“Come here”, I said to my wife. There was nothing but love in those eyes, so I kissed her, taking my time as customers walked around us and didn’t seem to care. Despite the lingering warmth, her face was slowly returning to a healthier shade of red.
“Listen, there are many gardens here with the signs ‘Impact play’, ‘gags’ and such above it. I will go check out the other floors and make a selection of what we might want to buy later. You can look at all things you want to buy, but don’t go overboard. Be ready at 13:00 hours so we can have lunch. I have seen a sign Restaurant zweiter stock somewhere. Here is your phone. When in doubt, send me a picture, but don’t do that with every item. I trust you will buy what we need.”
“Thank you, Master. I will call you at 13:00 so we can meet somewhere.” Whenever she was excited about something, her enthusiasm was impossible to resist. Still smiling, I walked to the stairs. On the first floor, I found mainly clothes, books, and DVDs. I skipped that and took the stairs to the second floor. They cleverly divided the space, with one portion serving as a restaurant and the other portion being occupied by an extensive collection of BDSM equipment.
Eye-catcher was an enormous fourposter bed with a real cage – metal bars and all – underneath it. Did I see something was moving in it? Curious, I walked closer to investigate. Indeed, there was a guy in there, probably a salesperson according to his clothes, walking on hands and knees in the cage. He spoke German to the gathered crowd around the bed, and from what I understood, he explained that there was no way out of there, except for the door in front of the cage that someone could only open from the outside.
It was quite a gimmick, but not for me. I don’t enjoy sleeping alone, even if the whole idea behind it was kinky enough. I walked on. Mounted against the wall were three St. Andrew’s crosses. All in black. One St. Andrew’s cross was made from wood, while the other was covered with black leather. The final one was crafted from a lighter type of wood and had metal studs on its surface. I looked carefully at the construction of the wood cross. There was no reason I couldn’t make it myself instead of buying it here for a ridiculously high price.
The next thing was a large metal cage I quite liked. High enough for Sylvia to sit in without having to bend her head. Big enough to move around and maybe even to lie down in it, if not stretched out, but at least in a fetal position. I made a mental note to show it to Sylvia.
A low cupboard at coffee table height with large metal rings on the sides also caught my attention. Finished with soft red leather and available in several colours, said the card in multiple languages. And also the price. This was not so hard to make myself, either. The presence of hooks and rings on the small furniture made it possible to sell it as BDSM equipment. Add a few rings, double or triple the price, and it’s a kinky attribute. Many of these items had an inflated price, and some of them even lacked quality. Some things I couldn’t appreciate at all, like a wooden horse made of untreated wood and rough, with sharp splinters still protruding from its surface. No way I would lower Sylvia’s pussy on that.
The pillory in the corner I rather liked. Adjusting the holes for the head and hands would make it fit Sylvia’s slim wrists. The cheaper ones had holes she could easily slip out. Maybe not her head, but her hands for sure. Downstairs were a lot of salespeople available, here only one guy seemed to manage the entire floor, and he was busy showing off the four-poster bed.
Sylvia hit me up and said she had seen so many things we just had to buy. I just replied with a thumbs up and went to the restaurant. It was rather busy, but I found an empty table. I ordered a half litre of some German brand beer and relaxed. A half hour to kill before Sylvia was ready. I looked at the billboards on the wall. They were all ads from BDSM-clubs. I did not know if they were all still in business, but most of them looked quite modern. Quite a few featured a Domina all in a leather corset with a ton of make-up and looking as strict as they possibly could. Alas, I wasn’t very impressed. I nursed my beer and spent my time people watching. The distinction between the people who embraced the lifestyle and the curious onlookers was easily recognisable. It wasn’t only the outfits that gave the tourists away. The assortment of kinky products they stumbled upon clearly caught them off guard, and they openly and boisterously marvelled at the bold fashion sense of the outspoken practitioners in our society.
