With or Without You (24 page)

‘I’m buying,’ she said now. ‘My treat.’

It’s not that I don’t have money. I can afford my clothing budget and gas for my Prius and dinners out. But I can’t drop money on frivolous items the way Nora can. That’s why I continued to shake my head as she reached for outfit after outfit for me.

‘You’re the one we’re shopping for.’

‘But you need something, too. Something sexy to wear to my Halloween bash.’

I took a deep breath. As much as I love Nora, I am not the type of person who goes to her wild Halloween parties. This year, she insisted I make an exception as I was without Byron and it was a bigger event than normal with the release of her perfume and announcement of the reality show contestants.

‘Do you have any idea of what you want to wear?’ I asked her. We’d been around the store several times now.

‘I’m torn. I’m thinking Naughty Nurse Nora or Naughty Nymphet Nora.’ She still names each outfit. It’s part of her charm.

‘And for me?’

‘Something wild,’ she decided. ‘Something wicked and wanton.’

‘You know me,’ I told her. ‘I’m none of those things.’

‘Yes, but this is Halloween. You should let yourself go.’

‘
You’re
not dressing different from usual,’ I countered.

‘What? You want me to go like a librarian? Or a translator. Someone shy and bookish like you?’

I gazed at her in mock outrage. ‘I am not bookish!’

‘If you were any more bookish you’d be an actual book.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘Here’s the deal. You be me, and I’ll be you.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You dress like me, and I’ll dress in any outfit you choose.’

‘Are you serious?’

‘Dead serious.’

She got a gleeful look on her face. ‘Fine. But for the reveal at midnight, I need to change into an actual costume.’

I hesitated for a moment, and then put out my hand. Nora shook before I could change my mind, sealing the deal. Sealing my fate.

When we’d both chosen (and Nora had paid for) too many items – we drove down the street to Dinnah’s Diner for a late supper. Nora had decided to wear one of her new outfits to dinner. She had on a purple velvet catsuit that fitted her body like a second skin. The catsuit actually had a tail, which she curled around her lap and stroked in an absent-minded manner. While we were in the dressing room, she’d used gel that she carries in her purse at all times to spike her hair in the front, so that she almost looked as if she’d sprouted kitten ears. The truth is, she looked amazing, and she knew it.

‘What do you call this one?’ I asked as I watched her
add a dramatic cat eye using liquid liner when we were stopped at a traffic light.

‘I don’t just name them off the top of my head,’ she said, sounding insulted. ‘It’ll come to me when I take the picture.’

‘Still Polaroid? Or have you updated to digital?’

‘No, Polaroid. This is all about my art.’ She shot me a smug smile. ‘Someday, it’ll all be chronicled in a coffee-table book. And you know I’m right, too.’

I didn’t say anything. Knowing Nora, she was definitely speaking the truth.

At the restaurant I started to ask her about the Halloween party, but my phone rang. Nora said, ‘Anthony,’ at the same time as I said, ‘Byron.’

Unfortunately, I was right.

‘Does he still want to get back with you?’ she asked.

‘Not since I told him about Dean,’ I said. ‘But the funny thing is, he doesn’t actually believe me. He thinks I’ve made up that story as a way to punish him for his indiscretion with Gwen, and he keeps texting me to say that I need therapy before we can consider resuming our relationship.’

‘Like you’re actually going to do that.’

I shrugged. Being away from Byron for a few days had made things clearer in my mind. Whenever we’d fought in the past, I’d always ended up feeling crazy. Now, I saw that he was the one putting those thoughts into my mind. I was grateful that Nora had brought me into bed with her and Dean – it showed me what I was missing in my life. Even if I might not choose a threesome again in the future, I also wasn’t going to choose the routine of being with Byron.

‘Are you all set for the party?’ I asked Nora as I tucked my phone away.

‘Of course. We’ve been ready for weeks. We have all sorts of exciting new ways to dazzle the customers.
Amazing decorations. Dancers wearing nothing but strategically placed silver stars. We have a fortune-teller with a crystal ball and tarot-card readers and a tattoo artist is going to be doing fake tattoos in the Body Graffiti room.

