1996.05/23 Sonny Devastation
May 23rd 1996 = Sonny Devastation, Thursday
Today I hurt the best friend I have in the world, perhaps beyond the ability
of our friendship to recover.
SONNY & KIM : close compadres
Jesus Arcilla (aka Sonny) and I have been fast friends since we matriculated
together at Caltech in 1988. He's a large Cuban fellow, engaging and
gregarious, instantly likeable. With a wide variety of interests, he's an
outgoing self-powered energy pack. Over the years we've become steadily
better friends, with surprisingly little friction, considering our disparate
natures. In fact, for a couple summers we were inseparable, twin terrors
spreading zaniness as we went.
There was a noticeable lull in our activities after I graduated in 1994,
because I moved from southern to northern California. But we still remained
close despite the distance. Involved emails wafted back and forth on a daily
basis, long phone calls were made when we had the chance, and we visited each
other whenever we could justify the trip. Early summer 1995 I moved back to
the Pasadena area, and our companionship resumed without missing a beat.
Since I had no place to stay he put me up in a house that he (and others) were
renting, so we were doing things again almost from day one.
SONNY & CHRISTINE : fatal attraction
In 1994 Sonny had become involved with an older woman named Christine. It was
perhaps Sonny's first really serious relationship. He had been BGI
[boyfriend-girlfriend-intimate] with a girl named Linda for a long time, but
the two situations were wildly different. Linda (like Sonny) was young,
inexperienced, and highly dependent. Christine was mature, experienced,
focused, established, and most importantly, she knew what she wanted. This
last aspect gave Sonny a lot of grief... and caused a lot of growth as well.
As time progressed it became clear that the two were incompatible, but things
lingered on. They had several breakups and reunions, each more poignant and
emotional than before. Sonny discovered a previously unknown weak will; try
as he might, he was unable to resist Christine though he knew things would
never work out. Eventually he was saved by a new job. In late 1995 he took a
position at McGaw Pharmaceuticals as a computer help desk person. Since McGaw
was in Irvine Sonny moved to Costa Mesa (about an hour away). Distance caused
the relationship to fizzle, and things came mostly to an end.
But just as Sonny was undergoing changes during this period, so too was
Christine. What began as just a fling with the "younger man" slowly took on
more meaning. She came to love Sonny and yearned for a long- term future with
him. (Of course, I am speculating these events, but there is a body of
evidence to support them. For example, she said to Sonny that he was the
first man she truly fell in love with. Later on she began dropping subtle
hints about the topic of matrimony. And most persuasive was her continual
willingness to reunite; unlike Sonny, had she wanted to end things, she could
have done so conclusively and permanently.)
SONNY & WOMEN : fish in the sea
The new job marked the beginning of an explosive era for Sonny. McGaw itself
is quite large, and he met a large population of new people, especially since
his job brought him into contact with different people on a regular basis.
But moreover, he had a steady flow of disposable income and free time in which
to spend it. He bought a new car, went out dancing like a madman, and started
etching out a new life. His network of friends was growing quickly, and life
was good.
Along with this exposure came a benefit Sonny revelled in, namely, easy access
to beautiful women. Recall that Tech, despite being coed, is predominantly
male. Furthermore, it is a highly monastic experience, with most of one's
energy necessarily spent on studies, with little left over for social
endeavor. Anyway, being the lovable guy he is, Sonny soon became the object
of affection of droves of women. For example, during a flower-arranging
phase, Sonny made several dozen arrangements and gave them to women at work
(earning innumerable "chick points", as one lady later put it). In essence,
Sonny discovered just how easy it was to find and seduce women, something
which did wonders for his then flagging self-confidence. [NOTE: There was
another older woman around this time, Nicole, who is being glossed over for
simplicity.]
SONNY & ROSEANNE : passions flaring
Anyway, via work Sonny met a married woman named Roseanne. The two had been
passing acquaintances since Sonny started at McGaw. Several weeks ago they
met at a party, started talking, and spent the entire night pouring themselves
out to each other. After that night they began spending more time together,
emailing each other, going out, and generally growing much closer. After a
few weeks things became intimate, and Sonny faced a disturbing situation. He
was powerfully attracted to Roseanne, and it was clear that she felt the same
about him... but she was married!
