“Your ex,” Helen said, wielding her disbelieving eyebrow like a cagey veteran, “is Vivian Leblanc?  That’s who you were talking about?”

 

Lucia nodded.  She ran her hands back through her hair, tucking the long black strands behind both ears, and took another bracing breath.

 

“Why is she coming here?  Do you…”  Helen pointed at herself.  “Do you think you’re gonna need backup?”

 

“No,” she said, firmly.  “No.  It’ll be fine.”

 

Helen licked her lips, squinted into the distance, and leaned on the counter so she could whisper, “Are you trying to get back with her?”

 

Lucia shook her head.  “No.  No, there’s no chance of that.  I… I know that now., but this could be the start of getting her back in my life?  Maybe?”

 

Helen frowned, just for a moment, and considered her before saying, “Okay, so…”

 

Lucia frowned, thoughtfully, and said, “Bunch of years ago we came back from a tour, and Kevin’s mom started pleading with him to go into rehab.  She’s worried about him.  Something with his dad.  His dad might have died.  I forget.”

 

“Okay,” Helen said, nodding as she listened.

 

“His dad hadn’t been in his life for a while.  It was just him, his mom, and his little brother.   Now, Kevin had it the worst out of all of us.  I’m an addict, but that’s just a…”  She swallowed hard.  “That’s a personality flaw.”

 

“Unfair, but go on.”

 

Lucia rolled her eyes.  “Whatever.  Vivian, she… she had her own thing, but she didn’t use like Kevin and I did.  Kevin, though, he was actively burying some… heavy stuff.  He was hiding from some things, but when it came to his mom, he’d do anything.  She gets him into this clinic, and he knows it’s coming.  We’ve got a couple days, and we’d written… Vivian had written a whole album’s worth while we were on the road.  We’ve got, like, a weekend before he goes and gets clean so we quick booked some studio time, and he recorded everything we needed from him.”

 

“How long,” Helen said, smirking, “is this story?”

 

“I’m getting there,” she replied.  “Viv and I recorded the rest of the album ourselves.   Took almost two months, and we had to do most of the rest of it in my old apartment to save money.  I had a spare bedroom where we—you know what, that part doesn’t matter.  Point is, he was gone for two months.

 

“As he got close to being done, they let him have some phone privileges.  We knew when he was getting out, so we scheduled a couple shows around town.  We get all our gear unloaded, we get everything all set up.  I’m sitting backstage.  Viv’s in the bathroom throwing up.”  She stopped and held up her hands.  “She had stage fright.  Threw up before every show.”

 

“That sucks,” Helen said, honestly.

 

Lucia nodded.  “Half a bottle of whiskey later, though, she’s ready to go.  I’m ready to go.  It’s showtime.  No Kevin.  Five minutes late.  Ten.  Fifteen minutes after we were supposed to go on, and the crowd is getting loud, Kev finally shows, and he’s so high that he’s practically glowing.  Absolutely lit.”

 

Helen shifted her weight, planted her elbow on the bar, and propped up her chin.

 

“We go out there, and our first song is terrible.  I mean, absolutely awful.  The worst we’d ever sounded.  We’d sent Kevin a copy of the album.  He said he was good to play it, and that he wanted to play the whole thing, right?  But he keeps playing too fast.  Like, way too fast.  Viv and me, we tried to get him to slow down, but he wasn’t listening to us.  Wasn’t taking our cues.  I don’t even think he really knew we were there with him.  He was on another planet, just going.   That song was already like two hundred beats per minute, but he’s playing closer to two forty.  Maybe two fifty.”  For reference, she made a fist, extended her index finger, and tapped it sixteen times against the bar in under three seconds.  “First song’s over.  Vivian turns to me, and we just look at each other.  We didn’t need to say anything.  She grinned, and I grinned, and it was like head down, ass up, see you at the finish line.”

 

“I like that,” Helen said, laughing.

 

“We finished a thirty-seven minute, forty-four second album in under thirty minutes.  To his dying day, Kevin argued that it was our best show, and I don’t know that he was wrong.”

