He, like all of us, believed introspection was cheap, overrated, but in order to keep that itch scratched, he breathed his questions into me. I was a composite of all his neuroses, I was a permissible vice—I was a second him.

when you love a narcissist, you love their games, the most prolific one of all being silence. It’s a ghastly torture for everyone who has to listen to what they’re not saying.

His negligence with me feels violent, his lack of response feels violent. After all, any calculation is a form of violence—just as my calling his violence violence is violence, but self-defense begs to be judged by an entirely different standard