How quickly things can change. If you had told me a month ago that I would sit here as a representative of the BDSM lifestyle, I would have found it laughable. And yet I was here in a gangsta paradise. Coming here made me realise we have played a very simple version of dominance and submission in the past. Not less intense, I dare say. If Sylvia had broken a rule we had previously agreed upon, she would hold her hands before her with the palm up. I had picked some sturdy reed sticks at our waterside and made a bundle from it. I would hit those sensitive hands varying from hand to hand, from hard to soft hitting, from slow to fast. If she couldn’t take it any longer, she would retreat her hands. And I would wait until she gathered enough courage to offer me her hands again. I would hit her again and again. She would have the chance to retreat and stop the punishment, but as long as she kept offering her hands to me, I would hit them. Until she could bear no more and stopped presenting them. Sylvia has an incredible pain threshold. But enough for her was enough for me as well. We would forgive ourselves and the matter was over and done with.
I absolutely get it if you think that hitting a woman on her hands is a sick idea of loving someone. I do not claim to understand why it turns me on. But I got a hard on in the restaurant so many years later just thinking about it. To ease my conscience, I compared my deviation to that of two men who love each other. When asked why they like men more than women, most gay people will answer with “I don’t know, it’s just the way it is.” I can relate to that, as it was the case with me too. Deeply hidden, of course. No doubt out of shame. It is not something to be proud of hitting your wife’s hands so hard that she can hardly use them for days. But it is in me to find that satisfying, and it has been there since I was a teenager.
The reason Sylvia is my soulmate is that she is on the other side of the same coin as I am. And I’m not referring to power exchange alone, but it manifests itself on many levels. I am the practical man. She is the theoretician. I look at all the risks, she is the intuitive decision maker. I am cautious. She is reckless. Fearless. What are the chances of you meet the better half of yourself in your partner? It’s amazing how lucky I am; I have a hard time believing that I deserve any of it.
The phone rang and brought me back to present times. Sylvia called me and I told her to come to the restaurant. She arrived with a huge smile on her face and gave me a big kiss. Yes, our love life – that wasn’t bad before either – had transformed from a pilot light to a burning fire.
“I can’t remember to see so much amazing things down there. When we were young, we had so little money and lots of that stuff down there wasn’t even available back then. So we had to improvise with clothespin instead of nipple clamps, we had regular candle wax, now they have soy candles, black light paraffin wax, wax in penis shapes, wax in a jar so you can easily pour it over me … OMG,” She fanned herself.
It didn’t bother me. “I hope you got everything you wanted?”
“I thought I had. But then I saw what’s on the first floor, and I was thinking, OMG, I have just begun!” she laughed.
In the midst of the bustling crowd, a server approached us and inquired if we would be open to sharing our table with another couple, because of the high demand. We agreed, and a couple joined in their forties, I think. I must admit, I have a terrible knack for guessing someone’s age.
“Thank you so much. We were afraid that the restaurant was already completely full, and all that shopping made us quite hungry. I’m Martin and this is my wife Helga.”
“Pleased to meet you, and you’re quite welcome to join us. I’m Koen, and this is my slave Sylvia.”
“Ah, you’re in the lifestyle as well, I see. Are you Dutch?”
“The accent betrayed us, I think?” I smiled.
“Whenever we visit Holland, our go-to destination is a holiday home in Zeeland, where we can take in the sights and smells of the beautiful North Sea.” Helga said. Slowly and intentionally, she untied and removed her scarf while carrying on with her conversation. With the removal of her scarf, a solid metal collar came into view, snugly embraced her throat. This lady loved the attention.
“We are in an informal vanilla environment here, so I suggest we will ignore all the formal speech rules. Do you agree?” I asked Martin.
“As you wish. In a BDSM-club setting, our wives should exemplify their submission and show how well they are trained through their words and actions, but here are a lot of vanilla folks,” Martin said.
“Watching in wonder.” I said.
“Yes. Well, at a transgender party we would be the odd one out”, Sylvia said.
“True. You guys go to clubs often?” I asked.
“Whenever we can. We have a busy calendar, so it’s not always easy. We always go to the same small private club and we feel we can be ourselves there,” Martin said.
“As a submissive, I try so hard to please my Master, and it’s so nice to show just how obedient I can be for him out in the open.” Helga added. “It’s very rewarding.”
“So true”, gushed Sylvia. “Now that our nest is empty, we have picked up where we left off a long time ago and pursue our unfinished dreams. That is the reason we’re here. We need to start all over again and not only material wise. I couldn’t agree more with you that when you give your Master your all, it’s truly gratifying when you can show off your hard work. Sometimes you discover that your best is not enough and that you can still learn a lot from others.”
