"To Dance With Mary"

Without going into any damning details, I must confess that I spent most of yesterday with Mary. I do well without her most of the time. I don't feel like I need her. Certainly not the way I needed her before. She doesn't have me wrapped around her finger anymore. I've come to a place in my life where I can just take her or leave her, and it's all my doing this time around. I won't be her slave.

And yet, when I see her...when I just happen to run into her...I can't help myself. Those old feelings rise within me. I can't help but say "yes" when she asks if I want to dance. Nothing in the world, that I know of, is as blissful as the way Mary dances when she's in the mood. No. she's not always in that mood. But even then she dances like an angel.

All the talk of freedom and independence from Mary's grasp, but yesterday I made it a point to run into her. I arranged it, as I knew exactly where she would be. She always waits for me there and I think she's happy to see me every 3-4 weeks. That's about how long I can make it without her. That might sound like she still holds some sway in my life, but the difference is that I'M the one calling the shots now.

I called 'em at about 2:30 pm. She was hesitant, probably a little upset that my visits have been less frequent lately. I was not worried. She was just as glad to see me as I was her. Maybe even more so. She offered me her hand as the music began to play soft, low and psychedelic.

Her dance had begun.

All the clutter in my mind melted away like snow in the sunlight. The stuffing in my brain plucked like tiny wads of cotton candy in a child's hand. She loaned me the key to my soul's cell door and let me frolic outside for a couple of hours in the fresh, sweet, herb-scented air. She saw me in ecstasy. She watched my inhibitions shed as if they were an old, dirty coat. She saw me running towards a cliff, too wasted to see it coming, and she caught hold of me. She saved my life.

Then she reminded me of how many times she'd saved my life in our days together. Of course, I could not argue with that. She'd pulled me up from abysmal depths of despair so many times I wouldn't want to try and count them. She'd opened a window to the world that proved to me, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that my understanding of reality was flawed and without purpose.

I owed her a lot, it's true.

But it took me a long time to see the truth. Her love was depraved. Behind every beautiful experience we had together she was sucking the life out of me. She was turning a knife that she'd stuck into my heart. I didn't even know it was there. She was borrowing my thoughts, taking them out of my head, fucking with them, then cramming them back in. I didn't mind, but the morning after was a haze of exhaustion and headaches.

Her love was selfish. In the end, after all the flattery's euphoria dwindled to an ember, she simply did not give a shit about me. It wasn't even about dominance or submission. She needed nothing of me. Her gifts, as well as her curses, were bestowed upon me without the slightest regard for any power they might give her. She didn't care about power. She didn't seem to care about anything at all. That didn't stop her, though, from giving away a mixture of pain and pleasure, a strange alchemy she was proficient with.

All that. All that and more. And there we were, dancing again, in a smoke filled room on a warm April afternoon. All those life-changing memories...Every slice of enlightenment...The curve of her body nestled in mine, arms entwined, holding on to each other for dear life...Her musky perfume intoxicating me...Her eyes a window not to her's, but to my own soul...

Twisting the knife, sucking the life, she asked, "More?"

I wanted to say "no". I NEEDED to say "no".

But it was no good. I knew I would never refuse her completely.

"Someday," I replied.

"Soon?"

"Maybe. Probably." I said, with a slight bit of resignation. "I don't think I'll ever be able to avoid you for long."

She grinned, an impish grin. "So it is, my darling. So it has been and so it shall be. Until the day you have no more left to give. Until the day you will be unable to take any more from me. A long time from today, though. So tell me you love me. Don't let me see you walking out the door, or I'll follow. I won't be able to help myself."

"I do, darling Maria. I do love you. Turn away now. Turn away."

This morning I woke up feeling like someone had bludgeoned me with steel pipes the night before.