These past few days have been more of my recent, newfound productivity: I tidied the bedroom (finally) after weeks of ill-health, and I’ve organised our under stair cupboard too. No more heaps of crates and boxes to be organised sometime never, now it’s all a system that makes sense. 

I’m pleased to say that all of the crap I wanted gone from under there went on Olio too: the hiking sticks that I used precisely once (and with encouragement of my mother), the impact driver that I was given by my neighbour, which I have absolutely no use for (a combi drill is quite fine for what I need). Even the two large under bed storage boxes that have been used for storing Christmas decorations, which I’d already pared down at the turn of the new year. They were cleaned out and given a new home, too. 

I feel better for it, lighter, but that’s not the only change that’s happened: I learned recently that I should be using a wide tooth comb on thick hair like mine, rather than a detangling brush that barely brushes the surface and would explain why I never felt like I could truly “win” with my hair. Now, the old, dead hair has been coming out in handfuls. 

And again, I do feel better for it: lighter, cleaner, more managed. So much so that yesterday and for the first time in more than six years, I wore my hair pigtails, with a t-shirt and my new denim jacket. Master Levi, my mother and my father-in-law all commented on how nice it looked. Valkyries, meanwhile, threatened to turn my new hairstyle into makeshift handcuffs.

So going back to Valkyries, after I threw the gauntlet down again the other day. 

Valkyries said that he feels he keeps missing my challenges, and I understand that, but that in itself is challenging: I certainly don’t try to be enigmatic — I even try to be quite open and direct — but if I “lose” people sometimes then that’s kind of awkward for both of us; it shows we’re perhaps operating on different levels.  

I forget how exactly, but Lara Croft enters the conversation, perhaps both hypothetically and quite literally. I grew up with :Lara: my first game was Tomb Raider 2 and I played them all until the realism in the latest games caused me motion sickness that left me feeling as sick as a parrot. I loved her, I was inspired by her — I adored her “can-do” attitude. 

I had a friend in secondary school, Kez. Kez and I used to play the Tomb Raider games together, and I remember us making it our mission to complete Tomb Raider: Chronicles. Despite our best efforts, we never could quite beat the timed, poison-gas shooting range at the end. 

But Kez and I took Lara out of the games; we embodied her. We took on assault courses through Girl Guiding and we formed an airsoft team. We learned to build shelters together and we learned survival skills. We applied ourselves differently to what it meant to be Guides — whilst some girls only cared for cooking and make-up, Kez and I were much more outdoorsy. 

Kez and I are no longer friends, there were a number of incidents that ultimately drove a wedge between us. We’re amicable when I see her (she’s now friends with my brother instead), but we’re no longer friends. 

Kez is now quite girly, but for me, Lara stayed within me, as a tomboy. I learned to swim sidestroke and front crawl by emulating Lara and perfecting the technique, and I learned to tread water that way, too. Even in my online roleplay games I took on a Lara-esque persona, because that’s just who I was. Even when I considered LARPing, I only turned it down because I realised that a combat queen was likely a little too modern for their tastes. 

So going back to Valkyries here: I felt like if he understood Lara, then he’d understand me. I, like Lara, don’t want combat, but I’m not afraid to do what I have to if I must. 

Valkyries and I talked favourite scenes from the Tomb Raider movies, and I mentioned the scene in which Lara (played by Angelina Jolie) seduces and tricks Terry Sheridan (played by Gerard Butler). Even in that, I realised, there’s a sense of familiarity: Terry calls Lara out as being guarded, and she tells him that “I’m not leaving because I can’t kill you. I’m leaving because I could.” 

I don’t need Valkyries, what we have is not a “needing” thing. When he entered my life I was quite done with polyamory — I’d returned to a life of being a strong, capable woman, living in a life of monogamy with a husband who I also love but don’t need. Suddenly Valkyries rocked up and risked destabilizing this new, stable life that I’d created. So I gathered that, if I was going to let him live in this space, then the least he could do was to be tolerable to me 😉 

Yesterday morning started with another of Master Levi’s full frontal assaults on my senses. Actually, it was kind of me who started it: Master had woken with an erection, and I was stroking his thigh, rather than his cock — mindful of it, but trying not to give it any undue attention unless he wanted me to. 

