In The Dark
written by:
Naughty Miranda

I was expecting it this time, but I still caught my breath, suppressing the gasp that drove up from my gut and fighting, too, to control the instinctive jump as fingers stroked roughly up my thigh in the darkness. Three times, three tunnels, and each time we emerged back into the daylight, the tableau was the same; two strangers seated at opposite ends of the compartment, heads still bent towards the books they'd brought to while away the journey. But when the lights went out, that was a different story.

I knew this route well and I swear, it has to be one of the most breathtakingly curious railroads imaginable. Picture seventy miles and two hours that wind through some of the loveliest mountain scenery in America, and then black half of it out with so many tunnels that it could almost pass for a subway system. Particularly on those occasions, like today, when nobody has bothered to replace the blown lightbulbs that would normally bring at least a modicum of lighting to the interior of the carriage.

So we plunged from dazzling day to stygian darkness, back and forth, bright and black, until the effect became borderline stroboscopic, and the rattle of the train became the soundtrack to some vast experimental art rock conceit.

One that was growing increasingly tactile as the journey continued.

The first time it happened, I blamed my imagination for the whisper of pressure that traced the hem of my (admittedly very short) skirt, the ghost of a breeze or the gossamer touch of a curious insect. My hand reached down to brush the skin and I turned my head slightly to gaze out of the window in that way that people always do on trains, as they wait for the tunnel to end. I'd already forgotten the touch.

The second time, the sensation lingered longer, strayed a little higher, and there was a definite deliberation to it, as though a pair of fingers were dancing on the very edge of my thigh, and I was just too surprised to slap or say "hey." So I waited in the darkness till we emerged back into sunlight and I glanced across at my traveling companion, the lone man who had boarded the same carriage with me. He did not move a muscle. My imagination again, then.

The third time there was no mistake. A soft scrape up my inner thigh, a pause and then an almost reluctant retreat as we approached the tunnel's end, and I say "almost" because I found myself regretting it, even as I seethed with deep-seated outrage. How dare he do this, how dare he touch me, and when the light returned to the carriage, my eyes were already fixed on the emergency brake handle that hung above the empty seat opposite. "Once more," my fury whispered within, "do that once more and the whole train will find out." But then I glanced over and he remained seated stock still, legs stretched out across the carriage floor, face tilted down towards his book, and when I measured the distance between him and me, there was no way that anyone could move that fast.

But I was ready, I was waiting, and I was not going to say a word.

I said I know this route well, although it's a few years since I last rode it; since I uprooted myself from my end-of-the-line hometown community college to study art on the East Coast. And I knew it because, back then, this was the only reliable way out of town once the snows started in October, once the passes became impassable and even the gritters and plows were tucked up until the thaw.

The railroad always ran, though, carving through the drifts with plows the size of houses, and only ever pausing while a work crew cleared the occasional avalanche. Once or twice a year, when the temperatures really dipped deep enough, you'd hear about an engine becoming becalmed because its fuel had literally frozen in the pipes, but another one would drag it out, emerging from the sidings that were carved out of the mountain's guts when this entire country was still wearing diapers. Normal service would be resumed before you knew it.

That was then. These days, the train runs for the benefit of tourists and enthusiasts alone, and never during the winter months. But the very prospect of a visit back to the town where I was born (elderly relatives, old friends, the usual) had filled me with nostalgias that I'd not expected to feel, and a trip on the train was the best way to start.

I wondered what my companion's reasons were? From the clothes he was wearing, I doubted he was a trainspotter, and from his apparent familiarity with the route itself, knowing when every tunnel was approaching, it was unlikely that he was a tourist, either. Although, who knows? He was probably wondering the same about me.

The tunnels vary in length. Some appear to stretch on forever, although we'd not come to any of those yet. Others feel almost unnecessary, as if the original engineer simply couldn't resist boring his tracks through every rock that he came to, even though it would have been quicker and easier to dynamite them all out of sight. Conservationists praise him now, pointing to the line as a supreme example of man working with nature, as opposed to simply blasting it into history. And I praised him too, because we'd flashed through three or four of those baby blacknesses now, and I didn't feel that touch. Another indication that my companion knew the line, another clue as to who he might be.

