Chapter 11 Mia
MIA
LOVE ME LIKE YOU DO – ELLIE GOULDING
My hands are wet, and I rub them nervously over my thighs. Whatever it is that happened tonight, I am as far out of my comfort zone as possible. Maybe it is all a dream, and I’ll wake up, and none of it was real.
Only it is real.
The hand pulling me out of the car is real.
The scent in my nose is real.
The cold night air in my lungs is real.
The electrifying sensation in my core is real.
The woman guiding me into her mansion is real.
Her hands wander around my shoulders and pull off my coat. The coat she gave me. The bloody thousand of pounds coat.
“Follow me,” she says and walks me up the stairs to a corridor on the right, where she opens a white door and gestures for me to go inside.
I feel like a puppet, and the best and worst thing is, I am not even opposed to it.
The room is dark, and I see nothing at first. She claps her hands twice, causing me to flinch, and the lights to turn on.
I don’t know what I expected, but this was not it. The room is as big as the living room and kitchen of my and Bella’s flat.
What comes into view first is a huge four-poster bed to the right, made from massive wood. Hooks everywhere.
My eyes fly to the left; almost the entire wall next to a leather armchair and a leather bench is covered with a picture frame that must be fifteen feet high.
It shows a photo of Victoria in a tight leather full-body suit with a deep V-neck that shows off her breasts.
She sits on a red velvet sofa, her legs wide, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees with a leather crop in her hands, staring directly into the viewer's eye with a confidence I have never seen on anyone's face. Ever.
Words fail me between being absolutely thunderstruck and wondering what kind of person would hang such a picture of themselves to see. The amount of confidence she must have.
“Are you feeling alright?” she asks from next to me.
“Yes,” I say carefully.
“Your face tells something else,” she says.
“It’s just—unexpected.”
“Is it?” she asks me cheerfully.
“I suppose yes,” I say.
“Do you have questions?” she asks me.
“Many,” I say, no idea where to start and end.
“Ask,” she says and sits down in the leather armchair, opening a button of her blouse.
I risk a stolen glance at her breasts, something she seems to find quite amusing.
“So, um, this is what you mean by lifestyle?” I ask.
“Yes and no,” she says. “This is just one room and a small part of what I call lifestyle.”
“Help me understand. Does it have a name? It all sounds so cryptic.”
“It has. I am a dominant, a domme, a mistress, some may call me, and the lifestyle I live is called BDSM—bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism.”
I swallow. Hard.
“So…you do what? Get off on hitting people who don’t do what you want them to do?”
“No. I offer liberation, trust and experience of the self through different elements of play and rules, which might include consequences like spanking or require elements on the more masochistic side.”
“Still sounds like hitting people to me.”
She chuckles. “It is not about the hitting. It is about the liberation that comes from trust. What other questions do you have?”
“Is that what your events are about?”
“They are, to some degree.”
“So, you live that lifestyle with other people?”
“Yes,” she says.
I stare from her to the picture on the wall and back. I don’t know what to say to it. I can’t imagine what any of it would look like, how it would work, or why people feel they need it.
“How do I fit in there?” I ask.
“I cannot tell,” she says.
“Why? You surely must have something in mind.”
“I do,” she says. “But it is neither my decision nor my place to say; it is yours.”
I am slightly taken aback.
“But isn’t this a two-way street?” I ask.
“Yes, and yet, I cannot—will not—persuade you of something you are not. If this is something you wish to explore, I would be delighted to guide you. If not, you say no, and our paths part.”
A heavy feeling appears in my chest. One that makes me catch my breath and makes swallowing difficult.
It is now that I finally understand what she meant in that interview I read about her.
She does not believe in love because she lives in a world where love has no place. Who would hit someone they love?
“Remember what you felt in the vault today,” she says and gets up. Her hand cups my cheek. “That feeling. The peace of mind. That is what I offer.”
I close my eyes the moment I feel her touch on mine, and the sensation spreads through my body. Peace.
Whenever I imagined my future, this was definitely not it. But it wasn’t a career ladder or being a mom, either. It was always me, books, my cats and peace.
“How would our life look like?” I ask and open my eyes to look at her. “If I were to say yes to this.”
