The Attic

“Come on! Last one in the house sucks pond slime!” Keri smacked the back of Todd’s bathing suit and dashed for the back door of the cabin.

“Oh, you’re going to pay for that one!” Todd chuckled and took off after her. He tiptoe-jogged across the sharp gravel of the driveway in his barefeet. “Damn!” he thought “I should have brought thongs like Keri”.

Watching her long gorgeous legs race across the lawn, he realized he probably wasn’t going to catch her before the house. They were both still a little damp from their plunge into the lake, she in her cute little peach bikini, him in his blue swimming trunks. Charging after her, he took the steps up to the porch three at a time, finally catching her as they raced through the French doors on the back of the house and tackling her down onto the living room couch.

“Gotcha!” he hissed, grinning down at her luscious form pinned on the couch beneath him.

“Oh no! I’ve been captured! Whatever shall I do?” she cooed up at him with a merry twinkle in her eye. “Help! Oh please, help!” she cried out melodramatically.

“Yes my pretty, you are my prisoner. And now… it’s tickling time!” Holding both her hands together above Keri’s head, Todd began playfully darting his hands across her exposed ribs.

“Todd! No! Oh you bastard! Stop it! Oh you big colossal goof!” she shrieked, desperately trying to protect herself and laughing until tears came out of her eyes. “Oh you…oh….oh? Oh….”

Somehow amidst all the tickling, her lips had found his and they began kissing, gently at first, then faster and harder. Her hands slipped out of his grip and found their way behind his neck, hugging him and pulling him closer. His lips continued to explore hers, then made their way downward, brushing against her neck, her shoulders, her breasts.

They kissed for some time, then lay peacefully together in each other’s arms, nestled together on the big old couch. Suddenly Todd looked up.

“Shit! What time are your parents coming home?”

“Relax. We’ve got at least another half hour.”

“I don’t know why your dad gets so protective. I mean, you’re twenty-one years old now. You’re not Daddy’s little girl anymore”

“I think I’ll always be a little girl in his eyes.”

“Well, he scares me is all, when he gets going. I don’t want him to find me here”

Keri reached up and put her hands on either side of Todd’s face. Gently, she turned his face towards hers until their eyes were looking directly into each others. “Hey. It’s okay. We’ve got time. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

She jumped up from the couch. “Come here. I want to show you something”.

He followed her upstairs to the corridor, which led outside the bedrooms in the cabin. “Oh my God” Todd thought, “She’s taking me to her bedroom!” Keri stopped in the middle of the hallway, though, and fetched a little wooden pole that was leaning against an old bookcase in the hallway.

“I discovered this the other day when my folks were out and you were out power boating.” She reached up and looped a small hook on the end of the pole through a hoop in the ceiling where Todd could make out the outline of a trap door.

“These old cabin’s were built back in the twenties. There’s stuff up here that goes back to my great grandfather.” She pulled open the trapdoor and unfolded a wooden staircase, leading up.

“Come on, it’s pretty cool up here”. Keri climbed up the stairs, giving Todd a great view of her gorgeous backside.

Being careful of splinters on his bare feet, Todd gingerly followed her up. A dusty beam of light came through a small round window at the end of the attic. Todd could see an old dressmakers dummy, old clothes hung on hooks from the roof beams. In the corner were old rolled up posters, and one large framed one advertising “Hugo the Magnificent”. On an old table Todd saw a gallon jar filled with old keys of all descriptions. Lying around the floor of the attic were old suitcases, footlockers, and a huge dusty old steamer trunk. It was a real classic, with domed roof, wooden slats to reinforce the exterior and iron brackets on all the corners. Oval shaped openings had been cut into both ends to form handholds to make it easier to carry. An old iron padlock as big as Todd’s fist hung open from the hasp on the front of the trunk and labels on the side proclaimed all the places it had been: “Rome”, “Paris” “Topeka”, “Niagara Falls”…

“Wow,” Todd said, picking up the big jar of keys. “What is all this stuff?”

“My great granddad was a magician and escape artist. I think those were some of the keys he used in his act, although my grandma says he was a bit of a packrat and just collected them for the sake of having them. I’m sure most of them don’t open anything. Here, check this out!”

Removing the padlock, she lifted the lid on the big trunk. Todd was surprised to see it was half empty. In the bottom were old tuxedos, oriental wizard robes, silk scarves - all the tools of a vaudeville magician, including…

“How about this?” Keri giggled, holding up what looked like a big canvas shirt. It took Todd a moment to realize what it was.

“Is that a…strait jacket?”

“Yep. I told you Gramps was an escape artist. Not a very good one, apparently. He never made much money. Even his name was fake. ‘Hugo’. His real name was ‘Myron’ but I guess that didn’t look very good on the marquee.”

“I saw a show on the Discovery channel once where they showed how people get out of those things.” Todd mused, reaching out to feel the stiff canvas. 

“Really? Care to give it a try?” That evil sparkle was back in Keri’s eye.

“Whoa. I don’t know about that…” Todd stammered.

“What’s the matter? Are you chicken? Or…” she whispered, leaning down until her lips were just brushing his ears “…don’t you trust me?”

With a gulp Todd looked in her eyes and gave in “Okay.”

