Before the Lord of Song

She slid below me like a minor third.

It seemed almost accidental. A bit of serendipity. Happenstance. We'd met at a pop-up sculpture exhibit on the roof of a brewpub in the post-artsy, post-post-industrial part of town. The summer heat was unbearable; the guests bathed themselves with hand towels dipped in the melting ice keeping the drinks cool. I couldn't take my eyes off her as she smoothed the sweat from her bare shoulders and replaced it with trickles of cool water. An ethereal corona of moonlight cloaked her and overthrew all my defenses.

We spoke, we smiled, we agreed to meet again on Friday, the sixth. I marked off the days on the calendar until we saw each other. It went like this: the fourth, the fifth, and then she fell to me on the sixth. I didn't even notice her gliding behind me on my way to the bathroom in the restaurant to which I was treating her. I locked the door and turned around and had her pinned against the sink before I knew she was there. She slid below me like a minor third, undoing my trousers like she was unwrapping Christmas and taking me in her mouth. With her hands she played me like a lyre. She anointed herself with me; my cup runneth over.

We stayed the night at my apartment, lights lowered but never off. She stripped the bed and then herself; what comforter did I need but her? She brought me my plugs and paddles, and shackles with which to bind her; had she not found them in the dark corners of my room, she might have punched holes in the drywall to find wood slats and copper wiring and metal coils with which I might beat and bind and flay her. She fought me so that she might lose; I fought her harder because I was already lost. She was a hurricane of need and desire that mirrored my own, and we did our best to destroy each other.

We woke the next morning and did it all again. I piled the bedclothes under her butt to find the angle that drove her over the edge again and again. We looked down with voyeuristic greed and watched ourselves fuck each other. I lifted her off the bed and she rode me while I stood, my fingers digging into her ass in the places where the bruises from the previous night were beginning to blossom. She cried out and flooded around my cock.

Spent, we collapsed and lay in our sweat and our shame, exhausted and afraid. That morning was the seventh. I had to admit to myself that this woman was something real—something to believe in. That may be easy for some, but not for me. If you'd lived my life, you'd know what a major lift it is to believe in anyone or anything.

Like anyone else, I've known the blues. I have sojourned with any number of companions, but my seconds have dropped away as I stumbled through the desperate, polluted bars (twelve, if you're counting) that fortify my neighborhood and contaminate my mind. I have walked through valleys of death, and I have feared evil for good reason. Even after my worst darkness cleared, the way was solitary and cold for years without number. I used to live alone before I knew her.

Of all those who have come and gone, she was the only one who never carried calamity in her sequined clutch, ready to pass off to me. We were natural and harmonic together, and if you don't think that's a sign of impending disaster, brother, you don't know me.

I tried to make it last, but it wasn't meant to be. Or maybe I drove her away like all the others. I did my best; it wasn't much. I showed her my darkness and told her the truth about me; I never tried to fool her. My mistake, I suppose. I've had enough experience; I should have known better than to think this world would ever work for someone like me. So when it all went wrong there was no anger, no blame, no wounded pride. Hallelujah for that, at least. No, in the end there was nothing but the clink at the bottom of the metal box when the coin drops and the dial tone buzzes like a bomber descending in flames and the emptiness echoes through the blackout alleys of the night that never ends.