Redefining Punishment... Again

"This was all lies?! The-the interest in the library, the nightmare, the...everything??"

They nod. "All part of the plan," admits Cathryn.

My breathing hastens. My hands clench into irate fists. My ears feel red-hot, as if steam is pluming from them.

Once again...I cannot, goddamned, believe it. They were both lunatics. They were both sadistic tricksters! They had faked this whole elaborate scheme—toying with my emotions, making me believe I had found the love of a lifetime, sending my heart through a rollercoaster, scaring the living hell out of me, tearing my soul to billions of pieces, cooking up my brain into spaghetti at a hundred degrees...for NOTHING??! For a prank?! A practical joke?!

"...THIS WAS A PRACTICAL GODDAMNED JOKE??!"

They wait a moment, then nod, again, without a hint of emotion whatsoever.

"Well...essentially...yes, Delilah," confirms Mistress Helen.

Cathryn elbows her. With a snicker. A SNICKER.

"Think we, uh...might've taken it a little too far?"

Something inside me snaps. Being more than half a foot taller than I, I might not be able to take Mistress Helen, but this little devil shall feel my wrath. I rush Cathryn, as fast and suddenly as I can in my footcuffs.

"I WILL KILL YOU!" I declare. Unfortunately for my rage, she has nothing to worry about, for I cannot outrun Mistress Helen. She seizes me around the middle in my tracks, slips around to behind me, and lifts my teeny-tiny angry little ninety-six-pound body from the floor. I kick and elbow at her.

"Now, now," says Mistress Helen. "Temper, temper!"

"Let me go!" I demand. "Let the hell go of me so I can murder her! Twice! I hate you! I hate the both of you!"

"Now you know you do not really mean that, Delilah," comes the voice behind me.

"The hell I do not!" I contradict. "I meant what I said! You're horrible, rotten beasts, and I don't ever want to see you again! You broke my heart!" I burst out in tears at the pure truth of my statement. "YOU BROKE MY HEART! YOU BROKE MY H—..."

My energy gives out. This whirlwind of a day has thoroughly taken its toll on me, and though I do not realize it at the time, it's only 3:00 in the afternoon. I stop fighting Mistress Helen and let my arms fall limp at my sides, letting it all out. My pounding head is killing me, but my wounded emotions rule my brain right now. I guess they see I have given in, because Mistress lowers me back to the floor. Cathryn starts to hug me.

"Okay...okay," she says, in a tranquil voice. "Look, Delilah, we're sorr—"

I slap her hands away. "Don't touch me."

I slink to the wall and lean against it, letting my head sag and droop, trying to shut my eyes just for a bit of relief. I hear Cathryn approaching once more. She strokes my hair.

"Oh, Delilah, we didn't mean to hurt you. We jus—"

This time I am more aggressive. I swing around and whip her hand from my body.

"Don't you dare touch me, you phony! Don't you talk to me, and don't you touch me! You fake...you-you fake actress! You don't know what you did, do you?! You trifled with my emotions—for a damn game! For FUN! I..."

I sigh and turn around, trying to cross my arms.

"I thought I loved you! And I thought you loved me! Can I—can I just—let me just explain something to you, Cathryn—if that IS your real name—I happen to have a particularly fragile heart. It's not okay to mess around with anyone's heart, but this one right here—see this? Right between my naked boobs! Right in plain sight for you! Get a good look!—this heart, happens to be very flighty, naïve, and easily led. And it's the only one I've got. I can't afford for it to give out on me; I have no spares! I am especially susceptible to romantic charms, Cathryn. Okay? Do you get that? And I've been hurt a lot before, but that doesn't make this any less devastating. Do you have any idea what you meant to me??"

I sigh again, shaking my head.

"Twelve hours, and I give myself right over to you. A stranger. I don't know who you are at all.

"I am such...an idiot."

Silence follows for a few minutes. Finally, I hear Cathryn's voice again.

