The red room is a little secret chamber in Vern’s basement, with a solid door that’s always locked, and a bit of soundproofing we no longer need because the house is warded. The floor is rubber, warmed from underneath, comfortable for long nights in any position. Hanging from the ceiling are restraints of various lengths, alongside swings. There are pommel horses, spreader bars, one uncomfortable table for being pinned against, and one big pile of assorted pillows and blankets for cooling down after the fact. On racks are various whips, dildos and buttplugs, chastity cages and collars, and the riding crop which he pulls from its spot on a rack, grinning as he does.

  “You’re going to stay down on your knees for me, you’re not going to stand unless I say so.”

  “I promise,” I say, and snap, binding myself to it. Silver threads flash through the air, sticking into the backs of my calves, and to the floor. My legs go out, I tumble to my knees in front of Vern.

  “Jeeze, all these toys, feels like I don’t even need them. Blindfold? Nah. Promise me you’ll keep your eyes closed.”

  “I promise,” I say, and feel the threads stitch my eyelids snug.

  “What are we feeling tonight, H-bomb?” he asks. “What’s the menu look like?”

  “I want to sub.”

  “Would be a weird start to a night of you domming,” he laughs, riding crop tracing the arc of my bare back.

  “I don’t think I need to cum.”

  “Same. I think I like the stone top thing, trying it out for a bit. What else?”

  “I think I just want you to tie me up- well- you know-” I gesture to my eyes, promised shut. “Bind me. And hurt me.”

  “I’d be happy to oblige. What’re you feeling for pain today H-bomb, one to ten?”

  The angry beehive between my ears will not stop. “Seven,” I say.

  “Seven?” he laughs wickedly. “Last time we did six and you begged to stop. Seven?”

  “Gimme seven,” I say. “Work is boring, witches are boring, everything is boring-”

  “You good H bomb?” he asks, touching the riding crop to my chin, raising my face to look at me.

  I don’t tell him I’m still mad about our argument over squishboy, or that I feel guilty too. I don’t tell him I got in trouble at work for mouthing off to the customer. I don’t say that Ali text me a whole ass ‘thank you for coming to supper’ that I’ve tried to respond to like fifteen times, and now I feel like I can’t respond because it’s been too long. And I certainly don’t tell him that late at night I miss Vincent and Valery and the life I ran away from.

  I point my blind gaze defiantly up and beg: “Thrill me.”

  He bats my cheek with the crop, not hard, but enough to startle. “I’m gonna make you regret that. What’s aftercare look like?”

  “Sit on the patio, have a joint with you, listen to something, maybe some leftover pizza?”

  “Yeah, that sounds good.” I hear his voice go soft and kind, all the more special for how rarely he shows off that side. Then it goes completely wicked: “And hey, make me another promise.”

  “Yeah?”

  “When I say shut up, you don’t make a noise, not till I tell you you can speak. Safeword with a hand gesture or something, I’ll get it.”

  “I promise,” I say. Threads wind around my neck, tied to a lead he holds in his palm like it’s meant to be there. I hear him put the riding crop back, fumble with the toys he bought but has never been allowed to use. My breath goes a little unsteady. What the hell did I just sign myself up for. After a moment he decides better of the studded paddles and just undoes his belt.

  He lays it against me, teeth grit. He winds it back, my heartrate spikes. And then with the strength of a monster hunter he strikes. I gasp, writhe, muscles twitch and spasm. All the noise, all the questions, the failures and peeves, it’s all quiet in the shock. I collapse, whine in agony.

  “Shut up,” he says, malice and authority. He winds up for the next, and I don’t make a sound.

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  Fifteen minutes pass, and it feels like hours. Each bite of the belt its own chapter in submission, in exhaustion, in pain. It’s a full body exercise, fighting against my imaginary restraints, sweat pools on my body, the sexual thrill of it, the utter powerlessness, has spilled out onto the floor between my knees. Vern takes a long inhale, admiring his handiwork. “You can speak.”

  “Can I open my eyes now?”

  “I suppose you’ve been good, yeah,” he says, And just like that, the string holding me to my words is released, my knees unstick from the floor, and my eyes open.

  I stand up, lose my balance, and he catches me in his arms. Warm, strong, tender, close. I melt into him, giggling. He kisses the top of my head, spins me around in his arms, then places my feet back gingerly against the floor. “Oh I’m not gonna be walking right all week.”

  “You said seven, and honestly, that was six and a half at best.” He puts his belt back on, a dot of precum staining all the way through to his jeans.

