blaze@apple.com (Suki)


				
				Pain

			       by Suki

	I can't sleep again.  The lights are out, and I'm curled around what 
used to be a teddy bear, now resembling a shapeless ball of fur with arms 
and legs.  

	He's laying beside me, which usually gives me enough comfort to 
sleep.  But there's too much pain.  So thick it's tangible to me, choking my 
throat and knotting my stomach.  I study his profile in the dim light from 
the street and wonder how I got so lucky.  He never believes me when I say 
that, he just laughs it off.  I think he's gorgeous.  He thinks I am.  Neither
of us can see it in ourselves.  For me, especially not now. 

	I'm sick of this.  Sick of the pain.  Sick of not being able to eat 
because my stomach is so tight.  Sick of making him worry.  Sick of not 
being able to accept what he or my friends offer in comfort.  But mostly, 
sick of hurting.

	"You can't sleep."  His statement startles me; I thought he was asleep. 
Tears begin to trickle slowly down my face.  I turn away from him, curling 
into a fetal position, trying to hold it in.  

	His hand reaches over to stroke my hair, brushing it out of my face.  I 
start to curl up tighter, but a sudden grip on the back of my hair stops me.  
He yanks my head back until it doesn't go any further.  I see him leaning over 
me to look into my face.

	"Not this time" his voice is firm.  "As long as you are already crying, 
I'm going to make you hurt for real.  I'm going to make you cry."

	"No..."  my voice sounds like a whimper even to my ears.  I strengthen 
the tone.  "No!"  

	Ignoring me he reaches over me and slids open the bedside drawer.  I 
see him pull out a piece of the soft nylon rope I usually use to secure 
leather cuffs to the bed with.  He leaves the cuffs alone and grasps my 
wrists together hard.  

	"No!  Stop it." I demand.  He does not listen.  Using safeword does not 
even enter my mind my now.  I just want to fight it, fight him, fight 
everything.

	My wrists are secured and he pulls them above me.  I bury my face in 
the pillow crying, but my body twists violently away from him.  I hear him 
reach into the drawer again, and one of his legs falls heavily over mine, 
keeping me on my stomach.  

	I scream as the first blow of my wooden paddle falls on my bottom, 
catching me by surprise.  No warm up, he is using full strength.  Now 
safeword occurs to me, but I cannot use it.  I'm so choked up inside -- 
confused.  There's a little voice in the midst of the pain telling me that 
almost feels like I deserve it.  The paddle comes down again, the sound 
echo's through the room.  My face is still buried in the pillow, and I can feel
it's wetness from my tears surrounding my face.  As the paddle continues to 
descend I imagine that I feel that wetness on my naked bottom.  Blood 
streaking down from the fire.  

	My body twists uncontrollably, trying to escape the blows of the 
paddle.  I remember crying out, screaming....  "No!  Stop!   No!  No!" ...and
then just screaming when I lost words.

	When he finally stopped I could only lay there and cry.  My breathing 
was ragged and sobs shook my body.  I heard the paddle drop loudly on the 
floor and he jerked the rope off of my wrists, rubbing them between his 
hands to soften the burns.  

	And he held me, molding his body around mine.  Pressing against me 
and holding me tightly, stabilizing me back to reality.  The sobs abated 
slowly but he never let go.  

	I fell asleep that way, my breathing back to normal, my back and 
bottom pressing against his body.  It was the first night without nightmares 
in a long time.