I nod. “Yeah, okay.”
“Anyway, I failed to, uh, complete one of the tasks. If I’d won, he’d have had to let me orgasm whenever I wanted for the rest of the night and for the next three scenes we do. But I blew it, so my forfeit was to give him total control until midnight Sunday. With Theo that means no orgasms until then.” She rolls her eyes eloquently. “That’s orgasm denial. It’s a frequent punishment, although a lot of submissives kink on being denied, so it can be a funishment instead of a punishment. Do you know the difference?”
“What it says on the tin? A punishment hurts. A funishment is really a game.”
Brenna see-saws her free hand. “Kinda. But remember how I said submission’s a spectrum? Some submissives don’t want any pain at all, like not even compressive pain from binding or cuffs. Some like a little pain, like a mild spanking. Some totally get off on pain, even serious pain like piercing and branding. That’s me. I’m a pain-slut. Pain is a huge turn on for me. Not all kinds of pain. I’m not into cutting or scratching sensations. But sting and thump, like from a spanking or a flogging? Sign me the fuck up.”
“You enjoy spankings?”
“Erotic spankings, yeah, absolutely. I’ve never had a true punishment spanking; they’re a different beast. One of my friends at the club, her old Dom used to give her true punishment spankings. There wasn’t any warmup or any sexual stuff during the spanking. He was just hitting her to make sureshe knew she’d done something to piss him off and not to do it again. She says they were awful.”
“Explain a warmup.”
“Okay, have you watched erotic spankings?” At my nod, she continues, “Porn or have you watched Logan and Emily?”
“Porn,” I say, not yet willing to explain Pixie.
“Porn isn’t really the best representation of kink, so don’t take what you see in porn too literally. The negotiation happens before they shoot—if at all—and other stuff happens off camera, too. But usually, in an erotic spanking, the Dom isn’t just whaling away at my ass. They’ll touch me a bunch first to make sure I’m aroused. It’s much easier to handle pain if I’m turned on. They’ll start with lighter hits until my skin’s warm to the touch. That helps desensitize the area a little before the heavier hits. There are also places that hurt more than others. The crease between the butt cheek and the thigh? Fucking ouch. Backs of the thighs? Also ouch. Top of my ass near my spine? Motherfucking ouch. Also, it’s not a good idea to hit someone there unless you really know what you’re doing because you can damage their spine.”
I gulp.
“I’ll be honest with you, that’s one of the things I’m most afraid of. I watch some of these videos and it looks like the girl’s going to be crippled for fucking life and ... it makes me crazy. I want to charge in and save her.”
“Ah.” She nods. “First of all, you’re probably not a sadist. Which is totally fine. Lots of Doms aren’t. But a sadist would have a different reaction. Second, this is a good time to talk about safe words. Do you know what safe words are?”
“I have an idea. Logan had Emily repeat her safe words before the scene I watched. But she didn’t use them. What happens if she uses them?”
“Depends on the safe word. Lots of players use the traffic light system. So green is all good, keep going. Yellow is this is getting really scary or painful and it might be better if we did something else. Red means stop. Really stop. Not think about stopping. Fucking stop and find out what’s wrong. It might mean the scene is over completely and it’s time for aftercare, or it might mean stop and fix the thing that’s gone wrong and then we can keep going. But you have to stop straight away. Did Logan have Emily say yellow and red?”
I nod.
“Those are common. Not universal, though, so if you’re negotiating a scene, it’s a good idea to just make sure the submissive knows what the traffic lights mean. It’s also important for you as the Dom to make the submissive understand that it’s okay tousetheir safe words. Safe words are no good to anyone if the submissive is too intimidated or reluctant to use them.”
“Does that happen?” I ask.
“Sure. I mean, most submissives are a little reluctant to use their safe words. Not all. Some submissives use safe words like an offensive weapon.” Brenna rolls her eyes. “Otherthan those guys, most submissives don’t want to use a safe word, because they don’t want the scene to end prematurely. The whole point of a scene is that everyone in it wants what’s happening, at least at some level. We can talk about consensual non consent another time, because that’s a whole different ball game. But in most scenes, everyone’s there because they want to be. It’s fun, it’s exciting, it’s sexy, there are probably going to be orgasms, although kink isn’t always about sex, but everyone gets something out of a scene. No one wants to stop it too early. What’s more, unless the Dom’s really experienced and chill, a submissive using a safe word freaks out the Dom. So even if the submissive is okay to keep going after whatever was wrong hasbeen fixed, the Dom might not want to. Here’s an example. I was doing a rigging scene last week with a pretty new Dom?—
Her eyes search my face, and she visibly backtracks. “Sorry, rigging is where the Dom ties up the submissive. In this case, it was bondage and suspension, so the Dom was tying me in a way that he could create a harness around my body and suspend me from a hook on the ceiling. He tied my arm at a funny angle and my hand went numb. It happened suddenly and I knew it was bad, so I used red to stop the scene until he could get the rope loose and the blood flowing again. I was okay to keep going after that, but he wasn’t. It was the first time anyone had used their safe word, and he was upset about it. We ended the scene and hugged it out.”
“Why would you want to be tied up?”
“Did you ever roll up really tight in your blankets as a kid?” When I nod, she continues, “It was frustrating because you couldn’t get free, right? But once you knew you couldn’t get free, it was fun. It’s warm and tight and you can just relax into it because you know you’re not going anywhere. Rigging, or shibari, is like that. Sometimes, I get so chilled out when I’m tied up that I drop into a trance or subspace.”
“Logan mentioned subspace. He said it’s like a trance.”
“Everyone’s experience is different, but for me a trance is really peaceful. Do you smoke weed at all?”
I shake my head. Navy used to toss random drug tests at us for shits and giggles and although weed is legal in some states, the Navy’s not that tolerant. I could have gotten it if I wanted to take the risk, but I didn’t, and I’ve never bothered to try it since getting out.
“Hmm, well, for me a trance is like smoking good weed. I get really relaxed and nothing bothers me. Sometimes I have deep thoughts and sometimes I just drift along, thinking nothing at all. Subspace is different for me. It’s more euphoric. I feel likeI’m coming off a great orgasm when I’m in subspace. Or I used to. I haven’t hit it in a while. But it’s amazing when I do.”
“And it’s something only submissives do?”
“No, definitely not. Topspace is a thing. Doms love it.”
“Logan told me before the scene he did with Emily that he might go into topspace. We’ve been skydiving and he said it was a little like that: the feeling of being high above everything but also part of it and being weightless while your whole body is tight with adrenaline but also really focused.”
Brenna shrugs a shoulder and sets her empty on the table between us. “Haven’t been skydiving, so I couldn’t say. But, yeah, that sounds like what a couple of Doms have described to me.”
