Brighton Lights: Safety Words
Richard Shayler: a walk on the wild side
“I think you need to relax … you’re sweating profusely. Please sir, you need to calm down. No sir, I can’t let you in, you haven’t got a ticket. I don’t care if you’ve dressed up especially for this. No, I don’t like your whip – and no, I most certainly don’t like your paddle. Put it down sir! No, I said put it down! OK that does it. SECURITY!”
This was an unfortunate misunderstanding I recently encountered at the cinema. I was in the Fifty Shades of Grey queue. I fashioned a rather trim suit, soldier’s cap and leather boots. My right hand wielded a whip and the left a humble paddle. I also had something in my pocket that I won’t divulge but let’s just say it most definitely should have stayed at home …
I thought, why not? I wanted to ride the BDSM bandwagon. I wanted to take it by the reins and make it submit. Make it squeal the safety word we’d agreed on pre-ride. I wanted to experience what all the fuss was about. But I was denied all this.
After all my planning. My outfit. My getting to the cinema on time. My adrenaline rush. My excitement. My dreams of becoming enlightened to a world previously unknown. All destroyed due to the show being sold out. In my unfortunate enthusiasm I had forgotten the most vital thing – the dashed cinema ticket!
I haven’t read the books and I don’t think I ever will. Not because I’m a bookaphobe, it’s simply because I don’t want to be seen reading it. Even in the comfort of my own flat … what if someone looks through the window and spots me? “Look at him,” they’ll sneer, “dirty man, reading his dirty filth. Probably getting a thrill out of it. Disgusting.” That’s what they’ll jeer. They will, and I won’t be having it.
It makes me wish our culture wasn’t so prudish. I can hold my hands up and admit guilt to this, too. I was recently asked to go and see the film but I refused. I thought they were testing me to see if I was a pervert or not. I wish I had said yes. But instead I’m being escorted out of the cinema by the security yelling, “please be careful, the whip was expensive and the paddle isn’t even mine!”
You see … I got annoyed that I refused my girlfriend’s invitation to go and see it so I went full circle and decided to embrace it whole-heartedly. Instead of just peeking in for a curious look, I tore down the protective leather curtain and cannonballed straight in. I wanted to prove to everyone that I was OK with it – prove that it couldn’t faze me.
Unfortunately in doing this I was left ashamed and embarrassed. And the final insult to injury happened upon my ejection from the cinema. That ‘thing’ fell out of my pocket. Someone whispered … “disgusting” … I reached down and picked it up. It was all three Fifty Shades in one big compendium.
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