I can't help the moan that escapes my mouth at the taste of her tongue against mine, and my hips pulse reflexively up to meet hers. But before I can reach the heat emanating from her core, she grasps my neck in her hand and pushes me away, pressing...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"I want you, Valencia. I want all of you."
His words rang through my head on repeat like a broken record.
I didn't know how to respond.
I sat, staring at him, at a loss for words.
A faint whisper of my name brushed my ears, over, and over, and over again.
"Valencia?"
Finally, his voice registered through the fog. My eyes lifted up from the cheap white iron table and fluttered toward his. Those deep, mossy green eyes were locked onto mine. An expression that I had seen before yet still haven't been able to decipher.
I was once so positive that this expression was pity.
The same pity that I saw when I dared to look deeply into the mirror.
That was the secret I carried tightly to my chest.
Every time I looked in the mirror, I saw a different manifestation of myself.
In some cases, I saw a gorgeous Black woman. She was strong and confident. She brought the most powerful men to their knees before her. She showed them the various ways that pleasure could become pain. This manifestation was the one I hid behind. Her strength shrouded me in a cloak of protection that I had never found in anyone or anything else.
Yet despite her irrevocable strength, she would always force her way through. The little girl I managed to push into the recesses of my mind, until she pushed and pushed and pushed her way through.
She demanded attention.
I would resist. Constantly.
Until I couldn't resist any longer.
"Valencia?"
His voice brought me back to the present.
I looked into those gorgeous green eyes, and I remembered every single moment we had together.
But I remembered most how I felt when I first saw him.
The curiosity.
The need to know more.
It was the first time that every single part of me was at peace.
The child, the woman, and the trauma.
Every single manifestation of myself surrendered to the back of my mind when I was with him.
Was I ready to let that go?
I still hadn't answered. I just watched.
Slowly, trepidatiously, with trembling fingers, he reached a hand out to mine. I hadn't even noticed that I held my tea cup in a vice grip.
Those oddly large yet soft, smooth, silky fingers brushed against my own.
Peace.
I felt peace.
Promoted stories
You'll also like
Every single manifestation of myself surrendered to the back of my mind when he touched me.
The child, the woman, the trauma.
Is this what I have been running from?
I knew his fingers were stroking my own. I could tell that this boy – no.
No that's not right, is it?
An 18 year old who felt such an immense pain, the kind that haunted every waking minute is no boy.
Trauma forces you to grow in ways that most couldn't fathom.
And so this young man stroked my tense fingers, and against my own accord, I felt a blanket of calm.
With every touch, with every flutter of a tentative stroke, I felt peace.
"Valencia?"
Again.
He spoke my name, again.
And yet, I couldn't bring myself to feel an iota of anger, or frustration, or trepidation.
Every single manifestation of myself surrendered to the back of my mind when he said my name.
My true name. My government name.
No title.
No 'mistress'.
It was fucking confusing.
"Mistres-"
"No." I finally spoke.
Fuck, the single solitary word sounded so weak coming from my lips.
No. No, no, no, no, no.
A term I was so familiar with. A term that resided in my past. A word that still haunted my every waking moment.
'No'. A single solitary word that endured a myriad of iterations. Fear, desperation, final words before everything you've ever known went to complete and utter shit. A single solitary word that teleported me to my own personal hell. One not entirely of my own creation.
But this time, it was different.
This time, it was a request.
I looked up into his eyes, the mossy forest green that i tricked myself into thinking I didn't need. That I deluded myself into thinking I didn't miss.
Confusion marred that pretty little face.
Trauma is a cruel mistress whose skeletal hands wrap tightly around one's sanity. One wrong move, she squeezes, and squeezes until all you can see is the slowly crawling darkness.
Trauma is a cruel mistress who will stroke your hair in the middle of the night and whisper lowly into your ear, reminding you of all the wrong you've done, all the pain brought upon you. She will convince you that you deserve it. She will twist every single memory into a vapor. Convoluted memories that make no fucking sense until you go to sleep. And then she transforms into every single fucking demon. And she chases you, and you can't escape her.
But sometimes...
Rarely, but sometimes....
Trauma can be forgiving.
"No?" This young man's voice, this young broken man's voice manages to push through the fog. A man who just might be as broken as me.
A question. I think?
I...
I feel like I'm sinking and this voice, a voice I can't entirely pinpoint....Is one that feels...
