Bedroom Bully by Harper West

13

Rebecca

Days passed without much sleep.I tossed and turned, waking myself up from dreams that made my panties wet. Every morning I showered down, and the steam carried the scent of my womanhood throughout my place. It was as if my own smell were trying to out me for the dreams I had been having, and my biggest fear was that it would eventually come with me to work. Especially whenever I ran into JoJo.

So, one random Friday after work, I shot Brit a text message to ask her for the name of that sex shop we went to after the burlesque show.

Me: Hey, what was the name of that place with all those crazy dildos?

Brit: LOLOL! Are you going back? Please tell me I can come with you.

I didn’t have the stomach to shop with anyone, so I came up with an excuse.

Me: I might stop by, but I’m not sure yet. It depends.

Brit: So, code for “I’m embarrassed about my interest in it, so I don’t want my friends seeing me freak out if I back out.” Got it.

Me: Brit, can you just tell me the name of the place?

I watched those three little dots bounce for way too long before the name finally popped up.

Brit: Happy Haven’s Adult Pleasures. Don’t say I never did nothin’ for ya. And hey. If you use them, I at least get first impression stories. All right?

I snorted as I reached for my purse.

Me: Deal.

With my work week behind me and nothing ahead of me, for once, I soared out of my apartment. I rode the elevator all the way down to the main floor before I flagged myself a taxi. I looked up the address of the place on my phone because I sure as hell didn’t want to say the name of that place to some random stranger driving me around. But the grin on his face told me that he was quite familiar with the address.

Which filled me with horrible embarrassment when he dropped me off.

“You have fun in there, okay?” he asked.

He winked at me, and I wanted to vomit. “Thanks.”

“And if you’re lookin’ for recommendations, me and my wife love their flavored lubes that they make in-house. Vanilla Raspberry is her favorite.”

I wanted to die. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

He peeked his head out the window and yelled after me as I walked toward the front door of the store. “And don’t forget about their DVDs in the back!”

Dear God, kill me now. “Have a nice day!”

I quickly slipped inside and forced the door closed behind me. I closed my eyes, drawing in a few deep breaths to calm the shaking of my hands. As the taxi drove off, I groaned to myself. From now on, any trip that required anything sensitive would simply have to be done with my own gas.

Then, I opened my eyes and turned to face the rest of the store.

“Welcome to Happy Haven’s!” the young woman behind the counter chirped. “Are you looking for anything specific?”

Might as well see how close to dying of horror we can accomplish. “Uh, do you guys have, like, I don’t know… a BDSM section?”

She smiled as if I’d asked her for a piece of gum. “Of course, we do. It’s been very popular since the introduction of 50 Shades into the marketplace. It’s right back there, all along the back wall of that little alcove. And if you need anything else, please let me know!”

My eyes traveled to where her finger pointed. “All right, thanks a lot.”

“No problem.”

With my purse gripped tightly at my side, I walked over into the circular little dome they had created for their BDSM section of the store. I gawked in awe and curiosity at the things slung up on the wall. There were blindfolds and feather-duster-looking things. Ink pens with flavored ink and, you guessed it, those flavored lubes the cab driver yelled about for the entire world to hear. I reached for a set of handcuffs and plucked them off the wall, trying to study their weight and their strength.

But none of this stuff looked like the kinds of things I wanted to try.

Still, I walked around the dome and checked out everything. I tried to recall the sorts of things I had seen in my dreams in the hopes that it might guide me through the store. And while I picked up a few smaller things to experiment with, I didn’t see some of the things that had caught my attention at the show.

Like a paddle. Or a bar that spreads a woman’s legs open. Or chains of any sort. Or even rope.

“Finding everything okay?” the woman asked.

I jumped as she randomly appeared behind me. “Oh, good Lord. Sorry.”

She giggled. “No, my apologies for startling you.”

Then, she looked down at what I had in my hand.

“Struggling to find things?” she asked.

I furrowed my brow. “How did you know?”

She plucked the blindfold and flavored lube from my hands. “It’s the look on your face. You look like a deer in headlights.”

I blushed. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

She smiled. “What are you looking for, specifically?”

My blush deepened. “Honestly? I don’t really know what they’re called.”

“Well, describe them to me. Maybe I can help that way.”

I looked around before I cleared my throat. “There’s this, uh, bar-like thing. You know, attached to cuffs, or whatever.”

“Oh, a leg spreader?”

I blinked. “Is that really what it’s called?”

