hierophany | INBOX (noctium)

[This response doesn't come for a long time, comparatively speaking.]

I can't decide whether I'm impressed or annoyed with how concisely you've summed up all the reasons why I would dislike it.

But you're the same, aren't you? You were looking for someone to have relations with that you could immediately cut out of your life, so as not to be exposed to their judgment afterward.

You are more impressed than annoyed, but being more impressed than annoyed makes you annoyed with yourself, because you'd prefer to be annoyed. So there is, technically, more annoyance than awe. But a not-insignificant amount of that annoyance is with yourself.

That was just an incredibly specific guess. But I've weighed the risks of humiliation for being wrong over how funny it would be to be correct.

I am the same. It's very inconvenient, being aware that you can minimise your vulnerability. Because then you always do it, and then you assume that your partner is always doing it and now you have a version of the prisoners' dilemma where both parties choosing the objectively correct option leads to unsatisfying sex.

If you're going to narrate my perspective in that manner, you could at least indicate the directions of the available exits and what I have in my inventory.

It also annoys me that you're more brave than I am. Even now you don't even know my name. I'm still just like Hierophant-kun, hiding behind identities and characters that suit me because I don't want to be seen.

I can't even enjoy the satisfaction of being melodramatic about safeguarding my feelings with a desire for anonymity, or anything like that. I don't know why I'm like this. I just don't want to.

You are COMMUNICATING WITH A FRIEND. In your phone's contact list, they are listed as '🌺', chosen for no particular symbolic meaning, just for being a cute symbol that is not a cherry blossom. This places them at the top, as symbols are sorted above alphanumerical characters.

You possess PROFILE DATA on 🌺.

In your inventory, you have:

-UNSOLICITED PSYCHOANALYSIS
-INCREDIBLY INAPPROPRIATE QUESTION, FOLLOWED BY UNSOLICITED ADVICE
-SERIES OF PICTURES OF CATS CAPTIONNED WITH PHRASES THAT HUMANISE THEM IN ENTERTAINING WAYS BUT THAT PROBABLY DO NOT REFLECT THE TRUE FEELINGS OF THE CATS

Exits are OFF BUTTON and TURN OFF MESSENGER AND PLAY GAMES INSTEAD

I examine the PROFILE DATA.

Following that, I use the INCREDIBLY INAPPROPRIATE QUESTION.

PROFILE DATA: 🌺

🌺 is a female who you assume to be in her late teens. Her favourite tarot card is the Star.

She values the truth above all else, and in her dedication to keep it sacrosanct she will not allow herself to accept even her own preconceptions as truth in the face of opposing evidence. As a result of her willingness to doubt anything that is not proven the the standard that she demands of anything claiming to be truth, she is capable of faith in things that many would never believe in.

She possesses an unfortunate nostalgia for processed foods. You are deeply concerned, but their existence makes her feel safe in her independence. You suspect that by taking the initiative to eat better, she would be forcing herself to admit that someone should have cared enough to do so for her.

Theoretically, she likes the idea of being both the subject and the actor of traditional romantic gestures, the kind that are carefully planned and prepared. In practice, performing these actions leaves her in a state where she can be easily hurt. You are certain that she would enjoy a grand gesture of thoughtfulness or romance but suspect that she may prefer to be the subject of smaller, spontaneous gestures that carry the implication that the actor is keeping her somewhere in their thoughts at all times.

Once, someone decided that they did not want her. This is a fact that has stuck with her, and one which has turned her instinct to seek out evidence against her, as she is saddled with evidence that she was once a thing that was discarded. She is waiting for the people around her to realise this fact and sort her back into the appropriate place. At present, she is looking through a her own profile data to find any evidence that you might realise it so that she can protect herself appropriately. You know that she is thorough and thus that you can subject her to whatever nonsense you please.

