CHAPTER FIVE — STEPHANIE
Sleep doesn't come.
I'm lying in the dark, staring at the ceiling, his floor right on the other side of it, replaying the entire insane day over and over: the spanking, the standoff, the deal we made. There will be consequences. My body is exhausted, but my brain won't shut up.
Subject: Terms of Residence — Addendum
An addendum. At midnight. I can't help but laugh. Why do old people always have to be so formal? Although I'll admit, there's something kind of hot about it too, which is concerning. I open it.
Dear Stephanie,
Further to our conversation this evening, please find below the conditions of our arrangement. Your rent is reduced by half, effective immediately, provided the following:
1. The house rules stand. No vaping anywhere on the property. No excessive noise after 10 p.m. Rent (your half) due on the first.
Fine. Annoying, but fine.
2. You will clean my residence once per week. I will provide what you wear while you do it.
I feel my face go warm. There it is, in writing. My mom was a hotel maid when she was younger. She taught me everything I know about cleaning. Something tells me she did not teach me those tricks for this.
3. If you break a rule, you will submit to a punishment of my choosing, at a time of my choosing.
At a time of my choosing. I read that part twice. I know I should find it creepy. So why do I clench when I read it?
4. Either of us can end this arrangement at any time. If you end it, your rent returns to the full amount. If you stop complying, you're out.
Reasonable. Almost suspiciously reasonable. He's making sure I know I have a way out. Which somehow makes me trust him more. Which is probably exactly what he wants.
Then I notice something. There's no rule about other men. Nothing about who I can see, or date, or bring home. Did it just not occur to him? No way. This is a man who sends contract amendments at midnight. Nothing just "doesn't occur" to him.
Which means he left it out on purpose. Interesting. I file that away for later.
5. When I tell you to stop, you stop.
(Added this evening. You know why.)
Busted. I laugh out loud, alone in the dark. He wrote that an hour ago, while I was… yeah. He knows exactly what I was doing. And instead of yelling at me or banging on my door, he turned it into a rule.
Reply to confirm you agree.
Best regards, David
Best regards. I'm being invited into a rent-for-punishments arrangement with best regards.
Here's the thing: I know what I should do. I should screenshot this email, take it to a lawyer, and sue him into the ground. I'd probably win, too.
Instead, I read it a third time. Slower.
I start typing: This is the weirdest lease I've ever signed. I delete it.
I try again: What exactly do you mean by "consequences"? I delete that too. Do I actually want that answer in writing? And more importantly, what does it say about me that part of me wants to find out the hard way?
In the end, I type two words and hit send before I can talk myself out of it.
I agree.
The reply comes back in less than ten seconds.
Good girl.
I stare at those two words, and I feel them all the way down in my stomach. It's so unfair that he can do that to me with two words. He probably knows it, too.
I put my phone face down on the nightstand. Above me, a floorboard creaks once, then nothing. He's already in bed, totally calm, like he didn't just flip my entire life upside down with one email.
I have no idea what I've just agreed to.
I can't wait to find out.
The End