She shrugged. “Some people just call it a spreader. We have those, but they aren’t in this little dome. They’re toward the back of the store.”

I snickered. “Deeper into the mouth of the beast.”

She barked with laughter. “First time in a store like this?”

I rolled my eyes. “That obvious?”

She patted my back. “It’s okay. Things like this can be intimidating, especially when you’re doing it by yourself. Come on, I’ll show you where they are. And I think you’ll find everything else you’re looking for back here, too.”

Her touch, however slight, had a calming effect, and soon I found myself standing in front of a wall laced with everything from my dreams. There was the leg-spreader, of course, as well as four different styled paddles. There was also that whip with multiple tails that I saw at the show, something called a “ball gag,” little clamps with chains attached to them, and a host of different things that peaked my interest.

And by the time I was done grabbing for everything, I had an armful of sexual proclivities I was aching to try.

“Here, let me take some of this up front and store it away. And when you’re ready to check out, we can ring you up!” the woman said with glee.

“Actually,” I said as I looked over at the edible underwear, “grab me a couple of those extra large-size panties and we’ll be good to go!”

She squealed as she reached for them. “I love shopping sprees. I sort of want to join you.”

After we carried everything up to the register, we started ringing me up. I was thankful that no one came into the store to see the bags upon bags of stuff I had purchased for myself, but when all was said and done, I dropped almost five-hundred dollars on sex toys.

“My parents would kill me if they saw this stuff,” I murmured to myself.

The woman snorted as she ran my card. “Here you go. And because you spent five-hundred dollars, you get thirty dollars’ worth of free product from us. You can choose anything from these five tiers, and you can also mix-and-match.”

As if I didn’t have enough stuff in the four bags I slid onto my forearms, I also walked away with two massage-wax candles, another thing of flavored lube, a spray to numb the back of my throat, and a couple of the largest pairs of fishnets they had.

Then, I decided to call Brit instead of summoning another catcall-car.

“Oh. My. Gosh. You have to tell me everything you got,” she said as she picked up the phone.

I snickered as I stood on the sidewalk. “I can do you one better. Come pick me up and I’ll order us some lunch and we can put all of this shit up in my place.”

I heard her snatching her keys in the background. “Be there in ten!”

She laughed her ass off the second she pulled up and saw me with armfuls of shit from the store. I piled it into her trunk, and we drove through my favorite fast-food place to get burgers and milkshakes and fries. We hauled ass back to my place and lugged everything up to my apartment where we dumped out all of the bags so Brit could marvel at my collection.

And as I sipped my banana-mocha milkshake, I couldn’t get over how high-pitched her squeal got sometimes.

“Oh! My! God! I’ve wanted one of these forever! And it was on sale? Girl, I gotta go back to the store once I leave.”

“Their lubes are fantastic. This is actually a new flavor I haven’t tried yet. My favorite is their strawberry vanilla, but now I kind of want to try this one.”

“A spreader! Fucking hell, girl, you went all out. I haven’t even tried one of these. Though, Kelly says it’s awesome.”

I furrowed my brow. “Wait a second, Kelly from work?”

Brit peeked up at me with a cheeky look behind her eyes. “Do you know what Kelly from work does on the side?”

I flopped onto the couch. “What do you mean, on the side?”

She waved her hand in the air. “Girl, I’ve got so much to teach you. Kelly’s a dominatrix on the side. She says her clients love the spreader bar.”

My jaw dropped. “Kelly?”

“Yep.”

“A dominatrix!?”

She barked with laughter. “Yep!”

“But—but she’s so cute. And petite. And little. And soft-spoken.”

She held up the blindfold to the light. “Trust me, I had the same reaction. I kind of want to book an appointment with her just to see how she does things. But apparently her target audience are men that enjoy being punished.”

I whistled lowly. “Wow, the things you learn about your co-workers.”

Brit polished off her food and stood up. “Well, as much as I’d love to hang out, I kind of have plans in a couple of hours and I need to start getting ready.”

I wiggled my eyebrows. “Got a hot date or something?”

And when she blushed, it was my turn to squeal. “Brittany!”

“What!? Yes, I’ve got a date. So, what?”

I leapt to my feet. “So, what? You haven’t dated anyone since I’ve known you. And even though I’ve only known you for a handful of months, this is big, right?”

She sighed. “Yeah, it’s pretty big. I’ve been out of the legitimate dating game for a while. Sure, I had coffee dates here and there just to find a maintenance man, but--.”

