Me Piace

Author's note: First thing I'm publishing on here, please be kind and gentle with any feedback.

The party hadn't been that riveting. Don't get me wrong, the people were lovely but my attention was elsewhere. Being the only sober person at a party is boring at times, especially when you're one of the only non-Italian speakers present.

I could speak a little Italian by now, in fairness. Pesca bianca (white peach), quindici minuti di pausa (15 minute break), and mangiare (eat) were all in my vocabulary. But party chitchat felt beyond me. Especially with tension keeping me on edge, the slight swooping tension deep in my stomach, delicious but very distracting.

You know when someone is all you can think about but you're trying to play it cool? So you're looking out at the murky river-water that flows under the Ponte di Medici, or you're chatting to a new friend about their plans, but you feel where this person is, you're pretending your attention is elsewhere but their presence is electric, and you, like a compass always pointing north, are keenly aware of them.

It had been that sort of an evening. I don't know if the others had sensed our energy, or if our conversation didn't seem stimulating enough for them but we were mostly left alone. Which pleased me. Tuscan sun long since set, but the night too warm for us to feel the chill. I can't remember how we got onto it but I remember him asking what I wanted.

Dangerous mistake

I really enjoy being honest, and from my lips came my true answer without me having approved it: "I want you to hurt me"

The few beats of silence that followed felt especially slow and heavy

"I don't think i can do that" came the reply, but his disappointment stoked the flame. So he wishes he could, I thought with a thrill

Conversation returns to something a little more normal then I think, but with the static crackle of wanting between us dialed up. Sly smiles and darkly sparkling eyes. I realize we are both enjoying the game as much as anything else. Good thing I have the ability to relish in sexual tension or the frustration would have killed me.

A lull in the conversation and we are looking at each-other, my heart feeling too loud, too big for my ribcage. It's nice, if a little confusing. Then he reaches across and takes a chunk of my left thigh between his fingers. It's sudden and my heart lurches. Our eyes meet. Then he pinches me. Hard. Harder than I have ever been pinched by anyone. I gasp in shock but it feels like all of the air is leaving my body somehow. Every second I think this must be the upper limit, he pinches harder. It pleases me. I love the feeling and how it's pushing me, how he's pushing me. We are both querying how much I can take. I lean into it. It hurts so much. Pain blossoming from my thigh and flashing up and out across my hip, down my leg. It is exquisite agony.

His pupils grow as he watches my reaction, the blue rim around them shrinking ever narrower. People's eyes can't go that big surely? They are enormous. Shining black obscuring all iris. Like a total eclipse. I'm sure mine are following suit, their brown slowly swallowed up by my pupils from pain and pleasure. He looks high. Super high. Or possessed. It's this, this that's doing that to him. That excites me. Regardless whether its my pain or my reaction to it that's doing it, I like that I'm provoking such a strong reaction by doing so little

I notice the small noise I'm making and try to breathe deeper through the thrill of the pain to make myself stop. We are fully in public, anyone could see at any possible second. I mustn't make a sound. The pain is shooting up from my thigh, stinging and aching all at once. Finally, he lets go. Time had slowed for us. It can only have been three to five seconds at most he's had my thigh pinched for but already the sweet hint of a bruise is beginning to bloom; all storms and plum. He's made his mark on me but he knew that already.

I'm quivering, my heart is going quick, and he points out I have begun to sway. I feel suddenly very pleasantly drunk and high all at once and I have to confess that I don't remember terribly much after that, except that he looked after me then. Fed me a white peach when he noticed the intoxicated state he'd brought me to, and made sure I could lean into him when my balance felt too messy. I remember that the sun rose in a purple streaked sky, and that from the moment we saw each others' pupils that morning, at 5am, there was an inevitability to us