Shadowed Soul by John Spagnoli

these women were not enjoying captivity.  Why did I find release in this fulsome subculture when I had never before required such an extreme in order to feel free of my own emotional bondage? Logically part of me understood that many of the shots were hired models and the look of fear in their eyes was a paid act.  Maybe at break time while they picked out their next erotic outfit, they laughed hysterically with the cameraman who praised them for having really nailed the look .  But there were some sites that contained images that could have been real, ones in which no fancy buffed leather or glittery rhinestone collars were worn, ones in which girls too young to choose a profession were bound in filthy basements or cement slab warehouses where no one could hear their cries.  Faces from a milk carton:  It rankled that these were possibly real victims of inhuman men whose car trunks were stuffed with hemp and gags in burlap sacks.  In my depraved state, the idea of extreme helplessness eroticized it for me more so than the work-for-hire bling.
    I had to be at work in a few hours.  Going to bed now would be worse than having no sleep at all.  I consigned all the shots to my trash bin then made coffee.  Sunrise caressed the cityscape as I sipped, staring out to marvel at the hunkered magnificence of New York City.  For some it would be a day of joy, light and promotions but for many others it would be a painful plod till sleep erased their pointless existence.  Life was not easy for most people.  In my depressed state, it seemed to me humanity collectively existed to suffer through vast wastelands.  Impenetrable obstacles blocked everyone.  How did anything get built?  How did any system manage to work?  Somehow the subways ran and the light switch brought light. There were only a few wily individuals who somehow got beyond the wasteland; they controlled the systems; they were the happy ones.  Since the onset of my condition, I believed I was destined to remain in my isolated tundra, struggling against unfathomed obstacles.  Had it not been for Beth and Bailey I would surely have allowed myself to lapse into a continuous series of emotional implosions and eventual death.  I knew that there were those, like my mother, who saw depression as a weakness in character and spirit.  Judgmental at best, they had little compassion for those who were under the grip of a Shadowed Soul.  To me, cheer up and pull yourself together! was like an amputee hearing grow a limb already!   Apart from being insulting, this lack of comprehension further marginalized people like me.  This simplistic view of my stultifying illness left me feeling guilty and incompetent for not being able to deal with it alone.  My abandonment issues were further exacerbated by a society that flatly rejected me.  Set adrift from the norm, I found it impossible to convey fully how devoid of warmth my world felt.  Throughout history people have suffered with depression.  How did they manage?  I have the luxury to live in an era when the world is more connected than ever.  I can talk instantly to people all over the globe if I choose.  With that opening of the internet that allows me to share thoughts and ideas, it seems to me that the world has become even more isolated.  With the immediacy of technology, email, Facebook, texting, tweeting, IM and Skype, I would easily be judged as a freak by people in places that I have never and shall never visit.  The sporadic negativity that I felt at an early age now became viral, instant, and exponentially more painful.
    Manhattan grew brighter and bleaker through my grubby kitchen window as I choked down a second cup of coffee.  I wished I could remove myself and my few loved ones from this confounding algorithm that chronically equalled hardship.  Assailed by a kinetoscope of women in bondage, longing for escape, begging for rescue, and I felt again like a bastard.  As I placed my cup in the sink