 

Helen blinked slowly.  “So… you had chemistry.”

 

“On stage, yeah.  Ridiculous chemistry.  Don’t get me wrong, it was a nightmare to play that fast for that long.  I think I lost, like, five pounds on stage that night.  I could barely move for the next couple days, and Vivian?  Fucked up her arm.  We had to cancel the other shows.”

 

“And you’re hoping that, what, you two can play together again?”

 

Lucia shrugged.  “I don’t think she’ll go for it.”

 

“But you’re gonna try.”

 

It was a long, quiet moment before she said, “Yes.”

 

“So… why now?”

 

Lucia immediately intuited what was being asked, but played dumb.  “Why now what?”

 

“You’ve been back in Portland for… how long did you say?  Two months?  Three?”

 

Step eight.  Those we have harmed.  “I accidentally, but then totally on purpose, stalked Vivian’s girlfriend, in that order.”

 

“This is how you tell a story,” Helen said, but her eyes were guarded and tight.  The humor was a front.

 

“I ran into her on the bus.  It was an accident…. But then I started talking to her and kind of followed her home.”

 

“It was an accident?”

 

Lucia shrugged hopelessly.  “I know how it sounds.  I just… If I asked you to, would you trust me that that was how it happened?”

 

Helen didn’t say anything.  Not at first.  Eventually, though, she said, “Okay.  So that’s why she’s coming today.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Helen nodded, rapped her knuckle against the bar, and went to handle another patron, leaving Lucia alone with her thoughts: a situation Lucia usually avoided at all costs.  It didn’t really register to her that Helen had walked away angry, because all she could focus on was Vivian.  Not wanting to spend too much time overthinking things, Lucia turned and watched the door.

 

She didn’t have to wait long.  A few minutes later, Vivian came through the door like a SWAT team.  She spied Lucia and pivoted without missing a beat.  Lucia smiled and stood up, pushing the high backed chair next to her aside so that Vivian could sit, but Vivian just sneered.

 

“Viv!  Hey—”

 

“Don’t you Hey Viv me, you fucking psycho.”

 

Lucia stared, slack jawed, as Vivian came to stand right in front of her, looming over her.  They might have only been a few inches apart in height, but Lucia suddenly felt very, very small.  “Wh-what?”

 

“I’m here because Delia said I needed this, but the truth is that I have nothing to say to you.  I’m done with you.  I’m over you.  Do you get that?”

 

“Viv, I—”

 

“You have no idea what you did to me.  What you put me through.  The way you led me on, for years, and you knew—you knew!— you were never gonna make good on any of it.  Do you know how fucking cruel that was?  You never had any feelings for me, but you knew that I did and you played me.  You manipulated me!  Do you know how worthless you made me feel? That you’d just up and leave me in the middle of the fucking day?”

 

“It wasn’t like that,” she whimpered.

 

“The fuck it wasn’t!”

 

“Hey,” came Helen’s voice, from across the room.

 

“That wasn’t about you,” Lucia sobbed.  “I fucked up, and I couldn’t—”

 

“You’re goddamn right you fucked up,” Vivian said, jabbing a finger at her.  “You’re goddamn right it wasn’t about me!  It was never about me!  It was always about you, you selfish fuck!”

 

“Hey!”

 

Lucia flinched when Helen appeared next to them.  She was more of a height with Vivian, though a bit broader, and the two of them stared each other down.  Vivian gave her a quick look from head to toe, and then gave Lucia a twisted grin.

 

“She came right over, huh?”  Then, after another brief look, she added, “That why you wanted to meet here?  Are you fucking her too?”

 

“Vivian!” Lucia said, exasperated, at the same time that Helen said, “Okay, I think it’s time you left.”

 

Vivian turned to her, like Helen had ceased to exist, and leaned in close.  “I need you to get this through your head.  You and me?  We’re not friends.  We’re nothing.  I didn’t think I’d need to say this, but apparently I do.  Do not come around again.  Do not stalk my girlfriend.  Stay out of my life.”

