“Who unhooked my bra last night?”
6:47 a.m. The bedroom still dark. Amid memories scattered like shards of glass, Sujin opened her eyes without knowing whose hand had first cupped her breast. Her lingerie lay crumpled on the nightstand, one set of gel nails completely torn off. A thick perfume mingled with an unfamiliar body scent.
The Moment We Lower Our Heads
Why did I offer myself up again? Or can I even call it an offering?
For the past three weeks, Sujin had attended the Chohonje every Friday night—an underground rite held in the company’s sub-basement. Alcohol, music, and bodies whose boundaries blurred in the dark. No one knew who started it; when the ritual ended, everyone bowed their heads. The bow was submission, a self-hypnosis: For this moment alone, I may forget myself.
At the same time, it was rapture—letting another take you entirely. Sang-woo always entered with eyes closed. “It becomes sharper that way,” he said. Darkness first answered with fingertips. Ji-na arrived wordlessly, a bottle of wine in hand, and slipped out first when the rite was done.
The Smell of a Cold Parking Garage
“You felt it too. That night.” Ji-na thought back to what had happened the month before. Early this year, at her cousin’s funeral, someone dragged her to a drinking vigil called a memorial rite. In the funeral hall’s underground parking garage, where silence lingered after the body had departed, someone took her hand. The cold concrete stung her nose, fluorescent lights flickered, and distant music vibrated against the ceiling.
She still remembers the warmth left in her palm. When the stranger guided her wrist to his chest, she did not resist. The touch was so gentle it brought tears.
“Do you remember how he touched you?”
“I don’t. I just sensed that my body was needed.”
Since that day, I can’t explain why I want to return.
Why Do We Choose to Abandon Our Bodies?
Conscious surrender becomes, at some point, another name for desire. We long to be voluntary slaves. The intoxication of Right now I may forget myself differs from the small obedience of buying lunch for a boss. It is total dimensional kneeling.
Psychologist Robert Kaiser calls this reversing. We live as the dominated, then—in a single moment—indulge in being deliberately dominated.
Returning Home with Empty Hands
Sujin checked the phone on her nightstand. At 3:22 a.m. a voice message from an unknown number:
“Sujin, are you okay? You were smiling, so I just watched. See you tomorrow.”
She did not know who sent it or what it meant. Only this was certain: this morning she had reclaimed her body, and that body felt devastatingly hollow.
Into whose hands do you wish to place your body right now? Or do you truly know who wants it?