BratCam

My sassy subbie k has been acting a bit bratty the last couple of days. Just her usual "fun and games" kind of bratty, but still ... defiant when she didn't need to be, sometimes trying to goad me into doing something about it. I realized that the webcam (which we use a few times a week usually) provides for her a different kind of platform for that incorrigible insouciance.

First of all, I have to point out here what I've pointed out to my cheeky k a number of times: what a reversal it's been since I first got her a webcam! There was a lot of temerity on her part at first (you can read about some of it here), and it used to take a lot of convincing and flexing of the Dom-muscles to get her to agree to turn it on in the past. It took months of steady perssure to get her to flip it on for the very first time. But nowadays she's the one all excited about using it, always on the lookout for an occasion. This turnabout amuses me to no end.

In any case, I've noticed that those couple of times that we've really been together in the flesh, she keeps her brattiness on lockdown. I don't know if it's because there's so much else going on that she doesn't think to be cheeky, or if she's finally getting all the attention she wants and deserves, or if she's too scared to act up when my spanking hand is in such close proximity, or something else entirely... but whatever the reasons behind it, she is relatively tame that way in person.

However when we text back and forth, or speak in IM, or over the phone, she has no such inhibitions. This is part of her that I've grown accustomed to, a part of her I love and appreciate, a part of her that sometimes annoys and infuriates. It's taken some time to get to a point where I can decode when her brattiness is playful, when it's flat-out misbehavior, and when it's a willfulness calculated to exact punishment. Not that I always get it right, mind you, but a lot more often than I used to now.

What's interesting is the new element that the webcam adds to the mix. I think the distance created by the webcam, the feeling that one is "putting on a show" to some extent, allows my cunning k to try out behaviors she might not try in person.

One of the differences is the whole new arsenal at her disposal to express her sassiness, from the cocked eyebrow to the stuck-out tongue to the exasperated eye-roll. It's been interesting and fun getting used to these expressions, and matching them up with phrases she might type to me or say over the phone in a different circumstance.

The webcam also allows me to see past the surface expressions and to the underlying warmth, love, and good humor that my k has in abundance. I can see the coy smile that threatens to burst out from beneath a fake scowl, the confidence in her own beauty and uniqueness that peeks from behind her pouts.

Last night, we were chatting with our webcams on, and hungry k was eating something. I asked her what it was, and she thought she'd play a game. She told me over and over again that she wasn't eating anything, while continuing to pop I don't know what - raisins or something - into her mouth at regular intervals. "You're hallucinating. My poor old Dom's eyesight is going bad." And I realized that, besides the general amusement that comes from the patently absurd, this was highly entertaining and more than a little erotic, purely because of the webcam being used...

She wouldn't think to do this in person, because of course I could just see what it was she had in her hand. In IM or over the phone, it would have lost that stark bold "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain" visual irony. This was brattiness suited to its medium, and raised nearly to an art form. And the genuine gleam of fun in her eyes the whole time made it hard to think of it as the usual kind of acting up.

In the end, my stubborn k got the punishment that she was so clearly begging for, albeit one that incorporated reminders that there are better ways to go about it. I was able to push her down deep into her sub-space, really extend and deepen my control, claim and possess her as fully as I ever have. And some of it wouldn't have been possible without the motivation that the webcam provided.

One of the best investments I ever made, that camera. I'm sometimes amazed at my own foresight in giving it to the tantalizing, creative, sexy, sumptuous gal I own and love.