Speechless, Monster

Any person that one encounters is actually two people: the person they are, and the person you think they are. I've never experienced such an intense dichotomy between those two with anyone else as I have with Aiden. He has existed as at least two people in my head alone...and then, of course, there's the real boy.

Way back when, there was the boy I fell unexpectedly head over heels for. In comparison to how I know him now, I didn't know him very well. Then I had enough of the way that things were working - or more accurately, not working - and put myself back in the magician's hat and disappeared. I convinced myself that he was a terrible person and wasted a lot of energy balancing that house of cards.

Then that house crumbled and we rediscovered each other...but this is all old news. I'm not rehashing merely to rehash, as entertaining as storytelling is. I'm still reconciling. I'm staring at a photograph that has been exposed not just twice but many times.

Having that many images stacked in my head of one single person can be confusing. I don't have too much trouble separating the nasty image I built of him when we were apart from the person that he actually is; that image served a purpose, but it was false, and it exists now only as a distant memory.

But then there are the grey areas. Even in the dark days, I occasionally threw things in the bucket that weren't entirely negative. Now I don't know what to do with them.

I'm powered by music. Aiden described it as having music woven into the fabric of my life, and that feels pretty accurate. I'm a musician and a singer and a dancer, and music has a more direct path to my feelings than any other passion. Every period of my life has at least one associated album. I've got music for seasons, music for activities, music for past events, music for friends and family and enemies. Needless to say, Aiden has quite a lot of music.

What brought all this up was playing an album tonight that I hadn't listened to since more than a year ago. (It's been a year now, as of December 8th...hard to believe, in a lot of ways.) I listened to these songs while drawing and while working, and they have associations with certain pieces of art and a certain school-bus yard in winter...but even more strongly than that, somehow I associated them with Aiden.

My first reflex is to claim that I have no idea why that happened. It was February of 2011; we hadn't spoken in nearly two years. If his name were mentioned to me, I probably would've had something unkind to say.

And yet, I put a passionate image of him into the music...not an outright sexual fantasy, but something that wasn't overwhelmed with stupid hate. The association was strong enough to have lasted this long without losing much intensity. I believe it was because there wasn't much passion in my life at the time, and when the music created a need in me to feel a memory that fiery and intense, I reached for the last one I had, and it was Aiden.

Why is it worth discussing? Because I'm reaching for it still. Fantasizing from that distance had an underlying assumption of truth, that if there was ever again a reality between Aiden and I, at least some of it would look like that. The reality recurred but the fantasy didn't.

I've never struggled so much with explaining the hook of music and its associations in my soul. Sometimes I send Aiden songs that I like, and he listens to them and shares his thoughts. Some of those songs are just things I hear on the radio that amuse me, and his response is sufficient, and life moves on. But some of them mean much more to me than that, and the first time that I was bitterly disappointed by his response of, "I dig it," I was blindsided. The response was positive...and yet I wanted to yell that he didn't get it. I don't care if you 'dig' it. These are not bumpin' beats to jive to. This is me telling you something important...

This has happened enough times now that I've become reluctant to share the songs that mean the most to me, because I don't want to hear the reaction. I know he intends the things he says positively, and yet I hear them as dismissive.

I still want to express it. But I don't know how to share what's there without being able to magically project an image from my brain. I've gotten some satisfaction on that front from dancing with him, to music that I associated with the dark days. It's the closest I've come. I wonder occasionally if sex to music would help, and then I consistently forget to ever make that happen. This isn't a fantasy that can become reality through simple explanation. This is a room in which I desperately want company, but where I cannot figure out how to make a door through which others can enter.

Rolling

So E is interesting.

Nothing like I thought it would be. Most of what I had heard about it (ignoring Kevin's idiotic opinions) was that it makes physical sensations feel amazing, and makes you feel like you love everybody and are very in touch with people around you. Aiden recommended comfy clothes for the adventure, so I put on some sweats and prepared to love everything.

The first thing I noticed was vertigo; I got light-headed and felt like my brain was being squeezed. Then my heart started to race, my adrenaline spiked, and my hands shook. It became difficult to focus on the jewelry project I was doing, as the beads became blurry and the light reflecting off the silver rings distracted me. I gave up on trying to teach Aiden to do chainmaille, as neither of us could see with enough detail to actually close rings.

The three of us moved on to stringing beads, which proved to be much more entertaining. Shelby started pulling finished pieces and flea market finds out of my supply boxes and decking herself out in them. "Have you seen what ravers end up wearing?" Aiden asked, and "furry boot covers" was all I could think of, but apparently that was agreement.

Shelby gestured at the table, which was covered in boxes and beads and rings and scales and tools and wire and every other shiny thing I could imagine, and said, "Look what the high kids did!" I laughed. I asked her if she was also tachycardic, since we're both like that normally, and she said yes and advised me to ignore it, assuring me that there was Ativan on hand if it got too bad.

I was stringing beads and continually noting how I felt like I had drunk an entire pot of coffee, when Shelby suddenly turned to me, grabbed my face, looked at me dreamily for a moment, and then started kissing me sweetly. I kissed back, surprised, and grinned when she let me go.

"Well that was unusual," I said, smiling. "You're not normally that sweet."

"I feel happy," she said, smiling back. "This is probably how you guys feel all the time "- I nodded in agreement -" but I have depressed brain chemistry. I wish I could be like that but I'm just not. This is me with enough serotonin. I'd take an SSRI but they mess up your sex life."

There had been some discussion of fruit earlier in the day, Aiden telling us to make a fruit platter when we went to the grocery store and Shelby explaining that fruit is somehow extremely amazing on E. So we got fruit. Aiden decided to cook some rice and make fruit sushi, so while Shelby and I discussed brain chemistry, he got out the sushi things and started constructing. I went over to watch, and tried a piece of the first roll. It was salty, not fruity at all, slightly fishy, and so sticky it glued my mouth shut.

"Blech," I said, without even thinking. I made a face, spit the sushi out in my hand, and dumped it in the garbage. "What the hell happened? That's awful. I can't eat that. I need to rinse my mouth." After rinsing my mouth, I thought about what I had just said. "I'm sorry," I apologized. "My manners aren't usually that bad. I didn't mean anything personal. But damn, that was just disgusting."

Aiden shrugged, and Shelby laughed. "It'll do that," she said. "You'll just blurt things out and then go, Oh, oh gosh, I'm so sorry I said that." Her description was accompanied with an intensity that I've never seen from her before. She's usually relatively inexpressive when speaking, and to see her lean in and speak with passion was new.

The honesty was a feeling. I said I could tell that if someone asked me a question, I would just spout off without censoring a single word.

Aiden got quiet and "contemplative" - unusual for him. I tried not to be concerned, deliberately keeping an awareness of the fact that his being quiet makes me worry, and just because I'm worrying doesn't mean anything is actually wrong. I restrained my concern to merely asking if he was all right a couple of times.

Shelby and I, on the other hand, couldn't stop talking. I've never in my life been so compelled to expel so many words. I couldn't stop, except to listen to Shelby. Between the two of us, there was no silence for several hours. Everything that entered my brain exited immediately via my mouth, shortcutting the usual judgment circuit.

Aiden had explained the therapeutic part of the effect, where a person can address their problems from an outside perspective without their own emotional baggage in the way, and now I understand what that means. For me, it was like the emotion generator was just unplugged from the rest of the system. We all expressed ourselves with complete and brutal honesty on quite a few topics, and none of us were at all insulted or perturbed. Everything was just interesting in an academic way.

I made a pot of Earl Grey, Shelby seeded a pomegranate, and the three of us had a tea party in the living room. We sat on cushions around a coffee table and talked and talked and talked. I noted that this was way better than acid, and it wasn't what I was expecting but it was great, and I felt like I could do it all night.

There was little in the way of physical effects. My body felt normal except for the slight buzz, which had subsided from "entire twelve-cup pot of coffee in ten minutes" to "maybe three lattes was too many in three hours."

Eventually the tea party ended and we returned to beading. A weird note of bitterness appeared in my head, and I guessed that my emotions were starting to be plugged back in. I was concerned about some things that had been said, but I focused on my beading and kept quiet. The silence was another clue that I was coming back to normal. Shortly after that we went to bed, and I was glad to find sleep waiting not far away.

The next morning, when the alarm went off, Shelby and I were instantaneously wide awake and ready to bounce into the day. Aiden was still logey, barely opening his eyes to our prodding and biting. "I just want you to care," Shelby said, and even that didn't rouse him. I still felt a little buzzy and a little more honest than usual. I wondered how long it would last.

A couple of hours later on, the buzz had disappeared, and over dinner I noted that things were now crossing my mind and only sometimes choosing to exit orally. I also realized that half the time I didn't say things I was thinking, it was because Aiden was already chattering about something.

This morning I woke up tired, having not gotten enough sleep. On my drive to work, I thought about the things that had come up that bothered me, and found myself fighting anxiety and depression. Shelby had warned me that some people get a day or two of depressive after-effect. I messaged Aiden and asked if he had ever found it difficult to process anything that came up, and he said no. But it turned out Shelby and I were both reacting to issues this morning.

Discussion of their having given up pot for me turned into a weight of guilt and panic on me, and discussion of how Shelby abuses her power as the breadwinner when angry with Aiden made her feel like he secretly hated her. We really could have used another day to just hang out and cuddle, but two-day weekends don't allow for two days of recovery. Fortunately this is only a three-day work week, since Thanksgiving is Thursday.

