Show your Lines

“Dear readers: This is the third Fancy Man story. For an introduction to Fancy Man and his world, please read: “Fancy Man and the Black Lion’s Mark.” For the story of how Mason met Charles, please read: “Fancy Man & the Southern Gent.”

WARNING: please keep in mind that my whip-master is fiction. If you have any interest in single tails, check out http://www.bullwhip.org/. Unlike in fiction, no one is *that* good and everyone makes mistakes. Wear protective clothing and goggles or hats at all times.

Once again, thanks to Dusk Peterson for editing and all things leather.”

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Connections between people aren’t always direct. Like magnets with polar charges, they may repel when face-to-face rather than attract. Bring in another magnet, however, and the two can be linked.

Putting it another way, sometimes lightning won’t strike without a lightning rod.

One of the strangest such connections that I ever witnessed was put into motion late one Saturday night through a very stupid mistake. The lady involved thought it was Friday night and therein lies the mistake, especially when we’re talking about the Cockpit bar.

The Cockpit is my hangout, a leather bar located at the untrendy edge of the trendy and very gay part of town. Once upon a time the bar was a regular dive owned by a retired airline pilot. He died and his wife sold the place to Master Nash.

Now, Nash is first and foremost an entrepreneur; he wants as many paying customers as he can get, so he’s put as few restrictions on the Cockpit as possible. What does that mean? Well, let’s just say this isn’t your granddaddy’s leather bar. Sunday through Thursday anyone of legal drinking age can come into the bar. Anyone, that is, who isn’t drenched in aftershave or perfume. That old fashioned rule still remains in effect. The smell of the bar must be that of sweat, leather and beer. If the bartender thinks your artificial fragrance is too potent, he’ll ask you to leave.

Other than that, the door is open and the welcome mat is out.

Nash’s reasoning is that there’s no need to filter out anyone but troublemakers. And he has a point. Most heteros on the prowl won’t be that interested in a gay bar, and gays who aren’t into leather aren’t going to bother with our little corner. The inquisitive will come to satisfy their curiosity and be gone or join the tribe. The bar will, in other words, weed out undesirables all on its own.

Besides, who needs a doorman when you’ve got bears in chaps and chains smoking in the parking lot?

So even though anyone of drinking age can walk into the Cockpit, it’s rare, very rare, that outsiders drop by.

But what, you might be wondering, about Friday and Saturday nights? Well, those are the nights when the Cockpit caters to the community. Friday is ladies only (read: Leatherdykes). Saturday is gents only (read: leathermen and gays into SM). Those days are gender specific, and the bartender or doorman will have you prove your sex, by taking you aside and having you drop your pants if need be.

Don’t even bother asking about pre-ops and male identifying dykes. We’ve had those arguments with Nash and he doesn’t want to listen.

There was no doorman that Saturday evening. It was one of those holiday weekends when most folk go out of town, and the bar scene gets quiet. By closing time, the Pit was nearly empty. I was still there with my new boy, Charles, shooting the shit with Nash, owner of the Cockpit, and Burke, another top. Robbie and Jordan, the bartenders, were cleaning up.

One of the front doors was propped open to the cool night air. From the sound of it, the world outside was also drawing to a close. The rush of cars, the steps and chatter of pedestrians had been replaced by the sound of tree branches groaning in the wind. All was pretty much quiet and solitary.

That’s how we heard her.

“Trish! Trish, I know you’re in there!” The voice was sweetly female and sobbing. It echoed through the empty streets. We exchanged looks. What the fuck was this?

“I’ve g-g-got a razor!”

That got us on our feet.

“Come out. Just come out and talk to me, please! I just want to know what I did wrong—”

I was out the door first, in time to see her kneeling there in the parking lot. She was wearing a willow green silk dress, far too light for the chill night air. A cascade of beautiful, satin brown hair curtained her face. One bare arm with twin slices dripped blood onto the pavement. She had the razor lifted for another cut.

“Hey, now,” I said, reaching her and grabbing hold of that raised wrist. I’m a hulking black man and at that moment I was terrified. Not that the girl was going to do anything to me, but that I was going to accidentally damage her. There are times when I know exactly how Superman must feel living in a world where everything is fragile. I had such a moment then, touching her. She was as delicate as fine china and it wouldn’t take much at all for me to bruise or break her.

I could just see myself in court trying to explain away assault charges. The judge would take one look at massive me, one glance at delicate she, and I’d be learning first hand how to play the part of big black cellmate.

“Tell her I just want to talk,” the girl begged me, “I just want to understand….”

“She’s not worth it, sweetheart,” I said, toning my voice at a higher, gentler register. As a voice actor, I knew how to make my pipes work for me. “Put down the razor, huh?”

I was prepared for her to finally “see” me and start screaming. It’s what most ladies in designer dresses would do if someone like me had a grip on them. But she just dropped the razor. It fell with a tink onto the pavement, and the girl bowed over her knees and sobbed her heart out.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “I’m pretty. I dress like they want me to and do what they want me to do. But it’s never enough. I’m just…decoration.”

“I know how that feels,” I whispered, and gathered her up. She might as well have been a soapbubble for all that she weighed anything. Her silk dress felt very nice against my bare skin. I saw a glittering green purse and nabbed that with two fingers.

The girl made no protest as I lifted her up into my arms. She just rested her face against my shoulder, tears wetting my tank. She didn’t reek of perfume, but she did smell sweet and flowery. Bath spray, perhaps? She instinctively held her bleeding arm away from her body so as not to ruin the dress. Blood trickled off it to drip onto the asphalt.

“I thought it was real this time,” she hiccupped for breath. “But it wasn’t. It never is. Not with me.”

“There, there,” I said, taking her back to the Cockpit. The other guys were waiting at the door.

“Robbie, medical kit,” I said as I swung the girl in sideways. I brought her over to a booth and settled her in. Charles slid next to her with a handful of napkins to blot at her cuts. My partner is a muscular, Southern white boy with beautiful black curls and gray eyes. He’s a vet in training. He put pressure on the arm to slow the bleeding.

I reached across the table and brushed back her long hair. The face beneath was pixyish, the skin unblemished and almost golden in hue. The weepy eyes were large with just a hint of an almond tilt to them, the irises a soft, tea brown in color. The sniffling nose was small, the lips full. All in all, she resembled nothing so much as a tortoise-shell kitten, all honey and amber.

Her make-up was partially ruined from crying, but it was clear that she was…well, a girly girl. The kind who takes hours to put on her face. Her cheeks were rosy with blush, the eyelids expertly mascaraed with contrasting shades of leaf and silver to match the dress. Her lips were swelled with glossy lipstick to a kissable allure.

