Thought that going to kinkier clubs and getting some experience there-- and not just masochistic bottom experience this time-- would scratch the itch still left in me from last year (to be the bike crash instead of the person falling off the bike), but it’s all easier said than done, of course. And really, maybe only one thing will truly scratch that itch, but will I ever really be worthy of it? Convincing enough for him? Would he just laugh in my face?
It’s one thing being able to convince dominants that I want what they have to offer. Quite another to convince submissives that I can give them what they want. I know what I lack, and they know it even more obviously, and then we both know it, and it goes nowhere, and I’m back to getting whipped. Even harder. Until I can’t think about it anymore, until nothing but pain remains. That still feels good in its odd way, and in the moment, being “punished” for being a pathetic little faggot that thought he could walk in his Daddy’s three-sizes-too-big boots feels strangely right as well.
But there’s still an anger that bubbles up underneath all that. Part of me does want to give up. Let the fantasy remain a fantasy. I’m a short little queen with a faggy little voice. Oooh, scary. SO authoritative. That anger-- defiance, maybe, more accurately-- makes me keep trying, despite how stupid it might be. I want to be worthy of him. I want to understand exactly how to give him that bike crash feeling, but more than that, and really, more importantly, I want to understand how to make him BELIEVE I can give it to him. Which means, first, having to convince strangers of it.
Not to say I haven’t had SOME success. But it’s been limited, and all with guys barely old enough to buy their own drinks (as much as I dislike how obviously I’m aging, now, it's made it increasingly easier to find bottoms, generally, too, but also usually younger. There's an appeal to it, for them. ...Maybe I'm more likely to be recognized by the older ones, too, and who the hell would be convinced of a dominant Jules Riley). Skinny little boys that want to get whipped so bad they don’t care if it’s another little faggot doing it to them. They want to get called pathetic for it and it’s easy to oblige. The problem is, I feel just as pathetic as they do once all is said and done and I don’t get an ounce of joy from it. I enjoy the whipping itself, and that’s something I KNOW I’m good at (a whip and a microphone cord aren’t THAT different, when it comes down to it). And even those skinny boys look lovely in their own way when they’re tied up to a chair or cuffed to a wall. ...But that’s not really what I WANT. Nathan hasn’t been a skinny boy for years. Short, yes, but beautifully muscular these days. And UGH, the way rope or twine looks on men that strong or even stronger… and fuck, just the feeling of being able to get a man like that, of them wanting it, of me being convincing enough for men that have a foot on Nate in height, even… ugh. Is it stupid? It feels so stupid. It’s getting me hard just to write about it anyway.
I really go through phases of suicidal despair, insatiable libido, and impossible rage, continuously oscillating, sometimes meeting, more than anything else. Those are my three fucking moods. That's what I've been reduced to. The numbness really is a welcome respite from it all at this point, which, when writing it out, is a little scary to think about (so, four moods? Is the absence of moods a mood?). I have no idea what else I can do, what other options I have. Lou sometimes feels like a way out of it into something better but there are days I feel that way might as well be barred off, locked behind an iron gate and security cameras down a private road. I have my first call and then likely visit in awhile with Jack coming up pretty soon, too, but I'm honestly nervous about that. I don't know how well I can contain myself right now. I hope that it'll help, that I can at least get stuck on more pleasant emotional tracks, even if they're still on the extreme end of those tracks.
Working with all this is (unsurprisingly) strange. The numbness is the easiest out of all of these to work around people with, but it's still uncomfortable, and right now it's too fragile for my liking. An example-- I'd been able to handle Jeffrey's bullshit up until this point. His "bullshit" being his lamenting over his marriage and his obnoxious awkwardness around me. I couldn't handle it today. Told him that I understood that getting divorced wasn't a fun time, but my relationship ended and various people in my life died and I wasn't moping all fucking day about it. I could tell he wanted to be nice and diplomatic about it. He made about ten different faces before he frowned, said that that was "different". And I asked him how exactly it was different. Ben and I weren't married? That's all? We were together for just about as long as him and Teri were but we didn't have a paper from the government about it so when it ended it wasn't as sad? He sighed heavily, rolled his eyes, told me he didn't need this today. Kicking me out, basically. But not REALLY. Gently suggesting I find my way to the door. To be fair to Jeffrey, it's not like I need that much heavier of a hint to want to get out of his house anyway.
