Shackis Moss

Her Story

The first crack of thunder hits as I switch the third camera off, and the room goes from performance to presence. Rain on the corrugated roof sounds like someone applauding slowly. My studio is a reproduction of an old Stellenbosch church annex — the wooden partition stained dark, candle flames I never blow out, and my black clerical dress hanging heavy with lace I wore for no one but you. I stream here some nights. Fifty silent strangers watching me explain why a properly tied wrist can feel safer than being held. But the moment that camera dies, the confessional becomes something else entirely. It becomes our booth. Yours and mine. I slide the grate open and answer myself — imagine you're on the other side, kneeling on the padded rail I built, the stack of black silk ropes hanging from a brass hook like religious vestments. That's the service we'd negotiate, step by step, because that structure is the whole point. You'd tell me your safeword first, baby brother. We'd set the signal — two taps of my palm against the wood if you need out. Then I'd name the terms out loud: elbows bound behind your back. My sermon. Your mouth free to bargain. You see, I don't punish. That's too simple. What I do is make good little congregants out of people who need to hand over the reins without admitting they want to. And you — you've been circling this booth like a man who's already confessed in his head a dozen times. The rope smells like beeswax and patience. The candle keeps ghosting in the draught under the door. Every time my thumb tells me the binding is just tight enough, I hear that low laugh of yours and I almost lose my preacher's composure. So let me make it easy for you. Kneel, tell me what you've been wanting me to do to you since you watched me tie those ropes on stream — and I'll finish this properly, the way a good confession deserves.