The Island

"Master and Mistress, they were there in ways that Mom wasn't."

"If you found out about Elie later?"

"I do not know. I do not think I could ever call Elie and Kia Mom and Mom."

"Do you want to have a relationship with Elie and Kia?"

"Kia is OK, she is stable. I just have a hard time with Elie being a hard ass one minute and a friend the next. I do not know how to approach her."

"Would it be easier for you for a court to annul your adoption?"

"It would crush Elie.'

"I am talking to you Goldie not Elie."

"I do not know, it would peel the parent label off and that does seem to be a stumbling block."

"Do you like living with Lance and Emma?"

"Emma is my best friend. Lance is gone most of the time."

"The thing is Dad the way things would have to change with Elie would be so radical. I would have to change my entire life. That would probably give me a breakdown. By going back to Stephi I would lose my last vestige of Master and Mistress. They are the ones that know me best."

"So let me see if I can sum up some of the points you made: 1) as an adult you want to be treated with respect just like others would want to be treated with respect from you. 2) Whether you are Stephi or Goldie you want to live with Master and Mistress because they cared for you in ways Mom did not and you are prepared to live by their rules."

"3) You would like a court to annul your adoption so you will be treated as friend by Elie and Kia, not as a daughter. 4) You want to continue your relationship with Emma even if you are living with your Master and Mistress. 5) You have never had a relationship with Elie and you may even feel uncomfortable holding her hand."

"6) You find it hard to approach Elie because you do not know what personality you will be dealing with at any given time. 7) If you snub Elie you feel like the Island community will continue to treat you as an outcast so you will have to leave to escape that oppression."

"I can see you accomplishing many of these points by moving off the island. However, if you move off the Island your relationship with Emma would be broken or changed. Confidences are spontaneous and shared not scheduled on a preplanned phone call. You cannot celebrate in her joys, help her with her sorrows or just be together in everyday life if you are not here. She will find someone else to fill that role."

"Who would that be Dad?"

"Does it really matter? It would not be you. I think it would most likely be Grace as she is so easy to talk to. If you want to keep that relationship the first step I would take would be to talk to Kia. She probably would accept many of your points but you will have to accept her points as well. You can start out by testing out your hand holding idea and progressing from there."

"Now let's assume you keep your name as Goldie, 1) you get your adoption annulled, so you get rid of that parent stumbling block. 2) You could stay with Emma in your current role. 3) You have a meeting of the minds with Kia which means you start to have a friend-friend relationship with bonding time with both Elie and Kia.

"4) That would include doing more intimate things with Elie to pull her off the brink. 5) As that relationship grows, the easier it will be to be with Elie. 6) The Island would not treat you like an outcast. 7) You could make it known you want to be treated with much more respect than you have been so far."

"All Kia is concerned about right now is Elie, she will do just about anything to help her friend. You more than anyone else. That 'Do Not Disturb' sign does not apply to you, she will welcome you with arms held wide open to just talk to you once. Love is not gained overnight, it is a long process and sometimes it is never achieved. If you never make an attempt you will never achieve it. Perhaps you have been hurt so much you do not want to achieve it. Does that help you at all?"

"It does clarify a lot and I seem to get major points rectified. I guess I can work on some of Kia's conditions if she is willing to work on mine. Dad, we never had this discussion, do you understand?" Albert nodded and walked away.

Goldie headed to Kia's house. She knocked on the door lightly.

Kia annoyed "Go away, can't you read?"

Kia. "It is me, Goldie." Kia raced to the door, opened it and engulfed Goldie in a hug. "Kia I came here to bargain with you, if you are willing. This has been very hard on me so I would like to go first and then I will promise I will listen to yours."

"I will hear you out Goldie."

"I want to be treated with respect; I am an adult not a child. What was proposed to me was all one sided weighted on Elie's side. Hard and fast rules. Take it or leave it. If the rules are not closer to 50-50 I will leave it. The three of us will have to leave the Island, my relationship with Emma will be broken and only the Lord will know what will happen to Elie."

"1) I want my adoption annulled, so we can just be friends, none of this Mistress crap. 2) I have accepted a live-in position with Lance and Emma. I propose a friendship level bond. 3) My name is Goldie not Stephi and I will not re-arrange my life to suit you. 4) I cannot be friends with Elie if I do not know if she is going to be a hard ass or a friend. The hard ass has to go. 5) I am willing to start being with Elie and you more, it might only start out with hand holding but that can get deeper. I cannot say I love either of you but we can work on that."

"Thank you Goldie, first thank you for having the courage to talk to me. We have treated you very unfairly and perhaps we did not even afford you the respect we would afford a stranger."

"I think getting your adoption annulled would be a start. Perhaps at this point in her life we should just call her Elie."

"I can ask her to focus on her caring side rather than her domineering side. I would like you to think about spending as much time as you feel comfortable with to help with Elie's therapy. My friend is very frail at the moment, so I want as much healing time as I can get."

