Fine Line by Zahra Owens Page B

whether he wanted to try and take it further.”
    “Further?” she asked.
    “Once a patient is relaxed and the tension accumulated throughout the day has gone, I like to test how well people react to touch. Some people are very sensitive to being touched and this can cause sexual dysfunction as well.”

    “JUST try to keep your arms and legs heavy against the sofa. I’m going to touch your hand with my hand.” Jay tried to keep his voice low and soothing. “Just like when we said hello.” Jay slid his hand underneath Mack’s heavy palm and let their hands fit together like a handshake. He then placed his left hand on top of the joined limbs and tried to relax himself, so his hands became warmer. Mack’s hand wasn’t cold either so he was very loose and calm too.
    “Now put yourself in my hands. Don’t struggle against the movement, simply imagine yourself to be a rag doll.” He slowly lifted Mack’s hand and the arm connected to it. Feeling its relaxed heaviness, he slowly started shaking it from side to side, seeing the movement ripple across the shoulder and to the rest of Mack’s body. “Excellent.” He then did the same with his other arm. “You’re really doing an amazing job.
    How does it feel?”
    “Relaxing,” Mack laughed out loud. “I dunno, I like doing the exercises, they make it easy for me to wind down at night and I think I even sleep better.”
    “That’s good.”

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    “I still have the dreams, though.”
    “You told me you had vividly sexual dreams sometimes, but you never elaborated. We have twenty minutes left. Would you care to tell me about them?”
    Mack seemed to think about it. Eventually he agreed, but his relaxed posture had changed somehow. “There are different kinds. The one I had last night was the rape.”
    “Rape?” Jay asked, trying not to sound shocked, fearing that it would stop Mack from talking.
    “Well, technically speaking it isn’t rape as such.”
    “Please, tell me,” Jay urged him on.
    “This always occurs in a place I’m not comfortable in. Never happens in my bedroom at my house. Yesterday I dreamed it happened at the gym. I was in the shower and a guy accosted me, asked me what I was doing there. So I told him the truth, that I was sweaty from working out and that I wanted to be left alone. Before I knew what was going on, he was pressing me against the wall and was… pushing his cock inside my body.”
    Mack was clearly a little uneasy about divulging his dreams to Jay.
    He’d had enough therapy to know that Jay would suggest that dreams were actually sexual fantasies. Jay remained non-judgemental, though, and didn’t even comment on Mack’s use of the slang word for penis, since the meaning of it was clear to both of them. He just wanted to keep Mack talking about it, hoping to find the real meaning of the dream.
    “Did it hurt?”
    “That was the strange thing. I’d been scared until then and worried that it would hurt. I remember bracing myself, but once he was inside me it felt really good. Of course then I woke up. I can’t even come in my dreams.”
    “Were you sexually aroused when you woke up?” Jay tried to The Fine Line by Zahra Owens

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    sound neutral and interested, of course.
    Mack nodded. “It took me until lunchtime to shake it.”
    “Did you have an erection?”
    “Yeah,” Mack admitted rather proudly, but then his mood lowered again. “It went away as soon as I touched it.” Mack righted the recliner and hunched his shoulders. “If only I could actually find some release, life would be a lot less complicated.”
    “Is this dream typical of the dreams you say you keep having?” Jay asked.
    “I don’t know if it’s typical. I don’t get raped in the other ones.”
    “Good,” Jay replied. “Not that a rape fantasy is bad. A lot of people have them, and just because you have the fantasy doesn’t mean that you want it to come true. I was actually wondering if the other dreams