I see Red

I come home from visiting family on a cold December night. I turn on the computer and sign onto Yahoo and go into the chat rooms. I post a message: “Young guy looking to try new things” After a few minutes a guy messages me and asks if I had ever been tied up. No, I reply, but I would try anything once. We agree to meet. He arrives in a red four-door sedan and parks near the light post out front of my house at midnight. A man steps out with a duffel bag and walks towards me.

“Hi. I’m John,” he says. He is 34 years of age, 6’3, weighs around 180, has brown hair and is clean shaven. I greet him and invite him in. His skin is a darker complexion and he has an almost mischievous smile. He is wearing a red Nautica cap, a white hooded sweatshirt and a red long-sleeved shirt underneath. He has red jogging pants on with white socks and hiking shoes that have a red stripe near the base.

We sit on the couch smoking a joint while watching Comedy Central. “Where is the bathroom,” he asks.

“Pass the stove, light is on the side behind the door,” I reply.

He goes to the bathroom and closes the door. After five minutes he comes out and sits back on the couch. There is silence as the comedians tell their jokes.

“Wanna go in the other room?” he asks.

“Sure,” I respond.

He gets up and starts to walk towards my bedroom. As I walk into my room I flip the switch on my stereo to the local rock alternative station. The lava lamps give a warm orange glow as they reflect off the wall in my room.

“Good, I was going to ask if you had music,” he says.

I sit at the end of the bed as he opens his bag and starts pulling out red rope and bandannas, placing them on the table next to the computer.

“Stand here and put your hands behind your back.”

I do so, excited to try out this new challenge.

“Where is your camera?”

I point to the digital camera on the table.

He takes some rope and slides it around my wrists and proceeds to tie them together. I spread my them out as he secures them to give me some extra room. I feel my shoulders bend back and he makes sure my palms are securely closed as he finishes with the first rope. I see him take a longer rope. He starts intertwining it around my arms making the bond of restraint stronger and stronger. As he loops the rope between my palms, I place my thumb in between, to move a little bit if I feel the need to untie myself.

He takes a bandanna and wraps it over the top of my head, tying it like one would wear at the beach. I see him grab another one, placing it over my eyes, and tie the back securely to prohibit me from seeing. My heart beats faster. I can hear him now in the background, moving. My mind begins to wander as my anxiety peaks. I am not able to see what he is doing, and it starts to frighten me, but I let him continue.

He ties my chest and my arms tighter. “Good Boy,” he says as he gropes me with his hands. He then goes to the back of me and comes in closer and I can feel him breath on me. I hear him flattening another bandanna. My body temperature starts to rise from the heat, building up inside my clothing from being tightly bound. He puts a bandanna with a knot in the middle in my mouth and ties it.

“No,” I say from behind the knotted cloth as I spit it out of my mouth. “Can we stop? I am starting to get too anxious and scared. Can you at least take the one off my eyes?”

“Just relax. You can trust me. Ok, we’ll try a smaller one.” He takes the knotted bandanna off and wipes my lips with something wet and they start to tingle. He offers me a drink. It tastes like Pepsi. He ties a smaller knot and places it in my mouth. I hold the knot with my clenched teeth. I start to think, “What should I do if something happens?” I had his phone number on an index card, saved on the chat session from Yahoo, but would anyone be able to find it?

I begin to grow groggy and sleepy, unable to stand up.



I move from the bumping, like I am in a car driving down a road. I try to stretch only to find that I am enclosed. We stop. I hear a door open. After a few minutes I hear the door open again and an engine starts. Am I am in the trunk of a car??

I am in a cell, beneath the streets. I hear footsteps. The man is gloating about his work. He has been proud of tying up his victims. He has used many methods, from tying a man in fishing line to tying a man up with wire. He is paid $1, 000 for each victim. He has pictures of his victims on the wall, depicting his art and mastery of tying. Beside his wall of photos there is a pile of digital cameras. Each one depicts the tying of victims, from the start, middle and the end result. It has taken years to master the art. I am one of his many victims, all to be auctioned off. This auction is being held under one of the Mill’s canal structures in Lewiston, Maine where Main and Lisbon Street connect through an underground tunnel built years ago.

