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14
Nina walkedthrough the park with her head bent against the wind. They were well into March and winter was showing no signs of loosening its grip on the city. Still, she’d found herself coming to Washington Square more and more often, although the park wasn’t at all convenient to either the gallery or Jack’sapartment.
It was nearly eight p.m., the sky still clinging to vestiges of blue in the west, but the park was empty. She came to the bench and sat at one end, glad she’d pulled on her gloves when she’d exited the subway. The gloves, along with her coat and scarf, made the cold bearable, and she sat back on the bench and lookedaround.
She’d given up leaving notes for her mystery photographer. It was obviously an exercise in futility, the photographer either oblivious to Nina’s outreach or against making contact. She was disappointed, but it also lent an air of additional magic to the city: somewhere out there the woman was still taking pictures, leaving them like letters from a secretadmirer.
She looked around. The city seemed to exist in another dimension. There, horns blared and people shouted and pushed their way through crowds in an effort to get where they were going. They walked with headphones in or their phones lifted to their faces as they held conversations with people who weren’t present instead of the ones standing near them on the subway platform or on the curb while they waited for the light tochange.
But the park was silent and alive, the trees bearing witness to the people who came and went, the sounds of the city muffled by the park’s borders. Nina settled into it, letting her thoughts turn, as they so often did, toJack.
It was impossible to think of him without finding herself in a state of arousal, without having flashes of their lovemaking: the scarlet rope wound in increasingly complicated — and restricting — configurations around her body: Jack’s eyes, flat and cold as he gave his orders: his face, nearly expressionless as he came insideher.
He was still gentle during aftercare, still made a point to remain with her in the tub or shower, to rub salve on the red lines that crossed her body immediately after sex. But while he still talked to her, he said less and less about himself, his emotional openness shrinking in proportion to the experimental nature of theirsex.
And it was experimental — for her at least. It wasn’t just the shibari, which had progressed to complex knots and loops that looked suspiciously like a harness. She never knew what Jack had in store forher.
Never knew what he would do toher.
She knew only that whatever it was, she wouldn’t use her safe word. Knew only that the further he pushed her, the more she wanted, until she began to wonder if she had any limits atall.
He withheld orgasm from her for increasingly long periods of time, bringing her to the brink again and again during a single night — and sometimes over a period of days — until she wanted to cry with the frustration ofit.
She’d considered masturbating to release the tension until Jack (was he reading her mind now?) had made it clear that was against therules.
She could have disobeyed. How would he know? (“Don’t try to hide from me, Nina. I know your body like I know my own. I’llknow.”)
But she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Even when she was screaming for release, when it was almost painful to walk for the additional friction between her legs, it felt imperative to follow Jack’srules.
No, that wasn’tright.
She wanted to follow the rules. Knew doing so would make her pleasure more total later. It was a kind of discipline she could never have imagined imposing on herself, a discipline she couldn’t have imagined would be so simultaneously painful anderotic.
It wasn’t just the rope. He made her say dirty things, made her beg for what she wanted. In the moment, she felt no shame. She was too desperate for his hands, his mouth, hiscock.
Too desperate to obey, to achieve the pleasure that came withobeying.
But later her face would burn with humiliation, her sexual appetite looking seedy and dirty in the harsh light ofreality.
She gave very few details to anyone. Even Karen was given only the morsels Nina thought wouldn’t bring judgement — Jack liked to tie her up, he sometimes made her wait fororgasm.
She couldn’t bring herself to confess her own dark desire, her arousal at being dominated, her willingness to obey Jack’sorders.
“Goodevening.”
Nina looked up, surprised to find that an older woman had appeared on the other side of the park bench. Nina had been so lost in her own thoughts she hadn’t heard the womanapproach.
“Hello,” Ninasaid.
“It’s a lovely evening in spite of the cold,” the woman said. “Or perhaps because ofit.”
Nina smiled. “Yes, itis.”
The woman’s figure was hidden beneath a fur coat, her face fully made-up under an elaborate hat rimmed with flowers. Nina thought she spied a fake bird nestled among theblossoms.
“I love the park at night.” The woman turned to her. “By the way, I’m Judith Chambers. I believe you’ve been looking forme.”
Nina sat up straighter. “I’ve been… Are you the photographer? The one who leaves pictureshere?”
