Desperation, Part 1 of 3 [Tier 3 Exclusive] (Patreon)

One

Desperation may be the worst thing. I can deal with things like anger and sadness. No, I don’t like them, but at least I have my agency. But back me into a corner and limit my options and I go into fight-or-flight. Survival Mode. Nothing is off limits, and the claws come out. I’m forced to do the things that I don’t want to do.

I don’t want to be desperate. But here I am.

Things had been going well for a while there. I lived with my boyfriend, and we had a cat named Marshmallow. I was a waitress at a restaurant; far from a great job, but it was paying the bills. I had even managed to stash away some money in a saving’s account, earmarked for future hopes and dreams that felt out of reach now.

I blinked, and everything changed. Robert didn’t want to be with me anymore. No definitive reasons were given, but given the way he protected his cell phone like it was the last granola bar in the apocalypse, I assumed he had just found someone else. Marshmallow disappeared too, around that time. I had accused Robert of taking him, but he insisted that he wouldn’t have done that, on account of the fact that he actually despised cats.

Who the fuck despises cats?

The restaurant closed soon after. A recession was coming, whatever that means, and it meant that there weren’t enough people willing to overpay for a hamburger while under-tipping the waitstaff.

And so I was dipping into my future hopes and dreams in an apartment that I lived in by myself while waiting for my luck to trend upwards again.

I was desperate. My agency was out of my hands.

‘No pain. No suffering. Your safety is ensured. In exchange for a moment of your dignity, you will be well rewarded.’

All I had was a screenshot of the online ad. Probably a good thing I had done that, too, because -for the life of me - I couldn’t replicate the digital path I had tread to get there in the first place. I had begun to suspect that I made the ad up myself in the midst of a depressed fever dream. I remembered it having been posted semi-recently. And the area code below the ad had suggested it was local enough.

But it seemed bad. Seedy and too cryptic for its own good. The kind of glaringly terrible idea that anyone would be able to look at and say: “Well, yeah, just don’t do that.”

I was desperate. My agency was out of my hands.

I crawled out of bed a little after 9 one morning - the latest I think my body was capable of sleeping in - and had dragged myself to the kitchen to find that my milk had spoiled. It felt like the last straw, somehow. Another tick in the ongoing tally of problems in my life. Two options presented themselves before me: Sit on the couch while eating dry cereal from the box, or call that number.

I was desperate. My agency was...you get the idea.

“Hello,” a masculine voice said on the other end. The tone and phrasing had thrown me off, not to mention the lack of any identifiable introduction. The onus was immediately put on me to direct this conversation.

“Hi, uh, I’m calling about the ad?”

“Which one?” A simple question, but one that spawned even more questions.

“Uhm…” I began reading the screenshot from my laptop: “No pain? No suffering? My safety is ensured?”

“Where did you find the ad?” the voice asked. It was devoid of any emotion. I’d have believed it if I discovered that it was a robot.

“I don’t know. I...stumbled across it. I tried to get back to the site, but I’m not sure where I found it anymore.”

There was a brief pause, perhaps only one or two seconds. But it was noticeable following the almost mechanically immediate responses the voice had previously offered. “Are you available on Wednesday, September 15th? At 7:00 PM?”

“Yes.” I had all the time in the world on any given day now.

“State your name.”

“Gwen Charles.”

“4516 35th Street,” the voice said. “34th floor. Your unique passcode will be ‘stepladder.’”

“What, uh, city is this in? Just to confirm?”

“Yours,” the voice said. It was the first time the voice seemed to directly acknowledge something I said.

“Okay, but…”

The line went dead.

I had to call back. I had more questions. I wanted to know what this place was and what I’d be doing. I quickly redialed the number.

“We’re sorry,” an automated voice said. “The number you are trying to contact is not accepting calls at this time. Please try again later.”

I did. Over the next three days I had called the number close to 30 times, hoping that one of those times would yield a different response or the return of Robot-Man.

I had even done some reconnaissance, spending some of my rapidly-vanishing savings to hail an Uber over to 4516 35th Street. It was just a modern office building, another glimmering monolith in a sea of identical looking buildings. The temptation was strong to go through the front doors and work my way up to the fourth floor, but a muscular man in a tight suit standing near the entrance suggested that, eventually, someone would need to know who I was and why I was there. And if I had an actual invitation to be there, I’d probably only get to use that once. So I went home, and spent two more days stress-eating dry cereal from the box in anticipation.