"Perhaps we can hammer out more items later. Right now my focus is totally on Elie. Perhaps we can make lists and when we each have at least have ten items on it we can say I will concede to this if you concede to that. The ones unresolved we can just leave on the lists for a later time."

"I think I can deal with that. I will afford you one warning about domination then all bets are off. I will not be taken lightly, you must keep your word to what you have agreed to."

After dinner Kia made an announcement. "Goldie has agreed to make some limited changes with Elie."

"Before I start, I want to ask a few questions of you, "In the last six months how many people called her Goldie?" No hands were raised, "What about being her friend?" No hands were raised. "How many of us dumped all our shit right on her and never helped her? We just let her try to sort it out herself and if it was too much for her we were more than ready to condemn her?" All hands' were raised

"Elie is my meaning for life right now. I realize I have failed as a friend to Goldie, a friend does not treat their friends with condemnation and offer no help when they see them hurting. I am going to expand on what we talked about."

"First, we have been treating Goldie like crap. Even when we wanted to help Elie all we gave her was an ultimatum. Personally, looking back on it makes me ill. What is the matter with us people? What has she done that makes us give her no respect at all?"

"If we give our word to her we must keep it, we can't blow her off. Do not agree to something you have no intention of keeping. As of this moment, this is a BDSM free zone. All benches, whips, crosses etc. will be taken off the island. Only small personal items are exempt."

"No more beating the crap out of someone because you disagree with him. GOLDIE, that is what she wants to be called, is willing to help Elie become whole but it will be a long process. If the community rejects these ideas Elie and I will leave the island. If an individual cannot agree to the terms you need to talk to us to make a concession or leave. Elie is important to me so I am going to do everything in my power to help her. I will be at home, with Elie and Goldie, to await your decision."

It was a lot to throw at people but it had to be done. When people looked at how they treated Goldie they all were shame-faced. It was inexcusable. What did Stephi have to do with this? Pi could not look anyone in the eye. "It was Stephi had to do this, and Stephi had to do that. No wonder she likes the horses better than the people."

Loui and Marie met in the church with the scouts. They could care less what Kia said, it was all about how they treated Goldie. They realized exactly how poorly they treated her, not even calling her by the name she wanted to be called by. They were blind to it.

"Would they treat others the same? Would they want others to treat them the same? Could they tend to the houses of worship knowing they have violated basic tenets of their faiths? With tears flowing and promises to keep in touch, most of which will be broken, every scout to a person including Marie and Loui decided to leave the Island.

What kept the Island afloat was unity of spirit, what they had was unity of division. Lance and Emma and Loui and Marie arrived at Kia's house at the same time, Lance and Emma let Loui and Marie go first as they represented more people.

Kia had expected just a summary report from Albert not unit by unit. Kia was stunned.

Loui summed up the scouts vote, they all voted to leave, not because of they did not want to obey Kia's rules. But because they violated their core principals. Each scout wanted to apologize to Goldie, with the sincere hope that she would accept the apology, they had wounded her badly.

Elie was still praying in the corner as the apologies were said and forgiven. No one was noticing what was happening to Elie.

Lance and Emma had come to the same conclusion. They have asked forgiveness. Tears were flowing, like a river now. Kia was going to get some tissues but decided these tears were cathartic.

Of everyone on the whole Island there was just two people who were always respectful of Goldie, little Davey and Mia. When Albert and Vicki heard that it drove a stake through their hearts.

Davey and Mia both nodded their heads. Mia said, "There must be something that we need to apologize to you about. We are here to apologize to you about that, whatever it is."

Goldie thought about it and thought that is probably true. Goldie said "I accept your apology under the condition that you accept my apology for forgetting what you needed to apologize to me about." Since none of them could think of what they had to apologize for but knew they must Davey said "Deal", Goldie was enveloped in a three way group hug.

James and Pi were the very last. The two most important apologies on the Island as far as Elie was concerned. These two had the deepest of condolences.

All the while going unnoticed, Elie was changing. It was all about reclamation and redemption with Elie. It was all about Goldie, the name did not matter to her. It had nothing to do with what Goldie had to do. It had everything to do with how people treated Goldie and she needed sincere apologies from everyone. It was a shame someone had to tell them they needed to apologize, they should have figured it out themselves.

Elie walked over to Goldie, a completely different women, in a hug she said "I am deeply troubled about how I have treated you about our relationship and how I have treated you personally. It was thoughtless and inexcusable not to mention it was unacceptable in the extreme sense of the word. I have broken my sworn duty that I accepted from Mia. I have violated everything I hold dear."

Elie kneeled in front of Goldie. "I have wounded you to the extreme, more so than the others because I am your mother. I ask for forgiveness and mercy from you."

Goldie reached over to give Elie a hug of forgiveness. At that moment a vail of darkness was lifted off of Goldie and Elie. Both were completely healed. Elie looked back on her life, she was 41 now, and 17 years after Albert hired her. She will follow Kia for the rest of her days, special friends do that. The Island was no longer viable, it will sink into the sea without a trace, and the BDSM gear on the island will disappear with it into infinity.