Overall, I'd say that rolling was much more enjoyable than tripping on acid, even accounting for the weird panicky after-effects, and I'd be more inclined to do it again. I do hope that I can eventually experience the other body effects, too, as they sound really entertaining.

Aiden also mentioned "candy-flipping," a name that I don't understand for doing acid and E at the same time. I'm not sure what that would do except possibly give me a heart attack from too many stimulants.

The Deep

The deepest mystery that's ever floated in my own head is why I'm scared of a certain class of things. I'm not even sure they are really a class. I don't know that they actually have a lot to do with each other. Maybe it's just that the fear feels the same, so I'm assuming a relation among the causes.

Or, perhaps, they can be generalized to "altered state of consciousness, not including sleep." I love sleeping. I love dreaming. That's never been a question.

But into the fear category have gone, at various points in time, spirits and seances, Wicca and spell-casting, hypnosis, mind-altering drugs, and That Damn Thing My Ex-Girlfriend Did*. I guess they are related after all.

What am I really afraid of? Is it just that age-old fear of the unknown that I've been told all people naturally have? Meh. Perhaps that's some of it. But I've busted into plenty of other unknowns with nothing worse than a touch of nerves, without experiencing that feeling of someone squeezing my heart in a fist. Drop me into a creepy alley in the middle of the night, and my pulse will race, but I'll march forward and face whatever's there, because I'm pretty sure I can handle it.

So maybe I don't think I can handle...what, exactly? A bad trip? That certainly sounds scary, but I don't think it would be any worse than a really long nightmare (assuming I don't actually encounter a malevolent demon from the abyss, which isn't exactly Concern #1). The Bad Trip explanation makes me nervous, but it doesn't quite reach as far down as the undefinable Panic. Moving on.

The night that Shelby came and stayed with me earlier this fall, I tried to explain to her what it was that made me want to run away screaming from the subject of drugs. I stumbled over my words, replacing some of them with helpless reaching gestures while saying, "I'm afraid of that other person going away. They're there, and I'm here, and we're both 'here' in this room, but I don't know where they actually are. I'm afraid they're going to go away without me." Yes, I'm definitely afraid of being left here alone.

If you're a person that I want to be close to, I want to be WITH you, not just exist in the same space as you. Lying near each other while we each experience something completely different sounds quite unappealing. Adventuring alone is all well and fine, but if I'm going to adventure alone, why would I waste the precious time that I get to spend with you to go off by myself?

That actually explains some of my behavior from the acid trip. I worked hard to get Aiden interested in sex, even though he didn't seem very interested at first, and then we fucked for what felt like hours. I wasn't particularly more turned-on than usual - in fact, I had quite a difficult time coming - but I needed to feel the human connection, to know that he was still there, not wandering lost in some other world. Touch me. Fuck me. Stay here with me.

Simultaneously, it explains why the thought crossed my mind yesterday that the keenest interest I have in drugs is to see how they affect sex.

I'm actually surprised how much that realization feels like the Truth that I was looking for. I was afraid that my ex-girlfriend would go off and do That Damn Thing without me. The "What do you need that for when this world is perfectly interesting?" question that I mentioned last time still feels the same when reworded as, "Why do you want to be over there when I'm right here?" Alcohol doesn't trigger this fear because I know exactly where it goes, and that it doesn't result in anyone mysteriously checking out on me. The thought of someone I love using drugs extensively does scare me, because I picture them ending up permanently changed, in a place where I can no longer reach them.

I spend a lot of time alone. This "don't leave me" discovery seems like an odd contrast to that. I often get overwhelmed and claim that I wish the world would just go away, that all the people would just leave me the hell alone. I guess this is the change when I get attached to someone...this is why certain people are allowed in my introvert bubble...this is why I resist when I find myself getting close to someone new. I won't hand over the power to leave me to just anyone. First I have to trust that you won't.

Being me, of course, I hide that. When I was tiny and my mom dropped me off at school, I envied the kids who held onto their parents' legs and screamed and cried and begged them not to leave. I wanted to do that. That was how I felt, but I knew it wasn't okay to express it. Being needy wasn't approved behavior. So I just let my mom leave and pretended it was fine.

The fear has matured since I was three, of course. I don't panic when someone walks out of a room. I'm not on the verge of tears every Monday morning when I go back to my own town until Friday night. But I can say that when I look back over the patterns that have appeared in my life, the things I've gotten most upset about, the things that trigger my OCD, the things I'm afraid of...they all fit this paradigm perfectly. They're all variations on a theme of Separation Anxiety.


*Something complicated that involved role-playing and visiting a mysterious "elsewhere" that couldn't be experienced by normal people who weren't "awoken."

The Letter E

My relationship with drugs is a strange emotional tangle. I want to understand it, but most days it's a mystery even to me. I keep inspecting the threads, and sometimes I manage to pull one or two out of the knot, and it gets a little smaller. I'm not really sure who dropped the ball of yarn down the stairs, or when, but eventually I will get it all organized. Maybe if I lay out the extant thoughts, it will encourage more. This may be a lot of disorganized rambling, but if so, it would mirror what's in my head on this subject with fair accuracy.

I've already gone over my family history with alcohol. I'm sure that plays a part, but it confuses me that I get far more uptight about drugs than I do about drinking. (When I say "drugs," I'm referencing the recreational use of any non-alcoholic substance, legal or illegal.) Logic would have me with an emotional trigger against alcohol...but no. I've been drinking for years, and I understand it. As long as I and the people around me are using alcohol responsibly, I'm supremely unconcerned about it.

I'm touchy, however, about any other substance. My reactions are part, "I don't understand [empathetically speaking]," part, "Why would you do that?"

I believe that people should be able to do what they want to their own bodies, and at the same time I feel a deep concern about people who want to be high, that gets voiced as, "Aren't you satisfied with the world we've got here? It's amazing! Just look around."

My personal history with drug use is very limited. The first time I tried smoking pot, I was 19, and it did nothing for me. I got some amusement out of watching my friend Mario talk about how pretty the snow was. I tried again a few months later, with a coworker from a strip club, and nothing happened then either, except that I got exceptionally angry about something stupid a couple of hours later, and my then-boyfriend told me it was probably a side effect.

I tried again at 21, on the trip to visit Alejandra that ended up so awkwardly, and got another load of absolutely nothing. At that point I decided that pot was obviously not for me, and pretty much forgot about it. Kevin and I developed a habit of leaving parties when people went to go smoke. It was usually late enough that we had had our good party time anyway, and we were usually the only ones not interested. It was never a "stomp off in a huff" kind of leaving; just an, "Oh, it's that time, I guess we'll go home." The habit stuck with me after I got rid of Kevin.

My next experience was being offered a smoke by Aiden and Shelby when we first got together. I've already gone over that story, so I won't rehash it.

In the category of harder drugs, my experience is even less. Kevin was addicted to a whole lot of things when he was in his teens and twenties, both prescription and non-, and he told me stories about some of the awful things that had happened. By the time we met, he'd been clean for quite a few years, and was proud of that fact. When Aiden came into my life the first time and my relationship with Kevin fell apart, Kevin suggested giving me E as a way of putting it back together.

I wasn't pleased with that suggestion. In fact, it disturbed me deeply, for several reasons. The biggest was that he thought drugs were an okay way to address a relationship problem. The second is that he wasn't going to do the E himself; he was just going to feed it to me. I felt like he was trying to activate sort of cheat code in my brain, to reprogram me to be infatuated with him because he was desperately unsatisfied with reality.

The third issue was that his own experience with E had been a bad one, landing him in an ice bath in the emergency room. When I asked him if that might happen to me, he theorized that because I have weird issues controlling my body temperature anyway, there was a pretty good chance it would.

I took that combination of factors to mean that he was okay with potentially killing me if it meant I might fall in love with him again. False love, mind you. Drug-induced "love," that he assured me would be permanent.

I didn't take the E.

I'd read descriptions of good E trips that sounded like fun, and I'd had enough interest previously to have written a novel based on the results of an unintended E trip. (They say to write what you know, and clearly research was needed.) But after that stupidity, I just put the interest away in a box, along with a few other things I had to accept that I'd never do as long as I stayed with Kevin. (Among the other contents of that box: fuck a hot guy. I distinctly remember the day I sighed and gave up on that one. God I'm glad I took the lid back off my box...)

When Aiden and I were back together again, I remembered that he used to do E. I considered asking about it, then told myself that was a dumb idea if I'd ever had one. We were adults, and I should damn well act like one, not like someone who never grew beyond high school.

One night I activated the Power of Drunk Texting, and thoroughly confused Aiden by asking him something like, "Do you still do the things you used to do?"

He asked me the next morning what I meant, and I winced and told him not to worry about it. Maybe I even claimed I couldn't remember what I meant. But somehow, eventually, it came out that I had been referring to E, and I admitted that I was interested. He said they had something whose street name I no longer remember, but somehow I memorized the chemical: 2,5-dimethoxyphenethylamine. (I got serious about doing my research.) We never did do whatever that was, but one day he asked if my interest extended to "other things." I said please don't hint around, just specify, and he specified acid.

I thought about it and said why not. Shelby asked me during a car ride whether I really wanted to do it or whether I was letting him push me around, and I assured her that I wouldn't let anyone push me around on that particular subject. I was grateful for her check-in.

