Part 2

Chapter 17

Valerie and Dana sat across from each other in the apartment’s small corner breakfast area, four walnut and leather-upholstered chairs around an elegant and modern wooden table. The floor-to-ceiling windows that made up the corner afforded a breathtaking view of the city. Valerie suspected the table and chairs cost more than her car. An untidy stack of paperwork sat to one side, and a few sheets were spread out between them, in front of Valerie. A cold mug of coffee sat off to the side, long forgotten, next to a half-eaten slice of toast.

Dana’s phone was propped up to the side, recording video. Proof of informed consent, she had explained.

“This is the health care power of attorney,” Valerie stated, speaking carefully and clearly, for the camera.

She felt a knot of anxiety in her stomach, and she swallowed nervously. The act reminded her of the leather collar still locked around her throat.

“It says that you are empowered to make any and all healthcare decisions for me.” She glanced up at Dana, feeling a little light-headed; incredibly nervous, but also exhilarated.

“Correct,” Dana acknowledged. She slid the paper across the table along with a pen. “This is the last form, and then we’re done.”

Valerie felt more hesitance that morning than she had the night before. Her nervousness had grown along with the stack of signed forms and agreements. They had gone through that same small ritual for each form- Valerie read the form silently, and then explained to Dana and the camera the gist of it. Then she signed, and they moved on to a new form.

The first form assigned control of and responsibility for all of her finances over to Dana. She would have signed this one gladly- the only finances she had were student loan debts, credit card debts, and a car loan with a principal that was definitely more than her car was worth.

The next form assigned all of her material assets to Dana, current as well as anything she acquired in the future, for the duration of the contract. Things had started to feel more real, then; she didn’t own much, but signing that form had left her feeling weightless in a way the felt untethered rather than alight.

Dana’s signature bound her to keep all of those possessions safe and undamaged until they were returned to Valerie; but she mentally compiled a list of all the small cherished items that brought her some comfort, and worried that they would be lost.

A coffee mug given to her long ago by a childhood friend. A scarf that a college crush had crocheted for her, years before she had met Heather, as a christmas gift. A small, pink resin fox figurine a stranger had given her, with no explanation, at a party the first week she had moved to San Francisco, so bright-eyed and full of hope. Her favorite fork, just the right size and shape.

The other paperwork had felt less impactful- legal powers of attorney, a promise of obedience structured as an employment contract, a publicity release, and others that seemed still more arcane.

This last form, giving Dana authority over her very body, felt meaningful; and as the last form, it felt weighted with symbolism.

“How do I know all of this isn’t, like… an act? I sign on the dotted line and you turn out worse than Churchy McChurchface was?”

Valerie didn’t doubt that there was lingering trauma from that night’s misadventure, but making a joke out of it felt safer than handling it more seriously, right now. She preferred bad humor to the formless terror that had lurked around every corner in her dreams the night before.

Dana just shrugged, and looked back at Valerie with a small smile.

“You don’t, I suppose. But .. you can undo all of this,” she gestured at the paperwork scattered around on the table in front of them, “any time you want.”

Valerie frowned as she thought through Dana’s argument. Every single form had included repeated wording about her entitlement to use her safe word, once and only once. None of the forms would hold up in court without her say-so, unless she accepted the final payment at the end of the year.

“Mostly,” Dana continued, “this is all for my convenience. It lets me manage all of your affairs so that you can just focus on being the best little toy you can, for me.”

Valerie shifted in her seat, suddenly flushed. Dana’s voice had a way of slipping past her defenses, and her last words felt particularly unfair. She dropped her gaze down toward the table, but her eyes flicked upward to stay fixed on Dana.

“Some of it protects me,” Dana continued, “from allegations of assault.. things like that. But just as much of it constrains what I can do to you, and binds me to keep my side of the arrangement.”

“It doesn’t constrain much,” Valerie murmured back, her voice lacking conviction. “‘permanent disability or impairment’ is really the only real boundary.”

“‘Health, safety, housing, and feeding’. That’s not nothing. I can’t break bones, lop off limbs, or strangle you to unconsciousness. I can hurt you,” she acknowledged, “that’s part of it, but I can’t truly injure you.”

“There’s a lot that doesn’t result in impairment, or injury…” Valerie replied softly.

She started imagining all sorts of things that Dana could do, with unfettered access to her body, and mind. All of the modifications, alterations, adornments that wouldn’t quite cross the line into ‘impairment’. Training. Piercings. Tattoos. Hypnosis, she thought. Conditioning. Brainwashing.

She grew aroused despite herself, below the table and out of sight of the camera; and hoped that Dana didn’t recognize the flush that rose in her cheeks. She was annoyed at herself for the response- she was trying to build up a healthy skepticism, not spiral into a submissive fantasy.

She kept her eyes fixed on Dana, but she was lost in thought. Her mind went back to the night they had just shared; how much of a fantasy-come-true it had been for her, but also how cared-for she had felt with Dana. That had been a surprise; in all her fantasies of bondage and submission, she had never imagined such a feeling of safety. Her heart ached like a never-used muscle suddenly called on to flex and hold. She wanted to feel that safety again; she yearned for it so much that it hurt.

