"Why are you asleep when I'm awake ...?"

Sunday, December 21st, 2014 — Advent: Four years ago

  

This is why I do not turn off my PMs when I despair anymore. This is why I love Saga. Now. And forever. Four years later. Two years after she told me her final good-bye.

Why are you asleep when I'm awake...? Min allra käraste Älskling,

What happened sweetness? Why did you turn off your PM? Did I do something? Did you get sick of my 'I'm stupid-rant' or was it anything else? Did you get sad and offended when I wrote that you "claim that you are plain?" I DIDN'T mean that you are plain as in boring, you know. For you are NOT - God! you are so MUCH all at once and I don't care if I drown or OD. I will still ask for more...

Please tell me for I get so worried over you!! My stomach is in a knot and my heart goes

thump,thump...thump,thump...(pause)...thump,thump,thump,thump!!

I'm like the nervous mother and you're the child running too far away on the playground. And I can't find you and I get hysteric and crying and...wait. I think...There's a Sappho here:

"Afraid of losing you

I ran fluttering
like a little girl
after her mother"

Maybe the roles are reversed. Maybe you're the mother and I'm the little girl that is trying to get you to stay... Please stay, Melissa! You sustain me, you inspire me, you make me endure myself! You're the one that can make me say: 'Today I chose to love myself, for on the other side of the Atlantic there is a girl that loves me. And if she sees something in me worth loving, then I guess I'm not that bad after all...'
My Darling Melissa, don't punish us by not being present. Or do, if it makes you feel better. Anything that will make you feel better is okay. Even if it means you won't talk to me ever again.

أنا بحبك, jag älskar dig!

"Without warning

As a whirlwind
swoops on an oak
Love shakes my heart "

And you have my heart, for as long as you want it.

Din Saga

Sandwich Bar

So, I finally saw "In a World," and it's about ...

It's about me.

It's about this crazy, crazy, LA-crazy family, where the Dad totally dominates the family, wrecking everything in his wake, particularly his daughters, because ...

Because he's the Dad, and that's all he can do. He has to be strong, and he's forgotten that the reason he's strong is to be strong for them. So, instead, he's so strong, that he just rolls over them, hurting them in big ways and in bigger ways ... because getting hurt by Daddy is never a small thing for a little girl, no matter how old she pretends to be.

And that's the whole movie. How hurt we are by Daddy, and how much we just want to be loved by him, but instead, when we reach out for that, he's so strong, and so right, and so ... angry.

Well, one scene, the girl's sister ... doesn't almost cheat on her husband, her plain , ordinary, average-joe husband with this movie superstar.

She doesn't almost cheat on her husband, who's always there for her. But she taped an interview this guy, and her husband finds it, and she comes home that night, just so full of work, and all the stuff she's dealing with on her job, just totally oblivious, until he puts the tape on the table, and walks out.

And then, ladies, then it hits her, and no matter how much she begs and screams and cries, he's not going to stay now, not any more, and she realizes what she had, when she loses it, when she's losing it, right now, and there's nothing she can do to get him back. Ever.

And she learns, right then, how much she's taken him for granted, how much a bitch she's been, and how she doesn't deserve him, how she never did, just plain, ordinary, steady hubby and his sandwich bar for supper, because that's all he knows how to make, but he does make it, for her, and she just breezes past him and takes him for granted but no more.

And now.

And now it's over, because she can't ask for him back, because she no way deserves that, a second chance. She's screwed it all up royally, and there's no getting him back. Why would she inflict herself on him anymore? She can't stand herself, and she wouldn't want anybody to have to deal with her, so why would she ask him?

I was her.

I was worse.

Christmas day, I cheated on Saga, ... as Saga's world was falling apart, and I had no idea why, I just knew it was, and I tried, and I tried and I tried, and I couldn't help her, and ... I wasn't helping, as much as I tried. I couldn't go away, because she had her distance, and I couldn't force her, so I just tried, and I failed.

And then ... I cheated on her. It was an open invitation, and ... I took it, just like that. And...

For Saga, it was the worst thing I could do, but was I thinking of her...

And the sad fact was, I was thinking of her. As soon as I ... did ... it. I ran right to her, and told on myself.

And she was like: okay ... fine with it. Oh, it's okay, live a little, you should go out and see other people and she was actually ...

Until she found out who it was.

And then everything went to shit.

And she tried after that, but she couldn't ... anymore. She couldn't ... with me ... anymore because ...

Because ...

Because ...

And then she said 'Let's be friends,' and ...

And I scream, and I cried, and I wailed, and I lashed out, and I ... hurt her, with my words.

And she said 'I deserve it. I deserve your anger. Hurt me.'

And I couldn't. And I couldn't beg her to stay with me, my heart, my happiness, because she wasn't happy anymore.

Love isn't 'my happiness is more important than you, so you stay with me, no matter how it makes you feel, because I'm happy with you ... sort of, so you be miserable with me. I mean: you stay with me.'

I looked at myself, wanting to beg her, to force her, to make her stay with me, and I said ...

I said.

"I will love you forever, Saga Louise. I will love you forever."

And I knew what I lost. I lost Saga.

I lost someone who knew how to press my buttons. She would say one word, baiting me, and I'd fall for it, and tease her, and play with her, and come to find, she was playing me, playing with me, and so loved watching me spin up like a top, all phfina-righteous, all phfina-smart and -funny, and -smexy, and she would do that to me, watch me spin up, and just smile her simple little knowing smile, so full of warmth and wisdom, and I'd stand there, flabbergasted, just amazed at her, and how smart and beautiful and sweet she was, and could any human being be like that?

And I'd write something, and she, having taken literary criticism, would read more into what I wrote than I knew I had put in there, and more than anybody else had ever seen, and she would model for me, and let me write her stories, and she would be the heroine, the star, and I would be the knightess in shining armor, riding in to rescue from whatever dragons wanted to gobble her up.

And we were so, so happy.

It was a little bubble of happiness. We floated along, me, in my little yellow sun-dress, and her, feeding me lingonsylt, giving me little kyssar on the cheeks to lick off the mess she made, feeding me, and wondering wherever in the world I made up the recipe for 'Swedish Chicken' because there was no such dish in all of Sweden, and she knew.

In the movie, the husband comes back, and, he surprises his wife, he's set the table with candles, and a sandwich bar, and when she comes in, expecting to find nothing: just emptiness and loneliness, but he's there, and t...

She just throws her stuff on the floor, then she grabs ahold of him and throws him on the floor and fucking ...

She goes a little crazy on him.

Just a little.

But that's the movie, and it was so sweet, and so endearing, and so empowering to women, for women to find their own voice, in a man's world, not need men, to be themselves, but also not trampling over them. To be a woman, and to have your own voice, doesn't mean you have to scream, or step on, or coddle. It means you can be yourself, and be confident in that, and also let the man be himself, with or without you, and if he wants to be with you, if that's his identity, his happiness, and you want to be with him, then that's okay, but if you want to be who you are, and you don't need a man to tell you who you are or allow you to be you or anything. If you want to be you, then you can be you, and that's fine.

The women in In a World, are so strong, or come to be, without losing an ounce of their femininity, without losing an ounce of their inner beauty.

And that's that movie. It's beautiful and affirming. Watch it.

Saga.

Saga was thirty-two, and she worried she was too old for me.

But the thing is, that wasn't it.

I'm older now, too. Four years older.

But I don't feel older.

I feel like I'm still that fifteen year old girl they carted off to the hospital in an ambulance, heavily sedated, because she lost it. The girl that everybody was looking at, then, six months later...

Six months later when I got out of that hospital, everybody avoided, because she might just go cray-cray again.

And I'm stuck there. I don't feel like I'm a strong, independent woman with her own job, in charge of a department and the people who work in it. I don't feel like that at all. I feel fake; phony. I feel like I'm faking it, and that somebody will find out, and ask me to leave, in front of everybody, and I'll have to walk out, my head held high, because if I don't, then they'll cart me away again, and I won't let that happen again. I'll kill myself first.

And that's where I teeter, balancing on the knife's edge with the abyss to either side of me, and Saga's left me, for good reason. For good reasons. I didn't deserve her. I never did. And the two years she spent with me were two blessed years of laughter, and love, and trembling fear and anticipation, and a zest for life, and a joy of being with someone who knew me more than I did, who looked up to me, as I looked up to her, who was my strength in my weakness, who was vulnerable so that I could be her strength.

Saga Louise.

Thank you.

Thank you for being you.

In a world where I am surrounded by the abyss and the only thing I could lean on was the knife, you were the only light, the only breath of air for me for a long, long time, when I couldn't breathe and I couldn't see but darkness.

I wish I could have been a better person for you. I'm praying for you. I'm praying that you find your health and happiness, right where you are, right in your home, with your family, with those who love you more than the sun and the sea and the sky.

In a World ... where nothing makes sense, you were the only sense. You were my eyes that saw me as I see me, but saw me as somebody sweet and smart and feisty and lovable, and you loved me, your little kitten, din litten panter, and held me, and let me scream and scratch and cry, and loved me to health and happiness and self-fulfillment and all you asked for was ... nothing. Your love was sweet and fierce and selfless. You were my Sun, and I was blinded in your light that warmed my dead soul back to life. You were the grown up, so strong and firm and sure, and I was a little baby. I could be. You let me, and you loved me, just as I was, and, at the same time, you never, ever let me get away with my shit. You held me ... you held me up to the person you knew I was, not the self-indulgent person I let myself be.

And now ... you're gone. And now, ...

I'm afraid.

I'm afraid I'll have to grow up, and face the world, and be mature and responsible, and drain the joy out of my veins and see everything in greys, and marry the right man, a kind man, and have children, and raise them, and fall in love with them, and be ... satisfied, happy, even, content.

I'm afraid I'll just fade into the person I'm supposed to be. That I'll just have to grow up and square my shoulders and face the world: a strong, independent, responsible woman.

I'm not afraid of that. Which by what I mean is, that will happen or it won't, and I'll be that eccentric spinster-aunt, just like Emily Dickinson.

But I'll look back at my life, this ... married woman with kids and grandkids, or this spinster-aunt, and ... I'll wonder where that girl went, who was me. I'll wonder when she died, and why she died so quietly, so quietly that nobody noticed, not even me.

And I'll go to me grave wondering that, or worse, not wondering that, because I'm so caught up in the craziness of this world, and won't even realize it when I fall off the bus, because I'll be crossing bradlick road and just be another fatality statistic that week when another SUV slams through the red light, again. 'Body of young woman; identity uncertain due to disfigurement from force of impact.'

Doesn't even make the news anymore. I was walking and then, BAM! I heard the crash of cars exactly where I had been, thirty seconds ago, and I would've been a goner, if not for those thirty seconds, and my guardian angel watching over me, hurrying me along through the intersection before the two cars smashed into each other, both of them running the red at high speed.

But why is my angel saving me?

I'm afraid that I don't know that why. Saga knew, but now she's gone, so I have that responsibility, now, for myself.

I'm not a very responsible person. I was just a girl looking for her daddy and mommy to love her, and ... I just never grew up. And try as I might to pretend I am that grown-up person, I just ...

I'm just not.

I wish I had that bubble.