 

“Let’s go,” Helen said, putting her hand on Vivian’s shoulder.

 

“Don’t touch me,” Vivian shouted, brushing Helen’s hand away and taking a step back.  “It’s fine.  I’m going.”

 

“Vivian, wait!” Lucia cried.

 

“You’re pathetic,” Vivian snarled, viciously.  

 

Helen gave her a shove toward the door, and when Vivian got her balance again it looked like they were going to come to blows.  She’d never seen Vivian so irate.  Instead of shoving back, Vivian just spat on the floor on her way out.

 

“Classy,” Helen said, dryly, and got a full-fledged bras d’honneur in return.

 

Once Vivian was gone, the bar went deathly silent.  Helen stood for a few seconds, hands on her hips while her chest rose and fell dramatically.  Puffing like a steam engine.  When she turned around, though, she wore a tight smile.  She said, loud enough for the whole bar to hear, “Next round’s on the house.”

 

The room erupted in grateful cheers, but Lucia heard little of it.  She was barely aware of Helen even as the red headed bartender slipped an arm around her shoulder and ushered her toward the back.

 

She was gutted.  In between one blink and the next she found herself upstairs in Helen’s apartment.  She sat on the edge of the bed, and Helen said some things to her—a story about her husband unofficially doubling as the bouncer, because of his temper—but Lucia didn’t really process it.  None of it really sank in except when Helen said she’d be right back.  And then Lucia was alone, which was what she deserved.  She sat very still, and she stared at the floor, and the minutes trickled by.

 

After a little while she got up and went to the bathroom, which was a mistake, because her least favorite person in the world was waiting for her there.  There was no avoiding her, and when Lucia saw her she saw the fear and revulsion.  Her gaze was inescapable, and Lucia couldn’t handle the judgement; the depth of the hatred was astounding.  The longer she stared at the mirror, the tighter her chest felt, and when she couldn’t breathe any more she leaned forward on the counter.  Her hand brushed something cold, and Lucia stared at it for a long moment.  Then she grabbed the scissors in a fit of mania, and started cutting.

 

When Helen returned, a little while later, she only made it a few steps in the door before she stopped cold.  “That is the gayest thing I’ve ever seen,” she said, without a hint of sarcasm or humor.

 

Lucia blinked, nervously fidgeting with her freshly cropped hair.  The hair was a little longer on top, parted near her ear and combed all the way over to the other, and then tapered down in length the further down it went.  She had no idea what she’d been going for, and she’d left a hell of a mess for later, but it had made the right first impression.  She stood up from where she’d been sitting, at Helen’s small kitchen table, crossed the distance, and kissed her.

 

“Whoa,” Helen said, but she did not push Lucia away.

 

Lucia kissed her again.  Longer.

 

“Luc, wait.”

 

Lucia did not wait.  She kissed her again.  This time, Helen grabbed her by her upper arms, and Lucia purred at being grabbed.

 

“Okay, look,” Helen said, squeezing her eyes shut.  “That, downstairs, that was, like, all red flags… all the things she said... but… I don’t think that’s who you are. Not anymore, anyway.  I’m… fuck me running, I’m choosing to believe that, okay?”

 

Lucia leaned, neck extending, and tried to kiss Helen again, but Helen backed up and held her at arms length.

 

“Stop.  Stop!”  She took a rubber band off her wrist, and slipped it onto Lucia’s.  “This is a conversation we’re going to have later,” she said, tugging on it with the tip of her finger, “okay?  We’re just putting it to the side for a moment.”

 

Lucia nodded and pushed forward again—the sooner they were kissing, the sooner she could stop thinking—but Helen’s grip was too much.  Which, she thought, was hot.

 

Helen compressed her lips to a thin, tight line, and scowled.  “Look,” she said, “I’m…”  She grunted, and took another rubber band off her wrist.  “This one too.  Two conversations.  For now, though, just… Banana.  You got it?”

