The Contract Rebecca's Lost Journals, Volume 2(9)

            But he also left in the wee hours of the morning, leaving me alone in bed. It had felt bad. Alone has always felt safe, not bad, so I’m not sure what it means that it no longer does.

            Maybe it’s the nightmares messing with me. Maybe it’s my worst fear—that he’s going to make me forget how to be alone. Yet didn’t he quickly remind me I am alone?

            Worse, I’ve agreed to lessons on how to be submissive, but I have no idea when we will have our meeting. He promised to be in touch. I am totally at his mercy.

            He says I have ultimate control. This does not feel like control.





Monday, March 7, 2011

            Nearly lunchtime . . .

            After a sleepless night, I headed to the coffee shop before work. Ava was chatty. She wants to talk men and personal lives every time she sees me, and I’ve never felt less like connecting with someone else about my personal life than I do now. I prefer to write down my thoughts. Writing lets me think out what I feel without anyone else influencing me, and that isn’t likely to change. I’m beginning to want to avoid the coffee shop. In a space of ten minutes, Ava has asked me about Ricco, Mark, Chris, and another artist who apparently comes into the gallery sometimes, but hasn’t since I arrived.

            While I was still there, the client I took to Ricco’s private gallery called my cell phone to see if she could take a relative by to see a work she was thinking of buying. Ava was all over my reaction, which was pure dread, and wanted to know what was wrong.

            I didn’t tell her. She truly was nothing but friendly, but I don’t even share my worries and concerns with long-term friends. Besides, she’s gorgeous and composed, ten years older than me, and apparently from a wealthy family, from what she said today. What do we have in common?

            Oh, right. The men in our lives that she knows well and I don’t. Finding out that she has bedded, or could bed, all of them won’t help me. In fact, it might really mess with my head. I’d rather not know.

            When I arrived at the gallery, it took me half an hour to make the dreaded call to Ricco to ask to drop by with my customer. I kept thinking about Mark telling me that Ricco never does private showings, and how this would probably feel very intrusive to him.

            What if he refused? I’d have an unhappy customer and an unhappy artist, which meant an unhappy Mark. An unhappy Mark isn’t on my list of things to do, any more than wasting Ricco’s time again is. I was actually relieved to get Ricco’s voicemail and be forced to leave a message.

            But what made me open my journal right now to write is Mary. She’s bothering me beyond her basic bitchiness, and something very odd happened today with her. She was in Mark’s office for about fifteen minutes and then stormed by my office in an obvious hissy fit. Apparently she left the gallery, and no one knows where she is. I’d thought from the beginning that her job was on the line, but since then I’ve gained respect for how well she handles the special events. I’m just not sure she wants to handle them. Maybe the new intern who started today was brought in to replace that part of her job, and I’m handling the sales aspect?

            I have a customer. More later.





Evening . . .

            I’m still in disbelief. I can’t believe I did what I did today. In a public place! After I finished with my customer, Mary returned to the gallery all smiley and happy, in a way she never acts. I’m not sure what that means, but when I volunteered to pick up sandwiches for me, Amanda, the new intern, and Ralph, she not only wanted to join us, she offered to pick them up. A very odd offer from her, and way too nice to fit her personality. Somehow, though, the sandwiches turned to pizza, so I headed to the sandwich shop on my own.

            Truth be told, I needed some fresh air. All morning I’d been thinking about Saturday night, and how I’d actually said “Yes, Master” in hopes of being rewarded with another lick or flick or touch, when I should have been focused on work. And when I wasn’t thinking about sex today, I was overanalyzing everything in my life in a way I’ve never done before.