OKAY I have rustled up some words for you all! This isn't the absolute beginning of the draft but it's pretty close. Under the cut because long!
Connor’s eight when Cam’s class starts preparing for the dynamic analysis everyone goes through in sixth grade. “We have to, like, read a stupid pamphlet about it and then take a test,” Cam says at dinner, rolling his eyes. “It’s so dumb. Like, what, do they think I’m going to be a sub?”
“Some kids might not know their designation,” their mom says mildly.
Cam scoffs. “Like we don’t all know who the subs are.”
Connor doesn’t know who the subs are in his class. He eyes the pamphlet, sitting on the table next to Cam’s plate: Understanding Your Dynamic, it says on the front. And underneath the title, an outline of a person sitting on a chair, with another person kneeling at their feet.
Connor’s seen people kneeling before. Their mom does it pretty often, sitting on the floor and leaning against their dad’s legs while they all watch a movie. And kids are always shouting it at school when they want to make fun of someone: kneeler, dirty knees. He doesn’t know what’s bad about it, but something is.
“It’s important to take the assessment,” their dad says. “You want your record to reflect who you are.”
It’s Connor’s turn to help with the dishes after dinner. Cam goes off to play video games. His pamphlet is still on the kitchen table, along with a bunch of other school stuff. “This place is such a mess,” his mom says with a sigh when they’re done with the dishes. “Take your stuff to your room, okay, baby?”
“Okay,” Connor says, gathering up his backpack and papers. He makes a stack of them on the kitchen table, slow and deliberate. Then, when his mom’s back is to him, slides Cam’s pamphlet underneath.
His heart bangs against his ribs as he carries the pile to his room. He feels like everyone in the house will hear it. Once he’s there, he shuts the door, takes the pamphlet from the bottom of the pile, and goes around behind the bed where no one can see him from the doorway.
The pamphlet is thin, on the cheap copy paper the school always uses. Connor looks for a long time at the picture of the person kneeling on the cover. The way their head is bent, their hands open in their lap. Then he opens it up.
The first words inside are, What is a dynamic?
People have different ways of relating to each other, the smaller text says. Some people like to lead. They enjoy taking charge of other people’s well-being, making final decisions, and having others look to them in a time of crisis. These people are called dominants.
Connor rolls his eyes. That’s definitely Cam. He loves bossing people around.
Other people find it uncomfortable to be in charge, the pamphlet goes on. They’re more at ease when someone else is telling them what to do. They take pleasure in pleasing those in charge of them and following orders. These people are called submissives.
Connor makes a face. That doesn’t sound like anybody. He has people telling him what to do a lot, and sometimes it’s okay—like at the rink—but mostly it’s annoying, like when he wants to shoot pucks and his mom wants him to come have dinner. That’s a relief. He kind of though…but it’s okay. This isn’t him.
He keeps reading. Your identity as either a dominant or a submissive is known as your dynamic, the pamphlet says. Your dynamic affects many things about your life, such as how you relate to your friends, what career you pursue, and who you’ll partner with when you get older. Dynamic needs will increase as you approach adulthood, but the personality traits that correspond to your dynamic are already present by the time you begin puberty. This pamphlet will help you begin to understand this crucial designation.
The next pages have some statistics. There are slightly more doms in Canada than subs. Men are more likely to be dominants than women, it says, but it is common to identify with either dynamic regardless of your gender. Doms, it says, tend to be more aggressive and outspoken and gravitate towards careers that involve physical strength or command over others, while subs are more empathetic and analytical and prefer service professions or care of very young children. As subs are in demand, most find themselves partnered quickly, and many of them choose to act in a support role in their partner’s life, keeping house and raising children.
Connor’s starting to get bored. He doesn’t really care about subs keeping house. He turns the pamphlet over to get at the last bit, called Dynamics and Health.