But I felt like that-- anger bursting at the seams, itching to get snappy with him, to get him REALLY pissed at me-- and at the time there was something of a thrill to it but also an anxiety, a fear, all of that combined, and then, once I was out of his house it dropped to that suicidal despair, and it only deepened when I thought about it, about how fucking broken my brain is. Ugh.
Going out to get smacked and hit with things has continued to work as a temporary mental reset. I don't always find it erotic, honestly, even if that's the obvious pretext, but it's always at least... therapeutic? I guess would be the word. Satisfying, at the very least. Like acupuncture for freaks instead of hippies. And much preferred to a shrink.
Nothing sounds or feels as good as I'd typically expect it to, but I've had to relent; I was driving everyone else crazy and deadlines are looming. It's not like I remember half of what we do once I walk out the studio door anyway. It's like I sleepwalk through work and wake up in a daze in my car, parked at my house. Sometimes I don't even know if it's dawn or dusk, if I left work or if I should be leaving for it, 'til I check my watch. The last time I felt like this it was when I learned Greg was leaving. Ugh, what a reminder of how unstable I've always been. Feeling like this now, in the situation I'm currently in, makes more sense than that whole mess, at least.
It sounds so stupid but I miss Shann's cats. After awhile I got so used to them I admittedly took them for granted. But really they were almost always sweethearts once they got to trust me, and even when I was feeling my worst, there was a comfort in having one of them jump on my lap and start purring. They kept you to a sort of routine, too; always expecting food at the same times and play at similar times and all that. You can't sink into bed too long without them causing trouble or pawing at you (...or biting you). Now there's so little stopping me from doing just that until the next day, whether I sleep or not. I often don't, or at least, I don't for long. It's so often filled with nightmares. The ones where I'm paralyzed in the dark, the ones I used to have all the time after leaving Lorenzo.
But another one, now, too. Even worse feeling, somehow. Or maybe, nightmarish in a whole new way. Far more visual. I'm standing in front of a church. In the dream I'm a child. Mom is with me. She's about to open the door and I desperately want her not to. I feel an impossibly deep, dark dread and it's coming from that building. I want to run as far away as I can, but I'm stuck. I'm pleading with her not to open the door, not to go in, not to make me go in, and she thinks I'm being silly, ridiculous, it's Sunday morning and we're going to church and you're singing in the choir; that's what you do on Sunday mornings. She pulls on the door handle and I wake up panting, trembling, covered in a cold sweat, so nauseous that some mornings I have to rush to the bathroom to dry heave. And then I'm at work, somehow, again, and everything starts over.
My life is little islands in a void.
So much is still awful (when is it not? Why would I expect otherwise?), but I think I’m actually getting a fucking hang around the whole dom thing and there’s admittedly an excitement to that. I know I’m not going to out-macho anybody. That used to fill me with a strange sort of despair-- I didn’t WANT to out-macho anybody, really. I’m lost in quite a few ways right now but I still know that’s not who I am. But I also wasn’t sure I’d be able to convince anybody of any of this without trying on some of that “macho” for myself. It wasn’t convincing for me, though, so that meant-- of COURSE-- it couldn’t really convince anyone else.
But the more I’ve gone out and tried, hit my head against a wall, experienced more things on the masochistic not-quite-submissive side myself, thought about what I’ve done in the semi-recent past to successfully assert a kind of authority in non-erotic scenarios, I realized more and more that there are ways to be... ~authoritative~, let's say, that don't require that sort of Daddy or drill sargeant character. The first time it really clicked for me, I just thought of the time I had Nathan against that wall. The way he looked at me. What I did to get him to give me that look. ...Maybe the guy having curls to rival Nate’s helped things along enough. I could act out what I wanted without much in the way. And UGH… god it was such a fucking rush. I can understand myself in a strange sort of hindsight for not wanting to quit at this. I needed a challenge, I think. A conquerable one. Like the motorcycle, too. And both of those, really, are a reminder to just GO with it instead of THINK so much. Maybe thinking of Nathan so much makes that easier, too.
