Title: Downfall, Chapter 5
* * *The investigation was continuing, and so far, Laura thought, it wasn’t looking very promising. She had not been careful in her affair with Victoria at all— and she knew what they were looking at when they were looking at it, because the committee running the investigation was making all their findings very clear to her. She’d been granted read-only access to the file in the computer system where all of the investigative records were stored, and it had become a bit of a compulsive habit for Laura to log into that file and read the investigation’s transcript of the day, each day the investigation continued.
She wondered if they were trying to scare her— or if this was some kind of punishment, forcing her to know that her doom was circling her, and all she could do was watch it coming. The same things were reported by witnesses: Victoria had been seen coming and going from her office— Victoria had been seen coming and going from her house. Laura thought there should have been more than enough already in that directory digital file for them to justify disciplinary action, but it seemed they wanted to have a completely full account of her wrongdoing, an account which included every detail. Her humiliation would be complete: no part of what she’d done would remain hidden. Every day, transcript by transcript, she had to watch their steady progress toward discrediting her.
One day, she noticed in the transcript that they had called a new witness— her own husband! Gerrit had made good on his threat to tell everything to the board; and he did tell everything, everything that had happened in her last conversation with him, what he had found, what she had confessed to him, how he had felt when he realized her betrayal, and worse, how she had so badly transgressed the code of ethics in what she’d done.
After seeing that transcript, Laura was sure that the investigation would be wrapping up and handing down its disciplinary action to her— but at the end of the transcript, there was no kind of terminating procedure, only a comment from the head of the committee that the investigation would resume the next day.
And there was more— really, so many students had seen Victoria go in and out of Laura’s office— some of them had even seen, over Victoria’s shoulder as she’d sat in the college classroom, that she’d had one hundred percent marks written on blank tests and assignments— and when they talked to Laura’s teaching assistants, those assistants freely admitted that Laura had never let anyone else mark anything Victoria handed— that she had purposely taken away assignments and tests from their stacks of marking— some of them even remembered comments she had made to them about how Victoria was a very talented student, and she insisted on grading all of her work personally.
Unfortunately, this meant that none of Laura’s teaching assistants could confirm that Laura was giving Victoria undeserved grades, as they could only see the grades she entered into the college system and not the papers which had resulted them, but there had been plenty of student eyewitnesses who’d seen Victoria’s assignments be returned to her after they were graded— and they had all confirmed— she got top marks on blank work.
Laura wondered often if she should be feeling something else— when she looked at the day’s transcript from the investigation one day after the next, she had a vague sense of dread— but her predominant feeling was simply one of general happiness. Victoria wanted all of this to be happening to her— and it was happening to her, so everything was going as Victoria wanted it to.
And really— Laura had already gone in and confessed to everything— they should have been able to finish her on that basis alone, but they were being thorough. Once the findings of the investigation were released, she’d never be able to work anywhere in the academic field ever again. When they finished her, they really would finish her— she just had to wait until they did it to her, and sometimes it made her juice at her desk— because she knew it was what Victoria wanted for her, and she couldn’t prevent it from happening to herself.
She was surprised, one day, to find Victoria’s name in the transcript— it appeared there often enough of course, but only ever in descriptions spoken by other witnesses.
No, this time was different, because Victoria was being listed as a witness— and while Laura had read all the other transcripts to date, to some extent they had washed over her, but now, as she read, she felt as if she was sitting in the investigation room, watching Victoria speak— or prepare to speak— and her heart was filled with a desperate longing— she’d heard Victoria’s name, that gripped her heartfirst, but what was Victoria wearing? What did she actually look like at the exact moment she spoke? Laura’s heart suffused with love, and her loins suffused with arousal— she leaned forward in the chair, reading the transcript even more carefully than usual, not wanting to mistake even one word for another.
They had Victoria confirm her name first, and that she was a student in Laura’s class. Victoria confirmed these things, and then Victoria said—
“I’ll tell you everything,” — it was written— “I’m so glad to finally have someone I can talk about this with. Professor Laura called me in for office hours one day, and she told me that she wanted to have sex with me— and if I didn’t, she’d make me fail this college course. And I needed the credit for my degree, so I was really scared and I told her yes.
“Then after that, she wouldn’t let me turn in tests or assignments. I would give them to her, but she’d rip them up, write my name on blank papers, and grade me 100%. I told her that was so wrong, but she said this way I had to keep sleeping with her, otherwise she’d reveal to everyone I’d only been handing in empty course materials all semester, and she’d change all my grades back to zero.
