To The Cabin

"It passed!"

"I knew it would," I reply. "Nice new Chrysler you have. Be such a shame if it was involved in a thirty-car pile up on the freeway."

I apologize for my snark. I'm talking to Arabella. She's my girlfriend. And I fucking despise her.

I give her snide comments all the time. And I wake up wishing she was never in my life. But it's the morning, and last night I lay for eight hours on her right breast, cuddling her into me. But I was clothed, my naked body is something I refuse to give to her - she took everything else. I utterly adore my Arabella, and I curse God every day that I went out that night as she happened to be running past.

Let me tell you what brought me to this messed up, broken, tugged-every-which-way state. I'm the only daughter in my family. I have four elder brothers, our family are recent immigrants to America. We're not rich, and we can't afford the visa fees for us all to stay. The plan was for me to marry. My father arranged a marriage to a stable, wealthy banker in the Gulf. He would set the whole family up for life in America, ensure we became citizens and ensure my brothers would have the opportunities this country offers like no other nation on earth.

I was a month away from the wedding. I zoom called my fiancé every day. That night, wearing a green sparkling headscarf, I listened to him tell me he'd secured permanent residency visas for the whole family.

"Bless you, thank you. You're infinitely kind" I told him, bowing my palms together.

"And the wedding is set. I'll be over in three weeks."

"We cannot wait."

Then he had to go. I bowed again and went downstairs. The family were watching Casino Royale on TV - my mother loves James Bond.

"Sabika," she told me. "We're out of butter." She loves to cook our traditional cookies, which need metric tons of butter. So I went to the store to buy some.

"Be quick," she called out. "The beach scene is coming up." She's seen this movie more times than I've had days at school, yet still never tires of the scene with James Bond shirtless.

I get to the store, put six packs of butter in a shopping bag and go to pay. Then my life changed. A woman, maybe five years older than me, sweaty from a run, entered. She tied her blonde hair in a tighter ponytail and went to the energy drinks.

To this second of my life I cannot understand it. Why I watched a gracefulness in her steps, a face red from her exercise, a shape I wished to examine for many hours. I wished to paint her until my acrylic paints ran out. I wished to draw her until my wrists failed. To see her was uniquely wonderful, in eighteen years of life I'd never seen perfection transcending this.

I put the butter on the counter and gave the man a twenty. I got maybe a few cents change, I didn't count, it didn't matter. She was behind me. I think I felt her breath. My heart, my stomach, both of them were beating. I had to leave, run, get away and back to my home and my fiancé.

I ran. I went as fast as I could, not looking behind so she didn't notice me any more. As I opened the door my mother pulls me in.

"It's coming on." And it's that scene of Bond walking out of the water. My brothers enjoy the action so sit through that part, my mother drools over his chest. But I look at him and don't feel anything. I can admire his form, admire his effort in the gym, but I know I'm not going to dream of him. I smile, I try and do a pretend wolf-whistle, then I put the butter in the fridge and head to my room.

I sit down, open my journal and write. "Today I saw Daniel Craig. And he's a good actor. I saw a girl at the store. And...."

I couldn't write anything. What if someone read it? If anyone finds out I'll be dead. I look through my phone at the pictures of my fiancé. He's handsome yes. Not quite James Bond but he's respectable. And in our culture life isn't just about you. It's about your family, your children, the wider society you have a duty to serve. We don't believe in the American individualist way. Women have a special calling to marry and give birth. I will fulfil that calling. I will help my brothers, my parents, I will give them grandchildren and a comfortable income. If I don't, they won't afford their visas and will have to leave.

But that lady I saw. I go into my bed. We're not supposed to do this but I can't help it. I touch myself as I think of her. The way she swept her hair in an arc so mathematically perfect, so elegant it could be filmed - who is she?

I couldn't sleep that night. I restrained myself after brief touching, but for hours I only thought of her. I got out my journal again and tried to write. If anyone read it I could pretend it's about my fiancé, but I wrote for her:

When Fortune saw me,

My eyes were blessed with you.

When Fortune knew me,

Her promises came true.

I have played the nightingale,

Proclaiming pure love.

Yet none were there to tear my veil

Till you came from above.

Fortune saw me

Bonded with you.

You're light of golden stars to me

The thousand suns in ecstasy

Sent me to you

Send me to you.