“Whatever we make it look like,” she says, and her mouth curves up as she brushes through my hair. “Tell me your terms.”
“M-my terms,” I repeat, stunned.
“What do you need to be content?”
I can’t think with her touching me. I have never thought about it, and now, I feel overwhelmed by the question.
“I don’t know,” I say. “I never gave the future much thought. It’s not a husband and a house of kids, though,” I say, and Victoria laughs. She lets go of me, and I can finally think.
There is a moment of pause. I watch Victoria, and while I am bewildered we’re even having this conversation, her radiance draws me in.
“Show me who you are. Show me what drives you, moves you, what is important to you,” she says.
“My life will bore you to death,” I say dryly.
“Mia,” she says, and a shudder runs down my spine, because it is the first time that I can recall that she used my first name. “Just because I can offer you the world, does not mean I do not know how to value a book read in silence.”
A grin stealths onto my face.
“Okay,” I say.
“Okay, what?” she asks.
“My cats need to be fed and cuddled,” I say with a glance at my watch. “That’s what my life looks like.”
Victoria laughs with such rich laughter that I can’t stop myself from joining her.
“Give Henry the key to your flat, and instruct him,” she says as she walks me out of the room. “He’s a sucker for cats. They come to him like he is their messiah.”
“So, that’s why he’s the only one who survived picking up my male cat,” I say.
“Henry,” she calls sternly down the staircase, and he appears through a door down to the left. “Cat duty.”
He smirks.
I feel quite uncomfortable ordering him around.
“Any notice regarding your roommate?” he asks after I've instructed him on their food-and-cuddle routine.
“Not necessary,” I say, and fumble my phone out of my pocket to check Bella’s location. “She is out—yep, still at the party she texted me she’ll be at. She won’t be home until tomorrow.”
“She seems not to have learned anything from last weekend,” says Victoria, and I snort out.
“She thinks it was an amazing, consciousness-broadening trip,” I say.
“One way to see it,” says Victoria, sardonically.
“Well, Bella, she’s—she has different priorities in life,” I say. “Her main objective is not to work and have as much fun as possible.” It is something I secretly admire, because I could never. I have no idea what fun is, and my dutifulness will kill me one day.
“And you don’t?” she asks me.
“I don’t think life is meant to be fun,” I say. “We live, fulfil our duties to the community, and then we die, and no one is going to remember us within the matter of one or two generations, especially if there is no generation reproduced.”
“Huh,” she says.
“I know you look at life differently than I do,” I say, “But not everyone is like you.”
“So…you suffer because everyone else suffers?” she asks casually, but I freeze.
“I—no,” I say. “It’s more complicated like that.”
“Is it?” she asks. “I think it’s quite simple. You do not allow yourself to have fun because you do not feel worthy.”
I roll my shoulders and bring some distance between us. Her words feel like an attack on me.
“I have a proposal for you,” she says. “One day, where you allow yourself to enjoy life, have fun and let yourself be surprised by it. One day. Give me one day to show you what life can be like. And I give you one day to show me the extraordinary in the ordinary.”
We’re standing in the middle of the entrance hall with this monumental chandelier. My eyes wander up and over to the art on the wall, as I consider her words for a moment. I am scared that if I let her, I might never recover from it.
I don’t know why, but I keep thinking of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave as I stare at the Caravaggio oil painting I looked up after my first visit here, which is estimated to be worth around 130 million pounds.
I am one of the people in the cave, only knowing shadows, and when presented with reality and a chance to explore the unknown, I would rather stay in the dark, watching the shadows, than face it.
“Okay,” I say simply and silently as I take my eyes off the painting. “One day.”
Her mouth becomes a warm, radiant smile, making her infinitely attractive.
“Then come,” she says, holding out her hand.
And I take it.
Outside.
Before I can blink, she opens the door to a black Range Rover for me, and I find myself being placed on the white leather passenger seat. I feel horrified by my own decision.
“Do not even think about it,” she says warningly. “Sit down and put the seatbelt on. I’ll be right back.”
While she walks back inside, I look at the car. It’s an Autobiography, something I only know because Bella’s father drives the very same car, just with horrible brown leather inside that makes my eyes hurt. Although the white isn’t any better. I generally have no clue about cars, nor do I care.
