Free Bound by Tradition by Roxy Harte

foot on a karate deck again. I even vowed it, silently of course. Sad thing was, it wasn’t the first time I’d made such a vow. I must have loved the punishment, because I always went back.
    * * * *
    Back in my room, after my shower, and after staring at a bowl of brown rice and stir-fried veggies I hadn’t touched, I called Shiro. I shouldn’t have. I knew I shouldn’t, and not because it was after midnight, but because I was seeking a partner in crime, not a true crime, just a little rebellion, and I knew he’d be more than willing to accommodate.
    “Did I wake you?”
    “No, I was reading. What’s up?”
    “I have classes and work today, but what if I skipped the dojo tonight? Could we do it then?”
    “Hell yeah! You’ll skip karate to get tied up in my rope?”
    I thought about that. I’d never skipped a karate class, let alone an entire night’s responsibilities. “You said I was responsible for my own happiness, right?”
    He murmured affirmatively.
    “And the way I look at it, if I go to the dojo, I’m going to be miserable, but if I go with you…I might find that mindless bliss like I found in the desert the other day. That seems like the wiser choice.”
    “Wisdom is it, grasshopper?”
    I made a face he couldn’t see. “Do not ever call me grasshopper again.”
    He laughed out loud. “Never again, if you promise not to renege on me. Should I pick you up at the campus again?”
    “Please. That would be awesome.”
    “No, awesome is knowing I get to set you free from your gilded cage.”
    “I’m not in a gilded cage. I love my father and respect him, but I’m not a prisoner.”
    “Tell me that after you tell him you won’t be at the dojo, and he’s really pissed off.”
    * * * *
    If Shiro had guessed my father wasn’t going to take the news well when I told him I wouldn’t be at the dojo at all, he would have only gotten it half right. If he’d have said livid, or furious, he might have been closer, but the part about feeling like a prisoner, he was 100 percent on target; but then, how else could I feel when my father screamed, “If you aren’t going to be at the dojo, don’t come home at all.”
    Really? It was only one night, and he had to pull out the big threat?
    Shiro sensed my mood as soon as I climbed into his Jeep, but didn’t push for details. He just let me simmer in silence beside him. By the time we arrived at the center, I was still irritated, still trapped by my own thoughts, but for the life of me couldn’t have identified who I was mad at. Myself, for failing my father. Or my father, for failing me.
    * * * *
    “Ready, Stephanie?” he asked, and I nodded, not willing to acknowledge I was shaking, or terrified, or self-conscious. I hadn’t realized there would be a crowd—technically students, but still. I never considered he might use me as one of the subjects. I should have been clued in when he handed me a spaghetti-strapped black unitard and said, “This one should fit,” and didn’t seem at all sexually or romantically interested in helping me out of my clothes and into the leotard.
    I went into the main salon with him and only then realized. Seeing how many people had shown up for the night’s demonstration, I balked. Oh shit . I turned into his chest and whispered, “I don’t think I can do this.”
    “You’ll be fine,” he said, kissing me on top of my head. I met his gaze, and he did that thing he was so able to do: making me feel like I was the only one in the room, the only woman in the world.
    My hair was in a long ponytail, and he drew his hand down the length of it, stretching it out, pulling it to make me look up at him. “Think of this as your opportunity to allow yourself to see that the cage door has always been open, and you just needed to be brave enough to fly through it. The life ahead of you is full of opportunity. Maybe that future includes karate; maybe it includes shibari. Both are sacred journeys; both are honorable paths.