On a lazy afternoon, we dropped the acid. I baked cookies while we waited for it to hit. We played with a hula hoop. We drank some wine. Nothing happened. Long story short, the doses weren't as strong as Aiden thought they were, and we ended up taking three hits each. Everything was hysterically funny, and I couldn't go to sleep when I was tired...and that's about it. The most spectacular feature was the boredom. I didn't see any dragons, and I finally got to sleep around 5am, mildly annoyed that it couldn't have been earlier.

At some point during the long night, Aiden handed me a glass jar full of ice and smoke and told me inhale it. He explained to my confused look that the ice cools off the smoke so it doesn't burn. I did as he told me, and succeeded only in reminding myself just how disgusting pot smells and tastes. Yuck. Why do people do this again?

A few months after that, there was the Meltdown. Two months further along, I agreed to be a supplier for my mom to ease the suffering brought on by the chemo, then deeply questioned myself for a couple of days. Shelby finally pointed out that I was mixing up the medical and recreational use camps, and I felt much better after that.

Caught up to last weekend, Aiden had procured some E. Shelby and I came home from an afternoon of brewing mead with Eben, and within five minutes of walking in the door, Aiden said to me, "You know what I think we should do tonight? We should roll."

That term was new to me, but I figured it out from context. I didn't say yes or no. When Shelby came downstairs, he said the same thing to her. We sat and ate dinner in relative silence, while a ping-pong ball careened around in my head, knocking against the inside of my skull. Yes, no, yes, no, what the hell, I wasn't prepared for this!

When we finished eating, Aiden went upstairs, and Shelby checked in. "No," I said, knowing that I was a level of freaked out that would lead to bad things. She nodded and said she had sensed that.

Aiden returned with a bottle and said, "So, shall we roll?"

"No," Shelby and I answered in unison, and he looked slightly taken aback, but said that was fine. He said that today had seemed like a good day because we didn't have to be anywhere tomorrow, and I said that while theoretically today was fine, springing the idea on me without warning wasn't going to work. The suddenness of the whole thing somehow triggered panic, and I had a moment of needing to prove that I could still control my own situation by saying no. (What am I, two years old?)

That treatise brings me up to date on the logic and events side of things, but doesn't do much to explain the mess in my head. I think I'll have to go a more poetic and less structured route to express that. To be continued...

On Consent

I have the sort of relationship with Consent that isn't acknowledged by well-intentioned sex-educational materials that say things like, "You have to have explicit consent, every time!" I get where they're going with that, and I don't fault them; I'm as against rape as any human with a heart. Particularly with a new partner whom you don't know well, the line between "fuck yes" and "god no" is often not a line at all, but a foggy field. The safest assumption is obviously to wait for the "yes" before the "fuck."

I'm rarely one to shy toward safety, however. I'll generally choose adventure over being comfortable. And how will I ever know what fun might be hiding in that foggy field if I don't take a step in and a wander around? Fear can be a hot button for me. My wiring is a little crossed, and I don't feel bad about it. Apologizing for who I am is pointless and only leads backward.

Aiden has made it clear that he's uncomfortable pushing the consent boundary. If one of us says we're sleepy, or simply doesn't respond to a neck or a shoulder gripped firmly in his teeth, it doesn't go any farther. Sleep is had, and sex is not.

I respect that. He explained to me a while back what the Trust looks like from the Dom's perspective: the faith that the sub will communicate, that they won't call the cops if something goes wrong in scene, that they won't deliberately mistranslate between the outside world and the private one.

I do respect that caution. But sometimes I don't want to be respected. I trust you to respect me in daily life, and to judiciously lay that respect aside when the moment is right.

Sometimes sleep is necessary; sometimes one of us isn't well (I promise not to eat any more pumpkin bean cake), or has to be up early. I don't say no all that often. But even then, sometimes it's a white lie. It's a challenge. It's a test. It's not really a no. I don't know how to communicate that to you, though.

All I can say is, I have a safe word. It's not "No," and the only experiment that would cause a true rift between us is ignoring its use.

The Edges

We bumped up against that wall again this weekend, the one that pushes him harder than it pushes me, where my boundaries are farther out than he's yet explored. I got annoyed and full of, We just had this conversation - why are we having it again?

He attacked me in the bathroom and we had a bit of a showdown. The entertaining kind that was mostly arm-wrestling and glaring. Then I got in the shower to wash off both the sex and the fight, and he followed me, and kept talking. Unable to get over it while it was still being poured on my head, I shut down and refused to talk, and finally started crying while trying to explain that the shower is not an okay place for this conversation.

Once I was dry and clothed again, I was together enough to thank him for pushing me and for opening up and admitting that he was nervous, and reiterate that it was not the wrong thing to do, it was just the wrong place to do it. He said that we're still learning, which is an attitude that I should use more often myself.

And we are making progress; I shouldn't overlook that fact. On Saturday evening he pinned me to the bed and started biting my side, digging his teeth in and tickling me with his tongue until I was shrieking and flailing. Shelby came in from the shower to see what all the commotion was about. I yelled and gasped and beat the wall until I couldn't deal anymore and yelled for him to stop. And he didn't. He kept right on biting me while I kicked and screamed and laughed, and it felt so good to be ignored.

When we were first falling unexpectedly into a relationship many years ago, he pulled me into an experience of BDSM that I hadn't had before. I'd played with handcuffs and hot wax and what have you, but I'd never felt what I've come to think of as the "real thing" - the power exchange, the intensity, the shift in perspective that comes with trusting someone so completely, even when you're scared of where it all might be going. I don't remember how the subject of BDSM ever came up between us. I don't know how he sensed that it was where I needed to go. I just remember him asking if I wanted to call him Sir, and answering, "Yes, Sir" without hesitation, because there was no other answer.

From that experience I learned to follow him; sexually, at least. He had more experience, and a mysterious but thrilling way of knowing what I wanted even when I didn't. He led me into things, told me how it was going to be, told me his deliciously twisted plans for me, and I ate it up. It was thrilling, and terrifying, and beautiful.

Even after we broke up and didn't speak anymore, I couldn't fill in the hole he had carved for himself in my psyche. Kevin ordered me one time to call him Sir, and I flat-out said no. When he asked why not, clearly sensing a storm behind my refusal, I told him that was Aiden's name. And he apologized, further cementing my knowledge that he wasn't worthy anyway.

When Aiden and I got back in touch last year and and were spending lots of time chatting about this and that, getting to know each other again, he mentioned that I should remember what it looked like when he took the leash off the Dom side of himself. I brushed it off with a demand to know why he would want to remind me of that. From the other side of a computer keyboard, it was easy to feign a screen of disgust over what was actually a powerful wave of, Oh god, yes please.

We've gotten to go many more places, play with many more things, and take our sweet time doing it over the last year, more so than we ever could have the first time around, when both of our lives were in uproar. He's made good on a handful of his threats, and proven that he knows a thing or two about how I work, both physically and mentally.

Apparently we've now explored enough that we're reaching some of his untested boundaries, instead of all of mine. Knowing that's the explanation, the grumpiness is giving way to a desire to hold hands and go exploring. Sometimes even I need to be reminded to look for the silver lining. I do love a good adventure...

Coming Around

I guess I panicked a little more than was necessary about the whole "death of passion" thing...but that's been my experience in the past. The first few weeks or months of a relationship are great, and then it gets boring. I don't ever want to be in a Hallway Sex relationship, where the partners just say "fuck you" as they pass in the hallway. Perhaps wanting to be conscious has led via over-correction to paranoia.

Aiden pointed out to me today that he's a bit new to this too, saying, "The D/s dynamic I have with you is the deepest and most intense one I have ever sustained. And sometimes I get wrapped up in the fuzzy being in love with you."

My first reaction was to point out that I tend to forget that, because it doesn't exactly add to the effectiveness of his Domination if I'm reminding myself that he's new to it.

But after some further consideration, I realized that reminder may have been exactly what I needed. Not to trigger my sympathy or what have you, but because the realization that he doesn't feel he has all the answers already makes me more willing to help find them.

He told me last week that he was enjoying an image in which I sat in front of him, telling him my sexual fantasies, while he slowly ordered the removal of my clothing one piece at a time. That's one of the most terrifying things he's ever said to me, and even though we were sixty miles from each other at the time and he wasn't asking me to do it then, I had a knee-jerk fear reaction.

Talking face-to-face is hard for me. Talking about my fantasies is also hard. The thought of combining those two things made me want to cry. I had an image of myself sitting down, clamming up, trying unsuccessfully to force words out, and then just freaking out and crying shamefully. That's what I did last time someone put me in that position.

A few days later I wrote the I Want entry, partially because it was on my mind and I felt like writing something hot, and partially to head off Aiden's threat. "There's nothing to say - I've already told you everything."

But my thoughts have changed a little. It feels less like a pressuring threat with today's new considerations and more like he's legitimately looking for ideas. So, I have one more that didn't make it into the poetic written record.

Ask me sometime. In person.

...maybe feed me a glass of mead first.

I Want

I want you.

I want you to want me.

I want you desperate, and desperately.

I want to tell you no and have you ignore me.

I want to do bad things with you, things that we shouldn't be doing. I want you to do bad things to me.

I want to be afraid. Of getting caught, of falling, of getting in too deep. Of you and your twisted mind. I can't emerge from the water until I've been under it.

Make it last.

I want you to take what's yours, and what's mine. Ignore my silly arguments. Tell me how it is. Tell me I can take it or leave it, but the things on the table are what they are.

Push me. Challenge me. Make me.

