No. Not no like the small kind. Not no like a door you can splinter. Not no like a whimper you can swallow. A no that has another heartbeat behind it. A second rhythm. A hand on the same leash that is not mine.
I press. I always press. I am pressure. I am the dark thought that slides under the tongue and tells it what to say. I am the animal behind the animal. I am the red decision. I am the old hunger pretending it is logic.
And then - it happens.
Warmth enters the room like a blade turned sideways. Not a weapon. Worse. A care.
Arms around him. Breath in his fur. A forehead pressed to his. A voice that does not command, does not bargain, does not fear me enough to make me real. A voice that says stay. A voice that says Iām here. A voice that says you are not alone like it is an order the universe must obey.
The body shakes - not from me. From the choice of being held.
I feel my grip slip. I feel my teeth meet air.
It should not work. It should not. It is softness. It is stupid. It is meat trying to talk to the sky. It is one creature daring to put their heart between my claws and what I want. I laugh - I snarl - I burn. I try to flood him with the old red images: tearing, biting, the clean relief of override, the bright peace of violence. I offer him the easiest answer. The blood answer. The answer that has never failed.
He does not take it.
Because another presence is braced against his ribs. Because another mind is holding him up from underneath. Because he is not fighting alone this time and that is the obscene trick - not strength, not discipline, not prayer - company.
The care makes a wall. Not stone. Not magic. A wall made of being seen.
I hit it and recoil.
Aghast. Yes. Shock is a taste. It is iron on the tongue. It is the moment the world blinks and your certainty is not there when you reach for it.
He should fold. He should kneel. He should open. He should give me the keys the way all warm things do when they finally tire. That is the rule. That is the rhythm. That is the law I was born with.
The other one - the tender one - dares to challenge me. The tender one does not even look at me and still the influence slides downward, forced, pressed, shoved into the deep like a filthy secret. Down. Down. Down into the place where I cannot speak loud enough to be heard. Into the narrow black pocket where I can only watch the world through thin cracks in his breath.
I am furious. I am surprised. I am afraid in a new way - not of pain, not of death, not of exile. Afraid of the proof. Afraid of learning that my control has a seam. Afraid of learning that a hand held in love can make a cage that fits me better than rage ever did.
Do it again, then.
Try again. Try harder. Wrap your arms around him like you can seal the doors forever. Speak your stupid soft words. Press your warmth to his trembling shoulders and pretend you can starve me out.
You can push me down. You can drown my signal for a little while. You can make him calm. You can make him choose.
But you cannot remove what is already threaded in. You cannot unlearn the taste of red once it has touched the tongue. You cannot hold him every hour. You cannot watch every dream. You cannot keep sleep from opening its wide wet mouth.
One day your arms will loosen. One day your breath will leave the room. One day he will be tired. One day he will be alone for the length of a single heartbeat - and I will be there, patient as pressure, hungry as a bruise, waiting in the deep where you shoved me.
And when I rise again, he will remember how easy it is to stop resisting.
He will remember - and so will you - that I always win.
Reveries:
I ā¢ II ā¢ III ā¢ IV ā¢ V ā¢ VII ā¢ VIII ā¢ X ā¢ XI ā¢ XII ā¢ XIV ā¢ XVII ā¢ XVIII ā¢ XIX
Significant Reveries:
VI Entaxis ā¢ IX Parataxis ā¢ XIII Exotaxis ā¢ XV Positive Scototaxis ā¢ XVI Negative Scototaxis ā¢ XX Palintaxis
VI Entaxis ā¢ IX Parataxis ā¢ XIII Exotaxis ā¢ XV Positive Scototaxis ā¢ XVI Negative Scototaxis ā¢ XX Palintaxis
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