Fifty Shades of Tedious Fuckery (Vol. 4)
Ana has no gag reflex.
Okay, this post doesn't quite zip along the story as quickly as I'd like, but that's because (like the last one) I get sidetracked by stupid literary devices that set my teeth on edge. Shall we?
That evening, Christian drives Ana to a heliport, in order to fly her to Seattle. "We’re in a built-up area of the city and even I know helicopters need space to take off and land." says Ana to herself. Which makes me wonder if Ana has ever seen a helicopter, or maybe even just a photo of one, seeing as the WHOLE POINT of helicopters is that they don't need a lot of space to take off and land. THEY CAN GO DIRECTLY UP AND DOWN, YOU MUPPET.
Anyway, they get to his fancy penthouse apartment in Seattle, where he plies her with white wine despite all his pearl-clutching about her drinking the night before. While she's taking in the swanky setting, this line happens:
""Do you play?" I point my chin at the piano."
What? If her hands weren't free to gesture, why wouldn't she just nod towards the piano? Does she give directions to people by pointing with her chin instead of her hands? Or does she have a hand hidden in her chin like Chuck Norris in Family Guy? So many questions!
Grey brings out a non-disclosure agreement for her to sign, which means that she can't tell anyone anything about what they get up to. Of course, a normal person would get the fuck out of there, quick smart. This is Anastasia though, so she signs it without even reading it. I hate her so much. He decides to show her his "playroom", which - shock! - is a fancy S&M dungeon and none of us saw this coming.
He wants her to be his submissive and shows her the rules of the contract she would have to sign if she agreed. It's a whole litany of overbearing nonsense about how often she has to eat, that she'll only wear clothes approved by him, that she'll do everything he says without question, that she'll be shaved or waxed at all times and "undergo any treatments the Dominant sees fit." Basically it's written consent for him to completely control her and everything she does and while anyone else would tell him to go and shite, Ana stays put.
She tells him she's a virgin, so after freaking out for a bit, he decides to go easy on her to begin with and sex her up all vanilla style. I'd just like to point out that it takes until the end of Chapter Eight for the first sex scene. With a book as tedious as this, that's like twenty normal-book chapters.
They get to the bedroom and there's some incredibly unsexy undressing described, detailing him pulling off her Converse and socks and "running his thumbnail up my instep". If someone did that to me they'd get an involuntary kick in the face. Jesus, like. Fuck away off from my instep. Followed by a voluntary kick in the face. Then, once he's got her in her knickers, this exchange happens:
“Show me how you pleasure yourself.”
What? I frown.
“Don’t be coy, Ana, show me,” he whispers.
I shake my head.
“I don’t know what you mean.” My voice is hoarse. I hardly recognize it, laced with desire.
Right. Anyone else would be a filthy liar for claiming that they don't know what he means, but then again, this is a 21 year old who has never kissed anyone or HELD HANDS with anyone. We can only assume that she was completely unaware of her genitals before now. To move things along, Christian tugs at her nipples for a bit, which is apparently enough to make her come for the first time.
To which I say:
BULL. SHIT.
He whips out a condom and "pulling off his boxer briefs, his erection springs free." Every time I read this sentence I hear a big BOI-OI-OING sound in my head. However, Ana is scared of his cock and thinks "Oh no…Will it? How?", prompting him to say “Don't worry [...] You expand too.” Because Ana has reached the age of 21 without finding out the basics of HOW SEX WORKS.
He eventually gets around to riding her, but right before he does, announces "I'm going to fuck you now, Miss Steele". Can you imagine someone saying that to you right before sex? You'd break your arse laughing. Anyway, Ana ends up orgasming all over the place, even though it was her first time, but that’s because she’s a human sex doll and Christian is a sex wizard. Also, he leaves his shirt on the whole time. Winnie the Pooh style. HOT.
The next morning, Ana wakes up with him beside her and wonders "How can anyone look this good and still be legal?" Be legal? Does she think he's a criminal of some sort? (I mean…) Or underage? Or does she just not understand what the word legal means? Fucking Jaysus Ana.