I want to go where we aren't allowed. I want to be a breath away from getting caught.

I want to know that there are consequences.

I want you to take a stand.

I want to dare.

I want you.

Sparky Is Dead

I drove Shelby home from my own town the other night, and we had a remarkable stream of Productive Conversation the whole time. We talked about lots of things over the course of the hour-plus drive, but the moment that sticks in my head was something she said while making the point that she sees Aiden as a very mutable person who sometimes mysteriously forgets who he used to be.

"He asked me the other day, Skylar wants me to be more dominant and I don't really understand...how do I do that?"

For a moment I was speechless, before blurting out something like, "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Sir has forgotten who he was. My dom - uncapitalized not in error - lost the spark. I saw it going, but I actually managed to have a little faith for once and decided he was just doing it to tease me.

See where faith has gotten me. Maybe being a cynical bitch all the time would be less disappointing.

He made some effort this weekend in the direction of being rougher with me, but I don't know how he's going to pull this one out. If there's one thing in which I have to have absolute trust, it's that my Dom knows what he's doing and has a plan. If he's just lost and wandering, I'm not going to put myself in his hands.

The whole assertive, confident, cocky Dom thing was what made him so exciting in the first place. Adrenaline and intrigue are what I got hooked on. And without that...I don't think there's a whole lot of attraction left.

Shelby said she got over losing her respect for him. She says that about most disappointments - "Yeah, I was angry. And then I got over it." I don't have that. I can't just give up. If I really do lose all the respect I've ever possessed for him, it'll be over. If he's no longer interested in my submission, or in being my Dom, I'll be heartbroken. And I'll go away.

I'm worried about where it's all going. Maybe moving in with them is a mistake. At least I know where I stand with Shelby; she and I have a pretty steady boat most of the time. Aiden's changing just puzzles the hell out of me. I don't understand what happened, and honestly, I'm kind of afraid to hear the answer.

Of all the places I could've imagined us ending up, "slow boring death of passion" wasn't one of them.

Random vs. Seldom

As good as the sex is with Aiden, sometimes I realize it's become a little normal and I'm itching for that extra something...the pain, the fear, the "unpleasant" things that make it so much sweeter. I was prodding him last night via instant message, and he told me, "Random reinforcement, doll."

"I have a hard time with random when it's also seldom," I replied. Not every sexual encounter has to be kinky. Vanilla is a flavor, after all; it isn't a blank sheet of paper. But when it becomes a little sprinkling of kink on a background of vanilla, I get twitchy.

One of the things I found most exciting when we got together was the taste of upcoming exploration. Sometimes it feels like he's forgotten about that. That's when I poke and prod and get annoying and bratty, and eventually escalate to spanking him just to get retribution. He's so hot when he gets that angry glint in his eye.

Stepping Onto the Long Road

Mom had her first chemo treatment yesterday. We arrived at the hospital at 10am, had an appointment with the doctor, and then were led into the chemo ward. It was a long room with a row of recliners along one wall, in front of windows that provided some nice sunlight. It was quiet, most of the chairs still empty, and mom chose one in the middle, with a plastic teddy bear sitting on the windowsill.

A nurse named Ariana came over and explained the procedure. She accessed the port that had been installed last week, and the flow of hydration and various scary chemicals began. Over the course of about three hours, there were two bags of fluid, a dose of ativan, a dose of a long-acting antiemetic, two types of chemo, and finally an anticoagulant to clear the port.

It was simultaneously totally uneventful and completely terrifying. Long hours - about six all told - of sitting, talking with various people, knitting, holding mom's hand, and watching things drip in tubes. Trying to push away the thought that I'm sitting there being supportive, watching my mom get willingly poisoned. Alternately not feeling much, and occasionally biting down tears as thoughts of the year to come refused to be ignored.

We went out to dinner afterwards at a Vietnamese restaurant that she likes, stopped at a pharmacy, and then went home. I escaped upstairs and hid in my old bedroom for a while when we got there, having temporarily reached the end of my ability to be an upright, functional adult. I called Aiden, barely managed not to burst into tears in his voicemail, then just lay there being blank for a while. Eventually I returned to the public space, made some tea, and read a book.

By 8:30, mom was clearly flagging, and went off to bed. I encouraged her to wake up during the night long enough to take her assigned antiemetic, since waking up for a few minutes would be infinitely better than waking up puking. I finished the movie we'd been watching, then went up to bed myself. Picking up my phone, I saw that I had 9 missed calls and several Facebook and text messages from Aiden and Shelby. Apparently I had worried them when I left my phone upstairs to charge and disappeared.

We chatted for a few minutes before I went to sleep. I was grateful to find that Aiden had left me a voicemail. I needed to hear his voice but was crying too hard to call.

I was up at 6 this morning, headed back to work. Mom called to me as I was leaving, and I went to check on her. She was smiling and said she felt okay except for some stomach cramps, and she had taken her medicine as directed. I gave her a kiss and headed out on a long, cold motorcycle ride back home. She looks okay now, but I know this is only the beginning of a long trek through a valley, and it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. I can smile through anything, and I will - she's depending on me for my positive attitude. But behind the face, I know I'm going to spend a lot of time taping up my heart.

The Itch and the Mustache

I have a three-year itch. I know, it's supposed to be seven, but try telling that to my high-energy, easily-bored subconscious. Status quo is not stimulating.

My latest need for upheaval centers around my employment and finances. I'm sick of this damn job, and I've got a plan to get out of it that centers dually around that inheritance check I mentioned and some lifestyle changes. I've been reading my way through the archives of a blog called Mr. Money Mustache (Financial Freedom Through Badassity) and charting my way out.

Here's my plan. I'm going to sell my car as soon as possible (yesterday would be great), pay off the loan, buy a cheap replacement car, and pour any leftover cash into my debts. When the Damn Check shows up, I'm going to pay off the rest of my debts (credit card and student loans), and invest anything that's left over. I'll keep working the 9-5 just long enough to build up a small cash cushion, then pay Shelby a few months' advance rent and move in with her and Aiden. I'm going to restart the webcomic I began in 2010, that by 2012 was paying me more than enough per month to cover the rent that Shelby requested.

Those are the major things. There are smaller ones, too, to help it all go forward. My motorcycle is finally fixed to the point where she's ready to be inspected, and I'm going to ride her as far into cold weather as I can handle. I'll install a 12V plug and get some heated gear (used, of course) and handgrips. She gets 60mpg...how can I not? I'm cooking almost all of my food myself now, and I don't really eat breakfast. I'm walking to work and biking to the grocery store. I'm telling Verizon to fuck off and replacing my phone with one from Republic Wireless.

I actually had nightmares last night that I bought things I didn't need, and felt a little silly when I woke up in a panic, trying to figure out how to return them.

I'm also geeking out about investing, learning about the different types of retirement accounts and rollovers and personal investing and interest rates and risk calculation, and and and...I love numbers. I really do.

The biggest day-to-day change will obviously be living with Aiden and Shelby. Shelby initially suggested the idea several months back, and I considered it lightly; it didn't seem like something I really wanted to do at the time. I saw it as an unnecessary upset to the relationship that would cause more problems than it would solve. I'm particular about my personal space, and I find it a difficult and time-consuming process to accustom myself to new roommates or housemates. I need my me-time to recharge, and I get grumpy and nasty when there's interference with that process. Even if Aiden, Shelby, and little Aiden were as quiet as my current roommate, it would still be three times the noise level I currently operate in. And none of them are that quiet.

Thinking about this potential issue yesterday, I had what appears to be a pretty brilliant idea, an image of what life could look like in this new situation, and now I'm excited. I have to separate my working hours and area from my non-working ones, and I have to be able to spend some time in my introvert bubble on a regular basis. I also know that I'm going to miss the mornings when I can get up early and have the house to myself...

...or not. If I combine those things, I can have all of the above. I can get up early, make my coffee, have the house to myself while everyone else is still asleep, and get started on my work. By the time everyone else gets up, I'll be holed up at my desk (what's currently a spare room will be mine for a drafting/music space). I can join Aiden and Shelby for breakfast, return to work when she goes to work, and then come out and be social when my work is done.

Have I mentioned I'm excited?

Mom

When I was sixteen, my mother came home one day with a scary announcement: she had cancer. One of her breasts was full of calcifications, a condition called DCIS (ductal carcinoma in situ). A surgeon had told her she needed a mastectomy, but she wasn't comfortable with that and was looking for other options.

Her search for other options became a complete lifestyle change. She went from being a fairly normal suburban mother in terms of her eating and living habits to being what I would call a hippie-dippie granola bar. She explored and read and talked to people, and became a born-again health nut. The emotionally-closed mother I had always known suddenly started getting in touch with her feelings and crying at random, and while I certainly couldn't blame her, it made me uncomfortable.

Then she started trying to get me on the bandwagon, and I ran like hell. Good luck telling your teenage daughter, who's full of her own angsty drama, that the way you brought her up was actually all wrong and now it needs to change. It became a point of pride for me that I could hide any and all of my emotions, no matter the situation, that I was as solid as a rock and absolutely unflappable. She alternately told me that she appreciated my cool head, and that I was going to do myself damage bottling all my feelings. I stuck to my guns. I was in a place in my life where I had no close friends, so I had no one to share with anyway. I became the sullen goth girl who floated through the halls at school, talking to no one, sharing nothing, slipping quietly into depression while no one watched.

