Page 123 of Ruined Vows

I shift and try to grapple free of his hold.

With anyone else in this position, I would be panicking. But with Isaak, I feel safe. I flex all my muscles just to feel them. To feel alive. And to check for any weaknesses in his hold.

There are none this time. I strain all my muscles against him, and again, I still feel safe.

This is the gift he’s given me.

To finally feel completely safe with a man. Which is when it hits me. Wow, I didn’t feel safe before. Because of what happened with Drew. If a guy I trustedsomuch could hurt me that badly…

I just turned it on myself, as if I couldn’t trustmyselfto understand what the world was really like. It was like everyone else already understood that sex was just brutal, painful shoving, and I’d been a foolish child with my dreams of sweet, pleasurable caresses. I thoughtIwas the one in the wrong.

But it was Drew. Drew was wrong that night.

I always told myself that it was because he was just a kid. I made so many excuses for him. But Isaak was right. I was just a fucking kid, too. For real, though. I was younger than Drew by a year, only seventeen to his eighteen, because I was graduating early. I was seventeen and didn’t know any better. He did, and I don’t even care if he didn’t. Any compassionate human should have known that was wrong to do to another person. I wassobbing.

But Drew’s not compassionate. He doesn’t have a compassionate bone in his body.

“Your face,” Isaak suddenly whispers, falling to the side, one arm still loosely around my stomach.

He lifts a finger to caress my cheek, his eyebrows high in wonder.

I know that look. The ’shrooms are hitting.

“What about my face?” I reach over to grab my phone so I can push play on the Johns Hopkins psychedelic playlist, and some chill French horn music starts playing. It’s a three-hour playlist with music from all over the world.

“There are glowing tattoos all over your face,” he whispers.

“Are they pretty?”

“They’re beautiful.”

“What do they look like?”

“Like glowing neon stars. And geometric shapes. They keep morphing and changing as you move.”

His big finger traces shapes on my face, so gently I can barely feel the touch. Immediately goosebumps rise all over my body.

We’re going in. I’m not the one on the medicine, but I can somehow feel that this is going to be big. Momentous. And I feel so happy that he’s allowing me to do this with him.

He just keeps tracing shapes on my face as we lie there together, side by side.

“Can I give you a massage?” he asks.

“Um. Yeah. Yes.”

You never know how anyone’s session is going to go. I’m just here as what’s called a “sitter.” But this isn’t like the group of fellow Ph.D. students I came with before. I never thought of what something like this could be like with an intimate partner. When I first thought up the idea of doing this with Isaak, I tried to prepare for anything. I always knew this might trigger his PTSD in ways that might be unpredictable.

But really, as a sitter, you just try to be open to whatever the other person is feeling. So, if he wants to massage me? Yes, I’m open.

“Take off your shirt so I can feel your skin,” he says quietly.

I do what he asks and lay down on the bed, my face sideways on the pillow so I can still talk to him and check in.

“Your skin is so beautiful,” he whispers reverently, running his hand gently down the center of my back. “I was joking earlier when I said I’d see fairies, but you look like one with these neon glowing shapes all over your skin.”

His strong hands come to my shoulders just as a woman with a warm, operatic voice dances up and down the octaves on my phone.

“God, you feel like silk,” Isaak says, still in a reverent whisper. “The softest silk I’ve ever touched.”

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