“I realized then she was only doing it to blackmail me, but it had been going on for so long it was too late to stop, even though the longer I continued, the deeper I was digging myself into it.”
The Victoria in Laura’s mind was tearful and hurt as she was saying all of this. And it didn’t matter that none of it was true— that Laura couldn’t have exerted power over Victoria if she wanted to. She knew what it meant— Victoria was telling the ethics committee exactly what they wanted to hear— a story of a poor helpless student made victim, and a cruel, evil professor taking advantage.
It should have registered as a betrayal, but all it felt like to Laura was a command— Victoria telling her, as though through the screen, this is how I want them to think of you, this is what I want to see happen to you.
And that just made Laura shake in her chair— because if Victoria wanted it to happen to her, then Laura wanted it to happen too.
They only asked Victoria a few more things, and Victoria answered in similarly sabotaging ways.
And it wasn’t very long after that, that Laura’s phone rang— someone on the ethics committee again, saying they wanted her to appear before the board again.
It felt pretty final to Laura, as she walked across campus to the meeting room she’d been told to enter.
Once she got inside, she found the same three people she’d made her confession to sitting there, staring at her in judgement.
“Professor,” the first man said. “We’ve conducted a thorough review of your confessed misconduct. And we’ve found that you have been doing it— doing exactly as you told us.”
Now the second woman spoke up. “Accordingly, you can no longer teach at this university. We are officially stripping you of your position, and if you have not cleaned out your office by the end of the day, we will have security escort you off campus premises, and whatever remains in your office will simply be thrown out as junk.”
“And,” the third woman now spoke up. “Most importantly. Your actions were so disgraceful, so disturbing, that we will be holding a press conference to make completely public the findings of our investigation.”
Laura knew what that meant— but her mouth was already speaking for her, giving her grim realization both voice and volume.
“So any other postsecondary institute I might apply to— as soon as they do a preliminary check into me— they’ll find everything.”
She didn’t say it sadly. She didn’t say it with fear— just with a heavy acceptance. And when it was accepted, it twisted back around to being arousal again— this was how Victoria wanted it, or she never would have given the false testimony that she gave.
“You’ll never work again,” the third person to speak sneered at her.
Laura nodded. Her disgrace was total— of her professional life, of her career, of her professional reputation: there was nothing left.
And even if not everything had become public yet— and so not every consequence had realized itself— it was only a matter of time.
“I won’t need to go back to my office,” Laura said. She pulled her schoolkeys out of her blazer pocket. Things to open classrooms, to open her office, to open copyrooms— she wouldn’t be needing any of them anymore.
“There’s nothing in my office I want to keep. I’ll just leave right now, then.”
The three committee members looked relieved— glad she wasn’t fighting them, or putting up any difficulty.
Laura stood. She’d lost her job— become a complete disgrace. There was nowhere to go now but back home.
When she arrived there, she was surprised to find the lights in the house were on. She’d been missing her family lately— not in the sense of longing after them, but in the sense of never being able to catch them when they were home— she’d been in the house at odd hours and out of it at more usual ones, so she had been the one to be caught by Gerrit, in more ways than one.
She entered, a little trepidatious, and it was to see both Gerrit and Sarah sitting on the livingroom couch like they were waiting for her.
“Well?” She asked, coming to stand in front of them. “Were you waiting for me? Why?”
She maybe hadn’t needed to open the interaction in such a hostile way, but it had seemed to happen naturally for her.
“I know the ethics committee has been investigating you,” Gerrit spoke first. “I did like I promised you I would— I went in and told them everything.”
“Good for you then, Gerrit,” Laura snapped again, leaning forward into a daring stance. “You followed through on something you said! And maybe you’d be interested to know that the ethics committee has completed its work! The investigation has come to a close, and the result is, I’m fired, and I’ll never work at any post-secondary institution ever again in my life because they’re taking the investigation’s results public. My name is ruined, it will be ruined wherever I go, I can’t work anymore— it’s done.”
It was probably unfair that she was shouting this out as anger towards her family, when towards the person truly responsible she only felt love, and gratitude— and sexual satisfaction.
“I tried to help you,” Gerrit said, folding his arms over each other. “I gave you options, I gave you chances. You didn’t want any of them. Do you say your ridiculous obsession with that college student was worth it now?”
That threw her off her anger; she could not remain angry while Victoria was the thought in her mind.
She exhaled. “Yes— it was more than worth it.”
