Saturday 23 February 2013

Brash tacks.

Civilization is the lamb's skin in which barbarism masquerades.
                               
                                         ~Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Batman is all apologies, no growl. He sipped his coffee and listened to me prattle on for an hour this morning over breakfast and then he finally looked at his watch, rolled his eyes and said he had a few things he had to say before he took me home.

He signaled for some more coffee and I drank it while he talked and then he looked at his watch again and swore in its face, saying he needed more time that he didn't have. We walked out under the grey paintings and the glass, the rainy lavender-charcoal colours muted in the clouds, the whole room giving off a vibe of austerity and severity and cold. I hate it but he likes the discretion he is afforded in a meal, content to leave the servers on the sidelines completely until he signals.

I wanted to take out my sketchbook and draw the orchids, draw the rainclouds, draw the silver service but he does not appreciate drawing implements at the table. He believes meals are conversation times and nothing more. Not sustenance, because he hardly eats either, and not habit because once he called me at four in the morning asking me if I wanted to go for lunch with him and seemed surprised when I corrected him to ask him if he meant breakfast.

He didn't. He hadn't eaten dinner yet and so it was obviously lunch time.

Oh, I see.

He is feeling very incredibly surprised that I have had such a profound effect on him. I'm not. Not anymore. Maybe I'm older and wiser or maybe just dumber but I truly think half of the effect they pin on me is their own competitive streaks running through them at breakneck pace. Fight or flight. Win or lose. Get the girl. Be the man. Win the war. Whatever. I don't think I have testosterone running through me or maybe I do but not in the same concentrations because I don't think there's any winning here, just a lot of trouble most would love to forget.

Except that they can't.

And so moments happen like last week when Batman asked for his own...arrangement, because maybe he deserves something for being there, for helping out with resources Caleb could only dream of. Because Batman is rich and bored and used to getting what he wants.

Except that with a girl like me, what he expects he will get and what I can actually offer are not the same thing. I may be submissive but I will not bend to your charms based on bottom lines or net worth. I can't be wooed with diamonds or trips or simple charm. I can't be explained.

He is learning that the hard way. I stood in his suites a week ago while he stood at the other end of the room assuming the fact that he had taken off his shirt and asked would be enough to sway my loyalties.

It was not enough.

Standalone, physically, it would have been enough. He is lovely. So lovely I would change my mind if it weren't already made up like a bed at a hotel with new guests for the night. We already danced this dance. I can't take it any further than where we brought it back to years ago and it makes me sad that he sees what everyone sees suddenly when they look at me.

Someone to fight over. Someone to take advantage of. Something to save.

But I only live for love now and I don't love him.

And so tonight I took the bourbon outside and the bitters too and I made Old Fashioneds with Duncan, on the freezing cold patio, and we toasted to the lovesick with desperate hearts, to favors with payback implied and then he asked how he was supposed to blame any man who looked at me and didn't instantly fall in love. I threw my drink into the grass and told him because people should have standards, and I am at the bottom of any conventional list of those. He drunkenly shook his head and grinned and pointed at the sky, telling me I could probably have the moon if I just asked for it.

I asked him about the concept of love for love's sake, without expecting anything except love in return.

That's a myth, Bridget. Someone always wants something. 

I don't want anything back. And I won't trade what I have for anything more than what I need. I just want to be loved.

Then you're the myth. How does that feel?

What great problem do I explain?

Why some people can live on love and others set out to destroy it. 

Really?

Yes. And now I need one of those drinks because I'm depressing myself. 

You know what you need?

A drink. Jesus, Bridget, don't you say anything else or you'll just wind up hating me too. 

I passed him one of the four that I made and watched him drink it in one gulp. He put the glass back on the line and told me I was unequivocally and utterly doomed.

I know, I nodded and drank a drink as fast as he did. I've actually heard that before.