One year married. Their first anniversary. It felt like only yesterday that Kate was having a ring slipped onto her finger with the promise of a lifetime of domestic bliss. A candlelit date at the fanciest wine bar in town was, strictly, more than she needed—all she needed was Scott, no matter where they were or how much it cost—but she wouldn’t dream of snubbing her husband’s insistence on being splashy and chivalrous for her sake.

A strange pressure behind Kate’s eyes heralded the appearance of the woman who crashed into their perfect evening like a wintry, ice-slick comet.

“Evening,” she said, pulling a chair from an empty neighbouring table and taking a seat next to Kate. “It’s a beautiful night for love.”

She looked to be in her late forties, maybe, her eyes a portal into a pale sky in winter, her salt and pepper hair worn cropped. Between the blazer, the dress shirt, and the long black slacks, she certainly looked dressed for the occasion if one were willing to overlook that it wasn’t her occasion to share.

It was Scott who broke the stunned silence. “Can we help you?”

“Oh, I think so.” She leaned back and crossed one leg over the over with the casual entitlement necessary to crash a dinner date in the first place, and flashed a charming smile at Kate. “I didn’t get your name, sweetheart.”

“Kate,” she answered readily.

“Wonderful.” They locked eyes, then, and the room seemed to tilt. “Kate, haven’t you forgotten something important?”

“I… Have I?”

Instinct urged her to look for a lifeline, to look for Scott, but Kate had already fallen forward into those wintry eyes; she was plummeting without a parachute into a sky so vast and overwhelming that it encompassed everything, filling her vision, her awareness, and eclipsing even her own sense of self. She fell, and she fell, and her entire world was only her.

The older butch’s voice dropped to a conspiratorial murmur. “Do I really need to remind you, Kate? You’ve been running around with this boy, playing at romance, but that’s not who you are, is it? That’s not what you want. Not really.”

Kate leaned forward in her chair until she was perching on the lip of it. If she wasn’t that, and if that wasn’t what she wanted, then… who was she, and what did she want?

The stranger smiled at the unspoken question written in Kate’s eyes. “Shall I tell you, Kate?”

“Please.”

“You’re my bootblack.”

Even without the full knowledge of what that word entailed, the words etched themselves into her soul.

“You’re my submissive, Kate. You kneel for me. You take care of my leather. That is who you are. That is what makes you whole. Devotion and service.”

Kate felt herself nodding, each and every word illuminating the previous one. Her breath hitched, her thoughts racing to flick through every piece of information she may have ever heard about her new object of worship. Boots. Leather boots. The smell of leather. The texture of leather against her skin. Everything she knew about leather rushed to the forefront of her mind and situated itself at the apex of her being, and her newest anxiety became only that she felt she had so much more to learn.

Her eyes were drawn down. There they were. Boots, honest-to-god, real leather boots, not any of the faux-leather crap she’d worn herself. How hadn’t she taken notice of her owner’s boots when she first approached their table? She should have. It was utterly foolish of her to not have noticed them. The shape of her entire life was drawn around them.

Calloused fingers took Kate’s hand. Kate trembled at the intimate contact. From her finger was plucked her ring, the expensive jewel sparkling in the low candle light. It was taken without justification. Her owner simply took it and looked it over with a smirk before slipping it into her pocket. And of course, why shouldn’t she? It was her right. It had no significance to Kate, but even if it did, then so be it—it was not her place to question.

“Now, Kate, why don’t you introduce me to this… gentleman?”

The pair of them looked at the man who Kate suddenly pitied, for some reason. She strained to remember why she might feel that way. It was like there was a piece of information just beyond her reach, something she may have been forgetting—but no matter how she tried, nothing came to mind. That made sense, though, didn’t it? They barely even knew each other. Oh, maybe that was why! He must have felt like such a third wheel.

“That’s Scott, Sir,” Kate said. “We met at… um, it was…?”

“A coffee shop, perhaps?” Her owner suggested.

“Yeah, something like that,” Scott said. He was very polite. There wasn’t even the ghost of intimacy in his tone. “We’re just—”

“Friends,” Kate finished helpfully. “That’s all.”

Kate’s owner seemed pleased by that answer. “Well, that’s nice, isn’t it? Kate, go ahead and tell your friend goodbye. We’re leaving.”

Kate perked up at that. “Oh! Um, yes, Sir, um,” she shot Scott a polite smile, “thanks, Scott, it was nice to see you again.”

“Yeah, we should… do coffee sometime,” he said, in that way people proposed things they didn’t really think would happen, but had to suggest might happen regardless. “And sorry if I was intruding on something. You two seem to have something very special.”

“We do, don’t we? I’m happy it’s so clear to see,” Kate’s owner said, offering Scott a stiff nod. “Pleasure to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Scott said. “Take care, both of you.”

A strong, possessive hand was already at the small of Kate’s back, sweeping her away. A life half-remembered lay behind her, at the table and in the cloakroom, but ahead of her lay her real life; she fell into step at her owner’s heel, filled with a phantom devotion that became realer and more honest than whatever dream of a life she was leaving behind with each step toward the cold winter night that lay beyond the threshold.

They stopped at the door, and Kate followed her owner’s gaze back inside, to the table where Scott still sat alone, staring into space—he, too, looked like he was waking from a dream. The butch’s lips curved wickedly, her hand shifting to find purchase on Kate’s hip.

“Come on,” she said, pulling Kate into her side. “The journey here to collect you from your little date has gotten my boots filthy with snow and slurry.”

Kate shivered with the thrill of what that would entail. “Yessir.”

She was led to the motorcycle in the parking lot, and waited patiently like a good girl to be handed her helmet, eyes feasting on the sight of the filthy boots that she’d been attending to within the hour. The command to mount behind her owner couldn’t come quickly enough. There was the purr of the engine, and then they were off into the night. The wine bar faded from sight, and as it did, so did the dream of a life not lived. 

That was okay, though—this life, her real life, was the one she wanted. Kate only hoped for many more wonderful years of service to come.