“Name please?” the muscular man asked when I returned to the building on Wednesday night, at about 6:50 PM. I couldn’t be sure if it was the same muscular man or not, but it probably didn’t matter.

“Gwen? Gwen Charles?”

“Passcode?”

“Uhm…’Stepladder?’”

He held a walkie-talkie to his face, pressing a button on the side of it to conjure a second’s worth of squonking static. “Stepladder,” he said into the device.

There was a moment of silence and a fuzzy voice from within the device repeated back: “Stepladder. Clear for entry.”

“Please come in,” he said, stepping aside and ushering me through the rotating front entrance.

I never cared for rotating doors. Glass walls and tight spaces - it always made me feel like a claustrophobic zoo animal.

The lobby was vast, though mostly uninteresting. Polished steel, concrete and glass. Everything had sharp angles. Somewhere, an architect was still patting himself on the back for his work here.

“Ms. Charles?” a voice said from the receptionist’s desk.

“Yes.” I hustled to the desk, where a young woman tapped at a keyboard.

“You have a 7:00 PM appointment, is that right? On the 34th floor?”

“That’s correct.”

“You may step into that elevator,” she said, pointing to the large bronze-colored doors that were slowly opening from within a wall to my right. “There will be no need to press any buttons within the elevator - I have set it so that it will take you to where you need to go.”

“Thanks,” I said, in a tone that came very close to sounding like a question. I was capable of operating an elevator on my own. I would’ve been offended, had the logical part of my brain not reminded me that this was likely a routine security feature.

The elevator was so quiet and smooth that I wasn’t even sure that it was moving. 34 seemed like a lot of floors to climb, and I wondered if I had ever been so high in a building before. There were taller buildings - I had run into a grade-school friend of mine a few years ago who claimed they now worked on the 108th floor of a skyscraper, which seemed almost too surreal to even imagine.

The slow upwards journey also, unfortunately, gave me time to think. Reconsider. I still didn’t know what I was doing here. And it somehow hadn’t occurred to me until just now - but I didn’t care for the fact that the ad had begun with a statement about one’s safety. Nobody had ever posted a job listing for an insurance agent that began with: Don’t worry, you’re probably not going to die.

I had almost talked myself into just going back downstairs and going home. Whatever this was, I probably didn’t need it. I’d walk down 34 flights of stairs if I had to.

I thought about the spoiled milk again. The unanswered resumes I had sent out. Marshmallow’s continued absence.

I just shrugged. Whatever. We’re here now.

The elevator doors slowly opened, revealing another small lobby. There were a few chairs set out, like a waiting room, but none of them were occupied.

“Hello,” said the man at a desk. I recognized that cold mechanical voice almost immediately.

“Hi,” I said. “I’m here for…”

“What was your passcode?”

“‘Stepladder,’” I said for the second time. I wondered how effective this system was. If I had just told someone on the street the word ‘stepladder,’ would they have been able to waltz in here as well?

“You’ll be in Room 4,” he said. He pointed down a hallway behind him - the only hallway. There were no further instructions, but maybe there didn’t need to be. I was feeling a little redeemed after having an elevator operated for me.

I smiled at the man - a sort-of ‘thank you’ - but he was already looking at a computer with no interest in looking back at me.

The hallway proved to be less obvious than I thought it would be. Room 1 was on my left. A ways later, Room 14 was on my right. Strange. But then Room 2 was on my left and Room 13 was on my right. I sighed, almost laughing at myself for overreacting to how rooms were laid out.

The door to Room 4 was closed - as were all the doors. The rich mahogany doors seemed at contrast with the sterile grey-ness of the rest of the hall. Had the hallway had any more color in it, the door would feel welcoming. Instead it just seemed as mysterious as everything else had been so far.

I knocked. No answer. I hesitated for a moment, wondering if I was expected to just walk right in or not. Nobody had told me to just go in - but nobody had told me that I needed to wait for someone to let me in either. I turned the knob and walked in.