I blinked. “A maintenance man?”

“You know,” she said as she leaned closer, “a man to maintenance my body?”

My jaw hit the floor. “I’m calling them that from now on.”

“You can thank TikTok for that one!”

I blinked. “Thank what?”

She groaned. “We really need to catch you up with the rest of society. But, not tonight. Tonight, I have a legitimate sit-down dinner date with a guy I’ve hooked up with a few times now. He wanted to treat me out to something nice, and I figured why not?”

I hugged her tightly. “I’m happy for you. Really.”

She hugged me back. “I’m nervous as hell. Will you be my bail call in case something goes drastically wrong?”

Now, that concept I was familiar with. “Of course. I’ll keep my phone on me and if you call, I’ll give you a reason to get out if you need it.”

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“Now,” I said as I pulled away from our hug, “go get yourself sexy-fied!”

“Woo hoo!”

I saw her to the door before we embraced one last time and it felt so damn good to have my friend back. I watched her until she got onto the elevator and was whisked away, then I backed into my apartment. I closed the door and turned toward my sex stash on the floor, wondering where the hell I was going to put all of it.

So, I walked over to the pile and started picking things up.

Knock, knock, knock.

I giggled as I stood with an armful of sex toys. “Come get whatever you forgot, Brit! The door’s still open.”

But when the door ripped itself open, horror unlike anything I’d ever experienced burst into my apartment.

“Surprise!”

They startled me so badly that I shrieked. I shrieked so hard and threw my arms up so high that the world of sex I had embraced against my body went tumbling to the floor. I gawked as I watched them pile into my apartment with suitcases behind them and toiletry bags dangling from their shoulders.

And I couldn’t force myself to move.

“Mom? Dad!?”

He smiled as he walked over with his arms outstretched. “Come here, pumpkin. Give your old man a hug.”

Holy shit, my parents had come to visit.

“Did I miss a message?” I asked as I embraced him.

Mom furrowed her brow as she looked at the floor. “What’s all this, sweetheart? Spring cleaning?”

And when my father looked down at the pile of literal sex toys on my living room floor, he immediately released me.

“Uh, honey?” he asked as he looked over at my mother.

Mom bent down and picked up a package of the edible underwear, and all I wanted to do was pass away completely.

“Maybe we should talk,” Mom said curtly as her fevered eyes met mine.

I started quickly picking things up before I snatched it out of her hand. “Here, let me just—mmph—get this stuff put away and—ugh—we can talk!”

Dad grunted. “Yeah, looks like we need to.”

Mom placed her hand on my shoulder. “Is everything okay at work, sweetheart?”

I rolled my eyes. “Just give me a few minutes to clear the floor and then we can talk about how I’m a grown woman who’s completely capable of buying this stuff for myself.”

I threw everything into my closet before shoving it closed, and after I had cleared the living room of any toys that made my parents’ eyes pop out of their heads, I tried to meditate. I closed my eyes and leaned against the wall, trying to right my mind before I went out there and dealt with whatever tongue-lashing my parents thought was acceptable.

Then, I cleared my throat.

“Hey, guys. I’m really glad you’re here. Please, take a seat. You guys want some coffee? I can only imagine how long it took you to get here.”

Mom snapped her fingers and pointed to the couch. “Sit.”

I turned to face her politely. “While I appreciate the concern, this is my apartment and you’re in my territory. Those snaps that you used to use when I was five won’t work here.”

Dad leveled his eyes with me. “Don’t you speak to your mother like that. We traveled all this way to surprise you and spend a long weekend with you, and this is how you treat us?”

I shrugged. “You’re lucky you didn’t walk in on me entertaining someone. That would’ve been really mortifying.”

Mom gasped. “Are you dating someone? Can we meet him?”

Dad wrinkled his nose. “Since when are you a ‘sex before marriage’ kind of girl?”

I rolled my eyes as I made my way into the kitchen. “You guys are more than welcome to stay here, but if you’re going to judge whatever life you think I’m leading, I know of a great hotel you guys can stay at while you’re here.”

I hated the insecurities that started popping up. I felt my strength being chipped away, as if I were some young pre-teen who was in trouble for making out with a boy and getting caught. I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of seeing my embarrassment, though. I wasn’t the one who had just walked in and ruined their weekend, so anything they caught an eyeful of was inherently their fault.

But that didn’t stop me from wondering if the purchases I’d made had been a mistake.

“So, who wants creamer?” I asked.