Footlocker

A Little Back story

I had slept alone for two years. Probably longer if you count the on and offs after my second was born. A wife shouldn't have to beg her husband to come to bed to sleep with her. Asking every night turned into asking if he would take the couch or choose to be with me. Sure enough, I grew accustomed to staying up late watching shows with my baby girl. She kept me company.

We would watch I Love Lucy reruns. That sweet face a glow in the light of my phone or laptop. She didn't know what was going on, but she knew I needed her. I had found a corner of happiness in the wee hours of the night.

Lucky me, my firstborn was already in the habit of sleeping through the night after a warm bottle and bubble bath in the sink. She was exhausted after playing all day at daycare and her evening ritual of Elmo's World. I was always exhausted. Two babies, in my final student teaching year, driving back and forth daily. Daycare dropoff, school, daycare pickup. Go home, clean, cook, feed babies. Maybe the husband would show up to eat dinner while it was still a little warm. Babies would have their bathtime. Oldest would ask for her warm ba ba and fall right asleep. The little one would stay up with me as long as she could watching our show.

I lost track of time and could only look back and calculate by the age of my daughters and the time when my third daughter was born.

Lonlieness caught up with me. Even in my second year of teaching. My schedule was just tweaked with an hour commute to way out in the middle of nowhere Texas. Here, I just pretended to be living the life I had originally planned out. Pastor's wife with a growing family, happy and blessed.

How did I even get here? Fully aware of what I have chosen to do. I've completely given in to my flesh. Mind, body, and heart were all separated, no longer communicating what was logical.

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The Drive

The drive to my destination was long but equaled the time it took to get to work every day. There was no talking myself out of this. My mind went back to the memory of Kim nearly choking one day in the teachers' lounge.

I had my coworkers fooled...except when I accidentally may have slipped up once to Kim that one time when I ACCIDENTALLY thought she was talking to me as a friend. Somehow conversations every once in a while would stray to the topic of sex and or husbands. She had expressed some of her husband's shortcomings in that line of work.

"It has been probably two weeks since my husband has even touched me," Kim says very emotionally.

"Ha! try a year!" I burst out.

Kim nearly choking on her salad, " a year!?"

I didn't even mention he didn't even sleep in the same room as me. The last time was when I had gotten pregnant with my third and was trying to gain access to my birthday money my parents gave me that was taken and hid away.

I couldn't continue with that bit of information after seeing the shock in her eyes. I felt all the judgment with that stare.

I laughed out loud at myself. Not that it was funny...

Just because how in the actual hell have I lasted so long without cracking before now?

The rest of the drive consisted of me blasting Blink 182.

Before I knew it I made it to his apartment. What I was wearing, I don't know. Jeans and a t-shirt maybe. I probably tried extra hard that night. Yeah, most likely I was dolled up to a point he didn't deserve now looking back.

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Footlocker

I didn't care at all anymore.

"Are you scared?" He asked.

"Not at even a little," I replied.

He brought me to his bedroom where he had pulled out his old army footlocker. Several different ropes laid out on top that was neatly bundled. Tealight candles were already lit and ready. Blindfold set right at the top where my face would lay.

He kissed me on my lips softly, as if he gave a shit about me, and he began. Shirt lifted off over my head, kissing my neck softly and speaking something in between, I couldn't hear because my mind was screaming, and my body was on an overload of senses that I had longed for. Every bit of clothing gently taken off of me.

"Give me your hands." Becoming a little more aggressive, he grabbed a bundle of rope and strategically formed cuffs tightly around my wrists. I could already feel my hands tingling and the rope burning my skin, but I needed to feel this. "Now, get on top of the locker. Make sure you are comfortable because you will be there for a while."

Ha! I wasn't there to be comfortable! I wanted to feel everything. I needed to feel good, to me, comfort was not what I needed. Pain is what I needed to match the years of agony. What I would feel tonight would be a pleasure. "Don't worry, please, don't hold back. You can't hurt me." I replied as I placed my left knee first onto the locker and then the other.

A smile was the last thing I saw before he covered my eyes with the blindfold.