Mom went to energy healers and naturopaths, who acted like therapists and helped her to see that my dad's addiction was poisonous to all of us. (Duh.) He grew angry with her for listening to "those crazy people" who were blaming him for all her problems. I listened to both sides, refusing to provide opinions or emotions to anyone.

The next time I heard about the cancer was the following year. We were on a family ski trip to Colorado with my then girlfriend, Petunia. My mom had made an appointment with some kind of natural healer out there. I wasn't sure what they were doing, and mom didn't want to talk about it. I could never tell whether she was shy about her treatments or whether she was trying not to burden me with information she felt I didn't need. Either way, I never pushed. And I don't think I ever heard about the cancer again. That was nine years ago.

Two weeks ago, mom called me and said we needed to talk. She had bad news, and wanted to tell me in person. We made plans to meet for dinner the following night, and I spent the next 24 hours freaking out about what could be wrong. All I could imagine was that the cancer was back. That was the only thing I could dig up from the past for use as a clue.

I was right. It turns out that the silence I had taken to mean as respite had actually been ignorance. The cancer is back, bigger and badder and more of a threat. It was never actually gone. She chose not to deal with it, and my faith that she wouldn't have made such a stupid choice simultaneously came to light and was destroyed.

Some test results came in a week later, and there's good news and bad. The good news is that it's not metastasized, which had been a concern due to a swollen lymph gland. The bad news is they are still recommending aggressive chemo as well as a mastectomy. Her next step is getting a second opinion and considering her options, and the way she said those things put me on edge. She is considering whether or not to do the chemo. If she chooses not to, I'm going to have a lot to say about that. She ignored it once, and while it is her body and her choice, I'm not just going to pretend it's fine if she tries to do that again. Look what happened last time.

No Worth in Words

My friend Bruce's birthday is today, and we had a party for him last night. Food, games, cake, general hanging out. There were a few people in the group that I hadn't met before. They fit right in. And I came to the sad realization that I do not.

The people that I attract as friends are usually various forms of geeky. I'm a geek myself; computer programmer and communications technician. But those aren't the forms of geek I attract. My non-derby friends are all RPGers, video gamers, LARPers, Trekkies, and Dr. Who nerds. They're super awesome people and I adore them. They have lots of conversations that I don't understand, and I've stopped asking to be read into those conversations because there are too many and it takes too much explaining. At any get-together there will be some stretch of time where I sit in my corner and listen politely until the conversation moves on to something I understand. I'm fine with that.

But last night, the conversation never moved on. They went from geekdom to geekdom to geekdom, never hitting on one that interested me even slightly. I sat in my corner and listened politely for hours. Eventually I left, having decided I would rather be asleep, thinking I would've been better off staying at the pool party that I had left to attend Bruce's birthday (although I wouldn't actually have skipped out on his birthday party).

To catch up on all of their fandoms so I could actually participate in these conversations would take hundreds of hours of watching TV and movies and playing video games, none of which I have the remotest interest in doing. The self-reflection sent me looking for a mirror I can't quite find...what is it that I do? What do I talk about when I talk? I'm constantly busy, but how do I spend my time, if not on the aforementioned things? The answer seems to be derby...is there anything left in my life but derby? Have I become a dumb jock?

Firstly, the "dumb jock" stereotype implies a lie, that being a meathead makes you dumb. To the contrary, working out regularly and taking good care of your body actually improves your brain function. Logically, I know that I cannot have become a dumb jock.

What can I talk about? Derby, in great depth and at great length. Communications technology, with lesser depth and breadth. I've been working in the field for five years now, and I know I've learned a lot, but I still feel dumb in comparison to all the things I don't know. I ride a motorcycle, but I don't geek out about it; I just ride it. I shoot guns, but I don't discuss ammo types or barrel bores. A while back, I spent a lot of time studying relationships, and for a while I could've talked relationship theory pretty intensely...but not anymore (another post, another time to explain that one). I spin circus props but I don't study those either. I don't nerd out about cars, or comics, or movies, or computers.

I'm a doer, not a talker. I would much rather pick something up, take it apart, program it, modify it, make it into something else, throw it, chase it, break it and repair it, or just build something new. I don't want to sit in a chair for hours and discuss it.

Somehow this makes me feel really stupid.

Meltdown: Productive

This weekend ended with an emotional meltdown on my part, that got passed on to Shelby on Monday night. On the bright side, I got something out in the open that had been bothering me, and I also think we as a group are getting better at fighting in a more productive way.

Saturday night my team had a game, and we took a rough beating, but left with the satisfaction that we had accomplished the non-points-related goals we had set for ourselves. On Sunday, Aiden, Shelby, and I hung out at the pool with my derby wife, Ninja, and had a lovely relaxing afternoon. Then Ninja went to a movie with another friend, and the three of us and the kid had dinner and drinks at the house. After dinner I cleaned up and did dishes - our usual balance, since Shelby provides the food and Aiden cooks.

When I finished the dishes, I realized the house was completely silent, and went around looking for everyone. I found the two of them outside smoking pot (the kid was in bed). I made a "WTF" gesture at Aiden through the door, and he just smiled obliviously.

Sometimes when I get angry I rage and pout and stomp off in a huff...but when something is really, seriously wrong, there's a creepy calm that falls over me. I went upstairs, packed my bag, returned to the kitchen, grabbed my computer and my derby gear and all the things that I had left around, and packed up my car. My next action in the past would've been to drive away without saying goodbye, but I had promised both of them that I would work on opening my mouth and speaking when there was a problem, so I went back inside.

I was finishing my drink when they reappeared. "We've been plotting against you," Shelby said. I wasn't mad at her, so I managed not to lose my shit. I just stared at her, downed the last sip of gin, and put the glass in the sink. Aiden went upstairs, and Shelby went to do something in the living room. I took a deep breath, resisted the urge to run one more time, and went upstairs. Aiden was in the bedroom.

"How is it okay," I asked, "to go outside and get fucking high while I do your dishes? What am I, some kind of slave?" I don't like addressing problems with words because I tend to fall apart, and I was losing it fast. I plowed through the rest of my statement before I lost the ability to speak. "That is so disrespectful. I am so hurt right now." And I burst into tears.

Aiden looked shocked. "I didn't mean it like that. I totally see how it came across that way. I'm sorry," he said. Shelby appeared behind me. I don't know if she had heard me or if she's that intuitive, but she immediately knew what was wrong. She took a seat in a chair. I inched toward the door, but Aiden shut it and put his arm against it, probably knowing I was on the verge of making a break for it. I twitched and considered asking him to open it again, but instead I backed away from him as he stepped forward, trapping myself in the corner made by the wall and the bureau.

The starting accusation sounds silly unless you know what's behind it, which is a lot. They prodded me with some questions, and once I got going, I almost couldn't stop. The summary is that Aiden displays addictive behaviors that are triggery to me. Not only do I worry about him, but I worry more and in a more deeply personal way than many people would, because my father was an alcoholic and his addiction tore apart our family before eventually killing him.

I first became aware that he was an addict when I was fourteen, and over the next six years, I watched things fall apart. Our family grew strained. My mom tended toward the "see what consequences your actions have wrought" type of spouse, and harbored a lot of anger toward him, which I adopted. He went to rehab three times, and was never clean for more than six months. He told us he had ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease) and only had a couple of years to live. Then it turned out he was lying. Then he had cancer. But he lied about that too.

My mom kicked him out of the house and he moved to the next town. He had lived there about two years when he went to the emergency room because he was having trouble walking. While there, he had a seizure, and they sedated him. He never woke up again.

I'm not afraid to tell anyone who asks what happened. The usual explanation is, "My dad was an alcoholic with PTSD from the Vietnam war and he drank himself to death." I can say it with absolutely no emotion, and I do so fairly often. My mom tried to tell me that it wasn't appropriate that people know that, and I basically told her to go fuck herself. I refuse to perpetuate the lies with which alcoholic families are so often riddled. I'm not ashamed of who he was or what he did, and if his story can help someone else, I will be happy to tell it a million times.

But I forget that people don't see the emotion behind it. I'm not a fragile person, and I have a pretty solid awareness of my own feelings that allows me a fair amount of control over them. This is undoubtedly the most triggery subject in my life by far, but even then, 99% of the time it's not a problem. I drink; my friends drink; it doesn't concern me.

I started noticing a while ago - actually, the second time that I ever hung out at Aiden and Shelby's place - that he exhibited behaviors around pot that made me uncomfortable. It was a small thing at first, and I ignored it. Very gradually the small things collected and started to bother me more.

The time she asked him, "You're usually itching to go smoke a bowl by now, what's wrong with you?" The time he said he had to go smoke before we worked on the kitchen or he wouldn't be able to work. The several times he's gone to smoke before sex, like he needs to be high to enjoy us. The time she told me, "I just do it because he does it. He needs it." The time I asked him what would happen if he didn't smoke before sex and he couldn't answer me. The time he ran off after sex and before sleeping to go smoke. The time he left me alone at fire camp to go smoke with complete strangers after we had just been warned by the coordinators about the zero-tolerance policy that would get us kicked out for any substance use. The chronic cough I don't think he even realizes he has. The fact that he'll go do it by himself even when Shelby won't go with him. The illogical amount of money he spends on drugs when his boss doesn't even pay him half the time, and I've heard Shelby guilt him about it.

