god & Monster.

She’s big tonight. Big and persistent and not backing down and I have far, far too much on my plate and mind and heart to coddle the demon. She trots back and forth in agitation. Barking an incessant litany of failures…the shit I ain’t done, ain’t never gonna do, the projects over which I’ve been sweating, the other projects on which I’ve fallen behind because of workload and overload and fretting and

 

…and you know what else?

What.

 

I don’t actually ask it as I’m staring into the light on the ceiling glowing below the ceiling fan, its blades spinning air into invisible currents that I feel like maybe…just maybe…I would be able to see if…

 

This submission thing you’re supposed to be doing. Isn’t it his job to tell you what to do? Why the fuck do you have to do all the heavy lifting with this emotional shit?

 

I wonder whether or not people can will themselves to dissociate. I’m pretty sure I don’t believe in it…

 

Did it ever occur to you that sometimes people are there to help you figure out how to shovel the shit out of your own soul?

 

She sneers

It is very convenient how you manage to make this shit OK with your miraculous ability to justify anything. You are getting pretty fucking pathetically desperate with how much you’re compromising of late. Look at all the shit you swore up and down were not acceptable attributes for a partner and you’re just giving them all up one by one. You’re a mess.

 

 

I continued to watch the fan, vision sharpening and blurring depending on whether I focused on the blades, the base, the light or the vents on the motor mount cover. Squinting just a little bit permitted me to see tiny rhythmic variations and minute oscillations in the chain as it hung down –

 

And now, look at this…you’re even twisting your way back towards not even being truly monogamous anymore just because he compartmentalizes things and is poly. Whatever happened to personal integrity?

 

I lost focus in one eye, and then the other as she
roared on
and now I am pretty sure I could see the currents in the wake of the fan or
at least
taste them

I decided to take a really good look at my demon. I don’t do that so often, not since she pretty much reintegrated with the rest of me but every now and then I push her out because I cannot swallow any more corrosive self-loathing and she has the stomach for it.

She was right there suddenly, larger than life and twice as horrid and raging and scornful and…
 
 
…something.

 

It is funny. My Deity loves her. To my puzzlement, @TheDominantGuy likes her too. Not only did he see her, he insisted she was “one of my greatest teachers.”

 
 

I will see what they see in you. 
 

I looked closer and she backed up.

 

I’ve a formidable arsenal at my disposal to battle against many things. Extra big personality to ward off the world, sharp tongue to ward off the weak, a blithely brash attitude to ward off those who are easily intimidated. None of these work with her and vomiting up compassion for a raging hyena doesn’t seem the smartest move.
 
 

I closed my eyes and felt a cool heavy lead pipe in my hand, and I watched her muzzle curl in disdain.

 
 

You will hurt too if you use that. I can take it. You’ve been beating me for years. Can you handle it?

 
 
I braced myself and took a breath and revealed my teeth in response.
 
 

Bubbles, we’ve been hurting real bad for a little while now.
But I need to make a point here.
You need to understand.
We won’t be rescued.
We won’t be saved.
No one is going to intercede on our behalf.
Nothing is going to numb us anymore.
And that is a fucking.
Gift.

 
 
I dug in my heels, hefted the pipe in my right hand and stepped toward her even as she glided towards me and
 
 

…staggering whitelight across my face and she gasped, superheated vermillion slash across her muzzle stopping her cold.
 
 

We stumble back onetwothreefourfive sixseveneightnineteneleventyfuckthathurt animal scream an aural doublehelix of pain wracking us both and ourmy eyes locked Myourher ears are temple bells smartly tapped resonating aural repeat of the howling
 
 

Listen
Listen here is what you are missing
Yes, there is pain. There is always pain. But we don’t do pain like the others.
Yes, there is sadness, but our sadness isn’t an easy drink away from relief any more.
Of course there is longing. Longing enough to drown in. Amber drops freezing in all manner of songs that call for succor.
…and we are built to tell of this. This is the process. The process is the path.
And the blood is beautiful.

 
 
I smile as the pain in my head is magnified and soothed by the pain in hers and I look down to see our blood sparkle vermillion putting The Moussaieff Red to shame with its clarity and color too beautiful for.

 
 
 

If where we are now is only a way-station on the way to a greater thing, we are blessed. If submission is but a gateway to some knowing as yet unpondered, it is right.  If suffering so sharp it rives us even as it knits up the wound with a terrifying, desperate immediacy born of lustfully desiring even more profound pain is our idol, we must bow before it.
 

– and –

 
 
I looked at the insides of my eyelids, stared until they closed their way open, remembering a whisper from my God of a truth I hardly have the courage to face.
 

…and I love you.

 
She looks at me, furious and terrified
 

I do. I’m not afraid of you. And I’m not afraid to hurt. And you know that we are provided for.

 

 

Your god…

 
Ours.
Our god

 

Your god says a lot of stuff.

 

And you remember what he said about trusting. That we have to. Even when it hurts. Especially when it hurts. And that we would be pushed to terrific pain and shocking joy and we would be. We will always. Be.

 

Yeah he said a lot of other shit too.

 

 

Bubbles, we’re blogging this. FFS, STFU. Don’t talk about that right now. Jeezy Creezy.

 
 

To our surprise we both laugh. Hers more tame than her body and mine more wild than mine and one might think the song beautiful.
 

 

We know. His words are for Us alone.
 
 

I blink and the fan sighs a bit, eddies of air, molecules molten, movement of small breezes on my naked skin rumpling goosebumps. I smile because Bubbles is smiling and we whisper our big secrets.
 
 

With a breath two are one and I remember again ebullient epiphanies and devastating dissolutions and the feeling of being held safe in his arms and for a moment I’m not sure whose arms I mean.
 
And then I remember it doesn’t really matter right now.
 
I feel many in my skin and by this I am comforted.
 
I see now how to love us better.