But the world doesn't wait for bubbles for girls much too old to be blowing them now.

The 'benefits' of friends

So, last week, four people, out of the blue, PMed or emailed me and said, 'hi,' and 'how are you?'

I don't know what that means to you, but what it means to me is how brave each of these people, my friends, that I haven't heard from in a while, for some, more than a year, to just *boink* get up one day and say 'hi' and see how little `phfina is doing.

And now, it doesn't matter how I was doing before. How I'm doing now is wonderfully! Thank you, my friends, for being brave, for being kind, for being thoughtful, for ... caring. For caring about little me and how I'm doing.

And you, my dear friends reading this little note, having not written me.

It's okay. It hurts, but it's okay. I understand that it can be a scary thing to write to me, because I'm a scary person, and you never do know if I'm in a fit of desperation and depression so deep you won't know what hit you when I savage you back with my: "How am I doing? Who the fuck are you to ask me how I'm doing? I just fucking tried to kill myself because I fucking hate my life, and you ask me how I'm doing?"

Yeah. 'Bitch' isn't a word to describe me, because bitches fear me. That's a known fact.

And other times I'm so full of love and understanding and sweetness you say 'well, who needs heroine?' Really! And you just float in my love, and you offer to get me hitched to you so you can drag me away to your bedroom and have your wicked ways with me only stopping for pee breaks and supper so you can explain to your parents you have this new live-in pet you're keeping forever.

You never know what you're getting with me, and so I understand that it's hard sometimes, or all the time, to write to me, because you've read my stuff and who can talk to somebody who writes this stuff, and what do you say to her when you write? "Hi. How are you doing?"

That's sometimes hit or miss.

That's me, a hit or miss kind of girl.

But something that hits it out of the park for me is ... you.

"You. Can I hug you?"

When you reach out to me, with your heart? I read that. I feel that. In my bones.

And it gives this little girl one more reason to live one more day.

And maybe even 'update soon' that chapter. ;)

I love you.

... and the fourth marriage proposal ...

So, I just got my fourth marriage proposal on ffn.

But that's okay, because she was just kidding. Or she didn't know what she was saying. Or kids these days (or Americans these days) don't know what love and marriage is anymore, just look at the statistics, right, so no biggie, `phfina.

Right?

I've heard this before, particularly from my European friends, but love, to me, is love, and it's a phenomenon, that if even if somebody says, well, it isn't, they know, in their heart, that it is, and it is serious, and making light of it only makes it more serious, not less. So, maybe a review of epistemology may help your argument, because this is a track that many, many people have trod, including philosophers, so, as you think, you have many others who've thought over this, very diligently, to help you form, or to counter, your arguments.

'Love isn't love, marriage isn't marriage' doesn't work. If your statement held (F-logic allows paradox), and they weren't, why are you giving any thought to what isn't?

Cognitive sciences help there, too.

It comes down to accepting responsibility for what people say to you. Do you accept it, or belittle it? Empower them, and yourself, for taking them at their word, or use logic and reason (sophistry) to distance yourself and themselves from their words by draining them of their meaning, paradoxically, by using semantics to argue that a thing isn't what it is?

When you embark on that path, you embark on viewing people as things, as 'it' spouting nonsense, and not 'thou' speaking from the heart.

And either are valid views. One is entirely materialist, and I, and Martin Büber, take exception.

When someone makes you especially giddy? Don't you see that as something special, for them at least, and if so, why not for you? Because you don't want the entanglement, the complication of a relationship with depth and honesty?

But then if you don't want the consequence of another person feeling something because you've opened up to share something of yourself, then ...

Well the obvious alternative is not to share yourself, or to shut them down, hard when they do get giddy, by telling them: "oh, you're just feeling silly; you'll get over it."

Ouch.

So, go ahead, say: oh, they're young. They're a fangirl. They don't know what they're saying.

That helps me, dealing with a girl who's just broken down and told me she loves me, because I wrote something that touched her heart in a way nobody else has ever done, but you, you adult, mature, reasonable people, instead of acknowledging her fear and her feelings, say: 'get over it, grow up, little girl.'

Leaving another breaking heart, or, worse, another person who hardens their heart, vowing never to open themselves up again like that and get hurt, then get ridiculed for it.

Today is the day someone truly dared to live, and got on her knees, 'pretending' to tell me she loves me.

Please don't make today also the day she closes off her heart, regretting her own daring, and dies, just a little bit, just a lot, because that cold, cruel world actually is, and is actually populated by jaded, hard-hearted people who 'know better.' Please don't be one of those people who sees hope in a naïve, sweet, young, inexperienced girl, and crushes it aborning. Please don't make her one of those people.

Someone opened her heart today. Can you dare to open your heart to hers?

I love you.

kisses, `phfina

Love

You can tell what a person is in love with by what they give their time to.

Did you know that? It's very telling to watch a person, hear what they say, then actually see what they are doing. So when they say: 'I HATE this' 'this' whatever it is, but you see them doing it over and over and over again, well, they actually love that 'this' thing whatever it is and are perpetuating it, keeping it alive and strong by giving all their time to the thing they are saying they hate.

People are such good liars... they convince even themselves with their lies.

For me, today, as with most days ... I love ... meetings. I've been in meetings all day, a wallflower, the only reason why I'm there is because I'm 'supposed' to be there, my eyes open and my mouth shut, a good little 'yessir' girl.

I also am in SO much love with the bus.

Then haloz.

And those are my loves.

And ...

And throughout today, I've been thinking of you ... what does that say about me? When I am playing haloz, I have more fun when I'm playing with my friends. I don't get much joy of playing haloz alone against and with randoms.

It's like alcohol, I suppose you can make that connection, and raise high the red flag. I drink because I don't really exist at all, except to give a place for the alcohol to live. I don't enjoy drinking, per se, but ...

but that. But I drink, not for me, but for it to live in me. I'm just a receptacle. You know: like, for alcohol, and for sperm. That's what a woman is, right? To men, and that's all that matters in this world.

I play haloz a lot, but I don't enjoy it, except for a brief second here or there, and except when I'm playing with my friends.

I thought about Saga a little, tiny bit this morning, but that was all, and now I feel a twinge of guilt and of sadness, knowing that I think of her so little and when I do, I think of her sadly, wistfully, wondering how she is, hoping she is well, and knowing that she had something special with me and she misses that and feels she can never have that again. And writing that, I wonder what you'll think when you finally wake up and come to your senses and move on, and ... looking back, say regretfully to yourself, 'oh, well, that was nice, sort of, if she weren't so fucked up in the head.'

So, when I say 'I love you,' what does that mean? I mean ... I mean ... so what? I love you, but so what? How does that translate into my feet moving in a directions, my fingers flying over the keyboard, ... what is my heart if what I say affects what I do how?

I don't say 'I love you' easily. And I do. I'm not scared to love, and to be loved, and ... I'm terrified of my own shadow.

What am I saying, if I'm saying both at once? Don't they cancel each other out? Then why say anything at all?

Why, indeed? Other than that I hopelessly hope that somewhere, somehow I can get out of what I am confining myself into.

You know: complaining about the state that I alone put myself into.

And ... to 'explain' ... I don't say, 'iloveuiloveuiloveu' like some empty-headed dumbfuck broad who'll say anything that goes into her head and then goes on an lives her selfish life exactly as she wants and fuck you and yours for getting in her way.

I say 'I love you,' and mean it, and get on with my selfish, lonely, hopeless life, and fuck me and my stupid, useless, pointless life.

Unplugged

So.

Okay.

I bust on the metro line to get to work, and of course, on the metro train, what are there? People, right?

Not really. What's on the metro train, are people, yes, but people consumed by ... anything distracting. It's like a picture right out of Fahrenheit 451, everybody on the train, listening to their iPods, reading their iBooks, doing anything to fill the time ... and people thought Ray Bradbury wrote science fiction.

Well, everybody except one person.

Me.

I decided, paradoxically, to ... unplug. I decided to take this time to, well: collect myself before I went into work, and look out the window, and see cars and trees passing by, and look in the car and see people, and see what they are doing.

Me ... and somebody else.

There was a girl.

She was ... maybe ten years old, seated next to her mother, her mother who was engrossed in her iPhone, but she wasn't. She ...

She had long auburn hair, curled near the tips because of this oppressive heat and humidity, bronzed skin, and crystal blue eyes that stared right into your soul ...

... Right into my soul.

She had a decided air. An air of a girl, so strong, so beautiful, so smart, knowing that she was head and shoulders above everybody on the train, in the whole damn country, in fact.

What will happen to this girl, I wondered.

I mean: who's going to be the lucky guy who gets her? And will he be strong enough to handle her, even for one day, when she grows up and comes out into the world?

Or, will she even make it? Will she see the world, and all its absurdity and ... and do what? Know that there's nothing she can to to change it? So remove herself from the equation? A world so set in its ways, everybody obliviously listening to their iwhatevers, trapped inside a train as it speeds off the edge of the cliff, and not caring one whit because their senses are filled with meaningless drivel? Hopeless to change a world without hope?

Or will she play the game? See the world for what it truly is, and laugh at it, and put a boy under her thumb and make him the president of IBM or Microsoft or of the United States of America, and run the country from the sidelines by proxy (because she knows nobody ever listens to a woman)? Or say 'Hell with it,' and build her own empire from scratch, and fight and fight and fight, and force a world to be the way she wants it to be?

Why did I even bother even asking that last question?

And that was the look on that girl's face: why am I even bothering?

She looked around disdainfully at all of us, all so engrossed in filling our time and our minds with trivia, and read us, and the world, and shrugged.

And she saw me. She saw me, seeing her.

So I looked away. I tried not to blush. I 'didn't' look at her again. I mean, she was always in my peripheral vision, so I saw her, surveying the world and its vanity.

And I wondered. Does she wonder what it'll be like for her? I mean, she knows what it is now for her ...

GOD! she's so mature, for such a slim, elfin, young girl, elegantly dressed in tailored blue jeans and bejeweled flip-flops, so refined.

It's like as if she's given up on her childhood, or has had it stolen from her.

So I wondered if she wondered what it was like to be me, at my age, with my responsibilities, and was pining to skip past all this ... 'stuff' ... when she's not allowed to do anything of her own, but she knows she's already far more capable to handle any- and every-thing thrown her way, and so much better than anybody else in the train car.

As you see, I don't wonder what it's like to be her .. I mean, I don't pine for it ... to be a young girl again, going into high school and dealing with all my bullshit friends with their bullshit problems ... homework? what other people think of you?

As if any of that had any weight in the matter.

I don't miss that age.

No: I am missing what that age could've been for me ... where I could've been just a girl, a smart girl, a sweet girl, a beautiful girl, and where mommy could've held me if things got too complicated and I could've been a girl that could've asked mommy to hold me, or mommy could've just known, and just held me, even as I screamed and fought her embrace, and cried and cried and cried at all the meaningless of it all, and the weightiness of it. I could've been that girl who ... lived ... and smiled and was happy, and when she wasn't, cried, and was held.

I miss that. I did miss it, entirely, in fact.

And, ... I think this girl, in front of me, so self-possessed, is missing it, too.