I kissed Master’s chest, up his arm and to his lips. By the time I reached his lips, his cock was straining against his shorts. I smiled. 

“What do you want?” he whispers. 

“The same as you, apparently” I reply. 

“Yeah? Well I want breakfast first” he says, and rolls me onto my back without another word. 

Master keeps me on the edge of my nirvana for a while, trembling and whimpering under his ministrations. I want to cum, but I don’t want this to be over. He understands the battle inside my brain. 

“So desperate,” he whispers against me, “so eager to cum”. I growl at him and the sadist laughs. 

It’s his probing at my entrance that breaks my resolve. It’s delightful. 

“Tongue fuck me all you want, please!” I groan. He laughs again, and he does.

Yesterday afternoon was spent at a family Easter Sunday dinner, with roast lamb as is traditional. I opted for a green floral t-shirt, black trousers and my new denim jacket. In a twist, I put my newly-maintained hair in low pigtails. 

“Hmm, pigtails?” Master growls, “you naughty girl.” 

“Strange, I was a good girl earlier” I giggle. 

“You were,” comes the reply, “and now you’re going to spend the afternoon at your mother’s house, full of my warm cum”. I glare at him with indignation, and again he laughs. 

In a dash of “back at you” I opted for a spray of my “Good Girl” perfume. Master raises an eyebrow at me and I smile sweetly. 

“I’m a good girl, remember?” I reinstate. 

Both my mother and my father-in-law commented on my hair, which was lovely — my father-in-law even said he liked the style on me. 

Dinner was delicious and abundant, with kale, peas, parsnips and carrots, as well as lamb and roasted potatoes. Dessert was one of Mum’s signature flower jellies, atop a peach mousse and biscuit base. She’s tasting out her recipe ahead of a cooking competition next week. 

Talk turns to my tiramisu, and Mum wants one of my tiramisus made for the next time the lot of us gather. My brother challenges me: he says he wants me to add my own twist on a traditional tiramisu. 

“Challenge accepted” I reply. 

But that’s not the only tiramisu I’ve been tasked to make. 

Master has also told his colleagues about my tiramisus, so, they want me to make one. 

“You’ll have it by Tuesday” I reply. Master is taken aback. 

After dinner we settle in the lounge, where I discuss paintballing and airsoft with my brother, who had been paintballing earlier in the day. He mentions archery with foam tips too, so I tell him about Valkyries, who wants to play “hide and seek” (a sub hunt) in the nearby woods. I tell him that I’d considered archery over airsoft, as it’s quieter.

I tell him some too, about how Valkyries got his name, and how I’d challenged him to a game of battleships that he still hadn’t taken me up on. 

“I’m beginning to think he’s less Admiral of the seven seas, and more Admiral of the boating lake” I giggle. My brother rubs the bridge of his nose with his thumb and finger and smiles. 

“Oh god, sis,” he says. I grin at him. 

“What?” I ask, “you know what I’m like. You’ve had thirty-five years of me.” 

“That poor fucking bastard” he mutters. I laugh. 

“He pursued me when I was just trying to exist peacefully,” I say, “so I spare him no sympathy.” 

Back at home, Master and I settled to watch a new series on Channel 4 — The Hunt: Predator  Vs Prey. 

Master knows I like Hunted; against well-equipped Hunters, how long could I survive? 

The Hunt is a slightly different premise: instead of a team of professional “Hunters”, the players are divided into two teams, “Predators” and “Prey”. Prey can earn money, and when caught by Predators, the Predator “wins” the money and the roles are swapped, so the Prey is now the Predator. And so it goes, until only one Predator and Prey remains, with the Prey having to do all they can to outsmart the Predator and keep the money, and the Predator doing all they can to hunt the Prey and win the money. 

“Which would you rather me, a Predator or a Prey?” Master asks. 

“Well if you’re a Predator, nobody is hunting you” I reply. It’s tactics. 

“I thought you liked being hunted?” he asks. I know what he’s doing; he’s trying to provoke me. 

I smile and place my lips an inch from his ear.

“See, that’s the fun thing, isn’t it?” I ask. “Just as this show teaches us, those who are hunted can be become hunters, and those who hunt? Can become the hunted.”

“Touché” comes the reply.