Peter Pišťanek - The Wooden Village

“Keep going, keep going!” she says and pushes him into a corridor. To emphasize her words, she gives him a lash with a riding whip.

A sharp pain runs through Freddy from his brain to his genitals. He obediently lets himself be pushed by his mistress into a small room equipped as a torture cell. The main feature of the room is a torture rack that looks like a prop from a film about Jánošík, the Slovak Robin Hood.

“Get your clothes off!” the mistress screams at him and casually selects a few of the various whips and other instruments of torture decoratively arranged on a low table.

Freddy Piggybank sits down and with shaking fingers begins to untie his shoelaces.

“Faster, you fat worm!” the mistress urges him. “In a moment you’ll curse the day you were born,” she adds. “You’ll be begging for mercy and a coup de grâce.”

Perturbed, Freddy looks up from his shoes and searchingly gazes at his torturer. He’s heard those expressions before, he just can’t recall where.

“Get on with it, get on with it!” shouts the woman and lashes him with a horsewhip.

A sharp burning pain floods Piggybank’s back, and his fingers feverishly try to move faster. After his shoes come shirt, trousers and socks.

“And underpants?” the torturer screams at him, when she sees him hesitate. “What about your underpants?”

Freddy takes a cowardly look at his red boxer shorts and pulls them down too.

The whore touches his crotch with her whip and lifts his genitals. She looks with disgust at his semi-erect member. She takes a condom from a drawer and throws it to him.

“Put it on!” she orders him. “I don’t want you making a mess here. And get to the rack!”

Piggybank obeys and lies face down on the rack. He notices a sizable hole that the carpenter has made in the middle of the rack for the penis.

The prostitute ties his wrists, ankles and waist firmly to the rack. “So how would you like it?” she asks bored. “Any special request?”

Freddy restlessly fidgets on the rack. “I’ve got gauntlets in my trouser pockets,” he says. “Put them on your hands.”

“Who are you ordering about?” the whore shouts at him and lashes him with the whip. Nevertheless, she then takes from Freddy’s trousers the big leather gauntlets used to protect brickyard workers’ hands. “What do I do with them?” she asks sternly.

“Put them on your hands and you can punish me,” says Freddy, delighting in the restraints that immobilise him.

The torturer puts the brickyard gauntlets over her black gloves and takes a different little whip from her varied assortment and, without warning, starts to whip him. Freddy jerks his body, and the burning pain makes him see stars in front of his eyes. A wave of clandestine delight runs through his entire body. His lower lip begins to tremble from the suffering and fierce pleasure. His spine arches back. Freddy moves his round head from the board of the rack and lifts it higher and higher. He shouts: “Aah!”

“Shut up, you fat slob!” the woman bawls. “Get your head down!”

“Aah!” moans Freddy Piggybank. He can now feel everything below, belly, thighs, behind, and genitals contracting abruptly and all of it together working up towards a mighty, blinding ejaculation of sperm.

“Get your head down, I said!” the prostitute repeats, comes up to Freddy’s head and with her thighs squeezes it between her legs, pushing it to the rack with all her weight. Freddy’s back is on fire. Firmly squeezed by the torturer’s black-stockinged booted legs, he presses his face onto the rough board of the rack. Two more lashes of the whip and Freddy is done. Rhythmic moaning and sighs of relief betray him.

The whore stops whipping him and releases his head. She releases the metal buckles on the straps and takes off the gloves. “OK, fat boy,” she says. “We’re done.”

Freddy collects himself and sits down. His back is still burning; he tries a few times to touch it.

“There’s nothing to see,” says the prostitute and takes a sip from a beer can. “Not a scratch, you fat pig! You’d have to pay me more to turn your back into a bloody steak. You can take a shower over there and arrivederci!” The whore points at the door to the bathroom. “You’re not the only one. I’ve got more perverse swine like you waiting.”

Freddy gets up and, the condom still on his member, goes to the bathroom. He is still shaking.

When he returns, he begins to dress. He watches the whore disinfect the used torture instruments with eau-de-cologne.

“Excuse me,” he dares to ask, buttoning up his shirt. “Didn’t you live in Nová Ves once?”

The torturer looks at him. Her morbidly painted face shows no change of expression. “So?” she asks.

“Well, you remind me of someone I knew when I was a child,” says Freddy. “Sida Tešadíková.”

The prostitute is startled. “It’s me,” she says.

Freddy stares at her. He doesn’t know what to say. “And I’m Alfred Mešťánek,” he finally says. He licks his lips and smiles.

“Really?” the torturer reacts. “I seem to remember. You mean that retarded little fat cretin who burned down our secret camp?”

Freddy Piggybank throws up his hands and nods with a sour smile.

“But we got you for that,” says Sida. “Near the station, didn’t we?”

Freddy clears his throat. “Yeah,” he says.

“Who helped you escape then, anyway?” Sida asks, sits down and crosses her legs. I remember we went to untie you in the morning, but you weren’t there any more. We were worried the rats might have bitten you in the night.”

“The knot wasn’t tightened properly,” says Freddy. “I untied myself.”

Even under the demonic make-up Sida visibly smiles at the memory.

“Those were terrific times,” she says. “Afterwards, every time we met you stared at me like an idiot. You probably wanted to screw me, didn’t you? Maybe you even wanked, didn’t you? But I was never into sex much. I lost my virginity at university. Want a Budweiser?”

The torturer takes a can and throws it to Freddy.

“And what about you?” Piggybank asks, gratefully opens the can and takes a sip. “How did you get here?”

“Well, how…” Sida shrugs. “I was teaching, and when…”

“You’re a teacher?” Piggybank stares at her.

“I used to be,” says Tešadíková. “I taught primary school Russian and civics. I’d hardly begun and suddenly came that revolution of theirs. And after the revolution those democratic swine just kicked me out of the school. So what was I supposed to do? I didn’t know anything else… For a while I worked at a massage parlour, but they wanted me to have sex with the customers. And I don’t want to do that, if I don’t feel like it.”

“And normally?” Freddy asks. “Are you married?”

“No,” Sida says. “You know, I’m not much into men…”

Freddy fidgets: he’s never seen a real live lesbian, only in dirty magazines.

“Are you a lesbian?” he asks.

“No,” says Sida and gets up. “Oh well,” she sighs. “I’ve still got work to do, if you don’t mind,” she says, apologizing.

Freddy gets up, too. He has another erection. Sida notices. She touches his trousers with her satin glove.

“You’ll come back again, won’t you?” she asks in a friendly way. “Always ask for me,” she advises him. “They call me Teacher, here. I’ll beat the shit out of you,” she adds, smiling encouragingly. “It was great to chat with someone from Nová Ves. I haven’t been back since I don’t know when.”