Preface:
I, Reginald P. Walcott, am a 37 year old professional bitch-slave, and until recently worked in the service of Ms. Beatrice Pennington of the law firm Kale, Pennington, and Shipwright. As of this writing I am approaching what would be my tenth year anniversary in this line of work. How, one might ask, does one become a professional bitch-slave? That is the question to which I have turned my attention in this prologue and the collection of diary excerpts that will follow. This diary was, I think, an attempt to make sense of the life into which I found myself bound.
My résumé, which I have unfortunately had cause to circulate recently, does not list my most recent position as "bitch-slave", but instead refers to me as a "Personal Assistant." I have a wonderful letter of recommendation in hand that not only refers to me as an "assistant" but also plays up the more professional business activities I occasionally engaged in. However, it has only been quite recently that "Personal Assistant" has become an apropos title. To be certain, the transformation to abject servitude doesn't occur overnight. It is an evolution that is arrived at through a series of compromises that have been interpreted as the valuation of security over pride or the acceptance of complete and utter servitude as the price of not being lonely. One gives an inch, and a foot is extracted. Each compromise signaled to my mistress a lower plateau to which I was willing to sink - all for a price that was pocket change to her. My mistress used this gradual approach, and it made me forget that I once had boundaries and that there were once actions taboo. If my mistress had tried to test my limits all at once I might have remembered that I was a person, and the primal attachment I had to her would not have yet been forged. I don't know why I succumbed to all the demands made of me by Ms. Pennington. Fear, insecurity, guilt, loneliness, or secret urges in the dark recesses of my subconscious mind, any or all of these may have been responsible.
There is a brief answer to the question of how one becomes a bitch-slave. At least I can say how I came to this career path. I worked in a job that involved nearly no self-satisfaction, but, instead, consisted of menial tasks done entirely for the benefit of others. However, it is not enough to just work in such a position, but one must do it exceedingly well. I thought I was invisible, but there were those who noticed. Good bitch-slave material is, apparently, not easily come by. Soon another person was offering me almost twenty-five thousand dollars more a year for what seemed at the time like only a marginal increase in debasement.
Why the term "bitch-slave"? Personally, I believe that Mistress Pennington favored calling me a "boy-whore" or "boy-slave". From my perspective, "whore" was more apropos in that I got paid for my service. From Pennington's perspective, "boy-whore" presented the additional benefit of ridiculing me as underdeveloped as a man.
Without further ado, I will present you with some illustrative excerpts from my diary so as to give you insight into my talent for subservience and how I came to develop it.
July 28, 2000:
I received a call today from a secretary at one of the best law firms in town. She said that her employer, Ms. Pennington, had been told that I was a loyal and competent assistant, and was looking for someone to replace an employee who had recently been terminated. She asked if I would be interested in interviewing for the position. While "loyal and competent" made it sound like I was a mediocre dog, I was open to any change that might provide some break from my depressingly mundane existence. The secretary cleverly intimated that Pennington would be willing to offer a salary considerably greater than my current wage. I said I would gladly take the interview.
The secretary gave me the home address of Ms. Pennington, and told me to be there at 9:00am on the following Wednesday.
August 2, 2000:
I have a good feeling about my interview.
I tried to size up Ms. Pennington as an employer the same way she was clearly sizing me up as a potential employee. I suspect she did a better job of this than I. I had trouble getting a read on her beyond the superficial, and even at that level she was a study in contrasts. She is a natty dresser. She wore an expensive pinstriped pantsuit over an ivory blouse. It all looked crisp, as though she had never worn it before. Her prematurely silvered hair was worn in a tight bun, and not a single strand was out of place. She's a bosomy woman, and the low open neckline of her blouse showed off her impressive and considerable cleavage. Here was the first ambiguity to be reconciled. That is, the contrast between the schoolmarm hairdo, the Wall Street ensemble, and the barely contained fleshy orbs that were straining to break free from the blouse.
Her demeanor was stern, but yet she seemed to have a sense of humor. She spent a number of minutes making infinitely clear that this was a personal assistant position and was paid for from her own funds. Therefore, I would be expected to conduct tasks that would be beyond the scope of work of a person hired by the firm. She said she had had to let five previous Personal Assistants go because they eventually refused to do personal chores she assigned them. I indicated that I understood that I would have to pick up her dry cleaning, get her coffee, and perform any number of other chores that secretaries tend to get chaffed about doing because they are not related to the firm's work. She then turned the conversation on its head and asked me to describe precisely what I was unwilling to do.
I said, intending to convey a little levity, "Well, I wouldn't commit a homicide."
Pennington paused a moment before showing her own dry jocularity. "Those terms are acceptable." Shortly thereafter she dismissed me...
August 3, 2000:
Pennington's secretary at the firm called me. She asked if I was still interested in a position as Ms. Pennington's personal assistant. I said I was.
She told me to report to Ms. Pennington's home at 8:00am on Monday the 7th...
August 7, 2000:
I got to Ms. Pennington's about 15 minutes early, and I decided to wait a few moments as she seemed the kind who would be just as displeased with too early as too late. I hoped no one would call the cops as I loitered outside the wall of Pennington's estate. This was a neighborhood of multimillion dollar homes. Even in business attire, loitering around outside someone's house might attract attention.
The wall reminded me of Pennington's cleavage. It was a salmon stucco wall with deeply plunging downward arches that were filled in by ornate wrought iron bars. It was consistent with the plantation hacienda theme of the building's exterior. At any rate, if one looked at two sections of the wall it took the shape of a couple ample bosoms.
At five minutes till eight, I poked the button on the intercom.
