HARSH TRUTHS
We entered Barbara's house through the garage door into her living room. I followed one step behind, naked as always except for the metal collar with the number nine on it. Once inside she turned to me and with a bright smile said, "Welcome to my home, Danica. I'm going to go change and then we'll have some wine and talk for a while. Feel free to explore the house. Mi casa es su casa." Then she turned and quickly strode out of the room as I stood there dumbfounded by her sudden transformation from the commanding business woman I'd been with for the past several hours to cheerful welcome hostess. It was as if she had simply slipped off one mask and put on another. It wasn't the first time I'd seen this kind of sudden transformation and sometimes I wondered which mask was the real Barbara, or if there even was a real Barbara.
I looked around the living room. It was immaculate and expensively furnished just as I'd have expected in a home owned by her, but it looked like it was a room that had been staged by a designer. It didn't have a lived-in feel to it. There was a large flat screen TV on the wall but somehow I doubted she hung out in here at night watching rom-coms on Netflix.
I wandered from there into a gourmet kitchen with granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, and a large island with eat-in bar and stools. It was a beautiful kitchen but it had the same unused feel as the living room. I opened a few cabinets and the refrigerator and found little in the way of food or cooking ingredients. Barbara obviously either ordered in or ate out. She was no cook.
I continued my tour of the house. It was certainly lovely, filled with hardwood flooring, high ceilings, and tasteful furnishings, but it continued to feel like a model home. There were few personal touches in it that you'd normally find in a person's home.
I walked down a corridor and peeked into a partially opened door and discovered a large exercise room. The room held a number of exercise machines, a yoga mat, pilates equipment and the faint smell of sweat. Unlike what I'd seen so far I could tell this was a room that got a lot of use.
Across from the exercise room was another door. I turned the knob and opened it just far enough to poke my head inside and take a look. The shades were drawn so I flipped on the light switch to get a better look into the darkened room and immediately realized that this was where Barbara spent most of her time when she was here. I hesitated about entering but she had told me to feel free to explore the house so I swung the door open and stepped inside.
I found myself in a large den with a leather chair, a brass floor lamp used as a reading light, and a side table with several books and a pair of reading glasses resting on it. The chair faced a beautiful gas fireplace built into the wall while another wall was covered with a set of built-in bookshelves filled with books. In one corner stood a beautiful antique grandfather clock. It was the only room I'd seen so far that Barbara seemed to care about but it felt like a lonely room. This was her refuge, her sanctuary from the rest of the world.
I walked over to the bookshelves and skimmed the titles. They were hard-cover books on history, warfare, psychology, philosophy and classical literature. Not much here in the way of light reading, I thought to myself. I pulled a copy of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" off the shelf and opened it up. It was well worn and heavily annotated and highlighted. Next I opened a large volume of Shakespeare's complete works and found the same. These books definitely weren't here as props or for show. Barbara was not only reading them she appeared to be devouring them trying to consume every ounce of knowledge held within.
A book title caught my eye and I pulled it off the shelf. It was an English version of an unauthorized biography of Mr. Hiromoto. It looked like a fairly new book but like the others it was heavily highlighted and annotated. She must have bought it prior to her first meeting with the man to negotiate on behalf of DDE to become his North American partners in the Mailgirls program. It illustrated to me how thoroughly prepared Barbara was in everything she did.
"I see you've found my hidey hole."
Startled, I turned to find Barbara standing in the doorway, a bottle of wine and two glasses in her hands. "I-I'm sorry, ma'am. I didn't mean to intrude." Barbara was wearing a purple bikini top with a colorful sarong wrapped around her waist. Her dark hair, which had earlier been tied up in a bun, was now spilling down over her shoulders. She looked stunning.
"No need to apologize, Danica. I told you that you could explore. And no 'ma'ams' for the rest of the evening. Tonight we're equals." She flashed a radiant smile at me then nodded her head in the direction of the doorway. "Come."
I placed the Hiromoto bio back onto the shelf and followed her out of the room. She led me to the back of the house and through a sliding glass door onto a patio. She motioned for me to take a seat on a small sofa rather than kneel on the ground, a sign that she really was treating me like an equal tonight.
The sun was going down now and there was a chill in the air. Barbara placed the wine and glasses on a nearby table, then walked to a wall switch and ignited a large rectangular gas fire pit. I immediately felt the warmth of the flames and saw its reflection in the waters of a swimming pool beyond the patio.
Barbara poured two glasses of wine, handed one to me, then slid in beside me. "Thank you, ma'am...um, I mean Barbara." I'd been forced to speak deferentially to her for so long that it felt unnatural now to call her by name. She raised her wine glass toward me and I clinked mine against hers.
Barbara took a sip and smiled at me. "No quid pro quo tonight, Danica. We'll just talk. No restrictions." I nodded and took a sip of wine. "So what do you think of my house?" she asked.
"It's beautiful."
"Are you disappointed you didn't find my 'Fifty Shades of Grey' torture chamber?"
"Um, I don't..." I mumbled, unsure how to answer.
"I'm kidding," Barbara laughed. "I don't actually have one of those here. Or anywhere for that matter. The truth is I'm no dominatrix although I'm willing to play one on occasion."
"So who are you then, Barbara? Really?" The question jumped so quickly from my brain to my mouth that it bypassed the internal filter between them and I immediately wondered if I'd gone too far in asking it. Barbara didn't seem bothered by it though.
"That's a fair question," she replied as she stared into the fire. "I should probably start by telling you where I come from. I suppose you think I was a child of privilege?"
"Weren't you?"
She shook her head. "My parents both died in a car crash when I was six. I spent years being shuffled between relatives and foster homes. No one really wanted me."
"I'm so sorry," I said. "I didn't know."
Barbara shrugged. "It happened. You may not believe it now but I was actually a very shy, lonely girl when I was young. I took refuge in books and reading. Still do, as you can see from your discovery of my den."
"So what happened?"
