Episode I
She had taken the pamphlet on the street and attended the lecture. She had read the booklet and now she stood ready to climb the steps and ring the bell.
She glanced up the quiet street lined with townhouses and small trees surrounded by wrought iron fences. There was very little traffic and no one seemed to notice her as she took a deep breath and went up to the door. A security camera monitored her progress.
She pressed the brass-ringed button once and waited.
A calm female voice flowed from a speaker behind a brass grill set in the wall. "State your business."
"I have come to... I seek..." she fumbled in her purse for the booklet. "I was at the lecture last week. I..."
She held the book up to the speaker -- then, sheepishly, to the camera.
"I was at the lecture last week and I read the book and... And now I'm here."
"Do you seek admittance?"
"Yes. I do. I want in. I want to join."
"Do you understand the requirements? The Commitment?"
"Yes. Yes, I do."
"And you are ready now?"
"Yes, I am. Please, let me in."
"First, you must demonstrate your commitment."
She waited, suddenly nervous, as the speaker fell silent.
After a moment the calm voice returned.
"Remove your clothes."
"Please, let me in."
The voice was now firm, demanding.
"First you must demonstrate your commitment. Remove your clothes. Throw them out to the sidewalk."
She bent to remove her shoes and tossed them out, clattering across the sidewalk and over the curb. She glanced up and down the street, no one in the light traffic seemed to notice. Her purse followed her shoes in a heavy arc.
She took of her jacket and started to fold it to hang neatly --
"Throw it out to the sidewalk."
It landed and slid a short way, sprawled awkwardly in the middle of the walk. The earrings went easily, and the wide, braided cincture.
She paused and again looked up the street.
A man in a grey pinstripe was standing at the open door of his dark sedan, watching her. She looked at him, hesitant, trying to decide between the blouse, the skirt or the hose.
Finally deciding on the later, she reached in under her skirt and rolled and peeled the clinging sheer nylon down one leg then the other, rolling over thighs, past knees, calves and ankles. Stepping out of the feet, she straightened and tossed them after the jacket.
Her eyes met a knot of three teens in jackets and bandannas across the street. They watched in coolly calculated amazement. She felt a pounding flush around her eyes and a burn in her cheeks. Her throat was dry as she began to unbutton the blouse. She turned to the door to shield herself from the eyes she could still feel behind her.
"Let them see you," the voice conjured from behind the grill.
She turned and flung the blouse into the street, breasts trying to sway but confined by the light, blue sports bra. She felt a liberating rush as she turned to face the street, and the growing crowd -
Her skin tingled along track that her skirt's side zipper chattered over her hip. She stepped out of the ring of heavy cloth and tossed it after the blouse.
A van stopped in the street and a large, bearded man in a T-shirt rolled the window slowly down to watch. She noticed a tattoo of a sledgehammer crossed by a spike-driving-hammer in black and steel-blue wrapped over the powerful muscles of his forearm. A group of young girls in school uniforms watched as she wriggled out of the bra, tits swaying and dancing. A woman in a tightly tailored business suit stopped and followed the arc of the halter out to the sidewalk.
She smiled and slid the panties off, bending and resting her naked ass against the door before launching them out to the street. With a saucy toss of her head, which set her hair dancing, she turned her back on her spellbound audience and spoke to the grille.
"I want to be let in."
"This is your last chance to change your mind. When the buzzer sounds you will have 15 seconds to open the door. If you leave, no one will know you were here. If you hesitate too long, you will not have the opportunity again. If you enter... you read the book."
"I did."
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
She opened the door and strode, naked and square-shouldered, into her new life.
>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<
The street door closed behind her and she stood, alone, in a small ante-room.
Opposite the street door was a wall inlaid with dark tiles: browns, purples, blacks and deep reds. There were masses of tendrils, curling and tangled, but she could not make out any image.
To the left and right identical doors set flush to the walls, no handle, knob or bar. She pressed one, then the other, to no effect.
Suddenly, she became aware that the light was slowly fading. She stood in the center of the small foyer as the lights dimmed lower and lower, until her naked form was cloaked in a luxurious darkness.
Her heart pounded in the silence. She could see nothing.
She stood without moving, anticipating some change.
In her mind thoughts and images swirled. Her apartment as she closed the door. The fascinated disapproval on the face of the woman in the tailored suit. Her supervisor's, "We'll finish this on Monday." Gericault's "Fall of Icarus" over her bed. The wide-eyed confusion of the school-girls. The drop-jawed lust of the man by the sedan, the heavy-lidded cool of the toughs and the quiet interest of the bearded man in the van. The photo on page 16 of the booklet. The hypnotic voice of the man at the lecture. The shower pulsing against her soapy breasts when she decided to come.
In the dark she became disoriented. She couldn't see the walls, she couldn't see her hands, she couldn't see her nose.
The darkness absorbed her.
She couldn't feel the air against her skin.
Nothing moved; no sound.
She touched herself to assure herself that she was there. Her right hand rested on her hip. Then her fingertips curled gently to slowly trace the trough between her abs and obs, from her hips to her lower ribs. She slowly moved over the corrugations of her ribs to cup her breast. Her nipple stiffened under the touch of her thumb and she felt the moistening vaginal congestion between her thighs. Alone in the consuming darkness she moved her other hand to press against her tender mound. Her fingers slowly pressed through the tangled curls and into the heat-radiating furrow. Her long, loose hair caressed her back and shoulders and she gently squeezed her breast. Her back arched and a shiver jolted her spine as her shoulders pressed against the cold outer door.
She gasped as her fingers danced against her inner lips. She leaned forward, rolling her spine against the door. She was reined sharply when she pulled her hair, pinned to the door by her back.
She placed both her hands beside her hips and pushed off from the door. She stepped forward to regain her balance and her hard erect nipples touched the smooth-pebbled surface of the mosaic wall opposite. She rocked dreamily in the darkness, rubbing the mosaic with her tit-tips. She pressed harder and harder into the wall, mashing her breasts into the smooth stone, dragging them heavily from side to side. Hair, pasted to her forehead with sweat, veiled her heavy-lidded eyes. Her belly touched the smooth bosses and she slumped against the wall, splaying to try to contact it with every part of her body.
Suddenly, the door on the right side opened, flooding the room with a blue light. The light was blocked momentarily as someone stepped into the room. The silhouette of a tall woman covered the wall until the door quietly shut, returning the room to the encompassing darkness.
The tall woman swept the sweat-pasted hair away from her face and back over her shoulders. Long fingered hands smoothed down her arms to her wrists, then up her sides. The woman reached around, tracing from the sides of her breasts to the aching hard nipples.
The woman touched the nipples with her index fingers, testing the way they pressed into the breast flesh, then suddenly withdrew. Her powerful hands gripped her shoulders and turned her toward the door on the left.
"Now."
It was the same voice which had flowed from the grill, quiet, calm.