Sarah made a scrunched-up expression with her face. “Really, Mom? She’s the same age as me, isn’t she? How can you be with someone who is eighteen years old when your own daughter is eighteen years old? And since when do you like women— and since when do you behave this unethically?”
There was true concern in Sarah’s voice as she spoke. Gerrit was more understandably angry, since he had already tried to help, and Laura had refused to let him— but even in his anger there seemed… something that was still trying to reach her. They were both so angry because they cared about her so much. And Laura really needed that care they had for her to be broken off— she was done with them now, and she wanted everything to be broken off neatly.
But Sarah was speaking up again.
“We think you should get some help, Mom.” She shot a glance to her father as she said this. “You might not ever be able to work again— but Dad and I, we can forgive you— we’ll love you, even if you never work again for the rest of your life.”
Laura knew how to break this. Sarah thought she could love her mother unconditionally, and maybe once this would have meant something to her, but now all she felt was anger— Sarah and Gerrit had become the obstacles standing between her and Victoria, and she wanted them gone.
And Sarah thought she could love her mother unconditionally— but Laura held the piece of information that could obliterate that assumption forever.
“Your trust fund is gone, Sarah,” Laura said simply.
Sarah stared at her. “What?” She gasped in a tone of shock.
“I had stewarding authority— I drained all that money, and I gave it to Victoria.”
Sarah bounded to her feed. “You stole from me? My own mother? You stole my entire future, and gave it to your— your—?”
Gerrit’s face creased in confusion as he, apparently, struggled to take this in. “Who was really taking advantage of who, here? If you were— ruining your career, your marriage, your family life— stealing from your own daughter— that doesn’t make Victoria seem very overpowered, or disadvantaged.”
Sarah looked on the point of crying. “I don’t want to help you anymore! I hope you never get any help at all! You stole my entire future from me— I’ll never forgive you for that and if I have to see you every day around this house, I’m going to move out!”
Sarah whisked out of the room, running in the direction of her bed, presumably to throw herself on it and cry.
And Laura felt no guilt.
She looked back to Gerrit— he actually looked more willing to help her now, which was the opposite of the effect she had hoped to cause with that revelation.
“Victoria is my future, Gerrit,” she said, testily.
And there was nothing really that she wanted to say to him, apart from this. She turned from where she had stood facing him in the livingroom and walked out of the house.
She went downtown, and took all the money out of her and Gerrit’s joint bank account while she still had the opportunity. And then she checked herself into a hotel.
She knew Victoria— felt so strongly that she knew exactly what Victoria wanted of her, now. Victoria wanted her to come to her one final time and never leave her again— but to do that, Laura had to completely break all the old ties, and make sure everything was resolved— so no necessity would ever call her away from Victoria. She went out the next day, and hired a divorce lawyer to get the proceedings going.
There was no communication from Sarah, which neither surprised nor upset Laura.
But Gerrit still seemed keen on trying to reach her— he was leaving her messages on her cellphone, until she blocked his number there— and then sending messages to her email, until she blocked him there. Then he was forced to communicate with her through her lawyer— and it seemed, forced to get a lawyer of his own.
The messages that came, then, were pleas to only separate for a time, pleas to meet up and talk things over just the two of them, pleas to meet up, the two of them with their lawyers also present, when Laura failed to accept the first offer.
Really, she refused all his offers. The message she sent back every time was no, she wanted the divorce, and she wanted them to get through the divorce proceedings as quickly as possible.
Slowly, Gerrit seemed to accept this answer— though more pleas still came— begging her to think of their marriage, begging her to think of their daughter, begging her not to leave the family, begging her not to leave him. All of these were somewhat amusing messages to receive, since her lawyer was the one relaying them, and he relayed them in a disinterested, uniform tone with little inflection.
But Gerrit’s desperation came through in the words themselves. He didn’t want to let Laura go, even though she had passed into a new phase of her life without him, and she didn’t want him along with her for it. She gave him ‘no’s every time. She was leaving him. She wouldn’t change her mind.
And then Gerrit would plead with her about Sarah— could she really just abandon her only daughter? Yes, Sarah was an adult now, but an adult woman still had a place in her life for a relationship with her mother— who could she turn her back on the woman she’d raised, a woman who might need her advice, or sympathetic ear? It would still be abandonment to turn her back on Sarah and cut all communication with her. And to Gerrit, it didn’t matter that Sarah now hated her mother— in his mind, and he made this clear through his messages, this hate only bestowed a duty on Laura to make things right again.