 

She nodded slowly without really comprehending.

 

As soon as the redhead let go of her arms, though, Lucia started moving forward again.  Helen’s eyes flared as she said, “Sit. Down.”

 

Lucia dropped back into the kitchen seat with a thwump, and her jaw went slack.  There had been such a jolt through her at being ordered to do something.  It was an affront to her mile-wide rebellious streak, which was itself getting quite a thrill from rebelling against the idea that she always needed to be contrarian.  She found herself breathing quite heavily as she stared up at Helen, with her crossed arms and her unimpressed smirk.

 

“You’re kind of a brat.”

 

Little by little, Lucia felt her mouth going dry as she started to maybe possibly figure out where this was going.  Maybe.

 

“Stay.”

 

She nodded, slowly, and watched in wonder as Helen stormed off past her bed and into her closet.  She sat very still, listening very carefully to the sounds.  A zipper here.  Rustling there.  A… creaking?  When she reappeared, Lucia’s eyes bulged.

 

“This is for me,” Helen said, gesturing to her leather corset.  It had two thick over-the-shoulder straps that started far out to the side and came back in around behind her neck, giving her already impressive bust a bit more cleavage.  As she walked, hands clasped behind her back and shoulders spread, she added, “I feel powerful in this.”  The bottoms of the corset functioned as a garter belt, and clipped onto some very thick-banded thigh-high stockings, with the look completed by a pair of lethal black heels.

 

Lucia self-consciously clapped her jaw shut and blinked.

 

"I don't get to wear it as often as I used to," she said, with a kind of dark wistfulness, "but there was a time."

 

The corset cinched her waist, with the criss-cross lacing set in the front of it, and it gave her a shape that, on any other day, would have given Lucia a terrible case of dry mouth.  On any other day, she would have bandied and quipped, and needled Helen about having something like that ready to go.  On any other day, Lucia would have found a way to get herself paddled, since, she now assumed, there was probably a paddle there somewhere.

 

But Lucia wasn’t up to talking just then and she wasn’t up to confronting why that was, so she just watched.  Helen stalked past and around her, and she saw that they were the kind of stockings that had a thick seam running up the back of the leg, and she squirmed.

 

As she came back around, Helen stepped over Lucia’s legs and sat on her lap, and Lucia experienced a gay panic as she had never felt in her entire life.

 

“I can work with quiet,” Helen whispered.

 

Every time their faces came together, and Lucia leaned in to kiss her, Helen drew back just a little.  Every time she drew back, those lips spread into a smile.  She could feel Helen’s breath on her, warm and wet, and she yearned for more.  Lucia’s heart leapt when she felt Helen tugging up on her shirt, and she helpfully raised her arms to let it pass.  The sports bra that she wore, purely to mute her nipples, went too, before she put her arms down.

 

Lucia tentatively laid her hands on Helen’s thighs, and Helen popped back to her feet with a smug, “Ah ah ah.”  Once again, Helen circled her, but this time when she stopped behind Lucia she drew Lucia’s arms behind her, around the chairback.  All the little hairs on the back of her neck, and there were many of them now, stood on end as she felt steel snap into place around her wrist, with a snkt-snkt.  Handcuffs.

 

Helen’s lips were at her ear, and she shivered.

 

“Remember.  Banana.”

 

Lucia nodded, and then twisted to try and look at her, but Helen stayed at the very edge of her vision.

 

“Eyes front.”

 

She complied.  It was hard to say why.  

 

Fingertips danced up and down her side, over her ribs, and Lucia shivered hard.  In the cool air, her nipples quickly reached the beautiful, painful ache that told her she was alive.  Helen noticed them too.  The redhead leaned over her shoulder, planting a row of kisses from the nape of the neck around to the collarbone, and along the collarbone, and she took up both nipples between her fingers.

 

“Mmmm,” Helen purred.  “Have I told you how much I enjoy the way your body reacts?”