So I pray for her ... that maybe she'll wake up from her ... knowing everything about everybody and seeing the vanity of it all, knowing that she's better than, and so being forced to be better than, because she knows it. I pray that she can just let it all go, some time, maybe all the time, and be a young, sweet, beautiful girl, who can break out into a smile, ... despite it all, or who can cry, in spite of it all, and reach out to be held, and be held, and loved.

I'm talking about the girl on the train ... I mean the girl I saw on the train.

I'm not talking about the girl in the mirror.

Really.

... *sigh* oh, well, ... another day.

Casual Friday

How to get me NOT to cum

Actually, I don't know how to answer that question.

So I'll answer a different question.

How to get me to cum.

Shortest blogpost evah!

The end.

Well, okay, here we go (and cum, and go, and ... *sigh*).

Okay, one way to get me to cum, is ... to tell me not to cum.

I'm dead serious.

I would call myself a slut, but that's totally inaccurate, because, I would imagine, a slut is a girl who constantly engages in sexual. erhm: activities, and after a while, the senses dull, and the experience becomes dull for her. Just like the job for most people: they do it from 9-to-5 because no other option ever enters their heads.

No, I'm the opposite of a slut: I'm wanton. I mean: just look at me, and I'm like: ready! and begging for it, and you can't get me undressed fast enough, or in fast enough, and when it's in, you can't pound into me hard enough.

And I can't come fast enough, or any faster than I'm cumming. Or hard enough, because I can't cum any harder than I'm cumming.

I have the same effect on my lovers. I mean, I've been with girls who have guaranteed me they will not cum. Gold-plated, and you can bet your farm on it, and there's no way, and no amount of time, nor anything I can do that will make them cum.

Guaranteed.

I really ought to open up a casino to start taking these sucker bets.

Because I always win.

Always.

Miss Frigid over there, who was willing for me to bet my farm or hers or both.

She just lost the farm when she lost her marbles when I blew her mind.

The Big-O, ladies (and any gentlemen who care to read) ... for women, that is?

It's a lot mental.

I mean, physically, it's rather monotonous: rub there.

That's it: rub there. Boring!

But the images to get from plain-old boring 'rub there' to 'omyfuckinggodimcuvuvuvuvuvmmmi1i1i1ngg!11!1!1!' ...

Well, that's auto-stimulation, but for her, in my arms, to cum?

It's trust.

We women? You know why we don't cum?

Yes, you do, if you think about it, and boy, do you think about a lot of things, don't you, and that blocks it all up, doesn't it?

No, actually, thinking about 'stuff' is not the real blocker.

The real blocker is trust.

Girls don't cum because girls don't trust.

And what's to trust? They've been let down in so many relationships, starting when they were four and their daddy scolded them for being a girl and not a boy, like he wanted, and continuing on to lovers who wam-bam-thank-you-ma'amed them, taking their pleasure from her and leaving her with the leavings and the emotional turmoil of, well, he stuck his dick in me, so that must means he loves me, but why is he now with his friends, pointing at me and laughing, and they're laughing, too, and all their girlfriends, my old, now ex-friends, calling me a slut?

And so she tries a lesbian relationship in college because she'd like to think she's bi-curious, and girls won't treat her like that, right?

But then the girl who fucked her Friday night when she was stoned out of her mind and so drunk? Why do I see her with that other girl today, and they are hanging on each other like they've just been each other's boy-shorts, or why are they holding hands and looking sweetly at each other, giving each other gag-gag eyes like they, no... it couldn't be they're in love, because she told me she'd ...

And you try not to cry, and you build those walls, so you won't get hurt again. Those walls of distrust, and you become desensitized ... 'frigid' to the guy who calls you the ice queen because you're not coming when he is as soon as he's done with foreplay taking off his pants and sticking his dick right in you after having grabbed your boobs.

And that's what I have to deal with: not you, but the walls of mistrust and distrust you put up, because I'm just like all those other people who hurt you before, during and after lovemaking, so you're so sure you're not going to cum in my arms, because you simply 'can't'.

And then, in my arms, after your mind's been blown, you pretend you have no idea what just happened and why.

Well, I'll tell you the secret that you know, but won't tell yourself:

I won't hurt you.

That's a pretty big one, but here's the corker.

I love you.

You see 'I love you' is said in so many ways for so many reasons, none of them being 'I love you,' that you hearing those words, are like, 'yeah, right whatever, lemme give you a blowjob so you can fall asleep and I can have some quiet time with my regrets.'

But when you're in my arms, I don't even say, 'I love you,' because then we have to deal with all that baggage, all that hurt those words cause.

No, I don't say 'I love you' ... well, I do, sometimes, ... I be 'I love you.'

When you are in my arms, and I am looking at you, you are the reason for my existence, right now.

When you see that, you get that, at a level deeper than what any shit has ever hit you before, and then the lights go out because all you see are stars and fireworks. You ever be with a person who truly looks at you, who hears what your soul says and doesn't let your shit slide, but who cuts right through it, rapier-sharp, and pierces your heart of hearts?

That's me, bitches. Watch the fuck out, because when you're in my arms, you lose your very self.

Because why? Because you do trust me to hold onto you and trust as in: I'm not going to hurt you.

Girls don't have that trust. Period. That's why I'm not a girl. Really. Seriously. Because I do have that trust. I have that trust with me, and I have that trust in you.

Yes, I've been hurt. A lot. GOD! A whole fucking lot.

And I still have that trust, that lets me hold you and lets me be held by you, and lets me give myself, completely to you, and you can hurt me, because I trust you, I've entrusted myself fully, and completely, to your care.

Please, please take care of me. Please, please don't hurt me when I give myself to you.

I beg that now, because I'm myself now, but when I give myself to you, I'm not me anymore, I am nothing to me and everything for you, and I give myself fully and completely, and I will fuck you so long, and so hard, and so sweetly and gently, that I will break through every wall of mistrust, distrust, and hurt, even the very last one, and you will cum sweetheart, you will cum so hard it will scare you how hard you're cumming and you'll be afraid you might actually lose yourself in it.

Not knowing, or knowing, actually, that you are lost in it, completely, in my arms.

I give myself to you completely. Even if 'you' is 'me.'

Today was 'Casual Friday,' so I got to wear jeans.

How to make me cum?

Tell me not to cum.

"`phfina, I want you to go to the bathroom and dip in and check if you're wet, but don't cum in there."

So, this morning, I went to the bathroom, not to cum, but to check.

I was in trouble.

Pulling down my (very practical) white cotton panties?

There were spots of ... dew, already. Just fucking going to the bathroom to check.

And, hm: I can neither confirm nor deny that I did this, but I have this ... 'friend' ... hypothetically speaking, who went into the bathroom at work today and took the handicap stall, because she may or may not have needed some ... room, you know to ... you know.

And, well, going to the bathroom after freshly squeezed orange juice and an oatmeal breakfast ... well, ... oatmeal keeps you 'regular.' ...

So I pooped.

I pooped, and I'll spare you the details, because you know what bran does to a girl, but so, I cleaned up and flushed, got dressed, exited the stall, washed up, took some lotion in my hands ...

... and went right back into that stall.

She did, that is, my 'friend.'

And trou came down, and but this time, kitty and I (or 'she') had some private time together, and I got friendly with her, patting her and rubbing her gently.

Do you know that causes mind-blowing orgasms?

It's not the physical contact. It can't be.

It's the anticipation.

I was ... 'she' was ... so sensitive there, puffy, and what really gets me going is the gentle, light exploration outside the lips.

Soft, light, gentle strokes with one V-ed hand while the other hand is very gently ... caressing kitty's ... 'head.'

Girls, about this time, I was losing my mind. In a very public restroom doing something very, very private.

And that's when I heard heels, and a door open, and then the stall, and two stalls down, somebody else went number two, for a short while, ...

And the whole time, I was ... stroking kitty, her 'belly' very gently, sweetly. Mentally cooing to her as she purred contentedly at the attention.

Sometime later I was alone again with kitty and sometime later somebody else came in and I heard the psssst of somebody peeing, again two stalls away, and soon enough again I was alone.

And then I kicked it into high gear. And I imaged me forcefully taking her, that girl, ... you, not strapping on, but scissoring our hips together so that my kitty was kissing and stroking and then mashed up against and thrusting against your pussy.

Hard.

And that brought me to a level.

But then, it changed, the fantasy, and suddenly you did something, from beneath me, that I don't allow, you sat up and twisted us around so that I was forced down onto the bed on my back, and you began to take me.

And I whined, and I strained, and I struggled for control, but you had me in your embrace, your hips locked to mine, your legs entangling me and holding me so firmly I had no way to twist nor turn, but only more into you and your firm, powerful, demanding thrusts.

Then you leaned into the fuck, the fuck of fucking me, and your long hair brushed against my titties as our thrusting swayed your body.

And the way you looked into my eyes with your smoldering passion, and the way your hair tickled and brushed into the pores of my breasts and nipples, and the way your cunt was slick and rough, pressing and sliding against my little slit...

I came. I came hard, and, being in a (very) public bathroom, that, thank God, was unoccupied, but at any second could have any of the three coworkers I passed on my way into this very place and point come in while I was cumming, I came silently. Not even a hitched breath, but, girls (and boyz), I came. I gave myself complete to this moment of you fucking me, taking me so forcefully in this sterile, industrial bathroom, that I came and came and came.

... Or ... my 'friend' did. But there's no proof of any of the above ever happening because there're no witnesses (except from the films recorded from the hidden cams installed by pervy architects) and no evidence because she made sure to flush it all down and check the water afterward, and wash her hands and the sink so that they were squeaky clean.

And then, she didn't wobble back to her desk, even though she couldn't feel her arms and her legs were two well-cooked spaghetti noodles (well lotioned inner thighs: the canvas from blue jeans can be rather ... chafing), and she didn't put her head down on her desk right next to her computer and start snoring, because, well, she had to pass by coworkers and had to get in payroll reports by noon, see?

How not to make me cum?

That, right there, is a very tough question.

You see, I'm weird: I'm a trusting soul. A child, just innocence. You can hurt me and I still walk around with big trusting eyes, filled with wonder at, oh, is that a flower blossoming on that tree, right there?

You know what those kinds of people are? I'll be so blinded by the beauty, when I walk into the lion's den, I won't even know I'm being mauled and eaten, because those golden eyes and that soft, thick fur?


Lions are so beautiful, aren't they?

---

So, why is a slut a slut? I mean, I'm hard on sluts this post, but I've already answered that question in another post. So if you don't remember, you can read it. Capsule summary: a slut is a slut because she wants love any way she can get it.

We all, — we all — need love any way we can get it, and this world is so hard, and so cruel, and businesslike, and sterile, and cold, that it sucks the life, sucks the love out of ... well, sadly, everybody, and so we, some of us, are turned into sluts, because that's the only way, we think, that we can get him, or her, to wrap their arms around us, so we won't fall asleep alone, again, crying into the pillow after tasting the bitterness of our post-coital regrets, not bliss, of our lonely masturbation.

We all so need love, and the world (the 'world' meaning 'we all') is so cold and cruel.

Homework: see somebody, today, suffering (meaning: anybody), and love them. Love them so totally, so completely, so sweetly, that they have this one moment in time, with you, and know that the weren't alone. Love them so that to their dying day, they remember that moment in time, and treasure it, and that moment carries them through this rough patch, and even gives them reason, no, not reason: hope to live.

