Page 25 of Submissive Lies

He asked me to lunch.

-Sure. So he could get your skank ass out of here and tell you to knock it the fuck off.-

He looked disappointed.

-He was disappointed! Now he’s got to deal with you sniffing around him like a bitch in heat for the rest of the set!-

You know what, fuck off! That is not what he’s thinking!

-Sure. Whatever you say…-

I didn’t know. I didn’t know what he was thinking, and for a second I considered doing what I’d thought about a minute ago. Just grabbing him and pulling him off somewhere where we could talk. But that fear, fear of what he might say, was too strong. That part ordered me to do what I did. I turned and walked out of the booth, moving across the show floor. I wasn’t even paying attention to which direction I was going, because that didn’t matter. All that mattered was that I was putting distance between us, trying to put my thoughts together and understand what had just taken place.

Why did I do that! What in God’s name possessed me to call him ‘sir’ in that voice!

-And let’s not forget that whole looking down thing, hmm? Yeah, that was fucking classic, Jen! Seriously, why didn’t you just get down on your knees? You know, in for a penny, in for a—

Stop!

-Don’t you ‘stop’ me! Jesus Christ! Have you lost your mind?-

Before I realized it, I found I was walking down the street, the humid spring Chicago air draping me like a wet towel. I looked around, saw a sign for a small café, and dived into it. I went to the counter and sat down.

“Hi! Can I get you a drink to get you started?”

I looked up into a young man’s face. “A… ah… iced tea?”

“Sure.” The server gave me a bland customer service smile. “I’ll take your order once I’m back.”

I looked without seeing at the menu in front of me. All that kept playing through my head was Steve’s shoulder pressed against me, his hand on mine, and then my voice, over and over like a broken record.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

I sighed and closed my eyes. So, this was it. It had all come to a head, and in true ‘me’ fashion, I’d waited to do it in the absolute worst of all places. On the show floor with some random I&D guy I knew fuck-all about.

-Perfect. Fucking typical. Jesus, Jen. You are a piece of work.-

What had happened in the convention center forced me to confront something I had never vocalized. What I’d done in there—every action, the inflection of my voice, all of it—was me being true to who I was. It was me being the real me. Not the person I had decided I would turn myself into by turning off my sexuality as if it were a light switch. Fifteen months ago I had convinced myself that I was no longer a person who would do those things. Persuaded myself to live a lie. But in a heartbeat I had destroyed all that. Made a lie of the lie.

A glass plunked down on the counter in front of me.

“Have you decided on something?”

I flinched at the sound of the server’s voice as he broke my train of thought. I looked up from the countertop where I’d been staring towards him. “Umm... no. I need a little more time.”

“Of course. I’ll check back in a minute.” His smile thinned as I put him off, and he stepped away.

I knew that I had, in fact, decided. It just had nothing to do with the menu. Even if it had been an unconscious one, I’d made a decision. I’d already come to terms with the fact that I could no longer deny those parts of me that were so integral to how I saw myself. Those elements of my sexuality that had reasserted themselves over the past month. The ones I now understood I couldn’t just toss away at the drop of a hat because I’d once convinced myself that doing so would help me get over the pain of what Ben had done. Prevent the hurt he’d inflicted from ever happening again. Those feelings and desires had boomeranged around on me, coming back with a vengeance. And they made me admit that the lie was just that. A lie. They made me admit to myself who I truly was.

I am a submissive.

The crystalline clarity that came over me hearing those words in my head, the feeling of a weight being lifted off my consciousness left me feeling light-headed. The enormity of it was far greater than I’d conceived, and yet while one weight was taken away, another fell into its place. The choice I knew I needed to make. The one I’d been struggling with even before that night with Thomas.

I sipped at my drink, distracted as a thousand thoughts bounced around inside my head, each careening into the other.

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