Chapter 1

It’s a cold Tuesday night in early October. The instructions I found online said to dress in normal street clothes. That’s all I have anyway. I do my best to look nice; I have no idea what to expect.

I’m going to something called a ‘munch’ that I read about online, on a popular fetish website. I’m not naming it because they aren’t paying me to do that, but it has ‘fet’ in the name.

Fet, as in fetish. As in perverted sex stuff. BDSM. Kink. I’ve been fantasizing about it for as long as I’ve known it existed, maybe before.

No, definitely before. On a hot day, I’ve always taken delight in touching the searing metal of the seatbelt hardware in my car, in letting the burn become so intense that it feels cold. Masochism.

I love going to the dentist, sitting in the chair. Being told what to do. Holding myself rigid at another person’s command. Being good. Obedience. Submission.

Once, in college, a friend had me over to their apartment and we got a little drunk. They had some stretchy bands on a shelf; I asked them what they were and they said they were bondage restraints they had picked up somewhere, that they weren’t into kinky stuff like that, but that they thought it was funny to have them. They asked me if I wanted to let them bind me. I said yes. I felt my breath go shallow as they immobilized my arms, with a mixture of fear and desire. Bondage. We didn’t talk about it the next day, but I had really wanted to.

The restaurant is named ‘Highway Diner’. It’s large, and I have been told to go to the large walled-off room in the back. I step into the restaurant and the warm, dry air feels hot on my skin.

“Just one?” says a server. She’s looking at me, expectantly.

“I’m ... I’m here with the Valley Munch.”

She smiles at me. I expected her to smirk, but she cheerfully leads me back. There is a tall woman there with astonishingly gorgeous legs. She wears a black blouse and khaki shorts.

“Felicia,” says the server. “It’s one of yours.”

The server hands me off. I look at Felicia. She’s wearing a lot of makeup. It skirts the line between glamorous and trashy. I like it.

Felicia’s grin dazzles me.

“Hello, my dear! Is this your first time?”

“Y-yes.”

“First time here or first time to a munch?”

“First time to a munch.”

She sees how much I’m shaking and her expression softens. “You’re very brave, you know,” she says.

“Okay,” I say. I don’t know what I mean.

“Let’s sit you down. I’m Felicia, but you can also call me Mistress Kroll.”

She leads me to a round table with one other person at it.

“Steven will take good care of you. Won’t you, Steven?”

Steven smiles at me. He’s at least twice my age, and he has short gray hair and a neatly trimmed beard. His eyes are kind, and they sparkle.

“Of course!” he says. His voice is warm. He stands and pulls the chair out for me. I sit.

I glance at Felicia. On impulse, I say, “Thank you, Mistress Kroll.”

When I say it, an electric feeling skates across my skin.

“You’re welcome, my dear.”

She heads over to greet a couple of preppy young guys who just walked in.

Steven takes a sip of water. “You did well to come in a little early. It takes forever for the people who come in right on time to get their food.”

I stare at him, helplessly.

His smile is gentle. “You don’t know what to talk about, do you?”

“No, I really don’t.”

“Well, you know my name. What’s yours?”

“Blake.”

“Like William Blake!”

I don’t expect him to know who that is. “Yes. My mother is an English professor and she loves Blake. That’s how I got the name.”

“Your mother has good taste!”

A woman sits down across from us. She has a large frame and generous cleavage. She has the rod of Asclepius, a symbol of the medical profession drawn from ancient Greek imagery, tattooed on her sternum.