During the early summer of 1978, when I was 13, my cousins came up for a two week visit at my house. This year was different in that they stayed longer, and they brought Karen along with them. This wasn't the first time Karen was at my house. She came up with my cousins, and Becca and Jim, to celebrate my 13th birthday a few months before. My parents really took a shine to Karen then--my mother especially got along with Karen very well. But since everybody only came up for the day, we never had the chance to play any tie up games.
Now, however, we had plenty of time.
The Sunday night of the first week, my cousin George (8) and I were tossing and turning in our beds. Neither of us was very sleepy, and we kept hearing the chitter-chatter of the girls, who were across the hall from us. It sounded like they were having a full blown slumber party over there. They were simply having too much fun, and I had to do something about it.
I got out of bed, stared at George, and said, "Wanna kidnap some girls?"
George sat up and eagerly nodded his head. At eight, he lost most of his baby fat and now had the thin and lanky physique of a young man. He also had an annoying habit of doing everything I did--to the point of wearing the same clothes I wore. This habit went as far as our bedclothes, or lack thereof. I liked to sleep only in my undershorts, and so George did the same--despite the fact that his mother packed pajamas for him. When I tried to get him to put his pajamas on, he would just shrug his bare shoulders at me and say, "Why don you put your pjs on?"
"I don't have any, I sleep in my undershorts," I explained.
"So do I," he replied with a small smile. I got the feeling that if I ran around wearing a Bozo the Clown costume, George would have worn his own version. My mother thought this was adorable; I thought it was creepy. But then again, I was only 13 at the time.
I didn't have any rope on hand to bind the girls with, so I had to get that, first. I put my robe on, and looked over in time to see George was also putting on his robe. He fastened the front of his robe--until he saw that I left my robe hanging open, so he quickly unfastened his to match mine.
I shook my head at him. "I'll be right back. You keep an eye on them, ok?"
"Ok," George said, as he gave me the thumbs up sign.
I left my room and ran downstairs to the utility closet in the basement. I collected a bundle of unused clothesline rope and a roll of tape for gagging. My bare feet were silent on the carpeted floors as I shot back upstairs to my bedroom, eager to begin binding Karen and my cousins.
But they weren't there.
All three girls stayed together in the guest bedroom across the hall from my room. However, when I returned, I saw the door to the girls' room was left wide open. I glanced inside, and saw that the place was a mess: the bed and cot was unmade, magazines were scattered all over the floor--it was as if a plague of locus had visited our house, and were moving from room to room.
I went into my room to ask George where the girls had gone. But I quickly saw that this was not possible. The reason this was not possible was because George sat on my bed bound and gagged.
For those of you who are letting out a gasp of shock at this moment, let me make something clear: since George was always considered the baby of the family, he was exempt from being tied up in our games (he never tied anybody, anyway). He always went along as an avid watcher who would pitch in every now and then by untying whoever he felt like helping. But during the winter of 1978, George decided that he wanted to take a more active role in our tie up games. This meant that he would tie up people, in addition to being tied up himself. My oldest cousin Keith, who strictly enforced the non-tying of George under a sentence of death to the offender, lifted his ban, thus freeing George to be tied (which sounds like a contradiction in terms, but you get the idea).
I was well aware of George's decision, but I still wasn't prepared for the sight that greeted me. There sat George, clad only in a robe and his undershorts, with his hands bound behind his back. His bare feet were tied together at the ankles, and he wore a cloth gag that was wrapped around his head. He glanced up at me with this look that was...well, it was adorable, all right? It was a sheepish look in his eyes that said, "Sorry!"
The door swung shut behind me, and Donna (14) and Shirley (12) grabbed my arms and took the rope and tape from me with a big "Thank you!"
Karen (14) came up from behind me, put her head on my right shoulder, and went, "Ticki wicki woo!" I flinched slightly as she tickled my sides, but Donna and Shirley held firmly onto my arms.
"Ticki what?" Shirley asked, as she frowned at Karen.
"Never mind, get him on the floor," Donna ordered. All three girls were barefoot, and clad in extra large T-shirts that came down to their mid-thigh.
I was made to kneel on the floor, where Donna gagged me with a strip of the same tape I was going to use on them. Shirley moved around to pull my arms behind my back, but Karen stopped her.
"Wait, let's make him comfortable," Karen said with a smirk. She grabbed the collar of my robe and pulled it off of me. I was now shirtless and barefoot, clad only in my under-shorts. Both Donna and Shirley went "woooo" and made wolf whistles at me. I saw George behind them writhing madly against his ropes, and wondered if he was now trying to remove his robe, since I had mine taken off.
"Isn't that better?" Karen asked as she bound my hands together at the wrists behind my back. "Now you won't be hot."
I was made to lie face down on the floor, where Donna bound my ankles together. While this occurred, I noticed Karen knelt beside me and placed her hands on my bare back. Karen explained that she did this to prevent me from moving around, to which I heard Donna reply, "Uh, yeah, right...."