‘And you’re really going to let me dress you?’

‘That’s the deal.’

I thought about it. ‘You know, people aren’t going to understand what’s going on if I actually dress you up to look like me.’

‘That’s not really the point. The point is for
you
to look like
me
. I’ll fade into the background.’

I couldn’t believe I’d gotten myself into this. ‘I’m not going to fool anyone, Nora.’

‘Not with your hair like that,’ she agreed. ‘We’ll cut it.’

‘No way.’

‘Then you’ll wear a wig. That won’t be too hard for people to handle. On Halloween, anything goes.’

‘But what are you going to put me in?’

‘Something suitable,’ she promised. ‘Don’t you worry.’

I looked at her, and she smiled at me. At least the concept took my mind off my dinner with Anthony. But in spite of her words, I couldn’t help myself. Worrying is something I do best.

On the night before Halloween, Anthony answered the door to his apartment holding a wooden spoon and wearing a white chef’s apron. The apron didn’t make him appear overly feminine or silly, simply serious about what he was doing. I realised that this was how he always looked, whether he was in the middle of translating an ancient work or parking his Harley sportster in front of the museum. Anthony’s Harley is black with crimson flames bursting on the sides. The first time I saw the bike was in a write-up about him in ARTSI’s in-house magazine. I’d thought it was a prop for the photo shoot until I saw him drive up on it one morning.

I’d never have imagined that the sight of Anthony in an apron would be more arousing than the vision of him on his motorcycle, but I was wrong. Every day, I found myself learning how multifaceted this man was. He appeared at ease holding court at ARTSI functions, in his element on a Harley and at home with cooking gear. He’d had no trouble hanging out at the Pink Fedora, and seemed to be fine with coming on to me in my office at work. Was there ever a place where this man’s confidence didn’t shine through? He was the masculine equivalent of Nora. Perhaps, I’d been searching for him ever since I first met my best friend. I didn’t want to analyse that thought too closely, unsure of how I’d feel if I were right, so I focused instead on what Anthony was wearing.

Underneath the apron, he had on a pair of faded jeans and a black T-shirt. From the words that showed above the top of the apron I could tell that the T-shirt was from
Sturgis, the infamous motorcycle rally that takes place each year in South Dakota. I know a bit about motorcycles since viewing ‘The Art of the Motorcycle’ exhibition at the Guggenheim in the late 90s, which had featured about one hundred of the most important bikes in the history of motorcycle production.

I appreciate when a curator can look beyond the norm to find art. There is definite art in a Harley, or a Triumph, or an Indian Chief. I wondered whether Anthony went to that motorcycle show, and I instantly pictured myself on the back of his Harley. The vision made me smile. There was Anthony in his jeans and T-shirt and me in my over-buttoned suit. I was going to have to broaden my wardrobe if I continued to hang out with him, something Nora had been begging me to do for years. But no matter how broad I made my wardrobe, I’d never have the creativity to name my looks.

‘The pages are on the table,’ Anthony told me, all seriousness. I realised suddenly that he hadn’t smiled once since I’d arrived. ‘I’m finishing up dinner in the kitchen. You can read the latest instalment while I cook.’

There was no talk about showing me around. No tour of his home. He sounded absolutely businesslike. I felt my heart start to race.

He knows, I thought. He knows.

I watched him head back into the kitchen, and then I looked down at the pages he’d left for me on his coffee table. I had the mental awareness to realise that the table was made of a surfboard. Not just any surfboard. A lemon-yellow board with a big chunk taken out of one side, as if gnawed on by a shark. I wanted to ask him about the unique piece, but he had already disappeared into the next room.

Feeling antsy, I sat on his sofa and looked around the room. The walls were done in varying shades of blue – from deep indigo to pale turquoise. It was like sitting inside of a wave. The fabric on the sofa looked almost as if it had been tie-dyed, also in blue. The candles burning
on the coffee table were housed in abalone shells. Nora would appreciate this room, I thought. Anthony had decorated it not to look like a beach house, but to look like the beach itself.