And the only way to do that would be to go and get the money back from Victoria to return it to Sarah— and Laura wasn’t going to be doing that either.
So Laura gave him constant refusals, and after so much communication like this, Gerrit finally seemed to get up. She was leaving them. She was abandoning them, and her adultdaughter too. He couldn’t persuade her otherwise.
Then the divorce proceedings were able to start up in earnest.
Laura’s lawyer repeatedly told her that she could try to get a fair settlement, a split down the middle of all their joint assets— but if Victoria had wanted for that Laura, she would have communicated that to her— and she wouldn’t have put Laura into a position where, if Gerrit actually chose to fight her, he would have had more than enough evidence, much of it on the public record, thanks to the ethics committee publicizing their findings, that Laura had been the one to give up on their marriage and betray it.
And Laura didn’t want to take anything with her— just wanted the divorce over completely. And if that meant she lost every possession she’d ever had, and every cent to her name, including the money that she’d stolen from the joint account before fleeing, that actually thrilled her. She wanted to be reduced destitute— to have nothing left— because even one thing would be a tie to a life outside of Victoria.
So, though her lawyer was a bit bemused by this, this was what he got for her: a divorce in which absolutely everything, everything she’d once owned, all the money she had remaining— went to Gerrit. Laura signed it all over, left Gerrit, abandoned Sarah— and the divorce was final, she had nothing to her name but the stitches of clothing she wore on her back, and she was free. And she was done.
She could bring herself to Victoria, now, and deposit herself there.
The only issue was— she didn’t actually know where Victoria was living. And all the usual places she had once used for meeting with Victoria were not accessible to her— she was not allowed to step foot on campus, and her former office there had, by now, doubtless been given away to a less scandalous professor— someone who still had their career and their reputation.
And she couldn’t step foot in her former home now, because she’d relinquished all right to it, up to and including her keys— it was now solely the possession of Gerrit.
So there was nowhere she could meet Victoria, and nowhere that she knew Victoria to be right now— but luckily, she did know Victoria’s cellphone number.
She didn’t know how she knew, and she hadn’t remembered it before now, but it was like Victoria had slipped it into her mind when she hadn’t noticed, leaving it there for just such an eventuality. Otherwise, she would probably have had to wait around indefinitely until Victoria tracked her down herself.
But she didn’t— she asked a business near the hotel she’d been staying at before relinquishing all of her funds to Gerrit as part of the settlement— asked them to let her borrow a phone, just out of sympathy, and they’d agreed.
And then she was dialing Victoria’s cellphone number. There was a click, as the line connected, but there was only silence passing between receivers. Victoria was waiting for Laura to speak. It was a silent command— Laura opened her mouth.
“My divorce is final,” she said, her excitement evident to her own ears. “I’m a divorced woman now, and it’s over. I’ve walked out on Gerrit, I’ve walked out on Sarah— I have nothing left. I gave Gerrit everything in the divorce— it drained my bank account to nothing. I don’t even have two dollars to my name— I don’t own anything except the clothes I’m wearing, and I can never work again, not at any university in the entire world.”
She waited for Victoria to reprimand her— for giving away belongings, for giving away all her money, for not fighting to take half, so she could give it to her mistress.
But none of that was what Victoria said.
“Where are you? I’ll come get you in my car.”
Since when did Victoria have a car? But Laura looked out through the shopwindow, across the street to the hotel she’d so recently been staying in, until she’d lost all the last of her money.
She recited the name of the hotel, and when she glanced a little further down the street to the streetcorner, named the names of the intersecting streets.
“Wait for me outside the hotel,” Victoria said. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Victoria had already hung up the phone, and though Laura was sad to lose the sound of her voice, she was happy to let Victoria go, because it meant that Victoria was coming to her.
She thanked the shop-owner for letting her borrow the phone, and went to stand outside of the hotel, on the sidewalk. She bounced on her heels a little bit, impatient, swinging her arms.
Soon enough, Victoria was pulling up to the curb in a luxury vehicle— there was someone else driving it in the frontseat, so Laura climbed into the back, where her mistress was sitting.
She was surprised to see the car had a partition.
“Go, driver,” Victoria said, once Laura was in the car— she never actually looked at them. She was looking at Laura all the time.
