Knees on the ground

Title: Knees on the floor-

I knelt without anyone ordering me to. That was the first time I understood that my body no longer belonged to me. No one forced me. There was no whip, no deep voice on the other end of the phone, no threat of punishment. Only an impulse born from somewhere deeper than my own will. Knees against the cold floor. Head bowed. Eyes closed. And a fucking, damn inexplicable peace settling in my chest as if it had always been waiting for that moment to come home.

Now I am here, waiting for his answer, and every passing second molds me deeper into submission. This is what a slave feels when he has already let go of the reins and all that remains is to wait for his Master to decide to take him in.

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I wake up the next day and the first thing I do is not look at my phone. The first thing I do is feel. The emptiness in my chest is still there, but it hurts less. It is like a muscle getting used to a new posture. When I finally pick up the phone and see there is no message, I do not feel anxiety. I feel confirmation. He is there, on the other side, watching, deciding. His silence is not abandonment. It is pedagogy.

I get up and go to the bathroom. I look in the mirror and no longer fully recognize myself. There is something new in my gaze. A point of surrender that has settled in the iris, right around the pupil. When I blink, I see his name written behind my eyelids. I do not know his face. I do not know his voice. But my fucking brain has already placed him at the center of the board. All the pieces of my life now move in relation to him.

While I eat breakfast, I chew more slowly. Time is no longer mine. Each bite is a permission I grant myself, but I know that soon he will be the one who decides when I eat, when I sleep, when I touch myself, when I breathe deeply. That idea should terrify me. Instead, I feel a deep calm descending down my spinal cord, dripping into each vertebra like hot oil. My amygdala has stopped firing alarms. Cortisol dissolves into the bloodstream. Dopamine appears in small doses when I think: He will decide for me. And that phrase repeats on a loop, like a leak, until it is no longer an idea, but a heartbeat.

I get dressed and choose a tight black T-shirt. I do not know if he will like it. But I want him to like it. That is completely new. Before, I dressed for myself, for others, to fit into fucking social standards. Now I would dress for him even if he is not watching. Even if he never finds out. Because it no longer matters whether he knows. What matters is that I do it for him. My intention is his. My effort is his. My image is his even if he never sees it.

I go out into the street and everything seems the same but different. The cars, the people, the noise, the traffic lights, the damn roadworks on the sidewalk opposite. All the same. But inside my head there is a tiny altar where I have placed him. And every so often, without ...