Page 2 of Flogging Faith
They made their way to a small diner, not too far from the club, and settled into a booth. The waitress was friendly when she took their orders and seemed vaguely bemused that all of them ended up ordering the same thing: burger and fries.
With anyone else, Faith would have imagined there might be some awkwardness, but Mandi was so engaging, she couldn’t help but feel at home.
“You have to tell us all about you! What brought you to the club?”
“Well,” said Faith. “I guess I wanted to meet new people and do some scenes. But I seem to kind of get it wrong with everyone.”
“What do you mean?” asked Amelia, her tone kind, not accusatory.
“It seems like everyone knows what the unspoken rules are for a place like that. I’ve read all of the written rules, over and over, but nowhere does it say that being bluntly honest about what you want is a bad thing. And yet, every time I told people what it was I was looking for when they asked, they looked at me strangely, or accused me of trying to top from the bottom.”
Mandi pulled a face. “Oh that sucks. People are so rubbish when it comes to rules. Half the time they don’t even know that they have them, which is so silly when it comes to”—she dropped her voice to a whisper—“kink. You’re neurodiverse then?”
Faith nodded. “AuDHD, so a delightful combination of hating routine and needing routine at the same time.”
That made Mandi gurgle with laughter. “I’ve got autism.” She turned her head and lifted her hair from her ear to show off pretty pink earplugs. “So, I do understand. Mommy?”
“Yes, babygirl?”
“Maybe Faith would like Rawhide?”
Faith wasn’t entirely certain what rawhide was. Maybe it was a type of leather flogger? But from the looks Amelia and Mandi exchanged, they were probably talking about something else altogether. “What’s rawhide?”
Amelia paused as the waitress brought over their food and waited until she had left. “It’s not a thing, it’s a place. Rawhide Ranch. It’s the resort where Mandi and I live. It is… accepting.”
“Accepting?” Accepting of what? Of their queer relationship? Of Mandi being a Little…?
“It’s a place for kinksters,” explained Mandi. “There’s a university, and a school, and there’s a program for Littles and a program for service subs, and it’s really nice. Some people visit and some people stay.”
“And you both live there?”
Mandi’s smile went all soft and melty, which hit Faith right in the solar plexus. She’d never felt anything that made her look like that. “I came to Rawhide when I was… I was lost.” She reached out and squeezed Amelia’s hand. “I was just going to visit, but then I met Amelia, and got a job as a librarian, and now I live there fulltime. We both do.”
“It’s a space where you’re safe to be whoever you need to be,” said Amelia. “Littles can be Little 24/7, if that’s what they need. But there’s also a Dungeon, and we have people come and stay for a week. The rules are laid out very clearly, and no one is going to be angry with you for saying what you need.”
“That sounds like heaven,” said Faith wistfully.
“Come and stay!” said Mandi, impetuously. “I mean, there’s a screening process, and you’d have to apply, but I think you’d like it. And even if you don’t find someone to play with, you’d be able to make new friends and hang out with me, and it’d be lovely!”
“It might not suit you,” said Amelia. “Because nowhere suits everyone, but it is a safe space, and it’d likely feel more welcoming than that club. Attending on your own must have been so daunting.”
“It wasn’t the best afternoon,” said Faith. “I’ve been with friends before, but no one ever wants to play with me, and I thought it would hurt less if there weren’t friends to witness that.” She grabbed a fry and ate it slowly. “It just hurt in a different way.”
“Well,” said Mandi, “how about coming to visit Rawhide because you want to develop more of a community? Then if you play with someone, it’s a nice surprise, rather than attending with that being your sole intention.”
Faith hadn’t been on vacation for a while, and she had accrued quite a lot of leave, and if she were honest with herself, the idea of spending time on a ranch, visiting with these lovely two women who knew nothing about her, but had been so caring—well, it just sounded lovely. “Maybe for just a weekend,” she said.
CHAPTER 2
Bex still couldn’t get over how different the US was to the UK. Everything felt so much bigger, and people were forthright in a way she wasn’t entirely used to.
And surely, retail assistants couldn’t be that happy all of the time.
It had been an adjustment, moving across continents for work, and six months after she’d started in her new role, she’d decided she needed time off. Not too long, she had work to do. But a weekend off wouldn’t hurt. She shouldn’t even be working on the weekend.
She needed some fun.
Back home, she’d just go to the club her best friend Riley ran, play with one of the willing subs she knew, but here she wasn’t sure which clubs would be welcoming of queer participants, and so she’d abstained this whole while.