Dirty Hands

Upon their return to the city, Justin forgot about the elm wand as he immersed himself in his work. His thesis absorbed practically every waking moment of his time, and was even rude enough to make appearances in his dreams. They often still met for lunch, but long days at the library and nights poring over his laptop took their toll—not just on his relationships with everyone he knew but on his health as well. "You're pale," she said one Saturday afternoon. "You can't go on like this. Sir."

It was just after Thanksgiving, and her final word made him realize how long it had been since they were last together. Really together. She invited him to abandon his apartment for a while and stay with her. She had a quaint little cottage that was technically on the grounds, a few doors down from the home of the president of the university. There wasn't much space, but the chance to enjoy a real, home-cooked meal was enough to tempt him all on its own.

"Where would I sleep?" he said. They had never had that kind of a relationship before.

"In the bed, of course."

Her answer called to mind images of long, sweaty Saturday mornings spent malingering in one another's arms, but it was not to be. She slept on the floor the first night, at the foot of the bed. After that, he had her construct a makeshift pallet of blankets and a pillowcase stuffed with socks, and she slept on it in the closet except when he kept her in a chest at the foot of the bed. On nights when she had been especially pleasing to him, he would lock her inside the chest, bound and gagged and hooded, and he would try to forget about her until at least noon. He rarely managed to last so long.

To his amazement, he still managed to work under those conditions. Perhaps it was because she kept him so sated that he could hardly manage to experience desire. Indeed, as he neared the end of his thesis, he couldn't remember having had even a moment of sexual frustration over the past weeks—despite being almost always within arm's reach of the object of his most intense, depraved desires. His color returned, he lost weight, he spent more time outdoors, and he had never been more productive. And the effect on Ash was electrifying.

There was something golden in her eyes when she looked at him. A glimmer of unadorned adoration, perhaps? A slice of raw, unrefined love that bathed him whenever she looked at him. Perhaps, had he never finished his work, had he done what so many others do and simply made a career of being a student, his life would have been very different after that. But he graduated that year. She cheered from the front row when he walked across the stage.

With his doctorate completed, he was cast adrift on the world. He had nothing to do and nowhere to go—or rather, he had no desire to do anything or go anywhere other than where he was, and Ash was happy to continue as they had been. He had a position as an adjunct, and he had the woman of his dreams. Unfortunately, he also had far too much free time.

And he finally remembered the wand.

That was how he came to be in the library again. According to the decimal system, he was somewhere in the 613 range—human sexuality. Around him were books on every form of perversion known to man, on every category of satisfaction and excess, every facet of tit- and tantalization. Still, he had trouble finding what he'd come for, and strangely he was too embarrassed to ask any of the library aides for help. He'd never felt old before. He laughed at himself as he at last realized how long he'd been a student—that it had been ten years since he'd first gone off to college. He decided, instead, that he would risk a search on one of the library computers.

Cooper, S. M. Sex and the Secret Society, New York: Wiley, 1968.

That was the book he wanted, but it wasn't here. He sighed and steeled himself to approach the desk, reminding himself that he was an academic, after all. Asking for a strange book was far from out of the ordinary in a place like this.

"It's not on the shelf?" said the aide—a freshman girl with bright, innocent eyes, lacking both wisdom and experience. Some fanciful part of him wondered if he might rub off on her just by standing too close: if his mere presence could some how stain her spirit. "Hang on. Let me look."

The library aide returned moments later with empty hands and a frown. "It's not on the shelf," she confirmed, and then she went into the back. He'd never been back there. He wondered what it was like. Piles of books too special to leave lying around? All the things that library aides wanted to be 'helpful' with, so they hid them from the public? For the breadth of an instant, he considered that maybe she had hidden the book deliberately as a means of meeting the kind of person who might come looking for it. It was a stupid idea.

Still, it was entertaining.

"Why didn't you tell me that you had it reserved?" said the girl when she returned. In her hands, she bore a thick, green-bound volume.

"Oh!" he said. His genuine surprise was intense enough that she took it as anything but genuine, and so he tried to play it off with a smile. "I'm sorry—I thought I had mentioned that. I'm a little distracted."

"Are you hitting on me?" she asked plainly, her pale eyes fixed on his in a way that Ash would never dare to do.

"No. No time for that," he said, sighing as he maneuvered himself into the role he was now playing. "I have a paper to finish. Can I come by and try again later?"

"Only if you don't work here."

He raised his brows once in mock surrender. "Damn."

He all but ran back to the little cottage down from the president's house. When he got there, the house was empty; Ash was still in the middle of her Thursday afternoon office hours, and after that they would meet at the gym, and from there they'd go to dinner. It was a perfect life, and so why was he so determined to see what was in this book? Why did he care what she had in her closet?

He thumbed the index and there it was: the Bitter Elm! He turned at once to page 491—

But it wasn't there. Page 491 had been torn out. As had 490, 492, 493... All the way through 502. And there, on page 503, a message had been scrawled in the margin.

Justin, we need to talk. Call me ASAP.

A number followed.

His hands were shaking. He dropped the book onto his desk. Ash's desk, he reminded himself. His pulse raced, his whole body thrumming with something like fear. Excitement. Perhaps even anticipation. He glanced at his watch.

Gym at four o'clock, followed by dinner at six. Then they'd be together all evening, and he wouldn't have the chance to make the call—at least not in private—until tomorrow. He reached for his phone and his thumbs started to write seemingly all on their own: Something has come up. Might be late to gym. He hovered over the send button, his heart pounding.

Three dots appeared on the lower right, alerting him that Ash was writing a message. "Department head is throwing a fit," said the message when it arrived. "See you at dinner? I can work out after."