Smoke and Mirrors (6 page)

“What is it you understand?” the doctor said, projecting his normal confidence, but stepping back from the awkward situation.

“I understand a lot of things. One of which is that you and your wife are trying for a baby.” The Asian man took a step closer to the perplexed doctor. He put a gentle hand on the doctor’s shoulder and smiled at him.

“I… what’s going on?” the doctor asked, now not really sure what was happening.

“I have a gift of sorts, and I see there are two little boys standing beside you, waiting for you to take them home.”

The doctor looked down to his left, then to his right. He didn’t see any little boys standing there.

“Oh no, you can’t see them, but I can. They look like you, and they’re smiling, telling me they can’t wait to meet you.”

The doctor was stunned. He thought the man was certifiably crazy, until the man said something that made the doctor really listen.

“Your wife, Stephanie, she’s the love of your life, and all of this…” He swept a hand around the hospital, “…is all for her. Everything you do, you do for her.”

The doctor was completely taken aback, the breath knocked from his body. The Asian man, in his late thirties or possibly early forties, smiled warmly at the doctor.

“How do you know this?” the doctor asked.

“As I said, I have a gift. I can see things. The dead, the not yet born, the world is different from where I stand.”

The doctor looked at him, then at the Asian man’s wife, who was suddenly holding her arms down beside her body.
She certainly didn’t look like she was in pain any longer.

“I…” The doctor was stunned.
What the hell was happening?

“We need to go somewhere to talk,” the Asian man said as he stepped out of the door, and gestured for the doctor to follow.

“Okay,” the doctor said, still unsure of what was happening. “We can go to the cafeteria.”

“No, we can’t. There are people here who won’t understand. Your office will do.” The Asian man and his wife walked the route to the doctor’s office, as if they’d been there many times before.

The doctor followed the Asian man thinking,
Wow! Is this real?

“It most certainly is,” the man said, looking back over his shoulder.

What the fuck!

The Asian man laughed, hearing what the doctor had thought, as clearly as if it was spoken aloud.

When they got to the doctor’s office, the man waited for the doctor to unlock the door.

The doctor thought this was amusing.
What, no super powers to walk through walls
? He snidely thought.

“No, I’m not blessed with that ability,” the Asian man chuckled.

Damn it – I’ll have to watch my thoughts.

“No please don’t. I’ve learned to ignore them.” The Asian man laughed. “But you’re extra loud and I knew I had to help you.”

When the three of them were seated in the doctor’s office, the Asian man started his rather intriguing, yet peculiar speech.

The Asian man had been blessed with a very rare gift of seeing and hearing things others couldn’t. Hearing the things others thought, but mostly he could see the ‘afterlife’ and the ‘before life’ – spirits waiting to be born, and spirits that had passed and wanted to convey a message so desperately to their loved ones left behind.

The two boys were anxious to tell their parents all they had to do was make a simple visit to a certain herbalist, who would assess both parents and give them an herbal concoction to ingest.

The doctor, who once believed only in traditional western medicines, was quickly changing his mind based on the things the Asian man was saying.

After approximately an hour of intense and mind-bending conversation, the Asian man stood and walked to the door.

“Wait, that’s it? Just go see this herbalist you’ve mentioned, and we’ll be able to get pregnant?”

“Unless you don’t want it,” the Asian man said with a shrug, although he knew how much the doctor and his wife wanted a baby. “There is one more thing…”

The doctor nodded, eagerly waiting for whatever final scrap of information he would receive.

“It would be in your best interest if you don’t speak to your wife about this.”

And so the Asian man and his wife, whose broken arm seemed to have miraculously healed itself, left the doctor sitting in his chair, thinking about everything that had happened.

The hours ticked by, and the doctor still sat in his chair, sometimes rubbing his chin, and sometimes looking at the photo of his wife on his desk. He was unable to focus on anything other than the message the Asian man had delivered.

Was that all real?

Time seemed to stretch, though before the doctor knew it, he was home.

What is going on?

The doctor and his wife sat at the dining room table, completely enveloped in silence. They weren’t hostile toward each other, just deep in thought.

Finally, at dessert, the doctor spoke. “Tomorrow, I’m taking the day off. I want us both to go see an herbalist that was recommended to me. He deals in ancient Chinese medicines, and I want us to go talk to him.”

His wife stilled her fork above the rich chocolate cake they were eating. “But you don’t believe in that stuff,” she said.

“It won’t hurt to try. IVF hasn’t been successful, so let’s just give it a go. What do you think?”

She sat quietly, not really knowing what to say.

The seconds passed, her mind ticked.

“Sure,” she finally said, and looked at him with a wry smile.

Now, six years later, she knew Cody was up to no good. He was a beautiful little boy one minute, and a monster the minute she left the room. Despite that, she adored him with her entire heart and soul.

Boys will be boys.

She came back into the room, to find Cody still sitting on the plush carpet, trying to read.

Cody’s eyes shot to the wall behind the desk where Simon had now drawn a picture of the entire family.

“Cody,” she said, much calmer after she’d taken a few deep breaths.

“Yes, Mommy?”

“Why did you draw on the wall?”

Cody huffed, and looked at his twin brother. His brother was silently giggling to himself, knowing that Cody was about to get into a lot of trouble.

“Mommy, I didn’t.”

“I think you better clean it up,” she said, annoyed, though definitely not as angry. “Before lunch!” she commanded.

“Mommy, it wasn’t me!” Cody cried, fed up with always getting in trouble.

“Then who was it?” his mom said, hands on her hips, and eyebrows raised.

