What is it Like?

I am slow these days. I was inspired by a picture I saw and wondered a little, 'what would it be like?' So I tried to imagine it and this is what I wrote.

My hands are behind me. I have to keep them there. You have placed them there, encircled them with iron, manacled me and made me keep them there. I turn my wrists, move my hands, try to pull them forward but the cold iron won't yield. My wrists are kept in your iron.

I struggle a little, feel a kind of panic flow through me. I know I am manacled but my body wants to move. I can't do anything but struggle against the iron, the iron that encircle my wrists. I am helpless and I have to defeat that wave of panic. I am manacled.

I can't even move my hands up or down or to the side. They are encircled by iron that is locked to another band of iron. This other band encircles my body. Around my waist there is a band of iron, locked in place as much as the manacles are locked around my wrists.

The band around my waist is tight, too tight. It presses on my belly. I can feel it when I breathe, as a restraint, as something that stops me from expanding my lungs.

I know I must not try to breathe that much. What I can do is enough and if I try to breathe deeper I will only panic. I don't want panic. I can avoid panic.

This sense of needing to keep my reactions in check makes aware of being bound, being in iron. Or rather it brings it home what it means to be in iron.

My feet are in shackles, shackles as close and locked as the iron around my waist and wrists. There is a chain between the shackles. I can walk but I can't take long strides. I hear the rattling of the chain as I move, in short steps.

I stand on a beach. And I am not alone. You stand behind me. I am not looking at you. I know you are there. You would never leave me alone on a beach in iron.

Unless you wanted me to feel left alone. You could do something like that. I know that. But you would never forget about me.

The sun is sinking closer to the horizon and the shadows are becoming long. It is still a hot day. There is sand on the beach but there are no one else here but us. That is strange but good. I wouldn't want someone to see me in iron like this. They would try to free me.

I look down on my body. I see my bare feet encircled by the heavy shackles. They look vulnerable and helpless. I look at my legs and my belly. I see the iron press into my flesh. That looks cruel. My soft skin encircled and held by hard iron.

I am startled by your touch. At first you place your hand on my shoulder. Then you place your other hand on my hip, just below the iron. You hold me and I feel how cold your hands are. I want you to touch me but your hands are cold and I shiver a little.

I am helpless. My reaction is to protect my body, not let your hands touch me. I don't mind the hand on the shoulder or on my hip but I fear you will move them, touch some other part of me. I want to protect myself from that. It is beyond my will. It is like when you protect yourself when someone tickles you, even if it is your loved one.

But I can't protect my body. I can't move my hands to take them away. I can move a little and I do but you hold me, keep me in place. There is a short struggle, a battle between wills.

I stop struggling. I am defeated. We both know that. I can't struggle and I don't want to struggle. It was never meant to be a struggle and I hear how you smile and I smile too.

You do move your hands. The hand on my shoulder move down, forwards and over my breast. I gasp. The other moves forwards, downwards, across my belly and down between my legs.

I hold my breath as you put your hand over my sex. There is nothing to protect me from your touch. Only the iron. No clothes are there to interfere. I am naked, wearing only the iron you have locked in place on my body. And the iron doesn't protect.

There is a moment, a reaction, that speaks of defiance, of a will to protect myself, a desire to choose when and where. But that moment is brief. I yield to your touch. I draw my breath and I surrender to your touch.

Your hand gently caresses my breasts and I feel how my nipple hardens in the palm of your hand. I feel as if it betrays me.

Your other hand starts moving and I feel an itching desire for your hand to do more, to touch me more.

You do. You let your fingers slip into me and I let out a sigh. The fire is awakened and I am helpless. You have touched me and I am in your hands. I am naked and in iron and now you have made my body hunger for you.

Then your fingers are gone. Your hand that caressed my breast is gone. I am not touched any more. I stand trembling and realise, again, that I stand naked and in iron on a beautiful beach in the light of the setting sun.

I know this is only the beginning. This will be a long night.