We Can Pretend
Here we are again. In that all too familiar place. I have lost count of how many times I have found myself here. Despite my very best endeavours, my valiant intentions and earnest dedication I am stood in his hallway of despair. Some time ago this hallway was a welcoming place where polished tiles gleamed and marble pillars glinted. The air was filled with the scent of jasmine, bright sunlight pouring in through the glass dome high above. So many corridors and doorways led from this hallway, offering exciting and intriguing possibilities, new experiences and enthralling opportunities. I can still picture you when you had crossed the threshold, invited into my world and you stood open-mouthed impressed and amazed by the grandeur. With a typically generous and expansive sweep of my arm I offered you the free run of those corridors and rooms. You took full advantage of my generosity and why not? You were a very welcome and special addition.
Now look at us. Your failure has made this a cold and desolate place. The dome has suffered as a consequence of you frequent eruptions of frustrated anger, the once clear panes now either broken or smeared with the grime of your betrayal. The sun has not shone into this hallway for a long time, in fact, neither of us can remember when it last did so. The tall pillars are cracked and chipped, testament to your unwarranted assaults on our person as your forked tongue of criticism lashed out at us. The tiles are fractured and uneven causing you to regularly trip and fall to the floor, the cold slap of your downfall a stark reminder of the change that has gripped this place. You can hear the low moan of the wind as it billows, wuthering and gusting, seeking entrance through the broken windows and dilapidated shutters. That is the wind isn’t it or is it the tortured protestations of the shades and spectres which still haunt this hallway? Sometimes you see them, the forlorn figures which glide haplessly along the dirty passageways, heads bowed as they seem to be seeking something. Whenever you see them you feel a strange sense of familiarity and understanding with their plight even though you are unsure who they are. No doubt a consequence of the empathic traits which still cause you to remain here.
I let you walk these beautiful corridors. I allowed you to marvel at the statues, the ornaments which adorned the walls and alcoves, mesmerising you with their beauty. You felt loved, you felt content and you felt safe as you walked this place never needing or wanting to step back through the door that you once entered all that time ago.
Now you are sat on the icy floor, your hands clasped together and raised in a gesture of contrition and pleading. Your face is etched with wounding woe and the lines of desperation evidence your determination to remain. I brandish the heavy iron key that will unlock the dark door which looms over you and which will reveal the doorway to the cold, uncaring and harsh would beyond, a world you have no desire to return to. I hold the key as I stand over you watching you and although I hear your voice I cannot discern what you are saying. You struggle to your feet, weakness pulling at you as you pull down the sleeve of the tattered garment which you wear and you begin to rub at a nearby pillar. You spit on it and frantically try to remove the grime as if you are showing me that the damage can somehow be undone. You turn and look at me, hand still moving back forth and I see that eternal optimism in your eyes. That look which once looked like paradise to me and now only serves to reinforce your selfishness in wanting to remain here after everything you have done and everything you have not done as you let me down. Again. The distortion that has surrounded your voice and now I can hear you as you are pointing to the windows and the doors which hang from their hinges, holes smashed into them.
” This place was once so beautiful and you have let it fall into neglect, why have you done this? I just do not understand. I helped you keep it shining and in a pristine condition but then you just lost interest, you would not work with me anymore and it began to fall into decline. It was too much for me to maintain alone though heaven knows I tried, I really did. Not only did you not help me but you then started to hinder me, stopping me from carrying out my tasks, holding me back and diverting me.”
Why are you saying such things to me? Why are you seeking to pin the blame on me? Why are you trying to make me responsible for the demise of this once grand place? I shake my head and point the key at you, a clear signal of my intent. Your face twists and the tears start to form in your eyes. Perhaps they might fall into the now dry fountain and bring about restoration. Does such restoration hang from your sadness?
“Don’t make me leave, please I do not want this to end,” you plead, your eyes, which once shone with delight and joy, which are now glazed as your fear of abandonment starts to rise.
“This does not have to happen, ” you continue as you place a hand against my arm, ” let me stay, I only want us to be happy, to be as we once were. Surely we can do that? Our laughter once echoed through this place and it can again. We can repair the damage, it is not about who caused it, I can put that to one side, I just want us to be together and for us to rebuild what we once had. We did it once, I know we can again, let us join forces and re-create that wonderful time once more, let us admit sunshine and clean away the dirt and the hurt that seeks to envelope this place. We can fix the glass, mend the doors, scrub the floors and clean and tidy and make good. We can do it. I know we can. I can sense it deep inside you, I know it to be the case.”
Your words are impressive and burgeoning with hope. Perhaps it can be done but then you let us down and for that you must pay the price. That momentary consideration of allying with you and recovering what we once had is dispelled. We shake our head.
“It cannot be recovered. There is no hope to do so,” we say slowly.
A tear spills down your cheek and hovers on your chin as if unsure of where to go.
“Then let us at least pretend that we walk through gilded and fragrant halls once more. Please? We can pretend can’t we?”
Yes, we can pretend. It is all we ever do.
14 thoughts on “We Can Pretend”
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This was me so many times 😞 & I always felt he got a kick out of it but I thought I was imagining things bc surely people aren’t that way.
