Caesar73 wrote: ↑4 years ago
Well, I hope, that Kat will get home without getting the cold ...and some rest, after that tripp
She would deserve some rest, doesn't she? I promise you, she won't touch a single rope in the next chapter if that's enough rest.
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“Hey, Kat, slept well? Ready for a new, dull day of studying?” Julian greeted the following morning as I let him in my dorm room.
“Absolutely perfect. Although I still have to adjust to jeans and shirts.”
“Oh, no problem. Our classmates wouldn’t mind your usual clothing,” he laughed, grabbing my bag and flinging it at me.
I caught it and thought about a snarky reply, but Autumn was faster, turning away from her laptop: “Do I hear I need to tie someone?”
“Yeah, yourself,” I returned, seizing my coat. Julian and I left the room and walked toward the college library. There were no classes on Easter Monday, but we had to hand in almost impossible exercises later that week. So most students from our class gathered together to work collectively. After three lazy days of vacation, Julian and I were behind on schedule, but the deadline was still manageable.
We walked hand-in-hand in silence, not mentioning how awful yesterday had ended. After four minutes of driving, I had given up. Too cold. Too much water for my body to warm up. The big blob around my feet grew, leaving my feet drenched in an ice-cold bath. So Robert halted at the roadside, helped me out of the car, cut me out of the plastic, and freed me from my onesie. No teasing as he saw I was serious. Lauren gave me a towel and my own clothes they had carried all weekend for emergencies. “Raynaud’s syndrome,” she had called my toes, of which three were pale. “No worries, my cousin has it too. Now get a warm pair of socks.”
I had accepted her offer as my entire body hurt from the cold. Wearing three pairs of socks, sweatpants, and a t-shirt, I had been zipped in a sleeping bag before we continued our journey. Half an hour later, they had tied me up again as I “looked quite warm and energetic already.” At home, I napped before eight o’clock without dinner and woke up well-rested as if I never defied my body and mind to cross all my boundaries. Julian understood I had to focus now, and did not want to discuss this, let alone reflect on our hiking adventure now. Excellent.
“Hi, guys,” a few of our classmates murmured, looking up from their notebooks as we entered the classroom. We took two desks, grabbed our stuff from our bags, and started working. It was not like everyone cooperated, but there was social pressure to get things done and give little hints to the weaker students. So boosting productivity and motivation.
As the morning progressed, more students trickled in: Almost half of our class, as few managed to do everything on their own. Triple integrals, differential equations, and reaction-diffusion equations boggled my mind. Julian’s even more as he repeatedly asked questions and struggled to come up with the answers himself. We advanced slowly but outpaced most, who had started days earlier. In the middle of the afternoon, I caught up with the leading pack who had started on Saturday.
At six, I finished the last gruesome computation together with four other girls, and I slipped Julian a note with not-so-subtle clues. Then we drove to one of their apartments, Michelle’s, for a girls’ night, something we rarely did but loved in our male-dominated field. It was unplanned, but as we had finished already, we had nothing else to do.
“Kat, Onions, garlic, and paprika are yours,” Michelle shouted to me, pushing a cutting board and five onions in my hand. She was the only local, so she had chosen not to live in the dorms. All others, like me, did and had to build a whole new social circle. At the start of the year, we gathered weekly, but as all found new hobbies and met new people, it was now unnecessary.
“Sure,” I replied as the almost militaristic process of warming up various kinds of food in complex ways and combinations began. Michelle took, as usual, the lead, and within an hour, we finished all three versions of risotto simultaneously. We sat down, and Michelle, Alison, and Olivia continued sharing their bottle of red wine while Sophia and I drunk water. No-one cared about that as we were from all walks of life. Alison and Olivia were more traditional nerds playing DnD, gamed, taught themselves to code et cetera. Contrarily, Michelle was your stereotypical popular attractive cheerleader. Only a thousand times smarter. Sophia was shy, never on the foreground, but her body exceptional flexible being a gymnast competing nationally. Often this gave me dreams about her potential, and you can imagine which, and no particular reason, my usual lab partner.
The night progressed with tiramisu Alison had made yesterday night and a C-level romcom, none of us loved. So we started gossiping shamelessly about the guys in our class, our professors, and crushes. Like middle school, only with tipsy, less insecure companions.
As expected, my new well-known lover made me a clear target. Their attacks were relentless. I was unprepared for these vicious killer-instincts as I usually was far from the most fascinating or mysterious. I never dated in high school and was not very popular, attractive, or exceptional. I had relished that image, but today differed.
“What do you like about Julian?”
“What do you do together?”
“What cute things he says to you?”
Clearly, I should not answer these questions truthfully, but I had never experienced such a cross-examination. The others perceived my stumbling and anxiety and persisted, sensing I was hiding something. Of course, the correct response would be to tell them to shut up in gradually more demanding manners. Yet, stupid, ignorant me, dodged the questions, making me fair game. Even Sophia joined, creating idiotic theories about Julian and me, and what we did together.
Yet, I blundered again by saying we had hiked for three days in the forest and had our own tent. These girls were way too nosy as each scrap of information brought them closer and energized them even more.
“C’mon, Kat, no need to cover anything. How bad can it be?” Alison asked. “I mean, none of us is entirely conventional. No need to be afraid.”
“Yeah, speak. You got nothing to lose. We won’t judge,” Olivia added with a bittersweet smile. “Not like I’ve had many dates in my life.