 

Lucia smirked and said nothing, but couldn’t stop herself from arching her back into the touch.

 

The touch vanished.  Helen stalked across the room, back toward her closet again.  Her heels made an incredible sound against the hardwood floor, but Lucia kept her eyes straight forward.  Just like she’d been told to.  In her peripheral vision, she could see Helen swinging a bag when she returned, and she unconsciously clenched everything.

 

“Legs apart.”

 

Her shoes made a shhhh as they slid around to each side, as far apart as her pants would allow.  Helen brough her own knees together, squatted demurely to the side, pulled out the most professional looking, all-black Hitachi personal massager that Lucia had ever seen, and brought the tip of it to rest against the crotch of her jeans.  Lucia squeaked.

 

“Eyes up,” Helen said.

 

The perverse pleasure of obeying was almost as good as the thrumming waves.  Almost.

 

The redhead held her gaze for a long, long time, unblinking, until the pressure of it was crushing and she had to look away.  Down at Helen’s lips, which were pursed, and moist, and soft.  At the tips of her teeth, visible through the smile.  At her tongue, drifting back and forth within like a coiled snake.  

 

“Do you understand,” Helen said, “that you can stop this… at any time?”

 

Lucia nodded.

 

“All you have to do is say Banana.”

 

Lucia nodded again, this time more emphatically, because as she did so Helen flicked the button on the vibrator and it started going much faster.  Much harder.

 

“Good, because you’re going to talk to me one way or another.”  When Lucia just stared at her blankly, Helen added, “Either you say the word banana, and this all stops no questions asked, or you beg me to make you cum,” and with that, she flicked off the massager.

 

Lucia collapsed, shoulders slinking inward, and all the air in her lungs left in a rush.  She hadn’t been close, but she also hadn’t not been close.  Helen smirked and stood, this time with her feet planted slightly wider than shoulder width.  Seated as Lucia was, this put Helen’s gorgeous labia right in front of her.  Lucia hadn’t yet had much of an opportunity to appreciate how pretty it was.  She had one petal on each side, and very plump outer lips.  Perfect for kissing.

 

“Do you know what I like most about bratty subs?” Helen asked, as she walked around behind Lucia.  Clack.  Clack.  Clack.  Each heel strike sent a shiver down her spine.  When she answered, she moved so that her whispered voice traveled back and forth from ear to ear.  “It’s that I get to be... creative.”

 

A long line of kisses, from the top of her neck, down and around, along her collarbone, with one hand reaching for her nipple while the other brought the massager to rest against her groin.

 

Lucia flinched, clenched her teeth, and tried to control her reaction, but she couldn’t stop the long, low grunt that escaped with her breath.

 

“That’s my girl,” Helen said, softly, and Lucia swelled.  “You will tell me when you’re getting close.  If you don’t want to say the word, you can just nod.”

 

Lucia nodded once, knowing what would happen, and the sensation disappeared.  Helen didn’t immediately turn it off, though, as the buzzing moved through the air around her.  She panted with a mixture of relief and growing anxiety.

 

Helen’s lips brushed her ear, as she whispered, “Do you trust me?”

 

This brought Lucia short.  She had, instinctively, placed a significant amount of trust in Helen, but this had been done without thought.  Unconsciously.  When Helen said sit, she’d sat.  She knew she was vulnerable, though she really didn’t want to think about that, and it had been a relief to let Helen take over.  A huge relief, she realized.  The more she thought about it, the less sense it made that she, of all people, would have surrendered so easily to this situation, in this state of mind.  Lucia Alvarez was a fighter, a rebel, and always had been.

 

She was tough.  Always had been.  Always so hard on the outside.  Living in rough places.  Playing to rough crowds.  Relishing every second of it.  Never really resting.  Never really letting her guard down.  Never really connecting with anyone.  Never really sharing herself.  Not even with Vivian.  Not all the way.

 

“Yes,” Lucia whispered, and she realized that she was crying.

