Vaidy’s Weblog

He said “I’d be devastated if you said No.”

She said “No.”

“What do you mean ‘No’?”

“I don’t mean ‘no’, but I’d like to see how you look when you are, as you say, ‘devastated’.”

“Come on, don’t play with my emotions.”

“I am certainly not playing with your emotions. I merely want to see and understand them.”

“Why? What on earth do you want to do that for?”

“To know and understand you. Because, as you say, you are basically a very emotional person.”

“This is not a theatre workshop. Am I in for an audition or what?”

“But this is surely some test. A trial of truth. True Emotion versus Declared Emotion.”

“Meaning you don’t believe me when I say I’d be devastated if you said no?”

“Yes. No, I want to see you truly devastated.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

“But how? Until… unless you really say no, I wouldn’t really feel or be devastated.”

“Then I’d really say no.”

“No. Don’t.”

“How else would I know that you’d be devastated if I said no?”

“Why do you need to know? Isn’t it enough if you simply believed me?”

“No, it isn’t enough. I wouldn’t believe what I didn’t know.”

“All right, Say no, really no, and you will see and know me devastated.”

“Great.”

“But let me forewarn you. When you see me devastated, I would be useless. As good as lifeless. You must then Not want me.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’d be practically gone, my senses totally benumbed, and even my sanity completely and irretrievably lost. The only practical question would then be: Burial or cremation?”

“If you were to be reduced to something like that, I wouldn’t want you.”

“How could you say that, without really knowing what it would be like to be reduced to something like that? Like senseless and insane.”

“I’d know. I can quite easily imagine what it is that I’d positively Not want.”

“Then why can’t you possibly imagine what it is that would cause that which you would positively Not want?”

“Well… all right. I guess you’d be devastated if I didn’t say yes.”

“Yes to what?”

“Whatever it is that you said you’d be devastated if I said no to.”