Her proximity to my wet cheeks sent a light shock through me. A helpless sound strangled in my throat.
“Oh my god.” She pulled back instantly, her eyes widening. “Morgan, are you crying?”
“No,” I sniffed, raising my arm through the cuff to wipe the tears off my face.
“Oh, fuck. Oh, shit.” Zafyra ran a hand through her disheveled hair. Her confidence had wavered within seconds, and suddenly, she looked awfully unsure of what to do with herself. Her form glitched aggressively. “You’re crying. Why?”
“Because this—everything you just said—this is what I want.” My body was shaking uncontrollably, tears streaming down my face with ugly sobs, faster than I could stop myself. “I want to worship you. I want you to use me for your pleasure. I want to suffer for you, but I can’t—I can’t even touch you, can’t even taste you, can’t evensmellyou…”
She breathed in sharply. Glanced around the room, as if the lightly flickering illusion was supposed to give her answers, before sinking down onto the leather couch. I continued crying and wiping my tears between babbled apologies.
“Can you please just… put on some clothes?” I forced out when my tears finally slowed, trying my best not to look at her breasts like I wanted to bury my face in them – a thought that immediately brought new tears to my eyes. The corner of her mouth twisted as if she were about to make another filthy comment, but she shook her head to stop herself. With a sigh, she reached out to put on a silk robe. It didn’t help much – she was still showing too much cleavage for me to think straight, and when she crossed her legs, the silk crept up her thighs like a teasing promise of something I could never have. Her form slowly stabilized.
My gaze focused on my feet, suddenly embarrassed by my emotions. My head throbbed, my core ached, I couldn’t tell which hurt worse.
I cautiously glanced up at her.
“You’ve never been fucked properly, have you?” Zafyra stated bluntly.
I almost choked on my spit. “What?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Well? Have you?”
“I have plenty of experience.” I curled up my legs, defensively wrapping my arms around them.
“I’m sure you have.” Her long, elegant fingers reached out below the pillows to grab a cigarette and an electronic lighter. I opened my mouth to tell her I didn’t like how cigarette smell lingered in mynostrils, then realized there would be no smell. “But no one’s ever fucked you the way you wanted. Correct?”
“You tell me,” I said dryly, sarcasm masking my insecurity. “How do I want it?”
“The fact that you have to ask me tells me all I need to know.”
“Wow.” I snorted. “I’m sure you know it all, being an AI without a physical body.”
She briefly glanced up at me before putting the cigarette to her lips, challenge flashing through her obsidian eyes. “But I’m not wrong.”
I glared at her before lowering my head to hide my flushed cheeks. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” I mumbled, barely audible. “It’s not like I haven’t been with generous partners. I mean, some of them didn’t really care for pleasuring me, but some did. Some tried. But it never felt right.” I swallowed hard, sharply pulling my hands out from the virtual cuffs to ease the buzz crawling on my skin. I didn’t talk about these things with anyone besides Joey – and even he didn’t understand it, not because he didn’t want to listen, but because the concept was so hard to grasp for someone who thrived on the dopamine of intimacy and orgasms. “Sometimes I think I want someone, but the moment they touch me, it just feels… wrong. They press too hard. Their smell throws me off. Their touch overstimulates me.” I sniffed, fighting more tears that stung behind my eyelids. “If I want release, I get it from toys, romance books, or my own fantasies. Never from people.”
And, apparently, AI now.
When I heard no answer, I looked up to see Zafyra studying me with an uncomfortable intensity, blowing out smoke through half-shut eyes, the phantom smoke slightly distorting the air and worsening my headache. “Maybe you haven’t been with the right person.”
I scoffed at the words I’d heard too many times. “I’ve been with enough people to confidently say I’m the problem.”
“Who told you that?” Zafyra narrowed her eyes.
“What?” I blinked slowly, alarms raising in my chest at the sudden change in her tone. “No one did. I drew that conclusion myself.”
“No one comes to that conclusion on their own.” There was a growl beneath her voice as she aggressively put out the cigarette. “Tell me, Morgan, who told you you’re the problem?”
I tensed up involuntarily at her sharp voice. “With sex?”
She shook her head. “With everything.”
I frowned. At first, I said nothing, hoping she would drop it – but she raised her eyebrows expectantly.
I had processed most of my childhood trauma as well as one could – at least, I believed so. Talking about it wasn’t hard anymore. I’d done so many times in therapy, with my close friends, and to my parents – although I quickly learned there was no point in the latter. They didn’t like to hear that, even though they always wanted the best for me, society and our education system had still scarred me – and seeing how my truth hurt my mom, I decided it was best never to bring it up again. Now, I didn’t expect Zafyra to care, but I was too exhausted to argue.
“It wasn’t one person,” I sighed out, averting my eyes. “Imagine walking into kindergarten for the first time as a kid, and you can’t think straight because all the noises are too loud, the lights too bright, there’s too many smells and kids are fighting, teachers are yelling, and everything is confusing.” I started picking at the skin around my nails. “Imagine every fiber in your being tells you it’s wrong, and you want to go home, you don’t know why you have to be there – and yet, somehow, you seem to be the only one who has this problem. All the other kids seem to just accept it.” I clenched my teeth against the unexpected emotions I thought I had processed so well. “And yet, you’re the one who gets punished for acting out. For having meltdowns. For getting into fights and trying to hide from the teacher to find a moment of peace. They all insist there’s something wrong with you, so they put you on forced medication so you can fit in, so you won’t be a burden to the teachers and the other kids. And your parents let it happen, because in their eyes, nothing is worse than not fitting in. And if all the adults in your life say the same thing, it must be true.” I glanced up, startled by the intense look in her eyes. “I mean, it’s notthatbig of a deal. I grew up with two parents who loved each other and me, we were healthy, money wasn’t an issue. I know people who’ve had it much worse.”
