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Ah, modern love.
Well, I asked. And I need to get my own records to send to him too. Then we can stop with the condoms. Our fantasies can be even freer—our scenes more spontaneous. More savage.
I remember what I imagined he whispered to me the night of the charity benefit. Next time I’m going to come in your mouth.
Next time can’t come fast enough.
• • •
It’s Doreen’s job to be a wet blanket sometimes. That doesn’t mean I enjoy it.
“You’re being obstinate,” I say during our next session. “You were all, ooooh, be scared, this date is going to be the worst date in the history of dating—”
“You know full well those words never came out of my mouth. ” But Doreen is laughing.
“No, but I bet you were thinking them. Instead, Jonah and I went out and had a really good time! He’s smart, Doreen. He’s—insightful, and patient, and interesting. ” I hug my knees to my chest. “Plus he has great taste in art. ”
“I believe you about the art,” she says. Doreen has another of my etchings, one I gave her as a Christmas gift last year. It hangs in her foyer; I walk by it every time I come to a session. “The rest, I’ll take your word for. I’m glad to hear that he’s a person you’re drawn to on levels beside the physical. ”
Gloating is too much fun to stop so soon. “You’re glad to hear you were proven wrong?”
“No, I’m glad to hear that you’re having the most honest sexual relationship of your life. ”
That stops me short. I hadn’t thought of it that way—but she’s right. “Jonah knows what I want. What I need. It’s what he needs too. ”
“Do you still feel guilty about the fantasy? Like it’s something bad you should be ashamed of?”
I listen to her clock for a few moments, the slow tick-tock punctuating the silence. “Less. ”
“Less means yes. ”
“It also means less. ” I readjust myself on the sofa, so I’m sitting up like an adult instead of hugging myself like a girl on her best friend’s floor. “The fantasy feels different when—when it’s shared. ”
“Then why do you think you continue to feel some shame?”
We go over this, and over this. I’m so fucking tired of answering this question. “Because I’m getting my rocks off on something horrible. Something criminal. There are women who get raped—even men who get raped—who never want to have sex again after that. I don’t know why it wasn’t like that for me, or why it was the exact opposite. It just is, and now—now I get turned on by the same thing I hate Anthony for. ” I have to swallow hard. “If I hate Anthony for raping me, but I keep putting myself through all these fantasy rapes in my mind—and finding Jonah, going into this arrangement we have—maybe I should hate myself too. Because I do it to myself. ”
That’s the first time I’ve uttered those words. The first time I’ve even allowed myself to think them. Doreen’s endless patient questions finally connected and broke me open.
“There’s a world of difference between your fantasies and what Anthony did, because he raped you,” Doreen says. “You choose your partner in the fantasy—whether that’s a figment of your imagination or a willing lover like Jonah. You didn’t choose Anthony. He took that choice away from you. ”
“I know. I know. ” Tears have started to well.
That’s Doreen’s cue to tell me that I shouldn’t beat myself up over my fantasies, but today she goes in a different direction. “You still haven’t told Jonah about your rape?”
“God, no. ”
“Do you think keeping this secret from Jonah is different than keeping it secret from others?”
“Jonah’s the last person I could tell. ”
“And why is that?”
The answer is obvious, but Doreen wants me to say it out loud. Fine, then. “I’m scared he’d get off on it. ”
Doreen sits back in her chair. “Vivienne, I want you to think about what this says about the trust between you and Jonah. You’ve given him a great deal of power over you; so far he hasn’t abused that. But how much trust can there be when you’re afraid he would enjoy hearing about your real-life rape?”
I have no answer for her. The clock ticks on, measuring the silence.
• • •
Those words of caution linger in my mind, but they don’t make me stop wanting Jonah.