The women moved a little closer together and started their own conversation. Martin and I delved into our personal lives, discussing our occupations, living arrangements, and other introductory topics. It was only when I saw the restaurant had emptied that I realised we had been chatting for an hour.
“If you still want to buy half the clothing stock on the first floor, I suggest we do that now,” I said to Sylvia.
“Oh, clothes!” Helga cooed. Almost imperceptibly, Marin shook his head.
“Well, actually I have enough clothes and it’s still a long way home.” Martin and I both laughed.
“You’re right, girl, it’s still a long way home,” Martin agreed.
As Martin and I shook hands, the girls locked in a tight embrace, holding on to each other and sharing whispered secrets.
“So much for obedient slave girls”, Martin grinned.
After they finally left, we didn’t buy half of the clothing stock, but we ended up with several outfits for Sylvia.
“Over there. I want you to see the pillory.” I said to Sylvia, back on the second floor again. “Try it on. See if it fits.” I stumbled a bit, adjusting the thing in height. We were both needed on either side to level the thing and secure it with bolts. I lifted half of it up and my little one laid her head in the middle and her wrists in the holes for the hands. Carefully, I lowered the thing again. On the side was a simple padlock to secure it until the prisoner was either punished enough or left to rot to death. The history of this thing was gruesome, but in BDSM it was a wonderful toy to have your slave secure in a bending position. Wonderful for fucking and impact play. Yes, we love euphemisms in the lifestyle. Impact play is flogging, single tails, spanking … Whatever made an impact if you hit a body part.
“Do you like it?” I asked Sylvia.
“It’s nice.”
“OK, we’ll take it.”, I said to the salesperson.
“OMG, did you see that?” Sylvia yelled. She had moved on and was now standing by the cage that I had noticed before. “This is a must-have, master.” She was all but clapping her hands, but it was close. She turned to the salesperson.
“It’s locked! Can I try it on, please Sir? I want to know if it’s fits. Her eyes sparkled like a cat who had just knocked over a priceless vase, full of mischief and no regrets.
People came to see what the fuzz here was all about. Sylvia was unfazed. “Master”, she was on all fours and looked at me with a huge smile on her face, “It’s tailor made for me. I even can turn around in it. Look!” I looked, and so did the group of men and woman that gathered around us.
I have to stop here for a moment. Just to make sure you will see the same thing as all these people did. Because when I said she was on all fours, you have an image of that in your mind. But it’s not the right one. You forgot she was wearing this long evening dress that reached her ankles. The one with that dress that left her entire back completely exposed, right down to the edge of her buttocks. You forget that the dress is almost completely transparent. You don’t remember that two strands hung down her back over each shoulder. You don’t remember that the front of her dress flares out into a big V and that her small breasts are completely visible now that she’s crawling crouched down. You don’t realise that in order to crawl; she has to lift the hem of her dress up over her knees because otherwise she’d tear her dress as she crawled around in the cage. Alright, we all understand and agree once more. Let’s move on.
No chance of haggling the price of the cage with a woman who spins around in her cage like an excited puppy. “Good, we will have this one as well.” I said.
To Sylvia, this shop was like an Intratuin on Christmas days for a child. (Intratuin is a Dutch chain of garden centres that starts transforming their stores into Christmas Paradise in September). The only thing that made me put my foot down was when she was walking around with Jane Doe-eyes around one of the St. Andrew Crosses. Seriously, just imagine two beams of wood forming an X-shape! I don’t need to pay premium for that. I can fix that in a day, and it looks better than this.
We went to the cash register as if it was Quasimodo’s safe haven. I will not tell you how much I paid, just that I had worked for three months to pay for all of this. We picked up the bulkier items at the warehouse section behind the building.
“Do you regret not buying the X-cross”, Sylvia asked as we were driving back to the hotel.
“No, I can make it myself. It’s not that hard.”
“I do.”
“You do what?” I asked.
“Regret not buying it. I don’t doubt for a moment you can make it, or that you can make it even better, but it takes time. And I only have one year, remember?” Sylvia added abundantly, “That dungeon is my first priority now.”
Don’t blame me for being quiet. I was still a little dazed by the amount of the bill. Dutch, remember?