For example you could use this time to inform her that when you kissed the boy who you will spend your life protecting, and perhaps you should have informed her of that earlier but you are sometimes bad at sharing information about your personal life, you did so on one condition. This condition was that, no matter what, you would not discard a girl who does not exist before you discarded him.

You do not think that you need to know her name. It would only make her harder to find in your contact list.

[ ... ]

Also, you ask 🌺 if there was a person she was thinking of sexting with. You do not need to know who, only if it would be something she would like to do with them in an ideal world.

Edited 2021-09-18 00:18 (UTC)

I PAUSE the game. I can't escape the fact that participating in this conversation is itself a text-based medium and therefore involves conscious and deliberate choices about the information that I offer. I might as well be honest about it.

I was raised to do one thing very well to the exclusion of all else. I was given limitless freedom and resources so long as I was acting in pursuit of that goal. I was not allowed to have my own phone growing up and was encouraged to isolate myself from others. I was six years old the first time I saw what a murder looked like and I was expected to determine who was responsible and why.

No one ever taught me how to be a person.

I know how to achieve goals. I don't feel things when I am pursuing a goal. Treating sex as a goal creates a catch-22 wherein the only way I can do it involves doing it in a way that eliminates the purpose of doing it to begin with.

I feel like you're the only person who stands a chance of comprehending how I feel when I say that sometimes I don't know how to be a person. It has nothing to do with you drawing on any personal experiences of your own but rather just that you have a tendency to understand the complicated things I say in ways that most people don't.

I want to delete this entire text but I refuse to be a coward and that in and of itself is an example of how I'm capable of achieving goals without being influenced by emotion.

I'm bad at sexting because sexting involves an inherent awareness of the aspects of oneself that the other party finds attractive and desirable and i don't

i hate being the object of people's pity because i don't want to have to consider whether i deserve it

I think I understand.

[ There's a fairly long pause. ]

I want to say more. But you're correct. I don't have a situation I can use to relate. I don't have a real solution. I don't have any insight at all. But I think I understand.

That's why I tell things like this to you. You don't awkwardly try to make me feel better about something that doesn't really have a solution.

I don't know if there's room for a person like me in an ideal world. I'm too crafted for an imperfect one.

I will rephrase my question, then, while the game is paused. An ideal world is not necessary, because the UNSOLICITED (and also, I will be honest, probably just as inappropriate) ADVICE is a way to sidestep the need for one. I'll need to explain my thinking to make it make sense, I think.

I referred to this whole situation as a prisoner's dilemma earlier before, where cooperation is demonstrating vulnerability and betrayal is refusing to. So long as there is a chance of being hurt, you will always approach the encounter as a challenge to be overcome, meaning that you will always be minimising vulnerability on your first move.

If you could test someone to see what move they selected, while delaying your own choice of move until after you'd seen theirs, is there someone you would choose for that?

...admittedly, the UNSOLICITED STRATEGY I was going to propose is less than ideal at present, considering the fact that I imagine this conversation started with communications being sent to the wrong person. But it would be a starting point.

Oh. I understand. The person who moves second does so with more information than the person who moves first.

Is your question whether there's someone that I want to sext me, or if there's someone I would feel comfortable exploring vulnerability with? They're related but slightly different questions.

Hmm. I was going to suggest something other than sexting, and it would be necessity involve you making the first move but in a way that you could dismiss as less emotionally significant if they did not respond in a way you liked.

Actually, this will probably be easier if I am not coy about it.

I was going to suggest that you buy vibrating underwear, send them the remote in a way that does not put you face to face with them and then observe both the underwear, to see if they try to use it, and any messages they send you in response.

If you don't care for their response, you then disclose that you did this to test their reaction. If you do, you can proceed allowing them to believe that this was you making the first move.

...

You mean leading them to believe I am, in fact, wearing the underwear as a test to see whether they respond by manipulating them in response.

Then let me ask you this. If you were on the receiving end of such a scenario, would you use the remote with explicitly sexual intentions?

