“So,” I said, “Alex, have you ever used this – thing?” “Oh, no,” she said, her black-clad legs straddled over the package, “But my yoga instructor – when she talks about it – you should see her. I just knew it would be for you – she just looks – well – rapturous.” For only a minute, I felt a pang of jealousy – lucky yoga instructor, to be so admired. Alex continued putting black metal pipes together as she scrutinized the package instructions, “I always think of you when she talks about it – how good it would be for you.” The pang eased just a bit.
When Alex finished her labors, the “thing” as she called it, consisted of a metal bar, to be strung across a doorway; the bar was fitted with metal boots with rather evil-looking clamps. From the bar hung a canvas swath, equipped with a buckled waist belt (“for ergonomic back and lower abdomen support” read the package) and, on either side of the doorway, handcuffs – one for the right, one for the left. “Alex,” I said, my skepticism regained, “Didn’t antigravity stuff go out with the 70’s? Unless this is some queer bondage setup . “
Alex’s look was, I thought at first, one of intrigue and amusement; this was quickly replaced with her usual star-struck innocence. “Oh, no, Kristin – anti-gravity’s been around for decades – it’s never really gone away.” She ignored the second part of my question. “All right, Alex,” I responded, “How on earth do I get into that thing?” “Well,” she said, turning away from me – I thought there was a hint of a giggle in her words – “First you have to get naked.” “I have to what?” I said, and felt suddenly angry again. “Okay, Alex, forget it – I don’t think I need peace that badly.” “What’s the big deal, Kristin? There’s no one here – and it’s the best way to approach it. Open, bare – you know. I’ll turn my head,” she was giggling. “No, no, no – I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want to do this – do you know how ridiculous I will feel, hanging up there, naked?” “You’ll have no idea how you’ll feel until you try it. Just try it Kris – please?” That Audrey Hepburn look again. Sighing, annoyed, I pulled off my t-shirt and jeans, dropping them in a cloth puddle underneath the “thing.” “Okay,” I said, crossing my arms to ward off a chill, “How do I get into this Rube Goldberg contraption?” Alex smiled. “First, you have to stand on your head.” “I have to what?” I said, for the second time in seconds, “No – No – I can’t do that, Alex.”
“You know,” Alex said, her eyes now filled with nothing but scolding, “If you had gone to yoga with me in the first place – as I asked you to – you’d be able to do a handstand with no problem.” I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth, “Alex,” I said, “I am 34 years old – I was a cheerleader two decades ago -- I could do a handstand then – Christ, Alex, what on earth was I thinking?” She walked toward me, stood in front of me, and placed her hands on my bare shoulders. I shivered, but it wasn’t from the cold. “I’ll help you,” she said, “You have to believe – remember – inner peace.” Was I angry? Crazy? Sunk by those insane feline eyes? Whatever the case – I inverted, Alex pulled on my ankles, and somehow I was in the doorway, upside down, my feet encased in those tortoruous boots, my hands clasped to either side of the doorway. I could feel my bare breasts swaying down, my nipples eyeing the floor. Alex stood in front of me – though standing on the floor, she, too, was inverted. I blinked, looked at her upside down face – her apple cheeks looked plumper but no less appealing. “Now what?” I said. “Now,” and her smile – was this Alex? -- seemed almost devilish. “Now, sweetheart, you hang.” She picked up her pocketbook, the sweater she’d left lying on my couch. “What????????” I nearly screamed, and then regretted it – the aggravation caused my blood to run to my head even more quickly, and my temples began to throb. “It’s no use finding inner peace with someone around,” she responded – was she teasing? – “I have to run home and change anyway. But don’t worry, love, I’ll be back. Until then – remember – relax – concentrate – inner peace.” She bent down – or was it tiptoed up? - tapped her lips on mine, and – with the quiet click of the door – she was gone.
“Alex?” I whispered. All alone. I could hear the tick of the clock and the hum of the refrigerator – how come I’d never before noticed either? I couldn’t see the clock and, thus inverted, had no real sense of time. How long would she be gone? How long would she leave me – err – hanging? What if my apartment was robbed in her absence? “Wait,” I muttered to myself, “That isn’t very peaceful.” I closed my eyes, tried to think of waterfalls and flowers, sunbeams and open fields. The quiet hum of my apartment’s inner workings soothed me, somehow, and perhaps if it weren’t for the slight torque on my wrists from the handcuffs, I would have slept that way. After an indiscriminate amount of time, the door clicked again – a quiet sound, but one that, in the echo of my apartment’s emptiness, rebounded almost bomb-like. I jumped – or would have jumped, were I not so securely thing-bound. “Alex?” I whispered, suddenly fearful, the brief feeling of peace and well-being evaporating, “Is that you?” Alex appeared in front of me. She had changed all right, though she was still wearing her tight black yoga leggings. She was no longer barefoot, though; her calloused feet were elevated, encased in five inch black heels. There was a rhinestone on each black spike. She wore an abbreviated black top, and I could see her muscles – though inverted – ripple underneath the tight hem. “Wow,” I thought to myself, “So that’s what yoga does . . “ I knew it was Alex, although she was wearing a mask – not a normal, Lone Ranger mask, though, but a sort of winged thing, exaggerated tips above the eyes. This thing, too, bore rhinestones. She carried a bag – yes, you guessed it, black with rhinestones. The rhinestones traced upside down words. “Alex’s toys.”
