"...sorry, can you rephrase the question -"

"He doesn't mind some Eclipse things but he minds, like, the idea that they'd be okay even if they weren't what you wanted. Like, if I grab you and drag you into bed, that is okay, because you would think it was nice, and it wouldn't be okay if you found it scary or upsetting and just endured it because you loved me."

"Is that a question?"

"I'm trying to get to the question - he makes sense to me - so that's how we see it. That's not how you see it, right?"

"Yeah, that sounds really complicated. If you grabbed me and dragged me off to bed - is this conversation going to have a lot of examples like that and if it does can it end with one of them? - then that would be nice? And if it weren't nice then... it... wouldn't be?"

"But you wouldn't, like, say 'Michael, stop that, I don't like it."

"...I might say ow if you pulled my hair or something? I think you can tell when I'm having fun all by yourself."

He shakes his head. "You make so much sense when I'm talking to you and then..." Sigh. Kiss.

Kiss! "Am I confusing as soon as I leave the room?"

"You are confusing as soon as I am trying to talk to my alt about whether he should be scared of hurting you. I don't think he should? But I see why he is."

"It's not like it's literally impossible but that seems like an unreasonable standard."

"That's not exactly the standard it's that - it would be extra bad to hurt someone who felt like they just had to accept that and get used to it and not fuss about it. And since you can't bring the chance of hurting someone down to nothing it's tempting to try to change the thing that makes it extra bad."

"...why is that extra bad?"

"I don't know, it just is, it's, like, kicking a shivering puppy or something. Kicking dogs is bad but kicking shivering puppies is worse."

"Iiiiis there some reason he can't just be like, 'so was that fun', if he isn't sure if it was fun? Or, like, the Eclipse version, whatever that is, like, 'I command you to tell me how fun that was or else'."

"He can read minds, if she's okay with that. The thing is that it's less fun if she doesn't feel like she has a choice even if she's okay with what's happening?"

"...that doesn't make any sense but if mindreading helps I bet she's into it."

He reports this.

"How does that not make sense, I think that makes perfect sense."

"It's - too many levels. It's great to care if she's happy. It's not helpful to care whether she believes herself to be entitled to be happy, that's confusing and it's not clear what you want her to do and now she's not happy, get it?"

"No!"

Shrug. Giggle.

He goes back to Eclipse and reads more Eclipse things.

Eclipse has many things. In the modern day they have catlogued a truly staggering variety of subtleties of dynamic and kink. In the 1800s there was less of that, although still plenty of range between "kneeling, occasional spanking, husbandly permission required for major decisions" and "wife not allowed to speak to strangers or eat anything not handfed to her and sleeps in a locked box and is well acquainted with various medieval torture devices".

He hopes Rebecca is not into medieval torture devices.