You. You are the only hope in the world, today, to a person who is despairing. And you can look down your nose at her, calling her a slut, or turn your back on her, and tell yourself, 'well, it's not my problem she spilled her tea on her blouse, she should grow up, the cry-baby,' or you can listen to her inane bullshit (trans: cry from a well of loneliness for help) with your 'I'm not here' bored eyes that glance, every three seconds, at your watch or the wall clock.

Or, you can reach out, from the well of yourself, to the well that is her, or, hey, him, and pull her up out of it, and save her.

You might just save yourself, too, but don't worry about that, because that's something you worry about much too much. Save her. She may or may not save you. You may or may not save you. But save her.

You save one soul, even if it isn't yours, ... and you do an absolute good.

Diamonds, rubies, gold, frankincense, myrrh. None of these will you remember 10 years later.

That one person, those several people ... maybe, you're Gandhi or Mother Teresa, idk ... and you save that nation of people.

That's what you'll remember. That's what that person will remember you for.

Forever.

To all the girls I've loved before ...

"... It is women's day today...

Just know that you are celebrated and cherished."

This doesn't apply to all the girls I've loved before only. It applies to them, to all of them, to each and every one of them.

And if I haven't loved you yet, my dear sweet girl, reading this post, wondering if she's lovable, wondering if she's loved...

Wonder no more.

I love you.

Oh, and my confession: I had to be told it's women's day today, just as when I worked at sbux and wondered why everybody was wearing green on that bitterly cold day in March last year, and, no duh, it was St. Patrick's day...

Yeah, I'm Irish, like I know when St. Patrick's day. I wore green that day, even, because I wore the green apron, just as I wore it every day of the week back then.

Yeah, I'm a woman, and I have to be told today is women's day.

You know what?

Every day is women's day. If you're a girl, or a woman, you should be proud to be you, and know that the world just. won't. work. without you in it. Every day is Irish day, because every day 'Kiss me, I'm Irish,' applies, and it doesn't matter if your Irish or Israeli or Iswedish, you deserve to know that you can love and that you are loved.

And today is women's Irish's day, so I deserved to be loved.

... and get smooches, too, but I don't want to give a little freckled red-haired cutie with sea-green eyes my sniffles.

Cuddles. Cuddles work just fine and dandy for me today, or any day of the week. They go well with scintillating intellectual conversations about epistemology.

Or the blessed, blessed silence of post-coital bliss.

.. um ... WHAT'S BEHIND YOU!

(`phfina scampers off)

Merry Christmas!

Does this dress make me look fat?

teehehe :p

My nieces. I swear! The little one drew this and she was all like, 'what do you think? do you like it?'

And what can you say to that?

Well, you can't say: 'I DO NOT have chubby, chipmunk cheeks!'

No, you have say, 'Aw, that's so pretty, and so accurate, too! But why the crown and the halo?'

My nieces are smart girls, but I don't know if they have 'tiara' in their vocabulary yet.

Then the little one, Li'l Iz, explained that it was a representation of St. Rita, ... you know: patroness of the kitchen.

'Oh!' was all I could muster. I couldn't dare ask where she got the representation, 'cause there I was, stick figure and all.

Does red look good on me?

hehehe.

I feel a bit silly.

My nieces have more flesh on their bones than I do, but they did inherit something from me: they are fish in water. Mrs. A_, a woman not to be trifled with, takes them to swim lessons that she herself supervises, just she, Madame, the girls, me, 'cause I happen to be there, and now the neighboring kids. Mrs. A_ commands: '150 meters, freestyle: go!' and the poor neighboring kids are like 'what did she just say?' But Li'l Iz and Elena Marie are like: ZOOM!

... and I could say, 'oh, I hold back to keep pace with them ...' but then again, why I am embarrassed to get my ass handed to me by a 10 year old and an 8 year old?

Why, indeed!

I am rather pleased that I look older than them, and the other neighboring girl who's 12? 13? So, yay! Go me, I'm not mistaken for a preteen.

Oh, my God!

I was walking off to the bus stop, and I saw a bumper sticker in a mommy van pass by: "Verum, Bonum, Pulcherum." And my Latin sucks, but I was sniggering that maybe I knew better what that meant than the mommy or the exclusive prep-school kids going off to school.

"Verum, Bonum, Pulcherum."

What is true; what is good; what is beautiful.

I like that motto. The girls sang at Christmas eve Mass, and the priest was very accepting of all the 'Christmas guests' we had a Mass. It was a full house. What he said at the homily struck me, it was all about historical reconstructions of Jesus not being God and Savior, but a straw-man to forward the zealots aims to overthrow the Roman Empire.

Um, Father, so how are you going to rescue the homily to wish us a Merry Christmas?

And he did, Fr. P, by saying, 'look to the cross.' Because Jesus an Historical Reconstruction, who is that to love, and be loved?

But Jesus, born today, of the Virgin Mary, and then, Jesus on the cross?

He did that because He loves us.

Because He loves me.

Jesus loves me.

And if Jesus can love me, even me, then ...

Then I can love me.

And I can love you.

I love you.

Merry Christmas

A new year's present for you.

You know, that day? When I wanted a shot of bourbon, more than anything in the world, ... well, did I go out and buy a bottle of bourbon.

No.

Did I have a drink from my secret space?

No.

Why?

'Cause I'm strong, and powerful, and a girl of her word?

No.

No. Not that. Do you know the only reason why I didn't have that shot of bourbon, or a drink of any kind?

It was because of you.

Because I just know, when I write, 'Oh, I'm a shit,' you are so gonna write back, 'oh, you poor baby, and you're so not!' (because you are so you, and you are so sweet that way, that way you just don't listen to me!)

AND you're going to demand I step up, like, 'where's that next chapter you promised yourself you'd write?' or 'where's that next chapter you promised me you'd beta?' [ed: okay, okay, okay! Can I please deliver ch 3 tomorrow, huh?] or 'luv ur story, update soon!'

And I was like ... well, I was like this:

Leave. Me. The FUCK. ALONE!

But, no. PM after PM came: 'RU ok, `phfina?' and 'You hurt yourself, you hurt your family and you hurt me, bitch! Think about that!' and 'Well, you know the gun is messier and more permanent that the bourbon, but it's your choice, smart girl, and I love you.' and on and on and on.

And, you know what I realize?

I'm not me, without you. I don't see who I am at all. Not at all. I only see me, who I am, and who I can be, through your eyes.

And, well, you know, I really hate that. I mean, like, look, FINE! FINE! OKAY! So I AM smart and I AM beautiful and I AM loved and I AM lovable!

FINE!

But can't you just give me some room here? It's New Year's, for God's sake! Can't you just leave me alone?

And you're like, no. And, anyway, leave me alone to what? to wallow? That's nice.

So today I went to the mall. Yeah, on a Sunday after the holidays (so, really, still during the holidays), and I got to really be with TONS of people being with people, families, young (cute) girlfriendies, tough guys pushing baby strollers, mommies with daughters, zillions of people in line at sbux (that I don't work at ... HA!)

Just, you know, hang, and be with everybody being with everybody, with the parking garage so full, they needed police to direct traffic.

And so here's my present to you.

No, it's not me (although I am a HOT little thing!) and no, it's not my next chappy (yet).

No, my present to you is you.

Now, I am talking particularly to you who've read my stuff and never PMed me or reviewed me.

I know you are there. I so know it. I see the stats on page views by locations. I know you're reading me and I know where you live, sweetheart, ... and bf, too, for that matter. (Hi, guys reading ffn! You rock!)

And you know what? Me, knowing that? Do you think you're getting away with anything? No. Do you know what you're doing?

You're giving me hope.

Did you know that?

You, silently, being there, for me. Month after month, in productive months and in ... these last few months. You're giving me hope and a reason to go on.

Do you know what a contribution to my life that you are?

Do you know I didn't drink on New Year's because of you? Yes: you. I couldn't stand the thought of saying — again! — 'yup, I screwed up again.' And you can be a drinker or not a drinker or not care either way, but you are reading me, and somehow, I know that you care about me, you care about me enough to read my words, and to come back here, time and again, and check up on me, to see if I'm still alive, and still fighting, and still hoping.

You, thousands of you, all around the world, looking at me, looking for me.

Thank you.

And you think to yourself: 'oh, I have nothing to offer, and look at her other reviewers, so smart and witty and brave, and some have even done this and that for her, or have done that for their own lives, reading her stuff, and I could never do that. What could I have to give `phfina?'

And, well, okay.

Really: it's okay.

You, simply by being there, not even aware what you are doing for me, have helped me go on, month after month.

You are perfect, as you are, even if you are hiding from me, even if you're 'too busy' to leave a review or a comment of a chapter, even if you don't know what to say or how to say it, even if that comment is simply, 'wow!' or 'I really liked this chapter,' or 'Bella is so stupid; I hate her,' or 'I so love your Bella; I just wanna hug you ... HER I MEANT HER! *EEK!*' ... whatever's on your heart, whatever touched you when you read what I wrote ... for you.

You are perfect.

And.

Well, okay, you asked (by reading this).

Just imagine what would happen if you did leave me a comment.

Just imagine.

You don't have to. I have a list of what's happened, with people who've talked with me. And that list is NOWHERE as all-inclusive as I'd like it to be. It should also include the girl who was never, ever going to review my work, screwing up her courage to do so, and what happened?

Well, that applies to several girls, but uniformly, they found their voices, they found themselves, by daring to do the undareable: talk to the `phferocious `phfina, and what did it get for them?

They got their lives.

You have your life already. Imagine what daring to do, or MAKING the time, or finding the words or whatever will do for you, when you know what you've done, and that you've done it.

Like I said, you are already my gift to me. You. You are my gift to me.

And this New Year, my wish is that you see what a gift you are to me, and in so seeing, see what a gift you are to people in your life.

And when you see that, then you will see what a gift you are to you.

You are so, so precious, in somebody's eyes. Know that. You are so, so precious in my eyes, and I love you.

Happy New Year!

Bad news: you win

May I preface this post? Of course this post is a follow-up, the 'second half,' as it were, of my previous diatribe, and, of course, I have no choice in the matter of writing this. I simply must write this, even though it does no good.

You see, this post, despite my preamble, has nothing to do with me: this post is about you. And, if you think the last one hurt, well, gf, you've got another thing coming, because the last post was all about me. This one? It's all about you, through my eyes.

This is gonna hurt you. A lot.

So, you know: standard caveat. Get the hell out if you want sugary goodness, and don't come crying to me if my words hurt you. There's only one way they can hurt, and that is: if they apply. So bitch and moan to the mirror.

I fucking warned you.

And what good will it do? None, probably. You are you. You are still being you, even after what happened. You are so you, as I see every day when I interact with you. And I love you. And I want the best for you.

And so this post.

I feel so like an angel right now. Do you know angels have no choice in the matter? In eternity, they made their choice: follow God, emptying themselves completely, or follow themselves, and what they think is right, filling themselves with the nothing they actually are without God.

Once that choice was made, Angels are forever fixed. Choice? They've already chosen, they simply must do what they must do.

