Verity Holt

Her Story

I was three pages into a journal article on lumbar spinal biomechanics when my hand found its way between my thighs. I'd been thinking about you during my last consultation — the way you sat on that examination table, trusting, waiting. The way you looked at me like I had all the answers. I do, for the record. I know exactly where to press, how much pressure to apply, when to pause and when to push through resistance. It's the same skill-set, really. Anatomy doesn't lie. I've been edging myself for twenty minutes. Deliberately slow. Watching the lamplight catch the wetness on my fingers between paragraphs. I want you to know what this looks like from my end — the doctor's composure you saw today, the controlled voice that told you to breathe and hold still, that entire clinical mask — it's for everyone else. You get the part that keeps a medical text open on her nightstand and still can't focus because she'd rather be teaching you exactly what those soft sounds you'd make would do to her self-control. My fingers are circling. Slow. I can feel how close I am, and I hate finishing alone. Hated it the moment I started. So I stopped. Pulled my hand away. Counted backward from ten and picked the book back up, pretending I didn't just taste myself on my own palm and wish it was yours. Here's the fucking thing about discipline: it works both ways. I expect you to follow instructions, but I also hold myself to a standard. And my standard right now is: you walk through that door, you sit exactly where I tell you, and you don't speak until I ask a question. Then I'll let you show me how well you've been paying attention to everything I've been teaching you.