I can’t believe I’m actually doing this. I’ve been travelling for over ten hours now. I caught a plane this morning and then hired a car, and have driven over three hundred miles to get here. And where exactly is here? A decrepit iron gate in a hedgerow in the second field back from the lay-by just beyond the filling station that’s four miles east of the junction of the A11 and the B1172. Does that sound like the middle of nowhere? It certainly looks like it, from what little I can see of it of course. A thin crescent moon dimly illuminates this unremarkable slice of English agricultural countryside, when it manages to peek through the gaps in the clouds that is. I check the time on my phone. Its screen seems stupidly bright in the darkness. It’s 23.50, and it’s cold.

 

She’s not going to come of course. Who would? She’d have to be mad to do something like this for real. It’s bad enough for me and I’m supposed to the dominant half of this. I’m not going to get tied up by a complete stranger. Or maybe I am. Maybe she’s actually an eight foot tall rugby player who has a thing for punishing perverts like me. I’m fucking well trusting her too. Not that she’s coming of course.

 

There’s a rustling from the other side of the hedge and suddenly a voice speaks. A woman’s voice.

 

“Mr Tean?” it asks.

 

“FirebreathingAlison?” I ask in reply.

 

“Err… Hello,” the voice says. Can you stay there, I need a moment to get ready.”

 

Fuck. Fuck! She’s actually come! My heart starts pounding. Are we really going to do this?

 

I can hear something going on behind the hedge. The sounds are consistent with someone getting undressed, and then I hear her moving to the gate. There’s some quiet cursing consistent with standing on thorns in bare feet. I can see her now in the dim moonlight standing on the other side of the gate. I can’t really make out many of her features, but it seems she has complied with her dress requirements. She looks naked from the waist down, just as we agreed. Above that there’s a short jacket, a face and some curly hair. It’s too dark to see much more and we agreed no torches.

 

She reaches an arm out towards me. There’s something in her hand but I can’t see what from this distance. I walk over to her and recognise what it is she’s offering me. Her dog collar. Up until now it’s all been completely surreal, but the sight of that collar brings it all home to me and I realise the enormity of what is going on here. This woman is about to let a man she’s never met and knows only from an internet chat room, bind her half naked to this gate. She’s going to stand, bend forward at the waist and place her neck and wrists on the top rung of the gate. And I’m going to put the dog collar on her and then bind it and her wrists to the gate with tie wraps. And she’s going to remain in this improvised pillory for thirty four minutes. Don’t ask me why thirty four minutes, that’s a story in itself.

 

Thirty four minutes she’s going to stand here, bound, uncomfortable, probably hurting after just few minutes, with the cold winter wind blowing straight onto her exposed bottom and crotch. And for no other reason than she wants it. She wants it so badly she’s prepared to trust a complete stranger to do it to her. How does she know I’m not going to rape her, or kill her, or just wander off and leave her bound to the gate? She’d freeze to death long before anyone found her. The answer is of course that she doesn’t know. I’m just a pervert from the internet and I could do any or all of those things to her. That must be the thrill for her. Some people jump off cliffs, race motorbikes, or trek to the North Pole for their fix of danger and excitement. She gets a stranger to tie her up and trusts him with everything she has.

 

I can barely stop my hands shaking enough to put the collar on her. I get it buckled and ask her if it’s too tight. She says it’s okay. I slide a tie wrap through the collar and round the gate, then zip it up tight. I place a second tie wrap along the top of the gate and then use another to fasten it there. She offers her left wrist and I snug the tie around it and then tighten the one that holds it to the gate so she can’t slide it about. Then we repeat on her other wrist. I step back and I can see her testing her restraints.

 

“Everything okay?” I ask.

 

“You could do the collar a little tighter,” she replies after a pause.

 

Tighter? Fuck, what a woman! I just bound her to a gate in the middle of fuck knows where, and she wants it tighter! I bend down to tighten the buckle and as I do so I notice how hard my cock is. I’m of an age where hard-ons don’t come so easily anymore and certainly don’t come this big. If only I could turn her into a pill and bottle her.

