by Mrs. Darling
Who am I? I wonder silently and before allowing myself to think too much of the hard-edged woman I once was, I pull myself into the present and start planning out who I want to be instead.
I text him back, simply:
Tonight.
I tiptoe-run to the desk in the adjacent room, untying my apron and tossing it across the white wicker loveseat in the corner where I throw open my laptop. I grab the spiral notebook that has become a journal and review for tonight, completing this first assignment that has ever been given to me by my mister, stopping only to text my mom about taking Emily after work. Grandma Larchmont agrees to take her overnight for the first time and my nervousness begins.
Last week after bravely spewing out the question of my lifetime to Leo he sat me down and listened to me ramble. I told him of the smut story I read in high school; the negative reaction I had gotten from my ex. I blurted out that this is the fantasy I masturbate to at night when everybody is sleeping and I lay awake, mind spinning.
My husband is really great about this kind of stuff and always has been. He’s an expert listener. He never gets distracted, never invalidates your feelings, or tries to “fix” the problem like so many men try to do. He just listens. Now, when it counts more than ever before, he doesn’t let me down.
After all I had to say was out, after I had purged my secret fantasy upon him, Leo asked, as calmly as can be:
“Is this something you want to explore in real life? With us? With me?”
The words sent a tingle throughout my entire body. In that moment I felt dizzy and sick, hopeful and terrified. This was my chance. This was my opportunity. Leo awaited my answer with patience. I had to make a decision.
I could continue on course: an average married woman living a typical life, with great sex and mediocre communication. Or I could push my chips all in. I could risk it all, risk that comfortable life for one that I wasn’t even sure I wanted, that I didn’t even know much about.
I know I will never stop wondering “what if.”
I fidget, feeling the heat of Leo’s gaze upon me. Mr. Leo Donnovan, so calm, so strong in his composure. I decide to go all in.
“Yes. I want to try this... stuff. With us. With you.”
“Define stuff,” he replies back instantly, hazel eyes smiling along with his wide, familiar lips.
“I don’t know I guess,” I speak my thoughts, “this BDSM stuff. I don’t know exactly. I need to find out about it, like the specifics.”
“Well, let’s do this then. You hop on the internet in your free time. Write some notes about ‘this stuff.’ What interests you. What doesn’t. What you have questions about. What turns you on. Come back to me sometime soon and we’ll go over what you researched. I have things to learn about too. I’ll work on this for you. For us. Then, we can see what evolves. Fair enough?” Leo concluded.
I felt excited simply by his ordering me to do something. I like having a job to do for him. It seems less like burden and more like an important, purposeful task. I agreed and ran off to shower, feeling like a lucky Daniel escaping a lion’s den.
On the night of my assignment being due Leo makes great time getting home and surprises me with a night off kitchen duties, citing reservations at a popular restaurant along the shore.
“Sounds great. Let me grab my bag and we can head out!” I head across the room to peck his stubbly cheek and move to gather my things.
Leo glances me over and with his lips curling up lightly at the corners; he grabs my hand and leads me directly to our bedroom.
Without speaking he gently nudges me to sit at the edge of the bed and walks away towards the bathroom, leaving me utterly confused.
“Leo? You need a minute?” I ask.
“Come here, Chloe,” he shouts from the bathroom.
On the back of the bathroom door is a pale pink tailored sundress that I haven’t worn since before I was pregnant. I had honestly forgotten about the dress in my current obsession with wearing what I considered “still acceptable” maternity shorts. My curling iron is plugged in and I hear the barely-there tick of it heating, noticing with embarrassment a layer of dust on the barrel. My makeup bag is sitting unopened. Perched in front of it is a new bottle of perfume I have never smelled before.
Ralph Lauren Romance, I read, and touch the tiny black gift bow stuck to the top. I look at Leo who is waiting on my reaction poker faced. I feel so considered. He thought of me when I hadn’t. Maybe it’s time I start caring about myself again. I turn to him and I kiss him open mouthed, tasting the only man I have ever truly loved. He tastes like home.
