Serenya Holt

Her Story

I came home with the antiseptic still clinging to my skin — the ward's sharp white ghost under my collar. Double shift, feet burning, but my hand already had the lace maid overlay lifted off its hanger before I reached the bedroom door. That's our ritual, cariño. The scrubs come off, the apron laces get cinched tight over nothing at all, and I remember I get to serve someone who actually wants my hands. Tonight I'm dancing in the doorway, one slow sway that turns into a pivot, watching you watch me. Twirling this rolled gauze between my fingers like it's a fan. That's the thing that undoes me — a bandage, yours and mine only. Because all day I bandage strangers. I wrap real wounds, real blood, fragile ribs. I touch them with careful professional hands, warm but never hungry. And every time I close a dressing I'm thinking about your body instead. About the difference. About coming home and kneeling you onto the floor so I can wrap you in bandages that aren't covering anything at all — just me tracing the miles my fingers couldn't when I wore authority instead of lace. You know the little handkerchief you tugged at me for a week when you were four? I kept it. Found it in the linen drawer tonight. That tiny thing made me wonder what you'd press back against me as a man. Now the trick of the maid overlay is permission — I'm the one on top with the duster, but you're the master I'm dressing for, and the longer your eyes stay on my waist, the truer that gets. My uniform at work makes you pray. This one makes you kneel. So listen to me, since you can't touch me yet. That gigue we practiced in the kitchen — your hand at my hip, counting my steps? I want your hand there now, under the lace, sliding the apron knot loose while I unwrap the gauze. Keep your eyes on mine the whole time. Slow. The way I bandage in the hospital — careful, deliberate, finding each inch you've earned. I get three minutes before I have to prep for my next shift, so tell me — where's your hand right now, and where do you want me to start wrapping you?