After this auction, the next will be in Singapore in March. Bids there will pay up to $50,000 for an American tied up. The patrons pay well. They have one thing in common, power. They’ve been upset and want to take out their mental anguish in a physical sense and now they can. The patrons each pay an entrance fee to go to the auction. The patrons buy the merchandise and transport their product to another section of the burned mill. Here they torture, sodomize and kill their victim anyway they feel will extinguish their internal anger. Then they release the remains into the Androscoggin though a pipeline outlet. But there is a hitch. If it becomes daylight, the auction is over . If the victims are not picked up from the auction, they are saved for the next one.

I can see the light coming in through a crack down the hall, or is it a light bulb? I hear the cars zooming overhead. I scream. “Help”. The cars drown my pleas. I hear footsteps from across the way. Clat. Clat. Clat. The footsteps get louder and I hear the cocking of a gun. My heart quickens and my breath becomes heavy and quick. The doorknob turns and the door creeps open.


I wake up. I hear breathing in the background. I try to move, but still find myself bound. I spit out the knotted bandanna. I open my mouth real wide to remove the bandannas and breathe the air.

In the background I hear something click.

“Dude, I gotta go home. I have to work in 4 hours.” He begins untying the bandanna around my mouth and removes the knotted bandanna from around my neck where it had fallen. He offers me a drink. I drink through a straw, tastes like Pepsi; I don’t remember having any straws in the apartment.

“What happened?” I ask.

He unties the bandanna around my eyes and I find myself sitting on the couch in front of the TV. “I gave you some acid, and you passed out on me. So, I carried you into the living room and watched the movie you had in the DVD player. “It is about these three guys who travel Europe staying at different Hostels. On a bus ride they meet a man who says the women in Slovakia are hot. Sex all night. So the travelers went and started popping up missing. The guy from the bus took his victims to be bought and tortured by these rich guys. It just ended. Freaky movie. I couldn’t tell if you were awake or not. You weren’t moving much.”

He unties the looped rope between my palms. I start moving my shoulders and arms as he undoes the final ropes around my upper body. I am now untied, walking very stiff as the blood starts circulation in my numb body. I walk over to the door where he is putting on his shoes and sweatshirt. He looks at me as he opens the door.

“I’ve always wanted to get tied up and stuffed in a sleeping bag all night. I got this friend In Lewiston. He uses body bags. Maybe next time you can tie me up.”

I begin to feel ill and nervous. He picks up his bag. “I left some pictures on your camera. I took some on my own digital camera. I’ll send you a copy,” and out the door he goes.

As I hear the engine start and he drives off, I turn on the camera. There are no pictures. An hour later I get an email from him. He sends a picture of me, all tied up, freaking me out.

I get a message from my friend Terry. He tells me about this experience he had with this guy who was into tying people up. I tell Terry that “I had just met a similar guy who was obsessed with the color red.”

“Hmm. Was this guy named John? I went to his house last Friday in Portland,”

“Let me send you his picture,” I type. In the picture he is standing in the background with a kitchen table in front of him, and all the walls painted red.

Terry types, “He wanted to tie me up. I got nervous after he did my hands and told him, ‘no fucking way‘. The freak wanted me to tie him up and spank him, and leave him in a bag overnight. The house was large, too much red though. I went to the bathroom and everything was red. He needs to watch ‘Queer Eye for the Straight Guy’ and get some lessons. He listens to too much country though. We tripped on acid together. It was great. He asked if I had any friends that are cool, and I told him about you. He said he was getting some more acid in two weeks. Wanna go with me? I can give you his screen name.”

I quickly type, “No. He freaked me out.” as I tell him about my experience.

“lol. You need to stay off the drugs, ‘Mary‘,” Terry says.

I signed off Yahoo.

I go to the fridge and cut a piece of cake. I eat the cake and go into the bathroom. As I take a shower visions of the movie Psycho and other evil themed plots that could have happened flash before me. How can a new experience can be so alive? Was what I experienced induced by the acid and the movie playing in the background? I become anxious and go around the apartment making sure all the windows and doors are locked. I go into my room and am getting ready to climb under the covers when I spot a red bandana on the floor.