And now a long story I have had some qualms about posting. I have shown it to friends and I have heard both 'don't' and 'do' regarding putting it here but the 'do's' won so here it is. It is a little harsher and darker than my ordinary postings but I decided to post in anyway, after all, the story was in my head and I wrote it. That should not be such a surprise, we all have darker sides, don't we?
A disclaimer, though. I feel that people riding motorcycles get a bad press in this story. All my stories are fantasy stories, dream stories and everything that is put in them are there to represent something in the story. A story set in Egypt is not about Egypt, the setting is there because I fancy it in a fantasy. The bikers in this story represent something that is not real life bikers. And I know there is a great difference between Hell's Angels and Totley on the Wold's Sunday Riders.
The same goes for how things are described in a story. It is not necessary one of my opinions that is expressed but an opinion held by the one expressing it in the story. Ah, you get it! I am too worried, perhaps, that you will think me dismissive. Now, read the story!
What a strange world we live in, where the whitest fears and darkest desires of our souls can take shape and walk the earth. And where that darkest of angels can take you by the hand and show you the nightmare that lives in your head, the dreams and desires that haunt your deepest mind.
I am the complete bore. I am the young professional, always perfectly dressed, always on top of it. I am in the middle of my academic career, successful, but like most women here, not as successful as my younger male colleagues. I am a celebrated lecturer and my paper on the fallacies of formal semantics caused some controversy and is very much cited.
I am the woman the mothers of my male colleagues would love them to bring home. I am smart, elegant and witty. I am attractive in their eyes as a career option but I am not the girl they think about alone in their beds.
I am young, successful, attractive and single, the kind of woman who finds her love in so many books of today. I am the perfect bore who should be loved by someone but who finds herself to be too aloof and cold to be pushed against the wall even when the whole department is having a drunken stupor.
He was different. He was a stranger in my world. He was my student, still I don't know if he was older or younger than me. He seemed to be without age, eternal youth, perhaps, but he walked the earth as if he knew every part of it and had been there many, many times before.
He was like a joke, like something from a film, with his leather jacket and fifties hair. I laughed when I first saw him. He wasn't bothered and he looked back at me with a smile that should have made me furious with its arrogance. Instead he entered my dreams.
He wasn't to be denied and I looked at him in a way that must have encouraged his childish content, his arrogance and smugness. I was like a schoolgirl, like the girl with the pony tail and long skirt in an old film who is giggling and staring at the boy on his motorbike.
When the conference dinner was held I couldn't stand the speeches and the stifling air of academic perfection. Instead I sneaked away with the biker boy and got myself laid. My colleagues would have stared in disbelief if they had seen how I was taken by this stranger in paradise.
They didn't know and I didn't tell them. Neither did I tell them about the weekend he had promised me. He told me he would show me something that I had never seen but something I would know what it was the moment I saw it.
He picked me up on Friday with his monster of a bike. He gave me a crash helmet and I climbed on board. I felt like something from a film, hitching my skirt high and holding on for my dear life as we left the parking lot with a mighty roar. My adventure was about to begin.
I didn't know him and shouldn't trust him. I knew I was entering into madness but I did it with open eyes, willingly, against my better judgement but I felt that I didn't want to judge. I felt that maybe he was beyond judgement.
We drove on for many hours and we didn't talk. I had no idea where we were heading but at that moment I didn't care. He was allowed to take me wherever he wanted. I followed him and was prepared for a dream.
Night came and we stopped at a B&B. We shared a room as a married couple and for a moment I pretended we were. We didn't share a bed and were too exhausted to think about it. It didn't matter. I wanted him but I didn't feel I had to have him there and then. There was still time.
He awoke me early in the morning. The sun was still down as we sneaked away from the inn. I had brought clean underwear and a clean blouse but there was not space for a complete change so I slipped into my skirt and jacket from yesterday and climbed aboard his stallion.
We drove on through the bitter cold and dark morning. I was cold and stiff and still sleepy. In the morning light we stopped by the road and rested. He told me we were nearly there.