At this point it might help to describe Roseanne and her state. She is an
attractive woman in her late twenties, married to a husband she helped make
successful. She is of average intelligence, strongly opinionated, and
exceptionally perceptive. Furthermore, she has a well-defined sense of moral
character (which is the crux of this entire story, by the way). Her marriage
was currently on the rocks. Where once she and her husband were very much in
love, they had become not only emotionally distanced but also physically,
since the husband's job entailed considerable travel. In fact, her
matrimonial troubles were the main topic that first night of conversation.
Events conspired to bring Sonny and Roseanne together. At the same time that
both of them were separately coming to the conclusion that they *really*
wanted each other and had given into their desire, Roseanne's husband called
out of the blue and told her that he thought that they should get divorced.
He couldn't stand things not working out anymore, and he felt that it might be
best if they went their separate ways. [Note that the husband is ignorant of
her affair with Sonny at this time.] This gave them the "all clear" on their
emotions. Whereas before they kept their attraction a dammed up trickle they
now let it flood freely.
SONNY & ROSEANNE & KIM : the dinner
By a happy circumstance Sonny and I kept in close contact even though we were
an hour apart. A mutual friend of ours, Ken Wiberg, referred me as a
programming consultant to his company, Douglas Energy. They wanted me to
write a monitoring program for Royalty Carpet Mills, located in Irvine. It
turns out that RCM and McGaw are across the street from each other! So every
time I went down to RCM Sonny and I got together, had dinner, and otherwise
bummed around. I was going to be heading back east for the summer, and a few
days before I left I went down to check on the mill program one last time.
Sonny, Roseanne, and I went to dinner later that night.
From the first moments of dinner it was apparent that something was bothering
Roseanne. She was edgy, she was snippy, and atypically uncomposed. However,
this was my last opportunity to spend some quality time with Sonny, so for the
most part we babbled away and her unvoiced issue was left unaddressed. The
movie "Mission Impossible" had just opened, and I invited Sonny to a movie
outing that Ken and I were making that Saturday (the 25th, two days hence).
All of us had been eagerly awaiting its arrival, and I wanted to catch the
film in a big Hollywood theatre while I still could. Sonny said that it was a
good idea, and he would see if he could make it.
This caused Roseanne to go off on him. Sonny had been planning a big bash at
his place that Sunday (by independent chance, the same day I was leaving) and
she was helping him prepare for the gala affair. There was still quite a bit
to be done, and she couldn't believe that he was considering dropping weeks of
planning just to go to a movie. She then admonished him that he had to
realize that there were only so many things he could do at one time, and he
had to pick and choose between them. People were finite, and could do only so
many things.
Meanwhile, Sonny and I just sat through her tirade with dippy grins on our
faces. It turns out that, years ago, Sonny and I had had this exact same
conversation. Sonny had been depressed that he seemed to be doing most
everything half-hearted and mediocrely, and he didn't know why because he was
really interested in everything he was doing. I pointed out to him that he
was engaged in upwards of twenty activities, and further pointed out his
lifelong trend of impulsively spreading himself too thin. So, we two were
amused because Roseanne was repeating my precise thoughts from years before,
and in some cases exact phrases. However, it probably appeared to Roseanne as
if we were blowing her off.
As the capstone to her argument she reminded Sonny that he had already
committed himself to spending time with somebody that Saturday afternoon. I
had a sudden leap of intuition. "Ahah!" I thought to myself, "They were
supposed to spend time together and she thinks I'm making Sonny choose me over
her." So, still smiling, I ask her aloud, "And who might that be?" with the
intention of trying to smoothe things over. The question is met with dead
silence. Roseanne is frozen. Sonny shifts uncomfortably. My smile fades and
I'm wondering just what the hell is going on. Finally, Roseanne answers
through semi-clenched teeth, "Sonny had already promised Christine that he
would spend the afternoon with her."
*This* was news to me. Sonny had said that he'd been seeing Christine
recently, but he neglected to mention that he was *seeing* Christine.
