Daddy’s Nervous Little by Jess Winters
CHAPTER 6
Lawrence
I walk into the station whistling happily. The whistling invites stares from most of the officers. A few of them wear annoyed expressions, but most chuckle and smile at me or exchange knowing glances with each other. Those who have known me long enough to remember my relationship with Dahlia know that when that relationship ended I became morose and withdrawn. I recovered from the worst of the emotions rather quickly. I knew before the relationship ended that we weren’t destined to be together forever, but I still had a difficult time moving on. It wasn’t that I missed Dahlia so much as I missed the feeling of being able to help someone be the best version of themselves. I miss that now. I miss it desperately, but I won’t miss it for long. We start after work and it’s going to be wonderful, I can tell.
That’s an aspect of being a Daddy that isn’t well understood by people outside of the lifestyle. Most people who aren’t in a Dominant/submissive relationship think those relationships are all about having kinky sex where the man gets to make the woman fulfill all of his sexual fantasies and the woman is expected to blindly obey his commands. I suppose if someone only looks at it from a distance through the lens of modern ideas about relationships, but never looks closer, they might think along those lines. It doesn’t seem to matter, I suppose, that the relationship is consensual in nature, that the woman entered into it with an understanding of the authority the man would take. Actually, most people just think of it as kinky, really.
It’s true there’s a sexual component to DDlg relationships that varies in degree from relationship to relationship, but the sex piece is really a very minor part of the relationship compared to everything else that makes these kinds of relationships special. Being a Daddy isn’t about making a girl do what you want in bed. It’s about protecting and caring for your little girl and helping her become the best version of herself she can be. Sometimes that means setting rules and boundaries and disciplining her if she breaks those rules or crosses those boundaries. Sometimes that means caring for and supporting her so she can take a break from the world and spend time in little space for a while so she can feel safe and secure and protected. It always means putting your little girl’s needs ahead of your own and doing everything you can to make her as fulfilled as possible.
It was this piece that was missing from my relationship with Dahlia. Oddly enough, she was the one who wanted to limit our relationship to the purely sexual components. I was the one who always wanted more, but whenever I pushed for our relationship to move beyond the bedroom she would pull away from me. When she left, I blamed myself for failing her. She had emotional problems from a past relationship that really inhibited her from leading a fulfilling life and I was supposed to be the one to help her overcome that, and I didn’t. It took a long time for me to accept that I had done everything I could for her and that it was her choices, not mine, that led to the end of our relationship.
With Wendy, everything is different. It’s true there’s a damn amazing sexual component to our relationship, but what really makes our relationship special is that she allows me to help her grow. In the four months since we’ve started dating, she’s cleaned and organized her apartment; begun exercising regularly and eating healthy; and subscribed to three different nursing journals to keep up with the latest news in her field. She’s stopped calling herself stupid and become more confident at work. She even spoke up during a recent staff meeting to suggest the hospital adopt shorter but more frequent shifts for nurses to reduce the risk of fatigue driven error. She is well on her way to being the successful, self-assured woman I know she can be – the woman she deserves to be – and I’ve helped her all along the way. So while a small part of the spring I’ve carried in my step is due to the mind-blowing sex I’ve been having, much more of it is due to gratitude at being a part of Wendy’s growth and maturity as a person.
I sit at my desk, still whistling. My partner, Gavin, glances up from his coffee from the desk next to me. “I liked you better when you hated your life,” he says.
“It’s time to let go, Gavin,” I reply breezily. “That Lawrence is dead and in the ground. Welcome to the new, improved, happy Lawrence.”
Gavin groaned and rolled his eyes. “If I’d known dating this girl was going to turn you all soft and mushy, I would never have told you to go out with her.”
“Oh, you love me,” I said. “Don’t act all gruff and surly just because you think it makes you look like Humphrey Bogart.”
“Humphry Bogart wasn’t gruff, he was terse,” Gavin retorted. “Gruff is like an older person. Like Paul Newman. He was gruff. Humphrey Bogart was just terse.”
I laughed. “I’m not sure you know what you’re talking about Gavin, but you seem happy, so I’ll let you believe what you want to believe.”
“Hey, don’t hate on me just because you know I’m right. How are things with your little girl anyway?” Gavin is part of the lifestyle. He doesn’t have a little girl at the moment. He’s one of the most genuinely good men I’ve ever met and I hope he finds his forever little girl soon.
“Things are wonderful,” I reply. “I finally feel l can be the man I was always meant to be. The best part of being with Wendy is watching her grow more and more confident every day. Knowing that I get to be a part of that is… well, there are no words. It’s just wonderful.”
Gavin nodded understandingly. “Isn’t it amazing that in order for us to be the people we’re meant to be, we have to help someone else be who she was meant to be? If that’s not a rewarding way to live, I don’t know what is.”
My phone buzzed, pulling me away from the conversation. It’s Wendy. I smile and open my phone. I hear Gavin say, “Well, there goes any chance of talking to you for the rest of the day. Hey, when Wendy lets you have your balls back give me a call and we can hang out.”
I don’t answer him. The smile on my face has fled and I stare blankly at the message.
Lawrence,
I’ve really enjoyed the time we’ve spent together so far but I think it would be best for both of us if we moved on with our separate lives. I don’t want to be a burden to you anymore and I don’t want to feel like I can only succeed in life if you hold my hand. I’m sorry, but it’s over.
Wendy.
I hear Gavin say, “Uh oh. That looks like bad news. Everything okay?”
I don’t answer that either, but if I did I would have to say that everything is very much not okay.
Nothing is okay.