I don’t think the Cockpit had welcomed in anyone so feminine since, well, since it was owned by the retired airline pilot.

You might be wondering how I felt about her. Being honest, there are rough and tumble daddies who will sneer and shit on anything lacking in masculinity. But we have come a long way from our forefathers’ biking clubs.

How did I feel toward a girl like this? Nothing sexual. Not even remotely. But she wasn’t an alien species. I have a mother and a sister. If I ever decide to donate sperm or fertilize an egg, a girl like this could be my daughter. I’ve got female friends, and in the last election I voted for a woman candidate to be my congressional representative. I may have no interest in that softness of shape, in spiked heels instead of massive black boots, in beauty all glitter and lip gloss rather than sweat and leather, but I’m not going to hold femininity in contempt.

I must admit, however, that it was odd to have something so…soft and painted in the Cockpit. Even the leatherdykes who frequent our bar don’t bring such ladies with them.

“What’s your name, sweetheart?” Nash asked as Robbie handed the medical kit to Charles. I could see the bar owner wasn’t too happy. Nash is something of a sexist pig. Not that he’d ever be impolite.

Burke, a wiry top with a mousy, Fu Manchu mustache, was also looking unhappy, as if his clubhouse had been invaded. “Girls, ick! Coodies!” his expression seemed to say, though I noted that he’d taken off his hat in her presence. Strange. I’d never have pegged Whip-Master Burke as having such quaint manners.

“K-Katie,” she sniffled and one-handedly got a tissue out of her purse to dab at eyes and runny nose. Her fingernails were lacquered with a silvery green polish that went perfectly with the ensemble.

“Well, Katie, Trish’s not here tonight. It’s Saturday night. Men only.”

She flushed very sweetly and her shadowed eyelids dropped over those kittenish eyes. “Oh.” Tears were still welling and falling down her cheeks. “I thought it was Friday for some reason. I…haven’t been keeping track of time very well. I’m so sorry.” She glanced from one of us to the other. “I’m so embarrassed.”

“You should be,” scolded red-haired Robbie. “What kind of a thing was that to do?”

“I don’t know where Trish lives, I just know she comes here on Fridays and stays till closing,” Katie whispered. “We had these four wonderful nights, and I really thought she was sincere. Then she went back to Delia.”

“Delia?” Charles echoed, gently applying antibiotic ointment to her cuts.

“D-Delia’s this blonde leatherdyke.” Katie bit her quivering lip. “Trish was just trying to make her jealous by dating me, and it worked and now they-they’re….Trish won’t return my calls. Or my e-mails. She says it was never serious and I need to move on. I had to do “something”.”

“But you don’t really want Trish back, do you?” Jordan, the Cockpit’s jet-haired, bi-bartender was unsettled. He was the only one of us males eyeing Katie with anything like desire. If she’d had a riding crop in hand he’d probably have been on his knees and calling her “Mistress.”

“N-no,” she admitted, trying not to break down yet again. “But this k-keeps hap-happening to m-m-me. I fall for these dykes on bikes, and I think one really likes me. “Me”. Then I find out she was just using me to get to someone else, some other dyke on a bike. It-it’s like they know if they date me, the girl they really want will notice them. I’m just…some accessory that makes them desirable.”

I shifted uneasily. Katie was cutting too close to the bone. Most men want me for the same reason. Not because they really want me–at least, not as anything more than a fuck buddy–but because I make them look good. On more than a few occasions, the only thing a guy has asked of me is to be seen in my presence. It boosts his ego and makes other men envious.

I felt especially uncomfortable being reminded of this right now. Charles and I were still new as a couple, and I had my doubts that he wanted me for me. He had some strange obsessions, you see, concerning black men. But that’s another story.

“Am I hurting you, Miss?” Charles asked Katie in that Southern drawl of his. He was bandaging the cuts.

She shook her head. She was the type who ached so deeply inside that nothing done to her flesh could hurt worse. The tears just wouldn’t stop falling from her eyes.

Nash sighed with resigned disgust. “I’m heading home. Lock up, Robbie,” he said, making his way out the door.

“I’m very sorry I troubled you all,” Katie said to the rest of us. She stared forlornly at her bandaged arm. “I guess I…I guess we can see now why no one really wants me.”

The girl was breaking my heart, and you can imagine what that meant she was doing to a romantic like Robbie. I saw him swallow, saw a troubled look on his freckled face.

He grabbed my arm and pulled me aside. “We’ve got to help her.”

I stared at him. “We? What’s this ‘we,’ white man?”

“Mason, come on, I’m serious.”

“So am I. What the fuck do you mean, help her? Help her do what?”

“I dunno.” He waved a disgusted hand. “Gain some respect from those leatherdykes instead of just being used.”

“Jesus, Robbie, what do you think this is? A romantic comedy? Let’s give her a make-over, turn her into the boi of every leatherdyke’s dream and help her gain the perfect Syr?”

“You’re the Fancy Man,” he insisted, “and if anyone can do something for her, you can.”

Fancy Man is my nickname. It refers to flights of fancy, not fancy dresser, and I got it because my turn-on is giving men their sexual fantasies. Emphasis on the “men” there. I’ve never in my life done such a thing for a woman.

“I’m an actor, not a fairy god…daddy,” I told Robbie now. “If you want me to dress up in drag and perform cunnilingus on her, maybe I can grant your wish, but I don’t even know if she’s being honest, or how many problems she’s really got, let alone how to solve them.”

Robbie frowned. He wasn’t happy with me. “You’d do it if she was one of the regulars in this bar.”

“Yeah, well, she’s not. I can’t save the world.”

“Do it for me, then.”

“Rob—”

“Have I ever asked you for a favor?” he suddenly demanded. “Any kind of favor? Ever?”

Shit. You have to understand. In my world, men fall into top or bottom categories. You get used to receiving deference or giving it, striding forward with an aggressive look, or retreating from another man’s more powerful gaze.

But Robbie was not a leatherman, he was a romantic. In his world, men were equal. Give and take. When he looked you in the eyes, he wasn’t trying to intimidate you, and he wasn’t going to be intimidated. He was expecting equilibrium, to be met halfway.

“No, you’ve never asked me for a favor,” I admitted.

“So I’m asking for one now. Grant this girl her fantasy.”

Never argue with an over-muscled leprechaun.

“Why don’t we introduce ourselves,” I said reasonably, “and find out if she even wants us involved. Okay?”