Everyone at the table sensed the potential for utter disaster in this line of
conversation, and by implicit mutual consent the topic was switched. The
dinner came to a close and Roseanne invited us back to her house. We had all
driven to the restaurant in Sonny's new car, so we had to go back to McGaw /
RCM to fetch our individual vehicles before heading off to her place. Along
the way another incident occurred.
SONNY & KIM & ROSEANNE : daredevil driving
Sonny and I had a long standing arrangment where we would jointly drive a car.
It began as an experiment (just to see if it could be done) but quickly became
a common convenience. Whenever he needed his hands free he'd motion for me to
take the wheel; I'd drive from the passenger's side while he shifted / braked
when I asked him to. On the way back Roseanne tickled Sonny from the back
seat and made a comment like, "It's great being able to tickle with no fear of
being tickled back." Sonny and I looked at each other, I grabbed the wheel,
and he turned around and started a no-holds barred tickling onslaught. She
shrieked and started saying, "Stop! Stop it!"
This went on for about ten seconds, and Sonny briefly looked back to me and
let me know that we were supposed to take the next exit. We were heading
along at a decent clip and took the turn faster than was comfortable (though
not faster than was safe). During the turn Roseanne shrieked some more and
was finally able to gasp out, "I mean drive the car, dammit! Stop fooling
around like this!" It was then that we discovered that she was freaking out
because of our unorthodox driving, and not because of the tickling. Sonny
resumed control of the wheel.
When we arrived at the parking lot, Roseanne stepped out from the car and made
a cold comment. As she walked to her car Sonny made a low whistle and made a
remark that she seemed upset. I mentioned that she was probably justified,
since she had been dumped on the entire night. Sonny said that it was just
her being upset over the driving; I said that I thought it went much deeper
than that. He looked puzzled and asked me to explain. Meanwhile, we had kept
her waiting in her car for me to get into mine, and she honked her horn at us
to get moving. I cut my comment short and said I'd explain later.
On the drive to Roseanne's house I had time to go over the events of the night
in my head. It seemed to me that something was already bothering Roseanne,
and that more than our antics was causing her to be short. Moreover, if that
were the case then it must be close to the surface if it was affecting her so
much. I decided that, should the opportunity arise, I would try to find out
what the problem was. Soon we all arrived at Roseanne's house.
SONNY & KIM : Roseanne's house
Here a diagram of the living room might prove useful:
---------------------------+
|
+-------------------+ |
+-------------------+ |
| | |
<- To | Roseanne Sonny | |
Kitchen | | |
+-------------------+ |
^ |
++-----+ Couch |
|| | |
|| Kim | |
|| | |
++-----+ <- Chair |
|
|
When we first arrived Roseanne went off to the kitchen to make us some drinks,
while Sonny and I talked in the living room. I grilled him a bit about what
was happening with Christine and was amazed to discover that he was still
intimate with her. Or to be more clear, that he was nailing her at the same
time that he was sleeping with Roseanne. This from the man who, five short
years ago, couldn't understand people's fascination with this "whole sex
thing" and got queasy at the prospect of being with one woman, let alone two.
He had... changed considerably since then.
The conversation then moved back to Roseanne and why she was upset, and I was
about to launch into my suspicions a second time when she came into the room.
She asked what we were talking about, and Sonny responded that we were
wondering why she was so upset. She said that it was because of our stupidity
in the car on the way back, and then she apologized for being snippy. Sonny
shot me an "I told you so" look and the subject was dropped.
Things drifted onto Christine again. Roseanne knew about the scenario, past
and present, but kept mostly out of the conversation while Sonny and I talked
about it. Essentially, Sonny was still unable to resist her, but he believed
the relationship would come to an end soon. I made a remark that he seemed to
be lacking a certain "strength of character" which would enable him to bring
things to a definitive close. Sonny liked the phrase and we used it as a
soundbite for the rest of the night.
As an effort to draw Roseanne into the conversation, I asked her what she
thought about the situation. She was initially reluctant to state any
opinions, mainly because she felt that she had a vested interest in the
outcome and her advice was likely to be suspect. So at this point she limited
herself to generalizations and facts. First, she said that I was being too
critical of Sonny; no one could resist the temptation that he had been faced
with. Quote: "Expecting him to have the strength of character to resist would
require him to be inhuman." Second, she also cited a recent phone call
between Christine and Sonny as proof that things would end on their own.
