repelled, and you don’t have a right to nothing if you ain’t
morally repelled, and I know I don’t deserve nothing, but I
wanted us back being us, the wild us outside and free or
stretched out together body to body and carnal, mutual; not
this fucking tame stupid boring tie me up then fuck me. I don’t
have some moral view. M y view was that I was on his side;
that’s what being married meant to me; I was on his side the
w ay a friend on the street, that rarest creature, is on your side;
anything, any time, you need it, you got it, I don’t ask w hy, I
don’t ask any Goddamn thing, I do it, I take any pain that
comes with it or any consequences and I don’t blab about it or
complain or be halfhearted, I just take it. That was it
fundamentally for me. I’d think, when’s he going, except he
w asn’t going; the husband gets to stay. I started having this
very bad pain in m y left side and I felt frustrated and upset
because I hated this, it w asn’t anything for me; it was banal. I
hated having to go through these routines and I’d see the rope
coming out, or the movement toward the bed, or the belts, I’d
see the shadow o f something that meant he wanted this now
and I’d try to divert him to something else, anything else,
football, sports, anything, or if I saw it was going to happen
I’d try to seduce him to be with me; with me. M ore and more
it was pretend, I had to pretend— the sooner he’d come, the
sooner it’d be over, but he liked it, he really liked it, and it
went on and on; afternoons, fading to dusk. After he’d be
jubilant, so fucking high and full o f energy, jum ping and
dancing around, and I’d have this pain in m y left side, acute
and dreadful, and I wanted to crawl into a corner like some
sick animal and he’d want to go visit this one and that one,
married couples, his friends, his family; w e’d go somewhere
and he’d be ebullient and shining and fine and dancing on air,
he’d be golden and sparkling, and I’d be trying to stand the
pain in m y side, I’d be quiet, finally quiet, a quiet girl, not
thinking at all, finally not thinking, eyes glazed over, nothing
to say, didn’t think nothing, just sit there, pale, a fine pallor,
they like white girls pale, unwashed, he wouldn’t let me wash,
dressed, oh yes, very well-dressed, long skirts, demure, some
velvet, beautifully made, hippie style but finer, better,
simpler, tailored, the one w ho’d been naked and tied, and he’d
look over and he’d see me fucked and tied and I’d feel sticky
and dirty and crazy and I’d feel the bruises between m y legs
because he left them there and I’d feel the sweat, his sweat, and
I’d be polite and refined and quiet while he strutted. The men
would know; they could see. T h ey’d fuck me with their eyes,
smile, smirk, they’d watch me. He liked ropes, belt, sticks,
wooden sticks, a walking stick or a cane; cloth gags sometimes. I didn’t feel annihilated; I felt sick and bored. H e’d always do it to me but sometimes he’d have me do it to him as
a kind o f prologue, a short prologue, and I hated it but I’d try