I didn't ask him where we were heading. I knew he wouldn't and, perhaps, couldn't tell. For once in my life I was patient.
The morning was still freezing and I was sleepy and miserable as I stepped from the bike. There was something in the morning air that promised a hot sunny day but it was still a dreary morning.
He stretched his body, yawned and looked at the world. He returned to his bike and took something from a bag. He returned to me and held out his hand. I looked at him and wondered what it was he was offering me.
I took from his outstretched hand a very tiny, blue and white bikini. I stared at him as I felt the fabric of the garments with my trembling fingers.
I had entered too far into his world to deny him. I was his and nothing could make me not do what he wanted.
I shivered in the cold morning air as I unbuttoned my jacket took and it off and then slipped out of my skirt. I looked at him as my numb fingers worked with the buttons of my blouse before I slid it from my shoulders. I saw him staring at me as I slipped down my knickers and put them on top of my other clothes. I stepped out of my shoes sensing the cold ground beneath my feet. I don't know why I did it like that, stripping naked before I put on the bikini.
The clothes he had offered me was nothing, protected nothing. I was naked in the cold morning air and my body was trembling. I was not completely naked but I was exposed and I felt that this was the moment when I stepped into his world. This was the way he wanted me and I had not uttered a word in protest. I had complied without protesting.
We drove on down the road and I clung to his leather clad body, pressing my small frame against him, sensing my nakedness against his protected back. I was cold. The wind bit my skin and I felt naked.
I looked up as we came through a curve and I saw the true glory of the world laid out before my eyes. The valley was glowing in the morning sun and the emerald hills were rolling softly down to the river, everything was made magic by the thin mist that was rapidly evaporating.
He pointed to a wound in the pristine landscape, a brown patch of mud and grey tents that looked as if the ground had opened and spewed some foul and forbidden blasphemy onto the virgin soil. We were on our way to that patch.
Then we entered the nightmare. Around us was a chaos of mud and tents and bikes and monstrous beings clad in black leather. They moved like humans but they were the rats of hell that had gathered here because the Old Man himself had thrown some unclean carcass on the ground that attracted them to this hell on earth.
We drove around among this gathering of men and motorcycles and my knight greeted them and was greeted by them as their brother. He was of them and this was his domain, his home.
There were women there as well. They were outnumbered by the men of the bikes. They were vulgar and brazen, bold and confident. The women of that camp were without fear and yet vulnerable and exposed. Their clothes were more revealing than protecting and their movements deliberate and provocative. They were ogled and fondled, held and pushed by the rough bikers. They did everything to attract attention and the attention they got was brutal and swift. Yet they performed their dance of pleasure and when they did not perform well they were slapped and abused and beaten and swept aside. Still they laughed and drank and held onto the brutes and bullies as if they loved them.
I was entering this hell camp of bikers and tarts clad in a bikini. I felt naked and clung to my knight as if my life depended on it. We drove through this chaos and I saw an unknown world move before my eyes. I held on to my biker boy as if he was the only thing I could trust in this madness.
Yet I knew, in my heart I knew that he had not brought me here just to let me watch. He had brought me here to show what his life was like, to let me feel on my own skin how his world felt against my protected body. He had dressed me in a bikini, exposed me to the men of this gathering, not to brag about his capture but to let me know what it was like to be a woman in his world. I knew he would throw me to the crowd. Yet I could not hate him.
Words cannot describe what moved inside my soul as I rode on his bike between the tents and machines and the crowds. I saw chaos and abuse, brutality and violence. I saw the worst of man that I could imagine. Still there was this stirring sensation within me that this was life. This was a kind of crawling, dirty and brutal life that made my department, my everyday life, seem like a tomb, like a funeral with its ceremonies and chants.
The sun was up and warmed my body. I was naked in this chaos and scared beyond anything I had experienced and yet I was alive and felt this tingling within me. The tingling that told me that this ugly and horrible place, this hell on earth made my body live. I hated it but I was alive hating it.
We stopped and I was ordered to dismount the bike. I had to let go of his body. I could no longer hold on to him. I had to stand on my own two legs. He looked at me and I saw that he, indeed, was one of them. He was my knight, my guardian but he was one of them. I didn't belong here. I was a stranger, an exotic animal.