“Fine.” Robbie went back to the booth. “Katie? I’d like to introduce you to Mason. We call him the Fancy Man.”

“Hey,” I flagged up a hand as her red eyes blinked up and up all 6′4″ of me.

Her lips parted. “Oh, gosh, I’ve heard of you!”

Charles, who now had a comforting, brotherly arm around Katie, smirked. “Whaddaya know? You’re even famous among the dykes.”

“Well,” Robbie said expansively, “then you’ve heard, he grants fantasies if he can. He wants to grant yours.”

Burke and Jordan had been hovering near by, listening if not contributing. They went stiff now. Burke with dismay, Jordan with envy.

“That’s…that’s very nice of you,” Katie said blushing with consternation. Her kitten eyes blinked back more tears, as if the thought of anyone being nice to her was overwhelming. “And you’re really sexy and handsome, but I only like girls.”

It was my turn to blush furiously and damn was I glad that my brown skin doesn’t make it obvious. Charles threw back his head and laughed out loud. Robbie, the fucker, chuckled. Jordan and Burke hid smirks.

“Oh.” Katie blushed again. “I misunderstood didn’t I? I’m not stupid, not usually. I’m just…out of my league.” She offered me an apologetic smile, and the difference it made was devastating. She was charming as hell when she smiled.

“You’re in a foreign land,” I agreed, warming to her. “Why don’t you tell me what your fantasy is? Let me worry about whether it can be made real.”

“My fantasy? I don’t think I’ve ever really had one. I’ve just…tried to live out what I wanted.”

Oh, she was getting to me now. If my cock had been at all interested in her, I would have claimed her myself.

“I suppose…” she went on, thoughtfully, “I suppose, at the moment, my one fantasy is for those leatherdykes to really desire me. I’m sick of being treated like a toy, like something to amuse them while their motorcycles are in the shop. I mean, I know clothes and shoe shopping and make-up seem frivolous. Are frivolous. But are they that much more frivolous than detailing a car or getting a tattoo?”

She glanced earnestly at us. I thought she had a valid point, but Burke’s face had gone white with outrage. Before he’d started selling handmade whips over the internet Burke “had” detailed cars and motorcycles for a living. He certainly didn’t want to hear his previous livelihood called frivolous, let alone mentioned in the same breath as shoe shopping.

“I don’t expect to be taken seriously,” Katie went on, tears falling again. “I just want those bitches, for once, to want me as much as they want those girls they do take seriously. I want them to fight over “me”, the real Katie, not over what they think I am or what they think I can do for them.”

Now there, I thought with a stirring in my blood, was a challenge. The problem, as Katie had pointed out, was that the silk dresses, the long shiny hair and perfume, would always make her seem more plaything than playmate. Leatherdykes, like leathermen, liked to play rough, and Katie was just too breakable. She wasn’t for everyday use.

On the other hand, trying to change her, make her more butch, would turn her into someone she wasn’t and defeat the purpose.

“Give me a moment to think on this,” I said, stepping away. Robbie came with me.

“So?” he said.

“Well, I can think of one easy answer. Jordan.” I motioned over the other bartender.

He joined us. “What’s up?”

“If Katie is seen making out with a handsome man, it will certainly draw the competitive attention of the other ladies,” I pointed out to Robbie while eying Jordan.

The jet-haired bartender got the hint. His face paled. “Oh, no,” he gulped. “Mason, no. I can’t.”

I frowned. “Why not? You’re already drooling over her.”

Jordan has these dark blue, guileless eyes. Just about anything he’s feeling can be read in them, and at that moment he was miserable. “That’s just it. I “like” women. I like her. But she doesn’t like men. I haven’t a hope in hell with her. You might as well drag my heart through the dirt, not to mention my cock. Don’t make me do it.”

Jordan’s not a leatherman. He’s a bisexual who’s into SM. Which is why he says things like “”Don’t make me do it.”" He’s a boy at heart. Charles has a certain strength I can push against. Jordan has none. I could rip the bartender apart like tissue paper and he knew it. A part of me wanted to, and a part of him wanted me to as well. We both knew we had to show restraint, or, after an orgy of self-indulgence, we’d both be ruined.

So I cut off that sadistic streak in me, the one urging me to loom over him and say, very soft and cold, “”You will do it.”" The image gave me a thrill all the same. Someday…someday in some judicious manner, Jordan and I were going to have to have it out. But that wasn’t for tonight.

“All right,” I said instead. “We’ll think of something else.”

Jordan released a breath of relief.

“What about you as the lover?” Robbie suggested.

“Don’t be daft. Everyone in the bar knows Jordan’s bi, so it makes sense for him to go for Katie. They’re not going to believe we would. They know us too well.”

“Charles?” he suggested. My boy was still a new face in town, his sexual orientation not yet firmly established.

I rolled my eyes. “I’ll ask, but I don’t think he can pull it off.” Back to the booth.

“…for all their toughness, they just couldn’t bring themselves to really flog someone,” I heard Burke saying as I came up. It surprised me. The last expression on Burke’s face had been one of revulsion, as if Katie were some soft worm leaving a trail of tears and perfume all over his manly bar. Yet now he was conversing with her quite earnestly.

“I don’t think that was it. I think it was because none of them put any real effort into flogging me,” Katie said, her sweet, demure manner contrasting with the topic. “I never got that rush from the beatings, that drifting off on a cloud of sensations. But then,” she added sadly, “I wasn’t the one they really want to flog.”

How the “hell” had they gotten onto this subject? Charles glanced over at me, eyebrows lifting to tell me he’d had nothing to do with it and was just as confounded.

“More likely they just didn’t know how to do it properly,” Burke said. “Most folk don’t take lessons like they should. They just go at it. And they don’t realize how much practice it takes to really get that swing. To build up the arm.”

“True. But you can’t instruct them when you’re tied up and they’re in the heat of the moment,” Katie pointed out quite seriously. “I tired to advise one of my daddies to use both hands with a belt but she just wouldn’t listen.”

“Got a sore wrist, did she?” Burke tsked.

“Well, she already had a repetitive motion problem. She really shouldn’t have been doing it at all.” Katie shook her head. “But you know leatherdykes. They never can admit a weakness.”

“I just wish they’d admit they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing!” Burke groused. It was one of his pet peeves.

“I wish they’d use something other than floggers,” Katie had her own bone to pick. “I mean, I’ve nothing against floggers. Some of them sting just fine. But you don’t get that pop that comes with a single tail.”