“Alex?” I whispered, confounded. I could hear the blood pound in my ears. The tick of the refrigerator, the hum of the furnace, were joined by another sound – the ticking of Alex’s heels across the tiled floor. “I think, Kristin, that you better let me talk – for once in your life, you just shut up.” The last two words were enunciated slowly, deliberately, in a loud stage-whisper. “Alex . .” “What did I say Kristin?” From the rhinestone-studded bag, she withdrew a “toy” – a long whip – not a bull-whip, not a cat-o-nine (yes, I had read the appropriate literature), but a scary whip nonetheless. I swallowed hard – given gravity, a rather awkward function. Alex paced in front me. Click, Click. The rhinestones on her heels glittered frighteningly. The heels, the rhinestones, paused. She began to lightly whip my bare legs, than my bare tits. “I understand, Kristin, that you’ve been upset.” “Yes,” I answered, trying and failing to flinch away from the strokes. “I understand you’ve been having some difficulty – finding – peace.” Her words were again slow, deliberate, delivered with a confidence Alex didn’t often express. “Yes,” I answered, and was surprised at the quiver in my own voice. “Just for a few minutes, Kristin, I want you to call me Mistress,” one rather stinging blow to the bare thighs, “And I want you to listen to me.” “Okay, Alex,” I whispered, suddenly a little frightened. The whip – the sting – one more time. “What did you call me?” “Yes, Mistress,” I said.
Alex walked around the divider, to the kitchen: she was now at my back, and I was denied the advantage of seeing the flashing heels. I could hear them, though, and could hear them pause behind me. Whack. A stinging blow to my ass. I whimpered, tried to move, tried to diminish the sting. “That,” Alex said, in her newly calm voice, “is for this stupid, senseless war we’re about to enter.” I wanted to giggle, but both pain and fear kept me quiet – so this was her release – whipping to cleanse. “Well why not?” I thought, “The Christians had hair-shirts. . “ Before my thought could continue, another stinging blow on my ass. I whimpered. “That is for the Republicans winning control of the Senate.” I could see red against my closed eyelids, and realized two things: my ass was stinging with an almost-glowing warmth, and I was soaking wet. Whack. Another stinging blow, this time to the backs of my poor, inverted thighs, “That is for the absence of any sensible energy policy.” The whippings came faster: Alex was breathing hard, and pausing only to articulate her reason: “That is for the oilmen coming into power,” “That is for the absence of a sensible environmental policy,” “That is for drilling in Alaska,” “That is for the loss of civil rights,” “That is for the loss of abortion rights,” and so it went, as Alex enumerated each disaster, each violation I thought was sure to come. By the end of her rant, there were tears running down (up?) my cheeks and I was pleading with her to let me down -- and suddenly, the problems of the world seemed rather distant.
Alex held my waist as she unbuckled the handcuffs and the midriff support. Somehow – I don’t know how – she managed to hold me up while releasing the contraption – and then, somehow, I was upright in her arms, and she was leading me to the couch. I was crying, but now silently, when she returned from the kitchen, her mask gone, the high heels off, and a glass of wine in her hands. “Here,” she said, and, after I took a long, deep draught, she kissed my forehead, then my neck, then lay back on the couch, holding me in her arms. I shuddered a little, and then felt the oddest thing – a wave of peace, almost, somehow connected to my stinging ass and my wet pussy – and Alex’s weird but effective cure. “Feel better?” she whispered, her breath whistling into my hair. “I do, you crazy bitch,” I said, and somehow giggled through the tears and the pain. “I knew it,” she said, “I knew it would work.” Then she said something that made me gasp and almost cry again: “Next time you’re naked, though, no thing, no inversion, and no whips. Just you and me – and delicious denial of the rest of the world.” I couldn’t look at her, and hoped she didn’t notice the juicy flow that was now leaking down my thighs. “And you know what else we’re going to do?” “What?” I asked, feeling vaguely childish but unembarrassed. “We’re going to start a Web site – and we’re going to collect every bad thing we can find – on this administration and its nasty policies – and you know what we’re going to call it?” “What?” I asked, dumbly, my voice muffled by her halter-top.
I could feel her smile against my hair. “We’re going to call it --‘WhiptheRepublicans.com.’”
