House Bound

Bardvahalla 2005

(House arranges an evening with a dominatrix)

She yanked at a tuft of her vibrant crimson hair like she was pulling a chain attached to a light. Despite all her tugging efforts, she wasn't being illuminated.

House deduced – correctly - that she didn't get many requests like his.

She tried to formulate a reply, but several seconds passed before she exhaled in frustration and blurted, "I don't think about that stuff. Guys just pay me to treat them like shit, that's all."

House shifted his legs into a slightly more comfortable position. "I know you what you do. I also know you don't think about it, but that's why I chose you. I'm paying you to think about it. I just want some honest answers."

"What was the question again?"

"I'm asking you to discuss your customers' requests regarding Trust and Pain."

She shrugged. "Whatever."

House mentally kicked himself, which was the only was he could kick himself. Perhaps he should approach this from the other side and talk to the guys who shelled out hard earned cash to be abused. He tried again. "How many regulars do you have?"

"I can't say names," she twirled her vibrantly hued hair around one finger, then another, then another.

"I don't want names." House assured her. "I just want to know what they want you to do to them, and - if you know - why they want you to… whatever."

"Umm…. okay." Bambi crossed her plump legs. "One guy likes me to spank him with kitchen utensils, then force him to go shopping for socks and plain white underwear. I have to call him Bubba. I have to wear a black wig. It's gotta be kitchen utensils or he doesn't get anything out of it."

House arched an eyebrow. "Mommy issues?"

"I don't ask. If they need to tell me, they do, but most of the times they don't, and most of the time I don't want to know."

"Okay… so your customers trust you to treat them like garbage in a very specific scenarios. Always the same or can you improvise?"

"Yeah and no. Depends on the customer. One regular frankly bores the hell out of me, but if I try to get creative he goes ballistic, so I just stick to the script."

His ears peaked up. "Script?"

"He wrote it all down. I have to say very specific things at certain time, and then smack him with certain utensils. I make him buy tightie-whities 'n stuff and then he pays me and I don't see him again for a month."

"Ah." House made a mental note. "So with Bubba it's more role playing than anything."

"Yeah… I guess." Twirl. Twirl. Tug. Twirl. "Why are you interested in this?"

"I'm trying to determine what the appeal of pain is - er…"

"Mistress Bambi." Tug. Tug. Tug.

"Right." House popped a Vicodin. Well, they can't all be as articulate as Annie Sprinkle.

"You're in pain, huh?" She gestured at his pills.

House thrust the bottle away. "Yeah. I just don't enjoy it."

Tug. Twirl. Tug. "So what does give you pleasure?"

House mimicked her apathetic shrug. "Music. Wardrobe malfunctions. Sports. Competition. A pain-free existence." Running. Running used to be one of his greatest pleasures. The euphoria of winning, making the goal. Defeating a rival. The sweet revenge of victory, especially if the other team played dirty. The silver heft of Victory, the heady moment the crowd roared your triumph. The sensation of hot sweat when the body began to cool down as you left the field -

"I meant sexually."

His fingers toyed with the Vicodin bottle in his pocket. It's contents rattled. The pills that kept his pain at bay and buried his passion. "I don't go there anymore. I'm asking about pain and trust. I'm hoping for some insight by asking questions."

Tug. Sly smile. "So what used to get you off?" Pink tongue arching slowly over painted lips.

"I'm not paying you to ask questions," House reminded her. "I'm paying you to answer them."

She shrugged again. "Okay. Ask me something."

House thought a moment. "You trust me to pay you, right?"

"You better." A hard edge to her voice. The playful smile gone. Her narrowed eyes darted to the door.

"I will." House assured her. "But there have been times when you got burned, right?"

She relaxed slightly. "Yah. A few times. When I was first starting out."

"Not regulars." House ventured. "They wouldn't want to piss off 'mommy', right?"

"No. I got tossed out of a hotel once for raising hell during a convention. Now we get a card number and verify it first."

"These guys who stiffed you for the money - what did they want?"

She thought a moment. "Mostly rape fantasies. One guy wanted me to kick him. I had to wear a pair of army boots he had with him, and then I had to make him lick the boots while an audiotape of Metallica played. Weird, but not the weirdest thing I've ever done."

"And the weirdest?"

She shrugged. "There was this guy I met at a party. We hooked up later on. He liked my face. He had a thing for nuns. I'm was raised Catholic so I know the jargon."

"So some old coot had elementary school penguin issues." House quelled a smile. "Go on."

"He wasn't old." Tug, Twist. Tug. "Not bad looking either, but man, he was one messed up dude."

House made a whipping motion with his hands. "And what did he want from the Sisters of the Perpetual Orgasm?"

Bambi giggled and leaned toward him. "He has to recite from memory certain passages from a Bible. A real heavy leather-bound one. Song of songs. Luke. James. Matthew, New Testament stuff mostly. If he screwed up, I had to – to put his thing in the open book and then slam it closed."

House winced. Now there was an image he could have done without. He cleared his throat. "So most guys like this want the pain. They're grateful for it, and want to role play a particular scenario repeatedly, like this Aussie, right?"

"I see him once in a while." She stopped playing with her hair and began to fuss with her ragged fish net stockings. "Guys want to be dominated or controlled. And it's funny, y'know. The more successful some of these guys are, the more they seem to want to be treated like crap and told they're worthl - hey, how did you know that guy was Australian?"

He ignored her question. "But your customers control you, so who's to say if real pain is what they want or just the illusion of pain."

"Pain is pain." Her eyes narrowed again. "Why they get off on it is beyond me. One guy told me it's the only time he ever really feels alive, 'cause the rest of his life is so boring."

He glanced at his Rolex. It had taken less than twenty minutes. House pulled out his wallet. "Cash okay? I'd prefer if my accountant didn't know how I spend this evening."

"You booked an hour." Her eyes glistened angrily. "So I get paid for a full hour."

House dutifully paid her and she left abruptly. A shadowy guy in a shadowy car waited for her out front. Boyfriend? Pimp? Regular? Didn't matter.

Yes. Everybody lies. Especially him.

His subtle inquiries, the names of certain party girls, his payment for saving a life led him to Bambi. Oh sweet Bambi! She'd been worth every penny.

House understood pain. The pain of betrayal. The pain of indifference. The pain of sacrifice. He had learned how to control it. How to cause it. But everyone was different, so some kinds of pain hurt much worse than others. I for an I. Truth for a truth. Now where in the Bible did it say that? House pulled King James from his bookshelf. He began with the Song of Songs.

Was it Kahn who said 'Revenge is a dish best served cold' or had Ricardo been quoting Dante. That didn't matter either. House now knew the Achilles heel of his rival. Now he merely needed an appropriate arrow, a clear shot and then the pleasure - no…

The thrill of the Chase.

FIN