Office control (2)
Although I agreed to take things a step forward and allow her to take the lead in our shared fantasy, it took me quite a while to actually do it. I was used to feeling her eager looks behind my back and her tense and excited anticipation. I loved to slowly built a sense of tension inside me; taking myself to new heights of self regulation, translating my ability to wait into her experience of yet another anticipated frustration. Controlling her gave me a sense of peace and a way of controlling my own restlessness. Giving this up was not going to be easy task.
On the first day after our decision to switch roles she did not show up for work. Still in my old state of mind I got very angry, sending her emails, leaving messages on her answering machine and feeling frustrated. When I got home there was nothing for me there either and I reluctantly concluded to myself that she obviously found it too out of character and impossible for her to do but was probably embarrassed to admit it. Slightly triumphant I went to bed just to wake up the next day still surprisingly agitated.
Although I was not expecting to see her at work I was still surprised when she did not show up again. I decided not to write or phone her but could not let her out of my head so around midday I broke my own rules and phoned. There was no answer and I became worried that maybe something was really wrong; maybe we ended up taking it a bit too far, maybe she was less robust than I thought she was.
I was very much surprised, therefore, when she opened the door to her flat that evening. She looked calm and soft, had no makeup on and was wearing an old t-shirt and worn tracksuit bottoms. "I was waiting for you to come…it took you less than I thought it would," She smiled and invited me in. I said that I was worried about her, as she did not come to work. "What did you expect to see coming here," she asked with a smile and I said "nothing much," quickly deleting a very depressed image of her and a caring image of me from my mind.
I sat myself on her soft settee feeling a bit baffled. She sat on the coffee table in front of me and said that she has been thinking about what we said when we last saw each other. Expecting her to continue I did not say a word but she remained silent. "Well…" I said eventually… "You were thinking." "I still am," she said and went back into her silence.
Memories of our last encounter started floating in my mind and I became slightly aroused. She looked kind of inviting in her soft clothes and I could feel myself being drawn to her. Pulling myself forward in my seat I came a bit closer. I wanted to kiss her…to say that I did become worried; that I thought something was very wrong with her and with what we did to each other. I reached out and touched her knee. She looked at me, gently put her hand on top of mine and looking into my eyes said, "not now…I can't…you are not ready yet." "Look, lets call the whole thing off," I said, "lets just go out like normal people."
She was no longer sitting in front of me. Standing a few feet away she said, "maybe now we can start…are you still playing"? I slumped back into the sofa and looked at her. Suddenly I was very tired and empty. "I don't want to play," I said, I want to forget about the whole thing, I want us to have a cup of coffee now and act normal. "No," she said, "You are playing, you have been playing for the last two days and you are playing now."
I got up, went home and got straight to bed feeling a bit strange, wishing I were not so weird. I woke up with a headache, which did not pass with the usual dose of coffee and off-the-shelf drugs. She was not at work again ('bitch') and I decided to do some work for a change. Looking at my 113 emails I did not see one from her and I could I worked until lunchtime without the usual distractions. I then had some meetings ('why do you look like you've been beaten up') but when I settled back in my little desk haven there was a message waiting for me. "Come over after work."
I smiled to myself feeling suddenly fuller, riding on my sense of expectancy. She answered the door wearing the same sort of outfit. "Are you playing," she asked as we were standing there. I said yes. "Good," she said with a smile, "Go home." I knocked on the closed door and rang the bell a few times until I realised how deflated I felt. I just turned and left.