The Diceman

`Where does old coitus-interruptus suddenly get all the time?' she asked. `The famous half-lay method not getting

good results?'

`I've retired,' I said.

`You've retired!'

`I've left my wife, my job and my friends and I am on vacation for life.'

She eyed me with new respect: as one citizen of hell to another.

`Jesus, you don't do things in fractions;' she said. But then a cold sneer returned: `But I become your slave for a

month? Huh. I know a lot of people who would pay plenty for that privilege. What do I get in return?'

`In return?'

I said, momentarily impressed with the logic of recompense. `I will do whatever you want for one month following

your service to me.'

`After I've been your slave, big deal. What guarantee do I have?'

`None. Except that when you experience your new life with me and my madness, you'll realize that my form of slavery

is desirable.'

`Why don't you be my slave first?'

`Because you wouldn't be an intelligent and imaginative master. I've been practicing this game on myself for years. I'll

teach you first and then submit' `Maybe,' Linda said to me. `But first I bat. For the next twenty-four hours you be my

slave. You obey all I say except what might physically harm you or u

The same will be true when I obey you. How's that?'

'All right,' I said.

We looked at each other speculatively.

`How do we seal this agreement?' she asked.

`Total slavery is a new path and we both want to travel new paths - that's what disintegration is all about. I'm satisfied

you have the desire and will live up to the agreement.'

`Okay. Have we begun?'

I glanced at my watch. `We have begun. I obey you until tomorrow evening at nine forty-five. For the sake of

anonymity my name is Charlie, Herbie (Flames).'

`Your name is what I choose.'

`Yes, all right.'

`Follow me.'

Leaving the bar, we hailed a taxi and she took me to an apartment - hers I supposed - on the West Side in the twenties.

There, after she had had me fix her a drink, she pulled her knees up under her on the couch and stared up at me with a

look of cold analysis.

`Stand on your head.'

With an effort I awkwardly tried to balance myself on my head. Despite my recent efforts at yoga and yoga meditation

I collapsed, tried and collapsed. About the fifth time down she said: `All right, stand up.' She lit a cigarette, her hand

trembling - perhaps from all she had drunk.

`Take off your clothes,' she said.

I took them off.

`Masturbate,' she said quietly.

`It seems like a waste,' I said.

When I want you to say something I'll say so.'

The command was easier said than done. Like most other red-blooded healthy American youth I had masturbated my

way through high school and part of college and after graduating to more frequent social and sexual intercourse with women, had more or less abandoned the habit. I had been pleased to learn when I studied psychology that my mind was not deteriorating after all, but a residual layer of guilt somewhere remained. After all, can we picture Jesus beating his meat? Or Albert Schweitzer? Undoubtedly Linda believed in the intrinsic indignity of masturbation or she wouldn't have assigned it to me. For some reason I didn't find it easy to create images of fantasies of pleasure which would raise the old ca

`I said play with yourself.'

Linda must have been under the impression that masturbation was primarily a case of self-caresses. In the immortal

words of General MacArthur: `Nothing could be further from the truth.'

Nevertheless, I began fondling myself. It was difficult to maintain a sense of dignity and therefore stared hard at the floor at Linda's feet.

'Look at me while you're doing it,' she said.

I looked at her. Her cold, tense, bitter face immediately stirred me: I imagined myself sexually revenging myself on her

in the month ahead. My ca

encounter, and with careful manual manipulation of the firing mechanism, I blasted off onto the floor. I tried hard to

maintain a neutral, dignified expression throughout.

`Lick it up,' she said.

A great weariness flowed through me; I'm sure my face sagged. But I slowly got down on my knees and began licking

at the tiny pools of semen.

`Look at me,' she said.

Somewhat awkwardly I tried to look at her and accomplish her command at the same time. I noted that the floor

between the rugs was shiny and that someone had abandoned a male slipper under an easy chair. I didn't feel too

superman-ish.

`All right, get up: I stood up, still looking at her neutrally, or so I hoped.

`You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Doctor,' she said with a smile.

I became ashamed of myself and my head and shoulders sagged.

`Are these the sort of things you plan to do with me?' she asked.

`No.' I hesitated. `I imagine men have treated you sadistically before.'

`So I'm not doing too well, huh?'

`Oh no, I think you are. I think you've chosen well, beyond what I'd expected. You've given me a new experience, one

I won't forget' She stared at me, puffing sporadically on a cigarette; she'd finished her drink.

`What if I were to phone a friend of mine, a queer, and order you to perform sexually with him. Could you do it?'

`Your command is my wish,' I said.

`Does the thought interest or frighten you?'

I introspected obediently.

`It bores and depresses me.'

`Good.'

She had me fix her another drink and went to a telephone and dialed two numbers, asking at both for Jed and hanging

up each time disappointed.

`Lie down on the floor, on your face, while I think.'

As I presented myself I began to look back with pleasure at being just old Luke. After a while she said: `All right, let's

go to bed.'

I followed her into a bedroom, neutrally removed her clothes piece by piece at her command and followed her into a narrow double bed. We both lay quietly not touching for a few minutes. I was conscientiously trying not to do a thing unless she commanded me. I felt her hand run down my chest across my belly and come to rest a few inches from my pubic hair. She turned to me and nibbled at my ear, licked my neck, kissed me slowly, wetly, languorously on the mouth and throat. And neck. And chest. And belly. And et cetera. Her maneuvers had a predictable effect despite my recent shameful behavior. She noted the effect, rolled over to the other side of the bed and said nothing else. She tossed and turned a long time and then I guess I must have fallen asleep.

Sometime later I was dreaming that I was going to take a bath and as I sank into the tub I paused to feel the delicious warmth on my balls and penis and awoke to realize that Linda had ward and stiffened my cock with her mouth. When I touched her hair and groped for her body, she gave one last farewell lick and nibble and came up over me and spread herself and placed me inside her and put her lips to mine and began to churn.

The state of semi-sleep is sometimes like that of being lightly stoned and I let Linda do all the work, which consisted mainly of making waves of wanton wiggles with her hips and her insides, and streams of wanton licks and nibbles on my chest, shoulders and neck, and when she said, `Pump,' I pumped, clasping in my hands her perfect buttocks like two hot firm grapefruit, and she groaned and became tense and grinding, tense and grinding, grinding and then relaxed.

She lay on me and I dozed off and then was awakened to feel her moving again, I stiff within her, her mouth on my throat and her insides caressing me like waves of hot eels wrapped around me and she moved but I dozed off again to awaken to her hard mouth enclosing my prick in her hands caressing and pinching and generally 'laying waste the lower erogenous zones and when I touched her hair she groaned and rolled over and took me on top of her and ground away at me and told me to move but not to come so I pumped and swirled and tried to think about Willy May's batting average statistics for the 1950s and after a while her body went limp and she nudged me to roll off her and I did and I dozed off and slept and awakened again already inside her, and she again on top of me moving easily and gently and it must have been near dawn because now I was more awake and began to move too but she said no and tongued and bit my ears, and neck and moved three directions at once down below and when she said okay I dug my fingers into her crack around her buttocks and tried to ram her right over my head and she made a lot of nice noises and I emptied a lake inside her lake and we both moved on a while and then fell apart into another sleep.