What was I even saying-- the time I finally began FULLY understanding it, when I finally started Getting it... he had hair similar to Nate’s (as good as his? Impossible), like I said, but he was close to six foot. Young, still, but with such a wonderful body. Great ass, nice cock. He smelled wonderful, but again, in his own way (and Nathan's smell... ugh. I've only been able to catch minutes of it at a time in the past, and only for seconds at a time more recently, and I shouldn't even try and reach for those minutes, but I remember it and I feel it in my dick and I want it so fucking bad-- fuck. Anyway, this guy was still real nice. Great pits). I treated him like he was my height from the get-go, like an annoying little arrogant brat that needed some extra discipline to earn true pleasure from me, and until then, he had to be satisfied with my venting. I expected something as close to perfection as he could get and I was going to make sure he measured up. ...Which is the approach I’ve been using when I’m the one getting whipped, too (and it is funny when they’re expecting an eager little submissive at first… I’ve said it before, but I make sure they have their work cut out for them and that’s its own thrill and pleasure). I didn’t know it could work in both contexts, but there, it worked wonders. --He had glasses, too, and that was fun. I didn’t take them off, so sometimes they’d get jostled, fall halfway down his face with particularly focused strikes (ones that vibrated up my wrist so beautifully, made him tense and clench and whine and whimper). I’d fix them. Play up the annoyance. Give him another reason to get "punished" (and I warned him that if he came before I told him he could I'd pull out and finish on those glasses and that'd be all he'd get). --I took my condom off at the end and came all over his back and I "made" him lick his own cum off the floor. ...And then I cleaned him up some and sat with him. Or rather, I sat, and he lay draped in my arms, panting, looking up at me... wow. I asked him if I gave him what he needed. Sincerely, honestly, but hopefully not... too sincerely. Anyway, thankfully it was a positive and affirmative answer, we sat there for another little while, and I played with that lovely hair and kissed it.
After that… well it still hasn’t always been smooth sailing. So few expect the way I do things, and while I can pull it off more and more easily now, it still isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. It almost always takes a noticeable longer while to find someone to whip than someone to whip me. Some people enjoy getting thrown off. Many others are looking for something quite specific, and are on the hunt for it such that they won’t accept anything less. Really, I suppose I understand. I’m the same way when I’m cruising for sadists.
When it does go well, though, I’ve only gotten better and better at being immediately convincing with it. Not just things said (and, as I’ve learned, things to catch in the sub early on through his own words or demeanor or manner of dress or lack thereof; even before negotiations I can often tell if they're the type to want to be degraded or humiliated in some way or not), but my pitch and tone of voice, expressions, the way I walk, the way I move my body generally, the way I hit them with various tools or objects (or don’t, or play with them, toy with them), the way I fuck-- all those things are getting increasingly easy to conjure up. It’s like drag, in a way, but not THAT feminine and not that type of feminine. Another sort of character, and a lot more of an entertaining one than I'd expected as I’ve continued to hone it.
Beyond the overthinking, it’s just been SO hot. They get so into it now that I know what I’m doing once we’re doing it, and that helps me get into it, and it becomes a feedback loop that envelops them and myself in different ways but never fully swallows us up. Strange, interesting little temporary shared creations in the service of pleasure. Strange and strangely satisfying, on both ends. And I can't help but imagine Nathan there, naked and hung by the wrists against a wall (...among other types of hung), giving me that look, so mad for wanting it from me but wanting it from me all the same. Grabbing that perfect jaw of his and forcing him to look into my eyes (feeling and smelling that gorgeous body of his at my leisure… whipping it, biting it, scratching it...). Who better to discipline him that way than someone who knows him the way I do?
...Ugh, and there's something about the idea of being dominant with Lou, too, as much as I almost hate to write it... so different from Nathan, obviously. Completely opposite to him in quite a few ways. He must be at least a decade older than me, a fair bit taller (a fair bit taller than Nate or Jack, too, then, naturally, and I can't lie and say that isn't part of why he appeals to me), so high-status, so put-together… Married. Working for me, and so closely. Willing to give me so much... wanting to give me so much. Wanting to feel a sort of strength in me, perhaps, that he thought I had the potential for. Everything about it that makes it stupid and outright dangerous makes it equally ridiculously sexy, which is quite the dilemma. And ugh, he smells wonderful too, and the best hit of it I got was still that hot day he took off and aired his blazer. And I could play with that tie of his, too... it's still easier for me to tie rope knots than suit tie ones. Maybe that says something, ha.
