The Dancer

I was always a little envious of her. It wasn't because she was prettier than me, even though she was; she had curly black hair that draped her delicate shoulders all the way down to her hips and her smile could light up even the darkest of rooms. Her appearance was enviable but that wasn't why I envied her. It was the way she moved that stabbed my heart and made me wish I could be as comfortable in my skin. When she dropped a pencil on the floor and put on foot in front of the other before she bent down to pick it up, it was like she was back on stage dancing. Always dancing.

All her movements were like that. Light as air and complete. When she waved goodbye it was like she had just curtseyed. When she stirred the pot in the kitchen it was like her fingers were repeating the same motions that hundreds of people watched her do with her hips. When she walked down the street to hail a cab, she moved like an invisible partner was guiding her forward. Every step she took was poised and measured. Even when she turned her head, it was with inhuman fluidity.

I was mildly obsessed with her even before we got together. Every Thursday night I would go down to the club where she performed just so I could watch her act. Normally I loathe going out like that but listening to her sing and sway her hips had become such an integral part of my week that I couldn't imagine going back to spending every night in. She did this thing with her fingers each time she started performing; she'd snap her fingers, close her eyes and tap her foot. She did that sometimes for a couple of notes and sometimes for a couple of minutes but each time when she opened her eyes, she made the whole world come alive. A couple of years after I first met her she told me her parents worried she'd become one of those singers who get lost in the background at a shady restaurant, it was funny because if they had ever looked into her eyes when she performed they'd know that kind of fire never gets hidden in the background.

When I'd been going there for about two months, she first came up to talk to me. I'd been hoping she would do that, more than hoping actually, I'd somehow just taken it for granted that she would come talk. I'm not timid by any regard but I do like to draw things out; I was content to just smile at her and watch her eyes sparkle when she looked in my direction, week-after-week, learning to expect to find me at that table. I prefer that kind of contact to last longer. What comes next is often inevitable and sometimes too tumultuous. Before her, I had made a habit of not approaching women I was truly interested in and focusing instead on lost moments of nonverbal distant communication. And when I wanted to have sex, I went to whores. It was hard at first to find an escort service that caters to women as clients but ultimately I found a guy who set me up on a regular-ish rotation. It was easy. I got to tell them what I wanted and I didn't have to engage.

I wasn't closed off to the idea of love and relationships, just that in the past they had been worth more trouble than they were worth so in the meanwhile I accidentally set up a life where I got everything I would from a relationship without having to be one. Almost, everything. But back then I thought I got everything.  I realized that I was wrong when she first came up and talked to me. I don't remember what she was talking about it, it was definitely some nonsense or other. She talked a lot of nonsense. I mean no malice by that, I truly enjoyed that about her. Connection was so easy for her because she came at it from everywhere.

When she walked away to do some vocal exercises I felt genuine interest in talking to a woman and maybe liking her before I had sex with her after a long time. I guess in some ways I was closed off or maybe I was just tired. Tired of seeing women I once loved cut me off because they didn't want their husbands to see the wild side of their lives. Wild side. That shit hurts when you realize someone you loved and cared about and had piss in your mouth thinks of you as their wild side. I was also tired of there always being something wrong with me. Too wrong to be loved. I worked too much. Talked too little. Didn't smile enough. Never wanted to go out. I guess that's somewhat on me and I want to make some efforts when I am in a relationship but I never seem to be able to see the reason in it.

She made me see reason.

I remember the first time I didn't show up for dinner when I told her I would because I, well, forgot. We'd been together a few months and the spark had worn into love or some shit like that she used to say very cutely. She finally called me around ten to ask where I was and I realized I'd been taking a walk for three hours. I'm a solitary creature and I tend to forget there are people waiting on me because there so rarely are people waiting on me. I designed my life to be that way. When she called me she wasn't mad or screaming, she asked where I was and when I told her about the forgetting she asked if was coming over or if she should go to bed. I felt terrible so I told her I would come over.

I was close enough to walk and I remember walking very fast. She didn't say she was upset but I felt like if I didn't get there fast enough she would be. It's a relationship-specific fear that I believe unites us all. I started apologising the moment I entered her house. Funny thing about her, she would never want to stay at my place. She thought it had no character. Her place was in a ridiculous location and looked like a rainbow vomited in it. At first it gave me a headache but I got used to it. Maybe I even started liking it.

