep one in such perfect condition.

  A woman climbs down from the driver’s seat, and if it is Jenny she has put on a lot of weight. But even after 15 years, something about the way she holds herself, the way she
pulls her windswept hair from her face tells me that it is indeed her. My old friend, my last ever girlfriend, my last ever abortive attempt at being straight.

  I run outside to meet her and amid the salty gusts we hug awkwardly. I run my hand along the curved roof-panel of the van.

  “I love the van!” I say.

  She smiles. “Yeah, isn’t it great?”

  “It looks brand new.”

  She laughs. “Believe it or not, it is. They still make them in Brazil.”

  Then she grabs my arm and pulls me towards the house. “Enough of the car though, I’ve been sitting in the thing for nearly two hours. What I need is a cup of tea.”

  Jenny does want tea, but it turns out that she doesn’t mind talking about the van at all.

  “They’re very difficult to get,” she tells me. “Nick got this one imported specially from Brazil, cost nearly twenty thousand by the time we got our hands on it.”

  I pour the boiling water over the teabags. “Worth it though,” I say. “The ultimate hippy statement.”

  Jenny frowns. “I don’t think that any twenty thousand pound car can be called a hippy statement,” she says. “But we looked at all the new ones, and they’re all like ice cream vans, or disabled buses.”

  “Well,” I say, handing her the tea. “You’re definitely more Miss Hippy than Mr Whippy.”

  She glares at me. “Mark,” she says. “It’s so not a hippy van.”

  I raise my palms in submission. “OK. Just joking.”

  “Yes, well don’t.” She says this without apparent irony.

  As we sit and chat I realise that the last fifteen years have changed Jenny more than I would have thought possible. Or they have changed me so much I don’t recognise her anymore.

  In my memories, she was a witty, sarcastic, happy-go lucky kind of girl; a pot-smoking, hard-drinking, man-chasing wench. But I wonder if my memories are accurate. I wonder if I haven’t somehow mixed Jenny up with a whole era of youth, a whole era of fun. Maybe none of us are those people now, maybe it’s just the mind playing tricks on the past and we never really were.

  I wonder when she will ask me why I am back in the UK, and I wonder how I will answer, what I will actually tell her. For the moment she is far too busy telling me about her house.