We were soon surrounded by men, bikers dressed in leather. They greeted my boy and talked and cheered and offered him beer and their love. They stared at me but did not touch me. I was still his, I still belonged to him and honour between men protected me. They cheered and talked about me. They talked about my body, how slim I was, how my breasts were too small and how a pretty innocent face I had and what they wanted to do with me and how they would have me perform and please them. They never talked to me, never offered me a kind word or even a can of beer.
Then my biker told me to take my top off. It was said in a casual way. He showed off his power over me to his friends. He didn't order me or threaten me. He just told me to remove my top. I was his property and there was no need to show me any respect. I had just to obey.
He took it and put it in a bag on his bike. He was still straddling it while I stood beside it. Taking my top off was like a signal, that I was not protected any more. The men closed in and crowded me and started to grope me and fondle my breasts. I held my breath and felt my body pushed from side to side. They didn't hurt me but they touched me. Their hands were eager and rough and some of them even had their gloves on. They pinched my nipples and caressed my belly and held my arms. Someone even put his hand down my knickers.
Then they stopped and moved away. My biker boy had waved his hand and said that is was enough. They liked him. They respected him and now he had said it was enough. The men laughed and moved away.
We walked through the crowd and I was still trembling and overcome with the chaos around me. I felt secure with him but I knew that I was not to expect to be protected all the time. I knew I was there for the pleasure of him and his friends.
Images of drunken bikers and screaming women flashed before my eyes and I walked in a haze, like in a dream or if I had been drunk. The noise and roar of the crowd mixed with the warmth of the sun on my skin and smell of leather from my knight's jacket. I remember stopping and taking off my bikini bottom. I think I was ordered. I remember someone taking my last piece of clothing and throwing it into a crowd. I never saw the bikini again and I walked on naked.
We came to a place where I saw a girl being pushed against a motor cycle and her knickers being ripped off. Then she was raped while screaming in fear and anger. We watched for a while and then she was gone and I was lifted onto the bike. I was placed facing backwards as I straddled the machine.
I was held in place and I soon realised that there was a crowd around me, staring at me, screaming and smiling. My legs were spread and soon I realised that they wanted me to touch myself. My hands were pushed down to my sex while I realised how exposed I was and how widely spread my legs were.
The crowd was annoyed that I didn't comply, that I didn't do as I was told. In fear I tried to do what they wanted and I put my fingers in my sex. I couldn't. I was not able to do it and I pulled my hand away.
I was rewarded with a slap in my face and suddenly there was pain and my heart started beating. Then I realised that someone had put his fingers in my sex. I was naked and exposed and ogled by a great, dirty crowd. He did not take notice and while they cheered and urged him on I felt him move his fingers within me.
I was helpless. I could do nothing. I was their entertainment. I looked desperately for my biker boy but I could not see him. I almost started to cry. The fingers moved and touched and wriggled like a snake within me.
That dirty, overwhelming life that was this camp, this gathering of bikers was moving inside me and that damned life warmed my body in a way I had never experienced before. I had no choice. It was not for me to decide what would happen. I screamed and cried but my body betrayed me.
I remember lying slumped on the bike, exhausted, overcome with this unwelcome climax of the unbidden intrusion. I was breathing heavily, my body limp. I was not there and yet I was and my body was warm and tired and seemed not to be mine any more.
I was, suddenly, pulled from the bike and stood on trembling legs for a second before I was thrust forwards against the bike. I heard the crowd roar with laughter and I was held down on my belly. I was told I was not being obedient enough and that I was too posh to treat them with respect. That I thought too highly of my own importance.
Then I felt the pain. I felt the impact that rocked my body forward. I didn't understand what it was but I felt something burning my buttocks. Then the impact again and I thrust my naked breasts against the bike.
