Editor's note: this story contains scenes of rough, reluctant, dubiously consensual, or non-consensual sex or scenarios.
*****
I was uncomfortable. Every hit from the flogger felt wrong. The rope felt restraining instead of like a hug as it usually does. I was trapped. I wanted out. With a huge lump in my throat, I finally was able to express it with my voice instead of scream it inside of my head.
"Please take me down," I said.
"What?" he replied.
"Take me down. I don't want this," I clarified.
He got up from his chair. "Oh, okay," he replied, as he started to untie me.
"Please, I want down. Now," I said through tears.
"I am untying you as fast as I can. Don't worry," he replied.
Every second that went by felt like hours. It felt like I would never get relief. I just wanted to be alone in my bed. I wanted the comfort of blankets, not the roughness and pull and pain of the rope on my skin. I wanted out. But, I tried my best to be patient. Finally, after what was probably only 10 minutes, he untied my body from the bamboo that held me up in partial suspension and I was free. I grabbed my robe and fell to the floor, laying while using my robe as a blanket. He joined me, comforting me in silence.
---
The next weekend, I returned to his house, as I did every weekend. We were going to do rope in the living room, so he asked me to go upstairs to retrieve rope from his bedroom closet. As I did, I found the pair of safety scissors in his bag. I suddenly felt a lump in my throat and a knot in my chest. Thoughts were running through my brain at a mile a minute. We had different rope in his barn that we used the previous weekend, and this bag wasn't down there. He always keeps his scissors in his bag. He tied me without scissors.
I began to doubt myself. There was no way he would tie me without scissors. He taught me about rope safety. He seemed to be very adamant about it. He couldn't have possibly tied me without scissors. I must have just not remembered that the bag was down there last week with us.
---
Later that night, I finally got up the courage to talk to him about the scissors. I thought about it all day about how to talk to him about it so that it wouldn't be accusatory but rather just to confirm that my suspicions were false and that he did, in fact, have scissors present.
"So, I have a question for you about last weekend," I started.
"Yes?" he replied, concerned at my tone.
"Did you..." I tried to straighten out my thoughts as my heart raced. I restarted, "I was getting the rope this morning for when we were tying but I noticed that the scissors were there in the bag. Did you tie me without scissors in the barn last weekend?"
He replied without wavering, "Yes, I did."
I was dumbstruck. This went against everything he taught me about. Then I thought that maybe he just forgot. Maybe he just forgot and while that is a horrible mistake to make, people forget things all the time.
I stammered as I asked, "Did you know that you were tying me without scissors?"
"Well, yes, I-"
I cut him off, "At what point did you know that you didn't have scissors?"
"As I started to tie your wrists, it came to my mind. That's why I tied them so loosely and made it so I could get you out of the rope easier, like I ended up doing," he replied.
He tied my wrists first. It was at the very beginning of tying me that he knew he didn't have scissors.
"So you knew, when you were tying me, that you didn't have scissors? Why didn't you have me go back up to the house and grab the scissors?" I asked, becoming confused and upset.
"Well, we were already starting to tie and I didn't want to interrupt," he replied.
I sat for a few minutes, gathering my thoughts. Who was this person? Where did all of his safety standards go?
"You chose to tie me... and you knew you didn't have scissors?"
"Well, yes, but I made sure you to tie you safely. It was okay," he attempted to reassure me.
"No. No it is certainly not okay. You put my safety in danger. You tied me without having scissors." I was getting more and more emotional about it.
"You were not in danger. I had everything under control. Don't make a big deal about this," he replied.
I sat in silence, not knowing what to say. I felt betrayed. I put my trust into this man to keep me safe. And he didn't. I went to bed, not knowing whether I should really continue arguing with him about it or just let it go. I at least chose to let it go for the night. I was tired.
---
The next weekend, after a week of arguing over text, I came over, and he apologized. It didn't feel genuine. It felt like he knew that this meant a great deal to me and not so much to him but he apologized anyways because he knew that we would not move forward without his apology. It was an apology, nonetheless, so I accepted his apology. I was happy to move on and go back to the way things were.
---
The next day, we were in his bedroom and he wanted to tie my legs and arms while he played with me. He started tying my ankles and wrists.
It then occurred to me that the play bag was outside in the barn and not in the bedroom.
"Wait," I said, "Isn't the play bag in the barn?"
