His hands make a warm survey of my ass cheeks and skim down the backs of each thigh. I’m wearing stay-up stockings because, the last time I was here, he destroyed an expensive pair of 10-dernier pantyhose. This time I’ve planned ahead.
Outside a car goes by along the wet road, its engine echoing through the canyon of white painted townhouses. The street is mid-morning quiet, and the sound of his uneven breathing fills the room: that’s how I know he likes the stockings.
“Next time, don’t bother with the knickers. Alright?”
…this story now appears in the “Coming Together Anthology: Remittance Girl” which is a collection of my work. All proceeds from this book go to support free speech, through the ACLU.
Oh, Rgrl! What a RICH story. And hot. Dark, yes. Ugly. Beautiful.
A deep sigh. I think I held my breath as I read. The desire for not just the pain but also the brutality… I shouldn’t have read this when I’m not allowed to cum… and I’m never allowed to cum except when specifically instructed to…
I love the metaphor of a dark garden for what many of us just refer to as our dark desires. It’s a richer image, recognizing the beauty of them as well as the choking vines, and the relief that can come from some brutal weeding. But now I can’t help thinking of how pruning a plant can cause it to grow back fuller than it was before… the relief is only temporary and the more we experience the more we can come to need.
A frustrated thanks for a stark and beautiful piece.
Hey OM,
Thanks for the comment. I really wanted to make the point that it’s not the pain she’s after, but the calm that follows it, and if I haven’t managed to make that clear, then I’ll have to go back and re-evaluate the story. I do think your point about the metaphor of pruning is very insightful. Thanks for reading!
“really wanted to make the point that it’s not the pain she’s after, but the calm that follows it, and if I haven’t managed to make that clear, then I’ll have to go back and re-evaluate the story.”
Think Pavlov. The bell rings, the dog salivates for the bone, whether it is there or not.
Well, they say the story is in the eye of the reader, but I certainly did not intend to make it an autonomic reaction. She’s conscious of it, and goal oriented. Pavlovian reactions aren’t conscious.
You have no idea what existential angst is.
Hello Summer.
Since I don’t actually describe the existential angst in my story, how do you know? I think different people experience it differently, Summer. Just because you don’t experience it the way this character does (and BTW, she is not me), I don’t think it’s fair to make the assumption I don’t know what it is. Actually, I know what it is very well.
Just awesome from start to finish. Seriously, this is as perfect as writing gets.
A reminder I need my garden weeded, the calm that follows is the drug. It clears the murkiness away if only briefly, one can walk away rather enlightened. x
Thank you for a dark, sexy piece, RG. It clung to me yesterday, like the tendrils she needs pruned, and this morning, upon rereading, couldn’t help but think it could be a form of self-flagellation.
I know that I find that calm on the other side of tattoos and piercings…I imagine, to an extent, her method leaves less external marks but more internal…
You want to tell the world, that beating someone up helps them coping with their angst?
Livingston,
I am not doing ANYTHING OF THE SORT YOU FUCKING MORON. Read my manifesto, “livingston” with the bogus email address.
Then fuck off. You’re a waste of comment space, you cretin. And your punctuation sucks.
Your denial is not surprising but that’s exactly what you do. Getting aggressive only underlines that you are out of arguments.
I refuse to condescend to your level of discussion.
My lack of patience with imbeciles is legendary. And the fact that you have left yet another comment and you did respond is proof that indeed you do condescend. It also suggests that you’re as dumb as a brick.
I also see you’re back with yet another fake email address and another fake IP address (by the way, you spelled your own pseudonym wrong on your fake email address). So you’re not just an imbecile, you are a cowardly, dishonourable imbecile, who doesn’t even have enough strength of conviction about your opinions to wage your battles without hiding behind anonymizers. You’re no better than a person who hits and runs on highway. Despicable.
Livingston, you are a cowardly, cretinous, uneducated, unsophisticated illiterate who really needs to get a life, and stay the fuck off my site. Next time you comment, I will not give you a pixel of space. I’ll click the little ‘delete’ button and flush your pathetic ass into the digital abyss.
if you don’t have the courage to identify yourself, then keep your comments to yourself.
there are like 17 disclaimers here, you’d have to be exceptionally stupid not to have seen at least one of them.
or – you could open your eyes and READ. what a fucking concept.
Brava RG!
“Livingston, you are a cowardly, cretinous, uneducated, unsophisticated illiterate who really needs to get a life”
Just so. What a very small person.
Absolutely lovely. Was hard for me, in the sense that it was challenging, and made my mental stomach turn more than a few times. This should not be taking as a put-down, of course; but rather an indication of how well you conveyed the squalour and true, ground-in ugliness of that dirty little bedsit and that vile man. And yet….how powerful ugly, vile things are! Often the most effective, actually, at doing those dirty, thankless jobs and clearing out the muck; the man seemed to me like some human dose of cod liver oil. *shudder* Brilliant.
Wow … hot & darkly powerful.
RG~
Livingston’s not worth your energy, which should be spent crafting deeply satisfying works of art like this one.
I love that you never tell us much about these people, yet tell us everything. I love the way you describe the dynamics of addiction (any addiction) while wrapping it in the familiar. The garden metaphor is especially lovely, and heart-wrenching.
Z
An amazing piece. Left me breathless and nodding my head in agreement. Sometimes being the man you despise, is what makes him the sadist you crave. Well done. Now I want to go write some more smut. It will have to wait. I must sleep and maybe wake with a story already written.
Thanks once again RG. I enjoyed “Dark Garden”as I enjoy your writing always. Not only is it hot and sexy, but well written, well thought out and emotionally wrenching. It captures the imagination and takes the reader into the world of the characters, be they beautiful and sleek or ugly and ashamed.
And BTW, I know you won’t let comments by moronic pricks bother you… (o;
Lola
PS: Please excuse my english, second language… *blush*
And to the very sick individual who keeps leaving messages on my blog using my own email address, it is a symptom of your pathology that you keep using my identity to leave comments. I deleted them all. You require psychiatric help.
Beautiful, again. I love the garden metaphor, and the images and feelings you evoke. Keep it up, and ignore the likes of Livingston. You’re doing us all a favor and giving us such beauty for free. He has no right whatsoever to criticize you.
Took two tries to read the first paragraph. Once upon a time, this was my world. I thought I had forgotten all about it. Amazing writing to take me back to a place that I didn’t even want to go to….and enjoy it.
rmpled,
Oh, dear. If it took you two tries to read the first paragraph, that is not good! I’ll have another look at it and see what is making it awkward to read.
Hugs and thanks for commenting.
It is most certainly not the flow of the words that caused me to have to start it twice. It was the fact that she was back at his doorstep. And I knew that if I kept reading it meant that she would go through the door. And if she had spent time talking herself out of going, in fact over the course of a month she might have spent a LOT of time talking herself out of going…but there she was. I had a moment where I had to stop and take a breath before I let myself walk through that door with her. If that makes any sense…
Beautifully written, and so evocative. We don’t have to have lived an identical situation to understand that dark need for release, and yes, the calm that follows.
This was a fantastic read. Very dark—- very deep. I loved it.
Wow.
I read this story and bookmarked this website straight after.
Yum. Well done.
You know what rmpled said? I agree. At first I was a little hesitant to read this story because it reminded me of memories I buried a long time ago, but now that I have read it, it truly is a beautiful story. The little bundle of nervousness and, I admit, a little bit of fear trembling in my stomach might have actually added to the eroticism and power of this story.