Walking away from BDSM

Cassie sat in her office, stunned. She didn't normally take personal calls at work but she made an exception. Clearly, it had been a bad idea. Her father, Thomas Alexander, shared the news that her stepmother, Carmen, had just died. No Cassie had to muddle through the rest of her day, three hours, in shock. Though she had respect and love for the woman, they had fussed and fought for the last twenty-five years. Each woman believing that they knew Thomas best. The funny thing was now none of that mattered because she was quite unexpectedly gone.

Her dad was blunt and socially inept of course because he had no idea that sharing the news of a family member's death was not something one did by telephone. He must be devastated, thought Cassie. Almost robotically she glanced through her work schedule to see if there was any way she could take the rest of the day off to go and see her dad. She knew her brother Linden and Jasper would already be there, but her job wasn't as flexible as theirs. Linden was a General Contractor with a crew of 12 and Jasper was the Director of a local non-profit. They had a life outside of work, Cassie didn't, mostly.

Cassie was the Human Resource Manager at a nationwide conglomerate for Marine Electricians. She was either in hiring or training mode up to twelve hours a day, six days a week. Living in a port city like Mobile, Alabama afforded her her dream job, but it left room for little else. Linden would coordinate everything for Carmen's passing, so Cassie decided to shoot him a text t explain her workload. He would understand. They all understood.

An hour later Cassie wrapped up a conference call to their satellite office in Seattle just as the first waves of tears began to flow because deep down she would miss her stepmother. She wanted to call her boyfriend, Dallas, but she was certain he would be unavailable, at least emotionally so. She knew she should stop thinking of him as her boyfriend because she wasn't sure their relationship had a future of any sort. Dallas Bendicott was a local newscaster with whom she had been dating for four months -only in their circles, it wasn't called dating. He was a Dominate and she was his sexual submissive and besides going to the underground BDSM clubs with their friends she and he rarely dated.

Somehow sitting there wiping her eyes as she tried to finish work it was all she could do not to seethe bitterly that Dallas wasn't the kind of boyfriend she could call in the midst of a family crisis. Damn, him! She had considered breaking up with him for weeks and now the timing of a breakup would just wreck her. As if on cue Dallas' afternoon texts buzzed lightly on her phone. They were supposed to meet up with friends Mick and Lily tonight at 8:00. There was no way Cassie would consider going tonight, no now with everything else happening. Dread was taking hold in her mind as she fought with making an excuse not to go.

BDSM was not a natural lifestyle for Cassie. She was all too certain she did not fit in with Dallas' friends there. For Cassie, it had been a whim, an impulse, starting a relationship with someone whose sexual appetites were so bold and intense. She had always been the "good girl" in her circle of friends, so delving into these practices had been a bit jarring for her. She might never have tried any of it if not for a crushing breakup from her fiance' of two years, Malcolm, just a year ago. Yet here she was feeling the draw of these deviant experiences and not knowing how to untangle from it all.

Geeze, now Dallas was calling. Based on their "contract", and her role as his "sub", she felt she had to take the call. She was not ready to handle any of this, not today, maybe not ever.

(...more to follow)