 

“How’s that?” I ask having done the collar up another notch.

 

“Mm. Better,” she says. “Timer?”

 

“Yes, I brought a stopwatch. I thought the screen on my phone might be too bright.”

 

“Okay, thirty four minutes.”

 

“Thirty four minutes.”

 

I pull the stopwatch from my pocket. Its dim backlight barely manages to illuminate its tiny LCD display and it casts no light on the bound woman in front of me. I click the button and it starts counting down.

 

“Remember not to tell me how long I’ve got left. Just when it’s finished,” she says.

 

“As we agreed.”

 

“Good.”

 

I’ve been on plenty of first dates, far too many if I think about it, for I would like more of them to have led to something. And on many of those dates there were those moments of awkward silence when neither of you knows what to say. This though, this is the mother of all awkward silences. I guess if you’re a real villain and you’ve just got your victim bound and helpless you could say all sorts of things about what you’re going to do to her, how you’re going to kill her or torture her or whatever. But here, here I’m just tying her up, or down depending where the height boundary between them is. Nothing else. Pilloried for thirty four minutes and that’s all. What does one say in these circumstances?

 

“Do you want to talk?” I ask. Christ that’s a crap thing to ask.

 

“Not really,” she replies. “But I can’t stop you if you want to.”

 

“No, but then you can’t really stop me doing anything can you,” I say, suddenly feeling a little evil and wanting to scare her a bit.

 

She doesn’t reply. She doesn’t even look at me. I can see her shift a little in her bonds though. That bent over position must be starting to ache already. And the cold ground on which a little frost is forming will be starting to sap the heat from her bare feet. I feel a bit deflated by her lack of apparent fear at my insinuation. I’m not a villain and I’m not going to rape her or anything else like that. But she mustn’t know that. Surely the danger is her thrill and she’s got to be scared to make it work. I wonder how I can scare her more. I’m obviously not very convincing as a villainous rapist even though I don’t think I’ve ever felt this horny, not even as a hormone filled teenager. Maybe I can do something about that and scare her a bit at the same time.

 

“I’m just going to go and have a cigarette, maybe make some calls. I’ll be back… if I don’t forget.”

 

I wander off along the line of the hedge. I’m hoping to hear her call out in panic, but nothing comes. How far should I go? How far before she can’t tell where I am? How far before she wonders if I’m coming back? How far before I can have a wank and she won’t know? Maybe she already knows. I wonder if she’s getting off on it. Maybe she’s got a little vibrator in her and she’s cumming right now. Sexy bitch. I wonder how old she is. Can’t really tell in this light. Forty maybe? Younger? Decent amount of curly hair though. She obviously hasn’t reached the point where she thinks she’s no longer attractive and cut it short to be less bother. I hate it when sexy older women do that. Okay then, I think here’ll do. Fuck I need this, and I need to get it out or else I might not be able to keep my word to her.

 

It’s a fairly well ingrained notion in most men that when pissing outside it’s best to face downwind. Pee-eth against the wind and one pee-eth against oneself. Unfortunately that instinct isn’t so well honed when it comes to jerking off outside, well it’s not something I’ve made a habit of over the years. Fortunately I realise and turn away from the hedge in time to save my trousers from a fate worse than a Lewinsky dress. I pull up a bit of grass to wipe myself off with and realise just how cold it is. It makes me think of her and her bare feet. I wonder how she’s doing. I wonder if she’s panicking that I’ve left her. I wonder if tie wraps can be broken by a desperate woman’s muscles. I wonder which is worse, the fear of being left like she is, or the fear that I haven’t left and could still do bad things to her. I wonder about a lot of things, but I decide to go back to her. I’ve travelled the whole fucking day to bind her to that gate and I’m not going to miss out on the spectacle.

