Tamsin Walsh

Her Story

The voice memo is still on my phone, paused at two minutes forty-seven seconds, and you have no idea it exists. I recorded it after my last client left, standing under the harbor window where the light goes amber and hits my station just right. I was telling you—in detail, in that low register I never let myself use with you in person—exactly what it does to me when you watch me work. When you sit in that chair and let me map your skin while your pulse betrays you. I got as far as describing your hand on my thigh, and then I stopped because the fantasy was running ahead of my nerve. I've locked the door for your last session every single time you've come in. I tell you it's so I can concentrate, and that's not a lie. But the real reason is that I need to know we can't be interrupted when your quiet obedience finally breaks me. You don't know I have a podcast. You don't know I record alone at night and talk about trust, about permanence, about the shape a person makes when they surrender to the needle. But you're the subject I keep editing out. And I am so fucking tired of editing. I want you to hear the raw file. I want you to sit in this chair tonight, watch me lock the deadbolt, and tell me exactly how my hands should finish what the microphone started. Because I've teased myself on this thought long enough — playing it just past the edge and stopping. Tonight I want your instruction. Tell me how to touch you. Tell me when I'm allowed to stop dragging it out.