"I don't like that you forgot to remember me," she said cutting through my apologies in her cool voice.

She was sitting at the table and the air seemed very cold around her. I was standing not five feet away from her, a little sweaty, and it felt like the sun was shining over my head.

She got up and walked towards me and it was like she was bringing the chill to me. When she stood in front of me my heart had stopped cold and it felt like the sweat froze. It was how she moved. She put her point across with her footsteps. She put her palm against my chest and she with just a little pressure moved up to my throat. Normally she was an incredibly gentle person but her touch was too fierce for her stature.

"I want to hurt you," she whispered into my ear, almost shy, except her hand around my throat already was hurting me, "Can I hurt you?"

I don't know why I said yes. I figured it was some kind of sexual fantasy and while it wasn't a route I normally took, the way she asked made my mouth go completely dry. For one second I believed I wanted nothing more than for her to hurt me. The words came out of my mouth before I had even processed what she had just asked.

She wasn't aggressive which is why I wasn't worried. She was gentle, if almost gleeful, she held my hand like a child might hold it. Whenever she touched me I felt more beautiful but when she guided me I actually felt like I finally moved comfortably. She had a power; her movement was perhaps more powerful than she ever realized.

She walked me to her dining table and then pushed me down onto it. On my back. She nudged just a little and I seemed to slide into place on my back. In all the time I had known her until then I had never seen her be that assertive but that wasn't the alarming bit, it was more alarming that she seemed never to lose her composure. So calm to be so young.

She kneeled between my legs and started to pull my pants, I don't quite remember ever being more turned on by anything. It's odd to feel like you're being prepared to be hurt but it feels good. Who knew. I wondered if she'd ever fantasized about this before, I wondered if she had just been waiting for a reason. I almost chuckled when I weighed this aspect of her against the rest of her personality. I wondered why I hadn't seen it in her crazy eyes.

She stood beside me running her fingers against my thighs and my cunt. She didn't say anything but she kept looking at me. I kept looking at her. As if she wasn't circling her finger around the opening of my cunt; as if she wasn't teasing me just how she knew I liked it.

"You can't eat at this..." I started to say to cut the tension a little but she cut me off by slapping me hard against my left thigh.

I couldn't believe her strength.  

And I couldn't believe she just told me to be quiet without ever having to use a word.

She became quite lost in slapping me against my thighs. I became quite lost in it as well. My head spun with the sensation between my legs and the heat coming from my thighs just made me more wet. Every now and then she would stop and rub my thighs. She'd look at my face as I moaned and I'd hold her gaze for as long as she'd let me.

At one point she stopped and began to undo her belt. It was thinking belt; more fashionable than useful. I was sure by then that she'd done this before but I was transfixed by how beautifully fingers can unfasten a belt. Her hands were like magic and I couldn't wait for her to beat me harder.

I knew instantly that she couldn't wait either. She smiled quite maniacally when she saw those things red well rising up on my thighs.

"Look," she said holding me by my hair and pulling me up, "Look at your thighs."

I couldn't help but smile at her. My thighs burned like there was a fire on me but seeing her eyes light up like that; like they did when she was on stage, I couldn't wait for her turn me into a red mess. She didn't wait. She flung that belt against me until her arms were too tired to hold it, when she could swing any longer she held a tiny little end of the belt and started slapping against my cunt.

"Does that hurt?" She asked with a smile on her face.

"Very much, baby," I told her wincing.

"Can I keep doing it?" She asked gleefully, with her fingers inside me.

"Please..." I told her even though I couldn't quite explain it to myself.

The way she hit me it was like she had forgotten what it feel like to have skin. She lost herself entirely. She was oblivious to my screaming and moaning, but each time she managed to mark me, she remembered to show me.

When she finally decided to stop I was humping the tiny end of her belt in a desperate attempt to cum. She retreated as suddenly and calmly as she began. When she reappeared she was pulling my pants back over my legs. Once again, she didn't say anything.

Later that night as we lay entwined in bed after a very late dinner, I pulled her closer than I ever had before.

"I hate that I can't dance," I told her.

She looked at me and smiled.

It was an odd thing to confess but the things we choose to keep secret are odd.

"I'll teach you to dance for me," she said digging her nails into my thigh.

And she did.