SONNY & KIM : phone calls
Roseanne got up to refill our drinks, and I asked Sonny about the phone call.
Sonny said that the same day that Roseanne's husband called up and told her
that he wanted to break up, he was supposed to spend the night with Christine.
Since he wanted to console Roseanne during this rough time, he called
Christine up to cancel. Apparently, he got as far as "Roseanne's husband just
called her to say that he wants a divorce" when Christine hung up on him.
Sonny was relieved; it seemed that she was going to break up with him and save
him the trouble of doing it.
But I was confused. If that was the last contact he had with her, why was he
going to spend the afternoon with her? Where these plans that they had made a
while back? Sonny said that she called him up later that night and apologized
for hanging up on him. She said: "There was no reason for me to leap to any
conclusions about you and your friend Roseanne." She kept calling and
eventually got ahold of Sonny, and they made plans after that.
Things became incrementally more clear. Apparently Christine suspected that
something was going on between the two (why else would she hang up?) but by
the same token didn't want to admit it to herself (why apologize?). But
moreover, it seemed to indicate that she was seriously smitten with Sonny (why
crawl back to someone she thought was cheating on her?), and I mentioned that
to Sonny. He thought it might be true, but didn't believe it was. I
suggested that he might be dealing with "old information" (since Christine
clearly wasn't in love with him at the start of their relationship). I
further mentioned that, unlike other encounters he had with her, she was
blameless; if anyone was the bad guy in the scenario, it was him.
SONNY & ROSEANNE & KIM : the oblivion hypothesis
Roseanne came back into the room, catching the tail end of the conversation.
The subject seemed to spark something in her, because she broke her position
of neutrality and flat out said that I was right on both counts, i.e.
Christine was still in love with him and that he was treating her badly. When
I asked her why she thought that, she cited the second phone call. R: "You
can her heart breaking on the message [on the answering machine]".
I brought up the point that to successfully cast Sonny as a villain he would
have to be aware of Christine's feelings to knowingly hurt her. I suggested
the possibility that Sonny could have been, and could still be, oblivious to
her condition. Roseanne was flabbergasted: "No one could be that oblivious,
not seeing how much she's in love with him or how much he's hurting her." I
stuck to my guns: "Trust me, Sonny could." [By the way, it might help to know
that Sonny *is* oblivious to a lot of things. He goes blithely through life,
attracted by the action scenes but missing most of the plot. I could
understand Roseanne's incredulity; it took me about three years and some
seriously incontrovertible evidence before I began to believe it myself.]
We went back and forth like this, with Sonny listening in but not
participating. Roseanne put forth an argument showing why Sonny was scum, and
I countered with a type of selective oblivion which would leave him actively
(though not passively) blameless. At the last she found something she thought
proved that Sonny must have known about Christine's feelings: "Why else would
he lie to her?" I mentioned that there was a difference between actively
lying, active deception, and passive deception. "Just because Sonny is
passively deceiving Christine by withholding information doesn't make him a
liar."
But Roseanne said that he *did* lie to her. I paused for a moment and
regrouped. K: "What exactly was the lie?" R: "Christine asked Sonny whether
he and I were involved and he told her that we weren't." K: "But this was
before the two of you were, right?" R: "No, it was after." I was simply
unable to believe this; she must be misinterpreting the situation somehow. So
I turn to Sonny and ask point blank for confirmation, and he says that
Roseanne is right. I do a double take. K: "Let me get this straight, after
you and Roseanne were sleeping together, Christine asked whether you were
involved with her and you replied..." S: "That she was a good friend but it
was a purely platonic relationship, nothing more."
KIM : why the lie?
In the next few moments I underwent an almost total spiritual realignment.
Sonny lied. HE LIED! Sonny despised people lying; he was one of the most
honest people I knew. We had had numerous conversations about lying and
deception, and in each one he went overboard, saying that it all was bad,
whereas I took the view that some types (for example, ignorant deception) were
okay. But then I stepped back and realized I was doing the same exact thing I
had just cautioned Sonny not to do. Namely, I was working with "old
information". I was making conclusions based from what I knew about Sonny in
the past, and not from present indicators.
