Chapter 7: The Screen's Command
The curry sat in her stomach like a ball of wet clay. Dave had laughed through most of the meal, telling a long, meandering story about a client at work, his hand resting on Catriona’s knee under the table. She had smiled, nodded, swallowed chunks of chicken korma while feeling the exact, minute trickle Aidan had promised her trace a path down her inner thigh. Every brush of her own skirt against her bare skin was a screaming reminder.
Aidan had been quiet, observant. He’d leaned back in his chair, one arm slung over the back, his eyes moving from Dave’s animated face to Catriona’s fixed smile. He’d asked a few questions, just enough to be polite. The normalcy of it was a form of torture far more sophisticated than anything they’d yet done.
Now Dave was gone, called away to help his brother move a sofa. The good boyfriend. The flat felt too large and too small all at once. The ghost of the meal lingered in the air—cumin, garlic, the faint sweetness of mango chutney.
Catriona stood at the sink, mechanically washing dishes. The hot water scalded her hands. She focused on the sensation, willing it to burn away the memory of the library, the feel of the cold metal shelf, the weight of him.
Aidan appeared in the doorway, leaning against the frame. He held the TV remote, turning it over in his hands.
“You’re quiet,” he said.
“I’m washing up.”
“You’ve been washing that same plate for three minutes.”
She put the plate down. Her hands were red. She didn’t turn around. “What do you want, Aidan?”
“You gave me a gift. In the stacks. A secret. I want to give you one back.”
She heard the soft click as he pressed a button on the remote. The living room TV buzzed to life behind him, that familiar blue haze spilling into the dim kitchen. “Come here.”
Her feet moved before her mind could protest. The living room was as they’d left it: three empty plates on the coffee table, glasses with dregs of lager, the throw pillow Dave had been leaning on still dented. Aidan sat on the couch, the remote held loosely between his fingers. He patted the space beside him.
She sat, perched on the edge, her spine rigid.
He didn’t look at her. He stared at the TV, which showed a blank, black screen with a single, pulsing search bar. “You live in your head, Cat. All those books. All those stories. You’re always the author. Tonight, you’re not.” He handed her the remote. Its plastic was warm from his grip. “Go on. That site we used last month. Hit ‘random’. Full volume.”
Her throat tightened. This was different. The library had been his invasion, his conquest. This was an offering of the reins, but reins attached to a chariot headed straight off a cliff. Her fingers felt numb. She navigated to the site, a garish splash of neon and thumbnails. Her thumb hovered over the ‘shuffle’ icon.
“Do it,” he said, his voice low. Not a command. An invitation.
She clicked.
The screen exploded into light and movement. A sterile-looking bedroom. A woman in a frilly, cheap maid’s outfit, dusting a dresser. A man entered the frame. No dialogue, just the tinny soundtrack of fake moans and slapping skin. He bent her over the dresser, hiked the flimsy skirt, and entered her in one rough motion.
Catriona stopped breathing.
Aidan’s gaze was on the side of her face. “Well?”
She understood the rules of this game. They had written them together, in whispers, weeks ago. The screen was scripture. She stood up on legs that didn’t feel like her own. Her fingers went to the buttons of her cardigan, the same one she’d worn to the library. She shrugged it off. Then her blouse. The room was cool. Her skin prickled.
She stood before him in her plain, serviceable bra and the same grey skirt from earlier. She didn’t have a maid’s outfit. But she had the role.
“I’m the maid tonight,” she said, the words ash in her mouth.
He just nodded, eyes dark.
She turned, bent over the low coffee table, pushing their dirty plates aside with a clatter. The wood was sticky with spilled curry. She looked back at him over her shoulder, the pleading in her eyes utterly real. Not for him to stop. For him to continue. To make it real.
He was up in a second. His hands were on her hips, his touch erasing the ghost of Dave’s hand from dinner. He didn’t bother removing her underwear. He just slid the fabric aside, and then he was inside her, a thick, unforgiving fullness that made her cry out into the quiet room. The TV maid squealed in counterfeit ecstasy.
He fucked her in time with the video, a brutal, mechanical rhythm. One hand fisted in her hair, pulling her head back to watch the screen. The other hand circled her throat, not squeezing, just holding. A claim.
A new clip loaded. A woman, on her knees now, between a man’s legs. Close-up. Gagging. Tears in her eyes.
Aidan pulled out of her so suddenly she whimpered. He sat back on the couch, his jeans open, his cock gleaming in the TV light. He didn’t say a word. He just looked at her, then at the screen, then back at her.
Catriona crawled. The carpet burned her knees. She positioned herself between his legs, the scent of her own arousal mixing with his. She looked up at him. His face was a mask of strained control, his jaw tight. She opened her mouth.
It wasn’t like before. There was no gentle guidance, no slow build. He let her take the lead, her movements awkward, desperate. She tried to mimic the technique on screen, bobbing her head, her eyes watering instantly as he hit the back of her throat. She gagged, pulled back, saliva stringing from her lips. The woman on TV made it look easy, graceful even in her degradation.
Catriona’s was messy. Sloppy. Real.
A soft groan escaped him. His hand came to rest on the back of her head, not forcing, just present. “Watch,” he gritted out.
She forced her eyes open, tilting her head to see the screen. The woman was swallowing, a exaggerated, pornographic act of submission. Catriona felt him pulse against her tongue. The instruction was clear.
She took him deep, fighting her own reflex, and when he came, she swallowed convulsively, the taste bitter and foreign. She kept going until he softened, until he gently pulled her off.
She knelt there, on the floor, breathing hard. The TV shuffled to a new, silent clip of two women kissing. The contrast was absurd.
Aidan leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. He hooked a finger under her chin. His thumb wiped a tear from her cheek she hadn’t known was there. His gaze was searching, looking for the woman beneath the act.
“You followed every command,” he said, his voice rough.
She nodded, unable to speak.
“That’s my gift.” He stood, offering her a hand. She took it, letting him pull her up. Her legs were unsteady. “The gift of not having to choose. Of just being told. Of being used exactly how you want to be used.”
He was right. The shame was there, a cold companion. But beneath it, roaring through her veins, was a shocking, crystalline purity. For those minutes, she had been empty of thought, of anxiety, of the crushing need to author her own desires. She had been a vessel. And he had filled her.
He pulled her into a hug, just held her. It was more intimate than anything that had come before. She buried her face in his shoulder, inhaling the scent of him, of curry, of sex.
“Dave texted,” Aidan murmured into her hair. “Sofa took longer than he thought. He’s staying at his brother’s tonight.”
They stood there in the blue glow, the silent porn playing on, a meaningless spectacle to a room that no longer needed it. The only script that mattered now was the one they were writing in the dark, each chapter more ruinous and more real than the last.