I was in NYC for the Pride Weekend. It wasn’t by design, but having never attended a Pride Parade or event, thought I would join in the fun and spectacle.
I loved being at the parade. I just cried. To see so many trans people in particular all together, in one place, being out and proud, was really beautiful for me. I wore the most feminine and most vulnerable thing I have yet to wear in public, a strappy top what was loose and blousy and light.
The night before I had attended my first ever fetish party, Torture Garden. What an event! It was fab. I went on my own, but in the end, had no problems meeting people.
I had been once a long time ago to a fetish evening in a London Dungeon, and it was a very different experience. I took a date, and she and I were just at the early exploratory stages of one another. The event was creepy. I felt really uncomfortable and bad for having brought her to the place. It was sordid and dirty, and very male energy, and we left within 10 minutes, but I felt completely slimed by the experience…and that put me off going to such events forever.
It isn’t that London doesn’t have an amazing scene, and I often looked at the fliers put out by Miss Kim Rub, who I wrote about recently. As a club night impresario, she surely hosted more female friendly and safer, less intimidating parties. I shall have to ask her.
Torture Garden is a reputable, kink-friendly, safe space for women and people like me and any others. They are thorough about touch and appropriate behaviour, and I didn’t feel uncomfortable for a single second.
They operate a very strict dress code policy—a kind of Hollywood glam meets fetish, and I had absolutely nothing in my wardrobe that suited. The only bits of latex that I have ever bought had long since fused together and ended up in the trash from age, poor care, and lack of use. I decided to pop round to a popular fetish store in New York.
One of the saleswomen asked if she could help, and I said I was going to the Torture Garden party and I had no idea what to wear, and if she could help me find something. Okay, I did walk in wearing a linen skirt and blouse, but they were quite conservative, kind of “mommy” energy more than anything else. She didn’t skip a beat.
She took me straight to the corsets. “I think you would look good in a corset,” she said, holding one up covered with buckles, “you’ve definitely got the body for it.” It had shoulder straps and was full length. Black leather.
“I love corsets,” I gushed.
“Good,” she said, “and what were you thinking for bottoms, a skirt or hot pants?” She asked holding up a pair of leather hot pants.
“Oh boy,” I said, “I think a skirt please. That’s too sexy. And plus, I don’t want to be confronted with any lumpy bits.”
“You could put a tight fitting pair of rubber panties on underneath…or maybe tuck.”
“It’s too sexy.”
“You sure?” she said wiggling them in the air, smiling, and then putting them back. “How about something like this?” She held up a leather skirt with straps and buckles. “Or this?” She asked holding up another.
“They both look great.”
“Okay, let’s try them on.”
In the event, the corset was too small, so she got another, and it fit perfectly. She helped me put it on, and as she laced it up, I felt myself drift into space. You know what I mean. That pull, that tightening, and how deliberate and drawn out it felt. Wow.”
“It looks great on you,” she said.
“Yes,” I agreed, looking this way and that at my reflection in the mirror. “It does. Like it was made for me. Oh gosh, I love it.”
“I can see why.”
“I guess I should see how it looks with a skirt.”
I tried on the two small black leather skirts, one with built-in garters and straps, the other plain. I decided to get them both.
“Which one do you think I should wear tomorrow night?”
“They both look great,” she said. “Maybe this one,” she said indicating the one with the garters. “Will you wear stockings?”
“Maybe fishnets would look good, the ones with the big holes.” Just then the owner, a man, came by.
“All good?” he asked.
“Just getting some stockings,” she said.
“You’ll need XL for the height,” he offered before moving on.
“Are you on Fetlife?” she asked when she came back.
“No, but I should be.”
“Yeah, it’s a great way to find people and parties.”
“I don’t know how I’m going to get into this thing tomorrow,” I said, “I can’t reach the laces on my own.”
“You can come back before we close tomorrow, I can tie you in.”
“Oh that would be great,” I said, “and then I can check out the boots too.” I had run out of time. And anyway, I really liked that idea with the heat wave, to be able to get dressed and then go back and chill in my hotel before the party. So that’s what I did.
I didn’t find any boots to my liking—knee high patent leather isn’t my thing—and I don’t need platform heels. But there was a rather flamboyant “drag star” downstairs doing a comic monologue, and there was an extraordinarily attractive women trying on some insane boots that came up to her thighs. She was admiring herself in the mirror but also hesitating on whether to get them.
“They look fabulous,” I noted and she barely registered my existence. How appropriate. A dominatrix might never acknowledge the existence of a slave. About 20 minutes later, however, when she saw me dressed in a way that implied “sisterhood”, both professional and sympathetic, she gave me the most enormous smile…and I nodded back in appreciation. Imagine my heart in such a flutter when 30 minutes later while I was chatting with the concierge back at the hotel, the same dominatrix sashayed in with all of her shopping. Never one to believe that things like this don’t happen for a reason, I vowed to see if I might find her and play with her one day. And well, that is another story altogether.
Reflections on all of this
I once told a certain someone, a cherished dominatrix, that if I had been born a girl as I have always wished, that I would aspire to be a sex worker and a dominatrix, two of the most empowered and empowering choices a woman can make. I meant it. She may have thought I was just an ass-kisser. But as I considered my reflection in the mirror before heading out that evening, it was uncanny that the shop assistant had dressed me as a dominatrix without ever discussing such with me.
That felt really good. For her to see no sissy, no bimbo, no anything other than to channel my expression of femininity into something empowered and empowering just felt great. As I strode off to the party that night, I was charged with a confidence and swagger that put electricity into my feet…and later, dancing with some people I met, I felt really happy to be surrounded by so many wonderfully eccentric people just letting it all hang out and having a good time.
Beyond Non-Binary 
3 thoughts