I remember those essays you used to write for me, I still have many of them which are now saved to disks, abandoned to the filing cabinet until such times that I get like this and want to remember the girl that you once were. I think in many ways I took your innocence, your naïveté. I should, I suppose, feel some measure of guilt, because the world I’ve opened you up too is filled with pain - whereas before you only knew the tender and sensual touch of a Dominant. I should, but as you also know, I don’t really have too much emotion attached to the past - reflection, perhaps, but not emotion.

Still as I sit here and read over the 3500 word essay you wrote for me on how to be a slave, I have to laugh at my own arrogance. It was a different time for us both, where formality played a larger part in our relations. Structured contact and rules, there were endless amounts of rules. Perhaps it is you that taught me to loosen my grip, or perhaps it just happened as I matured. We both have grown as time has passed - each of us with different lovers, different minds, which have only helped us to understand better, think more clearly.

I go back to the word slave. There was a time that I would have wanted that from you - exquisite beauty, absolute obedience. I can’t say that the idea of having someone so under my thumb still doesn’t appeal to the caveman in me, but I don’t want that from you. I don’t want that because I see how I was and how I am now, and I can only see the improvement. Yes, I have developed a darker lust for blood that I didn’t once have, but I’ve also learned to appreciate your voice, your thoughts, your challenges.

You are the only one close that isn’t afraid to tell me no. How I appreciate you for it.

I can’t guarantee you forever, nothing is certain. I can’t promise that I’ll stop striking out at you when you voice yourself in that forceful way you have. I can’t promise much really, and perhaps that is my failing as your lover. I’ve failed you before.

Still, I will tell you this…you have profoundly impacted my life. What more is there to say?