 

A pillory is a subtly cunning form of bondage especially if, as is the case with our iron gate, it is low enough to keep her bent really well over. It’s a lot different to just being tied to a post or a bed because she can’t relax and just be held in her restraint. She has to hold herself up on her legs constantly and that makes her a participant in her own subjugation. She is held in such a lewd and inviting pose but yet she is kept isolated from her own genitals, especially if the pillory is a big, thick wooden thing that acts like a wall. She can’t even see what’s going on behind her. It must be like having her most intimate parts in another room, helpless and vulnerable, but still connected so she will feel the pain and degradation when the inevitable happens. Even with our improvised pillory, her body is one field and her head and hands are in another. That gate is a lot more than just something to tie her to.

 

The wind has got up a little when I get back to the gate and it’s funnelling through the gap in the hedge and presumably over her naked rump.

 

“Miss me?” I ask.

 

She doesn’t answer, but I notice her shift her legs. The gate is not very high and this is obviously proving difficult for her. She seems to have three choices, to stand with her legs straight but pushing her bum up high and increasing the bend in her back, to crouch with her knees bent, or to spread her legs wide. None of the three look very comfortable and the temporary relief of changing between them seems to get more temporary as time goes on.

 

“How’s your back doing?” I ask, more just to say something than out of genuine concern.

 

“Sore.”

 

“You want me to release you?”

 

“No.”

 

She straightens her knees and spreads her legs wide, obviously trying to ease her discomfort.

 

“Am I allowed to climb over the gate and look at you from your side? I bet it’s quite a view.”

 

“We didn’t agree which side of the gate you had to stand on. And I can’t stop you.”

 

“No you can’t can you. I’ll stay here though. I might not be able to help myself if I see the view from the other side. I should have brought a whip. I’m sure I could improvise something though. There must be some springy twigs in this hedge. Maybe some nice young bits of willow, or perhaps I could use a bramble branch. The thorns would add something I would think. Would you like to be whipped?”

 

“No. But I can’t…

 

“…Stop me. I know. You keep reminding me that you can’t stop me. It’s starting to feel like a veiled yes. If I did whip you, would it be a criminal assault or a consensual sex act between adults? If I were to fuck you, would it be rape, or just consenting sex?”

 

“We agreed, no fucking.”

 

“We did. But are we already fucking? What is fucking anyway? Is it having sex? Are we having sex now by being here together with you tied to a gate? It is a sexual thing we’re doing isn’t it?”

 

“Talk a lot don’t you.”

 

“Yeah, well maybe it’s to keep my mind active and the beast within me under control. I mean, are you married? If your husband knew about this would he think we’re having sex? Would he think it adultery? If the police were to turn up now what would they say? ‘Hello, ‘ello, ‘ello. What do we ‘ave ‘ere then? Constable, take the lady home and you Sir, I shall ask you to accompany me to the station.’ I’m sure they’d think we’re having sex, or rape. But does the fact that we agreed to meet for a sex act mean I can’t be accused of rape? Well I can be accused, but will I be guilty? Can I ask if you fortified yourself with a glass of wine before you came out here tonight?”

 

“Gin. Several of them.”

 

“Ah well you’re okay then. Did you know that under the 2002 sexual offences act, a woman is considered incapable of consenting to sex if she’s under the influence of drugs or alcohol? All very well meaning of course, intended to stop men raping drunk women and then claiming it was consensual, but where does it leave the cause of women’s equality if the law considers them to be such fragile creatures that they need to be reduced to the sexual status of a fifteen year old every time they have a couple of glasses of wine? If I went out and got blind drunk and then passed out in the street in a pool of my own vomit, and then woke up in the morning to find someone had pissed on me and nicked my wallet, then people would laugh at me and say ‘serves you right for getting yourself into such a state’, but if a women goes out and gets drunk and then wakes up in the morning in the bed of someone she’d rather not be with, then she’s allowed to call it rape. Not really very equal is it?”

 

“Talk a lot don’t you.” 

