| MAIN | ABOUT | GALLERY | SLAMBOOK |
you and i do not get along, and that's okay.
i have been furious at you for the past two days. i have imagined every way i could make your life a living hell and luxuriated in the feeling of power those thoughts gave me. but i know i will not act on them (at least not the ones that would leave a lasting scar) because it is not worth my time, just as i have always known you were not worth my time.
the first thing we bonded over was trashtalking someone. this should have been the first red flag. you know how to find commonalities with people, and when you can't, you know when to make them up. you told me how you knew he was weird, how his vibe was off. funny now knowing all the things you two had in common. maybe that was when you started distrusting me; when you knew i hated people who behave like you do.
later that night you behaved like him. two hours into knowing me you probed about my sex life while we were alone in the car. we met because you were to be my manager. your overfamiliarity confused me. you were one of the first people i began hanging out with at college, and you were in a position of authority. (do you see it that way? with all of the super-senior jokes you make, it's hard to imagine you don't.) i did not answer you and i attempted to move the conversation forward. you told me all the things you like done to you in graphic, unwanted detail. if you were a man, would the other boy in the car have been as uncomfortable as i was? would he have answered you how he did?
i didn't know what to make of you but i knew you made my stomach churn. every time i was with you you'd bring it up. you'd tell me how you were fucked the night before and how it wasn't as violent as you wanted it. i didn't know why you told me these things, not the way that i do now. you told us all there was no such thing as oversharing with you, but never asked if we felt the same. it's almost antithetical how disarming that can be, how someone sharing their secrets so openly can make you feel okay sharing yours. i shouldn't have fallen for it, but i thought maybe the feeling in my stomach was a knot i could untie by loosening up. i shared with you the same things you shared with me, assuming reciprocity would strengthen my relationship with you and ensure my spot at the radio station. i told you that on halloween my close friend and i had gotten black-out drunk and slept together. you asked me for more details, ones i did not share out of respect to myself and my friend. you did not like when i didn't answer you fully.
it got worse from there. eventually i had to tell you about my ptsd, that that was why i couldn't talk about these things. that was honest; you had brought me to the point of tears multiple times when you described your sex life to me, even after i told you i didn't want to hear it. we were in the station, you, the general manager behind the station desk, and us, freshmen trainees, on the couch across from you. when the microphones were muted between songs you talked about the things i told you i couldn't hear. i couldn't help it when i left the room in tears. it happened more times beyond that. you know what ptsd feels like. why did you keep doing that to me?
still i tolerated you. you were my connection to the other students at the radio, the first place on campus that i had felt i belonged in. the walls of the station were covered in stickers and there was a room filled ceiling to floor with cds. i felt like a kid in a candy shop. i didn't want to let you ruin my fun.
when i threw a party at my house, you got to know the friend i had slept with on halloween. you sunk your teeth into her then. i tried to be naive and assume they were love bites, but i felt even then that you were carnivorous. she became your favorite person. you told her how much you love my little pony and driving with the heat on and the windows open. though i do assume you just exaggerated the former, i know that you fabricated the latter. you heard her say that and you parroted it to her. you know exactly how to use reciprocity to get what you want.
she didn't know that you knew we had slept together. not yet. why did you choose to tell her the night that you and her first hooked up? by this point i hated you. i loathed to be around you. i watched you tell her how much you loved her. i watched you laugh behind her back. but still i couldn't say anything. you were the link. did everyone love you as much as we all had to pretend to?
by february the knot in my stomach had gotten so taught that it was hard to breathe. i couldn't convince myself that your intentions were pure anymore. i heard your voice in my head telling everyone my secrets. i heard them laughing the way they did when you told a room full of people that your best friend had a vomit kink. (why did you do that?) at this time, i didn't know that you had shared your partner, my friend's, nudes with a mutual friend of ours. you showed my girlfriend a graphic picture of you giving a blowjob because you thought you looked hot in it. knowing what i know about you now, the way you probe and seek reciprocity, i wonder what you were trying to get in return. she told you that we sometimes took pictures too. you knew i wouldn't want you knowing this, and i think you reveled in that thought. later you blackmailed her. you told her that it was wrong of her to have told me what you shared, that i would be furious with her if i knew what she told you. i know now that you probed your partner, my friend, in this way about me too. i know you know more about my sex life than i ever wanted to tell you, so much beyond the boundaries i told you to stop trying to cross with me.
let me say it now in case it's not clear: i am not mad at them because i see straight through you. you are the pressure that squeezes secrets out of people. you are the cat that plays a mouse until it plays dead. i did not play dead with you, so you moved on to people who would. i don't blame prey for the predators actions. and besides, i am not ashamed of the person i am. i don't know if you can say the same. if i were you, i certainly would be.
your ex, my friend, broke up with you when she found out you shared her nudes. finding out that you had been telling anyone who would listen intimate details about your sex life was just insult to injury for her. you pretended not to care. you said it wasn't a big deal. you lamented that she wasn't "listening to your side." you seemed so much more upset at the thought of being kicked out of her band. knowing you, i'm not surprised. what's the loss of one person who really trusts you, who really cares and loves you and would do anything for you, over potential fans? she tried to get back together with you after that, exactly as you told everyone she would. you told her to trust her gut, to not listen to me. i told her to trust her gut, which was telling her that you were bad news.
i was so relieved to have never had to deal with you again, but god you know exactly how to push people's buttons. you are good at what you do. you are good at getting attention because you are desperate enough to do whatever it takes. you don't have a stable enough sense of worth to just be yourself, so you'll be whoever it takes to be liked by whoever will give you attention. you started fucking my friend's ex-best-friend. the one that my friend had lived with for a year. the one that my friend was still torn up about losing. the one i watched you cut from a concert lineup because you knew he was 20 years old dming 15 year old girls. i looked at your spotify recently. your new playlist "FALL WITH COOL FRIENDS" features a lot of title fight. your second most recent playlist is titled something about drunk driving. i used to be friends with him too, and i know that you are both similar levels of pathetically desperate. i see you molding yourself to be the girl he wants. do you not like my little pony anymore? did you ever drive with the heat on and the windows open?
you have us blocked on everything now. you won't respond to my friend, your recent ex's, messages. i assume you are trying to make her look evil in your mind, that you're doing this because she deserves it. i know you are ill, but i have trouble believing that you believe that. hurt people hurt people, and you must be torn up inside to do something like this.
you make yourself seem like such an open book, but you try to ruin the lives of people who find out who you really are. things that are intimate secrets to most people are fodder for you, pieces of information to barter for dirt. instead of an understanding of intimacy, you seem scared of sincerity. when you accidentally reveal who you really are, and get called out for it, you scramble to forget it ever happened. i don't think it's working very well. you seem scared of the person you really are. i think you distance yourself from her like most other people do.
we don't get along, and that's okay. i hated you from the time i met you, but now i just pity you. i don't even think you find yourself worth your time.