The New Me

by Halle Butler

She told me she didn’t like drama and confrontation, which was an obvious tell, a “red flag” if you care about shit like that, which usually I don’t. I knew that if I tacitly allowed her to dominate the conversation, it would addict her to my company and lead her to flatter me by texting me and contacting me frequently,

She runs her hands through her hair and sighs, acting self-important, playing a part, the hard worker, defeated by circumstance, a gentle soul misunderstood in the hard world. I know I’m about to hear some long-winded tale about how hard it is to work a real full-time job.

I wonder if it’s a misunderstanding of life to look for purpose, or if the mom, then, following through, thinks that her purpose—the full sum of her own life—was to give birth to a girl who would get the sweater fibers of a child rapist under her fingernails.

James used to say I was good at being ugly and indiscriminately resentful, and maybe that’s what I’m doing now. And maybe he liked my resentful side, and that’s why he said I was good at it. Who knows! I’m glad he’s gone. He had a talent for making me feel mean. We dated for four years, lived together for three of them, happily for two. Sometimes I can still feel him in the other room, judging me, avoiding me.

I should read a book, I should make some friends, I should write some emails, I should go to the movies, I should get some exercise, I should unclench my muscles, I should get a hobby, I should buy a plant, I should call my exes, all of them, and ask them for advice, I should figure out why no one wants to be around me, I should start going to the same bar every night, become a regular, I should volunteer again, I should get a cat or a plant or some nice lotion or some Whitestrips, start using a laundry service, start taking myself both more and less seriously.

It feels unfair that even when I imagine that I am also being shown the dog photos, I know I wouldn’t be able to say anything about them. I would just make a stifled, positive-sounding noise, or say something provocative about dog breeders, or laugh nervously. I feel this more, maybe, than the unfairness that I haven’t made a real decision in more than a year—and here she is faced with ten.

I was embarrassed to be me and needed someone to reassure me that I had good qualities, to reassure me that I was just overreacting or having a bad day.

You can’t ask someone to help you without letting them know you’re different than advertised, that you’ve been thinking and feeling strange things this whole time. That you’re uglier, weaker, more annoying, more basic, less interesting than promised. Without letting on that your feelings are easily hurt, and that you are boring, just like everyone else. Once you expose yourself as insecure, it’s easy to feel resentment if you’re not immediately put back at ease. If there’s even a flicker, a tiny recognition of your bad qualities, the resentment kicks in, the deal is broken, and suddenly you’re both angry strangers, spending hours alone in a room together and completely unsure of why.

The kitchen is the heart of the home, no one has touched my body in more than a year, and I have a beautiful living space. Bedroom, I’m coming for you next! I take a minute to stand completely still in my kitchen, looking at what I’ve done. I feel proud.

John had spent the day at work and was having some minor conflict with a coworker, which was transforming into a drama that shaped not only his days but the entire narrative of his life. This coworker was lazy and was making John look bad, or that’s how he felt, and he was unsure of whether he should confront the coworker or learn to manage his expectations. John went to bed thinking about this conflict, and there were five minutes every morning where he did not think about the conflict, but then it sprang again to his mind, defining his day. He