Bondage story - The Phantom of the Roxy - 3

Ira, realizing that the ominous shadows were distracting his actors, asked a stagehand to do something. About an hour later a scrim was lowered into place, blocking the entire backstage area from view. This, however, hardly eased Jessica’s nervousness. A scrim is a nylon screen often used in theaters for special effects or transitions. When lit from the front it appears to be a solid sheet of smooth fabric, but when unlit, with a lit scene behind it, it becomes almost transparent. Having it blocking the stage from the shadowed backstage meant that the actors could no longer see the backstage, but anyone standing back there had an unhindered view of them.

During lunch break, Jessica moved away from the others to work on her lines. Since the actors seemed to be giving that scrim upstage a wide berth, it was a likely place for her to work. Summoning up her courage, she moved near the ominous dark scrim. Of course nothing happened… it was just a scrim. Within minutes she had all but forgotten about it, pacing to and fro, reading each line and then sub-vocalizing it to the air.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when the chilling whispered voice called her name from beyond the scrim. “Jessica.”

She stared at the screen with wide eyes.

“Jessica, I’ve been watching you. You’re the one.” The voice seemed to be coming from barely a foot or two away from the back of the scrim. It spoke in a harsh, scratchy whisper, with a slight accent that she couldn’t place.

“What do you mean? Who the hell are you?” she said, addressing the spot where she knew someone stood, even though she could see nothing. “You will learn who I am in time,” responded the whisperer. “We are strangers, but I can see into your heart. You have a quality that I have been searching for. I can see it in the way you move, hear it in your voice. You are the one.”

Jessica felt a chill go through her. What was this man saying? Was he crazy? “What are you talking about?” she said aloud.

“You,” the voice said, “have a place within you where the Darkness can live.” The way he said the work “Darkness” seemed to give it some special signifcance. “You aren’t like the others. None of them could embrace the Darkness. But you can.”

Jessica stared. The conversation had gone from cryptic to creepy. The whisperer seemed to be either some kind of obsessed cultist, or he was completely deranged. Or, she suddenly realized, someone was playing a joke on her. The more she thought about it, the more likely that possibility seemed.

Jessica moved a step away from the scrim, at the same time easing slightly to the right and peering intently at the spot where she knew the whisperer had to be. There was a vaguely-lit patch of scenery some yards behind the scrim, and when she was in just the right position she could make out a fgure silhouetted against the scenery. He was tall and broad-shouldered, as she had perceived the fgure she’d seen earlier to be, and he did indeed wear a strange, wide-brimmed hat. Also, she noticed now, he seemed to be wearing wide, blousy sleeves, while the clothing on his body was tight-ftting, as though he were in a seventeenth-century costume. He was only a few feet away from her, but she could make out no more details through the screen.