It adds up to a picture that gives me a fucking panic attack. And I felt like I couldn't say anything, for several reasons... (1) It's not something I understand. Pot doesn't do anything to me, so I can't gain any direct empathy for what's happening when he's high. I just know he's different, and it freaks me out. (2) It's not my business to tell him what to do. I don't want to be the controlling bitch who makes demands. (3) I don't have a problem with drinking, and that should be my trigger if anything is, so I feel kind of hypocritical complaining about the pot when I'm happy to drink all night long.

But my emotions finally overcame my logic, and I sobbed and yelled and got icky feelings all over everyone. Shelby was amazing. She sat down and listened and answered my questions and agreed or disagreed where it was relevant, without getting emotional or taking any sides. When she said, "Oh yeah, his addictive personality drives me crazy," I almost started crying again, this time in relief. I wasn't making it up out of my damaged paranoia.

Her theory is that it's actually the cigarettes that are driving Aiden's addictive behaviors and not the pot; that he smokes pot as an excuse for a nicotine fix. She said she had stopped going outside with him recently because she didn't want to condone it. I had noticed that, and had been grateful to her every time she stayed inside, but it didn't change his behavior at all.

They both said they knew it had bothered me to a certain extent, but hadn't known how much (said Aiden) or what to do about it (said Shelby). Aiden said the fact that it bothered me enough to make me freak out and cry - something I don't think he's ever seen me do - made a big impression. Shelby told me it was sweet that I cared that much about him, and I said that was kind of embarrassing. She asked why, then thought about it and said I was totally right, it was embarrassing, and we had a laugh.

After many words and many tears, the going-forward is that they're going to quit cigarettes and see what happens from there. I told him the most important thing is to be honest with me. I understand that quitting is not a straight-line process; there will be slip-ups, and that's okay. What would absolutely not be okay is lying to me about it. My experience with addiction has given me a pretty bleak view on how it goes, particularly on how many lies will be told to salvage the addiction at the expense of the loved ones. I'm aware that that experience was not had with Aiden, however, and I'm going to do my best not to smear it all over him.

I spent Monday in a truck with two of the guys from work. We drove 800 miles between 5am and midnight to pick up some equipment in another state. When we decided in the afternoon to do the whole trip in one day rather than staying over, I told Aiden I'd have the next day off, and he called in to work so we could hang out. We got back to town just shy of midnight, and I took a shower and snuck into bed next to Aiden. When Shelby got up and he asked where she was going, I realized no one was actually asleep and something was fishy.

"She's mad at me," Aiden said when she had stepped out the door.

"Oh? Why?"

"Because I had a hard time with the rule when it was in place." He was referencing something that happened back in February, when Shelby had been feeling insecure about my presence in the relationship and tried to deal with it by making a rule that Aiden and I couldn't have sex unless she was around. It went badly for everyone. We didn't actually break the rule, but we had a very hard time following it, and since most of it was a grey area anyway, I'm not sure that we entirely obeyed it, either.

"Oh. Yeah. That came up in conversation last night." I'd mentioned in passing while coming off my own meltdown that I'd had to push him off me once to stay within the bounds of the rule. Shelby said later that she hadn't thought about it at the time, but the next day it had floated to the surface again and she had become angry, feeling that he had tried to take credit for more trust than he'd actually earned.

After a bunch of restlessness and Aiden chasing Shelby around the house, I finally dropped off to sleep. The next morning she had gone to work by the time I woke up, and he came back to bed to snuggle and make puppy eyes at me. I would've been fine with discussing what was going on for a while, but experience told me that he wouldn't snap out of his pouty state until she decided to stop being mad at him, and that could be days. I considered going home rather than wasting my day off, then thought maybe we could still go do something fun.

Then he asked me if I'd be willing to work on the kitchen with him. After an 18-hour work day, on my day off, in his girlfriend's kitchen, in a desperate attempt to make her less mad at him...I said hell no. Not my job, in every possible sense. I went in to work instead, deciding to take a different day off that would hopefully not be wasted.

Shelby messaged me as I was driving out of town and said she hoped she hadn't ruined my day. I said it was already ruined but I wasn't mad at her, that I had left and was going to take a different day off. She suggested I go back, and I explained why that wouldn't be helpful. She was apologetic.

"I didn't mean to ruin your day...but I guess ruining his kind of does that." I said not to worry about it; I probably would've been every bit as pissed in the same situation. She explained to me what she was upset about - that he does things that seem sneaky and sets off her paranoia triggers - and when I got to work, I responded with my own side - that I understood her anger, but the rule had been excessively difficult to follow. She understood that too, and we moved on.

I love how logical she can be when angry. It really works much better for me than trying to empathize emotionally in the stereotypically "female" way. She was concerned that I saw her as naive and stupid, knowing what had happened and that she didn't know about it. I said absolutely not; if anything, that situation makes me the really stupid one, because anything that he does to her, he will more than likely do to me too, eventually...and yet I hang around. Now who's naive? Shelby laughed and said that we're both dumb, but at least we get along.

Aiden also apologized when I told him I was annoyed about his kitchen request. He said he never means to trample the flowers in the garden, but sometimes he does, and then flattens everything trying to make it better. Awkward Turtle stumbles through the room, bumping into walls, knocking over chairs, and apologizing for his clumsiness...

Night Walk, part 1 [fiction]

a story by Skylar

The darkened room became bright as electric day for a long moment, a suspended flash of lightning that told me the following thunder would be severe. I smiled, enjoying the image of Aiden's naked shoulder covered with a light sheen of sweat, burned into my retinas long after we were plunged back into darkness.

A crack echoed from the sky straight down through my bones, spilling apart and rolling through the air like an avalanche of giant boulders. The walls shook and the windows rattled.

I sat up in bed and turned to look outside, resting my chin on the windowsill to enjoy the view. Dust whipped up and blew down the sidewalk in miniature funnels, pulling grass clippings and trash along in the frenzy. A stray speck of sand, escaping the coming onslaught, flew in through the screen and stung my cheek. I brushed my face absently with the back of my hand, watching the light show in the sky put the weak glow of the streetlight to shame.

The bed shifted under me, and a moment later I felt Aiden's chin on my shoulder and his arm across my back. His skin was even hotter than the summer night.

"Hi Kitten," he whispered in my ear.

I opened my mouth to reply but was drowned out by the sudden smack of rain against the window. The drops hurled themselves through the screen and were shattered, splashing over my face and arms and creating puddles on the windowsill. A drop of sweat ran down my back.

"You're wet," Aiden said, running a finger down my spine. I shivered as his touch passed over my lower back and heat flared between my legs.

"Not wet enough," I answered, standing up on the bed. "Come on."

I leaped onto the floor and headed out of the room. I couldn't hear his footsteps, but I knew he was following me. Pulling open the back door, I stepped onto the porch and took a deep breath. The warm, soggy air smelled of freshly dampened pavement and rain; the mist splashing off the porch rails coated my thighs, and then my waist and my chest as I took another step forward. I walked down the steps and jumped into the empty street, splashing in the small rivers running down the hill. The downpour soaked my hair in seconds.

The screen door slammed and Aiden splashed down beside me. Admiring him in the dim glow of the street light on the corner, I realized neither of us had bothered to put on clothes before going out into the neighborhood. I grinned. The likelihood of anyone seeing us this deep in the night was so small, it didn't matter.

"Street swimming?" he asked, grinning back at me and raising his eyebrows.

"Hm," I said, pretending to consider it seriously. "It's a little...shallow, don't you think?"

"I think we can go plenty deep," he said, grabbing the back of my neck with one hand and kissing me hard. The rain sheeted down our faces as I wrapped my arms around him and returned the kiss. Our tongues played games, and the feel of his lips started to melt my insides. I ran my hands up his back and over his shoulders. He pressed himself closer to me, and his cock brushed my thighs as he started to get hard.

A sudden splash in the street grabbed my attention, and light washed over us as a car turned the corner.

"Shit!" I said, diving for the side of the road. I jumped over the neighbor's split-rail fence as the car got closer, and saw Aiden do the same out of the corner of my eye. We paused on the grass, waiting for the car to go by, but it pulled even with us and stopped, and a surprised face peered through the driver's window. Aiden and I looked at each other, laughed, and took off running.

We headed through the neighbor's yard, around the house, and over the fence on the other side into the street the car had come from. I crossed the road and cut through the corner of the mechanic's parking lot, Aiden following me now, and sprinted down a side street. Into and out of the yellow circle cast by another street lamp, I plunged into the dark. The scraps of light that usually shone down the street were masked by the rain, and I slowed to a jog.

Avoiding street lamps and some driveways that I knew had automatic floodlights brought us to a deserted back street that climbed a hill. The few driveways that led off it were too long for the houses to be visible. The only exception was the house on the corner, with a driveway that opened onto both streets, separating the house from a fenced-in section of yard. The area beyond the fence was dark, and a steady hum emanated from somewhere inside, barely audible over the splashing of the rain. It sounded familiar, and I had an idea.

"That sounds like fun," suggested Aiden, reading my mind.

"Gate?" I wondered out loud, feeling along the fence. I turned a corner and splashed up the driveway, running my hand along the boards as I went. Several yards on, part of the fence shifted under my touch, and a tell-tale rattle showed me the way. We stepped through the gate and I latched it behind us.

A dim light shone through some bushes, and I picked my way toward it, unsure what might be under my feet between here and there. The answer was alternately grass and some kind of concrete pavers. Aiden made his way ahead of me, more confident that he could handle whatever he might step on in the dark.

