Hear/Say

…and it’s a curious thing, because of his affairs with these three distinct woman must have a kind of connection: bashful moments turned passionate by a clever phrase, a certain male posturing that baited their carefully poised coyness and burdened the flutter of their usually weightless wings. They can’t possibly play both parts; but they try. They try to avoid being just a notch or a good laugh, a fast act. A cool facade fails to hide their conflicted passion, and they become quick to defend and awkward to dismiss. He, on the other hand, seems to float effortlessly, spontaneously, without a retrospective glance backwards to confirm who he is with the first, second, or third. And to me, a quiet spectator of his sport through gossip, hearsay, whispered words pushed through mouth corners and squeezed through teeth, I see him as a caricature of life. A great player in the proverbial game, as he is probably the stereotypical all star on any team– and these ladies, who fancy a fantasy where their mere beauty and well-manicured girlishness can capture him and make him theirs…

A strange feeling of distraught came over me as I sink into the plot. And what for? I ask myself how it affects me at all. It shouldn’t, reason follows; but the knot of terror rolls over and ties itself once more. There is something bigger about being a witness to these silly romances that troubles me, and I don’t know how to express it.

Graceee