A railroad employee, maybe. Without appearing (I hoped) to be staring, I snuck another look over at him. I'd put him around my age, so sort-of-somewhere mid-thirties. His hair peeked dark from beneath his hat, his boots were clean though they'd not been cleaned. He might be wearing a tie. Hard to tell; his chin kept his neckline in shadow. But he didn't appear too shabby, and he certainly didn't look the type who you'd expect to find groping strange women on a Rocky Mountain train ride. Oh, and other thing. I'd swear he was sitting a little bit closer than the last time I looked, as though every time we went through a tunnel, he'd inch himself just a little bit closer.

A knuckle grazed my panties, grazed my pussy through the cloth, and I fought back the yelp by biting down on my lip. Lost in thought, I'd lost my bearings, and the next tunnel had crept up even stealthier than he did. I cursed myself quietly; I'd resolved not to make a sound, and so far I'd more or less kept that up. But I'd also resolved not to move, yet my legs had still parted as his hand slipped between them, welcoming, maybe; curious, yes. I wanted to know how far this would go. I wanted to know how far I could go.

The knuckle lingered, light enough that I could almost shut my mind to its presence, firm enough that it would be able to feel the wetness and warmth that was embracing my pussy. I held my breath, not trusting myself to exhale as I waited to see what he would do next, and I was concentrating so hard on one thing that I didn't even notice something else. That his hand had moved away, he had moved away, and we were back into daylight with me sat there frozen, a tooth still pinning my bottom lip down and my legs still parted wide.

And he was maybe a little bit closer.

I wondered if I should speak? Nothing incriminating, nothing accusing, just a few friendly words to pass away the time. But I couldn't trust my voice to stay steady, and didn't believe I could keep my words light. Besides, I didn't want to break the spell, that heart stopping moment when the hunter sights prey, because I hadn't yet decided who was who.

I looked out of the window at the landscape flashing by, placing it on the map that my memory sketched out. One of the big ones was coming up, one of the tunnels that drove straight through a peak, with a halt in the middle for the maintenance crews. A boyfriend and I once got off the train there, intending to explore the heart of the mountain. We wound up scaring ourselves silly with every ghost story that we'd ever heard, and didn't move from the platform until the next train arrived, eight long, cold and miserable hours later.

At least, that is what we told our parents when they asked us where we'd been all day, because neither of us dared to discuss what had really happened. How we'd found ourselves in a back room hewn from the living rock, with a light and a table and a couple of camp beds, a fridge with some beer, Cheese-Whiz and some nachos, a Stephen King novel and some old dog-eared porn. It was where the maintenance guys went to relax between shifts, but there was no-one around now and so what if there was? We weren't doing anything wrong.

I shifted in my seat, just enough to send a brief thrill of excitement bulleting into my abdomen, just enough to be ready for my companion's next assault. That was the day I learned the strength there is in silence, in guiding my lover with inaction, not words, making him work for the pleasure of bringing me joy, while I thumbed through the porno and refused to bat an eyelid. Not even when I orgasmed.

And the point of that story is, now we'd see how good my companion really was. I knew about that little halt, so brightly lit up in the heart of the darkness. But did he?

We were rounding the curve now that led into the tunnel and I braced myself. A knuckle last time; a finger this? I swallowed hard as my heart started to race, tensed as my pussy began pulsing expectantly, greasing the lips that would part in welcome.

I wanted him to touch me, to part me, to enter me. I wanted to feel his finger inside me while I sat immobile, frozen as my libido danced on the edge of triumph and lust, yet pinned into place by the sheer weight of his need. He wanted me and he was taking me, and without a word, a gesture, or any sign that I even knew he existed, I was letting him.

Nothing.

I sat, he sat. I bit down on my lip again, shocking myself at the absurdity of my shock and yes, a disappointment, one that bled into a flash of anger that pierced even more sharply than the rage that had greeted his overtures.

Who does he think he is?

And then it was gone and I was blinking as the train slowed into the light of the halt, my nerve ends relaxing as we stopped for a moment, and I allowed myself to breathe again as we lurched back into motion.

Breathe and relax.

He pinched. He pinched my clit. Through panties so moist they might as well have dissolved, thumb and forefinger were roughly gripping then twisting, and I buried my face in the arm that sprang instinctively out, holding it back with teeth in my wrist as I fought against the cry, fought against the struggle, forced myself to relax again. To ignore the pain that only hurt because there was no other word for the sensations that tore me. Uncomplaining and silent while he did what he wished, because that was what I wished as well. That was what I needed.

