Laura Meets Jeffrey (29 page)

The guy I've got by the throat tries to speak but can't, so I release my grip.

He croaks, “Sorry. I'm leaving.”

He gets up, grabs his clothes and exits.

“Smooth move,” says Tony.

“I didn't mean to ruin your good time,” I apologize.

The guys all say stuff like, “Don't worry, he was a jerk,” and, “Don't let it bother you.” Actually, “Doen let it bodda ya.” And three say, “Fugetaboutit.”

They are Italian. They understand these things.

“Back to the party!” says another guy.

I move to the girl to the right of Angie who is more excited about fucking me now, but I notice Laura beckoning me so I crawl over and fuck my damsel in distress like a warrior till I come loud and proud. I get a much bigger round of “Yeahs” than even Tony did.

I've had enough of this room. We collect our clothes and go to the bar to see what we can find. It's time to get Laura hers.

We order two vodkas with cranberry juice. I feel more tired than excited by what has gone down. I feel like I feel after boxing well. Good tough manstuff. I think the evening will be easier. I am wrong.

There are attractive people here, but no females in Laura's league. I look among the men for the one or two I would let fuck and whip Laura. Then he appears.

He is cowboy-chiseled handsome, 6
'
1
"
and 175 pounds, my dream height and weight. He is dressed in regular civilian clothes, white shirt and dark slacks, as if he'd come from the office and left his tie and jacket in his locker. He looks at Laura and then notices the whip in my pocket. “Does she like to be whipped?” His question is directed to me but he is looking at Laura. He sounds cultured, refined.

“Yes. I like to take pain,” Laura cuts me off, looking up into his eyes with a little too much eagerness.

“Why don't we go to a private room,” he suggests, still fixed on her eyes and still ignoring me.

“Definitely,” she replies. I haven't said a word. This doesn't feel good.

He puts his hand lightly on Laura's shoulder to guide her in front of him. I follow. The giant black security guard in traditional black leather “master” garb who keeps uninvited single men out of the private rooms smiles with approval as we pass. I begin to hear the sounds of whipping, slapping, commands and slut talk emanating from the private spaces; some doors are open, depending on their occupants' desire for exhibition.

In one a man on his knees faces the wall. Three women, each uglier and fatter than the next and each in skimpy leather lingerie, are whipping him hard while calling him “girl,” “slut,” “toilet slave,” “useless,” “whore,” and “lower than whale shit.” His back is raw but he is begging for more. Since most of the slave guys are tricks who pay for their pain, I figure he must be a big spender.

Across the hall is another open door with one guy and one girl. They are both short. The guy is more than slightly fat with a pronounced lack of muscularity. He wears an ill-fitting too-tight denim shirt and leather vest with their buttons popping, and leather pants with lots of rattling chains all over the place. Either he bought these clothes when he was thinner and outgrew them or he doesn't like buying clothes in his size.

Sticking out from his open fly is what would have been a miniature penis even if it had been hard. He has the obligatory huge key ring with the necessary three dozen keys that so many of these cardboard-cutout “masters” carry. He has short hair and out-of-fashion glasses and looks like an S&M nerd. His slave is smaller than he, rail skinny and naked except for a cheap, torn beige bra and ripped panties. She has a too-long face and sunken eyes. Even coke-thin Laura looks healthier than she does. The girl's panties are dripping with what appears to be piss. I don't know whether it is her piss or his.

“Would any of you like to use this bitch?” S&M Nerd pleads in a squeaky voice that matches his looks.

“Thanks anyway but we're busy,” I say. “Maybe later,” I add generously with a wink to the appreciative girl. Although this wasn't an etiquette situation she had ever envisioned, my mother taught me to be polite and try to say something flattering when someone needs it. The cool dude guides Laura into a larger than normal room with two huge sofas in the middle.

“What's your name?” I ask.

“That's unimportant,” he says too coolly.

I don't like him. For the first time ever with Laura I feel something akin to anxiety. I'm not in control and I'm jealous. Laura gets out her little brown coke bottle and spoon that is tucked into her garters and does three heaping lines in each nose. She offers. Mr. That's Unimportant and I decline.

He positions Laura so she is standing, bent over the back of a sofa with her ass jutting out. He pulls handcuffs out of his pocket, shows them to me and gives me the key (smooth bastard!) then puts the handcuffs on her. Mr. That's Unimportant pulls down her panties to her ankles and says, “Can you take it strong?”

“Yes, I want it hard. Hurt me bad.”

I might be full of anxiety but this is fucking hot!

“Can I have your whip?” he asks.

“Spank her first,” I say, trying to gain a toehold.

“Count them!” he commands her.

He spanks her hard a dozen times as she counts them off with pained glee.

“The whip now!” Mr. That's Unimportant semi-growls at me.

“Not yet,” I growl back.

He spanks her harder a dozen more times as she counts, and thanks him with more breathy pain and more obvious elation. I hand him the whip and without warning, he whips her once across the buttocks. I can tell it hurts. I'm thinking that I just might have to intervene when Laura says, “Oh, God. I need that. Please hurt me. Hurt me bad.” My dick is rock hard in my pants.