So, who was this Sonny before me now? Here was a man who had dated a number
of women in the last couple years and discovered it was easy to score whenever
he liked. Here was a man currently embroiled with two woman, both
pathologically in love with him, one that he was stringing along and the other
whose marriage was in shambles.
And why the lie? Let us suppose that Sonny really did want to break up with
Christine but lacked the strength of character to do so. All he would have to
have done when she asked the fatal question was tell the truth and Christine
would have gone away of her own accord. That hypothesis no longer fit the
facts... but there was one which fit all the available facts. Sonny was using
Christine; for sex, for revenge, for whatever, it didn't matter. This was a
case of out and out manipulation of Christine by Sonny, and it was being done
with the most efficient of tools: lies.
[ASIDE: Let me pop out of the narrative for a moment. It isn't my intent to
paint Sonny as a villain, and I honestly don't think he is. This isn't just
my strong feelings of friendship making me say this either; if I believed he
was a villain, make no mistake, I would hang his burning corpse in effigy.
Rather, Sonny has a number of deep insecurities about himself in addition to a
weak will... and also a *real* naivete about consequences. This combined with
his first exposure to the "real world" is almost a recipe for disaster. Sonny
as a Machiavellian manipulator doesn't make sense... but Sonny as a selfish,
inexperienced, and oblivious soul does.]
It was a shocking reorientation. The more I thought about it, the more other
niggling facts about Sonny's recent endeavors fell into place. My earlier
words echoed in my ears as a sad prophecy: Sonny *was* the bad guy in this
situation. At this point I made a hard and horrible decision... I judged
Sonny and discounted him. Up until now, I had always been on Sonny's side,
defended his stated interests, and tried to help him out. I decided that, if
his goal was to double-time these two woman (hurting them along the way), then
I was not going to help him do so. I privately shifted my goal to helping
Roseanne... irrespective of its effect on Sonny.
ROSEANNE & KIM : sleight of hand
Just like the foot-bath scene in the Odyssey, my recognition of reality
occurred in a flash. I took a long blink, I said a drawn out "Okaaay" and the
turned back to Roseanne. I decided the best way to do things was establish a
parallel scenario. K: "Well, let's put the issue of oblivion to the side.
Suppose that, on some level, Sonny doesn't want to go out with Christine, but
he can't seem to stop himself from doing so. Further suppose that people are
getting hurt because of it, and he wants to prevent that from happening again.
How could he avoid a situation like that in the future?" She suggested a few
ideas, all of which were quite insightful.
But something was occurring on a deeper level than just the conversation.
Several times she stopped and said that she was uncomfortable with the way the
conversation was proceeding. For example, she said she didn't like talking
about Sonny in the third person like we were. I assured her that it was not
only alright by Sonny but something he desired. She said she didn't believe
me. I told her all she had to do was ask Sonny to confirm (and each time I
knew I was right, because the points she brought up just happened to be things
Sonny and I had discussed at some time or another in the past.)
But she never asked, not once. I would say that we didn't have to talk about
things that made her uncomfortable and switched the topic onto a harmless
subject. She would eventually come back of her own accord to the previous
thread and talk more about ways to prevent this situation from occurring in
the future. To me her reluctance seemed to indicate that the topics were
beginning to hit close to home. Somewhere in all this was the thing which was
bothering her so much. So, I asked some open questions and gave her free
license to talk about herself as well as Sonny. Gradually she became more
comfortable talking about her own experiences, and a picture began to develop.
ROSEANNE : background
The fundamental cornerstone to Roseanne's character was integrity. If she
said she was going to do something, then it was as good as done. She didn't
welsch, she didn't renege, she did whatever needed to be done to honor her
word. As a consequence, honesty was very important to her. How could she
know whether she could do something if she didn't honestly evaluate whether it
was possible? How could she trusted if she wasn't honest with others? How
could she understand herself if she wasn't honest with herself?
For example, as proud as she was about her marriage with her husband, she was
more proud of rejecting a proposal by a different man years before.