I was surprised at what I saw. To be fair, I likely would’ve been surprised no matter what this room held. Even if it had just been a normal office, I would’ve still been astonished that I went through all this just to end up in a place like that.

But the room was big. And empty.

It was bigger than my entire apartment - maybe two of my apartments combined. There was no desk. No chairs. No shelves. No pictures on the walls. Just a vast open space with windows at the far end of the room, overlooking the darkening city. The room was well lit via the fluorescent bulbs in the ceiling.

This somehow seemed worse than anything I was expecting. If this room had something in it - anything - I could’ve speculated. Predicted. Prepared myself. But nothing? I didn’t know what to do with that.

There was one another door in the room, another mahogany door. I knew that whatever was coming for me would be coming through that door.

And so I waited. Not long. No more than five minutes later, the door opened, and a man emerged. A well-dressed man, wearing a pressed and expensive looking suit. His dark hair was neatly parted to the side. There was power in how he carried himself. The kind of guy I’d see on a TV show or movie, but never in my own world. My class didn’t interact with his.

He wasn’t alone. Two more men followed, a darker-skinned bald man and a younger man with reddish-blonde hair - both just as immaculately dressed and well-kept. Next, a woman, wearing a slim black dress while her dark hair flowed down the right side of her face and over her shoulder. None of them looked older than 40. Young, rich, powerful - just their presence alone made me feel insignificant and unprepared.

I had chosen to wear a pair of simple black slacks and a white blouse. I thought I had dressed like I was going to a job interview, though probably not an interview for wherever they worked.

Another man emerged from the door last. He pushed a wheeled cart into the room, with some folding chairs on it. In the center of the room, he began to quickly unfold four chairs in a sort-of semicircle. Then he unfolded a table, placing it down in front of the chairs. Finally, he placed a black duffel bag atop the table.

“Can we get you anything?” the first man finally said. “Something to drink?”

“Water?” I asked. I wasn’t thirsty, but it felt like the right move. If I got nothing out of tonight - I’d at least have gotten some water.

“Martin,” the first man said to the cart-man, “would you grab a water for our guest?”

“Yes, sir.”

Just as quickly as he went through the open door, he returned with an unlabeled bottle of water. Good enough for me. I took it, thanking him. He was then excused, and he left with his empty cart, closing the door behind him.

“Ms. Charles,” the first man said. “We’re happy that you could be here with us tonight.”

“My pleasure,” I said, unsure of what else to say.

The four took their seats on the other side of the table. In order from left to right: First man, bald man, young man, and lady.

“We come to you today with a simple offer. Do as we ask, and you’ll be rewarded.”

“Seems simple enough,” I said. “Though that depends on what you’re asking of me.”

“Here are the things we are not asking you to do,” First Man said. “There will be no violence. There will be no drugs, alcohol or efforts made to inhibit your ability to reason. There will be no restraints. And, lastly? There will be no effort made to detain you. You are free to go whenever you please.”

I nodded. That all sounded reassuring, though - again - I wasn’t sure that such a disclaimer was needed if they weren’t going to ask for something insane.

“Should we talk about the reward first?” asked Bald Man. “I think it’d be best to show Ms. Charles what she’s working for.”

“Agreed,” said the woman.

“Very well,” said First Man.

He reached into his suit jacket and pulled something from it. I winced, expecting a gun or a knife - even though they had just finished saying there’d be no violence.

Instead, he flopped down a bundle of cash on the table next to the duffel bag. My eyes grew large as I focused in on it. The top bill was $100, and while I couldn’t see what denominations were under it, the neat stack was tall enough to suggest that...there was potentially a lot of money to be made here.

Mo’ money, mo’ problems, somebody had once said. Now I was bracing myself for the other shoe to drop.

“You’re welcome to count it if you’d like,” First Man said. “But I can assure you, it’s probably even more than you’re estimating it to be.”

“At the risk of sounding obvious,” the woman chimed in, “if you do choose to leave before we’re done here tonight, you won’t be given any of the money. But, should you choose to stay, all of it is yours.”

“Tax free cash,” Young Man said with a grin. “It’s a good deal.”

I nodded, feeling myself sweating. “What would you like from me?”

“We’d like your dignity,” Young Man said. “Just for tonight. You can have it back when we’re done with it.”