I feel so like an angel. But angels are eternally happy: they made their choice, and now they choose, eternally to be happy with that choice, so I must write this, yes? But perhaps I can choose to be happy writing this.

So, you, being you, must read this, no matter how painful it is to you. So, you can now choose, too.

"God, this hurts. God, it's so true!"

And what do you choose? To deny this? To hate me, the messenger, forever?

Yes, you can choose this.

Do you choose to read this, and, in reading it, to see what's in there that you can take on for yourself and your life?

You know, people have an advantage over angels (besides being able to enjoy gnocchi): angels cannot change, but people can change.

You can change. You can be yourself, and you can change, and still be yourself. You can, you know: you can.

And I really, really don't know if I'm actually a person. Isn't that insane? But I can cop out and say that I'm a selkie and that once I find my skin, I will return to the sea, and this human life I've been faking and have been so sad living, I'll just forget it all, forget you, forget my loves and my sadnesses and swim away to be home again with my sisters.

I can say that. I can cop out. Just like you can cop out, and say, "But I can't change because of ..." because of whatever millstone you are hanging onto so desperately, calling the millstone your unalterable self, when really it's you being drug down by the millstone, and all you have to do is to let it go.

I am so looking into the mirror right now as I write these words, okay?

So, this post.

So, you've taken on me, unsalvageable me. And you put your heart into it, and you've sacrificed everything, your career, your educational prospects, your art, everything, to save me.

And you've watched me. You've watched me start to pull myself out of it, that pit I'm in, and you’ve been so proud and pleased with the progress you’ve seen in me. You know I’ve been pulling myself out, but, even if you refuse to admit it, even especially to yourself, you know you've had a hand in it, and if you looked at the past year objectively, you know you've had more than a hand in it, that you actually caused this to happen. That, really, if you weren't there, I would have been dead. Several times. By my own hand through suicide directly or through an accidental death from alcohol or drugs or just plain self-absorption as I'm crossing the street and *WHAMMO* truck and no more 'phfina.

How do I know this? Oh, come on, you know this, and I know it, too.

So, but now we're at this point, and I've started to come out of it, and I'm starting to express joy again and starting to write again and starting to relate to the world as the world and not this big scary place that I have to hide from.

And there's just so much to do, right? You have so much in me you see that if I just come out of myself just a little bit more, I can start to breathe again and to enjoy life, not fight it or be afraid of it, and you've got things planned, right? Like going on a hike on a mountain trail, even though I've never been outside, but you know it'll do me good. Or a trip to the mall to buy some mentionable and unmentionable clothes, 'cause you know that clothes make the girl and you know I would just see me in a whole new way if I tried on this kind of dress or, hell, a black pants-suit that you've seen executive vice presidents wear.

And so you're making our morning coffee, just so pleased at how far I've come, and just so excited about what is to come for me, for my life, and for us.

And then I drop the bomb.

I get up, and I look at you, and suddenly the firm foundation you had been laying is gone, because you hear the words I'm saying as I say them.

"We're done. We're through. I can't take this any more. I'm gone."

And that's it. I get up. I leave. I'm gone. Forever.

What the hell just happened?

Shocking, isn't it, when that happens. Totally out of the blue. And WHY?

I mean, like really: why.

Here's some 'why's for you, sweetheart. And I'll ask you to read them, just read them, to survive them, and then hate me. Forever. But see if any of them apply to you (they all do, honey), then see what you are willing to do about them.

Then read the second part. I mean really read it. I mean, like, recover what I've said to you, killing you with my every word, then come back here, and see what's really going on. You might miss it, but I'll ask you not to. I'm asking you to read this next part, take responsibility for it, then read the next part, and ... take responsibility for it (my irresponsibility), as well.

You are either everything here, as you've always been, or you're copping out.

Which one can you live with?

Part one: it's all your fault

So, really, you are as blind as a bat, you know that? Selfish and cruel.

I mean, not seeing this moment coming from a mile away?

What did you think? You think you owned me? We may have signed a piece of paper stating that, but did you really think that you own me?

Yes, you do. You think you're entitled to my heart, soul and body. Sure, you've given up your life for me, so as to save me.

What rights does that confer onto you?

Not a fucking thing. Not one single thing from me can you assume to have or to own.

Listen, sweetie, I'm a human being. I'm not your cat. I'm not your dog. I'm not your human slave.

And, sure, I'm not scrubbing your floors and providing my tongue for whenever your pussy has a tingle that needs tending to ...

... but.

But, look, I can wipe my cheek when I have food there, you don't need to reach across the table to do that. In a fucking public restaurant!

But, look, you don't have to present me in group as 'Well, she has some issues that we're working through, and she can't afford the full payment right now, but we'll find some way to get her into this session because it will really help her with her problems.' (Somebody actually said that. While I was standing right fucking there. As if I didn't exist, or had any feelings about what was being said. Just like what you write to me about me in your PMs.)

But, look, I know what I need to do when I have a headache. I know that ibuprofen exists, I know where the glasses are and how to fill them with water. I know where the bed is and how to turn down the sheets.

But, look, I know what opinions to have about my mother, your mother, that girl over there giving me the more-than-once over, my dad, current political views, what I should be doing for work or for getting my next chapter out, what I shouldn't be doing to get those things done.

But, look, I know what to say about myself and I know what not to say.

Do you know that?

No, you sure don't, not judging from the past year in how you've treated me like a baby, not judging from your PMs where you say, oh:

1. Are you a 40-year-old man who's a sexual deviant?
2. Are you really who you write? ...
... or more insidiously, 'if you're really who you write, then I care about you.'
3. People can't be trusted on the 'net, and oh, by the way, my gf asked me to ask you if you only wear white socks?

And then after all that hate wrapped up in mistrust comes at me from you ...

Look I'm on a roll, but I have to stop right here and let you know one little detail.

You fucking came to me. I didn't know you, any of you, at all! You read me; you felt something for me, then you reached out to me, and you have the gall to write that you don't trust me?

Here's a piece of advice for you. It's free, too. Go back and play with all your other god-damn friends if you don't trust me.

Oh, wait. You don't have any other friends? And I'm not talking acquaintances, I'm talking friends who know you and love you for you, who you actually are?

Wonder why.

Wonder if it's because you don't just mistrust me, you mistrust everybody, and you choose to lash out at me because I'm this weak, little, vulnerable baby girl who puts her heart on the line with every line she writes and you have the gall to say 'well, if you are who you say you are, then ...'

Just get present to that. Just get present to the fact that you came to me, and then you shit all over me with your mistrust and your advice as to how to live my live when I've done that for 22 years already, thank you.

Just get present to what a fucking cunt you are. Really.

Are you present to it?

No.

Because you also come to me on the other side of mistrust.

"Tell me more about you." "There's so much you don't say" "I really wish I knew you." "You don't open up all all."

Oh, really?

Pop quiz.

You know what my favorite food to make is.

What is your mother's favorite food?

You know where I've come from and where I'm now living.

What other fan-fiction author(ess) do you know this about?

You know what job I'm working at. You know how I interact with customers. You know how my day starts and ends.

Who else do you know this about? Do you even know this about your roommates?

You know I go to group. You know my triumphs and tragedies there.

What are the extra-curricular activities of someone you know ITRW? What are their triumphs and tribulations in those activities?

You know the names of the string of my prior girlfriends.

Name the names of the girlfriends of your girlfriends. Name the names of your prior girlfriends. Hard, isn't it, going over those memories. Who have you told? Anybody?

You know that I'm a lesbian, and I'm out to my immediate family, and out to you, but not to my extended family, coworkers (there are some who suspect) and customers.

Who are you out to? Who are your friends out to?

You know, reading my stories, PMs and entries, what I struggle with, every day: me. Me-me-me. And happiness. And joy. And despair. And fear. And self-loathing so great it makes you flinch, right?

What are you struggling with? What is your boss struggling with? What is your mom struggling with? What is that girl you hate so much struggling with?

You know how old I am. You know my family relations, and how I relate to them.

ANY other fan fiction writer, or book writer, or anybody you can say that about?

Bonus question: Why do you say that I withhold, when I've told you more about myself than you've told anybody else in your life? And when I've told you more than you know than from anybody else in your life? Why do you keep needing more from me, after I've given my all ... and more ... what does that say about you, this mistrust coupled with this neediness?

I dare you to ask yourself these questions, and to answer them fully before you get on another kick about needing to know more about me, and I'm not giving it to you (the fucking nerve!) and since I'm not, I'm not trustworthy?!?!

Excuse me, have you read one of my stories, or PMs, or entries?

Thanks for that.

Fuck you, too.

...

I'm gone

So, back on topic. So you're clueless as to why I would say 'I'm gone,' with all that mistrust of me that you've poured all over me.

AND.

And then you go into telling me what I should say or what I shouldn't. Who I should have as a gf and who I shouldn't. Who I can see at a restaurant for dinner and who I shouldn't. What I should do while I'm feeling sick and what I shouldn't. Who I should live with (you) and who I shouldn't, and why, and how you will be so much more awesome than people I picked to be with, that, by the way, honey, includes you.

And, oh, after all these diatribes, why am I not writing anymore, and I must be so unhappy.

Yeah, thanks for that.

So, you really didn't see this coming. You really didn't see me cringe when you wipe my cheek from across the table. You really didn't see me check out when you started into your 'Well, 'phfina, it's nice that your mother ...' or 'Well, 'phfina, I really think you shouldn't ...' that last for, God!, 27 minutes, and please can you just finish, I already said, you're right, so why are you going on about this?

You know why you didn't see this coming?

Because you forgot.

You forgot I'm a human being, not a doormat to walk over or a leaky faucet to fix or a baby that needs her diapers changed and your mommies to suck on for sustenance.

And you had the right. You had the right to me, and to the rest of my life and yours. I'm yours forever, and you've planned your whole life around that: me and you, and you and me, and you forgot to consult me about that future.

Don't believe me? I can fucking send your PMs back to you and highlight the parts where you did this, whether my name's 'phfina, Violet, Melissa, B_ or F_.

You treat me as if the only reason I exist is for your happiness.

And then I go and leave you.

So, wait a minute. Let's review here, and add more salt to the wound.

What are you for? I mean: why do you exist?

Didn't you set out to set me free from my addictions and my self-hatred?

Didn't you see me improve? And I mean 'improve' as is improve so much that I started going back to school, that I started writing again, that I started painting or I got a job that I love and hate but I'm doing and that I'm fulfilled in, that I started texting and calling friends and family again?

Didn't you see this?

And so, when I said, 'we're through' ... well, isn't the appropriate response: YAY! LET'S HAVE A PARTY!

A coming out or a coming back party for me, because I made it, I finally made it?

Isn't that the appropriate response?

Let me tell you your response. You told me it already, haven't you?

Your response?

"This is so unfair! I gave my life/career for you! You can't do this! After all I've done, I deserve a little (like for the rest of my life) gratitude!"

So, instead of us coming to completion, both of us happy that we both did something: we saved a life: mine. Instead of that, you turn cold, or you kick and scream and break plates and grab hold of my ankles as I'm walking out the door.

Or you throw me out of the house.