  I waddle slowly towards the front door, tying a bathrobe around myself. Vern rushes ahead to start rolling a pair of joints. “Can we talk about my statue?” I ask him. “I got questions about-”

  Vern’s phone rings. He makes a face, stuffs it between a shoulder and his head as he continues to work. “Mickey? Shit, that was tonight? Uh- yeah- no, I’ll be there, just a little late- Since when do you care what the bleeding heart brigade says, the wolf isn’t going anywhere. Okay, I’ll be there a little more late. Just- Hold on.”

  He looks at me. I don’t want him to force himself, to hear about this favour he did me, to have it held over my head. “Just go, it’s okay.”

  “I love you, Harvey, thanks” he says. He tucks the joint he’s got rolled behind my ear, combs his fingers through my hair and kisses me, flattening me to the wall, our tongues tangling. I finally feel, for a fleeting second, the closeness, the alive-ness that I want.

  And then it’s gone. He steps out the door, holding it open for me so I can take my tender seat on the porch, and watch him drive away.

  I grab my phone out of my balled up jeans, and the external microphone from the same pocket. I dial a number off a tiny piece of scrap paper.

  “Hello?” Luis sounds suspicious, then whispers. “Heidi?”

  “The one and only,” I say.

  “I didn’t think that would work-” he laughs. “Uh, and I haven’t- I mean, you know that.”

  “Can I come over tomorrow?”

  He sounds alarmed: “Can you-”

  “Sorry, I misspoke,” I take a long, dramatic drag on the joint, then cough. “I will be there tomorrow, at 6, make sure we have privacy.”

  “I- will- I’ll make sure.”

  I hang up the phone, blow out smoke, make direct eye contact with the disapproving neighbour across the street, till they buckle and look away.

  It’s a funny thing to realize, after a night of surrender, of no control, of simplifying my world down to one of obeying commands, not even having to think about where to point my eyes or what to do with my hands. But I realize it anyway.

  I kind of like being in charge.

  I wake up in bed to the sound of a slamming door. I get up, wearing nothing but the extremely uncomfortable boyshorts I keep trying on out of sheer trans stubbornness. I creep with my crowbar out to the front door. The fridge purrs in the kitchen. Vivi pants in the living room, near the front door. I smell dew. Leaves. Saliva. Blood.

  “Don’t lick that, dumbass,” says Vern.

  I exhale, stress rolling off my shoulders, turn the corner to see Vivi licking the floor, Vern raiding a cabinet for booze, his left arm leaking blood from beneath his leather jacket.

  “Oh fuck,” I say, and grab the first aide kit. “Missing any fingers?”

  “No, just shrapnel,” he says.

  I peel the jacket off of him, there are a half a dozen big puncture wounds in his fore arm, in no particular arrangement. Thick shards of metal stick out. Vern uncorks a wine bottle with one hand, then drinks it as I pull out metal, disinfect and bandage him hole by hole.

  “This was that thing with Sazwa and Ali?”

  “Yeah. Couple spell seeds, couple favors, just fight a wolf that’s thirty feet tell, can fucking see it from space, and also we’re not allowed to hurt it. That crew is dangerously stupid.”

  “Is everyone okay?”

  “I’m not okay,” he says.

  “Dead, I mean.”

  “Fucking- Mickey’s borrowers both got some broken limbs but Arleen set them, just need to sleep for a week and they’ll be fine. Bleeding heart brigade is basically untouched. What, you want a play by play?”

  “Kind of?”

  I pull the last metal shard out of his forearm, toss it in the ashtray. It’s not jagged metal, like when a quadcopter breaks up or a grenade goes off, it’s weird, clearly made of metal but the long textured break lines look like shattered glass. And where it’s not broken I can see what it used to be, the textured fingertip, the ridge of a fake nail.

  “It was over fast. Bait guy got bit and grabbed, everyone starts throwing sand, Mickey’s guys get kicked. Some dibshit turned the soon to be dead guy to stone, and when the wolf smashed him into the ground-” Vern blows a raspberry, mimes the shattered pieces going flying. “And Arleen says if I want healing that’s another favor, like what bullshit, it's her borrower who’s teeth I keep finding in my hair.”

  I wrap the last of the gauze around his arm, find I’m holding his wrist too tight.

  “I’m okay, Babe. It wasn’t that close.”

  “I know,” I mumble. Vivi sniffs at the ashtray, and I grab him, heave him up to sit in my lap.

  “I’m a witch, Heidi, I’m not going down like some chump, okay? I’m safe, I’m fine, I’m not going anywhere. I don’t take stupid risks, I won’t get myself hurt for no reason, okay? Trust me.”

  “Promise?”

  He chugs the wine, hands the bottle to me. “Promise,” he says, as he leans into my shoulder, and closes his eyes.

  I wait until I’m sure he’s asleep, snoring like a baby, then snap my fingers. I smile as I see the thread wind tight around him, and fall back asleep not long after.