SHe'd almost looked forward to the nonsexual intimacy stage, when he'd thought he'd be able to do it with Asher.
He does his best to hide how miserable he is.
SHe'd almost looked forward to the nonsexual intimacy stage, when he'd thought he'd be able to do it with Asher.
He does his best to hide how miserable he is.
"If you feel like you don't have someone to talk to about your problems who will accept you, you might eat less?"
".....it's at least partially about control," he says, very carefully. "I don't get to decide what kind of clothes I wear and I don't get to decide what name I use, but I get to decide what I put in my body. Except for how now I don't."
Christine notes down "sense of control."
The chart Christine creates does not contain the word "homosexuality" and does mostly contain things Alexander agrees with at least a little.
And on Sunday Alexander has his one-on-one.
"Have you thought more about the issue of names?"
"I have a list of things that are not girl's names in English that work for me!"
She hands Christine the piece of paper; the list is Minnow, Rain, Ghost, Phoenix, Millay, Aiko, Lynx. She's a little dubious about Phoenix and Rain is of course a pipe dream, and none of them are boy's names, but hey, it's visibly putting effort into a compromise. And none of them are Alexander.
"Excellent, Ghost!" She shuffles papers. "So, perhaps we should talk more about your relationship with Lev."
"You said in a previous session that you're finding your relationship with him very helpful."
"Yeah. Eating because I felt like probably I should didn't work and eating because there'd be consequences if I didn't didn't work but it turns out that eating because my friend is right there worrying about me totally does."
"It does seem that way." Never mind the event that precipitated this friendship.
"I'm sure we can all agree," she says mildly, "that it would be unfortunate if I had to tell Lev's parents that he is homosexually active."
"That would indeed be unfortunate." She wasn't going to have sex with him anyway, she's slutty, not stupid. She does not say this.
"You are conflicted about your recovery, but Lev is committed to his. What do you think about that?"
"I think Lev's personal history and mine are very different. Unless I've misinterpreted the question, which I might have."
"Many homosexuals have conflicted feelings when their former sexual partners decide to try to pursue heterosexuality."
She shrugs. "I like kissing him and will miss doing it but it's really not my place to make that decision for him and I'm doing what I can to help. He's getting a lot better at metalworking."
It was pretty obvious that you already knew, she doesn't say.
"I'm trying to act in good faith."