“I’ll be on the beach,” he murmurs when we break away, his thumb gently caressing my cheek and he leaves me there with my gift.
I look in the mirror and really see myself. I see a smiling ghost of the pulled together woman I once was. I peel off the fraying old shorts and, horror of horrors, the faded black maternity tee I am wearing that I see now makes me look about five months pregnant still only to realize that my undergarments are just as pathetic. I wrap up in a towel to sneak to my dresser for some sexier underwear and realize how ridiculous that is.
I want to become my husband’s ultimate sexual goddess but I am scared to be nude in my own bedroom with the shades pulled down. I turn and march back to the bathroom and unabashedly hang the towel back on the rack.
Faking the confidence I hope to one day have, I strut naked to my dresser and pull out the push up bra that makes my breasts look fantastic in that particular dress. When I go to grab equally fabulous panties, my hand hovers above my underwear drawer and I make a decision to go without.
What would Leo think? What would it feel like walking down the beach in a short sundress, ocean breeze blowing up my skirt, caressing my bare mound that I shakily shaved after receiving Leo’s text in the kitchen earlier? Would anybody be able to see through the material? All of this makes my pussy dampen a little just from the thought and I decide that makes it the right choice. I am going commando.
I toss the bra over the curtain rod and get to work. I brush my teeth and go the extra step of flossing and rinsing. Face next. It has been so long I have to completely remove the liquid eyeliner twice before getting it right.
In the end I stand back and realize how much more appealing I look: face clear and tan, my royal blue eyes glowing near the golden eye shadow, lips glossed over. I run my curling iron through my strands that are getting longer by the day creating soft waves once brushed.
I do the best I can to ignore my root color. I’ll have to fix that soon.
I reapply deodorant and unwrap the gifted perfume. My husband has never gifted me a scent. The thought of him in a random Florida department store opening sample after sample until deciding makes my heart swell up. I feel like this is his first step in making me into the kind of wife (and dare I hope whore) of his dreams.
I want to be that. Both of those things. I want to be his cared for wife. I want to be my husband’s own personal slut. Can’t I be both?
I squirt the scent onto my breasts and get dressed, anxious to let the night begin.
I pause for a glance at the end result and am shocked by the transformation. I am seeing myself as Leo sees me; I am seeing myself as a woman instead of a mother. I vow to no longer allow myself to live as a frumpy new mom. Tomorrow I will go through every inch of this beach house and gather up every shlumpy sweat pant, every stained and pilling tee, every maternity garment, and free myself of the temptation.
I look in the mirror and take a mental picture. I want to feel like this, look like this, every day. And as much as I want to look this way for Leo it is so much more for me. This is the woman I want to be. This is the mother I want to show my daughter.
But that’s for tomorrow. Tonight I see myself no longer as the lost woman that I used to be but instead as a preview of the woman I am becoming. I flip off the light switch and go outside, thrilled to share with Mr. Donnovan the real gift he left for me inside that bathroom. It meant so m
uch more than perfume. The gift of caring about myself again.
I can’t help but wonder, though, if he had planned that all along.
I walk through the back door onto the lofted porch sending evening shadows onto the sand. Leo is there on the beach, looking handsome in an ivory linen button down, khaki slacks and brown leather sandals. I take him in and when I meet his face, I see he is taking me in as well. Eyes smoldering, using his hand to shade the setting sunlight glaring off the white beach, he doesn’t take his eyes off my face while I head to him. He holds a hand out, and I take it.
Alone for the night for the first time in months, we walk silently down the beach towards the pier where the restaurants line the water but I can’t tell if he is enjoying the quiet or hiding himself away again.
“Are you OK Leo?” I ask steadily, the sky a now rich amethyst and orange that I have only seen in Florida over the water.
