Z is for Zenith

Dear diary,

While in my real life I've been trying to rebuild my life, starting from scratch, zero, nada, zilch. As far as A to Z goes, it's the last chapter, kind of like bookends. Or doors, one door closes, and the other one opens. I hope so much that the new door will bring me some sort of break. So far, despite all my most recent disasters, I reached the zen-like state, which is a polite way of saying, zero fucks given. 

As you can see, I deliberately sprinkle this entry with an excessive number of words that start with Z, not sure yet, which one of them will play a bigger part in the story. Because we have a story to finish, the Red and Wolf story. Remember where we left them or need a recap? After a sweet talk and a long hug, Wolf threatened to use the freshly cut switches on Red, and Wolfie, a wolf of his word, doesn't issue empty threats. Without any further ado, I will give the stage to Red.

Zing! The first strike of a supple willow branch zapped me like a thousand volt charge. Nothing can really prepare you for that first blow, no matter how much warm-up my poor ass already received. Switching is definitely out of my comfort zone. Every year in spring it's the same song and dance of ‘will he won't he’. At the end, he always does, there is no talking out of it.

Willow branches are Wolf's favourite, talk about the sentimental attachment, as they come from his tree in his forest. The same willow tree by the water he escapes to and sits under it for hours looking at and listening to the stream, when we have rare arguments. Everyone thinks that Wolf has a bad temper but he never acts on it. He would come back home, calm and resolute, and we would have a talk, which ultimately ends up with him removing his belt. If we had a fight bad enough to send him running for the hills, or the willow in his case, there is no other way to resolve it. For us. Either way, we never go to bed angry.

Switching in the forest is definitely the zeitgeist of our relationship. Bend over a tree trunk with my panties down, getting my ass whipped with the willow branches. That's public enough to bring out the humiliation in me, from the fear of being walked on, found out. But who will dare to go that near the Wolf's house without an invitation? That's the other side of it, Wolfie's pride for his forest and every part of it. Doing it in the forest, in the open, feeds his possessive side, claiming the ownership of me and the forest as one. Claiming, owning, marking, that's all Wolfie. But what about me, what do I get out of it? Despite all the hesitation and the attempts to forego the spring ritual, I crave it with all my heart, as every year Wolfie adds something new to it.

“How is my little zebra doing?” Wolfie stops after the first three to rub my butt.

“Zebras and wolves don't live on the same continent.” I snap back and immediately regret it.

Zing! Wolfie strikes again. “Au contraire, my dear African cousin, Canis Lupaster, is very fond of the local zebras.” Zing! “Any snarky comments why I called you a zebra?”

“Because you're giving me the stripes.” I pant.

“That's right. Perfect. Red. Stripes.” He punctuates every word with a swift whoosh. “You see, you get snappy, I turn zappy.” He stops again to give me a break.

“Zealous. Overzealous.” I dance on the spot from pain. “Please, enough.”

“Enough is not your safeword.”

“Pitchforks!” I yell.

“Where? What?” He howls and frantically sweeps the surrounding bushes.

“It's my safeword, pitchforks, you forgot?” I turn around to face him

“And I agreed to that? When?” Now he clutches his hairy chest. 

“I don't know, ages ago. Wolfie, I called a safeword, I'm not crying wolf.”

“Wolf is here.” He wraps me in his arms, still panting. “I'm sorry, my reddelicious, what did I do wrong?”

“Nothing. That zebra thing threw me off, and then it was too much.” I can't let the zenith of my year end like this. “Did you want more?”

“Just three more. Can you take it for me?” Wolfie whispers in my ear.

Why in the fairytales everything is counted by three? Three questions, three choices, three roads. Three more zaps, and it's over. I'm carried home in Wolfie's big arms, pressed against his big chest, my fingers buried in the hair behind his big ears. Whatever happens next is nobody's business. Hint, it involves Wolfie's other equally big parts. Not telling, I get incredibly shy after a good spanking.

Zee end.

Please No

This story is from the very early days of their relationship. Nick knows nothing. 

