“Yes. My mother said it must be my father’s fault to have two gay sons and no grandchildren. Something in the semen.” Silvio laughs and I join him. “See, I am fun guy,” he says to me in English.
“Yes, you are,” I agree, flattered that he cares about my opinion. I’m so accustomed to being regarded as a possession by the men in Master’s orbit, a pretty, vapid ornament. My internal thoughts I share with Master and Rebekah and Rico, but very few others.
“You should laugh more, beautiful.” Silvio touches the corner of my mouth with his thumb. My lips part reflexively to accept his digit inside, then stop, realizing what I’ve done. Rather than pull away, Silvio wipes a bit of ice cream from my lower lip and licks it from his thumb, smiling because he’s seen my slip, and he knows.
“He has pretty skin, no?”Silvio comments to Master about me the next afternoon.
“Golden,” Master agrees.
“What’s the story with those scars?”
I’m lounging on a beach towel in the sun, pretending to be asleep. I’m used to being discussed as if I’m not in the room, as it’s Master job to answer questions on my behalf, and it frees me from having to explain things. Silvio knows already that I used drugs, so he must have a suspicion about at least some of the scars.
“He cuts himself sometimes,” Master says matter-of-factly. “He has a lot of trauma in his past and voices in his head that are not kind to him.”
My lower lip quivers and my eyes burn a little, not because Master is speaking about my past but because the way in which he does it, is with so much compassion and acceptance. Master loves me, demons and all.
Master tells him, frankly, that I used to shoot heroin and use cocaine, among other things. And that, if given opportunity and access, I might again. “That’s why you must be careful when you go out as well as when you invite people over. Giovanni is intrepid. And very clever too. Even without money or means, he knows how to get what he wants.”
It would be a compliment if it weren’t applied to such deviant pursuits. Silvio must make some gesture or give some sort of look because Master then says, “An addict will do whatever is necessary, and it’s difficult for him to resist temptation. That’s why he must know who’s in control at all times.”
Master doesn’t use the past tense. He knows better than to think the addiction is behind me. I’m sober now, but I’ve had a few relapses in our time together. It’s a delicate dance I do with my demons, and they are constantly waiting for me to stumble.
“And he likes when you hurt him?” Silvio asks. He hasn’t witnessed that aspect of our relationship, not really, but he seems interested to know more.
“Giovanni finds the pain to be a kind of release.”
Master then gives one of his TED Talks on the physical and emotional benefits of the D/s relationship while I zone out and think about when he initially educated me on the subject and during our first formal scene, how easy he’d gone on me. A light spanking with me bent over his lap, firm hand to bare ass, followed by effusive praise. He couldn’t have known that I would respond so intensely. The rush I sometimes get from our play reminds me of when I was using drugs, but the difference is Master knows when I’ve had enough. Unlike my addiction, he handles my dosage and frequency and makes sure I have enough time in between sessions to heal. The pain is therapeutic rather than destructive and it only makes me stronger.
“Would you like to watch?” Master asks, and here my ears perk up because I haven’t been able to fly since Rome and Master will be leaving for New York in three days.
“Yes,” Silvio says and glances over at me again. Behind my dark sunglasses, I watch his eyes pore over my body, from my mouth to my naked cock down my long legs, all the way to my toes, and then slowly back up. I feel his lust rising like the tide as he adjusts himself inside his bathing shorts. “I would like to fuck him too,” Silvio says to Master and wipes his mouth with his thumb and forefinger.
Master says, “I’ll discuss it with Gio. Only with his consent.”
I roll over and turn my head so they cannot see my smile. This slave finds that they are not opposed.
10
Master takes me aside later that night to discuss the possibility of a scene with Silvio. He acts like he doesn’t know I was listening. I act as if this is the first I’m hearing of it.
“I’m not opposed,” I tell him.
“You are not opposed to him observing or to him fucking you?” Master asks because he wants my explicit consent.
“I’m not opposed to either,” I tell him.
I expect Master to question me further, but he only nods with a calculating look. I can’t tell if he’s pleased by my response or disappointed. As to the details, he’ll get into the nitty gritty of it all later. For now, this is enough for him to proceed.
True to my prediction, the three of us sit down the next day to negotiate our desires and limits. Master, being a strict adherer to protocol, has a checklist already prepared that he goes through with Silvio who answers affirmatively to nearly all of them. It’s shocking, really, his sense of entitlement to make use of my body in all the ways in which my Master has without putting in any of the work. Unfortunately for me, I like this type of arrogance in men.
When it’s my turn, I find that I have trouble answering, not because I don’t know my desires but because everyyesfeels like a small betrayal. Finally, I halt Master’s inquiry and say, “Master knows this slave’s hard limits already and would like him to proceed accordingly.” This isn’t me handing over my consent, merely transferring it to Master as a sign of trust. Besides, everything Master mentioned to Silvio is within my boundaries already. Still, Master offers me the list to review when it’s complete and I nod, signaling my approval.
Whenever I slip into referring to myself in third person, Silvio gives me a curious look, as if it’s some sort of mistake in my Italian. Master or I could try to explain it to him, but I imagine he’ll catch on eventually.
“Colors,” Master says, not to me but to Silvio.
“Green, yellow, red,” he responds dutifully.
