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Pain
©2005

How do you explain to someone who has never felt it? We never spoke about it. We didn't draw up rules. We didn't have "safe words". We just knew. We each had our "dark side" that most of our significant others never saw. Sure, we may have played with rope and playful spankings with our respective lovers. But with each other, we could be ourselves. We could let the curtain behind our eyes fall and we knew it wasn't playing. He was close to me in size, stronger than me but not by much. He almost always beat me in a show of strength, but sometimes I wore him down first. We acknowledged each other as equals yet he was the dominant one. He chose the times and the places. He almost always pinned me first. But I fought. Sometimes I even started the fight. I think he respected me because I gave as good as I got. He never escaped unscathed. We had this need to feel pain, to inflict pain. It was deeper than violence. Violence stems from anger, hatred, and rage. We went beyond that. We didn't hate each other; in fact we loved each other. But we needed to release in a way that most people don't seem to understand. He was a violent sort of person, bad tempered, eager to hit things or kick things or be generally destructive. But that was all for show. The violence he showed me was not a show. I was the only person who saw both violent sides, and his non-violent side, and was not afraid. Most people saw his public violence. Most people went to great lengths to avoid pissing him off so his rage would only find outlets in inanimate objects. But it wasn't real. He threatened and counted on no one calling his bluff. He was good at bluffing ... very believable. A few girls saw his non-violent side and they believed his rage and violence to be an act, a self-defense mechanism from someone who got picked on as a kid. That part is true. But they didn't see the real violence; the violence that doesn't stem from rage or anger or emotional trauma. They never saw what I saw: The violence for violence's sake; the need for pain that wasn't based on an emotion. It did not have a rational reason or defense. It would not make the girls think "aww, he was hurt as a kid, I can make him feel better" and attempt to rescue him, to play Florence Nightingale. It was void of emotion. It was a need, tied up in sexual release.

I was not afraid of his public violent side, since I had one too, when I was younger, and certain remnants of it remain. I think he respected both that I had one too and I was not afraid of his. It made others fear me as well because they would see him swing at me and I would not only take it but swing right back. This was foreplay to us. Behind closed doors was the real pain. We both had this need, this burning desire to hurt and to be hurt. He would bruise me, hit me and bite me, so the next day I could barely move without remembering the pain of the day before ... or the two days before ... or the week before. That was the best part. Sometimes I would intentionally wear certain outfits designed to give flashes of my bruises to other people. They would ask me how I got so beat up. I would tell them it was because of him. They assumed we got into another fight and shake their heads not quite understanding why we were friends when we beat up on each other so hard or, even more perplexing, why I wasn't afraid of him like they were. Of course we did get into another fight, but they didn't understand exactly what kind of fight. They thought we were like brother and sister, kids who picked on each other. There was nothing familial in our fighting. It was raw, violent sex without emotion. It was pain and pleasure at their extremes, mixed together to create that unique cocktail that nothing else can match. Their questions were simply another way to remind me of what we did and who we are.

He has since moved away and I have no other partner who shares that particular chemistry. I didn't realize how strong the need was until I lost the outlet. I didn't realize it was a need. I thought it was fun. I thought it was a game. It's not. I used to play at ropes and such ... silly little games that straight people think are kinky. It was fun but it always lost its shine. They got off on being "kinky", on doing taboo things with an exotic girlfriend. It wasn't kinky to me. It wasn't enough. They were always concerned about hurting me. They didn't want to push things too far. It was always a game. It had rules, safe words, concern for our respective well-beings. That becomes boring. Sooner or later, they start using these "kinky games" as a way to spice up a dying relationship but I can't use my need to make a straight relationship more interesting. It is not a game to me. He could really hurt me. Some instinct in each of us kept us from those killing areas. We did damage but nothing we couldn't recover from. If I started to lose my vision because he cut off air to my windpipe, he managed to adjust his position so I could breathe without making it feel as though he were pulling back from me. It was almost accidental. It's the "almost accidental" saving that made him different. I didn't gouge out his eyes like I would an attacker but not because I thought "Oh, this is just play, better not hurt him". I just didn't. Our restraint on each other was not quite restraint, the way it is when I "play" with other people. It was more like a finely choreographed dance. We couldn't kill each other or do real damage because then we wouldn't have our partner anymore. But at the same time there was no holding back. We hit to hurt. We kicked to hurt. We bit to leave marks and draw blood if possible. But somehow we each stopped the other from drawing blood, from breaking bones, without restraint, without holding back. He knew me. Our limits were very similar, we were not outmatched.

That is one major limitation with other men. I am a small person with delicate bones. Most men outweigh me and have some kind of training that makes them far outmatch me in a fight. I am not their equal. I don't even have a chance. If I can't hurt them as much as they hurt me, it's not the same. They have to hold back because of my size. That's not what I need. If they are holding back, it becomes a game. I lose interest in games. He was stronger than me but I still had a chance. I did beat him on occasion. The outcome was still the same so it's difficult to say what made one of us the "winner" or not. It wasn't about winning, it was about pain; nothing more, nothing less. Just this need to inflict pain and to receive pain. It had to be both. With a partner who outmatches me, I cannot inflict enough pain. A partner who is holding back is not inflicting enough pain. With him ... I could hit and kick and scratch and bite and hold down and push on until I ran out of energy. I did not restrict myself. He could also hit and kick and scratch and bite and hold down and push on until he ran out of energy. No other activity can satisfy this energy. Physical sports, regular sex, hiking, biking, swimming, running, they left our bodies tired but this ... need, this instinct, this energy was still there. How do you tell someone you need to be beat? How do you tell someone you need to beat them? It's not a game; it's not "kinky" fun. It's a need. It's an energy that predates logic and emotion. This energy continues to run through my veins, through my thoughts. I have to suppress it just to control it. If I lose my temper with someone normal, this energy might get out of hand with no other outlet so I keep it locked up tight. Even if I am "playing" with someone, this energy is locked in a cage in my mind, in my body. I am conscious of how hard I struggle, I don't hit or kick, I bite softly. But with him ... this energy had somewhere to go and someone who did not fear it, who understood it.

It has been several years since I had an outlet. The energy is getting noisier. It wants to come out. This is not some beast that will take over me and cause me to go on a killing spree. It is not the stuff psychotics are made of. I love, I feel, I have compassion and empathy. I understand and realize the need for peace and order in society and even desire it. I have no wish to randomly hurt people. But I do have this need to hurt. I simply need a suitable outlet. It will not break free and send me on a rampage. It will not manifest into an abusive relationship. It will whisper at me over and over again, louder and louder as time goes on to find it an outlet, the way most people's hearts will whisper at them to find love. I have love, both given and to give. This is a special need. The way most people "need" love. Everyone can exist without it, but no one really wants to. There is some driving force inside us all, whether we suppress it or not, to find companionship. We consider ourselves social animals, which makes this need for companionship an instinct. We find that social animals have behavioral problems when they do not get enough love. Humans do too. No one sees this as a flaw in the design because love doesn't hurt anyone, right? My need is not to hurt for fun or to cause chaos and indiscriminate pain. My need is only satisfied when the recipient of my pain both wants it from me and wants to return it to me. It is mutual, it is equal. I am not the dominate one, but we are still both equals. I can have a partner who tries to control me physically, who is dominate over me, who inflicts the pain intentionally whereas I inflict pain in order to escape, and yet we are both equals. I have no equal now. I miss my equal. I miss pain. I need an equal. I need pain.

The Inn Between © 2002