My heart was beating rapidly and my palms had become moist. I tore off the cap to my water bottle taking a few sips of water.

I wanted that money. I hated that I wanted it so badly. I hated that I wanted it more than I had ever wanted anything before.

Desperation.

“You can have my dignity,” I said.

“Discomfort is temporary,” Bald Man said. “Cash like this could help set you up for a very long time.”

The latter part of his statement wasn’t anything I hadn’t already thought of myself, but the first part was a little disconcerting. Still - worst case scenario, I could just leave. I’d be as poor as I was when I walked through the door, but not more poor.

I nodded.

First Man leaned forward and unzipped the top of the duffle bag. The large bag seemed lumpy and bloated; there were a lot of things in the bag. I wondered if I’d see everything the bag held, or just a curated selection.

“What do you think?” First Man asked the other three.

“Dog,” said Bald Man.

“Dog?” asked Young Man. “I was thinking cat.”

“No, you’re both wrong,” the woman said. “Baby.”

“Baby,” Young Man repeated, thinking out loud. “Yeah. Alright, yeah. I can see it. I’m with you.”

“Dog or Baby?” Bald Man asked First Man.

“Baby is the right choice,” First Man said.

Bald Man sighed and nodded. “You’re not wrong. It’s going to be good. I just...it’s been a while since we had a dog.”

“She’s not a dog,” the woman said, holding a hand out towards me. “She’s clearly a baby.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said with a shrug. “I see it.”

“Baby it is, then,” First Man said.

I could barely process this conversation. I knew what the words were, but the context was lost on me. I almost didn’t care what they were talking about - I just wanted them to get to the point.

First Man reached into the bag and pulled out a large flat object. White, thick, folded in on itself. Some sort of...shirt? Pants?

Baby. They had said baby.

It was a diaper.

“I trust you know what this is, Ms. Charles?” asked First Man.

“Baby,” said the woman. “We call her ‘Baby’ now. I’m not going to pretend that she’s one of us.”

“She’s not one of us,” said Young Man.

“I meant an adult,” said the woman.

“Right, right.”

“A diaper,” I said, answering First Man’s question and trying to disregard the rest of the banter.

“Take off your clothing, Baby,” the woman said.

“All of it?”

“Every single piece of it,” she said. “If you’re wearing jewelry, take that off too.”

“But…”

“I’ll say this once,” the woman said. “There’s absolutely no point in asking us to change our mind or to show you any leniency. We’ve already explained the terms. This money is here for you if you follow our directions. If you don’t like it, you simply leave.”

I nodded. I understood what she was saying: There’d be no sympathy offered. No reasoning or deliberation. Do or don’t. Walk out this door with a wad of cash or walk out with nothing.

Was stripping nude before four strangers worth that cash? I suspected I’d be asking myself a variant of that question many times as the night proceeded. Right now? Yes. My nudity could apparently be purchased.

I didn’t give them a show; there were no theatrics or sexy winks and nods interspersed in my disrobing. I went about it the way I imagined I would if I was completely alone at home. I kicked off my black flats and peeled off my thin black socks. I had a ring on my right hand, earings, and a bracelet on my left hand. They came off and were tossed as one handful towards my shoes. Next came my blouse, which I methodically unbuttoned and slipped off my shoulders, letting it fall to the ground around my feet. Next were my pants, unbuttoned, unzipped, and thrust down far enough that gravity would do the rest. That just left the hard part: the unmentionables. I debated which was more revealing, and opted to remove my bra first, reaching behind my back and unfastening the latches. The cream-colored bra - possibly adjusted to be tighter than it should’ve been - immediately lurched forward and slid down my arms. I was barely a C-cup - a detail that I rarely took issue with - but in this room, with this audience, I found myself feeling self conscious about every part of my body. That just left my purple satin panties; not my favorites, but I didn’t think anyone would be seeing them. How foolish of me. One brave push later and they too were on the ground.

They said nothing and just watched me carefully. I kept waiting for further instructions, but they were silent. I busied myself, kicking all of my discarded clothing into a single pile.

Still nothing. They stared at me, and so I stared forward at them. First Man and Bald Man barely seemed to react. It was as if they were watching a nature documentary. Young Man was practically salivating. The woman seemed amused; happy with where she was right now in life. I couldn’t blame her.