The nost painful part is to read these social media postings of kudos to him. How he is so full of life, loves life, the best heart, kind, funny, cool…
Who the fuck did I meet then? Cause I saw a psychotic, hate filled, angry, bitter ugly heart. Still can get wrap my head around that. He saved the ugly snake for me. The real deal, the real personality, just for me?!?
Ever the problem of being the primary source sarabella.
HG, I can’t be a primary source. We had no formal relationship. Never dated. Never married. No kids. Met only 3 times after 30 years and yet the hatred was off the charts when he let it out the night I left. I only provided plenty of negative fuel at the end. Lots and lots of negative fuel. How could I have ever been primary? How could someone you only saw briefly become primary? I don’t understand.
Would a narc secretly not even respect other fuel sources for being so easy to dupe? I mean he keeps finding them, creating them, they end up ‘posting’ the same things, but none of them date him or really love him. Does some part of him resent that they are so easily conned and fooled and if only they knew? And those same ones won’t ever love him or stay with him. He has to know that by now. It seems he would never show that group who he really is, but does some part of him feed off it even more from seeing their inferiority that they are so easily tricked by that false charm and false good guy character?
I agree, it does not sound like you were the primary source. Nevertheless, your leaving caused a wound and thus ignited his fury hence the outpouring of hatred.
There is of course the rapid alternation between adoration and hatred. There is the infatuation with a primary source which becomes hatred at their failure to be that which we envisaged them to be. In terms of the individual you are referring to, it sounds like he is seducing plenty of tertiary sources but they do not go anywhere because you say they do not date him. I am not sure to what extent he would regard them as being conned if they are not being drawn in to his world to become more than a fleeting dose of fuel.
Maybe that makes sense. He managed to cram everything in to one week… devalues, standing me up, letting me down, humiliating me, and more.
That last night… his head spun through a freak show. It was a literal dance through massive push/pull. Spitting hurtful words and I would pull away then he would psychologically come after me. It even turned into a physical dance of sorts all over the yard. Off the chart behavior. And one moment in the middle, he looked beaten. Henjust hung there looking so lost. So I hugged him and he gave me a hug where he held on to me so tight and the message was clear, don’t leave me (he admitted this later abiut the hug). Only he pulled away and it was back to crazy psychotic behavior.
And maybe all triggered by my leaving, the visit ending? thats crazy. he was never going to see me again and he did all that? why extract so much negative fuel? Was it all a set up for the massive negative fuel he knew he would then get later on?
Which is crazy cause he acted like he didn’t even want me there once I got there. Like I had impossed on him. But he later told me he had ‘met someone’ and he wanted it to work (it didnt) and he allegedly didnt want to hurt me. Which he made sure to do in every other way nevertheless.
sarabella
like HG said .. he had probabily “won” so many minions on his side with his faked charming facade..
therefore they feel confident that no one woul ever believe the ugly truth about them.. and unfortunately that is often the case .
Pretend. Children play pretend. Personally I think – Men in their 60’s who play pretend are sick MOFO’s. Despite a heavy dose of brainwashing….. I’m pretty sure the constant threats, gaslighting, belittling, out of the blue outbursts, and the pathological, habitual-chronic lying WASN’T pretend.
syd:
All that was probably the only real thing about them. I mean how real os all the programmed charm and flattery everyonr else got? How many ‘I love you’s’ can have that much meaning? None. But the rest … the rest that I received? Oh, that was the only real thing about him.
Uhh….so depressing. A cycle of nothingness and pretend feelings. That is why we Empath try to fix you. We see how alone you are,and you don’t care, but we do. We see that hurt, tortured child that became the sad Monster full of destruction . In the end ,you will all destroy yourselves, because you cannot even see the actual jewel that is my heart. It is your loss,in the end,even if you kill me or I go mad. Because I FEEL loverwhelmed and life,and you do not.
i don’ t quite understand this.
I thought that all the dismal abyss of breakages , all the wounds.. all the abandonment was a result of your hatred, anger and beyrayal..
all of which i cannot be held resposibile..
You are.
And there is one thing that repulses me even more than the beyrayal: the pretense in order to bring on more destruction.
I need to get up and fight.
Oh.. Eternal Mercy give me the courage.
Pretending. That’s so hard for me to wrap my mind around. That all the time it was all just a pretence.
But I do know that it was. It’s so unbelievable in so many ways. What an awful life you and your kind all lead. It’s all so artificial.
“Perhaps we can drive over (to our son’s
wedding ) together”? H brings some mail over as an excuse to visit. His voice is gentle and reasonable and assuring, his demeanor, calm. People find him charming but I know his stories and jokes too well.
Like water in a crack, he seeps in, creating territory. I say nothing. So many times have we started over again. I let my guard down. He really isn’t so bad, I think as he quietly seduces me. One of our children is present. I smile but I have no intention of disagreeing and being the bad guy.
So many times, rocked gently into submission, we have started over. I must he crazy to say no to such a quality male. But I don’t care about this. I don’t care what people think or about suffering public humiliation, receiving it quite regularly. I just don’t care to go around again. I know how this ends.