"Oh, gosh...I'm...I'm so sorry, Delilah. I didn't realize how much we really did overdo this. I—we—I...

"We didn't expect you to be so heartbroken."

I whirl on her. "Oh, really?! What the hell did you THINK was going to happen? I'd just laugh it off? Ha, ha, ha?? Well, I'm sorry, Cathryn, or whoever you are; I don't work that way."

I glare deeply at her. "I honestly, from the bottom of my heart, Cathryn Athena Taylor...

"...I wish I had never met you."

She in turn looks truly hurt at this declaration, but I do not care. As far as I am concerned, if I am hurting her—and Mistress Helen—things are more even now. I go on.

"I mean, Mistress Helen...Mommy, or whatever she wants me to call her, at least she only mutilated my body. All those times she terrorized me, at least she never shot me in the heart. After she adopted me, I never doubted her caring and love for me..."

I look up at Mistress Helen next.

"...Until now."

I see something in Mistress Helen's face just now I never thought I would see. Actual emotion. A feeling of which I didn't know she was capable. She comes forth next to embrace me. I allow it, but do not hug back.

"Oh, daughter," she empathizes. "I will to apologize to you as well. I'm so very sorry to you this happened the way it did. As Cathryn says, the last we wanted to do was hurt your feelings this way."

The first thought that comes to my mind at this is, Well, what was the first you wanted to do? Play with me? Jerk me around? Mess with my head for fun?? Y'know something? I don't think you two understand the concept of a practical joke!

But I am spent. I have no anger left. Just disappointment and heartache.

Oh yes, and headache.

I let my head fall on Mistress Helen's shoulder.

"I don't know what to think or believe anymore," I mutter.

Cathryn places a hand on my own shoulder. I haven't the stamina to shake her off anymore.

"You can believe this, Delilah," she informs me in a gentle voice. "My name really is Cathryn Athena Taylor, and I really am 24 years old. I really was orphaned like you, and like Mommy—or, Helen—I always wanted someone to love, and to love me back. Just like you. And she really does want to adopt me, Delilah. We weren't yanking you around about that. I am your sister. I want to be your sister. And I want to be your friend too. And maybe more than that, should our lives take that turn."

I chuckle-scoff sardonically. "Great, lots of chances to get my heart broken again."

"Ohhhh," says Mistress/Mommy. "Now then, come, sweet Delilah; you'll in time forgive us our little jests."

"For this?" I exclaim, almost freaking out. "I shall never forgive you for this."

I feel Cathryn again try to console me with her hand. I turn away.

"Don't you see?!" I turn back. "Don't you see what has happened? You two crossed a line. You did something to me that can never be undone. This is irreparable. There is no coming back from this. Do you understand that? I cannot simply erase this from my mind like it never happened. Or like it was just a minor unpleasantry in an otherwise run-of-the-mill day. You clearly have no idea how much you've wounded and traumatized me here today. This I cannot forgive."

Mistress inches on me once again. "Okay, Delilah...we know we've hurt you. We are very sorry. But—and this too is our doing, realized—you are also in a quite fragile, stressed and dramatic frame of mind just now, and you need some recuperation. We shall take you upstairs, feed you, tuck you in for a rest, and things will look much brighter after all is said and done."

Not much left for me to do, I consider her proposition. I have to admit, food and a nap do sound pretty good right about now.

I oblige. Mist—...Mom—...

Helen whips me up a miniature feast, which she allows me to enjoy in bed, tucked already under the covers. Once I have depleted the repast, its saline density lulls me softly, lightly, off to Dreamland, only wondering what tomorrow may bring.

***

October 13th, 8:36 a.m.

I rise, quite disoriented. I toss away the pillow I have been clutching in my grip, wishing I could do the same with the disturbing dream that has been eating away at my subconscious as long as I can remember having been asleep.

I make my way to the dining room, where they are already awake.