She forced herself to push that all aside; she could see it for the foolishness it was, signing away her entire person just to slake a libidinous thirst at the hands of somebody she still hardly knew. I’m not the kind of person that rushes into things like this, she told herself. I’m careful. I’m a survivor. She did not sound, to herself, very convincing.

She focused instead on the money- and the freedom that would give her. In merely a year she’d have more money than she had ever dared to imagine, enough to rebuild a life however she wanted it. Even a good startup job wouldn’t guarantee something like that. And this sounds way more fun than a startup job, something whispered seductively from a shadowy corner of her mind.

She resolved that she could survive anything— for only a year; for so tantalizing an opportunity to truly live; for the sake of her future.

She had, after all, survived a decade of childhood strangled by dysphoria and the faith of her parents, which had so rapidly soured into hate. She had fought through a college education that seemed designed to make her struggle. She had survived layoffs and bait-and-trap nightmare startups that tried to grind her to a pulp to extract the shareholder value hiding in her heart.

She could survive this woman, with her mesmerizing dark eyes; with the way her toned muscles felt against her skin; with the way her taste still lingered on Valerie’s tongue.

As her hand flowed ink out over the page, she reminded herself, like a mantra, that she signed for her future, not for lust, nor for love.

–

The robotaxi dropped the two of them at the end of Dana’s driveway, in front of the sturdy-looking dark wood and iron gates that marked the edge of the property line. Dana keyed in a code too long for Valerie to follow and then pressed her thumb to a biometric pad, and the gate swung open silently. Valerie noticed the same security controls on the other side, but she was quickly distracted by the property itself.

The last time the girl has seen Dana’s home, it had been in the rear-view mirror as she drove away in frightened confusion. She saw it now for, in many ways, the first time. My home, she supposed, trying the idea on; but it didn’t feel real. She tried and failed to not feel awed by the subtle tastefulness of the wealth that was on display. She had struggled to fill her car with gas; this woman owned an apartment in the city just to avoid the inconvenience of crossing a bridge after a party.

The house was built so that it would seem to disappear into the trees, despite the organically hardscaped expanse of wildfire-defensible space surrounding the structure. The above-ground sections of the house were relatively small, and clad in native woods— architectural panels set in artfully patinated iron frames that made clear their presence was an aesthetic choice.

At the back of the structure, large picture windows looked out over the valley that swept down through Berkeley toward San Francisco Bay. Most of the home’s interior space was at least half-buried in the hillside, including the garage where Valerie had found her car with its disconnected battery cable. It felt like months or years had passed since then; Valerie struggled to believe it was less than a week.

Dana tugged on the leash attached to Valerie’s collar. One of the benefits of a robotaxi is that there was no driver to cast judgmental looks at one woman leading another around like a pet; although that was not a totally uncommon sight in San Francisco, anyway. The collar had not been removed since Dana had locked it on the night before, and the leash had been likewise attached with a small brass padlock, moments after the last piece of paperwork had been signed.

Dana led the girl up the terrazzo-paved footpath that wound along next to the driveway, but she paused before opening the front door. She put her hands on Valerie’s shoulders, stilling her.

“There’s something I need to tell you,” Dana said to the girl, pressure on her shoulders encouraging her to turn face-to-face. Her tone was quiet, and serious. Dana was often quiet and serious, but there was a gravity in her demeanor that Valerie did not expect or understand.

“What is it?” Valerie was perplexed, and curious; it didn’t seem like Dana had many secrets left to share, but doubt and a little worry started to creep in at the edges of her thoughts.

“It’s about Samus,” Dana continued.

Valerie blinked at her, struggling to figure out the context of the conversation.

“Samus?” she echoed back uncertainly.

“Your cat..”

“What about her?”

Valerie’s eyebrows knit together, and tears prickled instantly at the corner of her eyes. The reminder felt, in that moment, simply cruel and unwarranted. Valerie had been unable to pay for the treatment Samus needed; her finances were simply too strained from the cost of merely living. Signing the paperwork to have her put to sleep was the hardest thing she had ever done; holding her in the office while she stilled for the last time had shattered Valerie’s heart; nothing else in her life had broken it into more pieces, recent events included.

She had never felt more like a failure, and all the guilt and shame she had not fully processed came flooding back into her.

“I.. bribed the vet tech. And…” Dana flicked her gaze away from Valerie’s face for a moment, before refocusing on her. “… lied a little bit.”

Valerie stared at her uncomprehendingly; Dana seemed uncertain and, she thought, a little guilty. A rage that Valerie didn’t think herself capable of started claw its way up out of her chest, filling her ears with a white noise of rushing blood. Dana bribed the veterinarian, she thought. Samus was fine. Dana lied. And bribed him. Samus would’ve been fine. She made me-

“She’s okay. I, uhm, I paid for the surgery.. She’s here.”