"I should be cooking for you," Jessi complained in a raspy voice as she watched me grilling chicken breasts on a cast-iron stove-top grill in the cabin's small kitchen. "Not only am I supposed to be your slave, it's Valentine's Day."
"I am not arguing with you anymore, Jessi," I told my twenty-year-old lover with as much calm as I could muster. "And talking is going to make your throat hurt more."
I turned to look at her for a moment, wincing when saw that the bruises that were forming on the front and sides of her neck were redder than they had been minutes earlier. I was sure that the finger shaped bruises on her left breast were probably a similar color, but my shirt that she was wearing covered those. As I looked at her, Jessi did not say anything else, but she glared at me to show her displeasure. I tried to give her a reassuring smile, but she just turned her face away.
When I was done with the food, which included mashed potatoes and steamed vegetables in addition to the chicken, I prepared two plates then carried the plates to the small table. I put one down in front of Jessi and then one at my place. I had already put napkins and silverware on the table, along with water for both the young woman and myself, so there was nothing else to do but sit and eat.
"Your food will get cold," I said when Jessi continued to stare off toward the fireplace in the front room.
The blonde looked back at me, fixing me with a long glare, then she picked up her knife and fork and began to cut up her chicken. I did likewise, neither of us speaking until a few seconds later when Jessi let out a little whimper after swallowing her first bite of the chicken.
"Does it hurt to swallow?" I asked her.
Jessi nodded, then took a drink of her water. She tried eating another piece of chicken, but with the same result.
"I'm so sorry, Jessi," I said, reaching across the table to rub her arm.
"Don't start that shit again," the young woman responded, but the hoarseness of her voice took all the sting out of her words.
"But I hurt you," I sighed, putting my own fork down. "And then I cooked something you cannot eat."
My lover took a deep breath as she looked up, then she again glared at me.
"You were in the moment," she said, her voice less hoarse but more quiet. "We both were."
"I should have not let it get that out of hand," I said, even though I knew we were rehashing our argument from an hour earlier, when I had realized that my use of Jessi's collar to hold her torso up off the ground had choked her more than I thought it had, as well as left marks. "You could have been hurt much more seriously."
"Yes, I could've," she sighed, shaking her head. "But I wasn't. You're still overreacting."
"Overreacting? You could have died if I had kept holding you like that."
"Yes, you keep telling me that," the young woman replied, and I could tell she was trying to keep her voice soft even though anger was again blazing in her intense blue eyes. "But I didn't, and we'll be more careful."
"It will not happen again."
"You've made that clear as well, Mark. Aren't you worried about our food getting cold while you sit and tell me what you've already told me?"
"Don't be a brat, Jessi," I snapped.
"Why not? You're not going to do anything about it," she shot back, then winced and took a drink of water.
I closed my eyes and took several deep breaths. When I opened them again, Jessi was tentatively eating some mashed potatoes. She blinked a couple of times after swallowing, then took an even larger bite of the potatoes.
"Are those okay?" I asked her, and she nodded. "There are more. And I can give you mine and take the chicken, if you want.
Jessi nodded again, then said, "I want a little of the chicken—it tastes really good—but you can have most of it."
It was my turn to nod as I pushed my potatoes onto her plate and took about two-thirds of the chicken from hers. After that we ate in silence for several minutes. Jessi seemed to do fine with the mashed potatoes, but she winced whenever she swallowed a bite of chicken, and about half the time when ate some vegetables. When she was had finished the potatoes and a little over half the vegetables, she pushed her plate toward me.
"Take the rest of the chicken, if you want."
"Do you want more mashed potatoes?" I asked her as took the few remaining pieces of her chicken.
"Maybe later," she replied.
"I can go to town and get you different food, as well as something for your throat," I said, repeating an offer I had made before I started on dinner. "I would be back in less than an hour."
"I'm fine," the blonde told me. "I have water, and the cough drops you gave me help."
"I could get you ice cream," I told her, eating the last of the chicken. "We could sit in front of the fire and eat it."
For the first time since I had told Jessi that we would not be engaging in any more Master/slave roleplay for the rest of the weekend, the young blonde smiled at me.
"That'd be nice," she said, and then she was crying.
"What's wrong, honey?" I asked, alarmed at her rapid change from angry to happy (if only for a fleeting moment) to sad.
"I don't know," she said, shaking her head.
I stood up, moved to her chair, took her hands to pull her up, then hugged her. Jessi hugged me back as she put her head against my chest and cried.
"It will be okay," I assured her, stroking her soft hair.
"You don't know how much I wanted this," she whispered. "How much I still want it."
"We are together," I pointed out, kissing the top of her head.
"Not the way we should be. Not the way I want."