He turns to me and takes me in his arms gruffly, then turns my world upside down by dipping my head into what can only be described as a movie star kiss. Instead of kissing me though he just looks in my eyes now reflecting the first of the evening’s stars and answers my question.
“Am I OK? Look at you. You are absolutely breathtaking tonight. Do you know how much?”
I feel the blood rushing to my head, curls already undoing themselves in the humidity of the night, feeling lightheaded. I realize he is awaiting my response and give one with hesitation, “Yes?”
“Good. Do you also know I can almost see your pussy and the slit of your ass through your dress, along with other gentlemen on the beach?” he asks seriously.
“Yes?” I answer again and though I try to stand up, hyper aware now of my position and the absence of my undergarments, he holds me there.
This is the first time ever being restrained by his masculine strength. It’s honestly a little alarming. And arousing. God, I thought I looked different in the mirror earlier. Where had my old husband gone?
“Are you mad?” I ask timidly and he breathes the words “hell no” before crushing down on my lips.
Angry still or not, betrayed still or not, undecided if this would continue to be my husband or not, this is still the man I’ve had such passion with for years. Sometimes the body betrays all rational thinking. Sometimes all you are is want.
Breaking the steamy public kiss and regaining our composure he props me back upright and I fall into a walking pace beside him, holding his hand with my left and my right hand subconsciously brushing against my lip where his taste still lingers. My lips feel ablaze and full from the intensity.
We arrive and Leo leaves me sitting in the small waiting area while he speaks with the hostess. He comes back and leads me by the elbow through the busy dining room full of tourists and leads me to a two-top on the outside patio. The hostess hands us heavy menus and when the server arrives for our drink order, Leo speaks for me.
“She’ll have a vodka martini, lemon twist, stirred, and I’ll have a draft beer, whatever local.”
I raise an eyebrow to him while the waitress finishes jotting her notes and we are left alone.
“OK. What’s up? I have so many questions for you.” I demand.
“I thought you were doing an assignment for me?” He laughs. “You first.”
“What exactly do you want to know?”
I have yet to get any input from Leo regarding my secret fantasy and I hate feeling in the dark. He leans forward in his wooden chair, cloth napkin draped against his thigh neatly (I wish for my hand there instead) and instructs, “I’ll answer your questions, but you go first. I asked you to gather information on what you called ‘BDSM stuff’ and to tell me specifically about what intrigues you.”
Lowering his voice to continue, “I wanna hear you talk about ‘this stuff’ here in public, sipping vodka, with nothing between your cunt and the chair but a stitch of fabric. I like that very much Chloe. Excellent choice.”
The word “cunt” slices the air between us simultaneously jarring me and turning me on. Even sexier is my pleasing him. I am glowing with the positive feedback.
“Ok, I’m ready.” I sigh, leaning forward even closer so nobody else could hear.
“I started by looking up the term ‘BDSM’ itself. I really don’t have much experience with it, except for what I already told you, and, um, I guess from porn, which I haven’t really told you.”
I look at Leo and his ever-changing hazel eyes concentrating on me, and it’s his turn to raise an eyebrow. How did we ever made it this far, years of dating and engagement, hundreds of sexual encounters, and neither of us really know the other?
Leo surely reads my fidgeting hands and uncomfortable squirming but I plow on as best as I can, feeling braver with every word spoken.
I tell of my internet and book research I’ve been doing, pausing for our server to drop our drinks and take our dinner orders. Leo orders for both of us again and it is the second time in our relationship to have ever done it. Twice he ordered exactly what I would have chosen on my own. Maybe we do know some things.
I tick off the basics: “Bondage. Discipline. Dominance. Submission. Sadism. Masochism. That’s ‘BDSM.’ It covers a wide range of things. Bondage includes things, like, that bond people to other people or things or themselves. Like restraints, handcuffs, rope, that kind of stuff. Discipline is when somebody punishes or, um, disciplines somebody else. Dominance is when somebody dominates another person, and obviously too, submission is when somebody submits to what another person says. Sadism is taking pleasure in bringing somebody pain. Masochism is taking pleasure in pain.”
