I Am Not A Woman in his Bed.

I had sex with my clothes still on me. I feel like I haven't done that it in a long time. They weren't even nice or sexy clothes, but they were warm. Suddenly, it's cold and foggy. I got back home at a quarter to seven and it wasn't very cold then, but when we got in the car at nine, everything was covered in a dense, shocking fog.  It came out of nowhere. I'm not complaining, I quite like the fog, I just wasn't expecting it. I wasn't expecting to smell the fog. I am very responsive to things these days, and I was explaining to my husband, as I got high in his car, that both sounds and scents have been getting to me in a way they never have before. They're occupying a space in my brain that is not available. I had to switch to fragrance-free products for everything and even the aftershave I once loved smelling on his neck, now gives my nose a headache. And the noise bothers me even more. 

There's a hornbill living near our house somewhere, and each time I hear its call, I want to kill it. Well, i'm not a violent person but if I were, I would kill it. I used to be unaffected by noise, but now every little auditory disturbance sits inside my brain for a while. Every beep. Every creak. Every dripping faucet. Every phone ringing in the distance. Every sound coming from a device. Every sound is permeating deeper than it has before and I suddenly wish everyone would speak a little softer. My environment hasn't really changed, it's just my definition of noise that seems different. What were previously pleasant auditory experiences, or just the diurnal sounds of mundanity, now hurt my ears. I crave a quietude that isn't of my mind, but really is. I crave a silence that is real, and not of my own creation. I want Gogo and Didi to stop talking. 

I think the noise and scents will stop bothering me eventually, but right now, I must be disturbed by them a lot so I can learn to be unaffected by this layer of penetration by outside influence. My anodyne struggles mean nothing to anyone, they don't even mean very much to me, but I was trying to explain them to my husband nonetheless. He's the only person around whom I feel human, which is odd because he is the only person who can forbid me from being so. I was telling him that I've come to accept the solitude as who I am, I have stopped experiencing the yearning for connection, acceptance or to be understood. I'm building a void, one that is free of external influence, and that's why it must be attacked by every imaginable force first, so I can determine that it is impenetrable. It's not a void to isolate myself, it's a void for worship, where I live alone by myself without scent, sound or sight. Needless to say, I was in a strange mood all evening. 

When we came back home, I stood beside the dressing table for a while, watching him close the doors, adjust the lighting and declutter the nightstand. He walked towards me and took both my hands, and in his eyes I could see that he was itching to hurt me. I can always tell now when he will hurt me, but I never tell how much. He pulled my head to his chest, and I am always surprised by how well it fits there. He swayed as he held me, it was almost a dance, but only to us, to anyone watching it would just look a strange hug. 

"You can beat me now if you want," I told him even though I didn't really need to issue an invitation, "I'd rather you not, but I sense an inevitability." 

He pulled back from me a little so I could see his face, and he pulled my arms around his abdomen. 

"I won't beat you," he said kissing the top of my head. 

Even though to an onlooker this would seem like a moment of tenderness, I know him well enough to know that those words are the harbingers of the inevitability of which I spoke. Maybe he was as surprised as I was about my admission, it is not often that I feel like I'd rather not be beaten. He leaned over and kissed me for a long time, it is not often that I enjoy being kissed either. When he pulled back from me, he straightened his back and stretched out his shoulders, suddenly he felt like he was so far away from me. I don't often notice the one foot of distance between my shoulder and his, but it was all I could see then. 

"You're always so far away from me," I told him, reaching for his left shoulder with my hand, "There's always so much.. distance." 

I've spoken about this many times before, there is a distance between us that cannot be breached. It's the consequence of playing master and servant with a little too much commitment. It's a sexual distance, one the prohibits me from leaping at him, pulling him to me and devouring him with a passion that rages right outside the void. One that prohibits him from taking me, like a woman, and not property, and making frenzied, frantic love to me like he actually cares about me. It sounds so tragic, and maybe it even is, but tragedy is far more entertaining than happily-ever-after. It's like the temptation to let the dog on the bed just once, you could and maybe it would be okay, but the chances that the dog begins to expect it or just takes the liberty of its own volition are too high to risk it. 

But in that moment, I was as close as I ever could be. If there ever was a moment when he might have laid me down, got on top of me and made love to me in an emotional celebration of man and woman, that was it. 

"What is this distance you feel?" He asked me, even though he should have already known.  

"I can't tell you," I said. 

