Page 20 of These Secret Years

Adrian will give me time to shower. He’ll even give me time to dry and style my hair the way he prefers it. He needs the time, I think, to compose himself. To settle into the character he plays for me. Or, if not that, to remove the mask he wears around everyone else.

I’ve never been sure which it is. It doesn’t matter.

I have the version of him I have.

And he’ll make me wait, too because he likes my uncertainty. He wants me on edge.

I have a text from Chelsea when I get out of the shower.

Chelsea

Did you make it home safe?

I tap out a quick reply.

Me

Home. Mom’s making roast.

Chelsea

Rude.

Me

I’ll call you tonight.

Chelsea

K. Love u!

Me

You too

Obviously I didn’t tell my girlfriend that I’d be spending the first week of my summer with the man who owns me. She and I are supposed to live together next semester, so I have an illusion to maintain and a relationship to take care of even if I still have mixed feelings about it.

I dry my hair, putting it into the high bun Adrian prefers. Well, he prefers it not to be long at all, but since it is, he wants it out of my face.

These little rebellions, he calls them.

The hair, the piercings, the tattoos. None of those bother him the way my weight does.

The weight loss started when I stopped eating meat. At first, I only wanted to see if I could be a vegetarian. Every ounce of muscle mass I had melted away like it was only visiting in the first place.

I didn’t love that, so worked to correct it, but I was determined to steer clear of meat. I’m not the world’s biggest fan of vegetables, but I like celery and cucumbers. And candy. For protein, I usually eat something like celery and peanut butter, or cucumbers and yogurt. I eat only enough to keep me from passing out, though. That only has to happen once in a public place to learn the lesson. I got lucky that it happened in the campus gym with Deandre on a weekend.

He didn’t make a scene or call an ambulance. He just pulled me over to a mat, waited until I came around, made me drink a bottle of water then got me back to our dorm room. There was a lecture involved, but I was too out of it to remember much. I’ve timed my meals better since then.

Working out and eating more regularly helped because I was able to get some definition back, though none of my old clothes fit anymore. That will change this week. Adrian will re-outfit me. He’s wanted to since spring break, but I refused him then.

I am allowed to refuse some things. Or maybe not refuse but reschedule.

Adrian is a forty-five year old man in an open relationship with a younger man named Quinn. Quinn is a concert pianist who travels nine months of the year. Quinn is also the only man who’s ever stuck his dick in my ass.

This, of course, was done at Adrian’s behest.

It’s happened a handful of times. I would count them, but I’m always out of it when it happens. Loose and pliant enough to consent but not present enough to be aware of anything but the physical sensations. The morning after regrets are potent enough for me to understand that I never want to experience those interludes—those acts—with a clear mind. I’d be scarred for life.