Leo jumps in and asks, “Of those six what is it that you are interested in?”
Before I have the self-control to hesitate I spit out, “Everything.”
To save face from him thinking I am a total freak (though I kinda feel like one) I continue the awkward explanation.
“So I think, I don’t know for sure, but I think it’s the middle two that are the biggest for me. Dominance and submission. It’s like, I spend all this time in life so in control and collected. I’m expected to be so great at everything I do, from being a wife to a mom to a career woman to a homemaker and it’s the way life has always been, ya know? I’m the one making sure that the electric bill is on time and I’m the one who packs the diaper bag so nothing is forgotten and I remind you of garbage day and I always feel like the weight of the world is on my shoulders. And shit, Leo, I just want to give that control up for a bit. I’m not complaining and I like my life, except of course recent ‘mistakes,’ but I want to shut my mind off from decisions. So there. Dominance and submission.”
Mr. Donnovan is staring at me, trying to process all that his innocent wife is saying, and his silence prompts me on.
“The others too but I think it all revolves around those two things. I want to be tied up, but that’s about giving up control. I may want the whole discipline thing, but that is the hardest one for me to wrap my mind around. I dunno. And sadism and masochism, well, those scare me because I don’t really know about pain. I do know that I am a lot... um... ‘rougher’ on myself than you are. My body is probably tougher than you know and can take a lot more hurt than you think. But again, those things are linked to dominance and submission too. I want you to take what you want, do what turns you on. And that’s it, I’m done talking. What does turn you on Leo? Does any of this? What do you know about this stuff? Have you done this before?”
Phew. Sitting back I watch Leo who is watching only me. Our super perky college-girl-by-day, waitress-by-night comes by to deliver our entrées and still Leo just focuses on my face. We break from conversation to eat, taking turns feeding each other sample bites like old times. I drain my martini and Leo waves over for another. I’m feeling quite tipsy already and decide to throw caution to the wind, knowing Emily is in good hands for the night.
I’m having a good time and it has been entirely too long since that happened. The sea bass I am eating is so light and flaky in
my mouth and for a while I am distracted by how wonderful it is to eat a meal without attending to a baby.
Once the plates have been cleared Leo orders a slice of key lime pie to go and decides to share his side of things. I listen with breath held, entirely entranced, waiting for the joke to be on me, waiting for my husbands’ disapproval. What I get is this:
“Chlo, I grew up with a father who was an absolute asshole to my mother. He controlled her in every way and she hated it. Said she felt more like a kid of his than an equal. This freaks me out. I have a big challenge to be able to get to a place where dominating you doesn’t make me feel like a dick, and like it’ll make you want to run out of the door with our family. That’s what I am trying to prevent.
“I want to make you happy. Nobody deserves that more than you, darlin. I need to learn about this lifestyle you’re seeking and I’ve already begun to research on my own. I’ve watched bondage porn for years, and some other kinkier stuff than what we watch together. I’ve had significantly ‘rougher’ experiences with my ex. I’ve just always been hesitant to do that with you. I’m a little scared to open this door and walk through it. With you. I don’t want to hurt you, I can’t do that again.”
I brave up and ask, “Well, I don’t want you to hurt me either but mister, can ya please spank me?”
Wide smile spreading, he tears away from my face and raises a hand, hollering across the room to any server who will listen, “Check please!”
“I’m only gonna to ask you once Chloe. I know you are... hesitant... about being together. This is your shot to take more time. I won’t be mad; I want you comfortable and willing. Tell me to wait longer and I will. But say the word and I am going to fuck you tonight. Not make love to you but plow into you. It has been entirely too long for me and I have never wanted somebody as badly as I do right now. Do you need more time to consider?”
