I liked to laugh. Not because I was jolly, or good spirited, but because everything to me seemed laughable. I giggled and guffawed at the world, seeing the billions and billions that lived on earth -- or ever lived for that matter -- as suckers, idiots. I didn't believe in anything, and even when I did I always gave it just enough to get through it. More than that and I was just another rat in a maze, moron on a treadmill.
Lifting a finger, cheating at my lover's game: that was so like me. Anything serious, deep, possibly meaningful was a joke -- a joke on everyone.
A joke on you
. Was that me, was that beyond me, was that somewhere to the left of my soul? I didn't move, but I did, inside, dropping through layers of mind and memory. Pieces of myself floating by my consciousness: birthday traumas, schoolyard pain, moments of clarity and what I thought to be understanding. I won't go through them all, not that they're too intimate but rather that thinking about them now they're just too damned dull.
I wanted to laugh, but not like I had before. I felt the muscles of my face start to pull and stretch me into a grin but I stopped them cold. No movement. None at all. Paralysis. But inside I moved a lot. Looking back at it all, looking down and through myself, I realized that I didn't have anything. I was good at things, but never very good at anything. I moved towards things -- work, avocations, even love -- but I never got close. I stopped just short of so much but never stepped beyond. Doing anything with all of me would mean that I'd stepped out beyond my smirking safety zone.
My leg cramped but I tried to ignore it. Pain flared there, a pulsing new kind of discomfort but I tried to push it away, keeping the tightened muscles from becoming knots. It was important, very important that I not move, not at all, not even a little bit.
My eyes were dry but I didn't want to blink. Blinking was movement and movement would mean losing the game. Then I remembered the game allowed that kind of thing, so I carefully, slowly, blinked. It felt good, but I vowed not to do it again -- or at least not often.
What had I done? In my life? I could have done so much more, I realized, but I hadn't. My life suddenly seemed shallow. What had I ever done except laugh a lot? I remember hearing that a friend of mine in college had written a novel, and for some reason that struck me as pathetic: that he'd spent nights and nights working on something that would probably never see the light of day, or if it did it'd vanish from the stands in a week or two. A friend from high school had been all around the world, visiting the Dalai Lama, being there when the wall came down in Berlin and I giggled that she'd spent all that money, used up all that time, and she came away with nothing but memories and some snapshots.
My lower back started to ache. It felt like a slug of heavy metal had been slapped against my spine. I so wanted to sit up tall, stretch, listen to the music of my bones realigning themselves. But I didn't. I didn't move. I was frozen. In bondage. I was in bondage and so couldn't, wouldn't move.
What have you done? What have you accomplished?
I'd had girlfriends, women I thought I might -- kinda, sorta -- love, but they hadn't lasted. They'd wanted to talk, to think about the future. I'd just wanted to have fun. How many had had there been? One of them, a fun little redhead named Cheryl, had gotten married, and I remember laughing that she was so ridiculous to stand up there in front of the world and say that she was doing it, when -- more than likely -- she and her husband would be talking to divorce sharks in a year or two.
What have I done? The answer was not hard -- not hard in that I didn't want to say it, to think it, because it came up as zero. Nothing. I laughed a lot, and that was all. I wanted to cry. I wanted to cry like I'd never wanted to cry before. Self pity surged through me, like a hot compress of shame. I wanted Sybil -- who was still looking at me with her deep amber eyes -- to hold me, to hold me while my sorrow came out. I wanted her to make it all better, because I realized that she was right there in front of me, filling my vision, and that I loved her.
But I didn't cry. Crying would mean moving, would mean that some part of my body would move and I would have failed. I didn't want to screw this up. I wanted to make this happen, to win this game. I wanted to feel good and, right along with that, I wanted Sylvia to feel good about me. I wanted her to know that I could and would do this small, impossible thing that she had asked.
Because
she had asked.
My body was a knot. Pain rolled up and through my muscles, tendons and even -- I swear -- my bones. My cock was still like a rock. In fact it hadn't changed at all during my inward moving. I thought about it as I sat there in bondage: how I wanted to touch it, to wrap my hand around it and enjoy its very-hardness. I wanted Sylvia to see it, to admire it. I wanted to share it with her -- to make love to her as we had before -- but I also wanted her to see what had happened to me, for her to see that for the first time in my entire life, I was trying. I was trying my best.
My best. My best. I'm trying my best. I will not move. I will not move. I will do this. I want to feel that I've done something special here today, I want to feel pride in this accomplishment, and I want Sylvia to understand that.
She was still sitting quietly, her eyes moving over my unmoving body. I could feel her gaze like a physical touch, a warm caress that soothed, for a moment, the pains in my cramped limbs. There was a question in her eyes, and though I couldn't quite put it into words, I knew the answer. Yes. Yes, Sylvia, yes my love, whatever you require of me, whatever you desire, I'll do my best to give that to you. To give my self to you.
Did she feel me? Did she hear my silent answer? Her thoughtful half-smile never wavered, but once again I felt a ghost of her touch. My cock throbbed in time with my heart. But I didn't allow it to move.
My legs ached. My back ached. My hand felt like it would never move again. Minutes? No, it felt like hours of immobility. I wanted to blink again, but didn't. My eyes were dry, they burned. I held my breath, because breathing was movement. It was okay, according to the rules, but not according to my rules. I didn't want to win by the rules, I wanted to do better than the rules. For her.
My head started to swim and for a heart-pounding minute I thought I'd moved, that my head had to tipped forward and I felt a surge of panic and shame. But then I realized that I was still where I'd been. Still frozen in place.
My cheeks felt strange. Had I moved? I had I failed? I didn't want to -- I wanted to rise up, to move beyond what and where I'd been before. My cheeks felt strange. I hoped I hadn't moved. I hoped, prayed that I hadn't moved.
Sylvia got up, walked towards me , the expression on her face new, unusual. I hadn't see her like this before. I'd seen her laugh, cry, orgasm, sigh, be angry, but this was new. Was this disappointment? Deep sorrow that I'd failed her. I hoped not. I really, honestly hoped not.
I didn't move.
Her hand went up to my face, my cheek. The touch of her fingers on my skin was like an electric shock and I felt like my whole body would jump at the contact. But I didn't. I felt the come boiling up into my dick, ready to explode. I didn't move. Not an inch, not a little bit, not at all. I didn't move.
"Sweetheart," she said, bending down to look at my eyes. "Sweetheart," she said again. "Thank you, thank you so much. You've done what I wanted and more."
That look on her face, and there in her eyes. Something new, something I wanted more and more of. Something I'd been missing for all those years, something I'd given up. Respect.
It was more than I'd ever hoped for, better than any orgasm. I slipped off the bench and into her arms, trembling all over.
"Thank you, Mistress," I said, the tears now pouring down my cheeks. "Thank you."