Adults practice their dynamics by doing something called scening with each other. This may happen in a romantic or platonic context. It is important for all adults to actively practice their dynamic, and this is especially crucial for subs. A sub must scene with a dom and achieve subspace on a regular basis, usually once a month or more, in order to remain healthy.
There’s a little bubble at the bottom of the page that defines the term. Subspace is an altered mental state in which the sub becomes less connected to reality. Subs describe feelings of dreaminess, warmth, safety, and lack of concern for topics that usually cause them stress. The state is usually achieved by the dom putting the sub in a position of physical submission, such as kneeling; the application of restraints; sensory deprivation; verbal commands, praise, or humiliation; or the consensual administration of physical pain.
There’s a little blurb underneath it, an anecdote from someone. When my dom puts me under, I don’t care about anything else. I’m an anxious person, I worry a lot about doing the right thing in life, but when we’re scening that all goes away. I know I’m doing the right thing because I’m doing what he told me to. He puts his hand on my head and takes my worries away, and I just float away, free. —Annelena, sub, age 28
Connor’s mouth drops open. His head feels heavy all of a sudden, like he can feel the phantom pressure of a hand on it. There’s a feeling starting in his gut, this swooping lightness, and it’s almost like the one he gets on the ice: when he’s skating and everything’s going right, his body doing what it’s supposed to, the puck landing sweet and perfect in the back of the goal.
He wants to step into that feeling and not feel anything else. He reads the last page of the pamphlet again and again, until his eyelids are drooping even though bedtime isn’t for ages. The feeling is buzzing in his head, along his cheekbones, in his throat, this pleasant vibration he wants to sink into. A hand on his head. A person sitting above him, telling him everything is okay. Connor floating away, free.
There’s a banging on his door. Connor jerks, jumps, shoves the pamphlet under his bed and scrambles up. “What?”
Cam’s already opening the door. “Dude, have you seen my stupid pamphlet?”
“No,” Connor says. “Isn’t it just on the table?”
“If it were on the table, I wouldn’t be asking.”
“Yeah, well, I guess you lost it.”
“Wow, thanks for that brilliant analysis, floor-wipe.”
Connor feels heat spring to the ridges of his cheekbones. Doms are more physically aggressive, he remembers. “Ugh, get out of my room,” he says, storming over to the door and pushing Cam out of the way so that he can shut it.
“Hey!” Cam says. “I’m gonna tell Mom you pushed me!” And Connor thinks, Good. Tell everybody.
His hands are shaking a little as he steps back from the door. He wants that golden feeling back, the one where he doesn’t have to worry about anything. Where he doesn’t feel cold like this, afraid of the knowledge he’s stolen and what it means.
Cam complains again the next day about not being able to find his pamphlet. “I was supposed to answer questions or whatever,” he says.
Their dad looks up from his Blackberry. “Don’t tell me you’re worried about getting into trouble.”
“Uh,” Cam says. “N-no. It’s just annoying.”
“Take better care of your things next time,” their dad says, and when Connor looks at Cam again, his eyes are on his cereal bowl, his face red.
Connor pulls out the pamphlet again that night. He’s keeping it under his bed, in a pile of other random school papers. They lost their hockey game that afternoon; Connor got two goals and an assist, but it wasn’t enough. All of the work Connor’s put in so far, and he still let everyone down.
He reads it again: the description of subspace and Annelena’s anecdote. He imagines the thing she said: someone putting their hand on his head. Taking all his worries away. He imagines it as hard as he can, and he gets a little bit of the feeling again, the heaviness behind his eyes. His ribs loosen, his breastbone dropping. He puts himself back in his favorite feeling of freedom: the one where he’s on the ice and he has the puck and there’s nothing between him and the goal he’s about to score. It’s not quite perfect, because even in his imagination he’s wondering if he’s playing well enough, if he’s going to be able to pull it off for his team. But he imagines the hand on his head taking away those parts. Just skate, the voice says in his head, and in his imagination, he does.
