Chapter Seven: One Dollar Bucket
I burst through the door to find myself by the pool, filled with sunglass-wearing bathers in various stages of undress, drinking cocktails and splashing around in the cool blue water.
“Hey! Perdita!” called a female voice, and I looked down to see Marigold, the girl who’d prepared me for my first evening at Eros House, squinting up at me from the edge of the pool.
“Are you busy?”
“I—well—no,” I fumbled, and Marigold surged up from the water and grabbed hold of my hand.
“Then come swim with me.”
“I don’t have a bathing suit.”
“So? You look all wet anyway,” Marigold replied, and tugged my arm playfully, pulling me into the pool.
“Oh!” I exclaimed, landing in the water with a splash. Marigold was right; I was still wet from the shower, and my wet hair had already begun to dampen the dress I’d thrown back on before coming downstairs. Well, hopefully it wasn’t ruined now…
Marigold, I now saw, was naked save for a pair of bright blue bikini bottoms. Her improbable breasts bobbed cheerfully in the clear water as their owner encircled her arms around me, kissing me affectionately. I kissed her back in spite of myself, feeling Marigold’s nipples firm against the wet skin of my dress.
“I’m not off-duty or anything,” Marigold said when she finally broke off the kiss, “but I am supposed to be spending the afternoon entertaining pool guests. Which, since you’re in the pool now, you’re clearly one of, so…” She moved in to nibble on my earlobe, but I drew back.
“I’m… actually not in that great a mood right now, I’m sorry,” I said. “I could kind of use a friend, though, if that’s ok with you.”
“Sure,” said Marigold, dropping her flirtatious demeanour and looking at me with concern. “Did something happen?”
“Sort of,” I said, and told her how I’d just accidentally witnessed my husband having sex with someone else. “And I know, It’s hypocritical, right? It shouldn’t surprise me to see him with someone else—it’s no different from what I’ve been doing since I got here. But even though it’s totally unfair of me to feel jealous, I do.”
Marigold sighed. “Let’s get you a mojito.” She grabbed my hand once more and towed me over to a swim-up bar, where a bartender wearing nothing but a green bow tie and a tan handed each of us a sweating glass of the refreshing minty drink.
“I’m not married,” Marigold said, stirring the ice around in her glass with a straw, “but I do know that jealousy is pretty normal, even if you’re open with your partner. Did you guys talk about sleeping with other people before you came here? I mean…”
“Yeah. We knew it was going to happen, and I thought I was prepared for that. I don’t know though… actually seeing it—it’s harder than I thought.”
“Sure,” Marigold replied, “especially when you came in on it unsuspecting. It would probably feel different if you had been in the room with him from the beginning. But this is part of the experience you both signed up for, right?”
“Yes, I suppose it is.”
“Well, then. If your relationship is strong, and you both went into this knowingly, you’ll be just fine. Getting jealous doesn’t mean the end of the world, it’s just a feeling. You just need to talk to him about it.”
Hearing Marigold’s advice made me feel better, if only marginally so.
“You’re probably right… But what if it isn’t fine? What if this ends up ruining our relationship?”
Marigold shrugged.
“I can’t give you any guarantees, but it’s not like everyone who leaves here gets divorced after. Going through stuff like this can actually make your relationship stronger, if you make sure to keep communicating, and listen to each other. Either way, you’re here now—just worrying about it isn’t going to make a difference.”
“Thanks.”
The uneasiness I felt had not disappeared entirely, but it was something I could set aside now for another day. “You are actually really great to talk to.”
“Oh, I see, so now I’m more than just a great set of tits, am I?” Marigold joked.
“I didn’t mean—”
“It’s ok, it’s part of my job,” said Marigold. “Are you… still in a bad mood now?” She leaned forward and sucked from the straw in Perdita’s glass.
“Um. I guess not…”
Marigold lifted the mojito from my hands and set both glasses on the edge of the pool.
“I’m glad,” she said, and pressed my back up against the pool wall. The water was just deep enough that I could still stand with my head and shoulders above water. Marigold slid her hand up the outside of my thigh and underneath my dress, grabbing my naked ass. “Because I like you,” she said, rubbing up against my body in the water.
“I like you too,” I said, letting my eyes drop half-closed, letting my head fall back on the pool’s edge as Marigold began to kiss my neck and explore between my legs with her fingers.
Presently, I became aware that a shadow had blocked the brightness of the sun from my eyelids, and I opened my eyes to see Master Aries standing over me, a bemused expression on his face.
“Perdita,” he said. “I’m glad to see you’re making new friends.”
“Uh,” I said, unsure how I should respond. Marigold drew away discreetly, resting her arms over the pool’s ledge a few feet away and sipping her drink.
“You seem to have lost your usual powers of articulation,” he continued slyly. “Perhaps you’ve gotten too much sun?”
“Am I… in trouble?” I asked, wiping the water from my eyes.
Master Aries swept into a low bow, bringing his face near to her cheek. “Why don’t you go towel off. I’ll see you in my study at five thirty sharp.”
“But aren’t I supposed to go to—”
“—I’ll cancel it,” Master Aries said, cutting me off before straightening and walking back toward the building. I stared after him, bewildered.
“What was that about?”
“I don’t know, but I’d go ‘towel off’ if I were you,” said Marigold, smirking into her mojito. “I’ll catch you later.”
***
“I suppose it is my fault, for not making myself explicit,” Master Aries said as he circled me.
I was standing in the centre of the rug in Aries’ study, head tall, staring straight ahead. My arms were bound in a black bolero-style straightjacket, strapped, immobile, to my chest just underneath my bare breasts. Aries pulled me off balance by tugging the strap that ran from the garment’s collar down along my sternum, and I staggered forward until he caught me, cupping his hand against my pubic bone.
“While you are in my service, Perdita, you are to be my whore. I may give you to others as I please, or arrange for playdates, as I did today with Master Jonathan. However, let me be very clear: this cunt between your legs? It belongs to me. I don’t want you to fuck whomever you please: while you are my pupil, it’s up to me who uses you.”
He massaged the outside of my cunt, roughly, and I could feel the tender flesh swelling with arousal.
“Do you understand, Perdita?”