You might find this story boring. Some experiences are very intense in real life, but it doesn't translate. Like when I tell you that I lay hidden among the bushes, it doesn't capture how much my skin was on alert and how startlingly vibrant every little noise was like the squirrel's claws crackling on the bark. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
To comprehend what it looks like, I've to introduce you to my local city park: Tompkins Square Park. The many mundane details are important to understand what I felt. The southwest corner holds a little space with stone tables with built-in chess boards. The park architects probably thought of the local intelligentsia connecting over brainy challenges and becoming a competitive community. Reality happened and brought a bunch of unsavory characters to huddle together the entire day, seemingly having nothing else to do, and being rejected by normal people found solace in the camaraderie. During covid, the police parked cruisers with flashing lights there to make them uncomfortable and leave.
Who's there? There are homeless people - wearing socks, darkened black from walking the streets without showering for days, hospital tags still on their wrists, and faces ragged from poverty and being in the street. There are the old Latin men: retired, aged, only speaking Spanish - having faces that they say never learned to express their emotions or talk like the modern day, but old-style people where the woman was meant to be at home and fetch the men a beer, not more. There were the drug dealers, rough, high, and always arguing with each other on the verge of violence flashing up with fists and knives. In between that medley were a few twenty-year-old college students: purple hair, black eyeliners, nail studs on leather clothing, torn-to-devastation panties, eating pizza and chicken wings while painting their fingernails hot pink.
The rest of the park had people playing guitar, walking dogs, and sunbathing - very cheery and upbeat. There is a beautiful center lawn where people have picnics. There are rows of benches where book people love to read for hours. There is a place near the statue where musicians play together and an artist paints abstracts on a giant canvas with his bare fingers. Bird watchers follow a red-tail hawk around with their binoculars.
The story starts when I met my Domme. A friend had told me to try the dating app Feeld. It's a more direct dating app where people say what they are really looking for. I risked being more forward. And then a man matched with me. He offered domination, servitude, and utter dedication to studying me. The profile explained a servant-leader dynamic. He'd do all the things to me that I had ever wanted to be done to in exactly the way I wanted to. He sounded sensitive, not the kind of abrasive domme - a mix of putting told to do things but wanting to be told to do those things. He twisted my mind up with how he seemed caring and cruel at the same time.
We were set to meet at a local Ukrainian restaurant that has been a neighborhood staple for years. I walked into the brightly lit, chirpy place with warm yellow and red decor. The color theme stuck with me. The waitress walked me to the back of the dining room. I was dressed neatly with a dark blue skirt, black slip-in heels, and a light jacket more for decoration than warmth, and had my hair down up cutely to show the curls like a pile on top of my body. I felt upbeat and chipper, ready in flirting mood.
The waitress walked me all the way to the far wall where plush leather couches rounded around the table. I saw him right away, a dominant figure because he was tall. He was also dressed in classic men's wear: black slacks, purple shirt, gray vest, and black jacket. There was a gold clip around his neck that made him look refined. I instantly smiled to make a good impression. He stood up slowly, buttoning his jacket, and with almost lethargy offered his palms to guide me to my seat opposite to him. A cool air of silence hit me. I calmed down my mood.
He sat down. He folded his hands on top of the white restaurant tablecloths. His blue eyes looked at me. His lips were relaxed. I hesitated. All these words were charged up inside of me to come out, but I felt out of place for speaking. He only looked at me. I wanted to say, "Hi, I'm Beth!" but the words chocked up in my throat under his gaze. I got mad. I wanted to yell and scream at him to who he was thinking he was. I felt my heart pounding, my belly churning, and my face distorting into a burst of anger.
He was very aware of my emotions. Underneath his face, I could tell that he knew I was going through these intense emotions. He sent me a calm that told me that he expected me to go through these emotions and that everything is going to plan. I wanted to send him a quizzical look that asked, "What's going on?" Yet, I could already feel in the slight emotional changes in his face that he anticipated my question and wanted me to go with it. Suddenly it dawned on me that he might be testing me. Only a truly submissive person would be afraid to speak up or storm out. And indeed, there was something in my personality, deeply embedded that made me that way.
So I sat. I watched his face. He was older. He had some folds carved into his face. The young face had faded to his cheekbones and jaw becoming more defined, having more character and more knowing. I could tell that he had voyaged through much in this world and navigated things. He was experienced. He had immense composure. He gazed at me constantly without staring. He seemed calm and comfortable to hang out in silence and absorb me. He was very reactive. Even though his face didn't twitch, he could read the questions, emotions, and twitches that ran through my body and would respond to them in his own way. I started feeling very unsteady for going through so many things while he held equanimity.
When the waitress came to take the order, I expected the silence to be broken. Yet, he simply pointed at a few places on the menu and then me. He was ordering for me! How dare! There was a strange sense that he didn't order random things but that he had studied me, not to simply give me food that liked, but to make me have a certain experience. The waitress left.
I started relaxing in his presence. I started feeling comfortable around this man. His jacket started becoming familiar. I had roamed the purple shirt and the way how the purple felt luxurious and old-world dozens of times. It was almost a slow induction. I could make out the faint smell of his breath once he coughed and ushered air across the table. It reminded me a bit of my father, which instantly put me a bit more into a submissive mood. At this point, I realized that I had bargained away a lot of my power by simply staying here and allowing myself to be submitted to such behavior.
The waitress returned with plates loaded up her hands and forearms. He took a small plate of green olives from her and placed it in front of me. I hate olives. I absolutely hate olives. How did he know? I don't like how they are tight, sour, and oily. Clearly, he had done it on purpose. He started eating calmly while I stared down the olives with fury. The way how he ate without caring if I ate the olives told me that he didn't care if I got up and left, but I had to eat the olives to earn my place to stay at the table.
With pointed fingers, I picked up the first olive. It took a deep breath to work up the courage to plunge the olive onto my tongue where it would make an indelible mark that I wouldn't be able to shake for a long time. I bit down, broke the olive into pieces, as the juices spread on my tongue - shudders running down my spine, actual shivering. He stopped eating to fully relish the tormented and disgusted expressions on my face. The corners of his mouth - a dark shadow of his facial hair visible and very many - pulled up lightly to display deep pleasure at watching my anguish. I fought with my resistance to get the next olive over my lips because I craved that pleasure that I could feel him having. His pleasure with such little outward signs was so intense on the inside. It gave me a high to be able to rouse such strong feelings in an older man. That moment, I realized how much power I had over him. I could affect him so deeply and make him feel things or deny those things.
