amicustenebris | Duplicity

[ this response comes more slowly and carefully than his previous few. ]

I don't think anyone you care for could, or should, fault you for doing what you must to survive and to maintain a certain level of comfort. None of us chose to be here, but here we are, and there doesn't seem to be any particularly reliable way of leaving. There is no need to suffer out of an attempt at martyring yourself.

And yet simply choosing for it not to matter does not seem to work.

Unfortunately, no. I'm sorry, I wish I knew what to say.

You don't have to say anything; it's not as though it is your fault I don't operate like so many others here seemingly do. I can't simply look at a person and want them, and I would be immediately skeptical of anyone that did the same to me.

[ his fingers move faster than his brain: ]

It's called being a slut.

[ and then it is IMMEDIATELY followed by his next text ]

That was a dig at myself, not anyone else, and not meant at all to be disparaging!!

[ and then a third ]

By which I mean, I sleep around a lot, and I enjoy it, and I am well aware that there are others who both do as well and don't at all. I'm lucky, I think, in that I do enjoy the pleasures of the flesh--it makes the stay here much easier. But I had recently also finally been able to have my partner accept our relationship, and had been happily monogamous before being dragged here. It's frustrating.

It's not a moral judgment on my part. Whether someone is attractive or not doesn't really...become a question, if I don't care about them in some way. There's no issue of lust overcoming loyalty. I do not have one without the other.

I am also just very accustomed to not being that for anyone else. Pipe dreams notwithstanding, if the problem lies with me, I can deal with it. All I have to do is take care of whomever I am with.

There are words for that now, I've learned. Attraction to a person only after having formed an emotional connection. I don't pretend I know and understand it all, but it's nice, I think. To have that.

Perhaps it's even the one they used on the advertisement, not that I'm keen to trust them.

But all this to say: Your professed interest is flattering, though I do not understand it, and not understanding makes it easier to assume it's a lie rather than anything genuine. I know the fault there lies with me. I am not especially experienced in any of this beyond what I have already seen here.

I was married once a very long time ago. Largely unhappily. Therein lies the bulk of my understanding. Of everything involved here. I genuinely cannot comprehend your consideration. But that is not necessarily a rejection.

May I propose the possibility of friendship instead, then? No strings attached. And I will do my best to explain myself, if you so wish. I don't mean to cause any discomfort, and will refrain from flirting unless you make it clear it would be welcome.

That all sounds fine.

I'm going to be nosy again...

As I said before, I have no issue with letting people know when I have had enough.

Just let me know. I was wondering if you'd be willing to talk about your marriage? You said it was unhappy.

What do you want to know?

Well... Why you got married at all, to start.

Because I was in love, and I wanted to have a family.

[ And I believed she loved me. ]

Ah. It didn't start unhappy, at least.

Not to my recollection.

That's good. I'm happy for that, at least. Did you get the family you hoped for?

We had a son. It did not last a good deal longer after that.

Were you able to maintain a relationship with him?

He died shortly before I came here. I would rather not discuss him.

[ Oh, that hurts. He remembers when he nearly lost-- And Johnny neatly turns his musings away from that thought before it fully forms. ]

My sympathies. What about your wife, then? Or, ah... Ex-wife?

She left when he was about four years old.

You raised him on your own? Impressive. Boys are impulsive.

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