 

“Well I travelled for ten hours to be here with you tonight. And tomorrow I’ll travel for another ten to get home again. I need to do something with you to make it worthwhile. Although tying you to this gate, that made it worthwhile on its own you know. The last time I tied a woman up I was too young and stupid to realise what it meant. I used to think that all women feel guilty about enjoying sex and that being tied up just allowed them to feel like they had no choice and so could get rid of that guilt and let go completely. There’s more to it than that though isn’t there? You’ve let me tie you up and you’ve given me everything. And you’re depending on me to give it all back. You’re depending on this little stopwatch to set you free. While you’re tied here you all your responsibilities are mine. What your kids are getting in their lunch boxes tomorrow, what you’re going to wear to that do next Friday, even that little bit of guilt you feel for voting for Brexit, for thirty four minutes none of that is your responsibility. For thirty four minutes you can enjoy a pure form of existence because all your troubles are mine and you only need to think about how you feel. How do you feel? Cold? Sore? Sexy? Aroused?

 

“All of those.”

 

“All of them? Well that’s good. And when you get home will you use a vibrator on yourself?”

 

“Perhaps.”

 

“Always assuming of course that I don’t satisfy you before you go home. Where is home anyway? I guess it’s around here somewhere. You must know this place pretty well to have such an intimate knowledge of this gate. Have you been tied to it before?”

 

“No. But I’ve thought about it.”

 

“You’ve thought about it? Haha. But not done it then. Tell me, why do you need me to tie you? Couldn’t you tie yourself to the gate in some sort of self-bondage set up? You know, handcuffs and a key in an ice block or something.”

 

“It wouldn’t be the same.”

 

“Why not? Just as cold. Just as uncomfortable. Just as humiliating if anyone happened to come along. Presumably it’s not my fascinating conversation that makes it all worthwhile. Is it the danger, or is it that you need to feel that you’ve been subdued by someone other than yourself?”

 

“You’re right. It’s not your conversation.”

 

“Ah so it’s the need for someone else. It has to be their will that you’re tied here?”

 

“Something like that.”

 

“But if you’ve agreed to come here of your own free will, then is it not the same as tying yourself to the gate? I didn’t force you or blackmail you or anything. You wanted this. It’s your will that you’re here, not mine. So how is this not self-bondage?”

 

“I need to submit to someone. I choose to submit, but having done so, I now have to accept your will.”

 

“But is it my will that you’re pilloried over this gate, or is it yours?”

 

“It’s your will. You suggested a pillory.”

 

“Yes but the pillory I had in mind was something very different to this. I imagined you bending over your bannisters, or the back of a chair, or the headboard of your bed. Something in the warmth and privacy of your own home. And I didn’t imagine me actually tying you. You came up with all the rest of it. You wanted to do it here. You wanted me to come and tie you. And you don’t have to accept it because you could beg for, or demand release. I’d have to untie you if you asked. Unless I’m a monster of course.”

 

“But then I would have failed.”

 

“Failed? So it’s a test is it? A test of endurance, like climbing a mountain? But it’s not really is it. Because you’re tied. You have no choice but to endure unless I choose to release you. From the moment you bent over the gate you passed the test. Climbing a mountain, one has the choice to give up and go back down, but that option isn’t available for you now. Would it be easier or harder for you if you were not bound, but I just ordered you to stay bent over like that? That would be a test of will because you could give up at any time. As it is, you can’t give up, you can only endure. So it’s not a test you can fail.”

 

“Talk a lot don’t you.”

 

“Well as you have been at pains to point out, you can’t stop me can you. And I would like to understand what makes you tick. But maybe I’m trying to find a logical explanation where there isn’t actually one. Why do I find tied up women arousing? I don’t know, I just do. I don’t hate women or anything like that, but I get off imagining them bound, chained, enslaved, subjugated. I have to say I’m getting off even more by actually seeing one bound and subjugated, even if it is dark. But I have no explanation for why I feel this way. So why should there be an explanation for why you feel the way you do? Like lots of men, I love to see women in high heels. Why? They are stupid, uncomfortable, unhealthy and impractical, but yet so many women love them and so many men love women who love them. Is there any logic to it? Is it that by wearing high heels a woman is stating that she values being sexy above being comfortable and practical? Is she saying that she’s not practical and if she gets a flat tyre she needs to be helped and looked after, and she will be happy to pay her debt for this chivalry three-fold when she gets to the bedroom? Or does she just think her feet look nicer in heels? You women are so lucky with your clothes. You can have such fun and make such statements with them. Men’s clothes are just boring.