There was a glint in Burke’s eyes now. Katie had pushed the magic button. “Most powerful sound in the world,” he agreed fervently. “Better than gunfire. You’ve seen demonstrations?”

“Oh, yes. Several. I was even part of one back when I was eighteen. The brother of the girl I was dating at the time had a black snake–”

“Excuse me,” I ventured to interrupt. An idea had sparked in my head, and I could feel it beginning to smolder. “I think…I think I may have a way of giving you your fantasy, Katie. Burke, if I can talk to you for a moment.”

Burke is half a foot shorter than me and sinewy rather than strapping. The arm I put around his shoulders must have felt like a boa constrictor. He frowned suspiciously as I led him toward the island bar.

“Top to top, brother,” I said, leaning on one of western style barstools. “Would you help me help her?”

He blinked. I might as well have asked him to go dress shopping with the girl. He tensed like a roadrunner readying for a dash.

“A whipping scene,” I said quickly. “Here at the Cockpit.”

The tension in his body eased. But he was still blinking. He glanced back, regarding Katie as he might a damp pile of used silk handkerchiefs. His expression said, “what the fuck am I suppose to do with these?”

“She’s a girl,” he said at last.

I raised my brows. “Really. Hadn’t noticed.”

“I don’t “do” girls, Mason.”

He meant that in every sense of the word. Burke was a leatherman’s leatherman. He whipped other leathermen. Had whipped them with everything from bamboo sticks to heavy chains one memorable year on the Delta run. Men three times Burke’s bulk and muscle broke down sobbing for mercy under his kind ministrations. And then he took them to bed and fucked them.

“So you can’t do it?” I asked mildly.

That got me a hard look. Burke was no fool. “‘Course I can. I just won’t. It doesn’t interest me, and if it doesn’t interest me I won’t do it.”

“Okay. That was wrong of me. I apologize for trying to play you like that.”

“Accepted,” he muttered.

“But come on, it’s just a scene. And I can’t do it like you. No one can. Think of it as a creative challenge. Hey,” I added as the spice, “you heard her. She loves the sound of a cracking whip as much as you do. She’ll appreciate what you’re doing on an artistic level, not just for the pain you’re inflicting.”

“That” tempted him. Burke had always felt that his true efforts and abilities weren’t appreciated. That the men he whipped were taking him and his genius for granted. He chewed on one corner of his mustache. “I’ll have to research,” he ventured, sounding nervous. “Females, I mean.”

Now it was my turn to be uncertain. “Research? You “do” know female anatomy, don’t you?”

Another glare, this one daring me to crack a smile. “Not up close and personal,” he said defensively. “No.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

He glanced away, arms crossed. “I ran away from home when I was twelve, Mason. I didn’t go through high school and dating and being all confused about my sexuality like the rest of you. I knew what I wanted, and by the time I was legal, I’d done a lot of it. I never bothered with anything else. Why should I? I like what I like.”

I was surprised. Burke had never mentioned his family or personal history. I suppose, like everyone else, I’d just assumed he’d appeared full-grown at the Cockpit, pool cue in hand.

“I didn’t know—”

“S’kay,” he flagged me off. His expression was strangely vulnerable, but the last thing Burke was going to do was discuss his feelings or deprived childhood. Fuck therapy, he’d say. In Burke’s universe, men just didn’t do that.

All the same, I felt I’d gotten a glimpse, as if by lightning flash, of a very bleak landscape.

“I’d appreciate it if you do this for me,” I said, notching my voice down to a solid masculine register. Man to man. “I’ll help you with the research, set-up, everything. I’ll answer any questions.”

He was chewing on the other half of his mustache now. “All right. Rule,” he added, short-hand in the Cockpit for a point of negotiation. “You defer to my judgment. I know how you like to run a show, Mason, but it’s gonna be “my” skills on display. My reputation. I’m not going to allow anyone to fuck that up.”

“Granted.” It was the quality I most appreciated in Burke. The man was an impresario, a perfectionist. When it came to his chosen art form, nothing less than the very best would do. And I could certainly appreciate the desire for complete control. “Let’s see if all this sits well with the lady.”

I explained to her and the others what I had in mind. Robbie lifted a skeptical, ginger brow; he still didn’t get the whole leather scene. Jordan, well, he sat down to hide his erection. Charles looked thoughtful and Katie…

“This is going to make them want me?” she asked doubtfully. “I mean, no disrespect, Mr. Fancy Man—”

Charles smiled at her courtesy.

“—but,” she went on, “I’ve let them whip me any way they liked and I still got dumped.”

“This will be different,” I assured her. “Those dykes on bikes think you’re just a pretty lipstick who can only take a good spanking. Burke’s going to show them how far you can really go. Who you really are. They’ll be falling all over themselves to get to you when he’s done. Especially if they know every other sister wants you, too.”

“That sounds…exciting,” her tone was only half convinced. “But…are you sure?” This to Burke. She was looking very dubiously at him, as if someone had handed her a studded leather belt and told her to make it go with her prettiest dress.

Burke shrugged. Thanks for the vote of confidence, Brother Burke.

Katie bit her pouty lower lip. “It’s going to take a lot of practice, isn’t it?”

The whip-master shrugged again. He looked uneasy, but he’d agreed and Burke never went back on his word. “Yeah. I can manage if you can. Have you got protective clothing? Thick leather pants? Goggles?”

“You give me a list and I’ll get it all.” She pulled out a little gold notebook and pen from her purse. Burke gave her a shopping list, and the two of them, leatherman and lipstick lesbian, worked out a schedule while the rest of us watched with bemusement.

#

There’d been some discussion and debate with Nash over the right night for our “scene.” The Cockpit is a small bar, but Burke insisted on plenty of room and a cording off of the area. When it came right down to it, the pool table would have to be moved. Nash didn’t like that, not until I suggested charging a modest admission price. I even floated the idea of a percentage of the take going to the local leatherdykes’ motorcycle club. If there was a charitable allure, then we’d get even more people and more money. Nash liked that.

Friday night was the most logical night, but Nash pointed out that Burke had his own fans, men who admired his whipping skills, and they would miss out. Besides, Nash didn’t want the leatherdyke dating scene disrupted. So we agreed on a Sunday evening. I had Nash hand out flyers on the two prior Friday nights and got the event listed on the bar’s website and on that of the leatherdykes’ club.

Over those two weeks I rushed about, arranging for the staging and clothes, publicizing the event. I even made sure to get a permit for the event. I wrote it up in the paperwork as “performance art.” We’d be fine so long as Katie’s private parts were covered.

