No one but no one can tell me what my experience is worth. No one but me. It’s something only I can know and understand and feel. It’s something only I can weigh up, measure and quantify. Something I can choose to pass on to others or keep for myself. And that’s my choice and my choice alone. It’s my freedom to decide. My responsibility to uphold.
Let’s not mince words here. We’re talking about sex. About fucking. And everyone does it. Whether in public or in private. More or less. Straight or kinky. Solo or in pairs or groups. With the opposite sex or their own. And, in practice, usually several or all of the above options in combination. Our sexuality is as at least as complex as our personality; maybe more so, because it involves our bodies, not just our minds.
This isn’t about science, it’s about being. And that’s why I don’t particularly trust the conclusions of people like Doctor Kinsey and Doctor Freud, especially when it comes to women. Because how do you quantify or categorize desire? How you can make value judgements on what’s good or bad for people, for individuals, based on how they feel? Based on how they fuck?
We’re all freaks. In secret. Under the skin. In the sack. Behind closed doors. When no one’s looking. But when someone is looking, or when someone knows, that’s when there’s a price to pay. A price that’s put on us, like a pound of flesh. And that price, it might be called many things, when it’s really just one thing.
Shame.
So consider that senior at high school who’s labeled a slut or a whore simply because she’s free with her affections and her body. When half her classmates are wearing promise rings as a prophylactic to contain their desires – as if that’s ever going to work – and, somehow, that makes them think they’re better. That she is somehow lesser, weaker, baser. Because she’s already decided that she likes sex. And she especially likes sucking cock. Under the bleachers. Between biology and chemistry. Not just with the quarterback but with the science nerd and the history teacher. Sometimes one right after the other, sometimes all at the same time. Have you ever considered what she gets out of it? What she believes it’s worth?
That girl, she’s not like me. She’s more like Anna.
That’s why I refuse to condemn Anna for the things she does.
Anna is everything to every man. She can move between all these worlds. Mistress, porn star, groupie, call girl. She doesn’t think of them as job descriptions, just categories of desire. She doesn’t feel exploited, so it doesn’t matter to her what people think. And, because she enjoys it, she doesn’t have a problem with accepting money. For her, it’s a fair trade.
Even though, to me, sometimes it feels like she’s living on a knife edge. As if the sex has become a need; and the need is there to fill the void, a void that can never be filled. She’s a smart girl so, eventually, she’ll come to a realization that she’s staring into an abyss. That’s the future I see for Anna. And it scares me. But I’m not going to condemn her for it. And neither am I going to try and save her. Because for her, at this point in time, it’s all worthwhile. She tells herself she’s fulfilled. At the end of the day, that might be good enough, for her, and who am I to tell her otherwise.
And me?
That’s the question.
What about me?
What am I getting out of all this? What’s the price I’ll have to pay?
And how could I have known? Before the fact, not after; because sex is not a supermarket aisle where you can browse all the different options and know the cost before you make your choice.
So let’s assume I was fully conscious and aware of everything that I was doing and why. It’s far more interesting that way, isn’t it? Because there are no excuses. There’s no one to blame.
I’m not just talking about the things I did, but about the things I fantasized and dreamed about. The places my subconscious lead me. Because it all comes from the same place at its core. And it will all come out in the end. That’s what I tell myself. It will all come out in the end.
I don’t know who I’m fooling, myself or Jack. My instinct tells me he already knows, that he already suspects something about me has changed. It’s not just hard to keep a secret from the person who loves you, the person who knows you the best, it’s impossible. But sometimes the things that are so blindingly obvious, about the people around us, our loved ones, ourselves, are the very things we choose to ignore.
Instinct is the most powerful sense organ we have. Not the gift of sight, of smell, of touch, of taste or hearing – instinct. It’s all of those combined and more and, if we learn to trust it, there is no path we can venture down that’s the wrong path, no action we can take that works against us, no relationship that will break off.