Daylight. I didn't require a mirror to tell me I was flushed, I could see my eyes wide in my reflection in the window. And him? Head still bowed, legs still stretched, he might have been sleeping if someone had glanced in to look at us. Sleeping while a mad woman sat wide eyed and sweating maybe three feet away.

My mind flashed back to film class at school. An old, old short, an Edison I think. A lady and her maid in a railway compartment, a gent sitting opposite, watching as they talked. Flashing through tunnels like we were. The difference was, every time they emerged back into the light, the tableau had shifted, the man growing bolder, the women growing wilder. And it ended with the gent in a clinch with the maid, while the lady simply went about her business.

Or is that what I wished had happened? Is that what I wanted to be happening now?

No. It was better this way. It was always better this way. A man will work harder to make you happy if you take his best shot and just wait for more. It makes him feel more like a man because you feel more like a lady, dignified and disdainful, daring him to do something, and this time, make it count. Come on, sonny, shatter my reserve.

So I would remain the lady, outwardly calm, aloof and unconcerned, and keeping her feelings locked so deep inside her because that was the encouragement that her companion really sought, a sense of dominion, of power and strength, and not even a fleeting flicker of realization that maybe he didn't have the control that he thought. That this was my game now, and my rules that he was playing by. He would do the running, and he would run where I told him to.

Now he was inside me, his hand stretching my pantie leg to the side and a finger as deep in my tunnel as the train was buried in it's. Film class again; I'd always hated that analogy, wrote it off as lazy and corny, and I didn't like the space rockets or waterfalls either. Now the image haunted me because what better one was there? Deliberate strength and irresistible motion. His finger felt endless as my pussy spread to welcome it, and when a second one joined it, I did not even flinch.

Deep and deeper, my folds unfurling as my wet flesh sucked at the harsh intruder, and his finger was fucking me now, smooth rhythmic motions that filled me to bursting while my body begged silently for more.

His thumb was on my clitoris and every nerve in my body flocked to the spot, each one jostling for the jolt of exquisite pressure that was pushing me towards the edge of paralysis. But only the edge. He knew what he was doing, teasing and tweezing, and convulsing me with shivers that I refused to acknowledge with even a gasp.

Would this tunnel never end?

He'd found a rhythm and it was driving me wild, a jackhammer pounding that didn't waver, just drove in and out, full steam ahead, and my flesh was ablaze and my nerve ends were singing, a blur of movement that was blurring my senses, and an onrush of sensation that left me soaring and falling and it doesn't matter how many times I've been fucked to a climax, getting there has never, ever felt like this.

My fists clenched, nails in my palms. How easy it would be to simply throw my body backwards, my legs parting wide, my hips bucking furious, screaming for him to fuck me harder. But I stayed in my seat, stayed motionless and calm even as my body continued to tear itself apart from the inside.

Then it stopped. Then he stopped. We were out of the tunnel, he was back in his seat, and if his nostrils caught the scent of pussy that clung so thick to the air around us, they neither flared nor twitched in recognition.

I'll give him this. He's good.

But I'm better.

I needed to calm down. Trusting the noise of the train to drown the sound, I took a deep breath, holding the air in my lungs for the count of five, then gently exhaling. Again, but this time ten seconds. And again, until I was holding it for thirty and my heart rate had gone back to something like normal.

I shifted in the seat and felt it sodden beneath me. My book had slipped off my lap and lay on the seat beside me. I picked it up and leafed through, searching for my place. I had no intention of reading, and I couldn't if I'd tried. I wasn't even sure if I remembered where I'd got to in the story. For at least half of this journey, though my eyes had followed the words, I doubted I'd absorbed more than one in ten. But I had to do something to prove that I was still in control, and with my pussy screaming cheated of the prize that had swum so agonizingly close, I stared down at the page.

Minutes passed. I glanced at my watch. Barring any delays between now and town, we would be there in about half an hour; thirty minutes which I measured in terms of a long uphill incline as we followed the river, and just two more tunnels, both of them long enough for... the thought trailed off, like an author over-using the ellipses.

Like I said before, blown bulbs weren't exactly unexpected on this line. In fact, it had once been something of a standing joke, even among the railroad staff. Growing up, I lost count of the number of make-out stories I heard from my friends, all of which happened on the train. Including a few of my own.