 

Helen moved around in front of her, and gently corralled her leg as she circled.  Lucia matched her, bringing her knees back together again, and this time when Helen sat on her lap Lucia kissed her with all the fervid passion of a woman falling head over heels.

 

Helen’s riotous mane fell around them as they kissed, and the world shrank.  Nothing else mattered.  She writhed, struggling uselessly against the handcuffs, and felt, more than heard, Helen chuckle.  In the middle of that—in the middle of the kiss she’d been working toward for twenty minutes—Helen took both of her nipples between thumbs and fingers, and squeezed.  Waves of searing euphoria broke across her skin, and Lucia whimpered pitifully…

 

...and having the room to be pitiful, just for a little while, was so freeing and so unburdening that she started crying all over again.

 

“You’re going to beg me for it,” Helen said.

 

“I know,” she replied, softly.

 

“Stand up.”

 

Helen stood, stepped to the side, and tucked her extended fingers under Lucia’s elbow to guide her through getting her footing.  The handcuffs weren’t fastened to the chairback, but it was still in the way, and she blushed at the casual consideration being given to her.  The basic, easy decency.  In its own way, this felt like the real reward.

 

The taller woman led her toward the bed: a hand pressed gently against the small of her back and a tap to let her know when to stop.  Her mind had lost the eyes straight ahead instructions from earlier, and she watched shamelessly, with rapt attention, as Helen knelt down, untied her boots, and unfastened her jeans.  Care was baked into each motion, and she nodded gratefully when Helen helped her step out of all of it.

 

Helen helped Lucia onto the edge of the bed, on her knees, and then steered her forward until her shoulders and cheek came to rest on the satin sheets.  Her toes and hips were nearly even, right at the edge of the bed, with her knees spread wide.  That tongue, that eminently kissable tongue, slid through her folds like a ship at full sail.

 

“Close,” she moaned, through gritted teeth nearly a minute later.  The tongue disappeared immediately, and the sensation of two fingers entering her did not replace it.  Not entirely.  They probed her, exploring her walls, and Lucia was only too happy to give helpful directions.  A little lower.  A little deeper.  Armed with better maps, it was only a matter of time until Helen built up another charge within her.  Lucia clenched, groaned, and held on as long as she thought she could before, again, saying, “Close!”

 

Those same two fingers plunged into her again, this time through the back door, and Lucia’s knees tried to spread completely to either side.

 

“Close!” she moaned, as Helen rifled those two fingers in and out while keeping a gentle pressure on her clit.

 

“Close!” she whined, from her back, as Helen sucked and licked and nibbled.

 

“Close!” she cried, her head on Helen’s lap, as Helen moved the massager in circles around, but not directly touching, her pearl.

 

“Close!” she gasped, into the kiss, as Helen lay beside her and idly fiddled with a remote control.

 

When Helen let off, and the little bluetooth plug in her ass quieted, Lucia could not stop shaking.  Her legs and her core were twitching, hard, and it was all she could stand.  She leaned into Helen, drove her forehead into the redhead’s shoulder, and wept as she said, “Please.”

 

“Please what,” Helen replied, as even as two.

 

Her abdominal muscles, flexing and relaxing involuntarily, made her voice flutter when she said, “P-please let me cum-mmm.”

 

“How would you like me to make you cum?”

 

“Mouth,” she cried, instinctively: no thought involved.

 

Helen pushed her onto her back, grabbed Lucia’s knees, and parted them biblically.  The slightest brush of the redhead’s tongue brought her back to the precipice, and when they locked eyes, when Helen looked up at her with such hunger and intensity, Lucia imploded.  Inward.  Knees brought back toward shoulders.  Spine curved forward.  She curled so far in on herself that she could practically kiss Helen’s forehead, and when the floodgates released, Lucia howled.

 

Two fingers entered her, curling in and up to feather the back side of her clit.  Sweat, and more, poured out of her, and her eyes rolled up behind the lids.  She saw nothing.  She heard nothing.  There was only the feeling, and the joy, and the release.