Izzie's fingers, now done with caressing Nick's cheek, slide into his thick hair. She struggles not to pull on his curls too hard. Beats her, how a simple act of caressing one's hair is considered an encouragement. She hates a hand on her head whilst she bestows the hand owner with a blowie. But Nick doesn't mind, and  he definitely doesn't need any encouragement.

A stray thought shots through Izzie's agonizing brain, who knew that Nick is so good at... How many women out there know, in a very biblical sense, that Nick eats pussy like a pro? With each lick, bite, tug, and swift circle, he quickly ascends to the top of her personal eat-it-like-you-mean-it list.

He doesn't waste any fingers. While the palm of his hand applies some delicious pressure on her mound, the fingers spread the pink lips wide open for his tongue to dive in. The fingers of his other hand sink in and out, following the tempo of some heavenly song. He cautiously circled around her back door once, and she shook his hand off from there. Not all at once, Mister. Leave something for the next date. But that was the only time she intervened in his proceedings. Magnifique, he was simply magnifique.

She didn't notice how her usual 'please please please' mantra became audible, and seconds later interlaced with no's.

"Please no please no."

Screeching halt. All digits and tongue withdrawn at once, he jerks away too fast, dragging his stubble against the sensitive skin of her thigh. The burn is surprisingly pleasant, but not the feeling of the cold air where his face was just a moment ago.

"Why did you stop?" she pants.

"You said, no." The sound of his voice comes from somewhere awfully close. She opens her eyes, and, bam, he is staring at her, like a deer in the headlights, his worrisome eyes just a few inches away from hers.

"I didn't mean it," she mumbles. "Go back." She nudges his head down.

"Wait, wait a minute. What do you say when you do mean it?"

"I doubt we'll ever get there." She muses, pushing away a forgotten memory. But no, he doesn't buy it, still waiting for an answer. "Don Quixote."

"Is this some kind of a safe word?" Nick asks. 

"Yes," she nods. "It's my safe word." That was not safe enough, her memory reminds her. The safe word that was discarded, disregarded, violated. That night that broke her, send her running for the hills, and eventually, to this island. That changed everything, and most of all, her ability to trust, to put herself in the hands of the other, guarded only by one little word that draws the line between whatever they do and abuse. Since then, years past but she never tried again: to trust. 

Whatever Nick sees in her face, he freezes, but it doesn't stop him from asking more. "Did you ever have to use it?" 

And she can't, she simply can't admit, the shame, the betrayal, the failure she felt. How later she got caught up in a lie. It's so much easier to invent a lie, even only to herself, than to admit the inexplicable. So she repeats the same lie. 

"I consented." 

Death, Taxes, and Belt

This story is a bit of a Dead Dove Do Not Eat variety, so proceed at your own risk. I promise there is a happy ending, as Aldous is Izzie's evil ex-husband, she left years ago. Mandy is Nick's ex-wife.

The memories that are flooding her brain, no, she's never going to tell Nick any of this. How she was lying on that rocking spanking bench, ball-gagged, hands tied behind her back, whipped into delirium, whimpering. How Aldous stepped on the runner to stop the bench from moving and pulled the gag out of her mouth. 

"What were you trying to say, doll?" Aldous asked. 

"Don... Don Quixote," she whispered her safeword. 

"Too bad, I'm done now." How the cold lube splattered on the small of her back. "What do you say now, doll?" 

"Please, Aldous, please. I learned my lesson!" 

"Tsk-tsk, that's not what you say, doll." He spread the lube over her reddened cheeks. It was one of those warming lubes, that was supposed to tingle, but on the whipped skin it burned like hell, same as fresh ginger juice or capsaicin cream. "Or should I pick up the belt again?" 

"No, no, sir," she writhed in pain. 

"Then say it." Aldous pressed two fingers till they sank in. 

"I'm just a hole, sir," she blurted it out in one burst. 

"Atta girl, now say it again, slower, and with more enthusiasm." 

Izzie stares at her shaking fingers. For the life of her, she doesn't know how to explain, what was a brutal nightmare with Aldous, would be a dream come true with Nick. But Nick is not ready for any of it. Not today, not now. The only thing she wants is to get out of here for Christmas. Next year will be different. There will be a whole year to figure it out. 