“Maybe I should spoil something about myself,” Michelle said. “I tied my high school dates to my bed. That gave a clue who was in it for sex, too desperate, too stupid, too boring, or a decent match. Let’s say none fell in the latter category.”
And there was my final slip: My mouth dropped open.
“What? Nothing wrong with that,” Michelle laughed, sipping from her sixth glass of wine.
“No, no, that ain’t no problem. Please, Michelle, I meant no offense,” I stumbled. “I had not suspected that.”
“So, you’re familiar with bondage?” Olivia cut in. “That’s you hiding? I couldn’t care less about you being kinky. That’s almost mainstream nowadays.”
I sighed. I had lost. Poor Julian. I had ruined it for him too. “Yeah, we tie each other up. Only rope and such, nothing extreme.”
This lie slipped through, as yesterday’s cold bath and spending half of Saturday in a net invaded my brain. The others smiled like hyenas after getting their prey. I wanted to nope out as Alison out of nowhere cracked up. “That’s all? Tying each other up? Saying that would have saved us half an hour.”
“Girls, this wasn’t easy for her, or am I the only one who’s never been tied up?” Sophia interrupted. Alison and Olivia said they had only read about it but had never done it themselves. Michelle liked to tie people up but solely to her bed and tease them. This made me feel like the bondage junkie once more, but the others missed the clues to get deeper into my mind. Or well, until Sophia opened her mouth again:
“You know, I fantasized about that, ropes, but who could I ask? Friends? Too risky. Family? I’ve no siblings, and my parents are a hard no. My coach or fellow gymnast seems foolish as anything that could injure me is prohibited.” She paused, taking a sip from her water. She looked around the room, fumbling with her t-shirt. “Will… Will you guys help me? Only once. Nothing big. Not too complicated.”
I looked at Michelle, who smiled from ear to ear. “Now? I’ve no ropes lying around.”
“Tape or bandannas, perhaps?” I said, not knowing toward this was going.
Michelle doubted this but left the room to search for any flexible materials to restrain someone with. Alison and Olivia gawked at Sophia and me sitting next to each other on the couch. She crouched towards me, trembling and letting her fingers play with each other. Everything had gone so fast, but she would not back down.
“Scarves it will be,” Michelle said, throwing four on my lap. All different colors and materials, so not her standard collection. “I’m curious about your skills, and you haven’t drunk anything, so you’re responsible.”
I accepted them, grabbed the first, inquired whether Sophia was sure before asking her to spin around and place her arms behind her back. “Nothing too complicated, you said, didn’t you?” I repeated as I picked the nicest shawl: a fake silk one, two feet in length. I wrapped it around her wrists that I tied palm-to-palm together, carefully. I intended to bind her, not to cut her skin.
Sophia was short with blond hair tied in a ponytail, freckles, and no unnecessary ounce of fat. A perfect gymnast, still in her study clothes: wide throwers and a bright yellow t-shirt from her team. She had hidden it underneath a more presentable vest all day but had taken it off in the temperate apartment. As I pulled her elbows together to inspect their capabilities, I required no force. Almost as if them touching was their usual position. A little jealous, I secured them with another scarf while quizzing her thoughts about the tie so far. “Peculiar,” was positive enough for me to continue.
The three other pairs of eyes in the room were aimed at me, placing pressure to act professional, whatever that meant. I could have played clumsy, nervous, or untrained but would only raise Sophia’s nerves. So I did not hide my abilities.
Having used the two best scarves, I tied her ankles together with a long, almost six feet, broad, woolen one. I could have knotted it but mummified her lower legs until her knees. Snug, and not leaving any marks while she could not kick out. Not as secure as I would have tied Autumn, as escape was plausible but sufficient for tonight.
“Is this acceptable, or should I blindfold you?” I asked, laying her against me on the couch. Each of my movements would remind her of her bounds, amplifying her despair.
“Eh, sure,” she responded. “This is weird, surrendering myself like this. Not that you’ve to free me, but I feel imperiled.”
“That’s the idea,” I responded as I folded the last scarf two times double and bound it over her eyes. “You stay here. If there’s anything, food, drinks, you want to get out, ask.” I could have gagged her, abandoned her in Michelle’s bedroom, or teased her, but decided to continue our girls’ night like usual: talking and snacking. Much cozier and giving Sophia a positive, not frightening experience.
Trying to act as if no bound classmate rested against my shoulder, I initiated a conversation. It led to bondage, so I retried, failed again, and this time said in no uncertain terms ties was a banned subject. As the others had more trouble putting our blindfolded friend out of their heads, we put on another movie. An epic fantasy movie Sophia had never seen.
She had tried to chat with us but missed the subtle social cues her blindfold absorbed. Interrupting, awkward silences, and general clumsiness, but the movie was even worse. Stunning music, complicated dialogue, us discussing the ladies’ apparels, and rating the males, included only one activity for her and three frustrations. She was agitated, and I liked my choice not to gag her as her inability to talk made her more excluded than an ignorable piece of furniture. I fed her popcorn, chocolate, and whatever else while her broad unambiguous smile this was she had hoped for.
Yet, all good things come to an end. Around midnight, I untied Sophia and let her acclimatize for ten minutes before we left Michelle’s apartment. Sophia still recovered and took in all emotions in silence during the half an hour walk to the dorms. Here, our ways split to different enormous concrete buildings, and she thanked and hugged me, saying she “had waited for ages for such a chance.”