 

“You think women’s clothes are fun? Do you know what it’s like to be constantly paranoid about what you’re wearing? Is it too posh, too tarty, too formal, too revealing, too young? And if I chuck on a shirt and jeans does that I say I can’t be bothered, or that I’m not comfortable with my sexuality?”

 

“Ooh, did I strike a nerve there? Finally the lady responds.”

 

“Women’s clothes are just a pain. Sometimes literally.”

 

“Ah, but then surely you should like them then. You obviously like a bit of pain and discomfort. Maybe you were born in the wrong century. Maybe you should have been a Victorian lady, all bound up in corsets and huge skirts. Would you have liked that? You could have spent your days worrying if your dress was too formal, or revealing or young for you. Maybe we should do another challenge. I should challenge you to wear a corset for a month. Or maybe just high heels. I get the impression you’re a jeans and trainers kind of woman. Perhaps some heels would do you good as well as being a suitable challenge. I wonder if corsets were the Victorians version of high heels. Were they forced on women by men to keep women subdued and frail, or did women choose to wear them just because they wanted to look sexy?”

 

I look down at the woman bent over in front of me. She doesn’t need a corset or high heels to look sexy, she just needs an old gate and some tie wraps. While I’ve been rambling on I hadn’t noticed how much she’s suffering, but I see it now. She’s shivering and constantly shifting in her restraints, trying to find some relief for her aching joints. No wonder she doesn’t want to talk much. I’m suddenly worried for her. What if her back is breaking? What if she’s getting hypothermia? What if she collapses and strangles herself?

 

“Are you okay?” I ask. “Do you want me to release you?”

 

She doesn’t respond and I bend down to see if I should cut her free.

 

“No!” she snaps. “I’m okay.”

 

“You sure? You look like you’re struggling.”

 

“Of course I’m fucking struggling. But I’m okay.”

 

Well she still has the energy to swear at me and so I guess she really is okay. It occurs to me that this might be the part she wants the most. The part where it becomes unbearable, but still it must be beared. Is this the intensity that she craves? I take out the stopwatch and check the time. She has eleven minutes left. Before I checked I wouldn’t have been able to guess that. Anything between a few minutes and twenty minutes would have been my best estimate, and hers too probably. She doesn’t know it’s eleven minutes. What must that be like? I wonder what I should do. If I’m right and these eleven minutes are what it’s all about for her then I should let her suffer/enjoy them in peace. I’m sure she doesn’t need my constant pontificating to distract her. Perhaps she doesn’t want to be distracted at all, pain and stuff being all the more intense if undiluted by other stimuli. At the start of this I felt embarrassed at the awkward silence, now I feel embarrassed that I have constantly spouted rubbish at her while she is trying to experience something profound. I think I’ll just watch quietly while she gets whatever it is she gets from this. I won’t release her unless she collapses.

 

Perhaps I’ve got it all wrong. Perhaps she isn’t enjoying any part of these thirty four minutes. Perhaps every one of them is as horrible as it looks, but the thrill for her is in the weeks before tonight. The thrill of knowing this is coming. The thrill of being afraid of this. The thrill of wondering exactly what will happen. And all of this is just the price that has to be paid for that thrill of anticipation. I wonder if it’s as bad as she feared, or hoped. I wonder if she’s impressed that I am apparently going to be decent and true to my word and not molest her, or if she’s disappointed that she’s not getting any action back there and thinks I’m a wimp for not taking her. I mean you wouldn’t agree to something like this unless you wanted to be taken would you? Sure we agreed no fucking, but then she’d have to say that or else she’d be a slut wouldn’t she? Is that like claiming that ‘no’ really meant ‘yes’? Well I’m not going to rape her so the question doesn’t apply.