“Do you like how you look?” asked Bald Man.

The question caught me off guard. It was as if he was responding to something he had observed. Did I carry myself in a certain way? Was it how I took my clothes off?

“I think so.”

“You don’t seem certain,” First Man said.

“I guess...I don’t think about it a lot. There’s not much I can do about it if I don’t. People have told me that I’m pretty before.”

“Do you think she’s pretty,” Young Man said, pointing to the woman.

I nodded. “Yes.”

“She’s fucking hot,” he spat back, as if my answer was an insult. “‘Pretty’ is for little girls. Are you a little girl?”

I wondered what their relationship with each other was. Outside of this room, did they spend much time together? Did Young Man and First Man go to baseball games?

“Well...no, sir. I’m an adult.” I didn’t even mean to call him ‘sir.’

“Not anymore,” said the woman. She pointed to the door back to the hallway: “Until you walk out that door, you’re not an adult.”

Young Man asked his question again: “Are you a little girl?”

“Yes. I’m a...little girl.” I felt my cheeks flare.

“A pretty little girl with pretty little breasts, yes?” asked Young Man.

I nodded.

“Cup one of your breasts with your hand,” asked Bald Man. “I want to see how big it looks in your hand.”

I did as he asked, using my right hand to cup the bottom of my left breast. It felt humiliating to be on display like this.

“Not bad,” Bald Man said.

“You like them smaller,” Young Man said. “I wish they were bigger.”

“Were they any bigger,” the woman said, “she’d be a dog right now.”

“That’s a good point,” said Bald Man.

I didn’t really know what that meant. I could speculate, but I didn’t want to. ‘Baby’ was at least human.

“Do you want her to put the diaper on herself?” asked First Man, leaning forward and turning so he could direct the question at the woman.

“She’s too little,” the woman said. “I’ll do it.” To me: “Lie down on the ground, Baby.”

I began to open my mouth. I wasn’t even sure what I was going to say - I just felt like I needed to respond to that somehow. But I had nothing to say, and I didn’t want to say something stupid. I dropped to my knees before easing myself down onto the ground, lying on my back on the hard industrial carpeting.

“Is there a razor in that bag?” the woman asked.

“You can’t do that,” First Man said. “She has to be able to leave here as she came in.”

“I can do whatever I want if she gives me permission,” the woman responded.

I liked First Man. Well, no, I disliked all of them. But I disliked him the least. He seemed the most reasonable of them.

“Baby?” the woman said to me. “It looks like a bearskin rug between your legs. Will you allow me to shave you clean? I think it’ll look much better in a diaper that way.”

Agency - a little tiny bit. It was posed in such a way that a negative answer wouldn’t get me kicked out into the hall. I could say no. But I wondered if agreeing to it would win me any favor.

“Y-yes,” I said. “You may.”

She turned to First Man. “There you have it. I think we’ll need some supplies.”

First Man stood and looked into the bag and shook his head. “What do you need?”

“A razor. Shaving cream. More water. Actually...a bathtub would be nice.”

“The shower?” asked First Man.

“Good enough,” said the woman.

“Then, here. Take this.” He drew a long black ribbon from the bag. A blindfold. He tossed it to the woman, who caught it.

“I should’ve thought about this before I had you lie down,” she said to me. “Sit up. I’ll need to put this on you.”

I didn’t completely understand what was happening, but nothing seemed so alarming that I wouldn’t just roll with it for now. I sat up, and she quickly wrapped the cloth over my eyes and around my head, tying it tightly behind me. I was blind now, which hardly seemed like the worst thing.

“You’re going to stand,” she said. “And you’re going to take my hand and you’re going to let me lead you. It’s not that far of a trip and we’ll be back soon enough. No funny business. No taking off your blindfold. If you can’t follow those directions, you’re done. Do you understand?”

I nodded. “But...I’m naked.”

“Yes, of course you are, sweetheart.”

I wanted to point out that I didn’t know where she was leading me to, and that I’d be making the trip there without any clothes on. But she knew that already. It was just something I had to be willing to deal with.

Yes, my ability to walk around a mysterious building without clothes on could be purchased.

