She read the poster again, for the third time, and decided this was just what she needed. She made a mental note of the web address and then continued on her way to work. She stopped and went back to check it again. She started to walk away, stopped again, went back and tore down the poster, folded it up and put it in her pocket.
Petra has been wanting to become a writer for years but there is one problem, she is one of those people who has loads of ideas but never seems to get around to finishing any of them. This might be the push she needs to get something done for a change.
That evening she went on line. The poster was for a writing convention sponsored by the local college. It was a day of workshops, lectures and panel discussions. In attendance were a large number of people who made their living by writing. They were going to try to help aspiring authors like her to find a technique that would work for them.
Some of the guest speakers she knew from having read their work, others by name only and a few were unknown to her.
Petra went through the itinerary circling all of the items she wished to attend. Then she went back and juggled her choices to eliminate conflicts and maximize her time. Lastly she registered online for each of her selections. Now it was done, no excuses, no second thoughts; this time she was going to go through with it.
Saturday morning the alarm went off shockingly early. A body that was conditioned to sleep in on weekends crawled out of bed. A shower and coffee relieved some of the stress. Petra, still not fully awake, stood staring into her closet. Deciding what to wear was usually not so difficult but today she wanted to look like an author. She just couldn’t decide what the hell an author was supposed to look like.
She finally went for the “serious/mature/but still sexy” look. A white blouse, black blazer, short grey skirt, hint of black stockings and the black pumps with the three inch heels.
By the time lunch came around she had attended two workshops, one lecture and lively discussion. She was grateful that she spent most of her time sitting because the pumps, even though they looked great, were probably not the best choice to wear for a full day.
For each of the morning’s events she had found herself in a seat towards the back so she cut lunch short to get a good seat up front for the next speaker. When she arrived at the auditorium she wasn’t the first but she did get a seat front row and center.
After a fifteen minute wait the seats were full, the ushers closed the doors and the host came on stage to introduce the guest.
‘Good afternoon. Welcome to our next talk which is entitled “Descriptive Writing Made Easy”.
Petra was confused, she hadn’t signed up for this. She checked her program and realized she was in the wrong room.
A voice over the PA system announced ‘Please help me in welcoming one of the world’s top selling authors EL James.’
“Oh my god” thought Petra “it’s that dreadful hack who wrote that awful 50 Shades of Garbage.”
As EL walked out to polite applause Petra considered her options. She could get up and walk out but all eyes, including those of EL, would be on her and they would know that she had screwed up. Or she could suffer through the next half hour. It was too late to get to where she was supposed to be, no late arrivals were allowed in. EL would talk for about twenty minutes and then take questions for another ten. If anyone else here felt the way that Petra did the Q&A could be interesting so she decided to stay.
‘Hello, I’m sure you all know who I am and what I have written. I’m also aware that opinions on the quality of my work vary widely but that’s not why I’m here. I’m here to explain a technique I developed to help me create an image. Time is short so let’s get started.’
El dramatically held out her right arm horizontally to her side. She wiggled her fingers and said ‘My words come out here’. With an exaggerated motion she placed her left fist over her heart and declared ‘My words start here.’
With the same sort of sickening drivel that she puts in her books EL said ‘If you draw a line between the two points you will notice that it doesn’t go through my head. I write directly from my heart to my hand. Unlike many of you I have no schooling in the art of writing. I have not had the benefit of critical analysis or grammatical scrutiny. You are being trained to use your head when you write to get your images into words. I had to find another way.’
‘I need someone to help me demonstrate’ she said as she walked to the edge of the stage and pointed at Petra ‘please come up here young lady.’
Petra looked up at the finger pointing at her. She looked around at the other 199 attendees and four ushers that were looking at her. There was no call for volunteers and no opportunity for someone who might actually want to help. There was just Petra and an auditorium full of people waiting for her to move.
An usher came over and Petra stood up to be escorted to the stairs and up onto the stage. EL took her by the hand and led her to the center, facing her towards the audience.