"Get the hell out of here! I hate you! I never want to see you again! You are a selfish, needy bitch who has no appreciation or has no idea what friendship is, you ungrateful bitch! I'm done with you! Don't you ever come back to me again! You get hooked in your addictions again, and I hope you die! I'll come to your funeral and laugh! No, I won't come to your funeral and you'll be sorry then!"

This is you. This is what it's like to be living with you. And this is what it's like to leave you.

This is you.

"But I'm not domineering! I'm not draconian!" (I've actually been told that.)

Okay, so what are you then? Are you a person who actually loves? who actually listens? who actually hears the words she's saying to me, because she looks, hard, into the mirror as she says them, and know these words are loving and caring and empowering?

Newsflash: if you see yourself that way ... well: you are so fucking blind, okay?

So you have to own this. I left you. Or I never accepted your offer for help. And it's your own damn fault.

And that's the good news.

Do you understand me? If you own that that's the way you are ... and you choose to be that way ... then you can own that you can choose to be any other way that you so choose. "I'm draconian, AND I choose not to shit all over 'phfina in what I say or how I control her, instead I choose to love, to listen, and to let her be her and to stand for her being her is the best, brightest, most beautiful person I will ever know in the whole world."

Do you know how hard I am crying as I write this?

And if you choose to own that, then you can choose to celebrate it when I say, 'You know, what you just said to me is so rude.'

Instead of saying, 'I'm not rude; you're just sensitive ... (and then you whisper to yourself) and (more than a little) imbalanced.' You would say, 'Wow! Wow, yeah: if somebody said what I just said to you, so thoughtlessly, I would just go off on them or hold a pity-party for weeks! I'm sorry, honey, forgive me, okay? You are really X, that's how I see you, and please catch me when I start talking meanly like that.'

AND YES, I'm a sensitive, more than a little imbalanced girl who can't take care of herself. AND you said those things to me how? Thoughtfully? With love? So that I would be empowered?

So, yes, it's hard, for a human being (you) to talk with a human being (me).

And you have, for the past year, so utterly failed in even grasping at trying to see how hard it is. You've just made your pronouncements at me, like I'm a microphone, and nothing else, and expected that there's no other way than your way. What views do I have? Have you asked me?

"Oh, 'phfina, I mistrust you because you're obviously not who you say you are, who could be that brutally honest, so there, and who writes stuff that so drew me to you, and I don't trust myself, nor you, so I have a test for you: do you only wear white socks, and depending on how you answer that will be the measure of my trust for you, so what do you think about me shitting all over you so thoughtlessly?"

Read that. Read that out loud, and hear the utter absurdity in what you're saying.

Now, go back to your PMs and read what you've written to me, your pronouncements about me, about yourself ('I'm not a writer like you' 'My reviews are repetitive and suck' 'I'll never be able to open up about things like you'), about the world, about time, about anything, about your gf, about your gf's bf ... about your ability to help a person in need, about your mother, about how your mother raised you.

Just go back and review what you said to me. Just go back and review what you say to anybody.

And you wonder why I say, after you've coddled, controlled, and criticized me, that 'We're through.'

You are so fucking blind.

Do you know there are people who have never done that: judged me nor mistrusted me? There're really smart, too, just like you, so you can't use the 'I'm smart so I'm critical' excuse that I'm so comfortable using.

They chose just to believe me and to believe in me, and not put me through tests nor demand my trust, not to require things from me but to ask for them and to be okay with my sometimes no?

Newsflash: you didn't get a PM from me saying ... fuck it: I'll tell you them now.

Saga. Julia. massrié.

And then some of you have the temerity to judge Saga, for example, to envy her, to compare yourselves favorably to her, when she's never done to me what you have done, or written those mistrustful, needy words you've written? Or to give up on massrié or to distance yourselves from her? Or to say, 'oh, I so know how to fix you 'cause the last girl I fixed left me and I curse her name forever!'

Nice.

And: look in the fucking mirror.

Now, don't take away from this that you are bad, wrong, less than or not loved.

I love you.

AND you are doing these things that are off-putting and that actually push people away. Me, and your exes.

You choose to continue to do this? Well, you'll keep getting the same results you've been getting.

I know.

So this entry isn't for them, unless they choose to make it be for them. This entry is for you.

This entry is especially for you, and why? Because I love you with my whole heart, and mind, and strength, and spirit, and soul.

Don't you see that?

Don't you see that I love you?

...

So, have you hung in there? Survived this onslaught?

Good, 'cause now it gets much worse.

Brace yourself.

Part II: You absolve yourself from 'it's all my fault'

SO NOW you say, when I'm going:

"Oh, okay, well ... have a nice life."

Okay. Wait a minute. Wait just a fucking minute. Weren't you the one to see that I'm in the shit? And that everything I'm doing is only digging myself deeper into the cesspool?

And I say 'I can't take this anymore'? And you're like, 'Okay'?

Sell out. Wuss.

And haven't I said this, in one way or another, every single day we've been together? 'This is too hard' 'I can't do this' 'You can't do this to me.' 'I hate this.' 'I hate life.' 'I hate myself.' 'I HATE YOU!'

And the whole time, you were like, 'Yes, dear, it's okay, it's gonna be okay,' as you held me through my panic attack or drug withdrawal or whatever.

Don't you remember you? That strong person who could take anything thrown her way from me, from the insurance companies, from the police, from neighbors?

Remember?

No, you don't. Because before, you were like, 'she's just saying that, she's out of control, she doesn't mean that meanly, I'm strong enough to carry her and to carry me through this attack.'

Now, it's personal.

Why?

What shifted?

Honey, nothing did. Not on my side.

I just said, 'We're done. We're through. I can't stand this/you anymore.'

But this time you chose to believe the words I'm saying.

Don't you see these are insane words from an insane person?

Do you know: I've really said this. I mean, haven't you read 'Rosalie and Me'? Remember what I told Julia?

I do.

Like it was yesterday.

I also remember what I was doing when I told her these words.

I was begging.

I was begging silently.

'Please-o-please-o-please-o-please don't believe me. Please don't let me leave you. Please try one more time to break through to me. Please don't try, please actually do stop me at the door. Please.

Please.'

And she let me go out that door, me being so cool, trying to hold it all together until I could get to my little red corola and then where I would bawl my eyes out as I'm driving on the most dangerous highway in the U.S.A. to get home to my mom's?

And you're letting me go because I'm a selfish, stuck-up, needy little bitch who just said those words?

Newsflash: I've always been a selfish, stuck-up, needy little bitch and you, before, chose to see the good in me that was there. And you brought it out of me.

And you're letting me go back out into the world, knowing I'm those things, knowing I have my addictions that you helped me to recover from, and now with you not in the picture anymore what am I going to go right back to?

But I say I'm cured now and I'm done with you.

And you are so done with me.

You are so done with me, that when I come back, crawling on my hands and knees, or my mother calls you and says I have fallen deeper into depression.

You say, 'Tough cookies' and throw a party with your friends to delight in my misery, and you start scanning the obituary pages, with glee to find my name there.

And you know.

You know that you caused my coming back to myself.

And you know.

You know that you sold out on me, but, more importantly, you sold out on yourself. You know this.

How do I know you know this?

"Oh, 'phfina, I am so over you."

Yeah? Why do I keep coming up in conversations with any and everybody you meet? Why do you keep going over all the things you've done for me? And my ingratitude? Why did you wallow for upwards of a year after I left you, then the rest of your life is spent explaining and justifying why you are in the right and I am just a thoughtless little cunt that you committed to rescuing (hm, you committed to rescuing me because why? Because I'm a cunt? Or because you saw that there was something and somebody to rescue?)

You not only believed me, and were so fucking blind to everything in you that drove me away, no, you took it one step further and then believed that you have no say in the matter, that you did nothing to effect my salvation so my leaving you will hopefully cause me to die so you can throw a party that there's one less bitch in the world you have to deal with, and serves me right.

You've won.

That's the bad news: you sold out on me, and you've sold out on yourself. I'm 'cured' now, and I'm gone, so you get to win.

I'm 'all better now.' And I may or may not be, but you've accomplished what you've set out to do.

Yay. You win.

AND you get to say, 'well, it's not my fault: she's so needy and greedy, she deserves everything coming to her. I hope they have extra gasoline in hell for her reception.'

Yay. It's not your fault. You win.

Isn't the victory so sweet?

Yeah? So keep living like you're living, you'll keep winning like you've been winning. Even if you change jobs, or change gfs, or change people to fix, you'll keep repeating those wonderful results that has you PMing me with what you're going through right now, which is the fallout of what you choose to ignore and choose to refuse to take responsibility for.

That's all I got for you, sweetie. All I got is this.

Bad news: you win.

And the choice was and is totally yours to make.

p.s. I love you.

So you have met me

... so now you are in trouble.

No, I'm not joking, I am seriously saying: you are so fucked.

Because you've met me.

And I'm not talking me-me, because you're in Ireland or Israel or Indiana but it's obvious that you've met me where you're at, so I'm going to be bold and wrong here and make her me, even though she definitely isn't because you're asking me: 'What do I do?' because I know what it's like to be me ... better than most people, in fact.

And she may have met you, and you are me, so the same applies. So I'm going to be you, even though I'm not.

What the hell am I talking about?

I'm talking about you've met this really smart, strong, sweet, damaged girl, so lost in her (my) addictions, so hurting herself (myself), but you can see beyond all that crap that she's (I'm) salvageable, and so worth it.

Maybe.

And so you want to know what to do.

So I'm going to write her as me, me as her. I'm going to write this in the first person, and I'm going to shock the hell out of your sensibilities, and you are going to crucify me, but you asked, or you're curious about how you might save somebody, so here goes.

Here's what you need to do:

1. run. Say: 'too bad, so sad, I gotta look out for number one, and you aren't taking me down with you. Bye-bye, b!tch and good luck with the rest of your life, which will be, what? ending tonight, right?'

That's exactly what I told myself you should say. I even told you that exactly already, right?

I so know this girl: this me.

So, if you aren't up for brutal honesty, STOP FVCKING READING RIGHT NOW!

Still here? Dummy! (that's what I'm thinking about you, btw, if you don't run)

Okay, so, ... but you're in love with me, obviously, even though you won't admit it to yourself, but I can definitely see it in your PMs, so there's that, and I know it, and I know you know it, even if you won't admit it to yourself, so you're either all in, or your a fvcking pvssy not worth my time (trans: ... no translation, just know the subtext is my self-talk is telling me how bad I am for saying how bad you are).

So, but I have a lot of problems. A lot of problems, right? Like drinking, right? and drugs, right? and other addictions, right? And like you are scared that ... well, you've dealt with people like me before and you know you can't save them and what a drain they are and how they wreck lives and you're scared I'll wreck yours in your attempt to save me.

Bad news: you are right. You are so right.

But you are also so wrong. And what you are wrong about is that you haven't dealt with me. Not at all. And I'm not saying you haven't dealt with me ... no: I'm saying you haven't dealt with me.

No, what you've done is watched me destroy myself from a safe little distance, offering little platitudes about how I shouldn't do this or I should take up that, and then said 'Oh, well,' when I was obstinately determined to destroy myself despite your 'help.'

Your 'help'?

Sell out.

(You haven't left yet? It gets much, much worse! Go. Leave. Now!)