Her hand grabbed mine and I held it right back. Tightly.

“We’re walking now,” she said. “We’ll be back soon.” I assume that was directed to the seated men.

“Don’t dawdle,” said Young Man. “We’re hungry.”

We were walking forward. A door opened. More walking. A door closed. I could sense more light wherever we were - it was brighter here - but everything else was a mystery to me.

“He’s an idiot,” she said as we walked.

“Who?”

She started to make a hard-k sound but stopped herself. I wondered if she was about to say his name. “The young cocky fellow.”

“Oh.”

“You have to respect him, of course, as you would all of us. But between you and me? An absolute dunce. A fucking brainless toad.”

It sounded like the words were absolutely cathartic for her to say aloud. I felt happy for her for getting that opportunity, but I said nothing. We just kept walking forward.

Another door opened and closed as we walked. I wondered where we were. I wondered if anyone else was around. I didn’t hear anyone, but for all I knew, there were hundreds of people surrounding us, all watching me get pulled along completely nude.

Another door. And then my feet felt hard tiles under my feet instead of the scratchy surface of the shallow office carpeting. By smell alone I knew we were in a bathroom or locker room of some sort. It wasn’t a bad smell - just a different kind of chemical smell. Different cleaning solutions, mixed with soap. I wondered if the things that the woman needed were already in here or if she had picked them up along the way.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” she said.

“I trust you.” I didn’t completely trust her, nor was I sure why she needed to reassure me of this, but it felt like the right answer.

“Stand here,” she said. I stayed put.

The sound of something thick and creamy being forced out of a can into her hand. Shaving cream or whipped cream - and I could probably guess which. I guessed I was in or near a shower now.

I wondered what I would’ve thought was happening if I didn’t know what was coming. Soft foamy fingers gently, liberally, spread themselves across my pelvis and between my legs. Truth be told, it had been a long while since anyone touched me down there. That the hands belonged to a ‘hot’ powerful woman only made it harder to believe what was happening right now.

“So...do you do this often?” I asked. It was a silly question - mostly just an attempt at eradicating the mysterious quiet.

“Spread shaving cream between the legs of a young woman I’m about to put into a diaper?”

“Uhm...yes? I guess.”

“I won’t answer that,” she said.

“Oh. Okay.”

I felt the cold rigidness of an object being pressed onto my skin. The razor, presumably. With slow and careful swipes, I felt it glide across my skin, taking up whatever cream and hair was under it.

It was another thing that I might have considered more carefully had I known what I would’ve been asked to do tonight. Back when Robert cared, I had shaved regularly. Just as much for me as I had for him. Not shaving since was more an act of defiance than it was laziness. It was an insurance policy that I wouldn’t do something stupid like stumble into an unexpected one-night stand without being fully prepared emotionally and physically.

Though - I pondered as this mystery woman in a sleek black dress trimmed away my pubic hair - if I wasn’t expecting this tonight, what was I expecting? Great question.

I didn’t know.

No, that wasn’t true. Something sexual.

I was desperate. Agency was out of my hands.

Admitting this to myself made me feel even stupider. Why hadn’t I shaved? Why had I chosen the purple panties? Why did I almost forget to put deodorant on? Had I really been that checked out that I was willing to walk into this scenario without taking better care of myself?

I had told nobody that I was here. If I didn’t come out of this building, nobody would ever know.

I heard the squeak of a knob turning, and a blast of cold water shot into my torso and ran down my legs. I yelped in surprise.

“Stand still,” the woman said. “I need to make sure I got it all.”

I felt her hands helping to direct the water where it needed to go to rinse me of the remnants of shaving cream and hair. The water slowly warmed. Her hands remained on me - though they no longer seemed to be helping to rinse. They were exploring. There was no friction between her fingertips and my skin. Completely smooth. The water turned off, though her hands remained on me.

I felt a hand between my thighs, gently nudging them apart. My body took the hint before my brain did, separating my legs a little in the shower for her.

“I’d like a taste,” she said.

I bit my bottom lip. I wanted her to. I also didn’t want her to. Not here. Not like this. Was there an audience here? A video camera?

“Go ahead,” I said.

“I wasn’t asking for permission,” she said.

I said nothing and let it happen.