Chapter 11

Emma heard the door open and shut in the other room, just as she was putting on her mascara. It was Luke, a half hour early. She called out to him and he greeted her with a friendly hello.

“I’m going to grab a beer while I’m waiting, ok?” he called from the kitchen.

“Sure, I’ll be out in a minute,” she replied, loud enough for him to hear her as she finished adorning her long lashes.

She closed up the mascara tube and tossed it into her make-up bag, smiling at herself in the mirror, suddenly grateful that Luke was in her life.

Her feelings were complicated, she knew that. She was sure that, like herself, most women had similar curiosities and desires like her own, but society’s unrealistic expectations of how women should ‘behave’ were drilled into their heads from a very early age and they often felt shameful and embarrassed to have them. No wonder they often didn’t feel safe enough to explore them.

Throughout her entire life, she had been taught to suppress her desires, starting with her parents who conditioned her, day after day, to be a good girl. They were very clear about what that meant. Good girls kept their mouths closed, legs crossed, and their skirts down. She never thought it was fair that her brother was encouraged to speak his mind and sow his wild oats while she was encouraged to “save” herself for the “right” guy, to be chaste until marriage. Men, she was taught, didn’t want to marry loose women.

But that was just the beginning of her education. Religion taught her that it was women who carried the burden of sin and that they would forever need to atone for it (thanks for that, Eve!). In school, dress codes were implemented and enforced to ensure that boys would not be distracted by scantily dressed girls. God forbid they see too much thigh and fail math, but no problem shaming a girl and sending her home to change while she missed a few hours of class.

The truth was, these messages were everywhere, magazines, commercials, television shows. Even the movies polarized women with ridiculous stereotypes.

But the most heartbreaking in Emma’s opinion? Other women. Instead of working together to end the oppression and shift expectation, they would turn on one another, shaming and degrading each other through malicious gossip and accusations, and as Emma recalled, that started at a very early age. If a girl was pretty and popular and was offered attention from boys she was deemed a slut, regardless of the facts. No one gave a shit about the facts. This made it very clear to Emma and her friends that they needed to pick a side. Shame or be shamed. It was heartless really.

All these things shaped her view of the world and ultimately forced her into an itty bitty box, slowly and methodically chipping away at her self-confidence, filling her with doubt, making her question her own truth. She learned that in order to protect herself she needed to fly under the radar and keep her thoughts, feelings, and needs locked up tight. When she did have desires that didn’t quite fit into the puzzle of her life, she felt unclean, immoral even. No, she couldn’t be the only woman who struggled with it all, suffocating under impossible expectations, buried deep under society’s conventional burqa.

That’s why she was grateful for Luke. He was the only person in her life who didn’t ask her to be anything other than herself. He encouraged her to lift the veil, to color outside the lines. He encouraged her to honor her truth, insisted on it really. She could trust him with her intimate thoughts and feelings. He never judged her. Unlike her mother, a devout Catholic who sadly, hadn’t quite forgiven her daughter for leaving her marriage. She had told Emma that divorce was a cop-out, a sin in the eyes of the church, and to this day had still not forgiven her for what she considered a “huge mistake”. Her mother always liked Andrew and considered him the best match her daughter could ever hope for.

“Can I come in?” Luke said, knocking lightly on her bedroom door, “Are you almost ready?”

“Yes, come in,” Emma invited, combing her long bangs with her fingers.

“It looks like a bomb went off in here,” he chuckled stepping over small piles of clothing on the floor.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I went through just about everything in my closet trying to decide what to wear,” Emma confessed, looking at him through her mirror. He had a grin on his face and carried a small shopping bag.

“You look great, Mimi, really, the fairest of them all, but where I’m taking you requires much less clothing,” Luke insisted playfully, picking a shirt up off the floor. He looked it over quickly before tossing it on the bed.

“Believe it or not, it took me an hour to decide on this,” Emma laughed, turning around to face her friend.

“Here, add this to your ensemble,” he grinned, tossing her a shopping bag.

“What is it?” she asked, looking up at him nervously.

He chuckled, slowly shaking his head, “open it and find out, silly!”

Emma took the item out of the bag and carefully peeled away the hot pink tissue paper. She looked it over carefully, turning it over in her hands.

“Ok, what is it?” she asked again, eyebrow raised. She held it up with both hands to get a closer look. It looked like a thong, but it was made out of sturdy leather with a small silicone dildo placed strategically inside.

“It’s a chastity belt,” he explained gently, walking toward. her.

“What’s it for?” she asked’, pretty certain she already knew.

“It’s for you to wear tonight. It locks around your waist, like this...” he said, taking it from her hands. He pulled a small lock out of his pocket and attached it to the buckle to show her before removing it again. “See?”

Emma felt her cheeks pinking up, the flush rising quickly, aroused by images that darted flirtatiously in and out of her imagination. She knew that Luke had toyed with BDSM over the years, a little kink here and there, and to be honest, whenever he shared his daring adventures with her she had been intrigued. She had often fantasized about being bound, held ‘against her will’ by a strong, handsome man and forced to submit to his whims, lovingly punished if she resisted...

“Mimi?” Luke said, drawing her out of her thoughts.

“Yeah?” she croaked, meeting his stare. He snickered, offering her the belt.

“Can you figure out how to put it on?”

“I’ll manage,” she grumbled playfully, slipping it out of his grasp. “But why this piece, is it really necessary?” She held the dildo delicately between two of her fingers, grinning at him.

“You’ll see...” he purred, helping her stand up, “Now hurry up, we have to get moving. And take this lock with you. Once the belt is on, lock it in place.” He gestured for her to hurry along, leading her to the bathroom. “Wait, wait...” Emma protested, her giggles masking her ambiguity, “where are we going? Why do I need a chastity belt? Should I be worried?”

Luke looked her in the eyes, his smile fading slightly. “No, you should never be worried when I’m with you. I’ll take care of you. I’ll take care of everything. Do you trust me?”

She regarded him for half a second before answering. There was no doubt in her mind.

“Implicitly.”