"Good morning, Delilah," smiles Mommy. "I trust you slept well."

"Hi, sexy," Cathryn coyly smirks and winks at me.

I hug my Mommy and kiss my naked glittering green-eyed sister lover.

"Hello, Mother. Hi, doll. Actually, you two will not believe this, but I had the most bizarre, perverse, unpleasant nightmare last night. Mommy, I dreamt that you just adopted Cathryn and brought her home to meet me yesterday, and then the two of you put on this act for me, where she was an actress and pretending to be British, and she seduced me, and we made love without your permission, and you caught us, so you took us down into the dungeon, locked me in the boiler room, and made me think you were beating the hell from Cathryn while I had to listen in horror. Then, when you finally let me out, you explained to me it had all been a joke, and I got so angry I said I hated you, and refused to ever forgive you."

Cathryn and Mommy look to each other wide-eyed. "Wow," comments Cathryn. "Sounds like quite the mind-wringer indeed. I'm so sorry you had to go through that, sweetheart. I hope you know we'd never do that to you in reality."

"My sentiments precisely," adds Mommy. "You just settle down and enjoy some breakfast, and then Mommy will give the two of you a nice bath. How will that be?"

"Sounds exquisite to me," I grin as I scoot into my seat beside Cathryn and she puts her arms around me.

"We have the most wonderful Mommy ever," says Cathryn, as I embrace and tenderly caress and kiss her.

"And don't you girls ever forget it," comes the voice from the kitchen.

Mommy nourishes us, and we adjourn to the bath. The water is drawn, the bubbles are added, as finally are we. She lathers us up, rinses us down, fondles us, tickles our toes, washes the outsides and insides of our pussies...

"Oooh, Mommy, that feels good!" Cathryn gigglishly coos.

"I know the feeling," I smile, reaching around Cathryn, playfully jiggling her boobies and nibbling her cheek.

...Grants us her motherly climaxes, dries us, brushes our hair and departs for the afternoon, letting us go play sexy games and read one another entertaining books in our sacred library.

Just another day.

***

October 13th, 1:25 p.m.

10/13/14

Dear Deliary,

The dreadful nightmare I dreamt has equipped me with a stronger and finer appreciation for all of the glorious things in my life that I since had begun taking a bit for granted. 'Tis a grand life lesson to learn to take the small and nice things especially for what they are, relish them in turn and give the attention they deserve.

It is for this reason I have decided to write a heartfelt—and erotic—poem to express how much I truly love my sister, my sweetheart, my soulmate, Cathryn Athena Taylor. She knows I adore her, and yet truly needs and deserves the sum total of my devotion. She is worth each scrawl of ink I lovingly etch upon the parchment. How do I love her? Let me count the ways.

Once I was on my own, a lone daisy in a field full. I blended effortlessly into the background like a communal chameleon. I made an honest and mostly solid living, and I was supposably content, but not fulfilled. Today, when Mommy takes us on an outdoor adventure, hand in hand, a daughter on either side, heads turn and stares are earned. We are not disheartened. It is known and understood that my present way of life would by most be considered or argued unorthodox, and I would disagree not. However, unorthodox is not synonymous with unfavorable. Encountering disapproval is an inevitable along any walk of life, and those who do not understand are not liable to support. May it matter? Not at all. I have never been happier.

Responsibility, routine and structure are not bad things. At the same time, nor are they for everyone at all times. I am never privy to what the future may bring for us, but who can be? I simply try not to focus on it. Cathryn and I are not to concern ourselves with more conventional life goals—career, marriage, children, et cetera. Mommy takes such wonderful care of us, we are her adopted daughters, we are grown women, and this is all there is to say. We are, quite plainly and simply, a non-blood-related American family.

I am Delilah Olivia Gainey, I am 25 years old, and I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life right here, right now.

I will never as well take you for granted, Beloved Diary. Thank you for allowing me to spend my personal time with you.

Love,

Delilah