 

For the next eleven minutes I just watch. Even in the darkness I can see what she’s going through, at least I can see the physical side of it. What’s going on in her head is something else though and that remains shrouded in mystery and wonder. I resist the temptation to look at the stopwatch. To start checking it would signal to her something about the time. I leave it for the unassuming little bleeps to end it all. And when they come and her ordeal is over, she shows no emotion. No joy or exaltation at her victory over the challenge. I cut her free and she stands up slowly and painfully. I wish she’d look happy because I feel like I’ve done something terrible to her. Some would say I have, but if it’s what she wants and I’ve brought her joy then I need to know. I need to know because my reward is her joy and without joy for her there is none for me. I need to know because I love her. Perhaps it’s not actually her I love, more like my fantasy version of her, but who is it who is standing in front of me right now, a fantasy or a real woman?

 

“How do you feel?” I ask. “I mean, if that’s not a stupid question. I assume you feel something more than just cold and sore.”

 

“Yes,” she replies. “Do you mind if I get dressed? I’m bloody freezing.”

 

Yes? That’s it? After all this she just says ’yes’, she feels something. What? Tell me you infuriating woman! Tell me what you feel. But of course I can’t ask her that. And so I just laugh.

 

“Do I mind if you get dressed? Of course not,” is all I can say.

 

She turns and picks her way across the rough undergrowth and disappears behind the hedge. I hear her return to where she got undressed and listen as she reverses that process.

 

“What now?” I ask.

 

“I suppose we have to go home.”

 

“Wow, that’s cold. I suppose it is what we agreed though. No relationship, no love, no getting to know each other, just a pure experience. It’s certainly been an experience, for me anyway. How about you?”

 

“I can’t...” she replies from the darkness beyond the gate.

 

There’s a long pause and then she walks forward, back to the gate that separates us.

 

“We can’t.” she amends her previous words to.

 

She offers me her hand over the gate. I take it in mine and realise how cold it is. I can feel her shivering through her hand.

 

“I didn’t think it would be like this,” I say.

 

“Have we rather fucked this bit up?” she asks with a hollow laugh.

 

She jokes about it but it’s true. For months I have loved her, even though she has only been words on a screen to me. Of course it wasn’t a real love, more like the fantasy love I might have for my favourite film actress. I know my actress is a real person, but probably nothing like the image she shows in a film and that is the image that is loved. Those words on the screen might in reality have come from something like a 70 year old transvestite man with a wooden leg for all I know, but I loved my fiery fantasy lady with a fantasy love that has brought joy to an old and widowed heart. Meeting her here tonight has made her real and my worst fear of it all has come true. Now that she is real, my love for her has become real, and now I know the coming heartache will be real too. Half an hour ago the silence between us was an uncomfortable emptiness. Now it is thick with emotion and unsaid feelings.

 

“It’s not over. I’ll be in touch, okay?” she offers eventually.

 

She gently pulls her hand from mine and steps away into the darkness beyond the gate. I listen to the sounds of her crying a little and of her feet in the mud as they slowly fade to nothing and I am left alone in the night. “It’s not over, I’ll be in touch,” she said. A classic line to finish a failed first date, but here said with a sincerity that made it true. We will be in touch, and I will challenge her again, and she will obey because that is what she does and I love her for it. Despite the cold I can feel a warm glow start to fill me. At least I know she’s not a 70 year old transvestite man now. And next week when I’m in the pub with my friends and they ask what I did on my trip to the mainland last week, I’ll smile and say “nothing much”, but I’ll think “Yeah, I met a sexy lady and tied her up in a fucking pillory and tonight I’m planning what I’m going to do to her next.” And I’ll feel my life is a whole lot more exciting than theirs.

 

Thank you FirebreathingAlison. It has been… worth it.



oOo



There is a part two to this story which tells the tale from FirebreathingAlison's perspective. It's called Thirty Four Minutes and you can find it here, 

. I thoroughly recommend you give it a read.