He was the one who gave up in the end.
He yanked her up off the floor, and tore away what was left of the stockings. He crushed the corset in his fists, twisting the boning. Then he balled them all up and threw them in the trash. He never wanted to see them on her again. He had a serious urge to throw it all on a bonfire, every stocking and garter in the house.
“Get out!” He pointed at the door. “Fucking get out!”
She stormed off, not looking at him, and he slammed the door behind her. He needed to get ahold of himself. He stood with his fists clenched for several minutes, listening to his heart race. He knew he should leave her alone right now, but he couldn’t let it end this way. He was the dominant. It was up to him to set things back to rights when they went sideways and all to hell.
After a few more quiet moments he felt calm enough. He yanked the door open and strode down the hall to her room. Her door was open, and he saw the red splotches all over her white comforter before anything else. His heart seized, but then he saw her over by the wall, and the smell registered.
Paint. The rest of the canister was turned over on the carpet, carelessly, on purpose. He stood and stared, but if she knew he was there, she was ignoring him. She had a can of black paint in one hand and a brush in the other. She had painted words in huge, broad strokes across two whole walls:
YOU DON’T OWN ME.
And under that, even larger, in big black letters, she was finishing the words
YOU NEVER WILL.
She threw the can down when she was done, black paint mixing with red on the white shag rug. She turned to him, ferocious, livid. She wasn’t Wednesday. She was some monster he’d created, some cauldron of fury and hate. She leaned down in a graceful, fluid movement and ran her hands across the river of ugliness on the carpet. She slapped it on the wall over and across the painted words, red-and-black punches and handprints. She came at him then and pushed him, marking him too. She made a sound like a scream, only more feral, then spun away, pulling clothes on over the paint. He stared dumbly at his angry marks on her body—every bit as starkly visible as her black words on the wall.
“Jesus, Wed,” he finally said helplessly.
But by then she was already gone.
* * *
Wednesday dreamed in red and black. She dreamed of his face, angry and cruel, then shocked. Defeated, at the end. She lay on her friend’s futon in the new clothes she’d had to buy, and counted the days, wishing for him to call but knowing he wouldn’t. She wondered if he would think she had gone to Vincent. Let him think so. Let him hurt the way she did. She hated him. Still, she cried for him every night.
Red and black colored all her memories. She couldn’t get a clear view in hindsight of what had gone wrong and how they’d both gotten so angry. Because he asked her to quit her job? But he hadn’t asked; he had demanded. If he had just asked her, she would have said yes. She had written all over his walls.
You don’t own me. You never will
. She had destroyed his pristine white room in his pristine white house. The pristine room he kept for her so she would feel treasured and comfortable. She had defaced the white satin comforter that had made her gasp in delight the first time she saw it, thinking it the most beautiful one on earth. She’d wrapped it around herself and thought how much he must love her. Then she’d splashed paint all over it, destroyed it and the carpet too.
No more possibilities. It had felt like bloodletting. Had she lost her mind? She thought they both must have, and she wanted to tell him she was sorry, but she’d hoped he would say he was sorry first. She could forgive him if he apologized. She would quit her job and follow him to Australia. She’d follow him anywhere, because that was how much she loved him. He didn’t know where she was, but he could at least call her cell…
A week went by, and she stopped waiting. She told herself it was better if they never spoke again. She decided to send some work friends over to get her stuff from Daniel’s, but somehow she never remembered to ask them. She certainly couldn’t face him herself after what she’d done to his house with his paints and brushes. That house was always too damn bright and perfect. He was too bright and perfect, with his intimacy and healthy relationships. When he’d decided he wanted her, he’d made a huge mistake. He certainly realized that now. It was for the best.
But she looked at her calendar every night and thought about Daniel flying to Australia. He would be so, so far away. Soon his trip was only a week away. Six days, five days until he left. She craved him like air and water. Soon he would be gone! She knew when he left, it would mean forever.
Her mind tried to move past him, but her heart was wild with grief.
Call him. Just call him
. She handled her phone, opening and closing it, imagining her fingers pushing the buttons. She tossed and turned at night, thinking of what to say to him. She remembered his anger when she’d defied him, when she’d refused to react to him. She remembered the defeated look on his face when he’d stared into that room and seen she’d gone crazy. Whenever she closed her eyes at night, big black letters danced behind her lids.
Four days. Three days.
Only three days
! That night, while rain beat against the window, she cried until she could barely breathe.
Call me, Daniel. Why won’t you call
? Then she realized why he hadn’t called. He still probably thought she wouldn’t go. What else would he think after the way she’d acted?
He thought she wouldn’t, but she would.
She took a cab to his house and stood outside, too afraid to knock on the door. What if he didn’t want her anymore? What if he wasn’t even there? What if he’d left for Australia three days early? She dug for her phone. Her fingers shook as she dialed. There was no time anymore to figure out what to say. He answered before the phone had even finished ringing once.
“Wednesday, honey—”
“Daniel!” Her words spilled out in desperation. “Daniel, please let me come back. I’ll pay for everything I ruined. I’m sorry. I’ll fix your room back the way you had it. I’ll make it all white again.” There was a long pause, and she thought maybe he’d hung up. “Daniel? Are you there?”
“I’m here, Wed. Jesus. Honey, it was your room.” He sounded kind, not angry. “It was your room to destroy. And God, I’m sorry I made you want to do that.”