During breakfast, he badgers her some more about her not eating enough, on the off-chance that we'd forgotten about that fucking irritating quirk of his. Funnily enough, he doesn’t seem at all concerned about her constant wasting of teabags though, seeing as she might as well just wave the bag in front of her cup and then throw it in the bin, for the amount of use she gets out of them.
They take a bath together after breakfast and he tells her to stop biting her lip again, because it makes him want to fuck her (and it’s not like he can control his actions or anything) and he can’t fuck her now because she’s sore from the previous night’s riding when he “ripped through her virginity”. That’s the actual phrase that was used, by the way. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard anything as deeply unsexy as that before in my life.
In the bath, he washes her for a bit and gets her to turn around, and she’s “shocked” SHOCKED that he has his boner in his hand, despite the fact that she noted how she could feel it against her back SECONDS BEFOREHAND. But never mind that, check out what he says: “I want you to become well acquainted, on first name terms if you will, with my favourite and most cherished part of my body. I’m very attached to this.”
Okay, aside from the fact that it would be physically impossible not to burst out laughing in his face after him saying that, two things.
First name terms? In that case what’s its name? Because I’m calling it Dr. Nathaniel McCleod from now on. Or Nate Dogg.
“I’m very attached to this” is such a goddamn stupid thing to say about something that is in fact attached to your body. It’s kind of a given. I’m very attached to my arms but I don’t need to actually state it. Shut up Christian.
She decides to go down on him - and guess what! – she has no gag reflex. Well of course not, she's been genetically engineered for sex, after all. Which is SUPER handy. Mid blow-job, she thinks to herself “He’s my very own Christian Grey flavour popsicle” and just when I thought such a thing was impossible, it makes me hate her even more. Also, she’s so delighted with her new found skillz that her “inner goddess is doing the merengue with some salsa moves”. My inner goddess wants to murder the fuck out of her inner goddess.
Would you like to see a list of all the annoying things that her idiot inner goddess does? Of course you would.
She:
stops dancing and is staring too, mouth open and drooling slightly
sits in the lotus position looking serene
jumps up and down, clapping her hands like a five-year-old
stops jumping and smiles serenely
glows so bright she could light up Portland (maybe she's radioactive)
makes a very vulgar and unattractive gesture at him with her fingers (him being Paul - one of the dudes that inexplicably fancies stupid Ana)
jumps up and down with cheerleading pom-poms, shouting yes
does backflips in a routine worthy of a Russian Olympic gymnast
smacks her lips together, glowing with pride
bounces up and down like a small child waiting for ice cream
is going to explode (I really wish she would, then we could dispense with all of this fucking stupidity)
looks like someone snatched her ice cream
lies on a rug eating grapes and tapping her fingers impatiently
hops from foot to foot
has her pom poms in hand - she’s in cheerleading mode
spins like a world-class ballerina, pirouette after pirouette
has a “Do not disturb” sign on the outside of her room
pops her head above the parapet (someone PLEASE SHOOT HER)
pouts, failing miserably to hide her disappointment
does the dance of the Seven Veils
basks in a remnant of post-coital glow
leaps up cheering from her chaise longue
subconscious and inner goddess glance nervously at one another (KILL THEM WITH FIRE!)
pole vaults over a fifteen foot bar
stands on a podium awaiting her gold medal (for being a fucking TOOL)
backflips off the podium and does cartwheels around the stadium
hides under a blanket behind a sofa
sways and writhes to some primal carnal rhythm
endeavours to look brave
LADS. I would LOVE to say that I made some of those up and you had to guess which ones I invented and which ones were actually in a book that was PUBLISHED and that someone got PAID TO WRITE. However, all of those things actually happened in it and I died a little inside every time they did. She's half cheerleader, half gymnast, all douchebag.
Appearances of the phrase "inner goddess": 58
So anyway. They have yet another ride after that, only this time he ties her up with a grey (of course) tie. Ana describes her horniness by saying “my heated blood pools low in my belly, between my legs” which sounds like she has some manner of internal injury and could probably do with an ambulance, rather than kinky sex right now. All of the sex scenes in this are really annoying, because Anastasia seems unable to say the word vagina, even in her head. It’s all "there", “down there” and “my sex”, which is the most unsexy and cringey and stupid thing to call your vagina ever. Another thing to add to the Reasons Why I Hate Ana list. It's filling up pretty fast.