It's not like you spend any less time with me now that he's back. I mean, you never really did spend time with me while he was gone, even when we were cuddled on the couch together watching TV. Your body is with me, but I know your mind hasn't been, not ever. I know I'm just a poor substitute for the real deal, and I guess I thought I could live with that just so I could be with you, but I'm not so sure I can.
While he was gone it was easy to forget that you don't really love me, that you are nothing like me. Oh, you'd pretend that you were interested in my music and poetry, even help me when I'd get writer's block and get so frustrated I would just break down. Come to think of it, you still do that, but I know now that you are really just pacifying me so I don't think about the way you look at him and how happy you are to be near him again.
You've never really talked much to me, though you talk at me a lot. When you do actually talk *to* me, it's usually about your family and friends back home, your art interests, and things like that. It's almost always over breakfast, too, when you're enjoying your morning coffee and reading the paper.
That's when you're at your best, fresh from your morning run. You look so perfect when you get back, even though you're all sweaty and tired, dressed in your trademark track clothes. You're the only person I've ever known that looks like a million bucks no matter what you're wearing, and I wonder sometimes if you know that's how people see you.
Not that it matters, of course. You always say what others think doesn't really matter, but I can tell you like the effect you have on me. You know I'm wrapped around the fantasy that you give a damn about me, even though I know you don't, not really. Only one man has ever mattered to you, and no matter how hard I try, I just can't be Hunter.
And gods, do I try. I've totally flip-flopped my personality to match his, mastered all of his facial expressions, even have his swagger down pat. I've given up all of my "fan following" because I would rather not have anyone care about me if it means you will. Even if it's only for a fleeting second, just knowing that when you looked at me, talked to me, said my name that it is actually *me* you are doing all of those things to.
You know that's why I took the heel turn. I know you do. You know I am not like this, not on the inside, yet you are doing nothing to stop it. Hell, if nothing else you are encouraging it more and more each day, especially now that he's come back.
You also know that you telling me you love me is tearing me up inside, don't you? Yeah, I'm sure you do, because I see the sparkle in your eyes when you say it. It's not a sparkle of love, or compassion, or even fucking concern for my emotional well being. You know the one I mean, don't you? The one Hunter would look at you with after Shane left him. It's the "I've got you where I want you, and I'm just fucking with your head" sparkle.
And fucking with my head is not the only thing you're doing, Duane. No, you've got my heart all torn up and twisted into this unrecognizable mass, and I just don't know how to keep you from shattering it into a million pieces every time you say you love me and look at him over my shoulder.
But you don't really care about that, do you? You don't care about anything that has to do with me. You've tolerated me all this time because I was the next best thing to Hunter, but you've never *cared* at all. Not about me, not about my career, or my music. Especially not my music, because that's the one thing you can't change about me.
You can mold my personality into his. You can make me walk like him, talk like him, hell even look like him, but you just can't make me *think* and *feel* like him, can you?
Not from any lack of trying on your part, not by a long shot. But there's something that I've realized since he's come back, Duane, and that's the fact that no matter how much you want me to play at being the game, I just can't *be* the game. Not for you, not for anyone, and I just don't want to try anymore.
All I want is to be more like myself, and whether you like it or not, that's what I intend to do.
