Cold Sunset by Melen (@Mindcryme)

A long time ago, Master and I got into the fight to end all fights. We have never gotten into another argument like it since, and I hope like hell that we never do again. At some point in our arguing, he looked me straight in the eye, and said, “Rayne, every time we do this, you lose something. You need to knock it off, or everything will be gone before you know it.”

I brushed it off as Master trying to blackmail me into giving him his way.

Stop laughing. It’s really not funny.

Okay, so it’s a little funny.

I was such a kid when I got involved with this man. And I was coming out of an abusive relationship with a boy who did, regularly, blackmail me to get his way. When that didn’t work, he tried other methods, like fake suicide attempts and armed robberies.

This mother fucker (my ex, not Master) once smashed his bedroom window, cried over his grandfather’s watch being stolen (his mother insisted there was never any watch), and reported a fake robbery so I would change my mind about going to see him. And he timed it just right so that the police would still be there when I arrived. He laughed when he admitted what he’d done as if it was some hilarious prank.

Another time, he picked up some girls he knew on the highway and drove them to Vermont instead of going to work, then called the cops to report a kidnapping with the hope that showing the police report to his job and to me would get him out of trouble with both of us. The police took the report because they had to, but told me they didn’t believe a word of it. He got fired, and I kicked him out. So, ya know…don’t do that. It’s douchey, no one will believe you, and in the end, everyone loses.

Since he was ultimately the person who taught me about long-term relationships, because I’ve run from pretty much everyone else the moment things got real, I just assumed this was how it was in every relationship, and carried on with Master like I had with my ex. That is, I freaked out and shut down any time we got into an argument.

It took a really long time for me to understand what Master really meant by “lose something”. Years. I’m one of those people you hear the elusive “they” talk about all the time who doesn’t notice change if it slips away slowly. Take away one small thing that doesn’t cause inconvenience, and I don’t even notice. Take another, and I’m like, “Oh, huh. Wonder where it went. Well, I can do it this way, instead.” You have to take big, giant chunks or I just fall into place behind until I stumble over a roadblock that wasn’t there before.

I’m working on that because it’s damn annoying to be plodding along at life and look up and realize some of the things I love went away months (or even years) ago and it didn’t even strike me as odd. Plus, it makes me easy to manipulate, and as is proven by my late teens and early adulthood, that’s no good.

One of the problems, when we argued back then, was that I couldn’t properly communicate what I was asking for in these moments. I didn’t have the skills. I’m working on that, too. People say, “use your words,” and it sounds like some condescending bullshit, but the reality is if you don’t say what you mean, you and your partner can’t work on your problems. Or, as was the case with us, they’ll think you mean one thing, when really you mean another.

Master’s pretty black and white. My way, or the highway. We are, after all, in an owner/property relationship. Your property doesn’t dictate how it serves you. It just does what it’s supposed to do. And I’m supposed to, also, but dude, life happens, and I’m fucking chaos incarnate, so when life happens to me, it’s fucking outrageous.

So something will happen, and I won’t like it, and I’ll tell him so, because I’m required to let him know how I feel (but I shouldn’t have any expectation of getting even a compromise, much less my own way). Only when I say “I don’t like this” he hears “don’t do this” and you know how well that goes over. What I mean is “Can we talk about this, and maybe work up to this so that I’m better able to handle this?” but I never say it that way. By the time I tell him, I’m so freaked out over the decision to tell him, and how I think he’s going to react, that I might as well just sit down and stick my foot in my mouth before I even say a word because that’s how it’s going to end.

(Here’s where I should explain that I freak out about literally everything. It’s got nothing to do with Master.)

So I start to lose things because he stops doing them because by the time we’re done arguing about it (which is totally not my place, being a slave, and all…see: chaos incarnate, life happens), I’m just screaming “I don’t like it!” and the only way he can think of to shut me up is to say back, “Fine, I won’t do it anymore.”

Which leads to a lot of “I’m sorry”s and “I didn’t mean I don’t want you to do it AT ALL!”s and bleh. Then he doesn’t do it at all because he thinks I don’t want it, and then I’m like, “What the fuck, Chuck? Why isn’t he doing this anymore?”

Most people would have kicked me out by now.

I’m so glad Master’s not most people.

Recently, I noticed all the things I’ve lost along the way through not properly communicating what I wanted and needed from him.

What bothers me most is I think I lost his trust. I mean, how could I not have? There was a time when he would just push me through everything, knowing that on the other side, we’d both be better for it. He stopped doing that. The only logical reason for that is because he couldn’t trust me to stick to my side of the bargain, either because I just couldn’t do it (mental and emotional issues over here, remember?) or because I wouldn’t. So he made a lot of concessions that he didn’t have to make and pulled back and pulled back until we got…well, not here, because since then, he’s heard me.

I’m trying my best to show him that my mind’s back where it’s supposed to be. I’m focused on him, and on us, and God, do I miss those things that he used to do to me.

I’m done (or as done as I can be) balking at the bit, and acting as if I don’t know there’s nothing I can throw at Master to make him run from me. I’m ready to try again, and I realize what he did for me in backing off, and I know I have no right to hope for things to be even half as good as they were before I lost things. Or for him to allow me to “try” anything.

So he’s bringing things back. Because he heard me. And the fact that he’s not trying to start back where we were—is instead slowly working me into the head space he wants me in—is proof positive that he’s in it for the long haul, and he wants to do right by me even though he doesn’t have to per our agreement.

I have dragged that man so far outside of our agreement over and over and over again. He’s one hell of a guy.

A few days ago, he started giving me to-do lists. And I was actually excited to get them done even though I was already sick to death of doing dishes. Today he fucked and beat me, but never touched my pussy and didn’t let me cum.

It’s delicious. Being heard.

And the sex stuff, too.

<3