“It was Simon! It’s always Simon.”

Cody’s mom gasped, and put a hand to her throat. Suddenly, all the breath left her, and a cold sweat blanketed her as she started to become light-headed as she stared, fascinated at the drawing.

Cody was an identical twin. His brother Simon had passed away during childbirth.

Neither the doctor nor his wife had ever spoken to Cody about Simon.

But the stick family drawn on the family room wall clearly depicted two little boys. Maybe now was the time.

He crawled toward her, ashamed and embarrassed.

He knew his lack of self-confidence had gotten him into this position, but that wasn’t what drew such raw, gut-wrenching emotion from him. His Mistress was disappointed with him, and knowing that tore him up. He hated when she was upset with him.

This was Zack’s second D/s relationship, although the first couldn’t really be considered D/s. It was more like a sadistic woman who liked to abuse, and a sub who didn’t really understand what power exchange actually meant.

All he’d known was he had a yearning to please women. To let go of all the darkness that inhibited him and allow another to take control of him, even if the control was only for an intense session.

His first Mistress was happy to beat him, not for punishment or because he did something wrong, but because she loved the power wielding a cat or a cane gave her. Zack didn’t realize this wasn’t a healthy Dom/sub relationship, for he was new to the lifestyle.

When he went to hospital for what he suspected was a broken rib after a session with his first Mistress, he was seen to by a woman with the softest and most caring brown eyes he’d ever seen.

Of course he didn’t know it, but she was a Domme. She automatically recognized in him the beautiful traits of a true submissive.

Lowered eyes, willingness to please, and of course the strength it took to embrace such a lifestyle.

The doctor spoke to Zack at great length, and although she had a moral obligation to report the monster he was currently seeing, she chose to try a different approach.

There was just something about him…maybe his timid, shy ways, or his hypnotic blue eyes that called to her. She wanted to protect him, to guide him, but mostly, to teach him.

She invited him to the local BDSM club as her guest to observe, so he could truly understand what a D/s relationship was.

Zack debated going, but after drawing up a pro-and-con list, he chose to go to the club. When he found the doctor, he kneeled beside her on the soft carpet and watched everything as it took place. Her hand gently petted him as he witnessed first-hand the correct forms of a D/s relationship.

His eyes grew large, and his heartbeat raced inside his chest. He watched the Doms (mostly male) play with their submissives (mostly female), and he watched as the subs begged for the stern, yet loving hands of their Doms. He saw the play here was all consensual, sane, safe, and surprisingly loving. Not once did any submissive use their safe word, and he wondered about that.

He’d used his many times, only to have his Mistress continue to flail away at him, ignoring his pleas to stop. But watching these submissives become aroused by the caressing touches of their Doms made him begin to comprehend the awful situation he’d been in.

He finally understood what he had with the Mistress that landed him in hospital, was not love. It wasn’t even BDSM. It was a woman on a power trip, a demon, a sadistic temptress who hurt others just for the sick fun of it.

But now, three months later, Zack crawled toward the doctor, and his heart was hurting. She told him she didn’t want him to disrespect himself any longer, nor did she want to hear him say he felt like a failure for not understanding the signs.

Today at lunch, he’d looked at the doctor and told her he ‘felt like a fucking idiot’. His new Mistress snapped her eyes to him and put down her fork. He could tell she was angry.

“I’ve told you on more than one occasion I won’t allow you to think such things about yourself, and secondly, you swore to me that you would not. You’re also aware I do NOT tolerate such vulgar words,” Mistress had said, making Zack lower his eyes in shame.

“I’m sorry, Mistress,” he replied, completely ashamed.

“Tonight I’ll give you ten strokes of the cane for your persistent self-loathing. You will not come, and all play is suspended for a week.”

Torture! That’s all that Zack thought.

Not being able to please his Mistress was the ultimate in punishments. He’d happily take the ten strokes, or even more. But knowing he wouldn’t be able to pleasure her or please her, ripped his damned heart out.

“Yes, Mistress,” Zack said, trying to be the good submissive he knew she wanted, although he was fighting back the emotion attempting to tear out of his chest.

Now Zack was kneeling beside the whipping bench. His head hung low, his body alive but regretting it was his own mouth that got him here.

He sat back on his haunches, waiting for his Mistress’s command.

“I’m disappointed,” she started, and his heart broke at hearing those two words.

“I’m sorry, Mistress,” he said in a small, defeated voice.

“Why are we here, Zachery?” She only used his full name when she was incredibly upset with him.

“Because I used bad language and called myself a name,” Zack said, trying not to reinforce the negative thoughts that seemed to run through his head incessantly.

“Up on the bench. Thread your wrists through the leather straps, bottom up in the air,” she said in her usual cool, controlled tone.

He knew though. He knew she was still saddened by his self-loathing. It was getting better, the voice of his former Mistress telling him how ugly and useless he was, began to slowly fade in his mind.

The first strike of the cane stung, though her cool hand was soothing the moment the cane was lifted off his skin.

“Count them out loud,” she said, when the second strike happened.

“Two,” Zack murmured.

The third blow was harder than the first two, and when he screamed out the number three, her hand automatically kneaded the soft skin where the cane had landed.

“Why am I upset, Zachery?” she asked with the fourth blow, landing right in the middle of his butt.

“Because of how I think of myself,” he spoke in a small, sorry voice.

The fifth, sixth and seventh strikes were in quick succession, though they all still hurt the same.

“That upsets me, because it means that you don’t trust in your Mistress,” she said when lowering the cane with hit number eight.