The pool showed over the tops of the knee-high bushes before we reached them. Aiden stepped over onto the surround, and a moment later I followed. The water was lit with a beautiful glow that would've disappeared in the dimmest dawn, but that was just shy of blinding in the pitch black of night. The water's surface was broken into a million tiny shards by the rain, and the blue speckled tiles below gave the whole thing an otherworldly sheen.

I wanted to jump in, but feared the splash would draw attention, so I sat on the edge and dipped my feet, then lowered myself down on my palms. The mud I had picked up in the yard swirled away from my feet like ink drops. I tried not to squeal as the cold edge of the water climbed my thighs, my stomach, and my chest. As I let go and sank all the way under, Aiden dove in beside me, somehow managing to get under the surface with barely a splash. The noise of the rain disappeared down here, erased by the steady roar of water pressing on my ears. Forcing my eyes open, I watched him sail through the water, weightless in a cloud of light, then turn sharply and come toward me.

I let out my breath and bobbed to the surface. I felt his hands brush my thighs, then his chest, and he slid himself up my body and popped out of the water. The world was one giant splash for a moment as my ears tuned in. I grabbed the lip of the pool behind me and pushed myself up on my palms. He grinned, shook his head like a dog, and put his hands on the pool deck on either side of my hips.

"I've never seen you so happy to be underwater," he said, pressing himself against me and pinning my hips to the wall with his.

"It's a great night to be wet," I said, returning his grin. I slid down, put my elbows on the rim, and wrapped my legs around his hips. Hooking my ankles together behind his ass, I held him tightly, pressing my lips against him. I felt his cock start to get hard again, and his eyes narrowed as his smile took on a twisted flavor. I shivered, wondering what terrible plan he was concocting for me.

He pushed off toward the center of the pool, and my elbows slipped off the ledge. I had just enough time to draw a quick breath before I sank. I'd never been good at floating, but upon realizing how fast I was sinking, I looked down and saw that Aiden had pushed himself under and was dragging me down with him. I unwrapped my legs and started to swim upward, but he grabbed my ankles and stopped me short, my hands reaching the air but my face still several inches from the surface.

He let go of one ankle and put his hand on my knee, then his other hand on my thigh, dragging me back down to the bottom. I stopped fighting and let myself sink, landing lightly on my knees. His smile was approving, and he put a hand on my chest and pushed me back against the wall, straddling my lap and kneeling on the floor so I couldn't get up.

I didn't like being that far under, and a feeling of panic welled up as I realized he had me trapped. I started to struggle, but he leaned forward and put his lips on mine, grabbing a handful of my hair and holding my head against the wall. Momentarily distracted, I kissed him back, my flailing hands slowing their chase and coming to a quiet inertia in the weightless void. I tasted chlorine and tried not to swallow it. Eventually my body demanded air, and I went to tap him on the shoulder, but he was already releasing me. We popped to the surface, gasping in the rain.

I hadn't taken more than a breath when he grabbed me by the throat and shoved me to the edge, pinning the back of my neck against the concrete rim. His fingers pressed insistently on either side of my throat, and I focused on his face as the rest of the world turned liquid and started to slide out of view. The sadistic gleam in his eyes told me I was in a world of trouble. There was no place I'd rather be, really...in this beautiful fairyland, drenched by the pouring rain...completely owned, lost...

[to be continued]

Getting Wet

Underwater play is one of those ideas that initially occurred to me in the form, "Ha, that would be a stupid thing to do!" It waited 'til I wasn't looking anymore and then sneakily morphed from stupid to fascinating. Sometimes I don't understand how my own mind works.

When I was very little, I nearly drowned twice, once in a swimming pool and once under an inflatable boat in the ocean. Upon becoming a slightly bigger little kid, I took basic swimming lessons, and I did okay. I didn't like putting my face in the water but eventually got over it and learned to love swimming fully underwater. I learned to snorkel in the Cayman islands around the age of 10 or 12 and fell in love; I spent hours drifting in the ocean, admiring the reefs and the fish, discovering a beautiful wonderland.

Around 14 or so, I suddenly developed a fear of swimming pools. I was swimming at my neighbor's, and upon opening my eyes underwater, the sight of the distorted floor and walls and the lights and the drains looking back at me was suddenly the most terrifying thing I had ever seen. I exited with haste and never looked at pools the same way again. I'll still get in them, but they freak me the hell out. I've never really understood what happened that day.

During a class trip to Mexico around my 18th birthday, I nearly drowned again. We were swimming in the Gulf, and I stumbled off an underwater cliff, got pulled under a wave by the riptide, and sucked in a lungful of ocean. Flailing and choking, I had the presence of mind to wait for a dip between waves and scream for help before going under again. A classmate heard me, grabbed me, and swam me to shore, where I puked on my teacher's feet and then sat shivering in the hot sun for a while, processing what had just happened.

I will still get into water, but I avoid the ocean, and I usually don't put my head in. Recently, however, I've been on a roll of facing down my fears, and I decided to add this one to the list. I'm doing damn well conquering my fear of heights (which also cropped up mysteriously in my early teens), and water is my new project.

Aiden, Shelby, their friend Carrie, little Aiden, and I went to Shelby's grandparents' yesterday and spent a lovely hot afternoon in their pool. I began with a jump off the diving board and then started trying to do handstands in the shallow end. I used to be able to do them, but I couldn't seem to figure it out. Every time I put my head under, I lasted about five seconds before popping up again, fighting back panic.

Carrie pointed out there were swim goggles in the poolhouse, and I went and grabbed a pair. Not having to constantly wipe the chlorine out of my eyes would certainly help. With shiny new purple fish eyes, I left the handstands for later and started doing bobs to reaccustom myself to putting my head under the water repeatedly.

I noticed Aiden watching me intently and gave him a quizzical look.

"I've never seen you have such an intense panic response," he said. "It's really interesting."

"Have I mentioned that I don't like water?"

"Of course. It makes me think twice about playing with you in this environment."

"Well, not right away," I agreed. "I'm working on it on my own right now. But I'll get there."

By the end of the afternoon, I could go from edge to edge completely underwater. I couldn't quite make end-to-end yet, but I'll get there. I really like that particular pool because it has no floor drain, making the underwater view more scenic than threatening.

I spent the last half hour or so sharing Aiden's inner tube, cuddled up on his back with my chin on his shoulder, while the three of them discussed the merits of carnivals and theme parks. Eventually the girls got out, and Aiden turned to face me. We were still squeezed together in the inner tube, so I picked up my legs and wrapped them around his waist.

"Look what you did," he said, after a few minutes of kissing and petting. I didn't need to look; I could feel him.

I grinned. "I'd say sorry...but I'd be lying."

Going Under

It was the end of May, heading into a weekend away at a fire spinners' retreat, that Aiden lead me into a great personal triumph. The three of us went skating and then got dinner at the bar near their house. I had a couple of drinks and started doing cartwheels down the street as we walked home. I nearly missed the house, and when Aiden yelled for me to stop, I was so dizzy I couldn't walk a straight line. My valiant attempts to avoid the tree in the front yard resulted in me walking straight into it, and Aiden grabbed me and guided me up the ramp into the house.

Once in the kitchen, he bent me over the table and started spanking me. Shelby gave us an "oh my" and then disappeared upstairs. Aiden pulled me upright, then shoved my back against the fridge and kissed me hard.

The next thing I knew, there was a roaring in my ears and I felt like I was returning to consciousness. I didn't think I had that much to drink. Oops. I don't even remember what he was just doing to me. Now I feel like an asshole. I looked around for a moment and finally said, "I don't know what just happened..."

"I'll tell you exactly what happened," said Aiden, grinning ear to ear. "You hit subspace."

I just stared at him in disbelief and finally said, "I love you."

He explained to Shelby a few minutes later that my dive seemed to be triggered by his choking me, causing me to grey out a little bit and go under. As soon as he said it, I remembered his hand on my throat, but I wouldn't have come up with that memory on my own. I never did remember anything between the choke and the waking up. I don't think much time passed, but honestly, it could've been hours and I wouldn't have known the difference.

I was so high for the rest of the night. Knowing that I can hit subspace is thrilling and I'm looking forward to playing a lot more there.

Helpless

I was tired on Friday night, the lazy kind of tired that just melted me into the mattress and made me part of the furniture. Aiden dealt with it perfectly - he got out the rope and tied me up, my forearms together behind my back and my left leg so that my heel touched my ass. He left my right leg free, but I wouldn't say I was in danger of actually getting away. Then he rolled me onto my back, spread my legs, and started eating me.

My shoulders weren't thrilled with the new requirement, and I had to hold my spine off my wrists to relieve the strain on the bones of my right arm, but I'm not complaining...not at all. I'm reasonably adept at slithering out of various forms of physical entrapment, but I didn't stand a chance against his shibari. Struggling against the ropes, knowing I couldn't get out, reveling in the feeling of being completely under Sir's control and at his mercy...that no matter how hard I fought him, I would lose before I began...

I'm getting wet again just thinking about it. I love when something works that well the first time. I can't wait for more.

Fight, Flight, or Fun

We were spending a lazy afternoon on the couch after a beautiful day of tubing on the river. Shelby was in the kitchen mixing drinks, and Aiden had taken a moment to pull me into a long, slow kiss. Suddenly I felt his hand brush my forehead and then he pinched my nose shut, sealing off my mouth with his and drawing the breath out of me.

It's going to be okay, I told myself, trying not to fight him. I shifted my position so I was lying straighter. This is not worthy of panic. You know he won't kill you.

