The Worst Days 2.1

Luz emailed me a complete copy of my Worst Days series. It was my first foray into erotica, so now I look back on some parts like this and think, That absolutely sucked. Ergo I'm rewriting it. In the meantime, here's more of the original. The first part is here.

The next day. The morning after. Ah, how can I describe it? I woke up feeling refreshed, I yawned and stretched and scratched my chest, then remembered why I was still naked and had a raw throat and giant eye buggers. I groaned.



Why me? I wondered. I had never questioned my sexuality growing up, hadn't felt any suppressed urges to fondle the naked man-flesh that paraded itself in the locker room. I hadn't popped a woody getting a massage from the male trainer. So why now was it that after I got married, after I was finally about to reap the benefits of keeping it to myself that a man came in and made me come, too?

Was I gay? I supposed that every man who had ever been put in my position (and what position was that, exactly? Oral rape?) would question his sexuality. I tried thinking about other men I had known; maybe if I pictured them in a sexual manner and got erect, that would tell me whether I was gay or not.

After a few minutes of this exercise I gave up. No erection, not even a tingle gave me any indication that my orientation had changed. I thought about Juniper, which worked, and also reminded me that I had to use the restroom. Maybe I was simply into anal stimulation and oral sex. I wasn't too eager to test that theory; it made me feel a little grimy.

That reminded that I needed a shower. There was a robe and washcloth hanging on the back of the door, and after poking around through the cabinets I found soap and some hair stuff that didn't smell too girly. I let the water pulse down on my head, drumming at my skull and knocking loose thoughts of the previous night.

"Argh," I muttered to no one. I didn't want to remember. I didn't want to think about it. I wished I had been tied down, because then I would have had an excuse for not beating Fen White's ass. I could have, had I really wanted to.

All right. Out with it. I let him blow me. I'm a fucking big guy, and I don't care how much bigger he is than me, I could have gotten away. He put a big hand on my chest and leaned. That was it. I could have rolled, or kicked, or wiggled (though that might have given him some different ideas), but instead I just lay there and called him names.

Now the question was where that led me. Did that mean that he was going to start doing this on a regular basis? Was I expected to reciprocate? He had promised that we wouldn't fuck, as he so delicately put it, until I asked. That wasn't going to be an issue, but there are a lot of sexual acts in which one can partake that don't involve the actual fornication. I haven't done most of them, but I heard about them a lot from teammates who liked to rib me about my virginity.

I wanted to wail like a little boy. "But I don't wanna be gay!" I was comfortable in my women-only lust. I wasn't one of those guys who couldn't admit when other men were good-looking, or who didn't wear pink, or who thought romance was only good for getting into someone's panties, but I was still very confident that I was a ladies' man in every sense of the expression. Or at least, I had been until I got blown and fingered—I didn't even know you could do that to another guy—by a man. And liked it well enough to come in his mouth. Did I believe in bisexuality?

"Tam."

I started so badly I almost broke my head in the shower. "What?" I yelled testily. I hadn't even noticed the buzz; I had thought it went along with the reminiscing.

Fen's voice came from outside the bathroom door. "The shower's been going for almost an hour. I just wanted to make sure you were all right."

"I'm fine." I started scrubbing as if he were going to walk in on me. He didn't, but I thought I heard a snort, like the bastard was laughing at me.

"Oh, and we are going to buy some shoes today. So be ready in twenty minutes."

"Or what," I grouched under my breath, "you'll spank me?" I rinsed the soap from my hair and body and turned the water off. "Probably would, you fucker."

Resisting the powerful urge to drag my shoeless feet, I was dressed and standing at the top of the stairs within twenty minutes. Fen appeared not ten seconds later. He cocked his head at me, and an amused little half-smile appeared for a moment. I noticed that when he smiled my hackles rose a mile in the air.

"Ir layeb annasta moir," he said, chuckling a little.

Maybe he had been speaking my native tongue just for the practice. "Huh?"

He shook his head, his hair falling into his eyes. "They didn't teach you that phrase in grade school?"

I stomped down the stairs. "No."

"Oh. Okay," he shrugged. "Let's go." He threw me a jacket, as if I were just a friend or a younger brother.

"Fine." I rolled my eyes. "Hey, what does 'dos iebsta janasviv' mean?"

