Self deception

 

March 21, 2012

 

Instinct tells me when I’m being fucked with, like the whispered voice over the telephone that says, “I’ve been stalking you,” and other things I know can’t be true because I’ve been around enough to know bullshit when I hear it.

And yet, like an advertisement for some macho man product I know is designed to play to my ego, I let her gone on, feeding me this crap, lapping it up because like junk food it has been a long time since anyone even tried to hand me a line, and I like it.

Later, I wonder why and understand down deep in the gut that this is some kind of game, and that I have something other than my manly charms she wants, and that if I play along too long I’m going to wind up with a snake bite that just might kill me.

I’m a sucker for danger, for playing with snakes and fire crackers, even when a young kid, always daring fate to take off the fingers my uncles said I would lose if I kept lighting the fuse.

And no doubt, when this is all said and done, when she walks away with whatever she came for, I’m going go feel the pain down deep, too.

It’s part of the curse of the dare devil, and being bright enough to recognize danger and yet stupid enough to step towards it when the inner siren goes off instead of running for cover.

Some day I might even understand what the game is, and why I was selected, and what it is she expects to get, when in my mind I don’t have money, power or prestige. But I might be in the way of some plan I can’t even imagine.

And still, gripping my cell phone in a sweaty palm, I wait for the next call to come, the one with yet another deception I pretend to belief, a bit a self deceit that doesn’t deceive me – if only it would.