I've still been going to his dinners. He hasn't seen me in leather yet, but I very much want him to, regardless of how stupid it is. The more I write the less I care. Whatever. It's already too much, why care at this point? And I know he likes me in a suit already. I always wear the rose/incense oil around him regardless of whether i'm visiting him for business or pleasure. There was one night, after one of those dinners, where he pulled me close for a quick hug and I could feel him breathe me in. I couldn't help but ask him if he liked it-- and he said he did, that he recognized it from the wedding, and I got to tell him it was just a little bottle of perfumed oil I bought from a Persian import market, that I liked it because it didn't waft very far, but still smelled wonderful up close. He laughed a little at that, said that it suited me (mmm... and that cologne of his was lovely but a different one than usual; might be an old Caron, there was a stronger lavender in it). It didn't lead to anything more, but that was fine. I want him to give in to me-- not the other way around. Then I'll know I can pull it off, and it won't feel so stupid anymore. It hasn't been the time or the place. One of these days it will be.
PS: One older guy did recognize me, and I usually don't go through with those types off the road. It would've been a different story if I was looking to get whipped, maybe. But he knew what I wanted, was quiet about it, wasn't a fan of the music whatsoever, and he was amused by it all in a way that worked for the both of us. "I always thought that the kinda guy that sung shit like that had to be the nicest guy on earth or the meanest bitch imaginable." --And that could've hurt, and it other contexts it might have. There, though? Oh, sweetheart, this is where I let it all out! And thankfully I was able to satisfy his curiosity and get him off, and he satisfied me.
Not sure what really got into me today. I mean, it was a nice day out, not too hot not too cold, and I don't technically have my license yet but so much of that's bureaucratic crap, picking all the skills up was easier than I thought it'd be, and the way there isn't long at all, so why not ride to work? A cop stops me, I'm Jules Riley (but a cop didn't stop me, thankfully). And the way there was very pleasant. I felt more alive, present, than I have in weeks.
...And then I pulled into the parking lot to find Nate there already, just arrived himself, leaning against his bike and fixing his hair. He turned to look at me, and I couldn't hear his laugh over all the motor rumbling but I could see it crack across his whole face and tilt his head back towards the sky. "Kinda hot for all the leather, don'tcha think, man?" He said once I killed the engine. And I said no, not really, and anyway I prefer getting bruised and banged up in more entertaining and less stupid ways than you do. "Huh?" Have any bike tumbles lately? "...No..." Good, because if you did you'd make a mess of yourself dressed like that. Unless that's part of the appeal for you-- but there're safer ways to make that kind of mess of yourself.
Ugh, it was so stupid, and I could feel my heart beating out of my chest while I said all those stupid things to him, frustrated and nervous that I still hadn't translated that dream of his into something he'd understand, or perhaps that it was a momentary impulse he enjoyed once before shelving it higher than he can usually reach. Meanwhile, it's been stuck in my head for two fucking years and I want it more the more I understand it myself. Fuck, he made me even more of a fucking freak and it was just nothing to him, huh. That would be so fucking typical. Maybe he really didn't remember; he WAS drunk when he told me. And he was still quite confused in the present, but I still saw his ears flush red while he stuttered his way through all his "whuh..?'"s and "huH??"'s. He finally cleared his throat roughly, lit a cigarette, laughed a little (not his usual big laugh, something quieter-- maybe even nervous himself). "I-I got no idea what you're talkin' about, man... but glad to see ya in a good mood. Cool to ride, huh?" ...Yeah.
The rest of the work day was a usual blur, and this time, spiked with the embarrassment of everything that came before it. UGH. Yet another situation that could have gone quite a lot worse, but also could've been quite a bit better. I still don't know how to be convincing in the way I think Nathan needs. He knows me too well, but he knows me as something I'm not anymore, and I don't know how to get him to see that. Then again, he always wanted me in ways I wasn't comfortable with. He liked me ~pretty~ like the rest of them did, when he could fantasize about taking me like he thinks women want to be taken (he's had girlfriends, so some of them do want to be taken like that, for awhile, but those girlfriends never last, do they?). Hell, there'd even be an extra thrill in it for him, to fuck a man into a woman into a Thing. I know how guys like that are-- and then he'd look at me just like those guys, too. I wouldn't be an equal anymore. Just an exotic novelty to toss out like trash once I'm used up enough. Gregory got that out of me. Nathan won't.
Thoughts like that made it hard to fully concentrate, but I think I got through everything alright. They're still there, though. Stewing in my head. I don't know if I can ever make Nate see me the way I want him to see me. I don't even know why I want to try or what, exactly, I want to prove. I just know I'm so fucking tired. And I still don't know what to do about it.