the boy, rook

Chapter 3: The Application

Previously: Chapter 1: Beginnings … Chapter 2: Chicago
I introduced myself and Ethan, a colleague who I steadily grew to like and respect, to whom I accidentally outed myself as a wanna be kinkster. Just when I thought I’d gotten away with it, he grilled me – hard. But he also gave me the opportunity to really learn what I needed to, if I could man up and commit.

Ethan told me to think long and hard about whether I was really ready to submit. I knew everything he said about me in Chicago was spot on. I was shooting myself in the foot when one minute I could envision being roped down and tortured, and the next minute barely able to smile at the cute guy in the bar. I was a coward.

But I knew this was something I needed. Lately my fantasies were a better turn on than a actual sex. Wasn’t that why I broke up with my last boyfriend? I wasn’t getting what I needed, and what I needed was what Ethan was offering.  Training. Service. The ability to test myself and explore myself and see what I was really made of.

But if I went through with this, so much would change, wouldn’t it? Would I even have my own life anymore? Would I see my friends? What would they ask if I started to disappear and how could I possibly answer? Would I still live at home? Was this the end of eating real food? Had I drank my last glass of wine? Would I ever walk normally?

Clearly my imagination was running wild, and each new question made my cock hard.

But this was more than fantasy fulfilled. What would it mean for life at work? We still had to work together, which would mean having to balance this Dom/sub arrangement with actual projects and other colleagues. He said my career would be safe, but what does that actually mean? Do we just live two lives? Do all the rules go out the window when we board the elevator? Did I trust myself to maintain the same composure that had gotten me where I was in life? Could I be the Director of Technology by day and Ethan’s slave by night? Would that distinction even be allowed and if not, could I fake it to everyone else?I considered waiting to answer until I could watch him in the office more – see if he gave any inclination that he was waiting, that he was interested, that I wasn’t making all of this up. But that was stupid. He clearly knew about me in Chicago and was a master at hiding it and controlling his expression. And on the other hand, I knew that every day I waited proved me a greater coward.

By 10 o’clock on Sunday night I knew it was time to decide. I’d spent a week worrying; there was nothing more to consider, nothing more for either of us to say or talk about. For an hour I stared at his profile, his firm chest, arms, and smiling stubbled chin, nice package, his eyes and jet black hair.

I clicked “Cruise.” It was done.

* * *

Monday went by. Then Tuesday, then Wednesday. Every new day was exactly like the months before it. Ethan and I carried on like we always had. I had my work, he had his; we met up on conference calls and strategy meetings. Anytime he popped his head in my door my heart raced, but I stayed nonchalant. He wasn’t anything to me but a colleague … and that would always be true inside these walls.

Nevertheless, something was coming (I hoped). At first, the suspense was killer. I stared off into space a lot, imagining what could be in store for me. I had to start wearing tighter underwear and looser pants, or else my nearly constant half-boner would show. But eventually I got to that point where I wasn’t thinking anything new, I was just rehashing the same stuff. That week went by, then the weekend, and despite hoping I’d get some kind of message or instruction, I was disappointed. I began to wonder if I’d just imagined the whole thing. That, or more likely, he’d changed his mind.

By Monday – a week and a day after I done the deed – I resolved to let it go. I was actually really busy and didn’t have time for fantasy; I was in the office by 8am, and didn’t leave until at least 8pm. My office was a mess. Invoices, magazines, and boxes of promotional crap piled up on a chair. On Thursday, Ethan and my boss poked their heads in. “Anyone in here?”

“Yeah, I’m buried under the northernmost rubble.”

“We’re going to lunch. You want to come or bring you back something?”

“If you can grab me a sandwich that’ll be swell.”

An hour later Ethan returned. “So do you even have a desk or did you just pile up boxes and old computer parts.”

“Thanks,” I said taking the food but not really looking up from my computer. “I had one, but it got in the way of the piles.”

“Is this all stuff from Chicago?”

“I think so, though I haven’t really looked at any of it.”

“What if there was something important?”

“It’s just promotional crap. Product samples. Swag and other assorted junk. I’ll bulldoze it soon.”

“Well, be sure to look at it first. I got dibs on umbrellas, Tote bags and Robots with Freaking Laser Beams.”

“You got it.”

He left. I ate. My team finished the project and went home while I turned to the disaster area surrounding me. Magazines went in one stack, brochures in the trash. Invoices to my inbox, direct mail to the trash. The boxes were, as I expected, from various companies I had only a vague recollection of. TrueTech, Marcoli Communications, Widgets this and Components that. Then I found the reason Ethan was so interested in my wreck of an office – a box from someplace called MasterE Technologies.

I was alone but closed my office door. I stared at the box and it’s handwritten label. I wasn’t expecting this, and I wasn’t expecting it here.  It was filled with packing peanuts but on top was an envelope with “Instructions” written on it. The note inside was clear cut:

“You followed your first instruction. Very well, then here is your next opportunity to flake out like a coward. This box is your application for training. You will complete everything exactly as I tell you, or else you’ll be rejected without appeal. Return this box by UPS by Saturday morning. No exceptions, no excuses. If your application is accepted, you’ll know it when you receive your next instructions.”

I appeared to have some work cut out for me – and it all had to happen tonight in order to make the deadline. I dug into the box and found a bunch of random items, each with its own instruction.

The first two things I pulled out were an at-home HIV test kit and an at-home Hepatitis-C test kit. The note was written on an envelope. “Follow the instructions and send these tests back to the company directly. Put the access numbers in this envelope and return them to me. You will not copy them down and you will not call for the results.”

Then I found a sealed envelope; on it was written “These are my recent HIV and Hep-C test results. You are free to look at them, and your application will not be penalized if you do. However, if accepted you will be taught to trust me, and that journey will be as hard as you choose to make it. Regardless, you will return this envelope and the results to me.”

There was another, unsealed envelope. “You will include copies keys to your apartment building, your apartment, and your office at work, along with any other rooms, places, or things you keep locked.”

A USB memory stick had a Post-it that read. “Copy your entire porn collection onto this drive. You will also photograph yourself clothed and naked, from the front, side and back, and include those photos here.”

There was a Zip-lock bag labeled, “1 pair of underwear, 1 pair of socks, 1 T-Shirt.”

Finally, I found a list of questions I had to answer. They included everything from detailing every sexual partner and encounter I’d had, to describing my fears, describing my regular day to day life, and writing out any particular fantasies I had. At the end was a checklist of every fetish, kink and sex act I’d ever heard of – and some I never had. My task was to mark the ones that I’d done (that was easy), the ones I was most interested in, the ones I wasn’t interested in and why I wasn’t, and finally any I thought were absolute limits.

It was a task that kept me up until 2am. The next morning I dashed to the locksmith to get copies of my keys, boxed everything up and overnighted it to the address I was given. I made the deadline in spite of my own total lack of organization.

Then it was time to wait, again. I got through the weekend by watching television, going to the gym, drinking with friends, anything that would distract me from the nerve-wracking excitement bubbling up from my groin, into my heard, and dizzying my head.

It was Wednesday afternoon when I returned to my desk to find a letter from MasterE Technologies. It was stamped and mailed on Monday. I opened it, too anxious to even close my office door.