Apparently he was rich and in love with Roseanne. He was going to buy an
island and he wanted her to come live there with him. She brought up that she
wanted to finish college first and he responded, "That's okay. You can take
classes during the week and I'll buy you roundtrip tickets for every weekend
and vacation. If you need tutors or anything, then we can have them flown
out." She realized he was offering her a life of total luxury and freedom...
but she also knew that she didn't love him. So she let him down easy and
rejected his proposal.
Along with her strong sense of integrity was also a type of morality. To
illustrate, she felt very strongly about adultery. In the past she had cut
off relations with good friends because they had had affairs; in some cases
she had blasted them for their weakness. She was in a knot about her own
case. She had stood in front of friends and family and declared that she
would stay with her husband for better or worse, until death do they part.
More importantly, she vowed to her husband that she would never leave him for
another man.
ROSEANNE : breakdown
The topic drifted into the realm of her matrimonial problems, and she raised
the issue of independence. She said that Sonny and I had already experienced
something she never had, namely living on our own. She had always been
provided for; even in college she spent most of her time living with
relatives. She tried to look upon the break with her husband as a potentially
good thing, an opportunity to start a new life. I asked her whether she was
going to live with Sonny when she left her husband. Her eyes opened wide, she
started trembling, and she answered, "Yes." Then she started crying. Not the
misty-eyed variety, either, but full-fledged soul-wracking sobs.
In that single moment she realized that she *was* leaving her husband for
another man. And she was an adulteress. And that her word meant nothing.
Slowly and painfully, all her hurts came bubbling to the surface. I put on
the super-sensitive gloves and started treading lightly with every word I
said. I don't know whether you've ever seen someone go through a fundamental
personality crisis, but its a highly volatile state. People become incredibly
suggestive, and it is quite easy to fuck them up for the next decade of their
life. Regrettably, our culture teaches us to change others but not ourselves;
almost all our internal changes occur in a crucible of intense pain rather
than a pool of calm contemplation.
Roseanne put her arms around herself and wobbled back and forth while she
began asking herself hard questions. R: "What am I worth now? The one thing
which made me special, my word, my integrity, is gone now gone. I have
nothing! My husband loved me. He still loves me! But he deserves better
than me now." I suggested to her that perhaps integrity wasn't like
virginity. It wasn't something that you have once and then can never regain.
Perhaps it was something renewable, reachievable. She brought up other points
and I did my best to moderate her wild sways.
She rambled into a different area. R: "Why did I do it? Why did I throw away
everything I had? Hah! This one I know the answer to. Because for the first
time ever I feel alive! Sonny gives me all his attention, he makes me feel
loved and special, makes me feel things I've never felt before. You can't
understand what it was like... how good it was. Do I do the wrong thing?
Should I have stayed dead, resisted the temptation?"
This was perhaps the most crucial moment of the whole night. What Roseanne
was looking for was a definitive answer: as confessor, I could tell her she
was damned or I could redeem her via penance. She didn't care which. But I
don't like playing priest or god, and I feel it is important for people to
come to their own conclusions, no matter how painful. K: "I don't know. But
I do have a good friend, someone whose words I trust, who once told me that to
resist a temptation like that would require a person to be inhuman." Hearing
her words shot back at her caused a fresh storm of weeping, but these tears
were healing tears and not scarring sobs. With some more careful support she
quickly returned to both composure and sanity.
SONNY : Mr. Oblivion
At this point the astute reader might be wondering, What the hell was Sonny
doing all of this? He was asleep at the far end of the couch. Wait, wait,
wait, before you start lambasteing him, this isn't a strange as it first
seems. During the start of the night he and she had been lovey-dovey,
snuggling, stroking each other, etc. When Roseanne and I got down to brass
tacks he started nodding off. It was getting late (or perhaps I should say
early) and he had been running himself ragged without any sleep for the last
few weeks. So, to be considerate he moved to the far end of the couch to take
a nap (previously he had his head in her lap).
