KELLI. Men had always provided me with sexual satisfaction. I have had a man in my life to fulfill a sexual satisfaction, and that was it. I had no need, desire, or feeling of necessity to have a man actually be in my life. The thought of having a man be a part of my life, prior to meeting Erik, made me want to abandon any male that tried to attach himself to me.

As I painted my nails, I wondered what Erik would say about them. He noticed things like this. He noticed everything. He not only noticed, but he commented. He commented on how I smelled and noticed if I wore something different. He commented on my skin tone, my nails, my clothes, shoes, watches, hair, hair color, attitude, the tone of my voice.

Everything that I did, I thought of him. He had consumed me. He had crawled inside of me and had become part of me, part of my day-to-day life. Even when he was not in my presence, he was part of everything that I did. He was in my mind. He had infected me.

I painted my nails and I hoped. I hoped that he praised me. I hoped that he smiled. I hoped that when he said what he said, whatever it might be, that he ended it with those two words. Baby Girl.

I am ruined.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ERIK. Broken People. I had completed the book and was trying to digest what I had read. The parts about codependency and today’s youth were spot-on. I had never, however, looked at people as broken, only different. We are all different. Looking at humanity as broken was a different approach, and the attraction of broken people to broken people of a similar likeness was ingenious.

Something in me clicked when I read it, like the flip of a switch. All my education, intelligence, people skills, training, understanding, experience, and knowledge were tossed aside. I sat, with an empty mind, and absorbed what I had read. One other part of the book made me really think. It was a more difficult part to come to terms with, but an easy part to comprehend and understand.

“…you don’t give someone your love. They take it. Love is taken. And, when someone takes your love, you will know it…”

 

The taking of love. It made sense. We have little, if any, control over what we feel. And, according to the book, there is no wrong way to feel. I believe that. I have always believed that. How do we know when someone takes our love, I thought. I wondered. I tried to recall every woman I had ever encountered and spent any time with. I tried to decide if I had ever actually loved one of them. I decided, quickly, that I had not.

Someone cannot take, easily, what is protected from their grasp. The taking of love--or the taking of one’s heart--could be easy, I supposed, from someone that had minimal effort in place to protect it. Someone that had erected walls to protect their heart from being taken would be less subject to the theft.

Theft.

The act or an instance of stealing; larceny.

I decided as I sat and reflected, after the first time I read the book, that I had erected walls to protect what I felt was in need of protection. My heart. Not because I was afraid of theft, afraid of it being taken, or afraid of love - protected because I didn’t like feeling pain. Pain from the loss of what it was that we love.

If we didn’t love, we wouldn’t feel pain. If we didn’t have expectations, we never have disappointment if the expectations weren’t met. My heart was protected to protect me. Like a gladiator’s armor protected his heart from the lance of his opponent.

It would take a gladiator with a cunning nature, keen skills, considerable strength, ability, diversity, and endurance to have an opportunity to take my heart. To take my love. After I read the book a second time, I felt vulnerable. I felt unprotected. I felt changed. And that change, for me, was uncomfortable in many ways. My armor set aside, I was exposed to the threat of my opponent’s advances.

To believe that, after thirty-six years of living, a simple book, written by a simple man, could change me. The thought was unnerving. Time passes and things change, yet another quote from the book. Change is as inevitable as the tide. I sat on the edge of my weight bench and thought.

I contemplated lifting weights, as if the strength gained from the workout would provide protection. I felt like a soldier in combat, standing before the opposition weaponless. I felt weak. I wondered if, for all of these years, I had actually been the person that I was becoming, and it had taken a book of unconventional wisdom to get me to realize it.

My mother, unlike Marc’s mother in the book, was not a woman to discuss things like love and compassion. I suspect, in retrospect, that my mother was hurt from the loss of my father more than she ever let me know. She too was an only child, as was my father.  Growing up, I always had her, and I never really took the time to think of what she had or did not have as a support system.

I sat on my weight bench, without protection from harm, and cried. I cried for my mother. I cried because I had lost my father. I cried because I had no siblings. I never got an opportunity to run to a pomegranate tree, rub fruit on my siblings, and get yelled at when I got home. I would, in a sense, now trade anything to have had a father scream at me and call me a dumb fuck. 

Wiping a lifetime of tears from my eyes, I stood up and stretched. Although I knew that I would always be dominant in a sexual relationship, somewhat manipulative, and very slow to accept others into my life, I stood…open to the thought of loving someone. I stood sensitive to the thought of that person being Kelli.

Kelli had proven to me that she was everything that I had ever wanted a woman to be. She was willing, able, and so far, had been open-minded enough to consider all that I had exposed her to. I certainly had not exposed her to all that I had intended to, but if her past performance was indicative of what the future held, she would do extremely well.

Excited for what the future might hold, I went to shower. I stood in the shower like when I was a teen, letting the water run over me until there was no more hot water left. Just stood and let the water pelt me into a trance.

I got out of the shower and dressed, sitting back on the edge of the weight bench. I compared my feelings to the same type of feeling I received after watching a feel-good movie, or a love story like The Notebook. You leave the theatre full of inspiration, and in a few days, that feeling fades.

I knew the degree of what I felt would eventually lessen. But how I felt about life, about love, and the potential of being able to love was real. I have lived a life with walls erected around me and armor protecting my heart. These things, as I read that book, were broken. After reading the book a second time, they had truly crumbled.

The helpless emotional child on the corner of the weight bench was proof of this. Conscious of my vulnerability, I made a decision to tell Kelli nothing. I would proceed with this relationship and see what she felt, and what she made me feel. If, in fact, she captured my heart, or stole my love, I would allow it. In the interim, we would continue a Dominant/submissive relationship of friendship and sex. She would be none the wiser of my epiphany.

The thought of any form of progress in this relationship both excited and scared me. We feared the unknown, and I had no experience with actual, loving relationships or commitment. The lack of experience gave me no certainty and that lack of certainty fed my fear.

My fire of fear was fueled with thoughts of Kelli and her willingness to provide me with whatever I wished of her. I stood from the bench. I had every intention of eventually leaving Kelli when we met. My thoughts now, of her being in my life, caused me discomfort.

We fear the uncertain. That, if nothing else is, is certain.