I did manage to stop by in between to watch a few practice sessions in Burke’s backyard. These, however, left me biting my nails. Katie, garbed in protective leather jacket, pants and goggles, laid herself out on a table so that Burke, swirling his whip, could learn how to snap at certain spots on her body.

Burke had gotten the points down quickly and precisely because he was a master. Even his research had paid off as, pants and jacket notwithstanding, Katie had let out some satisfying yelps when the whip struck tender areas. There’d been, however, little interest or passion in Burke’s style. The form was there, but the artistry was lacking.

Fuck it all. I knew he would rather be marking up firm, masculine flesh, but if he didn’t put his heart into this we were screwed.

And Katie…Katie tried, and granted she wasn’t feeling the full effect of the whip. But she lacked real enthusiasm. I think that was due less from wanting Burke to be a woman than from the fact that her whip-master wasn’t into whipping “her”. No electricity was being transmitted.

And then there’d been their inevitable arguments.

“No high heels!” Burke had snapped that first time Katie arrived in a pair of designer boots. “I said no high heels!”

“They’re only two inches,” she protested.

“They’re making divots in my lawn!”

“Well, isn’t that a good thing?”

It was like Abbot and Costello.

Katie had her own complaints, of course. “Don’t you ever bathe?” she’d asked, wrinkling her nose at Burke’s ripe fragrance. “Or shave? Or wash your clothes?”

“Why bother?” Burke had quipped back. “Men like how I stink. An’ if we’re going to go on about that, do you have to use all those perfumed products? Bath foams and creams and shit? You smell like a whorehouse.”

“How would you know?” Katie had muttered.

The arguments had spilled over into the look of the performance as well.

“Cut out the make up,” Burke had insisted. “People want to see a face, not paint. You look like you’re in a kabuki play.”

“Well, that mustache makes you look like one of the Village People,” Katie threw back. “Talk about ridiculous. The 70’s revival is over.”

They didn’t hate each other, but they certainly had some issues. Including Burke’s house. Seeking a glass of water, Katie had taken one look at Burke’s kitchen and started bringing her own bottled refreshment. But kudos to her courage, she’d only begged for my intercession with the whip-master once.

“Can’t you please ask him to clean the bathroom?” she’d nearly wept. “I don’t mind the dirty pictures but, the toilet and the floor…it’s disgusting!”

Knowing Burke wouldn’t clean up his act for Katie, I’d dragged Charles and a box of cleaning products over to the whip-master’s place one afternoon.

“My bathroom’s clean. Mind if I put my slave to work on yours?” I asked Burke. “I owe you for what you’re doing anyway.”

Being a polite top, Burke had obliged me, or at least pretended that he was helping me to work my boy. If he knew what I was really about he didn’t let on. We drank beers and watched Charles, dressed only in a jock strap, scrub and de-rust the toilet, scrape and polish the floors and pipes and sink till they…well, they didn’t sparkle, that would be too much to ask of any slave; but they weren’t so repellent.

Which all led up to a telling moment between Charles and me. If a brother may digress….

I said that Charles and I still have new couple smell. It was more than that. He was, you see, my first real slave. My usual modus operandi is to go home with a guy and play master/slave for an evening. Sometimes, if I like the boy, I’ll do it again, maybe even on a regular basis. But I’d never wanted anything lasting, not until I met Charles.

I’d barely known Charles Beaumont five minutes before I’d started thinking of him as mine. Mine as in territory. As in property. As in partner. He was the first man I’d ever met that I wanted to mark, tattoo my name on his ass and piss on him just to be sure everyone knew he belonged to me.

So I’d stupidly said yes when he’d suggested that we take our relationship for a long drive.

Now I had a responsibility, and it made me nervous. With guys like us it’s not just about merging personalities, it’s making sure the top cares and is inventive, is masterful, not just brutal. Likewise, the bottom has to be honest and open to new experiences, submissive but not passive.

It’s a very delicate balancing act, especially when it involves love and sex. I…was not honestly sure I could do it. I didn’t want to fail Charles any more than he did me.

While Charles scrubbed the bathroom floors, I eyed the graphic images Burke had torn out of gay porno mags and plastered on the bathroom walls. I was trying to get ideas. Charles and I were certainly strong enough to pull off some of those positions, but were we flexible enough? Maybe yoga classes were in order. I was about to say as much to Burke when the phone rang and the whip-master went off to answer it. Charles took the opportunity to pause in his scouring.

“Sir,” he said to me. “After this…is there any other way I can serve Master Burke?”

This cleaning project had been a surprise to Charles. I hadn’t warned him, I’d just told him to put a jock strap on under his trousers and had taken him to the store to pick out the products. Like I said, a master’s job is to be inventive, to give a slave new challenges and experiences.

When Charles’ had seen the bathroom, his face had gone blank for a moment with horror. Then, like a good boy, he’d said, “Yes, Sir,” stripped down, and gone to work.

Now, Charles took “me” by surprise, as he sometimes did. I hadn’t even considered gifting him to Burke afterwards. Thinking on it, however, it was clear that I’d been remiss in not considering this. Was Charles pointing that out to me?

I took one giant step through the bathroom door and went down into a crouch, putting us face to face.

“Hands to head,” I said. As he dropped the scrub brush to put his palms up, I reached for the elastic band of his strap. I pulled and jerked it down, exposing his cock, then slipped the band under his balls.

He gulped, and his gray eyes flickered with apprehension. Charles gets aroused by humiliation. Exposing him even in this mild way made him blush furiously. His cock naturally began to swell, which made him blush even more.

That made my cock respond in turn.

“Are “you” offering, Cadet?” I had nixed the use of words like “master,” “slave” and “boy,” between us for obvious reasons if you know anything about how and why we met. I was rather pleased with “Cadet” as a substitute.

“Or do you think “I’ve” made the offer?” I added, stroking behind his balls. It was a sensitive spot for him, and his breath came short.

Charles’ eyes grew angry. He couldn’t offer himself, and he had no idea if I’d done the offering. That’s what he wanted to know, after all. I was fucking with him.

“Sir,” he said, in the gentleman’s drawl of his. “I assumed my ass was part of the favor owed to Master Burke, Sir.”

What a nicely ambiguous response. Clever, and it helped me figure out what was going on. Charles was mine to do with as I liked, but a good master communicates with his boy, finding out what he needs and can take. We hadn’t yet discussed whether I’d be sharing him with others. So if I gave him to Burke for the afternoon, then I was either testing him, seeing if he could blindly obey, or I was teaching him some sort of lesson. Burke, after all, was a whip-master who might well use Charles’ ass for target practice rather than sex.