I saw Fen laugh for the first time. He threw back his head, his eyes squinted shut, and he exposed a set of extraordinarily white teeth and two dimples that Juniper would have been coveted. I said I was a man who could admit seeing beauty in other men without desiring it. Against my better judgment, I admitted that Fen was a beautiful man, despite that ever-present menacing air. Damn his pretty hide. Damn my logical mind. Damn that tingly brain-feeling that made my mouth twitch a little in response.

"I don't know if there is a direct translation. It's something like 'show us a good time,' or 'show us a little something,'" he laughed. "It's something you would only hear if you're stripping at a club."

"Hmph," I responded.

Fen cocked his head at me again. "Where did you hear it?"

I frowned. "At the auction house."

"Auction?" he asked, furrowing his brows. "What is that?"

I crossed my arms, wondering whether I should punch him for reminding me. "That's when some old man strips you naked, parades you in front of horny homos, and then some asshole buys your life, which was never for sale in the first place."

Fen nodded. "Oh, okay."

Apparently sarcasm doesn't translate. "How do you know it's something you only hear if you're stripping?" I asked nastily. "Done a little time on stage yourself?"

I was incredibly gratified to see a dark look cloud its way over his pretty face. "Come on," he growled, and stalked out the door.

The hoverlimo was waiting outside, a short but burly man holding the door gave us a curt nod and shut the door crisply behind us. I took a seat as far away from Fen as I could. There was a small lurch as the motor turned over and then we were off.

"By the way," said Fen, "If you even attempt to leave my sight I will slap a collar on your neck faster than you can blink."

I huffed.

"Or if that's not enough of a deterrent, I'll let the police get a hold of you first, do what they do best, and then I'll slap a collar on you." He gave me a look that prickled. "I expect you understand that."

I looked out the window. I understood: Fen was a better option than the police.

The quest for shoes was surprising in it banality. I went in, tried on shoes, either said yes or no, and we left and found another store. Perhaps it was due to Fen's overpowering presence, but no one looked twice at my brown hair or blinked at my accent. Fen only spoke to me in Nitkan, and asked me simple yes or no questions to which I could easily respond. I was depressed, though. One doesn't purchase shoes for every occasion unless one plans on being in the area long enough to experience every occasion. I didn't want to need anything more than sturdy running shoes (Fen raised an eyebrow when I kept rejecting the sporty-casual fashionable shoes. No fooling him, I suppose). I didn't want wingtips or loafers or dressy-casual or business-casual or boots. I didn't want to be in Nitkistan.

I grew more and more surly as the process continued. I started answering in my own tongue, adding a few well-placed expletives here and there. I was never sure how well the people around me could understand what I was saying, but they raised their eyebrows every time I snapped at Fen. He was unruffled, which made me feel a bit childish, which in turn made me even surlier.

Eventually he waved the salespeople away and turned the force of his grey gaze at me. His expression was as smooth as glass, but my buzz told me he was irritated.

"We can do this another time, but you need shoes. Unless you intend on running barefoot, like a savage? I'm sure that can be arranged."

So sarcasm does indeed translate. Tired of being contentious (shopping is a wearying sport), I opted for honesty. "I hate this," I hissed. "I hate buying shoes like I'm going to be here forever. I have a wife to get back to. I hate feeling like your little dress-up doll, and if I take any of this shit from you, then I'm giving in. If I let you buy shoes for me, if I wear those damn shoes, then I really am a slave."

Well, I was a little more honest than I had intended, but I think I got my point across. Fen hustled me out of the store and into the car. He barked an order at the ape-man chauffeur and settled back in his seat. He growled at me in Nitkan. I understood that he was inclined to kill me in a creative fashion, but the rest of the colorful vocabulary escaped me. His cool expression never changed.

My head ached. To be honest, I didn't know what to make of this situation. I was unsure as to what my role was supposed to be—sex toy, slave, or companion—and I wasn't sure how I felt about the night before, and I didn't like it that no one but me seemed to think that my escape was inevitable. I kept returning to the fact that I didn't know what to think. I sought Juniper, and was content to feel her heartbeat, steady and sure, and focused on that while we twisted and turned through the streets.

When we stopped I saw we were at a public park. "What is going on?" I asked.

