Baby Cuck Feels

“I love your freckles,” I say softly for the millionth time while I stare at her face. She smiles.

“They love you,” she says, pulling me closer. “And the new ones I get from the sun next summer? They’ll love you too.”

I grin, this sweet love of mine who says things like she means them. Such a devoted babe. In 2 and a half years not once has she made me fell like any less than the apple of her eye. But I’m a twisted little thing and I can’t help but wonder… more out of curiosity than jealousy… is this how she always replies to women who love her freckles?

We all have them, canned responses, cute quips or deflections we’ve picked up over time to respond to common comments or compliments. If she kisses me and we get a static shock I will wiggle my eyebrows and say “shocking” with a cute grin, just like I have with everyone who’s kiss-shocked me since I was 15. I’m sure she’d cringe knowing this response was not born for her. I’m sure she’d find it less adorable. But I can’t help but be curious, I know there are plenty of things she says and does that are part of her “usual routine” with women.

I flirt with the masochistic feelings of being cucked. They’re so big and scary and ouchy, it makes sense that I’m attracted to them. (The physical pains I enjoy are big and scary and ouchy too.) It mostly happens in my head, thoughts like this that I linger on while my partner is blissfully unaware that I’m tormenting myself in my imagination, getting wet from the mix of fear and heartache. Hurts too big to say out loud, or let someone else wield.

I know I’m the hundredth pretty girl who’s fawned over her freckles.

“And they love you,” I think of how she must have held her ex like this, the same words on her lips. It pains me in a specific way; “it’s not special, you’re not special”, this is the most delicate truth to play with. It cuts like a scalpel, this primal fear for human beings, one of my brain’s earliest hurts. I think of all the other truths I don’t know. I think of how she promised her “next freckles” would love them too, I think of how they don’t, how one day she won’t love me either, she’ll say sweet things to someone else. How she’ll know it’s her go-to answer, how they’ll swoon at the darling phrase, oblivious to it’s history, not tormenting themselves with the truth.

I’m careful to keep my smile steady, I don’t want her to think something is wrong. The emotions twist inside of me and squeeze my heart a little, I throb. I want to be hers. I want those freckles to love me. I know the ones she gets next summer are already there under the surface loving me right now. I don’t want that to change. Change is so scary. I want to control it. It’s so hard not to be in control. (Masochism comes in so many forms.)

It’s quiet as she holds my gaze.

“Fuck me,” I whisper.