Victoria returns five minutes later with a mid-sized bag. I don’t even want to know at this point. This day feels so out of touch already; whatever is about to happen, I don’t care. So, I don’t ask.
I look at her when she settles down in the driver's seat, and it’s like the car was made for her. Everything about it, about her, the car, just fit.
“When was the last time you saw something other than London?” she asks me.
“Um—“ I say and rub my hands over my thighs. “Never.”
Because the truth is, I have always been here, in my cave.
“Uh-hu,” she hums knowingly.
We don’t speak much during the ride. I watch her navigate London traffic, something I could never do, even if I had a driving license. And somehow a feeling crawls up on me that I wish to deny, because something about this feels so normal. So ordinary. Our ordinary.
At some point, she pulls over into a driveway and parks the car in front of a lot of red. I crane my neck to see where we are.
Edmiston London Heliport, I read in my mind, and goosebumps spread over my arms. Not of the good kind. Because I have never been in a plane, let alone a helicopter, and I am scared of heights. Very scared.
“No way,” I’m telling her. “I can’t—“
“You will,” she says and gets out. She walks around to open my door, and I feel like a toddler.
“One day,” she says to remind me. “Henry will take care of everything here in the meantime; your cats will be the most spoiled cats on the planet.”
I groan and curse to myself.
She gets out of the car and is joined by a man in a suit, who takes the car keys and the bag and guides us to a terminal at the heliport.
We are directed onto the field, and a heavy rock drags my stomach to the ground as I see the helicopter with what is supposedly a pilot waiting for us.
“Victoria,” says the man, holding out his hand, “How wonderful to see you.”
So, they know each other.
“Likewise,” she says and takes his hands. “I hope the kids are alright?”
“They are,” he says, while I just stand there, staring at the black helicopter like an idiot.
“Did you and Miss Phillips have a pleasant arrival?” he asks.
“As always,” Victoria says.
“Wonderful,” he says and opens the helicopter door.
“Come,” she says to me, but I am frozen to the ground.
“First time?” asks the pilot, and I nod. “You may just sit for a moment,” he says. “I’ll explain and answer whatever questions might arise.”
Victoria gets inside and holds out her hand for me to take.
I hesitate for another moment.
The cave, think of the cave, I tell myself. One day, no cave.
And I take her hand and climb in.
I am fixed in my seat, with the headset on, when I suddenly hear the pilot's voice in my ears. He explains what is about to happen and starts the rotor.
I will so regret this.
The vibration goes through my body, and my heart beats into my throat the very moment.
Victoria, next to me, watches me carefully, but approvingly.
“Ready?” asks the pilot, and I shake my head.
“You better be,” Victoria says. “You will learn to love it.”
Learn to love it, I repeat to myself, and can’t unhear the sound of the future coming with it.
“London Tower, this is Sierra Echo Yankee Charlie One, requesting departure clearance from London Heliport, Echo Golf Lima Whisky, VFR flight, private charter, routing northbound to private landing site in the Highlands Glenmere Manor, ready to lift.”
Goosebumps spread over my entire body. Private landing site in the Highlands.
“Sierra Echo Yankee Charlie One, this is London Tower, you’re cleared for departure. Maintain heading zero-one-five, climb to one thousand-five-hundred feet. Contact Scottish Control on 124.5 once leaving London airspace. Have a safe flight.”
I can’t believe my ears.
This is really happening.
I bite my lip as a smile displaces itself into a grin of disbelief.
The helicopter lifts off, and my hands, my entire body, are as sweaty as they can get. I try to calm my breathing because the vibrating-while-hovering feeling is absolutely not my cup of tea.
Victoria grasps my hand, and I am embarrassed by how sweaty it is, but she does not seem to care. She caresses with her thumb over the back of my hand in a calming rhythm.
“Focus on something outside,” says the pilot through the headphones. “Something in the distance.”
And when I look up, we’re rising and leaving London underneath us.
It looks so small from up here.
I can’t believe I am doing this.
I’m flying in a helicopter.
With her.
Everything about it is so absurd that I start laughing.
This is probably the scariest and most wonderful thing I have ever done.