I realised I was being beaten. I was being whipped. They held me down, pressing my naked body against the bike while one of them whipped my bottom. I think he used a belt but I am not sure. It bit my flesh and soon I was screaming like a baby. I looked up and saw through the tears in my eyes the face of a woman. She was pretty, her face was young and innocent. She looked at me with something I thought was pity. Then she started to laugh.
They laughed while I was whipped. They told me I deserved it. I was worthy of nothing better. And I cried.
I didn't realise, at first, that I wasn't being beaten any more. I was panting, overcome with emotions. I wasn't prepared for the intrusion. I felt something entering me from behind and I knew I was being taken. I realised with a surreal sensation that it was not enough to whip me. They wanted more and they took it.
I don't know how many men entered me but there were more than one and I had to endure them all. They laughed as they did it and I closed my eyes. Again my body betrayed me and the crowd found great pleasure in that.
The rest is just a blur. I remember being placed on a motorcycle again and how we rode through the camp. I held on and didn't realise at first that it was my knight who was driving. I slowly woke up realising we were leaving the camp. We were on the road again.
I pressed my still naked body against his leather clad and held on. I was crying as we drove on, relieved that we were leaving the camp behind. He was my knight in shining armour after all. He saved me from the crowd. I was grateful and crying.
We stopped by the road where I had entered into his world. I stepped from the bike and he gave me my clothes and my shoes. I dressed in silence. I didn't recognise my old clothes. Another woman had been wearing them, in another life. I dressed and covered my nudity and climbed onto the bike again. We didn't speak.
We drove through the night and I held on. In the dark night we came to where another woman lived. I dismounted the bike and walked to the door. I seemed to understand what I was supposed to do. I had a key and opened the door. I stopped and turned around. I saw the boy on his bike and he looked at me. He didn't smile, he didn't say anything. We both knew he had shown me something I didn't know existed. I had been to hell and I had returned.
I wondered what would happen after this. What would I say to my students? Would they see that this woman had been somewhere far, far away, and beyond? Would they know that she had seen her darkest desires and her whitest fears? Would they know she had harboured that within her?
The biker boy revved up his engine and drove off. He disappeared into the night like a dream. I stood and watched him go and saw him drive into the shadows. I knew I would not see him again. I knew he would always be here.
There is an intensity here -- and I think an honesty -- that is thrilling, and chilling... this is a vision of Hell, is it not -- Something out of Hieronomous Bosch, or perhaps Dante being shown around by a none-too-protective Virgil?
ReplyDeleteJanice, thank you, this story is both dark and beautiful, it does you credit.
ReplyDeleteWarm hugs,
Paul.
Motorcycle biker babe Dove appreciates the disclaimer.
ReplyDelete'...a wound in the pristine landscape...' I love the way you have written this. That and the next paragraph so descriptive I can see it around me.
This is beautifully written and though dark our heroine has still gone in eyes open. She knows she will experience something she otherwise would not. She is bright and shining entering this hell with a protector (?). He saves her though is the same one who throws her to the dogs in the first place. Now she has this secret thing in her heart that no one knows of and that will never leave her.
Hugs
Dove
Very, very well written. :)
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading it. It's intense and scary and exciting.
Thank you Wystan. You always read with a clear mind. It was intense to write it. Maybe it is hell, I don't know. I am not so sure. Remember, she says it is hell, it is through her eyes we see it! Maybe it is a kind of life, after all.
ReplyDeletePaul, I bow my head. Thank you for those words.
Dove, I could see it too. I am chuffed that you could. This means writing works. As always, Dove, you have hit the nail on the head. Her eyes are indeed open. She is devastated but not a victim. She learns something and I believe she is stronger for it.
Ofia, thank you for those words, it was scary to write it, believe me!
This was a brilliantly written story Janice.
ReplyDeleteIt dealt with a terrifying scene with a frankness and quietness that counterpointed beautifully with the subject matter.
You have managed to open the dark fantasy within with skill whilst maintaining the heroine's tenuous touch of the fact that this isn't real, a fine effort.
Having said that I would be surprised if such things didn't go on in real life.
Thanks
Ollie
Thanks, Ollie, I know you are a careful reader so this means a lot to hear...smiles.
ReplyDelete