When Demons Are Redeemed: The Dominant's Muse

Fifty-Four - Out Of Place

FIFTY-FOUR

Out Of Place

Despite healer’s apprehension, Catherine does not exit the coatroom.

“We both look moronic, in that picture: I look so insignificant, standing beside the two of them, just the thing who delivered the goods to him, and he looks weak, seated, to hold the baby,” she understands from the next woman whose eyes she meets. “And it’s the photographer who insisted on that pose, and, afterwards, I discovered that that kind of setup in pictures is seen all over the world now, no doubt to compel women into stepping back altogether, into staying in that background.

I hated having him there for the birth, because, in the end, the man being there is actually insulting, since some of the most insulting words that a man can say to a woman, at any time, are ‘cut the cord already,’  and so, when he’s there in the delivery room and literally cuts that cord, really? Do women not recognize men’s wink-wink in that move? Because men know exactly what that ritual is really about, what it really means: it’s when a man takes control by literally breaking that natural bond. Think about it: wouldn’t it be embarrassing for a man to do so little, if it meant nothing else, symbolically? By contrast, men of the past who weren’t in the room to take delivery of their merchandise that way, they were nicer to the mother-child bond. And let’s not forget that men named it the delivery room . . .

Well, I came to realize that there could be a plus to my standing in the position of power, in that picture, where the man should be standing, watching over mother and child, with the ability and strength of his wonderfully strong male body put to natural good use. I came to realize that perhaps this would be how women would finally take control of the world, with men weakened that way, and how it would all backfire then, and come back to bite men hard, because they just went too far. And then, men would have much more to complain about than women being everywhere in the workplace, career-wise.

And what a ridiculous complaint that is anyway, when men are the ones who stopped getting married at 23, 24, so, what were women supposed to do, when men decided that they wanted all that superficial, disease-spreading body-pleasure, with a variety of partners, for years and years, and so, when they pushed back getting married and used many, many women instead, coldly passing them around, and remaining cold afterwards, of course? Well, what women did is they got a career, and, once they had that career, they didn’t want to be rid of it, nor the independence that it gave them. So, you see, it’s men who changed society by changing women in yet another way.

Not that I had a career. But what my ex did actually put me on my own two feet, in a sense, and I learned to embrace it, that position: so now, I make grown men cry by profession. They pay me to do it. And if it wasn’t for the recent fire at my place of business, I wouldn’t be here this weekend, but I have bills to pay, so I had to find other work while it’s being renovated. And . . .  we need more women like me, in the world: experts at using whips on men. If this weekend can ever end -- I just can’t stand being on my knees --  I can go home to my son, whom my ex returned to me when he wasn’t to his satisfaction. Too effeminate, not good in sports. Out of place, according to my ex, just like my ex was in that picture. My love for my son, however, wasn’t shaken one bit by expectations.”

Catherine releases the woman’s eyes. The female before her does not seem so wounded, so broken. Just thoroughly annoyed. There might be more to her, however. No hint of her childhood.    Nor of how much she might have loved that man, before he did what he did, before he awakened her to his true self, after the birth.

“I remember when I was still young enough to fantasize about having his baby, and how those words were magical, like from a fairy tale: ‘I’m having your baby.’ And those words were supposed to make him so thrilled, and to make him grateful, and to make him see me as a great woman, and then, as a great mother, of course. Sacred,” another woman begins, when window to window reflect within each other. “Well, I had a kid and not a day went by after I did when it wasn’t hell. And I didn’t even want another kid, but I met a man who was so hot that I just wanted to kiss and lick him all over, just always have his body right against mine, and . . . A mother sweetly talking to her baby, with all that adoration in her voice for that little human, talking about eating him or her all up like mothers do, you know that men overheard that and just so wanted all that adoration for their dick, and so, we came to have women going down and kneeling daily, before the selfish child-god men created. No more fairy tale.