Mr. That's Unimportant spends the next ten minutes teasing her with the whip, making her beg for it and whipping her. Usually Laura says, “This is for you, Jeffrey. I'm taking this pain for you.” This time I hear no mention of my name.

“Do you want to fuck her?” I ask. I don't know why I say that. I think it is just to break their rhythm.

“No. Not tonight. Maybe another night.”

“Are you sure? She likes to be fucked. She's a great fuck. She's got a wonderful pussy.”

“No. Not tonight. Maybe another night.”

Laura says, “I want more pain.”

For the first time ever with Laura I am jealous. I am on the outside of whatever they are sharing. In some twilight zone perverse logical way, I think if he fucks her, or has any kind of sex with her, the jealousy might go away.

“Maybe you'd like to have her suck your cock?”

“No, thank you,” Mr. That's Unimportant says politely.

He never takes off his pants. We never see his cock. Maybe he is like Jake Barnes? Maybe he has a tiny penis? Maybe he has genital herpes? It doesn't matter. I am jealous.

Mr. That's Unimportant continues for another ten minutes, whipping her more than I ever did and harder. All I can do is stand there. I never before lost control of Laura in all our outings. I never felt fear when she turned a trick. This is something brand-new and ugly and it is not sex that does me in—but Laura's masochistic desires. She lets out half a real whimper and Mr. That's Unimportant asks her whether that is enough, and amazingly she says yes. I am relieved.

I smell foul from my own fear. My hard-on is long gone. All I want is for this evening to end. Mr. That's Unimportant puts out his hand and I give him the key. He unlocks her handcuffs and she falls to the floor theatrically, at his feet. She holds on to his feet and kisses them and thanks him.

I feel humiliated.

Mr. That's Unimportant bends down, thanks her, gives her one long tonguey romantic kiss, stands up, shakes my hand firmly, thanks me, and walks out of the room without making any future plans or asking for our number. Thank God. I'm afraid Laura might have given it to him.

“Was that good for you?” I ask, hearing a cracking lack of confidence in my own voice and hoping it won't telegraph to Laura.

“That was fabulous. Fuck me, please. Now I need you to fuck me.” She pulls her knickers off her feet and lies on her back with her arms and legs outstretched to greet me.

I don't know whether I can get it up.

“I love you Jeffrey for letting me have that,” Laura pants. “You are the greatest master. It's my pleasure to be your slave. Please use me now. Please use me now.” Maybe she does sense something. Or maybe not.

One thing for sure: At that minute with her makeup smeared and what I have just seen, she is the ultimate slut-goddess. I undress, put my cock in her warm mouth, feel it grow hard, move around to put it inside her and fuck her hard and long, very long because my head is so full of psychic turds it takes forever to shovel them out and make room for an orgasm.

To Laura it is just a great long hot fuck that allows her to come about half a dozen times, but to me it is an uphill battle, wondering the whole time if she is making believe I am him. Usually, when we fuck after a scene I instant-replay the best moments with color commentary. This night I am silent.

Laura stops coming and hangs in there another ten minutes to get me off. Finally, after a rest stop and some amyl nitrate poppers, the real things, I come. It is not great. I feel cold and alone. Now, not only do I fully hate the coke, I half-hate S&M. Wherever Laura has gone with her “M” is no longer the complement to my “S.”

It wasn't Mr. That's Unimportant; it was what she did with him. I was the outsider. I'd been with Laura while she thrilled to terrific orgasms with handsome men, and I never blinked. Like her coke habit, her sex trip had moved beyond mine.

43

S&M clarification

December 1982

For the first time down this road I find myself uncomfortable. Being an “S” in an S&M relationship sounds playful. Being a sadist sounds cruel. I need clarification, so the next day I go to the New York Public Library while Laura is seeing several of her clients.

I read that there are pathological sadists who like to inflict pain on the innocent, and sexual sadists who only enjoy giving pain to those who beg for it. At least I was in that latter group, rather than the first one with Ted Bundy and Dr. Joseph Mengele.

I find comfort in
Havelock Ellis
's classic,
Studies in the Psychology of Sex
. Ellis died just before World War II so he never went to Plato's Retreat, but his theories are helpful. He says sadomasochists want the pain to be inflicted or received in love, not in abuse. Ellis says mutual pleasure is essential for the satisfaction of both the S and the M.

Ellis says consensual S&M is not only pain to initiate pleasure, it's also violence—or the simulation of violence—to express love. Sadomasochism, Ellis believes, might appear to be controlled by the sadist, but it's really controlled by the masochist. That took the ugliest side away from it. And the part about Laura actually controlling it not only made me feel better, it was true.

I read that addictions are there to relieve and control psychological suffering. It may be a clumsy and dangerous answer—but it is an answer. I really do not know what Laura is working out, but at the beginning I bought the idea that I was helping her, that somewhere inside her was an intolerable pain that couldn't be soothed except by being a whipped sex slave.