Concertos of the spheres agree

Constellations destine me.

Bless me with you.

Blessed me with you.

Fortune saw me

Embroidered into you.

Then Fortune told me

My heart she will renew.

Eagle to my nightingale

We scale the skies of love.

Bring your claws to tear my veil

As we reach above.

Fortune saw me

Locked tight to you...

And I couldn't write more. My heart felt so full of light I had to put my journal down to rest.

So now perhaps you can understand why I'm angry with Arabella. Because of that night when I saw her my life couldn't be easy. I should be writing poems for my husband and reciting them on our wedding day. With hundreds of happy family applauding our union. But I saw her.

I put the journal away and tried to sleep. I couldn't. The next morning I get up when my alarm goes. My job is to cook breakfast for the family. My brothers drowsily awake, come down, and the meal is there. There is nothing wrong with women who choose this life. We serve our men. They respect us, they keep us, when we die God who sees our deeds rewards us with bliss everlasting. That's all I ever wanted since I was a girl of five. A husband to love. I've still got that husband if I go through with everything. But the night of tossing and turning told me I'm not ever going to fancy him. Not honestly. I can pretend for the people around me.

But I'm not normal. I realize this fact. I will be at least truthful with myself. I am a girl who loves a girl. Who lusts after her. I must have zoom called my fiancé for over fifty hours. Never once did I want to touch myself because of him. But that lady runner, the sight of her in my mind and I feel an itchy urge. An urge to caress down there, bite my lip and wish it was her caresses - wish that down in her private parts we were touching.

If only it wasn't so. I smile as my brothers come down, I bow to them, and move my headscarf to show that I am thinking of my modesty. I love my brothers. And I enjoy this life, the life of feminine service. Why did it have to be me? Why God? Why couldn't you make everything work well? As my father returns from his night shift I take his portion from the oven. I set it down. This is how it was meant to be. I serve my father until I am given in service to my husband. And in honesty I liked this way. So much simpler, so much happier than the bratty American way.

Yet that girl. I'll have to stay inside. I can't go to the store, can't go out. I cannot see her.

"Sabika I forgot the sugar." It's mom.

"Can Abdullah get it while I wash up?"

"He's busy with his calculus assignment. Don't be long." I finished high school and was planning to go to college when the marriage offer came through. Visas and college fees for my brothers - they're my dowry.

Mom gives me another twenty and off I go. I put my shoes on and walk briskly to the store. She won't be out again. She can't be. God is good. Obey Him and He will work for your good.

I get the sugar, pay and I'm out. I leave, and I hear: "enjoy it. Bye."

It's her. She hangs up her phone. I stare perhaps for too long and she gives me a "Hi."

I don't know if I should reply. I should run home. But that's rude. So I give back a quiet "Hi."

"You baking?"

"Um, yeah. Um, who was that?"

"Oh my friend Tanya. She's off to Colorado for two weeks."

"That's good."

"Yeah skiing with her girlfriend. I'd usually come too but work is busy."

"How can she have a girlfriend?" In my culture that cannot happen. I know it does in America but I still find it hard to believe.

"Tanya used to be my girlfriend. We stayed close."

"Really." I start walking back, face down. In my faith we take refuge in the Lord of the daybreak from the evil of His creation that would pull us away from devotion to Him and devotion to the duty He laid down for us.

"Yeah I stayed here, became an electrical engineer. She wanted to travel - total trust fund baby. So she's skiing with her new girl and I'm applying what I studied about resistance. How about you?"

"I'm, well. I'm due to be married next month."

"Congratulations. By the way what's your name?"

"Sabika."

"Hi Sabika I'm Arabella. I run into you on my runs haha."

"Yes you run every day?"

"Basically yeah, training for the Boston marathon. Wanna run?"

"I have work to do but thank you."

"Ok well when do you get off?"

I'm outside my house. I should go in now. I've been fixing my gaze on the ground the whole time. One last look up to say goodbye.

"Later. Good--" I freeze. I pause. It's her face, her eyes. They're sea blue with almost a golden tint. My stomach does its wobble again. My heart pauses, then beats, now brings me a cool wave of joy.

I can't help break a smile. This is what they call instant love. This is the person life was meant to be lived with. That's what my whole being is saying, even though my whole world calls it sin.

