Is cruelty really lighter when you don't wear heels?
Part 6: The Table as Altar
He lay still. Still as he could manage, considering the tremble rising beneath his ribs. He knew what came next—not from a script, but from memory. From whispered hints and the way her voice lingered earlier on the word “stay.”
The music changed—low, smoky jazz yielding to something slower, older, more intimate. A crooner’s voice stretched like syrup across the room, and with it, the vibration of movement. Weight shifted. Laughter softened. The game was changing.
He couldn’t see them. But he could feel them approaching.
The first couple.
She stepped up first—barefoot, light, almost teasing. Her partner followed, heavier, slower, deliberate. And then… the first pressure.
Her sole pressed gently into his belly, toes curling slightly as she balanced.
Then his.
A firmer step—confident, weightier—flattened the other side of the gimp’s abdomen. Together, the pressure grew, not brutal but complete. There was nowhere for the air to go but out. His masked breath came shallower. Not panicked. Just… managed.
They began to move.
Slow, swaying steps. A private waltz performed on the body of the man she used to love.
She giggled as her toes pressed into his ribcage. He flinched beneath them, but stayed still. Her partner adjusted his footing and smoothed a hand along her waist.
“He’s learning to take it,” the man said, his voice a low purr.
“I trained him to,” she replied. “Shame is a better teacher than love.”
They circled slowly, shifting their weight with practiced grace. Each step forced a new submission—a new shape for his lungs to collapse into. Her heel found the space below his sternum and held. His did the same, nearer to his navel.
Their kiss, above him, was slow and lingering. Mocking. Reverent.
“This is better,” she murmured to the man against her lips. “You move with purpose.”
“And he moves with fear,” the man replied.
As the music dipped, they stepped forward in unison.
One foot—her foot—pressed gently against the mask.
The other followed.
They stood on his face.
His breath stopped—not from lack of air, but from awe. From the weight. From the finality of it.
“Good rug,” she whispered, then stepped off.
The man gave a soft, amused grunt and did the same.
Their dance was done.
But his humiliation had only begun.
Love lifted her. Shame steadied him.