Fiction or reality? Does it even matter?
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“Tell me a story,” she says.
I gaze at her levelly and she lowers her eyes to the steaming mug of tea before her. She’s fidgeting, playing with the wooden stir in her fingers, twisting the string of the teabag tighter and tighter around the stir, strangling it in her nervousness.
I wait for her to meet my eyes. I’ve learned to be patient. Took me long enough.
Finally she looks up; her cheeks flushing slightly in affront at my continued silence. What did she think, I’ll just launch into a bawdy tale like a drunken bard?
“What kind of story?” I ask softly, leaning a bit toward her, mindful of the potential audience in the otherwise buzzing coffee shop. We’re sitting at a tiny table wedged in the corner. She is facing me, her back to the commotion while I’m facing the rest of the shop, watching her while gauging who might be paying more attention to our conversation than to his own latte.
“You know…” she fidgets with the cup some more, then, as if realizing what she’s doing, folds her hands in front of her on the beat up and scarred wooden surface. “Tell me about…” she stumbles over the unfamiliar words, “about your Dom.” The word, so laden with meaning when it falls from my lips, in her mangled speech sounds almost cartoonish.
“What about my Dom?” I hide a smile. I know I’m tormenting her. I know exactly what she wants but I pay dearly for the story itself, the least I can do is extract a little tribute from her for living vicariously.
Her cheeks flame even more and she opens her mouth, then closes it. She lacks the deviant vocabulary to conjure up the words. And just like that, in the face of her distress, I relent and reach across the table to cover her tightly clasped hands with one of mine. The hand that wears his ring adorned with Kanji characters for pain and devotion.
“It’s ok,” I give her fingers a gentle squeeze, “I’m just teasing you.”
A story... What haven't I told her yet? My mind is sifting through the possibilities as I idly scan the shop. Just as my eyes are about to return to her, I catch a lascivious gaze of a portly, middle-aged man one table over. His eyes are vague behind the glassy sheen as he stares at her bent head and my hand over hers. Slowly I slide my stocking-clad legs in their knee-high six inch heel black boots from under the tiny table and leisurely cross them. Stifling a wide grin, I watch as his entire face slackens, gaze darting between my face, the table and my legs. Men can be such fun.
"All right," I say, as I refocus on her face, “I’ll tell you a story.”
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The sky has been threatening rain all day and each distant, mocking rumble of thunder resonates in my already aching and heavy head. I spent the entire day jittery and increasingly frustrated. Days ruptured by a bang of one disaster can sometimes be better than those punctured by a slew of miniature mishaps. Like this day has been so far. The frustration just keeps cranking up, like a plastic washer inexpertly tightened, more and more, until it cracks with a resounding pop.
Except that I don’t crack. I just seethe, irritation radiating from me in spiky waves. I’m trying to keep the lid on, but it’s useless. I’m going to explode; it’s just a question of when.
When I get to his house, the windows are dark and I wonder if something is finally going right. Maybe he’s out and I can have a few minutes to myself to regroup. I’m already fishing for the spare key in my purse when the hall light goes on.
“Fuck,” I mutter under my breath as the door swings open. I’m still trying to rearrange the mutinous expression on my face into an appropriately submissive one when he appears in the doorway. He takes one look at my clenched fists, the tight jaw, and slightly flushed face and I can see his expression altering in response.
I’m about to brush past him into the house but his hand is already outstretched to stop me.
“If you don’t want to be here, go home.” The chilly tone is achingly familiar. This is my last chance to snap out of it and behave, but I’m too far gone. Instead of apologizing, I push his hand out of the way and take a step inside.
The door slides shut behind me and in the next moment my breath exits in a startled whoosh as I’m slammed against the wall. His palm on the back of my head saves me from a nasty bump but even as I'm thinking that what I did was stupid and I must apologize, I can already feel his fingers tangling in the short curls, tightening painfully, holding my face up.
An explosion of pain, heat and sound greets me as his free hand leaves an angry red imprint on my cheek. I gasp but the hand is already coming back, backhanding me across the other side, the titanium band of his ring delivering an additional punch. That’s going to leave marks, I think vaguely before the dam breaks and a guttural sob escapes my clenched jaws, followed by a torrent of tears.
I slide down the wall as he takes a step back. His hand is still in my hair but he allows me to sink to my knees right there in the hall. My arms wrap around his legs, my face buried in his sneakers as I sob. My entire body is shuddering and shaking as the poisons leach from it, dissolving in my tears, in my submission to him.
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“But…”
I look up and meet her eyes. “But?”
“I don’t understand,” she is silent for a moment, trying to fit my world within the confines of hers. “Did you want him to hit you?” She stops, as if gauging my silence and tries again, “wouldn’t it be better if you just sat down and told him about your bad day?”
I look at her in silence, wondering how the hell one explains the inexplicable.
“I’m sorry,” she shakes her head, “It’s your business, I just,” she inhales sharply, “I just don’t get it.”
I shrug, “sometimes, neither do I.”
I look up at the tastefully beige paneling on the ceiling, my left hand drifting unconsciously to my throat, to the coolness of a collar encircling it. Finally I meet her eyes again.
“I need walls, something immovable to push against, something to struggle with,” I pause, “someone to keep me in control, stronger than me, willing to stand up to me when I am as I was that night I just told you about.”
I stop for a moment, considering my words carefully.
“Imagine a wave breaking against a large, jagged rock, then rolling back, gathering strength, before rushing to the rock again. It’s an endless, macabre dance. The wave is powerful in her own right. It will sweep boats out to sea, it will lift plants and hurl sea creatures about, but it will keep breaking on the rock because that’s what it needs to regroup, marshal its resources and renew its strength.” I pause as I see her nodding slowly.
“He’s my rock,” I say softly. “He’s the outlet for my energy and strength and fury. The rock doesn’t bend to the wave and he doesn’t bend to me, not when he knows that what I need is a solid wall to break against.”
“Tell me more…”
I incline my head slightly in a mock courtly bow, “As you wish…”
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To be continued...
... to love and be loved in return.
