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[abrightboy]

This is Bright. Leave a message.

Comments

[pharadyne]

I've never heard of the Admiral demoting a Warden over that. Although I don't know anyone who's done it, either. I did offer my inmate a blowjob, but he declined.

I still don't see why sex should be presumed to automatically add a fraught emotional dimension. Or an emotional dimension at all. Friendship has emotions. Sex is just a physical act. I've had sex with people I don't even like very much.

[abrightboy]

Which you should probably examine; you did point out that you use it to manipulate people, as well.

[pharadyne]

I don't think there's much to examine there. You encourage someone to want something, then you give it to them so they get a taste for it, and once you've established yourself as the source of the thing they want, they're inclined to do favours for you to keep getting it. [Very romantic.]

Or sometimes a terrible person is just hot. Or it can mollify a bad situation. There's lots of reasons to have sex with someone I don't like.

[abrightboy]

All of which are excuses to avoid emotional intimacy.

[pharadyne]

Why would I want emotional intimacy with someone I charver and don't like?

[abrightboy]

You wouldn’t. That’s why doing them is a sure fire way to avoid emotional intimacy.

[pharadyne]

Oh I see what you mean!

Well. Yes. Is that a problem?

[abrightboy]

It depends. Obviously you do it to protect yourself and that served you at your old job. And you graduated just fine. But, at the same time… do you really not want to ever be close to anyone? That’s so lonely.

[pharadyne]

I can be close to people. Some people. [It's a work in progress.] Just not everyone I have sex with.

[abrightboy]

I wouldn’t recommend it with everyone you have sex with. We’re talking about sex as part of intimacy, though. With someone.

[pharadyne]

Why can't intimacy and sex just be separate things? Part of the reason I developed a bit of a pash for you back when I did was because you turned me down. [People who like him but don't want him feel safer, on the whole, more trustworthy. With a few rare exceptions.]

[abrightboy]

I think getting to know each other and trust each other first is a good start. But if I hadn’t gotten together with Will, we would have done it eventually. We were definitely working up to it. Would you have… had less of a ‘pash’ after that?

[pharadyne]

I don't know. Difficult to predict what didn't happen. In the past, with other people, I've had it go both ways. Sometimes it's wonderful and I feel very close, and sometimes it creates a distance in me that wasn't there before. The opposite of intimacy.

Are you still attracted to me, even though you're with Will? [Since Malcolm's asking blunt and probing questions, Norton thinks turn about is fair play.]

[abrightboy]

Of course I am. You’re a great person and good looking, too.

[pharadyne]

I am, aren't I. But despite that being objectively true, not everyone is attracted to me.

Why did you choose Will? And not just why you like him, you're obviously well suited to each other, but since you're the sort who only choses one person, how did you decide to chose him? I was in the offing, and Neal would have waited for you until he graduated if you'd asked. Was it the timing, the circumstances, something else entirely?

[abrightboy]

I... you have to understand that I've never been in a position to have one person who wants me to choose them before. And I didn't know any of you were... interested like that. I didn't expect... Anyway, Will came to me one night and confessed. And so... I guess timing? He told me plainly and... when I thought about it, I felt that way too, but... I just... I guess up to that point I didn't think it mattered what I felt. What I felt has never panned out before. But if all three of you told me at the same time and I had to choose with all the information? I don't... really know what I would have done. I don't have tools for that. And I wouldn't want to lose you or Neal. I was... worried I had right after I told you.

[pharadyne]

The snogging wasn't a clue?

Golly, all three of us lined up would have been like the bloody Judgement of Paris. Trojan War on the horizon.

[abrightboy]

Neal only did it the once, right after a breakthrough in counselling. And you do that with people you don’t have feelings for all the time. So. No. Not so much.

[pharadyne]

Point taken.

Just as well, maybe. I don't think you'd have been very happy with me, in the long run.

[abrightboy]

Why not? I like you a lot.

[pharadyne]

I think eventually you'd want more stability than I have in me to provide. Will might be a teensy bit nutters but he's solid. I don't think it's quite in my nature to be anyone's "home."

[And he sounds sad about that, wishes it could be otherwise. Although at least Neal's plan, that Raylan will be his home and Norton will flit about as his usual capricious self and always have a place, has reassured him that he won't lose Neal over it. Neal's found a way to have it all.]

[abrightboy]

Because you don’t want to be or because you’re afraid of how much responsibility that sounds like?

[It’s not pointed or judgemental; he’s sincerely asking.]

[pharadyne]

Neither. It's just what I am. Everyone says so.

[abrightboy]

'Everyone' doesn't get to decide what you are. I don't think that's what you are. But I think you're really good at hiding what you are. You fooled me for a while.

[pharadyne]

What do you think I am?

[As he says it, he thinks it's maybe not wise to ask a profiler that question, but too late now.]