Sonny also groggily woke up at several points and saw Roseanne in tears, and
then drifted off to sleep again. His girlfriend is in tears and he sleeps
through it!? Again, this isn't as odd as you might think. Sonny has seen
this exact same scenario a dozen times. People break down in my presence on a
regular basis; Sonny himself has done so several times. The first few times
he followed the conversation and came to the conclusion that I was a master
psychotherapist. So, his sleeping through everything was more an indicator of
his confidence in my ability to deal with the situation and less a lack of
regard for his girlfriend.
ROSEANNE & KIM : the jig is up
Roseanne dried her eyes and a reflective silence followed. She had just been
through a lot and needed a breather to sort things out. After awhile, she
looked up at me, looked over at Sonny, and then slowly looked back to me, a
gleam in her eyes. She said that she had come to two incredible conclusions.
R: "You know, this entire night it appeared that we were talking about Sonny
when in reality we were talking about me."
I thought to myself, "Holy Shit! The jig is up!" I started to apologize but
she cut me off. R: "It's okay, I don't care. I really don't. Actually, your
misdirection has been helpful because it helped me observe a second thing.
I've just had the worst night of my life, and the man who says he loves me,
who has professed his desire to be with me forever, is totally oblivious to
everything that just happened. I would never have believed it if I hadn't
witnessed it with my own eyes. I still can't believe it."
Roseanne rifled back through the earlier discussion about Christine and asked
me point by point just how oblivious Sonny really was. There were a few cases
I had made for the sake of argument, but yes, I said, virtually everything I
mentioned before was true. Sonny probably didn't know about how much
Christine loved him, he probably wasn't aware of how much pain he was causing
her, and he was probably equally oblivious to Roseanne's internal crisis.
R: "And he's always been like this?" K: "And probably always will be."
ROSEANNE & KIM & SONNY : to leave or not to leave
At this point Sonny perks up, and Roseanne starts reading him the closing
credits. Sonny had been considering finding another job, and so Roseanne says
that he shouldn't let this affect his decision on whether to stay at McGaw or
not. Sonny is clearly confused: what's "this"? After awhile she winds down
and I think to myself, "This is where she should ask us to leave." R: "Now is
the time I'm supposed to ask you to leave, but I find that I can't do it." In
turmoil she fetches our shoes and starts slowly lacing up Sonny's.
What followed was a series of poignant scenes which ripped my heart out. She
kept delaying kicking us out, waiting for Sonny to hold her and make
everything okay again. At one point she was inches away from him, radiating
pain, just wanting to be held. Meanwhile, Sonny was paralyzed by indecision.
He had puzzled out that Roseanne was seriously hurt, and had inferred that he
was the cause of the pain. Should he console her? Would that just make
things worse? He didn't know. The situation was further confused by my
presence; had I not been there, he would have followed his basic instinct and
tried to comfort Roseanne.
At the last I couldn't stand it. K: "Sonny, she's been waiting this entire
time for you to hold her. If you had done so while she was crying, you would
have owned her forever. If you did so right now, she could still be yours."
Sonny looked at Roseanne, who confirmed my words by the yearning in her eyes.
He turned back to me and said, "I think I know what the problem is. I feel
... weird doing that with you around."
I said that I would be happy to leave, but was stopped by Roseanne. R: "No,
don't leave. I don't think it would be a good idea if you left." K:
"Meaning, it wouldn't be a good idea for me to leave with Sonny still here?"
R: "Right." Roseanne was visibly pulled in two directions. She desperately
loved Sonny, wanted him, and had no power to resist him on her own. But she
also knew this was the only chance she'd ever get to break free and regain her
previous integrity, and relied on me to provide the support she needed.
ROSEANNE & SONNY : a private moment
Sonny easily got around the problem of my presence by walking into the other
room and motioning for Roseanne to follow. They needed some time together
alone, so I didn't follow. I can only conjecture what happened. I heard both
of them break into crying, they were holding each other while they were
sobbing. A long conversation ensued, but I only caught snippets here and
there. Actually, most of my effort went into just staying awake. I
stretched, I did calisthenics, I paced the room. I decided that despite
Roseanne's request that I would leave in two hours. At that point, I felt
that they would most likely be in bed together and my presence would be
superfluous.