My ankles were hog-tied to my wrists, and then George and I were left bound in my bedroom while the girls ran downstairs to raid the fridge. Having wreaked their havoc in my room, this plague of girls now swept down to storm the kitchen.
But I was in a real mess, now. Time was, I could always count on George to untie me on the sly. But here he was, tied up with me! When I glanced up at him, I saw that he was still helplessly wiggling around on the bed. Then, he abruptly stopped struggling against his bonds and stared back at me in a determined manner. George hoisted himself forward...and fell flat on his face on the floor. He landed with a muffled grunt. It must have felt as painful for him as it was for me to witness. After laying on the floor like a sack of potatoes for a minute, George started this frenzied wiggling and writhing across the floor to get to me.
I wished I could have met him halfway, but the hog-tie I was in kept me pretty much in place.
However, before George could be my rescuer, Karen ran into the room and excitedly jumped up and down in front of us. George and I exchanged a strange look, then stared back at Karen, who spun around and waved both of her hands in front of her as if she were playing a bizarre game of charades.
What happened was, the girls' midnight raid of the kitchen was cut short when my mother appeared in the doorway and ordered them back to their beds. Karen wasn't actually in the kitchen with Donna and Shirley when my mom found them. Karen had stopped off to use the bathroom, first. She was descending the steps when she heard my mother reading the riot act to my cousins. Karen ran back upstairs and into my room, where she promptly freaked right in front of George and I.
She untied my hands, just as we heard Donna and Shirley entering their bedroom across the hall. As soon as my hands were free, I removed my gag and pulled Karen close to me. "Turn out the light, now," I whispered in her ear.
I figured that if my mother saw my lights were on, she would come in. She could still very well come in, anyway. But I hoped that by shutting the light off and playing possum, it would increase our chances of not being caught.
I untied George's hands as Karen switched the light off and threw the room into blackness. I knelt back and untied my ankles as I listened to Karen stumbling around in the darkness. Once my legs were free, I got up, grabbed Karen, and pulled her down onto the bed. I kept an arm wrapped around her body, which pinned her arms to her sides, and I handgagged her. Other than a muffled whimper, Karen offered no resistance. And I must admit, that the sensation of holding Karen close to me like this was...nice. She was so soft and cuddly, and she smelled great. Her hair was--
Um, anyway, my mother never came into my room. The two of us huddled together on the bed in the dark for several minutes until we were sure the coast was clear. I could faintly see George on the floor, untying his ankles. I got up, making Karen sit up with me, and turned on the light.
Karen gave me this knowing smile. She looked positively radiant. She went to get to her feet, but I stopped her by grabbing her arm and pulling her back down next to me on the bed. "Where do you think you're going, missy?" I whispered in my best villain's voice. "You've seen too much for us to just let you walk out of here."
I was thrilled to see Karen backing away from me on the bed like a damsel in distress. She kept backing up until she was up against the headboard, where she tucked her bare legs under her and watched me and George with mock fear in her wide brown eyes.
George, who saw that I had no robe on, promptly removed his own robe. Just to bust George, I got up and put my robe on in one sweeping motion. "George," I said, "get the rope."
George let out an annoyed sigh as he put his robe back on, then shot me a look that said, "On or off? Make up your freaking mind, already!" He got the rope for me, and I used it on Karen.
I made her lay face down on the bed. I bound her wrists together behind her back while George tied her ankles together. I brushed her long brown hair out of her eyes, then gagged her with a strip of tape. Karen cast a nervous glance at me out of the corner of her eye as I sat down on the side of the bed.
"Ticki-wicki woo to you, too," I said.
Karen started laughing hysterically under her gag even before I tickled her. I tickled her sides, her bare feet, and her neck, and Karen squirmed and wiggled all oer my bed. George got into the act and helped me tickle our pretty young captive until we were interuppted by a knock at my door. Thinking it was my mother, I frantically untied Karen's wrists, then told George to help untie her ankles while I ran over to answer the door.
Thankfully, it turned out to be Donna, who stood with her hands on her hips. "What are you perverts doing with Karen?" she asked with mock disgust.
"Why?" I asked flippantly. "You wanna join her?"
She shook her head. "You really are a pervert..."
"I'm not the one who's undressing his captives," I shot back.
"Me, neither," Donna said. "That was Karen's idea. She's a pervert, too."
"Hey, hey," Karen said, as she stepped past us and walked into the hallway. "I heard that, Donna."
The door to my parents' bedroom swung open, and Karen and Donna dove into their bedroom and shut the door, just as George and I dodged back into my room and shut our door. We hit our beds and pulled up the covers just as I heard my mother shout: "If I have to come out here one more time...."
She never finished her threat. She didn't have to, we stayed in bed for the rest of the night. My mother later told me that it was nights like this that made her and my father grateful that they only had one child. More weirdness in the next story as George and I introduce Karen to the lake monster, and then to something even more frightening: my bondage-happy neighbor, Tyler. Thanks for reading.