I smiled at memories that I'd not indulged for so long, remembered how every twist in the track flashed its own secret signal, a bit like the notebooks we girls would pass between us, detailing the exact cost in compliments, gifts, meals and movies of every conceivable thing a boyfriend might ask for. A burger at the diner earned one hand on your breast, and those buildings on the rocks over there; after ninety minutes of him kissing and pawing like an octopus, that was when you'd reward him with a hand that slipped downstairs.

Because, in the same amount of time as it took to unbutton his Levis, the tunnel would swallow the train, and by the time it spit it out again - well, like I said, I hate railroad-as-a-metaphor-for-sex analogies, no matter how appropriate they may be. Then another ten minutes to tidy yourselves up, and you'd be stepping out onto the platform as bright-eyed, bushy tailed and very freshly fucked.

I wondered if my companion's friends had ever read the same notebook?

Resting my head on the rattling window, I could see the tunnel entrance approaching. In my mind I began counting down the seconds, surprised how readily the old habit came back to me, and not at all surprised as my mind framed "zero" to feel rough hands grasping my wrists, pinning them against the coarse seat-back behind me. A mouth was on mine, hard and unyielding, forcing my lips to open around it as a lithe tongue slipped inside, liquid and serpentine, tasting of hunger and heat and tobacco.

I kissed back, my teeth grazing him, and my arms were wrenched upwards, held above my head as my wrists were transferred to the grip of one hand. The other stroked down my cheek, neck and breast, pinching nipples with a passion that I fought to ignore, but there was no hiding their hardness or their eager response.

His hand returned between my legs, pulling at my panties now and dragging them down. I raised my ass slightly, and felt the fabric slip away, binding my legs as it was pulled to my knees, before fingers fought roughly to reopen my thighs, spreading me wide as he grasped my wrists tighter. I gasped, but my sudden shock was devoured by his unending kiss, and his body moved closer, one foot forcing my panties to the ground and his legs parting mine as his fingers continued to thrust. The carriage had been dark before, now it was black as his body loomed over me, and I felt his presence overshadowing me, tall and greedy, brutal and hard.

He broke the kiss but his hand was still pounding, and then that stopped as well as he straightened himself, and I sensed his fingers moving to the buttons of his trousers, flicking them open as he reached in for his cock. I could feel its warmth as it sprang out from its cage, riding that sudden breath of musky sweat that sent a fresh spasm of want through my screaming wide cunt.

We hung there unmoving or moments like minutes. Occasionally as the train jarred and jolted, there would be a tantalizing touch of heat on my cheek, and my mind conjured images of that one eye staring wide, a trace of seeping pre-cum stretched from my skin to his.

He was jerking himself slowly, deliberately, softly, hardening himself for whatever the next scene in the play, and my arms were beginning to ache, still gripped in a fist that encircled both easily. I took a breath and inhaled his scent again, thick with desire and excitement and want. Masculinity. That's what romance writers mean when they use that word; the smell of a man, every one unique, but unmistakable too. The smell of the taste of the need of the hunger, and my mouth was watering as wet as my pussy, and still we were frozen, still life with desire, a moment that lasted for as long as a photograph, permanently fixed in the endless darkness.

My heart rose to my mouth, and my body took control, feeding from the images as they clattered through my mind. I felt myself soaring towards the precipice again. But was I really soaring? Or was I being borne, snatched up and carried there by the strength of his will, by his relentless drive, by his need to possess, by the ease with which his very presence grasped my emotions, my responses, my body?

Because that is what this was all about, a battle of wills, a trial of strength. In love as in life, and especially in the darkness of a railroad tunnel with a stranger about to fuck your throat, you are either going to take what you want, or you will accept what you're given.

Right now, he thinks that he is on top.

Right now, he thinks he can take what he wants.

Right now, he thinks that he controls the night.

But I'm the one who grew up with these trains, and I'm the one who remembers the day when they installed the over-seat lighting. And if he raises my wrists just a little bit more, as he will have to when he takes that final step forward, as his cock comes in reach of my greedy, grasping lips, my knuckles will be pressed against the dollar-sized on-switch that is set into the wall.

And as I fold my mouth around his hardness, and he startles blindly into bright, unexpected light, well then we will see who is left in the dark.