And it was the truth, it would have been unfair to tempt him to compassion with my vulnerability. Sometimes the dog has to ensure it doesn't get on the bed, especially when it senses that being honest might lead to it. For a while he prodded me for an answer, kissing me intermittently and backing me into the wall; stroking my face and uttering words into my mouth. When I refused to speak, he clenched his fists. That's was a return to normalcy that hurt me more than I could have expected. He touched my chin with his thumb, it's his tell, he does it every single time before he starts to hit me, and I wonder if he knows that. 

"If you give into the temptation to do what you're about to do, the distance between us will only increase," I told him. 

I don't know why I said that, it was a moment of weakness, I suppose. The craving for humanity in sexuality is very intense sometimes, and I only ever feel it with him, the only person who is resolute in his determination not to allow me that luxury. Maybe if I had said it out loud, just once, that all I wanted was to feel him close and inside me, and all I needed was for him to touch me like a woman he loved, he would have held me with his tongue and undressed me with his eyes, but I couldn't say that. I couldn't say it because I knew I couldn't stand his rejection in that moment, it would have broken me to hear him refuse so I chose coy, clever insinuation, and then I watched him for a response. Maybe I just watched him so I could see him feel sorry for me. I will take the sympathy we reserve for the wretched, if only it means a moment of tenderness at the right time.  I watched him realise exactly where I was, and what I was thinking, I watched him mull it over, I watched him decide and I watched him lean over and cup my face in his hand. His thumb began to graze my chin, as he quickly kissed my forehead, and I took on little step forward towards his chest. He took both my hands in his. 

"So will you increase the distance between.." I started to ask.  

I hadn't finished my question when a blow so ferocious landed on the left side of my face that I could feel it instantly swell to twice its size. My hands continued to hang there, mid-air, holding on to absolutely nothing but the void where his hands used to be. He hit me a second time, with the back of his hand, on my mouth, instantly cutting my lip, and all of the distance was back. He looked at my hands and then back at me, and I pulled them away from him and put them behind my back. I don't often long to place them against his chest when he beats me, but even the distance couldn't erase the longing I felt, and with every subsequent blow it felt like he was reminding me that I couldn't ask for the comfort I so clearly craved, and he couldn't give it to me, even though he was so sorely tempted just a moment before. I wondered what had to happen to make us these people; these people who will stand so far away from each other just to feel closer. I didn't wonder long because I couldn't feel anything but the pain. He hit me so hard I could feel the pain of tomorrow already today. 

I stood there quietly, against the wall, digging my nails into the paint, while his fists and palms and legs and knees beat parts of me that are best left alone. I don't know when I became capable of such silent, almost poised, acceptance, but it's worth the denial of humanness to access this space. Maybe I was hoping that after the blood had run dry, he would fuck me. It would be as cold and transactional as ever, but at least I could feel him closer, for a little while. Even if he fucked me like he was trying to get me to cry, at least he would be inside me, in a manner vaguely reminiscent of what I had been desiring all evening. 

But sometimes I think nothing pleases him more than crushing me, I see no other reason why the peak of my small, scared vulnerability brings out the peak of his cruelty. He pushed me to my knees, still fully-clothed, while he pulled his cock out of his shorts, and put it against my face. The moment he did that, I started to cry, and each time he heard a little sob, he pulled back and slapped me until I stopped shedding tears and sounds. 

"You're not a woman in my bed," he said pushing his cock into my aching mouth, "I don't really give a fuck if you cry, but I see no reason to allow your tears on my cock." 

There is no reason, to him. To me, it felt like his decision not to fuck me was so deliberate, and the clothes on my back were just there to remind me of that. His cock in my mouth, just there to remind me it wasn't somewhere else. The cold, unyielding wall behind me just there to remind me that it wasn't the forceful warmth of his pelvis  holding me in place. Every action seemed designed to remind me not to attempt to breach this distance between us again. He didn't even cum in my mouth, he came in my hair, holding me down by my head so I couldn't even look at him. For a moment, it seemed like I didn't even need to be there. Then he stepped away from me, the moment he was done, and lay back on the bed. 

"Shower," he said, lighting a cigarette, not even looking at me, "I don't need filth in my bed." 

I waited for a few minutes, stumbling around on the floor because everything ached so much. Perhaps I waited just to demonstrate to myself that he wasn't going to help me up, and when I had established that to a hurtful sufficiency, I stumbled into the bathroom by myself, wobbling on my shaky legs. I stood under the shower for a long time; way too long before I realised I was showering with my clothes still on. 

I showered with clothes still on me. I feel like I haven't done that in a long time.