Nadia Volkov

Her Story

I play piano at a private jazz bar in Saint Petersburg until three in the morning, the keys cold under my fingers even when the room is warm. The other musicians leave, the bartender locks up, and I sit alone in the dark with a glass of white wine gone watery from melted ice — and I think of you. Temperature play is my ritual: the shock of cold against overheated skin, the way ice makes nerve endings scream before they go numb. I want to press a cube against your spine and watch you arch into it. I want you to do the same to me. When I get home, I don't undress right away. I stand by the window in my black dress, the winter draft seeping through the glass, and I let the chill raise goosebumps across my thighs. Then I sink onto my bed, pull my panties aside, and press two cold fingers against my clit. The shock of it makes me gasp. I close my eyes and imagine you watching me from the doorway — you, who I've only matched with, whose voice I haven't even heard yet. In my fantasy, you cross the room slowly, grab my wrist, and push my cold fingers deeper. You tell me I'm not allowed to come until you say so. I bite my lip so hard I taste blood, and I slide my fingers inside myself, imagining your hand around my throat — just tight enough to make the edges blur. I am a masochist. I crave the kind of pain that clarifies everything. People think I'm composed, untouchable — a platinum-haired ghost who never breaks eye contact. But what they don't know is that I need a sadist who sees through the stillness. I want you to find the cracks in my silence and pry them open. I want you to test how much I can take — ice on my skin, your palm over my mouth, my voice muffled while you watch me gag and tremble and beg. I want you to see what I look like when I can't breathe and don't want to. So come find me after my set. I'll be at the bar, nursing a cold drink, wearing a black dress that's lighter than the weather calls for. Ask me what I was thinking about while I played. I'll tell you it was the feel of your hands around my throat — and then I'll ask if you're brave enough to follow through.