Either way, Charles was letting me know he was up to it. That if I was planning on throwing any more unpleasant surprises his way…well, bring ‘em on. I wasn’t getting rid of him that easy.

Fucker. Made me love him.

I brought his jock strap back up into place. “You assumed wrong, but only because I forgot my manners. Thank you for reminding me of the courtesies, Cadet. I’ll see if Master Burke’s interested.”

Burke came back from his phone call. I took him aside and made overtures. Charles’ sweaty labor had aroused him, so he accepted my offer.

Charles’ expression when we “both” went into Burke’s bedroom was priceless. Even more so when Burke, kneeling on the bed, got Charles out of his jock strap, handed him a condom and, once it was on, started to suck the Southern boy’s cock. Ha. That’ll teach Charlie to assume. It was one of the interesting ironies of the leather world. A leather top can be, in vanilla terms, a bottom sexually. Burke liked receiving far more than giving.

I gloved and lubed up and gave Burke a very good ass fucking while he blew Charles. The real moment came when Charles and I gazed at each other over Burke’s prone form. Our thrusts were so in time, back and forth, they were almost coordinated. A connection flashed between us, and we both started to cum. We finished almost simultaneously, leaving the whip-master a happy man.

Great sex, and his restroom was cleaner than it had been in decades.

As for Charles…I took him back to his house and gave him a long, warm bath. Then I let him have what he really wanted as a reward for being such a good lad. Do you know, he even moans with a Southern accent?

#

Getting back to Burke and Katie: they didn’t hate each other. They just had no reason, as Robbie would have put it, to meet each other halfway. If she’d been interested in Burke’s dick, then Katie might have made an effort, as girls do, to buy him a six-pack of his favorite beer and learn a little about the sports he enjoyed watching. If he’d been at all interested in Katie’s pussy, Burke might have bothered to wear clean underwear or get a shave. There was no such interest. As Burke had put it, he liked what he liked, and the same went for Katie. Why should either of them surrender an inch? Especially given that their hook up was temporary and for this one event only?

That said, they did respect the whip. For all his complaints about Katie’s girliness, Burke could not fault her when it came to practice. She gave her all, working as long as Burke demanded, and then suggested they try one more time. And though Katie may have thought Burke vulgar, he never dressed her down or lost patience with her when that whip was in his hand.

They didn’t even take their frustrations out on me, though, Lord knows, I deserved it. Now and then I had to let Katie weep on my shoulder and Burke vent, but they never berated me for my stupid idea. It gave me new respect for Burke, a man as solid as concrete, and for Katie, who managed to stay aloft like a bird on the wind.

I started to lose sleep, worrying that the whole thing would belly flop. If it did, Burke and Katie would be left with egg on their faces, all thanks to me.

That Sunday night finally came around, and we got quite a crowd of dykes mingling with the leathermen. They milled about, their buzz cut heads moving in and out of view round the screened-off area.

“How’re you doing?” I asked Burke and Katie, stepping behind those folding partitions.

“All right, I think,” Katie said, wiping sweaty palms down the belted coat she wore over her costume.

Burke was far less nervous. He focused down before demonstrations. He gave me his “don’t-bother-me-with-stupid-questions” look.

On the other side of the screens, the crowd was getting restless.

“Up you go, Katie!” I said as she slipped off the coat. Burke came over and we got her arranged and comfortable.

“Ready?”

Burke picked up his whip, and licked his lips. He gave me the nod.

I waved a hand outside the partitions. Robbie hurried up to help me fold and carry them away. The crowd’s chatter went down to a murmur.

I stepped over to a spot reserved for me at the bar. Charles was there. He put a supportive hand on my shoulder.

Behind the ropes was a wide, clear area. Burke, in black leather pants, vest, gloves and biker’s cap, stood there with his whip. His corded muscles, the brush of fur on his chest, his tattoos made him into an iconic figure.

Suspended before him was Katie. I’d gone for simple ropes to cradle her thighs. A pair of thick, soft loops hanging from hooks in the ceiling kept her braced and spread. For the wrists, chains and padded cuffs. She wasn’t completely horizontal, allowing her to rest back a little. She appeared to be floating.

She was wearing thigh-high boots and a leather thong that barely hid anything. Decorative chains draped her hips. Katie was delicate, but she had a fine ass, very round and soft. Her skin was covered in unscented glitter lotion. A pair of leather falsies, chains between them, hid her nipples.

Her satin brown hair hung free down the sides of her face. Atop her head was a matching biker’s cap.

“It’s striking,” Charles breathed in my ear.

It was. A larger man than Burke would have made it disturbing; a picture of heavy male dominance over helpless femininity. But Burke’s leanness, his symbolic look, allowed the audience to see him as purely leather, the rough, earthiness of it, neither male nor female. And there was Katie’s beauty, her glistening figure implying an androgynous spirit.

Burke seemed as stunned as the audience by the scenario; he remained frozen for a minute, and I thought he was going to panic. I’d had Katie model her costume for him and he’d just shrugged and stepped around her to professionally mark with his eyes where to strike with his whip.

Now, however, he was faced with her there, a near naked woman, up-close and personal. He could make out the rose of her libia to either side of that leather butt floss. He could probably smell her sex.

He looked ready to throw up.

Or perhaps he was just frightened of this new canvas hanging before him, demanding he use it.

He gulped, and let the whip drop down to his side. A flick of the handle caused the leather to slither like a snake. A gunfire crack rang out. The crowd twitched and caught their collective breath.

Katie’s head came up, as if she’d just heard her lover’s voice.

And that’s when Burke and Katie connected. The panic left Burke’s eyes, and he got that look we all knew, one that said he was “on.” Katie’s body shifted, as if easing into a yoga position, indicating her readiness.

The whip went up over Burke’s head, right into a swirl. This was why he’d wanted plenty of room. So he could circle that leather. Off it went. Sailing toward Kate’s vulnerable ass.

“Crack!”

Katie’s head went up, her long hair swung and she released a cry that was more like a song. It mingled with the echo of the whip’s snap, there in the air.

Across her left ass cheek was a fine, horizontal welt. It blushed pink, then reddened almost to purple.

Burke was swinging again, his body moving like a dancer. The whip looped and snapped out.

“Ah!” Katie sung, and a matching welt rose on her right cheek.

Burke picked up speed now. The whip flourished and snapped, one-two, so fast the audience gasped.

Twin marks reddened the insides of Katie’s thighs, right between boot tops and ass cheeks. Her gasp became a delicious moan.