"Sabika when are you free?"

"I um, I'm not sure."

"Then take my number. Running will make you an even lovelier bride."

"OK..."

I take out my phone, show her my number, she enters it.

"I've not run before. If my mom lets me."

"Tell her you're getting in good shape for the wedding."

"Yes beautiful for my husband."

"He'll love every inch."

I walk up the path to the door. "Have a great day Sabika.", she calls out as I enter.

It's time to zoom with my fiancé. Maybe I can forget her soon enough. She's right, the time I spend in the kitchen cooking for the family - I taste a lot myself. My stomach has two large rolls that show through my robes. If I run, I can get rid of them and be extra lovely before him.

And this is femininity: cooking, caring, and keeping yourself beautiful for your husband. So perhaps God is working mysteriously through Arabella. Helping me be ready for the day.

It happens that he accepts. I tell him when I was getting sugar to make the cookies I ran into a marathon runner, and she told me she could help me be in shape.

"Bless you," I tell him as I bow again. "Bless you for letting me run."

He smiles and we hang up. I get ready. I have leggings, a running jacket, and a pink silk headscarf that's easy to keep cool in. I put them on, prepare family lunch, when she texts.

"5pm run? 💋"

"OK" I text back. That is a kiss at the end. But it's mere friendship of course? Even if she sees me that way, anybody can tell I am not one of those people. Perhaps I can find her a husband. My brothers say girls go through phases. They're confused here in this country. They have no principles to guide them so they experiment like in a chemistry lab. Our faith and culture is a witness to this nation, to show where truth and happiness really are.

5pm comes and I go out. My mother is unsure, but I tell her my fiancé accepted it as it's to get fitter for him.

I open the door and she's there. Her ponytail is now a bun several round layers high. I go out. I walk, slowly. Does she want something from me? She's wearing a short white vest top that goes down to her navel. Below I can see firm, strong, crafted muscles. I've never seen abs on a woman before. I've seen pictures of a muscular chest on a man but never on a girl. Doesn't she eat? Perhaps I should have brought her some of my cookies to help her gain a bit of womanly belly.

Below are black leggings. Larger than mine, clearly her leg muscles are strengthened by her runs. And her arms too look like they could lift me and carry me away. I stop. Do I want to look like her? My fiancé isn't marrying a boy. She smiles at me, waves, says "come" and I carry on down the path. I'll run a bit, but I'll be careful.

I jog without her prompting. I don't want to look at her, don't want to talk to her. I only want to run until I become a beautiful bride. We run into a nearby park but it's not long until my breath runs out and I rest by a tree.

"Not run before?"

I shake my head.

"Keep it up. Need to work on your Vo2 max?"

"What's that?" I ask as I recover my breath.

"How much oxygen your body can take in. So how long you can run."

"How long do you run for?"

"I've done 20 miles. The 26 at Boston is next, then my first ultra."

"How do you do it?"

"It's practise. Come on."

I'm still holding my hands on my knees. She extends her right hand, I take it and get back up. I wish I could describe to you its silk-like, elegant feel. But the next moment changed me. I looked at her, again directly into those oceanic eyes and I was special.

I felt something that was unique. Love. Genuine, eternal, purest love. Nobody else could possibly have felt like I have felt. In my culture we don't love like this. We marry out of duty. That's what the other girls in my culture all do. The Americans have little understanding of love. They're about casual hookups and a new partner every week. That's how the girls at school spoke.

But this love, the undying love I know for Arabella right now - this is different and I have to keep it.

So I froze as I looked at her. She kissed me, briefly on the lips before urging me to run again. But a boy from school, a friend of my brothers, happened to be passing by. He must have suspected as he recorded our whole interaction from her taking me by the hand to her kiss. He ran past us, gleefully shouting "dykes! Dykes!" before running off. Arabella chased after him, caught him, and threw his phone on the ground. She picked it up, demanded he delete it. But too late.

It had gone on Instagram and by the time he opened the phone again was shared with my family, my fiancé, and everyone else we knew.

Things moved fast. I was impure, no longer a woman of virtue, a disgrace. My mother looked at me with spitting disgust. The wedding was called off, my brothers planned to leave America as the visas were no longer realistic, and everybody spoke of me as a fallen woman who deserved the punishment of death and hell.

