Darryl

Mom cares but it isn’t the same. She wants me to be ok. He wanted me to be upright. I think I’m neither.

Can you face your own inferiority? Can you watch yourself be replaced?

His death opened a door that I no longer had the energy to walk through.

It’s sad, who loves the world more than me? Whose submission to it is deeper?

Maybe that’s what humanity is, not the human species but humanity, culture, a sedimentation of little cults, each following one guy who’s worth it. All that energy, all that history, somebody was packing heat. That’s real religion: real dick.

Therapy shouldn’t be a British guy who looks like my dad making fun of how I have sex.

But he’s a real person. He’s sweet, he’s actually sweeter than me. I think that must be the appeal of him for Mindy, he doesn’t just get her off, he gets her.

Sunday morning, Bill let me touch it. That was interesting. He asked if I wanted to and I didn’t know what to say. I’d never put my hands on another guy like that before. So that’s what a real man feels like. Different for sure.

In most ways, though, I follow the pack. I put a lot of stock in what’s “normal” in my life.