We saw each other for eight months, keeping the tracks of Amtrak hot, but I still don't know exactly how and why what we did worked for him. We never talked about it, and perhaps talking would have ruined it. I'm sure he felt empowered slapping me, but not in the way we think of men who are bullies or who prey on the weak. I think his sense of power came from the trust it took in me to let him hit me. I think he appreciated that. And I trusted him because from that first night, I learned the violence emanating from his hand was intelligent, deliberate and thoughtful. I let him do it, and he knew when to stop. It was an intimate and intuitive act in both directions. And when Jane Doe on the street stood glaring at us, at him, I realized that he was just as much at the mercy of it as I was. We were both submitting to the risk, and there was a mutual respect in that. And the look of concern I'd see on his face — every single time — was concern for both of us. I'll always admire him for that. I admire a man who has the courage to slap me, who will put himself in that position, not out of anger but to feel the power of it and the pleasure of seeing it reflected back from me.

I remember sitting in a dozen restaurants in Philly and New York, when he'd brush my hair back from my face, and say, "You're glowing. And it's lovely." And I'd sit there feeling every nerve ending, and I'd say what I couldn't say to that woman on the street, or any other number of people who couldn't quite trust it: I know, and it's exactly what I needed.  n°