‘Take a look at this pretty lady. I want you to take two minutes to write a paragraph describing her. Oh, one more thing, imagine that she is seated in a chair, bound and gagged. The ushers have pen and paper for those of you who don’t have your own.’
Petra stood for the longest two minutes of her life as the entire audience studied her. They would look up, then they dropped their heads and scribbled. Up again, down again, more scribbling.
‘Time is up, how many of you actually wrote something?’ About 90% of them raised their hands.
‘How many wrote something that you think is good enough to show someone else.’ Almost all of the hands dropped.
‘You were writing with your head and you had to alter what you saw to suit the image I asked you for. You struggled to find the right words and second guessed it when you did.’
‘I realized that writing is an art and when I looked at the problems I was having I compared it to other arts and found the solution to my problem. Painters, sculptors and photographers work with models. They don’t have to create an image, they just have to interpret what they see. I decided to write the same way.’
EL called out ‘It’s time boys.’
Two young muscular men emerged from behind the curtains. One carried several coils of rope, the other a chair. Both wore tight black leather pants and black leather vests that were far too skimpy to conceal their bare rippled chests. They could have been twins, maybe they were. The only difference between them was that one wore combat boots, the other cowboy boots.
Cowboy placed the chair behind Petra and Soldierboy helped her to sit. They each took an arm and crossed her wrists behind the back of the chair. Cowboy tied one end of a rope to her wrists, four times neatly around and four cinches. Then they passed the remainder of the rope around her waist and the chair four times securing her to it.
Once again Cowboy did the 4X4 tie to her elbows. They finished up passing it around four times above her breasts and four times below snuggly binding her to the chair.
Cowboy whipped out another rope and it uncoiled across the stage. He passed the end between Petra’s legs just above the knee. Soldierboy took it from there and passed it back again. They quickly and neatly made a figure 8 pattern until there were four wraps around her thighs using half of the rope. With the remaining rope they repeated their handiwork just below her knees.
‘I would have done this myself’ said EL ‘but I’m too slow and too sloppy. This is work for experts.’
They got down on their knees on either side of Petra. In perfect unison they each took an ankle and lifted her feet. They slipped off her shoes and placed her feet with her ankles touching the outside of the leg of the chair. Four wraps and four cinches later her ankles were tied to the chair, her feet pointing down and her toes several inches from the floor.
They got to their feet and stood on either side of her while EL came up and stood behind her. Soldierboy reached out and pinched Petra’s nose shut. When she instinctively tried to breathe through her mouth Cowboy placed a thumb on her chin and pushed down.
As her mouth opened wide EL reached over and inserted a big red ball gag into her mouth. As she buckled it she spoke ‘Now I want you to take another two minutes and this time write from your heart. Don’t just record what you see, record what you feel too.’
Petra blushed with embarrassment to be put on display like this. She wiggled this way and that but knew it was hopeless.
She sat helpless as they studied and scribbled again. Even in her stressed out state she noticed a difference. There were fewer pauses, the pens moved quicker and more deliberately. The glances at her had more intensity.
‘Time is up. How many of you wrote something this time?’ All hands went up.
‘How many of you think it is good enough to show someone else or it is so good that you would rather not show it to someone else?’ All hands stayed up.
‘I’m afraid that this took a little longer than expected and we won’t have time for a discussion. The ushers have my business cards to give you, don’t hesitate to contact me with questions or comments. Thanks for being here. Have a good day.’
Petra watched the audience as they gathered their notes and filed towards the exits. Quite a few people, both men and women, took another look back at her as they left.
EL removed the gag while the guys quickly untied her.
‘You are the only one who didn’t get to write a paragraph and I would like to make that up to you.’
EL held out her business card. It had a room number scribbled onto the back of it and was accompanied by a hotel keycard.
‘If you come by promptly at seven tonight my two friends will be just leaving. Don’t bother to knock, just let yourself in. You will find me in a similar state to the one you just found yourself in. You can write a paragraph, you can take a picture or you can make a movie. Anything you want to do. Anything.’
Petra looked at her watch. She only had a minute to get to her next meeting. She took the cards and left without a word.