ROSEANNE & KIM: futility
An hour and a half passed when Roseanne returned to the living room. I
offered some friendly advice. K: "You know, your only chance it to go total
cold turkey on Sonny. Otherwise..." I looked into her eyes and realized that
the whole night was a temporary blip; like a moth to a flame she would be
drawn to Sonny the next time he called on her. I couldn't take the sight; I
lowered my head, closed my eyes, and slowly shook my head.
It was Roseanne's turn to console me. R: "I know. Hey, don't take it like
that. You're one strange man, you know that? But you did a lot of good here
tonight; you helped me a lot. Hell, you should be a therapist! I'd pay 100
buck an hour for conversations like that, and think I was getting a bargain."
We joined Sonny in the other room and after a brief goodbye Sonny and I went
outside.
KIM & SONNY : farewell
Sonny was still in tears. In a curious irony the situations were reversed. I
felt unable to comfort Sonny because I felt like I was the originator of his
pain. S: "I loved her! Didn't you see that?" K: "I think she was and will
always be the biggest love of your life." S: "Kim. You know that I would
never question your infinite wisdom, but right now I think that I should hate
you." K: "Sonny, I can't think of a single reason why you shouldn't despise
me." He then begged off the final few get-togethers we were supposed to make
before I left, and I said that I understood. We got in our respective cars
and drove away.
It was the last time I saw the man I called my best friend.
KIM : introspective
Since that evening I have felt about two inches tall. Don't misunderstand me,
I have no problems with my interaction with Roseanne; in some ways, I'm almost
proud of that. I not only helped her come to some important realizations but
also lanced a pain which had been festering inside her. But I knowingly and
willingly hurt my best friend. "You couldn't have known that's what would
happen," some friends have told me upon hearing the tale. But that is
untrue... because I *did* know what would happen. At any point I could have
defused the scenario, pre and post breakdown, and I certainly could have
averted their "breakup". But, even knowing the impact it would have on Sonny,
I fostered a schism between the two, because I felt the it was the best thing
for Roseanne.
But in addition to guilt I feel a futility; even were I exonerated of all
blame it still seems so useless. I'm almost certain that Roseanne and Sonny
will get back together, and I'm just as certain that it's doomed to failure
from the start. No matter how much the two love each other, Roseanne's
capacity to despise herself is even greater. She is caught between a rock and
a hard place: her desire for Sonny (and the 'life' he represents) and her need
for integrity (and the 'honor' it represents). Unless she can somehow
reconcile the two, she will come to hate herself and eventually the sense of
integrity which defined her before will crumple up and go away... and the
world *will* have lost something special then. So in the end my meddling
not only accomplished nothing but also trashed a valuable friendship.
Lastly, the whole situation is highly reminiscent of something which occurred
years ago. Two good friends of mine, Alix and Adrian, had been going out and
then ostensibly broke up. But many months later they were still intimate
(though few people knew about it). However, I also knew that Adrian was
leading Alix on, because he was dating and nailing other women. I was in a
quandary: should I tell her, or not? [BTW, things are further muddied by my
attraction to Alix at the time, which is a different story...] After much
agonizing I finally told her. She broke down when she found out, but then she
picked herself up and resumed living her life (which had been on hold waiting
for Adrian). Anyway, I wasn't able to find a satifactory resolution then...
and I didn't find a satisfactory resolution this time, either. In both cases
I've preferred helping the "used" party... which invariably led to the loss of
the "user"'s friendship.
KIM... & SONNY?
Since then I've tried contacting Sonny, but my only reply has been a brief
email essentially telling me to go away. After awhile I gave up trying. I am
faced with the sad prospect that it might be better for both of us if we
weren't friends anymore. Sonny is transforming into someone I might not be
able to interact with positively. No, I'm not judging him and saying he's
becoming a bad person. I have good friends of all kinds, some of which are
much scummier reprobates now than Sonny will ever become. But they keep their
more questionable activities at a distance, whereas Sonny is already in the
habit of telling me everything. I could well become an unhealthy inhibitor to
his new experiences... and I feel that friends should enhance each others'
lives, not detract from them. Sigh.
Sonny, I wish you the best of luck in life. I hope you find happiness.