 

Years later, when the last of the tides drew back, Helen helped her onto her side and unlocked the handcuffs.

 

“You,” Lucia gasped, as she rolled onto her back to look her lover in the eye.  “You…”

 

Helen was biting her lip, and smiling, but her eyes were closed and her arm was moving rapidly.  Lucia had to sit up a little, which hurt, to follow the movement all the way down, but before she could intercede, before she could give voice to her desire to give back, Helen came like a freight train.  All she could do was lay there, and watch, and admire.  Helen was gorgeous, even more so when she was making those little meeping sounds, like she was trying to hold in something that would not be contained.  She did the one thing she could think to; she took Helen’s face in her hands, cupping her cheeks, and pulled her into a long, slow kiss.

 

Slow was all she could manage, but it felt right nonetheless.

 

Helen collapsed on top of her, using her chest as a pillow for what felt like several minutes but was probably less than half of one, before getting up.  

 

“Stay,” she said.

 

Lucia did not give any thought to disobeying.

 

The redhead got to her feet, somewhat unsteadily but with a dreamy smile, and picked up the handcuffs.  She pulled out the plug and picked up the remote, and the massager, and put them back in the bag, and went into the closet.  When she came out again, this time fully naked, she gave Lucia a plain white t-shirt so big it could have fit two Lucia’s side by side.  When she came out for the last time, wearing another immaculately matched set of lingerie under a similarly overlarge t-shirt, she helped Lucia to her feet and guided her to a couch and television on the far side of the room that Lucia had not even known was there.

 

Helen sat down, put a blanket over her legs and a pillow in her lap, and tapped it gently with her fingertips, and when Lucia laid her head there it felt right.  One handed, Helen pulled a blanket off the back of the couch and draped it over her.  She was warm, and comfortable, and the nails dragging over her scalp made her eyelids heavy.

 

After a few minutes, Helen reached under the blanket, carefully took hold of Lucia’s forearm, and pulled it out to where Lucia could see her wrist, and the two rubber bands.

 

“One,” Helen said, as she pulled the first one off and wrapped it back around her own wrist.  “We will never do anything like that again without better communication.  You need to be able to talk to me, okay?”

 

“Okay,” Lucia said, softly, if a bit mechanically.

 

“It’s important,” Helen said, laughing.  “We are nowhere near, like, a gag, or something where you can’t talk.”

 

“Okay,” Lucia repeated, this time nodding.

 

“We might get there—”

 

Lucia rolled over under the blanket, so that her back was turned to the TV, and looked up.  “I understand.”

 

“Okay,” Helen whispered, “that gave me chills.”

 

Lucia bit her lip and nodded, and the nails on her scalp resumed their gentle scratching.

 

“The second thing is a little harder.  Are you…”  Helen raised her eyebrows questioningly, and Lucia nodded.  “Okay.”  She took a long breath, and then another one, before saying, “I’m going to guess that you were… fifteen.  The first time that you had sex.”

 

The statement took a while for Lucia to process, and she had to blink several times before she responded, saying, “Fourteen.”

 

“And he was… Eighteen?  Twenty?”

 

“Twenty three,” she said.

 

“Twenty three,” Helen repeated, softly.  “I was, um…”  She sniffed and looked away for a moment.  “I was sixteen... the first time I was raped.”

 

At this, as Lucia sat up and moved closer, the last vestiges of domme and sub slipped away and left two women: survivors.  She just listened, occasionally holding Helen’s hand, while Helen talked about how her experience had changed how she saw sex, and her body, and her self-worth, and what she had to offer the world as a person and as a woman.  It changed her perspective in ways she hadn’t come to understand until many years later, years during which she’d had the benefit of a loving partner (she was very clear about that, and how it had helped, and gave Lucia a lot of meaningful looks).  She talked about how hard it had been to find the strength to love herself again.

 

Lucia listened to all of this, shaking with an unnamed but familiar fear. It took her a long time to understand what Helen was telling her, and even longer to understand why.