Chapter 17: Aftermath

“You’ve got to get off here, sir. Service terminates here.”

The words of the Underground guard snapped Lionel out of his confused state. “What? I’m sorry...” he began.

“High Barnet, mate. We don’t go no further.”

“No. No, of course.” He looked around. The carriage was empty. He got up slowly and a little stiffly, still very conscious of pummelling that his buttocks had received from Allison.

“Are you all right, mate?”

Lionel nodded. “Yes. Yes, of course.” He looked around as he went to leave the train. “I missed my stop.”

“Next one back is on the other platform,” the guard said, shaking his head. It happened all the time. Drunk, doped up or simply too dozy to notice; they all ended up at the end of the line eventually. This one looked relatively normal though. Apart from the rather pre-occupied expression on his face.

“Thanks.” Lionel stepped out of the carriage and headed towards the train that would take him back south again. It was worse than missing his stop, though. He’d actually gone off in the wrong direction all together. He’d have to go back to Camden Town and then change onto the Edgeware branch.

The southbound train was empty too. There were only a couple of people sat at the far end of the carriage. At this time of the evening they were probably heading into town for a meal or maybe a late cinema show.

Lionel sat down cautiously. The pain of the beating was the least of his worries. He still didn’t know how he felt about what had happened at Allison’s flat, apart from being sorry for having distressed her – and not just because of the immeidate consequences. She had been justified in being upset, of course. He knew that. She had been entitled to punish him, hadn’t she? He hadn’t meant to worry her but he had been thoughtless and she had obviously been concerned.

If it hadn’t been for that what would he have thought of the session? Her peremptory commands, the sense of her barely contained anger, the feeling that she was taking no notice of any objection he might have to the way she was treating him – all these played directly on Lionel’s fantasies. Being bound and beaten? Well, to be taken captive by her had been arousing. The beating less so but being held across her lap as she brought the spatula down time after time had seemed somehow unavoidable, necessary even.

And what of what happened afterwards?

He wondered if his cheeks looked red. They felt red, almost bruised from where his head had been trapped between her thighs. He could still smell her. The scent of her cunt still hung in his nostrils from where she had pushed his face hard in to her groin. His tongue was sore, as though he had bitten it, from where she had pushed forward violently with her hips trapping his tongue against his teeth. His scalp hurt from where she had grabbed at his hair as she rocked backwards and forwards trying to come to orgasm.

It had been violent but he hadn’t cared. He was a bit ashamed of that.

Her reaction had been sudden. Unexpected. He was used to Ms Calloway’s measured, controlled manner. He could understand how Allison in her inexperience might have been overtaken by the situation and shocked herself with her own unanticipated behaviour. Could he have done something to stop that happening or to calm her after the event? He didn’t think so. Certainly afterwards she had wanted him gone and as quickly as he could go.

But was that about him, or about her?

He looked out of the carriage window. The train had stopped and the doors hissed open. Camden Town. He got out.

There were a few other people on the platform. Couples, individual men and women; a woman trying to cope with a toddler dragging her by one hand and a push chair in the other.

He had no idea of what to do next. He looked at the others on the platform, envying them their apparent sense of purpose. He wasn’t even sure if he should get the next Edgweware Road train or simply stand there on the platform, as if all ability to choose, to initiate, to act, had been taken from him by the circumstances of the evening.

There was one thing he was sure of though. Allison should not have to punish herself because of the situation he had put her in. It was, he knew, his own set of fantasies and his own assumptions that had created the situation. He also knew it was pretty unlikely that she would want to hear from him any time soon, so he couldn’t see any immediate opportunity to apologise. As for work ... That was going to be dificult too.

There was, however, someone that he thought might help. He looked at his phone. No signal. That was hardly surprising down here. It would have to wait until he got back. Then he would call.