I've dreamt again of Manderley, I would think sometimes upon waking alone in bed, sweat soaking through my clothes. I'd breathe deeply, reminding myself I'm not at that vacation house overlooking that dark lake.
Your vacation house. Your hideout when cursed with writer's block. Your sanctuary.
The house you told me not to call Sara Laughs. You never appreciated my dark humor. Your wife left you though - she didn't die. She deserved to. She deserved to be on her beloved boat as the black water swallowed it up.
Although she was dreadful, you should've finalized the divorce before fucking me. Maybe that's why you're haunted.
But we did fuck so many times before those papers were signed. Oh how we explored it all - every fetish and desire. You were the best and worst thing to ever happen to me.
"We never cease wanting what we want, whether it's good for us or not."
I read that somewhere. It embodies us.
You unlocked a monster inside of me. That monster won when I decided to visit you there - at that place where you wanted to be alone with your ghosts and write in peace. I didn't listen, didn't obey, but I had no fear of punishments. Part of me ached for them.
Perhaps I traveled there as a sweet surprise for my... whatever you were then, whatever you are too scared to be now. But perhaps we both know that's a lie. My desire for your strong, aged hands on my pale, slim frame was just too much.
I craved you, even that dark side of you, especially that dark, uninhibited side of you. Your Tyler Durden, your John Shooter.
I craved your fist in my hair, flat palm on my ass, the burn of rope, the whoosh-snap of a flogger. I was addicted to that intense, overwhelming pleasure that floods in and consumes pain.
So I went. Selfishly I went. Ignorantly I was surprised when you didn't appear happy to see me.
"I told you not to come."
"I wanted..." but I didn't know what I wanted. Crickets and frogs filled the silence between us as evening arrived. Fireflies floated in the damp lake air. The horizon shone pink.