That is what I mean.

Hmm. I would consider the gesture an invitation to do so, but I would probably feel the need to communicate about it further first.

And the tone of your communication would be?

Cautiously intrigued, somewhat concerned that there may have been some kind of mistake.

This is assuming that I would not be aware that we have had this conversation.

Hold on. Are you answering as pertains to me specifically, or in general?

I meant in general.

Oh.

I would return the remote.

[TIME TO CHANGE HER SCREENNAME]

Assuming a hypothetical world where neither one of us had to sacrifice our individual romantic entanglements, including but not limited to the people we kiss and/or are going to spend the rest of our lives protecting

are you sexually attracted to me

Ah. I suppose this is what I get for asking inappropriate questions, isn't it?

Yes.

That you sometimes become subjected to them yourself? Yes.

My impulse now is to interrogate you about this. That would be a goal-oriented thing to do and it would make me feel confident and competent instead of vulnerable.

I'm going to ignore that impulse. As best that I can.

I don't think I've done anything to deserve a sentiment like that, however. So I'm. Uncertain.

You would feel safe if you were interrogating me, insofar as you would feel anything. But doing so would render any answers I gave you relevant to you only as information you were seeing, and leave them disconnected from you as a person.

I could elaborate without your prompting me, if that would work as a compromise.

I feel safe around you in general. Regardless of context.

I suppose my previous hypothetical and question were the equivalent of mailing you a remote control, figuratively speaking. Now I'll take your advice and see what you do with it.

I think. I think that right now, perhaps it's best that I return it.

It isn't that I don't care for the idea of it. Not at all. You are very beautiful. You are a master of your art. You have been kind to me when I needed it most, and you know more than I do about more than I'd like to admit. I could watch you picking every last bit of objective truth out of the world around you and never be bored for a second. I could watch you (in general) and not be bored. It's charming, how Sakura-chan does her best even though she's nervous and forgets to let the molds dry.

It isn't Jotaro, either. We really did talk about it.

But I think right now, 'a thing that makes you safe' is everything I want to be.

And I don't think I'd enjoy our conversations any less, but I think they'd lose something if it was an option to say that actually, this is stupid and I'd rather kiss you.

We'd end up never getting to talk about stupid things.

i have to type something and it's going to take me some time don't read anything negative into it

[JUST GONNA. MITIGATE SOME OF THE APPREHENSION OF WATCHING "..." GO ON FOR TWENTY MINUTES, FROM THE OUTSET.]

I've never considered the possibility that my talent could be...aesthetic. It was always the opposite. Something not to be seen. Any focus on appearance or form would only detract from the output, the technical value.

There's someone here that I loathe. I've never met them but I loathe the idea of them because they do what I do, but with a focus on appearances. They draw attention to themselves. Every part of me rejects the idea of my work being a show or a spectacle.

But there's also a person here whose talent is photography. He takes pictures of me and the thought of leaving behind evidence of my existence unsettles me. But what overpowers even that feeling is the look on his face when he raises his camera and focuses on me. He looks at me like I'm something to be looked at and I've never been that before.

He could've been a fluke. Except without knowing any of that, you said the same thing.

I don't want to spend the rest of my life protecting you and I don't want you to spend the rest of yours protecting me. I don't want to do stupid things to get your attention or act like Sakura-chan except when it's convenient to be Sakura-chan or to stop being what I am for the sake of trying to be some conception of what I think I should have been.

I want you to watch me and tell me what it makes you think. That leaves us both vulnerable. I don't get to hide. And you don't get to dodge.

That should work out anyway, shouldn't it? I have to believe that most of what you'll tell me will be very stupid. We'll do a lot of talking about stupid things.

I don't just want you to make me feel safe. I want you to keep making me feel uncomfortable but safe, in a way that makes you uncomfortable but safe.

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un: inappropriate.and.invasive.question.facts

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