The master-slave relationship Laura and I lived was nuclear synergy where one plus one equaled four. It was an explosive shot of adrenaline, like jumping out of an airplane or riding a huge draft horse at full gallop or performing on stage and basking in the applause of a huge crowd. It was living in the beauty and serenity of black and white and exploding to the vivid color and saturation of Kodachrome.

I left the library wondering if an evil person walks around thinking of himself as being evil. I thought not. So what was I?

44

New
Y
ear
'
s Eve
1
983

Little Richard meets the Sopranos: The wedding of Silvio Dante

After that night at Club O, we slipped back into our routine. Laura turned tricks and did too much coke; I continued my video apprenticeship and our sex continued to slide into S&M. I couldn't tell day-to-day that we were falling apart but month-to-month I could feel whatever we had getting smaller.

On New Year's Eve, 1983, Laura and I got a gig with the video company I'd been working for. The pay ($100 and a half gram of coke each) wasn't the draw; it was the chance to be part of a glamorous New Year's Eve party-slash-wedding.

Little Steven, a.k.a. Miami Steve, a.k.a. Steven Van Zandt, the lead guitarist for Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, was getting married. Bruce Springsteen was the best man, Little Richard was the preacher, Percy Sledge would sing “When a Man Loves a Woman” at the kiss, and Gary U.S. Bonds and Southside Johnny were the wedding bands.

I was an assistant director so I went to the rehearsal a few days before the wedding with my boss, George. George was killing himself with cocaine and vodka, but he was brilliant and I kept learning the business from him while he remained alive. At one point during the rehearsal it fell to me to go over to Mr. Springsteen and tell him, most humbly, that he was standing in the wrong place. Springsteen was amazingly polite and shy. You could hardly hear his voice when he talked.

He didn't move much either until he started talking to a young black man, one of Little Stevie's ushers. The topic was dance steps, and the young black man said he'd never heard of the “Mashed Potato,” so Bruce, with great flair, gave a demonstration. The rehearsal ended with many in the wedding party doing the “Mashed Potato.”

If you could bet on whether celebrity couples would last, I would have bet that Stevie and Maureen would make it. The first time I met them they seemed like an old Italian couple with conspiratorial togetherness, deference and tenderness. They were a couple that didn't seem to need to work things out. And as far as the chemistry thing went, well, that was easy; Maureen was a slinky fox with such a warm smile that any man would enjoy being naked next to her.

This wasn't a normal one-camera wedding job. We would cover the wedding with four cameras. Each camera package was totally mobile with battery packs, cameraman, a grip with a hand-held Sun Gun, and a soundman with a boom. Each team was connected to each other by headset. And on a different channel the two assistant directors were connected to George. Two production assistants just charged, recharged, and ran batteries to the units. Unconnected to us was another company, an audio company with a mobile, sixteen-track tape deck in a truck outside that would record all the sound that wasn't synch-sound video. In total it was nearly the equipment, minus a live switcher, used for a small televised rock concert.

The New Year's Eve party-slash-wedding was held at the Knickerbocker Club and the place was grand. I heard the flowers alone cost $15,000. Huge exotic floral displays were everywhere and they made the entire hall fragrant, like what I guess the rain forest smells like when the sun comes out.

I was in charge of two mobile units. I followed George's instructions over the headset and made sure what he wanted got captured on tape. Even when he was stoned on coke and booze his talent was formidable. With Laura holding one of my unit's Sun Guns, we covered the wedding from various angles, interviewed guests, and then shot the bands and the dancing. Stevie wore his trademark bandana. Maureen looked like a seductive pixie angel. I was surprised that Bruce Springsteen came without a date.

“Little Richard said, ‘Come over here and sit on my lap.' He was totally coming on to me, playfully.” Laura remembers. “He was being very forward with me. I did go sit on his lap, and I was sitting there talking to people, waiting for the wedding to start. I thought he was gay but he was at least bisexual that New Year's Eve.”

At midnight, just after I wished Little Richard “Happy New Year,” and a belated happy birthday (we both are born on December 5th), I was looking into Laura's face and over the airways of our headsets we wished each other Happy New Year and said, “I love you.” I did love her, but it was changing shape. George had given us each half a gram of coke. Mine was still in my pocket. Laura's was dripping out of her nose.

At 2:30 a.m. on New Year's Day 1983, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band took the stage and played for two hours straight. Springsteen, quiet as a mouse and slow as a sloth offstage, exploded as a performer. The entire room stood and sang every word of every song and at one point Bruce just took a break, and became Mitch Miller leading the sing-a-long.

“Before that, I didn't like Bruce Springsteen's music,” Laura confesses, “but then we were standing right on the stage watching them perform for two hours, maybe three hours and I was so taken with the energy. And the music just pored over me and I liked it. He was so quiet before he performed and then when he got on stage and he was like someone else.”

Twenty years later Steven played Silvio Dante of
Sopranos
fame. His wife on the show was played by his real life wife, Maureen. They did pass the longevity test.