Page 147 of These Tears

Click. Click.

He leaves the question hanging. The only sounds are the faint rustle of branches in the soft breeze and the nearby cluck of one stubborn chicken refusing to sleep.

Then his grey slippers drag through the snow, already dark with meltwater. He walks as if one wrong word might set off the fragile peace between us in this minefield of silence.

He stops just shy of touching me.

And devours me with his gaze.

Then he looks down at his feet.

My thoughts flare in every direction, as violent and impossible to separate as the colours overhead. I don’t know whether to scream or push him or pull him into my arms.

The expected apology never comes. I search his face for some sign of it, but the longer I look, the more the events of this night intrude on my thoughts.

Click.

‘Those demons, huh?’ I ask, almost conversationally, but with a bit of taunt still threading my tone.

His face flattens somewhat, his mouth closes. I circle him, the crunch of snow keeping time with the hard beat in my chest.

‘Demons…’ he echoes. ‘I… may have crossed a line.’

May have? As though the line itself had simply relocated beneath his feet.

I press my teeth together. ‘Well, there is really only one thing you can do to redeem yourself.’

I’m already behind him when I open the aperture another stop and fire a short burst as he meets my lens, that familiar darkness settling back in his eyes.

Click. Click. Click.

‘Well?’ he prompts. ‘Are you going to make me wait in the cold?’

A wicked, terrible thought takes shape as I continue in a half-circle until I emerge on his left side. His eyes follow me along the way as much as his body allows.

‘In the words of a semi-famous, slightly mental philosopher, “I can make this so much worse.”’

A brow lifts; so does his chin. Whether it is defiance or preparation, I’m not entirely sure. But the light washes over his marble cheek, and my finger is compelled to answer at the shutter.

‘Define worse,’ he says.

Click.

I deliberate for a moment. But I know very well what I’ve been keeping my own demons from.

The words are already there. His words: hem, top or bottom, chains or the rest of his body. They writhe on the tip of my tongue.

If he can turn obedience into intimacy, then I can make it look like punishment.

‘Take the jumper off.’

I’m not sorry for saying it. I’m aware of the implications. I know where some of his wounds are, and I use mine as permission to press on them anyway.

And that is the ugly excuse my demons have to offer.

I take it. Because I want to.

I know it’s not justice. Or healing. It’s me using the same weapon he used and pretending it’s different because it changed hands. I tell myself he needs a taste of his own medicine. That if I make him feel the edge of it once, perhaps he’ll remember where mine is next time.