She was quiet, listening to his soft breathing, her heart aching more than ever now that she heard his voice, so familiar and caring, in her ear.
“I want you to come back,” he said. “I know you probably don’t want to, and I definitely don’t deserve you, but I want you to come back to me. You can keep your job. We’ll figure out how to deal with being apart. I just got so caught up in the D/s shit and the ownership thing. I went totally over the line. I’m so sorry, Wed, but…baby girl…I’m leaving Monday.”
“I know,” she said. “I want to come.”
“You do?”
“Yes, I want to come with you. Can I? If you still want me to come.”
“Of course I do. Where are you? Where are you right now?”
“I’m outside. I just got out of a cab.”
“You’re outside where? Outside my house?”
“It’s raining out here, and it’s cold,” she said. “Can I come in?”
Miracle of miracles. Wednesday. He’d been so sure she was gone forever. All the happiness she’d brought him, her smiles, her myriad moods and expressions all gone away. He’d barely functioned since he’d driven her off. Sometimes he punished himself by imagining she’d fled back to Vincent. He would shake with anxiety picturing her cowering under his hand, kneeling at his feet beside Samantha.
But no, she was here at his door with red-rimmed eyes, her arms wrapped around herself. Then she was inside his house, in his foyer, dripping wet, cold rain on his floor. He closed the door, and for a minute he just touched her hair, the damp curls cold and soft under his hands.
“You’re all wet.” He went to grab a towel and tried to think of what to do, what to tell her. He had to say exactly the right thing so she’d never go away again. “Wed…” His voice sounded strained, but then she launched herself into his arms, and after that there was no need to say anything.
He took her straight to bed and held her while she cried, cried too hard to tell him where she’d gone, how she’d been. He held her close, and they talked in whispers. They didn’t say much, just heartfelt
I’m sorrys
and
why?s
and pleas for forgiveness. He insisted it was all his fault. He was the dominant—he should have had better control. But she shook her head and said she had stolen his control on purpose.
“Why did we hurt each other?” she whispered, so tired her eyes were closing. “Let’s never, ever do it again.”
In the morning, he reached for her tentatively, unsure of his reception. She turned to him without hesitation and took his cock in her hands. She would have ducked under the covers and started to suck him, but he stopped her. He wanted her near, not down between his legs. He pulled her under him and aligned her warm, lithe body to his. Her hips to his hips, her thighs to his thighs, her heart to his heart, and his lips against her neck, licking her pulse. He wrapped his hands in her hair and kissed her, an endless kiss. Somewhere in the middle of it he parted her legs and entered her. He hugged her so close while he fucked her that he could feel every breath, every flex of muscle, every heartbeat.
Wednesday.
They lay still a long time afterward, until his perpetually hard cock finally grew soft and slipped from her. He made her stay and rest while he brought breakfast, and they fed each other in bed. While they ate, he spoke of his efforts to repair her room, shushing her continued apologies and offers to pay for the damage.
He told her she could choose a new room if she wanted and make it different if the memories would be bad. She didn’t answer. She just got up and padded down the hallway. He followed and stood outside the door, watching her. She looked at the room a long time. It really did look nearly the same as before. New carpet, new white satin comforter. Many coats of white paint on the walls until those words were obliterated. While she looked, he gazed at her back and remembered that awful Sunday when her ass had been so red and bruised from their standoff. He marveled at how white and unmarked her skin was now, completely pristine, as it hadn’t been since she moved in.
She reached to smooth the comforter on the bed.
“How many coats did it take?”
“A few,” he said. She laughed softly, and he did too.
“Thank you for fixing it back the way it was.”
“It was all I could do. I didn’t feel like I could come after you, so I did this instead.”
“Why did you feel you couldn’t come for me?”
“Because I didn’t feel I deserved you back. I still don’t. Where were you by the way?”
“A friend’s,” she said after a moment. She didn’t go into specifics, but he knew she hadn’t been with Vincent, or she would have been marked.
“I would have come for you eventually. After I got back. When I was nearly mad.”
She looked doubtful. “You’d have found someone else by then.”
“Do you think so? It took years and years for me to find you.”
“You would have found some lovely submissive somewhere.”
“More lovely than you? I don’t think one exists.” Of course he meant it from the bottom of his heart, but she gave him that doubtful smile that always made him want to shake her. Jesus, he thought. Why don’t you look in the mirror?
She did look in the mirror then, but she was looking back at him. Without meaning to, he glanced over at the wall. The words were still there, for both of them. No doubt they always would be. But she was there in his house with the intention to stay, and he bought luggage and travel things for her the next day. She settled matters at work and said good-bye to her friends. When she finally started packing, he worked alongside her, offering advice of what to take, what traveled well. So he knew when she went to the armoire and rustled through it, choosing some sets of corsets, garters, and stockings to carefully pack alongside the other things.
And since Wednesday packed the costumes, he thought it only right that he pack the props. He collected all his favorite instruments of torture and tucked them into her bag. She made no comment, only continued to pack as usual. He sincerely hoped no one demanded to inspect her luggage.
After they packed, they fucked, fast and rough. They did it right on the floor, because her suitcases were still on the bed. It was a
welcome back
and an
I’ve missed this
fuck. It was a fuck to say to her,
You won’t be sorry. I promise to be better from now on.