(cont.)
As to how I knew he was lurking the Facebook world,
I was watching his little chat availability icon. When green, the little dot means a person has been actively using the site within the last five minutes. So I was sitting there, noticing that it was 4:30 in the morning and he was online...and I yearned to talk to him. It had been two months, two of the most painful months I'd ever experienced. I thought it but a fluke he hadn't de-friended me. I was sure that if I made my Facebook presence too conspicuous, he might do just that.
But I grew more confident that he knew I was still his Facebook friend at least and hadn't deleted me yet, so...I published status updates, vague stuff like movies I'd enjoyed. Or maybe it was just my commenting on a picture a mutual friend had posted on my wall...basically, I was just more Facebook active than usual.
Once, he posted that he wanted to start an organization for ending unnecessary anger and bitterness. Who would join him? He got like 19 likes on that, but it made me laugh.
After he messaged me that one night and I went over, he referenced parts of the stuff I'd been posting, and I suppose that was what tipped me off to the notion he'd been following me to some extent, with which some hidden sense of mine I'd suspected all along. Despite his cruel, absolute silence.
He confided in me today.
"I'm just a dick all the time, but I don't understand it," he says earnestly. "I don't even know I'm being a dick-well, yeah, I do know. Cuz I'm a dick all the time, it's true."
And, "Normal people, they don't have to learn how to talk, you know? I mean obviously I can talk, I just can't...."
"communicate?" I pipe in helpfully.
He has this thing, tells me I think too hard all the time. Which doesn't make sense to me really, but it is easier just to let him talk. "in order to understand me, you have to stop thinking about it. Once you start thinking about trying to understand me, you've already got it wrong. Just stop trying."
Hmm. He's so strange. A few nights ago I was at his house. I'd smoked this stuff called spice with him and was not enjoying myself, it was too strange for me, I squirmed. His attempt to comfort me was possibly well intentioned...but backhanded.
He said some things that were a bit insulting, but as if they were nice things to say. And all the while I am not sure if he is mocking me, or trying to be mean, or failing at being nice....
I feel weird about it and so I ask him about it the next day, expecting him to get angry as he has dealing with confrontation in the past.
But instead he apologizes profusely and says he thought he was saying only nice things (really? Is he lying? Still not sure) and he is so fucked up and mean and sorry. And, he says, last night he finally felt "sane and clearheaded"...he asks,
what am I? But I don't offer any opinions on the matter...poor boy, he is so confused.
He has this trail of girls that he leaves behind him. Many of them are excellent friends of mine. Actually, he picks the most fascinating people as friends. Truly, we are an odd tangle of social incestuous-ness, and he is at the center. A week ago, an old friend of mine stopped talking to me because after those two months of his silence and her consoling me, I went back to hanging out with him (to be fair though, I never lied about that to her)
"he is the Villain in my life, and you are supposed to be my Sidekick," she laments.
"that's so black and white," I say "there's grey in the world. Things aren't just useful or worthless, good or bad. Yes, he is an ass, he is crazy, but it's all a balancing game. If I didn't get something out of it, we wouldn't still be friends."
But she is stone cold, immovable on this. I think sociopath boy is quite complex, and rare, and fantastic. She thinks he is evil and why consort with evil things? It is not black and white, but there are people you'll never be able to explain this to.