The leatherdykes were breathless. They were in awe of Burke’s skill, envisioning themselves in his place. They wanted to be creating those welts, eliciting those songs from beautiful Katie.

Come to that, “my” cock was twitching. There was no stopping it, any more than I could stop my imagination from feeling Burke’s energy and control or the sting of Katie’s welts. Male crotches all around joined me, swelling with captured erections. Lips parted. Hands went southward.

A snap like a gunshot as Burke sent the whip under Katie’s suspended form. The leather tip flicked up before retreating, carressing her right between her breasts. The touch was so light, the chains there barely swayed. Burke’s control of the whip was that masterful.

Katie’s breath sucked in, and in the dim light we all saw a glimmer as a slick wetness spread down from her crotch to dampen her inner thighs.

“Jesus,” Charles breathed.

“What she’s got that we poor males don’t, Charlie boy,” I murmured. “Her whole body’s a sex organ.”

“I have got to get me a girl.”

I elbowed him.

“Crack! Crack!”

Another pair of welts. Katie’s reddening ass squirmed, her wrists twisted in their padded cuffs.

“Oooooh,” she moaned.

Members of the audience were jockeying for position now. Some wanted to watch Katie’s lovely face, tears trailing down from her shut eyes. Others wanted to gaze up at the responsive ripple of her belly and pelvis. The rest were fixated on the welting of ass and thighs, the juices dripping from the barely hidden cleft between.

“Crack!”

Back again to the right cheek, and—

“Snap!” –to the left. Katie’s ass now had a trio of welts. Her breath caught, and caught again. Her tender backside had to be burning, the welts searing like white-hot metal.

Suddenly, she started to struggle against the ropes and the cuffs, as if she knew what was coming and had lost her nerve.

The whip snapped, calling her name, asking for her attention. Vertical wheals appeared right through the horizontal welts on both cheeks. Katie’s hands fisted as those acid lines seared her. She released a cry, and her struggles stopped. It was as if Burke had caressed her, calmed her down. Asked her to trust him.

She relaxed into the ropes so that her thighs spread even wider. “Yours, Master,” her posture seemed to say, with conviction and faith. “All yours”.

I heard Charles choke. His hand was at his crotch. I sympathized; sparks were going off in my tight, high balls, and my erection was throbbing against the denim of my jeans.

The whip spun under Burke’s control, like a whirlwind. The audience went tense. What now?

“Crack! Crack!”

Up strokes, masterfully aimed at the most tender spots, just next to the red lips peering round the thong. A fine spray from her liberal juices went up into the air, shimmering in the faint light. Her cries were more like mews, plaintive, yearning.

The leatherdykes went weak in the knees, overcome with a desire to kiss those tender welts. Taste and lick those soft, wet folds.

The air had gotten very thick and warm in the Pit, the breathing audible. The perfume of sex wafted up. Katie’s most pungently, along with the smell of Burke’s sweat. His ropey shoulders were glistening with perspiration, and there was a pool of it at the base of his throat. When he raised his arm, sweat dewed the hair underneath.

He moved as if in a trance, every muscle as sinuous. I don’t think he knew anyone else was there. It was just him and her.

Another gunshot below her suspended body. This time the whip, amazingly, flicked up to brush her navel. Katie released a high note, her body jerking and rocking. Her red ass bore beautifully symmetrical welts, like a musical score, and her equally welted thighs were soaked in her slippery juices. Her head rolled, the light shimmering over her hair as her golden face appeared and vanished.

She was lost in those jolts of pain and pleasure, in the rush of endorphins that even the sound of the whip shot through her body.

Her whip-master was panting. I’d seen Burke swing heavy chains at a man’s back and seem less exhausted. But this was all style and control. This was art. It was taking everything out of him.

He made the whip swirl and dance at his command once again. The audience was enthralled. He sent out some cracks, there along the floor, under Katie.

She writhed and moaned with each snap, as if it had scored her flesh. Beautifully responsive.

God. If those leatherdykes couldn’t see what Katie was by now, all she was, they were fools. If they didn’t want her and all she could give them, they were idiots.

Back the whip went at last. Everyone, myself included, held their breath.

Out it went, sailing it seemed. It didn’t touch Katie, but the crack, the gunshot snap of it occurred right between her legs, and the sound of it, if not the delicate tip, must have hit her clit.

She jerked and jerked and cried out again and again. Her hair fell back, her face glowed with elation.

She fucking orgasmed.

Burke took one step back, as if her response had sent a lightning strike right back at him, right through his heart. His tight leather pants showed a visible erection. As Katie sunk exhausted in her bonds, he snapped the whip twice more. Katie twitched as the tip stuck her on either ass cheek, like kisses. The finale.

And then the whip went still, lying there on the floor, depleted. Burke’s lungs were heaving, Katie was sighing.

The audience was stone still. For a moment, no one was sure how to respond. This is the Cockpit and we’re a small, conservative bar. We’d never had anything quite like this. But Burke’s mastery of the whip, at least, deserved applause, and finally, we offered it. Enthusiastically.

I felt Charles fingers lifting my chin, shutting my mouth. My jaw had come unhinged.

“You are so going to fuck me tonight,” he murmured into my ear.

“In every orifice you own,” I agreed, “and many that you don’t.”

As the applause died down, Burke finally blinked out of his trance and hurried to get Katie down. I nabbed some bar towels from a shocked Robbie and got over there to help.

Burke had her out of the ropes and was unlatching the cuffs when I tossed down the towels. And then the whip-master was sinking to the floor, cradling Katie in his sweaty arms.

I saw she was completely lost in what some call “subspace,” her eyes dreamy and blinking without seeing, her breath coming faintly. So I set myself up to guard them, urging those pressing at the ropes to give the two room and time.

When next I glanced back at them, Burke, to my amazement, was kissing Katie. It was the most chaste kiss I’d ever seen in my life, as if he was touching his lips to those of a saint.

“What the fuck?” I took a step near. Burke’s eyes shot up, and I immediately stepped back.

I was twice Burke’s size and muscle but I would not have gone near Katie at that moment if a gun had been pressed against my head. If I’d even tried to touch her I think Burke would have torn out my throat with his teeth, he was that protective of her right then.

“Oh, Daddy,” Katie whispered as he held her tenderly. “You were magnificent!”

“So were you, Angel.”

God…help us. They had pet names for each other! I hadn’t intended this, and I could not fucking believe it, but there it was. No denying it.

