“I’m a bad girl, Daddy” I muttered into the pillow below my face.
“Louder!”
“I’m a bad girl.”
It was true. I was a bad girl. I was his bad little girl and I deserved to be spanked by him. And yet, two weeks earlier, I hadn’t even known Daddy existed.
ONE
Natalie
“Where did you get to last night?” Alison asked, throwing herself onto the sofa with a groan. “I missed you.”
I didn’t bother to look up from my book. Heathcliff was just starting another of his brooding looks and I didn’t want to get too distracted by reality. “You didn’t miss me,” I said.
“I did. I turned round and you weren’t there.”
I sighed, closing the book. She wasn’t going to let it drop. My housemate and I have a lot of things in common but when it comes to men, we’re worlds apart. I prefer a brooding antihero who spends most of a story scowling with his arms folded, only thawing when the right heroine comes along to melt his icy heart. That’s where I tend to picture myself, some windswept moor about two hundred years ago, dress billowing in the wind as he sweeps innocent little me into his arms and carries me into his bedroom, the door closing behind us. Alison prefers what she calls ‘real men’ and I call ‘pricks.’
It’s always been this way. Back when we started college, she had a boyfriend called Chad. Who’s called Chad outside of an 80s surfer movie? He had a skateboard and a Mohican and called people ‘dude.’ I had Wuthering Heights and a reading nook in the corner of our shared room, a nook I had to vacate every time Chad ‘swung by to hang out,’ as he called it. If I didn’t, he’d try to rope me into a threesome in the least subtle ways imaginable, usually involving his wandering hands. After Chad, there was another Chad, and then another.
Why did I put up with her hanging out with more Chads than a voting machine salesman? Well, other than her taste in men, she’s a lovely person. She just has a little sensor inside her that detects testosterone and when it does, her logical brain switches off, replaced by the slut-o-tronic 9000 she becomes.
“I was there,” I said with a roll of my eyes. “With you. You left.”
“I didn’t, I wouldn’t leave you on your own like that. Would I?”
“You had enough vodka inside you to floor a Russian parliament meeting, you pulled a beard with a man attached and you were so busy sucking his face off you didn’t notice when he took you outside, leaving me alone once again.”
“No, I remember his mate. His mate was chatting to you.”
“He was chatting to me. He was chatting about the best way to gut a pig. Apparently, it’s with a swift twist of the wrist and ignore the screams. I told him I was a devout vegan and he went off to find someone else to invite back to his abattoir.”
“But you’re not a vegan.”
“I know that. Oh, look, forget it. How did you get on with Santa Claus or whatever his name was?”
She sighed, closing her eyes and lying back as her phone beeped in her handbag. “He’s called Mark and he’s amazing. Said he can’t wait to see me again. Hang on, this’ll be him now.”
She dug her phone out and looked at it, her smile fading, replaced by a scowl. “Fucking dickhead!” she snapped, throwing the phone onto the carpet at her feet.
“What is it?” I asked, already knowing the answer. My eyes fixed on her phone for a moment, a moment too long. I forced myself not to think about that, looking back up at her whilst swallowing down the old emotions yet again.
“Fucked and chucked once more. Why do men do that?”
“At least he texted to tell you.”
“Oh, yeah, he’s a real saint. God, why does this keep happening to me?”
I’d gotten so used to consoling her each time this happened, the words just fell out of my mouth without me really having to think about them. She was better off without him. He didn’t know what he was missing. She didn’t need a man to make her happy. My mind was already back in the book, Heathcliff picking me up to carry me home despite my half-hearted protests. Heathcliff would never - to use Alison’s wonderful vernacular - fuck and chuck.
She didn’t seem too upset. Within ten minutes of receiving the text, her fury over her latest paramour had faded and she was already planning another night out. “Come with me,” she begged, tugging at my arm while I tried to read. “Please, I promise I won’t leave you again.”
“No,” I replied, scowling at her. “You will leave me, you always do. I’m not interested in being your sex P.A.”