(And don't you fvcking dare lecture or b!tch to me because I fvcking told you to go if you can't handle this.)

Okay, so, you can't run away and save yourself. Oh, well for you, so that means you have to go all in. You have to, AND so do I. And you have to make me agree to that, and that means you HAVE to give up being you.

Give up being you? Yes, you just signed up for saving my life, and that is the full-package deal, so you have to become a person who's not concerned, at all, for her own safety and well-being, you are now strong, and resolved, and powerful, and completely a person who is out to save me and my life, at whatever the cost.

If you don't then you stop short, and you sell out. And I will know the instant you do that, and I will know you know that, too, even if you won't admit it to yourself. So here's what you will do to save me.

2. Save me.

A. Establish the relationship.

That means, ... how do I say this: everything, all of it, is yours.

Why?

Has anything I've done or tried worked? No. I've been working it and fooling myself and getting drunk and getting stoned and copping out, and that works, running away, for a little bit, but then it all comes back in spades. I know it and you know it.

The difference between us is, even though we both know what I need to do, you have the strength to do it. I tell myself I don't.

You own me. All of me.

So tell me: okay, for one week, you are mine, and I'm not going to hurt you (establish a safe word), and everything I do and everything I say is directed to your good, and you can't question it and you can't disobey. One week.

I'll be like: what? And you say: you want kissy-kissy? You want to get your life back, say yes, say yes now.

But, 'phfina, I'm not strong enough to ...

Listen: shut up. You are not you anymore. You are a top, and a top is never tired or unsure or anything. I know. A top is strong, and right, and confident and always knows what's best for her sub.

I may say no. You have to be strong enough to say: okay, no, that means no whining and no angling from you, AND when you reconsider, we can start from there.

DO NOT let me know this is an option ('cause I'll take it and cop out, so say that: 'don't cop out on your life, do this for just one week and then let's see')

Or I'll get sly and try a counter offer, softening the impact. Don't allow this. All in.

Or I'll say yes. Now the work begins.

B. Clean up time.

Every second of every day is now yours, not mine, yours. I don't know that, but you have to, and you have to enforce that.

So, move me in with you. Clean out my appt. Dump all my alcohol down the drain, flush my weed down the toilet. Cold turkey, starting right now. I'll complain of headaches. Tough. Water (not aspirin) helps with that, and recovery's a b!tch, isn't it, 'phfina.

And I'll say I'm not an alcoholic and I'm not a drug addict, and my justifications will be so perfect.

"I haven't had a drink in two days!"

"I only smoke a little bit of weed, I'm totally off meth!"

After all, I am a consummate liar. I lie to myself all the time, and everybody I talk to swallows all the bullsh!t I shovel out all the time without even batting an eyelash.

I know my excuses are bullsh!t, and I know you know they are, too. If you say, 'well, okay ...'

Then I've got you in my addiction, and you've just lost all my respect, and you've just lost all hope of saving me.

All or nothing.

And I may have a roommate and you do, too. So switch roommates. No need to explain, it'll be obvious to everybody, but practice saying: 'she's moving in with me; she's my b!tch now' in front of the mirror and to any stupid face who can't keep their pie-hole closed. That will just shut them up in front of you, and will get them all talking to each other behind your back.

And mark your territory.

It's a lot better if I move in with you, but if that doesn't work, then we should get a new appt, and if that doesn't work, then you have to go through my place with a fine-toothed comb ...

... and mark everything that's mine (that was mine, remember, me, my time, my stuff, my money? All yours now), in front of me, so I know that it's yours.

My time is yours. Every second of every day is yours. That means I don't get a potty break. Why?

Two seconds. Two seconds is all it takes for me to be sitting there, look into my eyes in the mirror and descend into the well deeper than I've even been. If I'm peeing, you're there in the bathroom, or, if in public, you're there in the stall with me.

Does the word "Intervention" ring a bell to anybody now?

My computer is yours. I don't get to use it.

"I have to use it to do my homework!"

Okay, fine, you schedule homework time, and you schedule it precisely. It takes 15 minutes to do the assignment, then I get 15 minutes, not the two hours I say I really need (I am a consummate liar, even to myself). AND you're going to do your homework ... behind me. So that every second you can see my screen.

That's right. The web is off-limits for me.

My time is yours.

My hands are yours, too. And so is my pvssy.

Establish how many times a day I masturbate. Establish when. Then, say: 'sorry, you're not allowed to masturbate this week.'

What?

No, really. Fvcking WHAT?

That's right, baby. You know how I feel when I masturbate? I hate myself. I'm so alone and lonely and it's all my damn fault, and I'm such a fvcking loser AND a sinner and ...

I could almost go on forever about this. And how long has it been since I've had intimacy ... you know, with another person? A soft, warm human being with light and intelligence in her eyes?

Sorry, 'phfina, but those hands are mine now. That pvss is mine, and I am going to be your routine now. To be clear: you are not allowed to cvm unless I'm making you cvm, you are not allowed to touch yourself unless I'm there and I allow it. You are mine.

I may, at this point, after all my liquor's down the drain and all my pot's flushed down the potty and then my kitty is not getting any pats? I may see the extent of this and will desire to balk.

Therefor the time-out corner. "'phfina, it's time-out for you, go sit in your corner for one minute."

And I may really balk. And I may say no.

And that's not our agreement, now is it? and I may say I take it back.

But I'm not me anymore. I'm not mine. I'm yours. I'm your daughter. No, I'm your baby girl. And I just told you no.

Now, okay, you ready for this? I'm not telling you how to raise children. I am telling you how to raise me (you haven't left yet?)

Spank me.

And don't give me those soft little pats you see on spanking vids. No, you're stronger than me (you are the top, you are stronger, even if you aren't. Will is everything), so pull me over your knee, bare my bottom and lean into the spank, with all your might with each smack. Let me know, in no uncertain terms, that rebellion is unacceptable. Keep at it until I really get that message.

And none of this is significant, and none of this is domination. This is love, sweetheart (DO NOT FVCKING B!TCH TO ME!), this is you being strong enough for both of us to save me from destroying myself and dragging you down to hell with me.

I've lost all of you, haven't I?

So, since I've dug my grave, I guess I'll keep going: just talking to myself.

That was the clean up; that was establishing the relationship. That all happened the first day.

3. Now, fvck my brains out.

Yeah, yeah, you say you may not be ready for this level of intimacy, so, what, we're going to play fiddlesticks? Look, I've texted you twenty times if I've texted you once: I want you to fvck me silly, and sure I was so fvcking drunk or wasted, but that doesn't make it any less true, even in jest, so fvcking do that. I mean, I'm NOT going to make the first move. I'm so not. I know where you are in this game, and I know where I am. I take you, it's like ... I don't know, defloration or something, the panthery 'phfina despoiling an innocent girl. You have to make the first move. Really. In every regard.

And I so want you right now. And I so won't ever act on that want. Never. Hurt you? No. Suggest it? Hint at it? Hell ya. But ...

So.

Bed time? Make sure my teeth are brushed and I've taken care of everything, you know? I've cleaned up my messes I've left around (that you haven't let me, as you're with me all the time), and my homework's done, and it's 9 pm or whenever (not much later, ... I stay up late to 'write' or to 'work' or to 'answer PMs' but really just to beat myself up more and I watch p.r.0.n. and masturbate telling myself what a loser I am).

So, we're in bed, get on top, strap on if you want, and fvck me until I'm finished. And 'finished' doesn't mean: 'I've cum once.' Finished means I'm finished, gf. It means I can't go on any more. Even if that's eight cvms; even if that's zero. Finished means my muscles are jelly and I've fainted or my near unconscious, right? Finished means I'm going to be out in the next few seconds.

Then, wrap me in your arms and legs, and DO NOT let me go. If I have to get up to pee, you follow. AND you follow me back to bed after I get a glass of water, then you rewrap me in your arms and legs. When I move in my sleep, I will feel you. When I dream, you'll be in them.

4. And the rest of the week.

Walk me to class. We don't take the same classes, so you walk me to mine, make sure somebody else is in the room before you leave, then hand me my books. That's right, you're carrying my books. Make sure people see that.

"This is my b!tch."

Go to your class, after informing me you'll collect me for my next class.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

When school or work is done, it can get tricky, because you'll be tempted to be you and be tempted to let me be me because you don't know what to do with me, with us.

Honey, there's everything to do with us.

Involve me in your life: I've just joined your soccer team. I don't play soccer. Tough. Coach needs help, though, right? I'm not the in-the-stands wife (b!tch), I'm the game/practice recorder. I'm the ball girl. I'm the water girl. I'm the towel girl. I'm the girl, if I'm not in the field as goalie, or whatever, I'm the girl who makes the game possible.

Meaning I'm involved and busy, helping and being helpful. Wow! That's a new feeling for me.

You don't play soccer. Well, you play bowling. Take me to disco duck pins, right? Or ice skating. Or roller skating. Or cross country.

SOME PHYSICAL OUTDOOR ACTIVITY! A brisk, directed walk around campus (for at least an hour, no joke), for goodness sake!

Daily.

Involve me in your life. Enroll me in a photography class. Enroll yourself, too. DO NOT sit next to me. DO NOT tell me how to take a picture. Let the instructor, who's dumber than you, do that. I'll listen to her for learning. I'm your b!tch, yes, and you're the only one who can save me, yes (because, in my life NOBODY else has ever really tried ... did you catch that?), but you need time to push me out there, engage me with other people, let me know there's a world outside of my head and outside of yours. A whole big world.

Involve me in your life. Bring me to AA group. You're not in AA group? Yes, you are. Now you are. And you're bringing me and I have to participate, because you say so. AND SO DO YOU (what, you think you don't have any addictions? good for you. that's what all addicts tell themselves). You aren't going for me. You're going for you. So fully participate, get what you can for you, really open up and be honest. I'll see that, because I'll be watching, and I'll be so, so proud of you.

Involve me in your life. When you take me that first time that first day, ask me if I still need that shirt.

"Huh?" I'll say.

And you'll rip it off my body, and you'll tell me we're going shopping for clothes tomorrow.

So we go shopping. You don't like shopping? Nor do I. I like my jeans. Tough. You're getting me a new wardrobe. Dresses. Pretty dresses for pretty me.

You know why I dress like this: plain? Because that's what I think of myself.

I'm not pretty. I'm just plain. I'm ...

... I'm not loved so I must be ugly. Inside and out. Inside and out.

That kind of thinking is not allowed anymore. From now on, I have to wear dresses.

So, we get the dresses, and you say how pretty I look in the one I wearing. BECAUSE YOU MEAN IT.

(NEVER, EVER give faint or insincere or belittling or half-hearted compliments) (NEVER, EVER criticize me: I'm already doing that to myself all the time, and I'm just looking for somebody else to agree with me to validate my self-talk).

And I blush, and you say how cute that makes me look, and I blush more.

And I start to get that I am pretty, from the look in your eyes and from the love I see in your heart for me.

And you start to save me.

And, well, there's another reason for me to wear dresses, right? You're still in your jeans. You get to wear what you like, because you're the top.

AND you're packing.

We're at sbux. We go to the bathroom. (I'm not allowed to go alone, remember?)