I held on, focusing on his tongue to keep my body from reacting instinctively, and a moment later he let go.

"It's amazing how much more strongly you react to that than you do to me choking you," he said with a grin. "I can feel your fight-or-flight response."

Even reminiscing now, more than twelve hours later, I feel the need to go take a few deep breaths.

Waking [fiction]

a story by Skylar

The fog was warm, and dark. There was no sound, no light, no sense of my surroundings. The thick air flowed over my skin, caressing me, keeping me suspended in what might have been sleep. Was I asleep? I wasn’t sure, and it didn’t much matter. I took a slow breath, enjoying the comforting nothing holding onto me.

Suddenly a point on my upper back lit into a burning sensation, then started to drip downward. I gasped and my eyes flew open. There was nothing but blackness in front of me, a mystery beyond a wall of light that grew from a circle of candles at my feet. They were without holders, supported on the concrete floor by large puddles of their own wax.

I tried to put a hand on my back, where the burning was continuing on a slow, excruciating path down the right side of my spine, but my hand wouldn’t obey me. Neither would the other hand, and when I tried to bend forward, the floor refused to come any closer. I could turn my head just far enough to see my arms outstretched to my sides, thick black stripes around my wrists and upper arms. Whatever I was fastened to was hidden by the shadow of my own body.

The drop of fire on my back took a detour to my ribs, stopped momentarily, then began again in a different direction. With a great effort I managed to curve my spine and shift to the side a little bit.

“Don’t move.” The voice was right in my ear, and I started.

“What -” I said, and was immediately cut off by a hand over my mouth. “Mmf. Hm!”

“Shhh.” His hand gripped tighter, pressing my lips into my teeth. “If you move, I can’t finish my work.”

I looked sideways, but couldn’t turn my head far enough to see him. “Hm.”

“Are you going to be a good girl and hold still?”

I nodded.

“Good.” His hand came off my mouth, and I took a deep breath as the fiery point made itself known on my left shoulder blade. It traveled at a leisurely pace across my upper back, made a turn on my right shoulder blade, crossed my spine on a downward angle, and slithered down to the center of my sacrum, where it faded away. The trail it left glowed hot in my skin. Soothing warmth spread downward from the searing lines, and I enjoyed it for a moment before it was overpowered by a new journey starting at my neck.

I tried to make sense of the patterns forming on my back, but couldn’t construct an image I recognized. Lost in following the trails, alternately wincing as the lines formed and then reveling in the warming glow they left, it took me several moments to realize it had stopped.

Peeling my eyes open again, I drew in a sharp breath when I found his face a centimeter from mine. I don’t know how I hadn’t felt him breathing on my lips.

He smirked as I drew his face into focus, and his eyes narrowed into an expression that spoke of dark ideas. A shiver went down my spine and between my legs.

His lips parted, and I opened my mouth to return the kiss, but my tongue was met with metal. The warm, smooth surface was topped with a razor-sharp edge. He drew the blade slowly between our tongues, and the metallic taste mingled with that of my own blood. My heartbeat quickened; I could feel his tongue over the edge of the knife, but didn’t dare move any closer.

After a long moment the edge shifted, and then the tip drew away, leaving only an impression of itself. The blade gone, our tongues melted together, and I tasted sweat alongside the blood. Then he stepped away and disappeared.

“Aiden?” I whispered. One of the candles guttered and went out, and I realized it wasn’t the first. The darkness flowed over me again, and I sank into the fog.

What's Beyond Ouch

We were eating dinner on Friday night when we heard...thunder? Gunfire? Fireworks. The three of us took a walk outside to see what we could see, and found traffic piling up on the bridge over the dam where other people had found a good view. They were at least a town away, but possibly even more beautiful at that distance with the water framing the explosions from the bottom.

When the show was over, we walked back, and Shelby tried to pull off my panties from under my dress while I was walking. They got twisted up but didn't come off, and as I was trying to fix them so I could walk correctly, Aiden grabbed a handful and finished the job. I was talking non-stop about something - possibly the removal of my lacy underthings - and he wadded them up and stuffed them in my mouth. He left two fingers inside the wad of black silky fabric, using them to lead me like a bit. Shelby wondered aloud if the occupants of any passing cars might call the cops, as Aiden was holding my head at an odd angle that turned my walking stride into a following-along stumble. I tried to say that I was laughing too hard to cause anyone legitimate concern, but it came out, "Mmm hmmm mff!"

As soon as the front door closed behind us, Aiden shoved me into the dining alcove, placing my hands flat on the table and my head in between them. He pulled up my dress and proceeded to spank me, a couple of times lightly and then harder. His hand made a thorough journey over both of my cheeks and my thighs, hard enough that I stood up, protesting the pain.

"Excuse you!" he said indignantly, pausing to stare at me, and I put my elbows and face back on the table, awaiting my punishment. It would be worse now than if I had just stayed where I was. I tried to relax, knowing it would hurt more if I tensed up. Shelby, sitting in a chair to my right, reached under my chest and started pinching my nipples.

"You're being mean," she said to him as he worked low on my thighs, and I squeaked and scooted the table across the floor.

"I don't think she minds," he said.

"Oh, I didn't say to stop. I just said you're mean."

After he again worked over my thighs and ass, Aiden stopped for a moment and walked away. I heard the drawer of the freezer open in the kitchen. I think Shelby asked if I was ready for ice, and I tried to say I didn't have much of a choice, but I still couldn't talk. She reached over and pulled out my gag, and Aiden returned a moment later and iced me down, freezing the heat off my skin until cold water ran down my legs. I lost track of the ice cube when it touched my lips; he may have put it inside me, but I'm not sure. He definitely put his fingers in.

I moaned. The finger-fucking was a beautiful relief from the spanking, at least for a moment, until he added a fourth finger and then his thumb. I knew what I was in for when he said to Shelby, "She's fighting with the knuckles on my hand." I tried to relax, but I'm not sure how successful the effort was.

He grabbed my hip, or maybe it was my shoulder, and pulled me around. "Flip over." I felt like I'd been glued to the table; turning myself face-up was a struggle, made harder by Aiden's hand still inside me. "Up on the table."

My memory at this point becomes a bit blurry. There was the sound of the table objecting to unusually violent use. Me reaching over my head and putting my hands on the window. Shelby joking that he was going to put me through said window. Fighting the sensation that I was going to throw up by reminding myself that the violation in progress had nothing to do with my stomach no matter how it might feel. And lots and lots of pain.

I felt tears coming on, and I accepted it, but never quite made it to actually crying. I couldn't stop gasping long enough. At some point it occurred to me that I should have the safe word handy, but I couldn't think of what it was. I let it go and then circled back around to it. What the hell was it again? A sensation floated into my head that described a set of three, and after letting it sit for another moment, I remembered we have a three-part safe word: red light, yellow light, green light. Red was the one I was looking for, but I didn't use it, just let it float nearby in case I needed the life raft.

I have no idea how much time went by while Aiden worked me with his fist. I wanted it to be over, but not enough to actually end it. "I think I need to say 'yellow light' for her," Shelby said eventually, and everything stopped. I took a deep, shaky breath, hanging in the sudden void. The rest of the sensation in my body reappeared slowly, and I floated up to the sound of Aiden's voice.

"You did so well," he said, sounding like he was on the verge of giggles. "I didn't know I could do that to you!"

I wanted to ask what his new discovery was, but didn't have the words.

"Sit up," he told me.

"Why..."

"Come on. Come here, into my arms."

Shelby helped me upright, nuzzling her head into my side and putting her arm around my back. Aiden leaned over me and wrapped his arms around my shoulders. His smile was beautiful.

I was shaking and just trying to breathe, and realized that at some point I must have cried because my face was wet. I held onto both of their hugs like I was rediscovering life.

Eventually the promise of bed lured me off the table, and Shelby grinned at me when I walked into the circle of lamplight in the kitchen.

"You have the best battered-woman cry-eyes right now," she said, and I grabbed my phone and snapped a picture for my own inspection. I did indeed have huge black circles under my eyes.

"You have no idea," Aiden said to me the next day, "How much I loved those overwhelmed tears streaming down your face."

I had to agree; there's no reason I'd rather cry.

Druncle

People tell me - often after a fight has occurred - that I should just say what I'm thinking and not sit on it. I agree there are circumstances in which I need to be better about that; if you are consistently doing something that drives me bananas, it's my responsibility to bring it up.

But there's another circumstance, too, and this is where it becomes a grey area: the moment when acknowledging something makes it more real. Sometimes I keep feelings to myself not because I think secrets are fun or I like drama or I'm afraid of confrontation, but because I think the thing will be easier to work through if it's just me in the arena. Another person's focus can be helpful, or it can simply add more weight to something that didn't need to be that important.

When I've been accused of keeping secrets, that's usually what has happened. I didn't say something at the first sign of whatever-it-was because it wasn't that important at the time, and I'm inclined to sit back and see how things play out rather than make a big deal about them immediately. And some things do get better or disappear, and then I've avoided unnecessary drama by not saying anything. But some things don't, so by the time they reach a point where I've accepted a need to address them, I get the "Why didn't you tell me sooner?" response, and I can never adequately explain just why.

I'm not going to default to bringing up every little thought that passes through my head; my head is loud some days. The voice in the back of my mind is the drunken uncle at the family reunion. Sometimes he's right, and sometimes he's just spewing crazy talk, and life is usually easier after he passes out by the pool.