Page 114 of The Menagerie

“Yeah,” Rowan responds immediately. “I like being able to focus on something. Working with my hands, I guess. Keeps my mind from wandering to bad shit.”

Something about the vulnerable situation they’re in—despite being surrounded by dozens of strangers—makes it easy for Rowan to half confess some of his demons.

He’s not expecting to have to elaborate, but Mal doesn’t take the same opportunity to make a playful jab at his answer, instead following up with “What kinda shit?”

Like whether I’m gonna snap and wind up in the psych ward again. Or not be able to get out of bed for a week straight again. Or risk my patients’ lives again. Or stress out my family again. Or….

“Work stuff. Family stuff. And I uh….” He takes a deep breath, finding it easier to speak as he pulls each section of rope taut around Mal’s body. “I have some shit I deal with that takes a lot of energy sometimes. Makes me need to stop or slow down and think things through rather than letting my thoughts run wild.”

“Shibari’s good for that. Kink in general.”

“Yeah,” Rowan agrees.

Though realistically, he feels like his mind’s been nothing but a flurry of activity the past month and a half. But maybe that’s not kink. Maybe that’s just Mal.

Camilla walks around to survey the class’s progress, but she’s little more than a blur in Rowan’s periphery, his concentration solely on Mal as he checks his lines. A small adjustment here, a tiny nudge there, and from where he’s standing, everything looks perfect.

With the rig fully done, Rowan takes a step back to admire his work. It’s breathtaking, seeing Mal like that. All trussed up and perfectly still. Every time he’s had Mal bound in some way, he’s always been struggling against cuffs or Rowan’s hands, making a show of it. But now it’s as if he’s settled into the ties, completely content to simplybe. The deluge of thoughts cascading through Rowan’s mind at all the ways he can get Mal into a full-body rig sends a real shiver down his spine.

“Beautiful….” Camilla’s voice floats into his ears, snapping his attention away from Mal. “You’re a natural.”

The compliment does little for him, even coming from someone as knowledgeable as her. He’s much more interested in Mal’s thoughts on this particular subject.

“Thanks,” he says anyway. “Got a good model.”

“Mmm,” she hums, eyeing Mal up and down, an appreciative smile on her face.

It’s weird is all Rowan can think. And he can’t help but see her in a different light now that he knows she and Mal have scened together. That she helped him figure out what he wanted when he was new to the kink scene. Like Mal’s doing for Rowan now. The tiny pang of envy that grips at his skin makes him feel like a teenager who didn’t get to ask out his crush first before the popular kid got to him.

He mentally slaps himself for it.

“Everything feel okay?” he asks Mal, needlessly straightening already near-perfect lines.

“Yeah. You did good.”

“Wish they had a mirror in here.”

Mal bites his lip. Shifts his gaze to the side for a beat. Flicks back to Rowan.

“You got your phone?”

In the short time it takes the words to register in Rowan’s mind, his heart rate skyrockets.

“Yeah, why?”

“Can take a pic if you want.”

“Wh—really?”

“Just don’t be postin’ my mug to Instabook.”

“That’s not a… yeah, yeah, course. I wouldn’t.”

Scrambling to get his phone out of his pocket, he hears Mal huff a laugh.

“Ain’t goin’ anywhere, man. Kinda tied up at the moment.”

Rowan feels his face flush as he unlocks his phone and opens the camera app. “Your legs’re still free.”

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