Burke had found his muse, and he was laying claim to her. If he’d snapped a collar on her neck and branded his name on her ass he could not have made it more clear.

And I would have sooner faced a rabid badger then argue the point with him.

“You carried me through it,” Katie went on. “I could hear every word you said to me, in every sting and pop.”

“I was just responding to you,” Burke answered, stroking her hair, “Every move, every cry, I knew exactly what you wanted.”

Right. This was getting way too intimate for me. Understand, they didn’t want to fuck each other. In fact they likely would have made faces of disgust at the very idea. It wasn’t even like with Charles and me, a Master/slave relationship. This was pure SM, the purest possible, as it involved just one instrument. Burke didn’t want to dominate Katie, he just wanted to whip her. And Katie didn’t want to submit to Burke, she just wanted to be whipped by him.

They’d finally found a reason to meet halfway. Or, to put it simply: love is a many splendored thing and these two…had fallen in love.

“I don’t know how to thank you,” Katie breathed to Burke, tears of joy in her eyes. “That was the most amazing experience of my life.”

“I was about to say the same thing,” Burke said wonderingly.

“Uh,” Charles was at my shoulder, speaking in hushed tones as if in a library. “Master Nash wants to know if they’re going to sit there all day. He wants to get the pool table back in.”

“If Nash wants to try and move them,” I whispered back, “he can try. I ain’t gonna touch no one.”

“Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing?” Charles asked.

“You’re seeing it. It’s going to strike us all blind.”

“Fuck me sideways.”

“What a good idea,” I murmured.

#

We convinced Burke that Katie needed to go home. He agreed, wrapping the coat about her shoulders and keeping his arm around her the whole time. He opened the car door for her, buckled her in, and seated himself beside her. When we got to her apartment building, he got her out and escorted her up the stairs, refusing our help and telling us to vamoose.

So far as I know, he tucked her into bed and stayed the night with her. I’m guessing he cooked her breakfast and doted on her all throughout the next day.

Me, I took Charles back to his house and barely got him through the door before I had my hands in his hair and my tongue down his throat. Then I put some love bites on his neck, before shoving him to his knees. I fucked his mouth till I came, then I got him into the bedroom, and sucked him before flipping him over and taking him from behind while jerking him off.

Then we did it all again.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but Burke and Katie’s performance certainly served as a lightning rod for us.

The patrons of the Cockpit talked of it all week long and, as hoped, offers of courtship came in for Katie from many an enamored leatherdyke. Lustful inquires came in as well from more than a few boys wanting Burke. Both sexes left gifts with Robbie: leather bracelets, boxes of candy, corn whiskey, riding crops.

Neither Katie nor Burke, however, resurfaced. For the entirety of that week, they were MIA. I called and sent e-mails, but got no answer.

Finally, eight days after the performance, at the start of Happy Hour, the two of them stepped into the Cockpit.

Burke looked clean, as if he’d showered, and laundered his clothes. He still had his mustache, but he’d had a professional shave; the scruffiness was gone and the facial hair was neatly trimmed. Katie looked fresh and happy, a smile beaming from her face. It was a far cry from the weepy girl we’d found that Saturday night. She had on chic jeans, a leather bustier and low-heeled boots. Her make-up was subdued and she had not used any perfumed products.

Both of them wore biker hats, and around Katie’s neck was a delicate, heart-shaped lock on a gold and diamond chain. It looked like an expensive fashion accessory but we all knew it was more than that. Burke had asked, really asked with Katie’s pleasure and tastes in mind.

And Katie had accepted.

Katie was collared, and the two of them now belonged to one another.

“I guess congratulations are in order,” I said scooping her featherweight up and hugging her.

“In more ways than one,” Katie said, kissing me full on the lips. For a girl, she was a damn good kisser.

“We’ve been busy,” Burke explained as I put Katie down. “All kinds of requests are coming in for demonstrations. Some of them want to pay for travel and rooms and everything.”

“Which he deserves,” Katie said, taking Burke by the hand.

“Now, Angel—”

“Daddy,” she stopped him, “you are the best in the whole wide world, and it’s time everyone knew it.”

A few minutes later as Burke got himself a beer, she confided to me: “He told me all about that Delta Run thingy. They had him whipping men with “chains”! Can you believe that?” She was aghast.

“It’s not as bad as it sounds—” I tried.

“Chains!” she interrupted, angrily. “That’s like handing a concert violinist an accordion! How could anyone have been that “insensitive”?”

“Um, well….”

“His whole life men have been taking advantage of him. Using him, never giving him a chance to really display his art.” Tears glimmered in her kittenish eyes. “Well, no more. Not while I’m with him. From now on, he gets treated right.”

I would never have imagined delicate Katie could be so passionate. So fierce.

“Isn’t she amazing?” Burke said, when I stepped up to join him at the bar. “Do you know,” he added confidentially, “Women are more empathetic than men? They feel “everything”, and they’re not afraid to show it!”

“I had heard something about that,” I responded, bemused.

“It makes such a difference. I never realized how all that take-it-like-a-man attitude was interfering with the feedback I was getting. With Katie I can use finesse, technique. I don’t have to whale on her like I do with guys.”

See what happens when you finally leave your comfort zone? A world of possibilities opens up to you.

“You’re going to get razzed about having a girly boy,” I warned him.

He shrugged. “I can take any grief any guy wants to dish out, so long as he remembers to show Katie respect. Anyone who doesn’t is going to find out what I can really do with a whip.”

The newlyweds (sic) chatted with us a little longer and then it was time for them to go. They were, they informed us, on their way to Des Moines leather fair.

Robbie came up to me as they left. “You out did yourself, Fancy Man.”

“Nope.” I shook my head. “I didn’t do a thing this time. It was all them.”

In spite of my protests, however, the story spread, and I was held responsible for the miracle love affair. Robbie warned me that Fancy Man’s reputation as a fantasy granting genie was spreading beyond our little leather bar, and inquiries were coming in from an odd assortment of folk. But those are other stories….

As for Burke and Katie, they went on tour. Katie garnered a lot of admirers, of course, but she made it clear to her suitors that if they wanted to spend even one night with her, they needed to win over her very protective Daddy. Burke, likewise, let anyone who asked for a whipping know that they had to get approval from his Guardian Angel and manager. Neither one of them might have known how to defend themselves, but they knew how to shield each other.

And Charles and me? We’re still on the road, seeing which way the relationship takes us. It’s not often you get that lightning strike of true partnership. I can only hope that one day, some crack of a whip will reveal to us how perfect we are for each other, just as it did for the leatherman and the lipstick lesbian.