I glanced through the pages. Again, he had typed them single spaced. Next to the pages was a wooden-handled ping-pong paddle, black side up. I turned towards the kitchen, thinking of asking Anthony what the paddle was for, but a stirring at the pit of my stomach made me keep quiet.

I knew why it was there.

If I asked, it would be an admission that I knew. I couldn’t do that, couldn’t make myself do it. Instead, I forced myself to focus on the pages. As had happened before, once I’d started to read the words, I was pulled in, free-falling into a world that had existed thousands of years before. This segment of the journal was written by the girl.

His name is Marcus. He told me this only after several hours had passed. Passed in the most delightful of ways, with us, the two of us, embarking upon the most decadent of activities. I had never truly understood the ways of the flesh. I had images in my mind, of course, images that were lent to me by our artists, by the painters and sculptors who have their way with the human body every day in the work. I had played kissing games with Alita, the kitchen maid at home, touching and fondling and caressing in that almost juvenile way. None of my fantasies – or realities – came close to the actual act.

When he was finished with me, when the night was ending and the sky opened up pink and blue, he lay down at my side.

‘Untie me?’ I asked. ‘Please untie me?’

He shook his head. ‘You have felt tremendous pleasure tonight,’ he whispered, ‘but I am not through with you. It is my desire to introduce you to pain. Pain that clarifies your mind and makes the pleasure that
much more immense. I can assure you one thing: you will truly understand me afterwards.’

I listened to him and instantly pictures flooded my eyes. Pictures of fertility festivals in which girls suffered the spectacle of public flagellation in hopes that it would help them to bare a strong and sturdy child. My own mother had taken it upon herself to be treated in this way before she gave birth to me. I recalled stories of orgies attended only by the most beautiful girls in the village, so-called banquets hosted by
hetairai
, just like Danae, the owner of this house, private parties that women went to alone, and that were whispered about for months afterwards. Girls with girls with girls. Head to tail, body pressed to body, the sheer curtains of their clothing thrown away, their naked forms together on the grass. Outdoors, always outdoors, where the goddess could witness and take delight in the festivities.

In my head, I saw paintings: Tsuguharu Foujita
Five Nudes
from 1923, the milky-white skin of the models. The luminous quality of the women. Paintings flowed through my mind – Picasso’s
Les Demoiselles d’Avignon
. These visions accompanied the text for me. Art and words, together. I went back to reading:

While my thoughts were filled with such decadent episodes, Marcus reached for the knife again, using it this time to cut through my bindings. I stayed still and silent, and I let him manoeuvre my body, roll me over until my face was against the mattress, before he bound me again, tighter this time, my wrists over my head, my ankles stretched out wide.

‘Are you ready for me, Elena?’

The fear swept me in a way that I had never imagined, and I could not find my voice to answer, although with all my heart I wanted to say ‘yes’.

‘Are you ready for me? You have already seen that I know how to treat you with the ultimate kindness. Trust me now to prepare you for the rigours of your future
life. After me, there will be others, in the nights, there will be women for you to engage with. But every day, every evening after they have left you, there will only be me. Are you ready, Elena?’

Did I say yes? Did I speak at all? I do not know. I cannot tell. All I know is that he was right. He spoke the truth: his words opened a door to a new world. His body on mine had pushed me over a brink and into a sea that I’d never known existed. Now his belt against my naked skin revitalised me. He coiled it, swung it, let the leather lightly hit my thighs. It stung, but did not hurt.

‘Are you ready, Elena?’

Was I ready? If so, I could not make myself speak.

He brought the belt back up, doubled the leather in his hand, again let it fall on my skin, a little harder this time, giving me a taste of what truly sensual pain might be like.

‘Elena, are you ready?’

The third time, he hit me hard, as I had somehow known he would, and I gasped for air and buried my face in the bedding, trying to find a way to deal with the burning sensation. I searched for a hiding place, but there was none. I was exposed. I had nowhere to go. The only thing for me to do was surrender.

‘Eleanor, are you ready?’

Anthony was standing at the side of the sofa, and he stared pointedly from me to the paddle to me again. His gaze was as hard as steel when he met my eyes. His mouth was set into an expression I couldn’t immediately decipher. A look I didn’t really want to decode.