What does control mean to you?

It means that I allow what happens in each given situation.

Has there ever been a time when you weren't in control.

Yes.

How did it affect you?

I didn't allow myself to not be in control again.

How did you make sure of that?

I hurt people before they hurt me.

So, it was a person that made you feel out of control?

Something like that.

Was it more than one person?

Yes.

What did they do?

They controlled me.

What did they do?

They controlled me.

But what did they do?

I already told you; they controlled me.

***

The dictionary defines the word control as having the power to influence or direct people's behaviour or the course of events.

But control is so much more than that.

Control is understanding your position in any given situation and knowing how to use it to your advantage. Control is about understanding yourself and how best to use that intrapersonal knowledge to direct your own life.

But that type of control is hard to achieve. I like to tell myself that I've achieved it. Complete knowledge of self, but I haven't. I'm still nothing more than an asteroid veering off-course about to collide with my own destruction.

I know that.

No one else needs to know that though.

***

He loves me. My shrink.

He whispers it in my ear as he spills himself inside of me. He waits until I'm asleep to tell me that he's going to leave his wife for me. He's brought his emotions into our sex and I don't want that.

He no longer even has sex with me. He calls it lovemaking. I don't want to make love to him. I just want to fuck him senseless. Love doesn't get me off. He tries to prolong it now... He prolongs the intervals in which he thrusts into my body and he kisses my breasts instead of biting them like he used to. He doesn't want to hurt me, but he's not making me orgasm either.

I lay bored beneath him. It's only when I'm on top that I'm able to orgasm. He doesn't even want me to masturbate or watch porn any longer. He thinks I'm cheating on him if I do that. But I've already been cheating on him. I met someone at work who's able to separate his feelings from his baser self.

I'm leaving him soon. I know I will.

I can hear him talking to his wife in the bathroom. He doesn't need to hide their conversation from me but he's afraid that I'll say something out loud and have his wife overhear. I'm not a child.

I don't need for his wife to know. As long as he gives me what I want, she never needs to know. But he's changed.

"You're looking beautiful."

My smile is fake as I lay back, allowing my short nightie to slide up my legs. "I know."

"My wife wants to know where I am. She suspects something." He sits beside me, tracing his finger up and down my thigh.

"Of course she does. You're spending more time here than at your own home."

He turns to me, surprised at my sharp tone. "Do you have a problem with that?"

I quirk my brow, voicing all that needs to be said.

"I see." His hand drops to his lap and he turns his back to me. "Is this over?"

"Yes." I sit up, rifling through my drawer for a cigarette I know I had stashed there.

He shakes his head, muttering beneath his breath. "You're such a bitch."

"You knew that when you slept with me." I light up, blowing the smoke away from his face. "Go back to your wife."

"You already know it won't be the same." He glares at me, unable to believe that he had fallen for me.

"I know. You'll always see my face when you come inside of her."

"I don't want to." He pushed himself up from the bed, ripping bis shirt from the pedastal beside him.

I pulled the stick to my lips, taking a deep puff, savouring the sharp, bitter taste. "I told you I'll poison you, but you didn't listen. You wanted to fix me."

"No one can fix you." He said, buttoning up his shirt. "You're broken."

He thought his words would hurt me, but, how could they?

They were the truth.

They were my truth.

I had accepted it already.

The only regret I have is that I would need to find a new shrink. Maybe a woman this time.

Someone old and horrid looking...

He barely looks at me as he packs whatever belongings he has in my room. That in itself should have alerted me to his clingy behaviour. And he walks out.

For the last time.

***

My head hurts and my eyes are burning.

I know I need to stop but I can't as my hand delves beneath my panties. I don't know how many times I had masturbated the night before but I hadn't slept.

Not really.

I had gotten a minute-long nap every time I had orgasmed but as soon as I woke up, my hand reached for my breasts and my core. I wanted to stop but each time I did, his words echoed in my head once more.

I wasn't fixable.

I was sore. My thighs felt swollen and it hurt to even touch the soft folds of my body but I couldn't stop my finger from delving into its depths. I needed the release of those chemicals in my brain to help me forget what he had said. I had to, but it hurt.

I cry out more from pain than pleasure as I orgasm for the umpteenth time. I'm breathless and my eyes are blurry from the tears that cloud it.

I want to sleep. I want to sleep and sleep until I can wake up and never want for this ever again. I want to wake up and not crave an orgasm or sex or the feeling of a man's body on top of mine or inside of it. I want to wake up and not need sex to forget or to feel in control.

I want to wake up and feel fixed.

But as my eyes close, I know that I'll wake up once more and my fingers will trace my opening once more even though it burns, and I'll make myself come over and over again even if it hurts.

Darkness overcomes me and in my sleep, I think of nothing at all.