“You really had saved quite a huge amount of money for Sarah. It’s serving me very well. There was more than enough for me to buy my way into all the kinds of experiences I always wanted to have— like having my own chauffeur, having my own luxurious home. Enough for all of that, while still leaving plenty left over for me to turn over to a financial advisor I hired— she promised me she’d keep the rest of the sum growing at a generous percentage indefinitely. So, thanks to you, and to the money you transferred from your daughter to me, I’ll be a very, very rich woman for the rest of my life.”
This felt like indirect praise to Laura, and she took at as such, squirming on the seat and feeling warm.
“So I’ve dropped out of university now. I didn’t like it, really, and now that I have more money than I could ever spend my way through— and will continue having that amount throughout the future, I didn’t see the point of continuing something I disliked. I’d rather live a life of leisure.”
Laura shrank a little, not to be mentioned as a part of it, until Victoria’s hand came to rest on her cheek. “Enjoying your companionship,” she clarified; and that was even more praiseful than the last, so Laura had to shake on the seat.
Victoria kept absently petting her for the rest of the driver home, but she was looking out the window now, at the scenery as they drove past. Laura didn’t care where they were or where they might be going, so long as Victoria was touching her in that patient petting way.
At last, the car pulled up in front of a large house with a pleasant housefront, made of fine stone, and some marble— Victoria waited for the chauffeur to come around and open her door for her, and only then did she step out. Laura followed when she did.
And she continued following Victoria into her house, and up the stairs, down the hall past many rooms— Victoria led her, eventually, to what was clearly Victoria’s own bedroom.
The size of the bed, the way it was positioned in the room, the richness of the colors on it, deep blues and emerald greens, all of that made it so clear that this was the main bedroom of the house, the bedroom for the owner of the house— and whatever other bedrooms there were, they would all be guest bedrooms, they would always be secondary to this room.
Laura had only ever been with Victoria in the old bedroom she’d once shared with Gerrit. Having a new venue to occupy with her owner and mistress was exciting to her, but now that she was here with her, Laura was doubting herself.
Victoria had stepped into the room to regard her bed with what seemed to be pride. And it would have been the obedient thing to silently allow Victoria to do this, but instead, Laura felt a rising pressure in herself to speak which she could not repress.
“I’m sorry,” she rushed out. “I’m sorry if I should have fought more in my divorce— sorry if I should have tried to take half of everything, so that I could give it to you, I’m sorry, I’m sorry if I failed—”
Victoria turned back to Laura with a stately turning, and reached her hand out to her.
With the gesture, she called Laura more effectively than she could have done with the speaking of words. Laura drifted to her, feeling called, and when she was in reach, Victoria gripped her face firmly— it almost hurt, a bit.
“This is how I want you,” Victoria spoke, with intensity. “I want you as nothing, I want you with no other ties to the world, I want you to have nothing outside of me.”
The harshness of her tone made Laura shudder— she wanted that harshness from her.
Laura had to respond to it some way, and she didn’t care if this way was disobedient of her— she let her legs sweep from under her, her body falling kneesfirst, her knees crashing against the ground— she could feel the reverberations of her descent in her kneecaps, shaking through cartilage and bone.
Victoria looked approving. “I want you as only my slave— for that to be all that you ever are. No money, no connections to the world, nothing but what I give you, what I allow you to have, what I allow you to do. In losing everything, you served perfectly. It was what I wanted.”
Laura nodded— she felt comforted— and also like she’d come to rest at the final stopping place of her life. She would be in this house at Victoria, she would stop at Victoria, she was here with Victoria, now, and she would never leave. She would be here in Victoria’s house until Victoria let her out, if she ever did— she’d just be here, Victoria’s slave, every day, every hour of every day, every minute of every hour.
It was all she wanted anymore, and she wanted to celebrate this.
She wrapped her arms around Victoria’s legs, pulling herself closer to Victoria’s body as she stayed kneeling. Victoria teetered a little in her stance, but adjusted for it.
Then Laura let her go, and lifted up her skirt, putting her head under it— Victoria wore no underwear below, so Laura wondered if Victoria had taken them off when she got Laura’s call, knowing that she would be coming over again, or if she just never wore them anymore, now that she owned her own house.
Laura didn’t care, she had her access, and she planted a kiss on Victoria’s pussy, a kiss of thanks, a kiss of acknowledgement: this was where she would be now.
One kiss quickly led to others, and then Laura was faithfully serving at the crotch of her mistress. She hadn’t known it until Victoria showed her, but this had been where she was always meant to be, what she had always needed to get to.
Now she was here. She would always be here, serving, sometimes like this, and sometimes in other ways.
She was Victoria’s now, Victoria’s completely.