a duty? really?

communication between us goes like this:

apr 03, me, messaging chee: “safely upstairs … (weather forecast) … please be okay this time cheetah. i have no idea how to even talk to you anymore”

no reply

apr 04, chee messsages me: “wifi password”

i reply with the new wifi credentials, and add “glad to hear you’re well”

he replies “i’m not”

does he mean he’s not well? or he’s not glad to hear that i’m okay? probably the former, i reason

apr 05, i message chee: “hopin’ you’re doin’ okay then”

no reply

apr 06, i decide it’s time to go down and check

house is okay, i guess. there’s signs he’s been eating. the kitties’ litter box hasn’t been scooped since i left three days ago. garbage smells like something in it is rotting and should have been taken out a while back too

i do all that, plug in the kitties’ water fountain and refill it, turn on the air filter again, and start some laundry

sometime later i find his booze bottle in the freezer

granted, i could have handled this part with a little less snarl. instead i took it to him and told him to get it out of my house

this of course he didn’t like one bit. he called me childish a whole bunch and it really seemed like he barely stopped himself from throwing the bottle at me. he was in a pitcher’s pose, mimed throwing it, and i threatened to call the cops before he made himself stop

yeah, that’s stable

he then demanded i pay him fifteen dollars for the bottle of his booze i got rid of when going around and fixing the house after his rampage. i asked him if he wanted to pay for the hundreds of dollars of damages. sure, he said, getting sarcastic, let him just find some money. i point out he’s got no grounds to stand on then if i got rid of the alcohol. but i honestly got no impression that he could see any connection

he then tried to complain that 1. i’d left him in denver, 2. yes he told me not to get him, 3. i dragged him home anyway without giving him a choice, and somehow all of these are true at once, and he’s justified in being mad at me for all at the same time

i finished our interaction by asking what his actual plan was? does he plan to keep laying in bed each day forever? like, it’s been a month now since we began talking that he needed a place to move on to, so what’s his actual plan?

he doesn’t have one, and we both know it. he doesn’t have a plan to get out of bed, much less act like he has any actual intent of making life happen

it feels like even in this conversation, as he pulls the whole “i tried to kill myself, feel pity for me!” routine, that he seriously thinks i owe him my company and attention. that he can be as unpleasant a person as he wants, but it’s still my responsibility to accept him, and coddle him, and help him on everything, but never call it helping him, because that might imply he’s not the hero, so i’m supposed to help him anyway, even if he says not to, because reasons. but also, if i push too hard and he decides to do a violence against me, well that’s my fault too

fuck that shit

he started shoving me out of his life months ago. by end of january, i wasn’t supposed to do anything for him or with him, ever. even sharing food was sus. in february, he attempted to beat the crap out of me. in march, he trashed the house

there’s been like maybe three afternoons in the last two months when he’s at all been someone pleasant to be around

why in the ever fucking hells does he think i would want to be around him anymore?

or, as i wrote above, does he seriously think it’s my duty to tend him?

heh. i write that ironically, because i absolutely know he thinks just that

like, i remember last summer when he needed to go to the hospital, and he could only talk shit to me when i tried to stay with him, then was totally shocked that i wandered off. he told me for months that no “normal person” would ever do that. he seriously acts as shitty as he ever wants to his allies, yet believes we have some kind of obligation to stay there and take it

fuck. that. shit.

update: okay, that was a big argument, kinda fierce

i was about to go get a pizza, but as i put on my shoes he was there in the room, so i offered that we could go for a walk and try to talk about things. he accepted, and a few minutes later we went out

i’d hoped being in public would keep us from yelling at each other, but it didn’t. so after a loop around the block we retired into the house to yell in earnest. i actually started recording at one point

i said very clearly, and several times over, that i want to break up

we went on for a bit on that one. to give him a solid reason for it, i tried to make the point that i’m poly and nothing will make me not be poly and he’s not poly and nothing will ever make him be poly. he called me a liar, but when we rewound and i went over the exact same two points again he couldn’t find any part of what i said that was wrong

speaking of hazy truths, he claims to have no memory of any of the times in the past we talked about him needing to move out. i said this was the fourth conversation, though i’m hedging on that because i’m counting earlier today as the third. truly, i remember twice before today: once a couple weeks before his breakdown, the other a day or two before. i remember after his breakdown when i spent so much time crying thinking that my conversation with him about needing to move on was why he had a breakdown

he insisted circumstances had changed when he had his breakdown

i called him out on holding himself hostage. that he’d tried to kill himself because i wasn’t treating him right, and he’s threatening to do it again in order to get me to treat him the way he wants

in all seriousness, i am very pissed off about this

he claimed that was bullshit and i invented all that

but i keep listening to the recording. less than one minute after i accuse him of it, he tells me point blank in so many words that…

him> “i mean, jesus, how am i fucking do this when i’m just fucking hurt over and over again?”

me> “i don’t know, it’s on you that you keep hurting yourself!”

him> “it is not!”

me> “i am not hurting you! i am not putting drugs in your veins!”

him> “you, but you fucking consistently do fucking super emotional abuse!”

me> “i hide from you, that’s emotionally abusive?”

him> “yes it is!”

so… the takeaway is that:

he told me to my face that he’s hurting himself because i’m not giving him enough attention

i’m pretty sure this is the most manipulative thing anyone has ever said to me. yet on the other hand, i’m so very glad we finally have it out in the open

i feel very justified in breaking up now, thank you, cheetah

to finish out our argument, i tell him rather fiercely that “once again, i do not owe you my time!”

it was not a very nice conversation

then i went to go get my pizza

i left the pizza on the counter with a note that invited him to have some of it, and he accepted and took some slices. so that part is good anyway