“Here, hold your arms out in front of you.” Deftly, she pulled the jacket over his arms, then slipped behind him to begin buckling the straps that went up the back. Todd could feel the cool, stiff canvas pressing in to his bare chest.

“Got to make sure these are nice and snug!” Keri grunted, pulling the straps as tight as they would go and buckling them securely. “Don’t want to make this too easy for you.”

“Wow! That’s really tight Keri.”

“Oh don’t worry,” she leaned her lips close to his ear again, “Your fun is just beginning”. Stepping back she crossed his arms in front of him and slipped them a loop on the front of the jacket. “You see, a lot of the early escape artists got out of these by pulling their arms over their heads so the jacket makers got smart and started putting these loops on.” She slipped behind him again and pulled the strap at the end of the sleeves, again buckling it as tight as it would go. “The final step is to keep you from pulling it off over your head, that’s what this one is for.” Slipping her hand between his legs, she grasped the crotch strap and bucked it securely.

Stepping back, Keri admired her handiwork. Todd’s arms were crossed tightly in front of him, strapped securely and tightly into the jacket. Todd began tugging experimentally at the jacket but he could see that Keri had done an expert job of strapping him in.

“Still something missing,” she mused, smiling up at him. Reaching into the trunk, she pulled out one of the silk scarves and softly brought it up to his face, stroking his cheek with it. Slipping behind him once more, Keri rolled up the scarf and tied it snugly across Todd’s eyes. “There. Just a little bit harder when you can’t see.”

Todd was a little scared but also very excited. He was amazed how much more vulnerable he felt with his vision taken away. Again, he felt Keri’s soft lips by his ears.

“It makes me so hot seeing you all bundled up like that. You’re my little prisoner now Todd. You’re not going anywhere until I say so.” She nipped playfully at his earlobe, then kissed him on the nose.

“I think we have to do just one more thing to make this escape authentic.”

Keri put her hands on Todd’s shoulders and began gently spinning him around.

“You see, one of the problems that Gramps had was that vaudeville audiences tired quickly of the simple straitjacket escape. They needed bigger thrills, like someone who could escape from a straitjacket while, say, locked in a trunk!” By this point she had steered Todd into position so that the backs of his knees were pressed against the end of the trunk. A quick push on his chest and he fell backward onto the robes and costumes that lined the trunk.

“Luckily there’s lots of room in there for you.”

“Keri! Wait…!”

Keri grabbed Todd’s legs that were still sticking up and tucked them into his chest, using the trunk lid for leverage as she forced them down. Reaching onto the front of the chest, she flicked up the two latches, sealing the lid in place.

“Don’t worry handsome,” she cooed down to the opening at the end of the trunk, “I’m not actually going to lock you up. It would take me forever to find the right key in that big jar. The latches should be enough to keep you in place until I want to let you out.”

“Keri…”

“Shhhh… My folks will be home soon. You don’t want them to find you, do you?”

Keri lay on top of the trunk, tracing little patterns on the canvas-covered wood beneath her. She could hear gentle rustlings as Todd struggled to get comfortable in his prison. “I like having you as my little prisoner. You’re making me very… excited,” she whispered down at the wood.

Suddenly a new voice cut through the stillness of the attic. “Keri! What are you doing up here!” Keri’s mother came up the attic stairs.

“Mom! I didn’t here you guys come in!”

“Well, the Peterson’s wanted to borrow our pickup truck and it seemed like such a nice night that we thought we’d just walk back around the lake after the barbecue. Now young lady- What are you doing here?!”

“Nothing Mom. I was just looking at some of Gramp’s old things.”

“I’ve told you not to muck around with his things. We might want to sell them to an antique dealer some day and we won’t be able to do that if you’ve had your grubby hands all over them. Now get off that trunk!”

“But Mom…”

“But nothing! You keep saying you want to be treated like an adult well it’s time you started acting like one.” Keri’s mom suddenly spied the padlock lying in the dust of the attic floor. “You opened Great Granddad’s trunk! Didn’t you? Well, I know how to keep that from happening again.”

From inside the trunk Todd heard the clip clop of Keri’s mother’s high-heeled shoes as she walked over to the trunk. Time seemed to slow down. He heard a soft rustle as she knelt down, smoothing her skirt automatically on the way down; the swoop of her nylons rubbing against each other. He heard a metallic scrape as she plucked the padlock off the ground, a crack-ker-clack as she closed the hasp and fed the padlock through. Time slowed even further. CLLAAACCCKKK----KERRR---SNAPPP! With a dull echo she snapped the lock closed and let it fall against the side of the trunk.

“Now Young Lady! It’s time for you to go to bed! Come with me.” The shoop of nylons, the clip clop across the floor then down the attic stairs.

“Todd, I’m really sorry. I’ll try to come up after my folks are asleep and find a way to let you out. I have to go. I’m so sorry.” she whispered.

“Keri…”

Then the flop flop flop of her thongs crossing the floor, down the stairs. The cur-rrreaak of the stairs being folded up and locked into place.

Wriggling around in the jacket, which kept his arms pinned tightly to his sleeves, Todd tried kicking feebly at the thick lid above him. It didn’t even budge.

It was going to be a long night…
 
 

05.09.03