Fen barely glanced back at me as he got out of the vehicle, but the buzz was much less irritated. "No more Lomagnian in public," he ordered. "It will attract negative attention."

I grumbled and climbed out after him. "What's the most offensive way to say 'fuck off' in Nitkan, then?"

Was he laughing at me? "Lez mab najyashova," he responded.

"What does it mean?"

He raised an eyebrow at me. "Go suck your mother's dick."

I snickered, and memorized the phrase immediately. "Why we in big green place?" I asked. Any foreign language is easier when one is immersed in it, but my speech still had a ways to go.

"We are in a park because I do not enjoy seeing you be rude to people who did not deserve it," Fen answered. "So I decided to let you see how most Nitkani feel about your people."

"What does that even mean?" I asked.

"I think you need to appreciate how I could be treating you if I so chose. And you need to appreciate how the rest of this country would react," he said slowly, making sure I understood every word. I followed him over to a bench, not sitting too close, and the chauffer followed us and sat on Fen's other side.

We sat there for a few minutes in silence, and I quickly noticed what Fen had been explaining a moment earlier. I saw non-natives for the first time in weeks, but that did nothing to lighten my spirits. If they walked unbound then they walked behind a Nitkani citizen, though most had some sort of leash or harness strapped on their bodies. Their heads were lowered, their eyes downcast, their demeanor subdued. They looked at the world from the corners of their eyes and felts its eyes slide over them with indifference. I'm not an emotional man by nature, but my heart hurt when I saw these people in the park. Not every Nitkani had one, but no one batted an eye, either.

I looked at Fen, who simply nodded without looking at me. The buzz in my neck was almost painful. I wanted to ask him why he fucking bought me if he disliked seeing other people enslaved.

"Why, Fenton White!" boomed a voice from my left. I barely managed not to visibly jump and looked up to see a man in his late thirties squinting down at us. I glanced behind him and saw not one, but two subdued figures slinking behind him. The man was dark-skinned and slight, and the woman was top-heavy and fit. At a jerk of the chains attached to their necks, the pair kneeled in the grass by the end of the bench. I couldn't stop staring.

"Almus Tobergus," replied Fen smoothly, clasping hands with the man. If not for the prickling at the back of my neck I would have thought he liked this man. "How's business?"

Almus Tobergus laughed heartily, and gestured behind him, "With the wars it's booming. I'm almost done with these two, then I'll be working on a couple of former soldiers from Fyet. Those are always fun."

He eyed me up and down, and I stared back at him, knowing dislike was probably showing clear on my face. "Of course, for you I could always shift my schedule around if you want. Your boy obviously needs some training."

My gaze shot to Fen, who lazily draped an arm over my shoulders and pulled me closer to him. Yikes. I went along with it, tucking my feet under me and trying to look delicate and tame, no easy task for a man my size.

"No, but thank you, Almus," Fen chuckled, stroking my hair (I didn't cringe. I didn't). "I've got him under control."

My ass he has me under control. I smiled up at Mr. Tobergus and turtle-pinched Fen's side. He pulled my hair so hard my eyes watered, so I quit.

Tobergus raised an eyebrow. "He seems unusually affectionate. You must tell me your secret," he said. I batted my eyelashes at Fen, who almost snorted.

At that moment my stomach decided to rumble, loudly. Fen nudged me off him and pointed to a stand at the other end of the park. "Go grab us some lunch, Tam," he ordered, shoving me lightly off the bench.

"Er, no money," I said, adding "sir," after a quick glance at Almus Tobergus. Fen pressed his lips together as if he was trying not to laugh, and the chauffer smiled openly at me. I rolled my eyes for his benefit.

Before Fen could reach for his wallet Almus interrupted by throwing his leashes to Fen. "I'll buy, Fenton. I haven't eaten either, and I want to talk to you about a new security system." He grabbed me under the arm (which was when I realized he was several inches shorter than me. Complex, much?) and began to march me over to the stand. "Besides," he called over his shoulder, "someone has to make sure he doesn't get snatched up by some jealous bystander."

Awkward. I wanted to shake him off me, but I didn't know if that would bring worse trouble on my head. He reminded me of those kids in grade school who always started fights, got their asses thrashed, then spent their adulthood trying to overcompensate for it. By training slaves. My skin crawled from his proximity.

"I know who you are," Tobergus said in a low voice.