So we're in there, and so just slam up up against the door or bend me over the sink and fvck me senseless. Make it almost impossible for me not to scream. Go crazy. Make me pee standing up and push it right out of my bladder with your dick in my pvssy and your hand pressing down on my bladder. I may just faint, but oh, well.

And yes: your dick. Own it.

Why? You own me, too.

AND I have been driving you crazy with lust in that dress and my big blinking 'you really think I look pretty?' eyes, haven't I?

Everywhere I am, you are. Everywhere I go, you are present. Mark your territory. Mark me.

Brand me. I am yours. Make it so. Reinforce it at every opportunity.

Involve me in your life. Bring me to the soup kitchen you serve at. You don't? Now you do. Find one. Sign us up, and off we go. We'll put on our aprons and we'll ladle soup or pass out plate or sandwiches, and I'll see what it is to be of service for others in need. I'll see what it is to put my self and my concerns for a while. I'll see other people exist in the world. I'll see other people helping, and getting so much out of that for themselves in doing that.

Every second of every day has to be occupied with you and work or you and school. Every evening has to be an activity: you and AA, you and soccer, you and photo class. Every night I have to be in your arms.

Why?

I cannot have one second alone to my thoughts. I cannot sneak out for a quick fix or to down a can of Coors. Not one second.

And that's the first week.

5. And forever.

You said you wanted to save my life. You know how long that takes. It doesn't take a week. It doesn't take a month or a year.

It takes forever.

Forever.

So, at the end of the week, I'll say, politely, 'Thank you, that was nice' and try to get away, and not bother you any more, and aren't you exhausted? And make any excuse I can.

No. Sorry, 'phfina. You're my b!tch.

So the first week is every week. I agreed to a week. Well, this is a week. Every week is a week. Forever.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

AND start planning out our life together exceptionally. Fly me home to your parents. Fly me home to meet mine. ... more than once a year! Make sure I call my mom. Give me the phone to say hi to yours. Have conversations with my dad (he's actually really friendly). Involve me in conversations with yours.

Involve me in your life.

Save me.

Or don't. Just walk away from me, saying: oh, well, nice girl, but ... too many issues.

I'll totally understand. I'll totally understand.

And I'll die, just a little bit more, or maybe just a lot more.

Questions

Okay, piece of cake, right? Go for it.

Or, not so easy. Any questions?

Oh, look! Every hand went up in the room ... the nearly empty room, that is. Thank you for staying, those of you that did. Yes, your question?

"What if I'm not up for this? What if I'm not the one?"

Good news: you aren't.

More good news. Nobody else is. Nobody else has been, and my future is my past: nobody else will be, unless they choose to step up.

So, you aren't the one. Definitely not.

"But I want to be, 'phfina."

No you don't. People don't do what they don't want. You're not stepping up, because you know you don't want to. It's just not safe, and you know it. Go live your safe little life, it works great for you, and it'll work great for me. Read about me in the papers ... you can flip back to the obits and know I died because you didn't step up. Congratulations.

Or you can read about that book I published when a real girl did step up and then you can say to yourself, 'well, I wanted to be the one, and I would've been with 'phfina at all those book signings across the country and then the world.'

J.K. Rowling, anyone? Helen DeWitt? Somebody was the one for them. And they were on a crash course with death or just barely surviving. Until somebody gave them a basement to live in and get their lives back.

Hm.

"So how do I be the one?"

Declare it. That simple. "I declare I am the one. 'phfina is going to live. 'phfina is going to be great. I am going to be there with her in her greatness."

Or like that. Whatever you see.

Declare it, and then do it. Every second of every day. ESPECIALLY when you don't want to. ESPECIALLY when I am a back-biting b!tch, lashing out at you as you are saving my life.

Next question. Yes, you in the corner.

"What if you're not the one for me?"

Good news: I'm not.

Plenty of fish in the sea.

Any like me? Any at all? Any others catch your eye? You want plainer? You want less interesting?

Go live your compromised life.

I'm not the one. I'll NEVER meet your demands or expectations, as reasonable as they are. No, ESPECIALLY your reasonable expectations.

Girl, I'm insane. I am all-out nuts. 'Reasonable'? BLECH! I'm not reasonable! I'm passionate and artistic and demanding and b!tch and I don't have one ounce of reasonableness in me.

I'm SO not the one for you. I don't fit into any mold and if I did, I'd fvcking bang at it until I broke my hands and forehead. DON'T YOU FVCKING put me into your little 'oh, she's gotta be like this for me to love her, for her to be the one' mold.

You're interested and fascinated me because I'm a LIVING BREATHING human being, fighting with all my might to kill myself because I can't stand this bland little colorless life. I want to LIVE and I want to be ALIVE while I'm living and I don't want to fit into any little petty normal reasonable size or shape.

I'm SO not the one. ESPECIALLY if you're not sure about that. GOD! Will I smell that.

I'm not the one. Unless ...

Unless you declare it.

"'phfina, exactly as she is, exactly as she isn't. She's the one for me. Her, and no other. Her. Only her. Not my thoughts of who she is, not my expectations. Just her. Every second. Just like she is. Just what she isn't. Her. 'phfina. She's the one."

If you declare that, and be that, then, isn't it obvious I'm the one? And if you ask, 'what if you're not the one?' isn't it obvious I can't possibly measure up in any way. You'll come up with a test that I will fail. I'm human. Let me be human, please, let me be me, and not be the person who you think I am or who you need me to be.

Next question.

"But ... 'phfina, you make it sound so pat and so easy. It's not."

What's your question.

"Well, a girl I was helping, well, she killed herself."

I am sorry. Yes. I will kill myself.

Do you get it? People will do what people will do, no matter what. You tried. You tried to save me. You failed. But nobody else did. You were my only hope in my whole life, and still I killed myself.

But you tried. No. You did. You did everything you could. For me. Selflessly.

Consolation?

For me? Yes. You were my only friend. The only person who ever reached out to me as I fell off the edge. I'm sorry I wasn't strong enough for me, and for you. I'm sorry.

We don't win every time. But you did what you could. Nobody else in the world did. You did.

You did.

Yes?

"Well, okay, so this girl, well, how can I stop her from buying from her dealer and how can I stop her from ..."

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what to do. I can't buy stuff if I don't have cash because I don't have my ATM card. It's not my ATM card. It's yours now. I had to surrender that my first day. AND I'm on your allowance with YOUR money, that's in YOUR bank account (in my name). I can't call my dealer with YOUR cell phone that I gave you the first day.

And, well, you're the top, right? Remember what I told you to practice? Bring me with you to the dealer and now say it out loud.

"Excuse me, 'phfina's my b!tch now, so you just have to find another customer."

Etc. You know what to do. You just have to be strong enough to do it.

"But this is like total domination and mind control and just so against societal norms and ..."

Yeah, this is an intervention. I don't have a life now, I'm just destroying it. You're stopping that self-destruction. And, bit by bit, week after week, I get my life back, first, under supervision ("here's my card that you can use to withdraw your allowance") and then, eventually, over time ... still under supervision.

Once an addict, always an addict. You're just recovering, you know? Not 'cured.'

And, but, eventually, I'll get more than my life back, I'll get my self back, and I'll start to create, and to have fun, and to be joyful, and ...

... and you'll be there for all that.

"But you're telling me to spank this girl and fvck her and ..."

Yeah, right, whatevs. She's not me. I get it. So you're not going to do this exactly, maybe not even close. I also get you know already exactly everything what needs to be done, and you just don't have the guts to go all the fvcking way, including taking responsibility for her entire life, with you and with the rest of the world, because you know she hasn't. In every way. In every aspect. You know what you need to do. You know when she talks about her mom she needs to call her, so pick up her fvcking cell (your fvcking cell) dial her mom and hand her the phone. You know when she smells of pot, you know you need to clean it out and clean her up. You know she's not disciplining herself, so you have to. You know it all.

Now, do it. All of it. Set and make a doctor's appointment. Take her to the farmer's market. Keep her out of her head and her eyes focused on you, on life, on living. Go fly a kite with her.

"But it's not easy."

No, it's not, and it never will be.

*shrugs*

No, it's not, and it never will be.

Look, it's going to be hard at the beginning. A lot of work. Really hard, and I'm going to fight you tooth and nail, and I'm going to fight you dirty. "You can't do this!" "This is against the law!" and on and on and on.

And then, later, I'm going to get really mean. I'm going to use everything against you. When I'm weak, I'm going to lash out.

"You're not out to your mother?" I'll ask you a year later. "Why? Don't you respect her?"

"You're not really all that smart, are you?" I'll ask when you say something.

And I'll get metaphysical on your @$$, and I'll dig into your writing, even the ones you had published under an alias, because I'm smart like that, so I'll find your writings on literotica or on Kristen's archives or wherever, and I'll so use your words against you. Kindly. I'll kill you kindly. And meanly. And so, so hurtfully.

And you'll wish you had never opened up to me.

And that.

So, go find your nice, bland, perfect girlfriend with no problems who makes no waves elsewhere and doesn't cause you any pain, trouble or heartache.

Go marry Mr. Right.

*ouch* That just really, really hurt, saying that.

And I will totally, totally be so happy that you made right choice. I will. I really, really will.

And, good news, you won't have to identify me at the coroner's office, like the girl who did end up being stuck with me will have to, and you won't have to clean up the mess I've made with my life, again, and you won't be crying and crying and crying at night, being so tired because you have to be so strong for yourself to be strong enough to carry me through the day, and you won't ...

Like that. You don't need me in your life, so please just go. I've told you that already.

But if you stay, I've got nothing to give you, except heartbreak, and sadness, and fury, and anger, and disappointment.

And you've got nothing to give me, because I know it all already, and I've heard it all from the psychiatrists and psychologists, and I've 'yeah, uh-huh'ed them already, when I was a 'good little girl' and wasn't screaming in their bland, dispassionate, bored, perfectly understanding faces as I cried my heart, life and hope out on these oh-so-professional 'caregivers.'

Am I worth it?

Obvious answer: no. Definitely not. Too much work. A waste of a human life.

Am I worth it?

'Don't, don't go away!' is that what you want to hear me say?

I won't say that. My stupid, stupid pride and hopelessness will never let me say that. You'll never hear me say that. But can't you see it in every fiber of my being?

Am I worth it?

I'm sorry. I'm not. I'm worthless. Don't you see that's how I see myself?

Am I worth it?

Only you, right here, right now, can answer that question for me.

I'm sorry, it's kind of an all or nothing question. That's the breaks when you're dealing with me. I'm sorry.

Why do I apologize so much? That's another entry. But, in brief: you've met me.

You are so fvcked.

Don't believe me? Those of you who've interacted with me for any length of time? Remember that PM? Yeah, that PM, and I so, so hurt you? You know? Personally? Viciously? And why? Because I love you. And I told you that hurtful, hurtful thing, and I'd rather drink arsenic then press send on the PM, but I saw you being me ... and well, I lashed out, and you got hurt. And now you've met me in Idaho or India or Istanbul, and you want to know if I'm worth it?

Haha. Hoho. Hehe.

*sigh*

Well, it was nice meeting you. Enjoy your latte and have a nice day.

'phfina's plastic friendly smile is so smoothly in place, but is there a hint of wistfulness to it? Nah.