I didn’t know where it had come from, this need for restraints, for punishment, denial, and for being told what to do. It was a silent partner inside me, creeping out from its hiding place six years into my relationship with Ricky. I had no idea how to broach the subject. He had a controlling streak but nothing that led me to believe he’d want to tie me up, flog me or issue commands of a sexual nature.

We were strictly vanilla.

I kept my feelings and fantasies to myself. There was no point in upsetting the balance. Me expressing my needs wasn’t something I’d ever done. And did I even truly need what I was thinking about? God, I just didn’t know. We had the kind of union where discovering new practices in the bedroom came out of the blue, usually by accident, never by design.

Frustration set in. I was stifled by not being able to tell Ricky what I wanted, to the point where I asked myself the question no one wanted to ask—are we right for each other if I can’t tell him what I need?

I squashed that thought. Didn’t want to find out the answer, yet deep down I suspected I knew it already. So I continued as normal, having sex that didn’t quite hit the spot and always left me wanting more. I was empty somehow, with a gaping hollow inside me that wasn’t filled as full as my cunt had been.

Then my needs spilled over, out of my control.

I dreamed of scenarios, ones that gave me orgasms so vivid they woke me up. My cunt pulsed even with my eyes open. My nipples were harder than they’d been in any act of lovemaking. Sweat covered my body. My heart raced. I glanced over at Ricky, hoping he was asleep, that he didn’t know what had just happened. I was horrified at the thought of admitting it, of him thinking he wasn’t enough.

Ricky slept on.

I marveled at how not only men could have wet dreams. Who knew women could have that pleasure too? A part of me was ashamed that I’d come in my sleep. I blushed, struggling with feelings of guilt. Told myself I must be a filthy bitch, obsessed with sex and all that went with it.

It was as though I should have had some power over what my mind conjured during the nighttime hours. Of course, when I thought about it properly, I knew that wasn’t possible, that the short films in my mind came unbidden.

But did they? Weren’t my fantasies, ones I let myself indulge in just before I drifted off—when Ricky was busy on his smartphone, browsing online—the root cause of them? I’d provided the fodder, and my mind had eaten it all up, stashing it in the dark depths while the unseen filmmaker was busy editing it into something worth watching, experiencing. Then that filmmaker rolled out the red carpet for the premiere, me the only person invited to walk on it, into the cinema to see my desires on the big screen.

The men in those dreams… I’d read somewhere that you’ve seen every person in your dreams somewhere before. You apparently have to for your mind to bring them out. I wondered, while recalling those men—their bodies, their cocks, things I most certainly had not seen—where I must have noticed them in real life. I didn’t recognize any of them, so they must have been imprinted on my mind from swift glances, perhaps in the supermarket, or it might have been on TV.

At the time I probably hadn’t given them a second thought. I could have been miles away, thinking about what to cook for dinner, what was on my to-do list at work, preoccupied and not really taking anything in. Yet take them in I must have, it seemed. My mind had decided to notice them and as with the fantasies, it had stolen their images and filed them in the movie category of my brain.

And wasn’t that funny? Those men had no idea they starred in porn films, albeit ones that no one but me would see. I’d thought about them afterward sometimes and with another truckload of guilt, forced myself back into that semi-asleep state where I became the director and those men reappeared again. They were living their life oblivious to the knowledge they romped inside my head, affecting me to the point I found myself taking more notice of the people I came into contact with, just in case I spotted them for real. I wanted to see them for real, to find out if a spark of recognition flared up should we make eye contact. That was ridiculous, the stuff of youthful naivety, yet I was a grown woman, still entertaining girly wishes.

No, they had no idea they’d touched me.

Licked me.

Whipped me.

Stuck their cocks inside me.

Made me come.

I wanted them to knock on the front door, to be the delivery man, the postman, anyone who had knocked before when I’d been too wrapped up in life to really look at them. I wanted them to appear behind the meat counter in the supermarket, or be toiling by the pavement, fixing a pothole in the road. I walked around, thinking they were watching me. I tossed my hair, made myself pout and appear more attractive. I dressed better, like I had when I’d first met Ricky, all because I thought they could see me when I couldn’t see them.

I wanted them to be there, to exist. And that brought more guilt. Was I contemplating an affair? If I wanted those men, didn’t that mean I had the potential to be unfaithful? Something I’d never thought I could be? If one of them did appear, what the hell would I do?

I’d spent two years so far having those dreams, behaving as though the men were out there somewhere. Two years of keeping things to myself. I never tried to introduce what happened in my dreams into my real-life bed. I didn’t think Ricky would like the idea of smacking my arse with a wooden spoon, tying me to the headboard, then leaving me there for hours alone, only to return, his cock in hand, him wanking off until he came over my face. Going out of the room again, telling me I couldn’t come, that he wasn’t about to let me get off—or get me off himself. I was bad and needed to be punished. Coming was a reward, one I had to earn. He wouldn’t want to return to the bedroom once his spunk had dried, to wank himself all over again, his cum splashing down on the same place it had before.