"That Christmas," she clears her throat,  "Aldous bought me a spanking horse, as a gift, and a Gucci scarf to tie my hands. I left him for good on New Year's Eve. Happy?" 

And the same as on The Day She Came Back, Nick crosses the distance between them in one move. Does he slide, like tennis players on a clay court? He holds her tight, as if his embrace can protect her from all the evil in the world, and in this moment, it feels like he can. 

"May I please kill him?" Nick says ever so plainly. 

"I consented. We were trying a new… dynamic, and I failed." 

"You failed? Izzie, I do know the difference between consent and abuse." 

"I consented." 

He holds onto her shoulders to look at her face. "What the fuck, Iz? You kept in touch with him. Hell, you were trying to conceive with him right up until you met me." 

"I did not sleep with Aldous since I left him!" she steps back. 

"I know, he told me." 

"What did he tell you?" 

"Ask her about the turkey baster, he said. Quite self-explanatory if you ask me."

"I wanted a baby, he was still my husband, legally. What was I supposed to do? Get pregnant from a stranger I picked up at..."

"Please continue, I dare you." Nick bites his lower lip, hands in his pockets,

"Piss off, Nick, not now," she pauses. "Stockholm syndrome. I don't know, the devil you know?" 

"Oh please! You let me be 'friends' with him, so to speak, I invited him into my house. For crying out loud, he slept with Mandy."

"More like, Mandy slept with him," Izzie rolls her eyes.

"Do you understand what you did?? Couldn't you bring this to my attention earlier?" Izzie buries her face on his chest, and that alone switches off his anger and into a protector that he is, first and foremost. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, forget everything I said." He pulls her into a bear hug, his lips pressing onto the top of her head. "I need to talk to Mandy. I can't let him anywhere near you, her, kids. Please don't go away, Iz. Not now, not fucking now." 

That’s just bloody epic, with Izzie on his lap, on the verge of a bloody nervous breakdown, he needs to deal with his ex-wife, aka Hurricane Mandy, thankfully on the phone.

“Mandy, Mandy, listen to me. I’m going to say it only once. I’ve just promised Izzie not to kill Aldous and not to put him in jail, and I’m not sure how to keep this promise. You’re not to see him ever again… Yes, that bad. You can get on Tinder and fuck half of  the tri-state area, I will say, good for her and give you a five-star review for excellent deepthroating skills... Why Uber? No reviews on Tinder? How do you know?.. No, I don’t give a fuck, I just told you. Have a nice and restless night!”

Free from the phone, his right hand presses Izzie’s head under his chin, fingers combing through her hair, touching her motionless shoulders, noticing how quiet she had gone. Gone.

Not today, not now but she will tell him one day. How she plays in her head this nightmare of a scene, an all-time numero uno mover and shaker of her personal wank bank. How the cameras roll every bloody time she is about to come, from the perfect vantage point of a pitiful but useless guardian angel, floating somewhere above, just underneath the mirrored ceiling, watching her old self, pinned down and screaming under the belt rising and falling in slow motion, as inevitable as death and taxes, on her crimson cheeks. Yes, that’s it, death, taxes, and belt. How she chants the words faster and faster until…

“Nick?” she cries out, holding onto the words that burn the bridges. Startled, he shakes his head slowly, sensing the disaster, begging not to speak, no more. She presses a single finger to his lips and takes the leap. “When I get off... it helps me to get off… in my mind, I see myself on that spanking horse, and I scream, please sir, I learned my lesson.”

“You mean, when you are by yourself?” he offers her a meek way out.

“Every time. I’m sorry.”

“When I make you come, you see Aldous beating the shit out of you, did I hear it right?”

“Nick, I’m so sorry.” 

UPDATE:

To read all the stories in order click here  I was hesitating to ask you, what would Nick do, but I'm afraid that the answer would be unanimous (Thank you, Hermione!). Hold your horses though, nothing is simple when it comes to Nick...