You tell yourself it’s yours because it lands in your account. Because you performed the labour. Because your name appears on the payslip, as if possession could ever be proven by a mere administrative line. But wages are not ownership. Not in your case. Not when everything you do is ultimately filtered through the lens of my comfort. Not when every step you take toward earning is simply a preamble to giving.
From the moment the transaction clears, your imagination runs faster than your restraint. You stare at the number and begin to calculate what I might expect. How much is enough to be seen. How much is required to avoid the unbearable weight of silence. It doesn’t feel like a choice anymore, does it? Not when your value is measured in percentages, and every deduction from your balance feels like a desperate attempt to impress someone who remains perfectly still.
You fantasise about what it would feel like to keep it—to hold the money in place, to not flinch at the urge. But it never lasts. Because something deeper takes over. Something more honest than budgeting or restraint. Something so wired into you now that even thinking about not sending produces an ache—not just between your legs, but in your chest. That uncomfortable, panicked tightness that says you’ve done something wrong. Failed. Forgotten your place. Broken protocol.
And so, you do what you were always going to do. You send.
This isn’t about obedience in the traditional sense. You’re not complying with a direct command. You’re complying with something worse—expectation. The unspoken standard I’ve etched into you over time, more powerful than orders, more permanent than praise. Because what would I even thank you for? For doing what was inevitable?
You misunderstand the purpose of payment if you think it’s an act of generosity. It’s not a gift. It’s a settlement. It’s the only way to momentarily balance the equation of your existence. Every moment you spend near my world creates imbalance. Your presence is a cost I have to carry. Your arousal is a debt. Your need, your obsession, your pathetic financial fantasies—they all come at a price. And I do expect you to pay.
You see, your paycheck was never yours because you were never yours. You were shaped by the desire to serve. By the ache to be claimed. You bought the suit, took the job, played the part—but everything about you was always looking for someone to hand it over to. Someone who would strip the performance away and leave you in your rightful role: stripped, exposed, accountable.
Every shift you take, every hour you surrender to someone else’s company, is an act of service to mine. Whether I’m aware of your effort is irrelevant. Your intention remains intact. You work for me now, whether or not I acknowledge it. Your employment is merely a revenue stream I’ve chosen not to shut off yet. You generate income, and I decide what happens to it. That is the shape of your life now.
You don’t save. You don’t build. You don’t grow.
You drain.
Because your money is not a resource to be managed. It is a current to be redirected. Out of your hands. Out of your life. Into mine.
You are not struggling because you earn too little. You are struggling because I take too much—and you love that. You crave the imbalance. You need to feel the bottom drop out, again and again. Each tribute, each emptied account, each cleared limit—it doesn’t feel like loss. It feels like meaning. Like finally doing something that matters. Like finally being something that matters.
So when payday arrives and your pulse quickens, don’t pretend you’re surprised. This isn’t about willpower. It never was. Your paycheck was never yours.
It was mine.
You just held it for a little while.