Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 66993 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 335(@200wpm)___ 268(@250wpm)___ 223(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66993 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 335(@200wpm)___ 268(@250wpm)___ 223(@300wpm)
Her body was art. Her hips curved with intent. Her breasts were full. What struck me most was the ink that adorned her skin.
Her tattoos were a vertical line of moon phases that ran from the hollow of her throat, between her breasts, across her navel, and down into the soft dip of her pelvis.
New moon to full moon.
Waning to waxed.
Starting and ending.
Over and over.
A mesmerizing worship of time.
The man beckoned her to walk over to him and where the red rope was tied to the hook. And that’s when my brain started to spiral—just a little.
What exactly is this? Is she going to swing? Float? Climb? Is this some sort of ritual? A dance? A hanging?
God, I hoped not that last one.
My heart gave a little kick in my chest.
I mean—I was in Japan. Their definition of art and entertainment might not line up with my American sensibilities. Granted, I always figured America was much more of a violent country than Japan, but I didn’t know enough to truly expand on that topic.
The rope swayed lightly in the night breeze. The cello moaned and a chill rippled down my spine.
But I was alert.
Watching.
Waiting.
Please don’t let this be one of those “death as art” kind of things.
I liked the woman.
There was something powerful in the way she carried herself. Calm. Proud. She hadn’t even spoken and I already admired her. She didn’t strike me as the type to participate in a final act. Not like that.
Still, the rope.
The hook.
The music.
It all felt so. . .loaded.
But Kenji sat completely still beside me.
Which helped me breathe.
If something were about to go terribly sideways, I had the sense that Kenji wouldn’t be sipping sake and smirking like this. His posture was too open. Too grounded. He looked like a man watching a prayer unfold.
And the woman. . .she looked free.
Not in a reckless way.
In a chosen way.
I let out a breath, leaned back in my seat, and grabbed my cup of sake.
Okay.
I didn’t know what was coming but I was ready to see it. As long as nobody bled or caught fire, I was game.
The woman got right by the hook, the rope hanging from it, and the man.
My breath caught.
He didn’t touch her right away. First, he knelt and began looping the thick coils of rope, lifting the end and brushing it between his palms as if to warm it.
Then. . .he lifted the rope up to her.
The moment the rope touched her skin, something shifted. Not on her body, but in the air. As if we’d all crossed into another dimension.
She closed her eyes and lifted her chin.
He tied the first knot at her sternum, right between her breasts. The rope pressed against her skin and made her let out a sharp inhale.
I exhaled too, not realizing I’d been holding my breath.
The red rope shimmered under the moonlight.
Then he began wrapping more rope around her but he didn’t just tie knots—he sculpted. He wove the rope like it was silk spun from flame. He threaded lines across her chest, framing the fullness of her breasts. The rope cinched just enough to lift them, emphasize them, showcase them.
He slipped more rope around her waist and let the taut lines trace the dip of her belly and the arc of her ribs.
The fibers sank into her skin.
Her thighs flexed slightly as he moved behind her, pulling the cords tighter around her hips.
He looped them just under the swell of her ass, cinching upward to lift, to cradle, to emphasize.
My thighs clenched without permission. I felt the phantom trail of that rope across my own skin.
As he continued to work, she never flinched. Her breath remained steady.
Knots began to adorn her body with a stunning pattern that paralleled the moon phases tattooed on her skin.
Then he moved back to the front, his hands running over the ropes, checking their grip and tension.
His hands plunged into the coils again, threading it from her back around the left thigh, then crossing behind to wrap it around her right thigh.
She was a canvas of rope and skin.
Soon, he stopped tying the rope around her and stepped back, taking a few seconds to examine his handiwork.
Wow.
As if hearing my thoughts and wanting to show off more, he pulled sharply at the rope.
Her body lifted off the ground, just an inch at first.
Then he pulled more, she rose and was suspended entirely.
Her feet no longer touched the platform.
The rope held.
The knots cinched.
And she hung there like a spell suspended mid-syllable.
She was floating.
The cellist played on.
The woman's face was a serene mask, her eyes closed, her posture relaxed as if she were lounging rather than hanging in mid-air.
The man slowly circled around her once and I just could not turn away.
The man reached for another section of rope threaded through the hook, and with slow, measured tension, he began to turn her.