So I had to go. Arabella took me in, yes that was kind of her but I hated her. I hate her. She destroyed my life, took away my comfort and happiness, forced my whole family to leave America. Yet she's the only person my heart has ever or could ever adore, with her I've known love unknowable in this shallow world.

But I haven't given her sex. The deepest reaches of my body, the place of uncleanness and renewal of life, that I keep to myself alone. Yet she's arranged a cabin in the Berkshire Mountains for us to stay for the weekend. I plan to keep myself still somewhat pure, punish her for what she took from me.

Yet a weekend with her is my paradise. I've wanted nothing but to be held by her, feel the encompassing love that only we can know. So I'm in her Chrysler, sitting in the passenger seat trying to restrain the resentment-induced snark I've shown her for the two weeks of our relationship.

"You know why I stick with you, despite it all?" She asks me.

"Why?"

"I've been through the same." I've not asked her much about her life, I guess I've been too wrapped up in my own.

"Really?"

"I told you I didn't have my mom growing up. My dad was a small-town mayor, I was his All-American girl. He lost re-election after I came out."

"I'm sorry."

"So we have to go through it, he's come around now but I'll never be what he wanted."

"If only we had just been born normal."

She slaps the dashboard.

"Well we weren't Sabika. We're queer, we're different, but we fucking love hard."

"And love fucking hard?" I've never used language like that before. But this is my life now, so I may have to change everything about me.

"How can you love what you've never tried?"

"Maybe I've built it up so much the reality will disappoint."

"Then we won't start you off vanilla, I'll bring out the gourmet right away."

She smiles at me then I stare out the window, wondering what she has planned. We reach our cabin and get out. She takes out suitcase, still in her running gear - I've never seen her in anything else. I'm in a purple headscarf and green robes. In public I still keep my old appearance, I'm still between worlds and am not ready to fully let go of my old one.

"Close the door and wait there," Arabella tells me.

"Why?"

"Wait there. Five minutes."

She takes the suitcase upstairs. I wait. Why is she making me stay here? I feel greater nerves, greater butterflies, when I hear steps.

She returns, and I've never seen her before like this. No more in her sweatpants and sneakers. On her feet are black heels that look at least five inches high. Then dark black stockings around her legs. Then another black dress, with a belt restraining her waist and her hair tied. She's carrying a whip and a belt. She walks to me.

"I am your Goddess now. You've left home and family for me. And you were right to do so. For I am Goddess Arabella. And I demand a lifetime of worship and service. Are you mine?"

I nod. I love you Arabella. I have indeed given up everything for you. So take me and let me forever honor you.

"Then remove this." She points at my headscarf. I untie it, she takes it and drops it to the ground.

"Now this." She moves her belt over my robes. I remove them. I have a bra, pants, and socks on. I step on my robes.

She flings the back strap of my bra.

"Off." Her voice is firmer, more official. I do as she says.

She flings the back of my pants.

"Everything off. And kneel." I do so.

"Kiss." She puts her shoes right at my mouth. I kiss them.

"Around the heel." I kiss there as a sharp, sudden pain hits my behind. I cry out. She has struck me with the whip.

"Lick them" she calls out. I do so as she strikes me again, several times. The pain burns and stings but I continue to kiss and lick her heels until I feel myself pulled up by my hair.

Arabella puts her head close to mine. "You've been rude."

"I'm sorry."

"Sorry what?"

"Sorry Goddess."

She spits in my face.

"Worship them." I go back to kissing her soles as she strikes again. This time with the belt. I cry out, I grab onto my robes to deal with the pain. At last, unable to take more, I scream "Stop. Stop, please."

She stops and walks back a few paces before gesturing at me. I walk forward.

"Face to the floor." I do so.

"Taste the nectar of your Goddess." I hear and feel a drip, then a flood. Piss washing over me, her warm and slightly sweet extract rushes over my back, down my legs, through my hair and some enters my mouth. When it stops, I hear the crack of the whip and, knowing what it means, I lick the rest from the floor.

"There's a shower and cleaning cupboard in the next room. Clean yourself, wipe everything, then upstairs."

I do so. The warm shower stings my burning ass and back. Who is this woman? I thought she was a sporty runner. Our nights together she was always gentle.