No, Ricky wouldn’t do anything like that.

Why did I want that kind of sex? Where had the idea of it all come from? I hadn’t read anything rude, hadn’t watched porn, and I was just a regular woman—so how come the thought of him treating me like a sex object had become a sole focus for me?

Confused, and tired of trying to work it all out, I tried to block my thirst for what I termed my filth. Wasn’t that what it was? Wasn’t I filthy for wanting it?

The torment, the constant swirl of it all, almost sent me mad.

Six months passed, me successful in my attempts to be who I once was. I had sex with Ricky, grateful for what he gave me but, as usual, restless, yearning—without acknowledging I was doing it—for that extra something.

The problem was, my desire for him decided to go for a walk, to run away and leave me dry as a buried bone. With me holding everything inside, pretending vanilla was enough then painfully realizing with every fuck it wasn’t, our intimacy faded. Gone were the days of tumbling into bed and shagging until we struggled for breath. Gone were the nights of fucking, then talking until the early hours. Gone were the mornings of spontaneous couplings that were as wonderful as they were unexpected.

We’d turned into just friends. Companions.

I told myself that no matter how embarrassed I got, I ought to let him know my thoughts, to share my needs with him—bit by bit, bringing out the least shocking things first. Every time I opened my mouth to whisper into the darkness that I wanted him to tie my wrists, then fuck me roughly from behind, the glow of his phone intruded.

He was busy, he wouldn’t want to hear that.

If I dredged up the courage to turn onto my side, facing him, I could explain. ‘God, would you just slap my arse now and not stop until I scream?’ But the eye of the camera on his phone blinked and said, ‘No, don’t ask him that.’

Oh yes, he was busy, he really wouldn’t want to hear that.

During the first weeks of my libido scarpering, he approached me every so often, light touches on my belly, drifting his fingertips up, up, up until they settled on my nipples. I waited for my cunt to clench, for the stirrings of desire to bring on the flood of wetness between my legs, for my nipples to respond, perking, straining for more. Nothing happened. I remained still, thinking he’d give up and turn away, going back to whatever had held his attention so much on his phone. The news, perhaps. The football. Or maybe even a blog he’d stumbled upon.

And that was the weirdest part of it all. Yes, my libido had fled, and yes, I waited for him to tire, to get the message I didn’t want to have sex, yet at the same time I was screaming that I did want it. Lots of it, just not the kind he enjoyed.

What if he would enjoy your kind, though? You’ve never asked. What if he surprises you with his answer when you tell him what you want?

Those whispers had given me plenty of trouble, a lot to think about, but I thought I knew him well enough to know for sure that he’d never be the one to give me the things I craved. The sadness of it all was that although I didn’t respond to his advances, I was almost one hundred percent sure he wouldn’t stray. More guilt came then. How long could I deny him before he said something? Was he blaming himself, thinking he was the problem? That I no longer fancied him, that he didn’t do it for me anymore?

I’d got myself into a mess. A rut.

I decided, one day after we’d had quite a long sexual drought—three months I think it was—that I’d bite the bullet and spill it all. At least then he’d know it wasn’t him I’d gone off, just the type of sex we’d had. He could turn his nose up, be shocked, think I was disgusting, but he’d know it wasn’t him, that it wasn’t his fault.

I cooked a meal. It was nothing fancy, just a pasta dish. The wine I’d got from Marks and Spencer—a crisp cava, apparently glorious on the taste buds according to the label—would go some way to giving me courage. And who knew, maybe it would loosen Ricky up too, enabling him to digest what I planned to tell him.

To understand me even though I didn’t understand myself.

We always said we could figure anything out so long as we were together.

I had to believe that was true in this case.

The table was set. White cloth, candles burning, sparkling glasses and shiny cutlery. The food was simmering on the hob. I dressed in my only saucy nightie. Red, satin, lace on the bodice, the hem stopping mid-calf. I sprayed perfume behind my ears and on my wrists. My hair was glossy, falling about my shoulders in waves, makeup understated yet effective in hiding the gray shadows that had appeared beneath my eyes when I wasn’t looking.

He walked in from work, took one glance at me, then the table, and blinked.

I thought he was stunned by what I’d done, that we’d gone so far from anything like this lately that he couldn’t process how I’d engineered the evening to resemble a time from our past. I held my breath and waited for his cheeky smile, his sigh of relief that yes, yes, I wanted him again. That I still loved him. Desired him.

It never came, that cheeky smile.