The Passenger, or Meeting a Ghost

I had agreed to meet my fake Bajoran friend on Sunday morning for coffee. I was nervous, but I thought I’d be alright.

But actually it was awful.

I mean, really terrible.

She was late (I’d forgotten to expect that), and by the time she turned up, I was shaking and felt so sick I thought I’d lose my breakfast…

… and within 5 minutes of talking I had snapped, lost my temper and walked out, and then to top it all, while I was still furious, like a raving lunatic I texted her.

The conversation went like this:

Friend: [initial chit-chat, blah-blah-blah]

Me: oh. oh, really. oh, right. aha. oh. ok.

Friend [all the things I’m doing with my Ferengi], and so how are you doing with your Ferengis?
(perfectly reasonable question, apart from the fact that the last time we spoke she had insulted me and them in public in the same sentence…]

Me: Well, actually I’m not ready to discuss my Ferengis with you. [Actually, I’m thinking I’m not sure there’s any subject I feel I can comfortably speak to you about right now!]

Friend: [looking astounded] What do you mean?

Me: [Deep breath] Look, on one hand it would be fine to lay all this aside and pretend it didn’t happen…[I’m wanting to say, "but I feel uncomfortable and maybe we need to set some boundaries here." But I don’t get a chance to say it.]

Friend: I’m not pretending it didn’t happen, but I never lied to you.
[Lied? What? Who brought up lying? If she really hadn’t lied, why would she even bring that subject up? If she hadn’t lied, the only thing she’d have to apologise for was disrespecting me and my Ferengis in public. This feels like a guilty conscience speaking.]

Me: [Completely snapping] Oh, really. So you didn’t lie to cover up what you did?

Friend: No, I didn’t.

Me: [Standing up] Well, then there’s no future for this conversation. [I’ve completely lost it, I walk out, and speed back to the Station in the Defiant.]

Oh! I’m so annoyed with myself!

It wasn’t meant to go like this!

I had vague visions of it all somehow being magically sorted out, and that things would be able to go back to the way they were.

This isn’t turning the other cheek! Why couldn’t I turn the other cheek? Well, I just couldn’t! I felt like I’d turned the other cheek so many times my face was stinging.

Of course, I wasn’t expecting anything like an apology – all the other times she lost her temper  and treated me badly she never apologised. She just knew I’d relent and let her get away with it.  (In fact I think she relied on that fact, thinking that actually she could get away with saying anything) So apologising is obviously something that doesn’t come easy for this Cardassian in Bajoran clothing.

But I really thought we could actually lay this all aside and just be civil with each other.
I though I could lay this aside and be civil.

I didn’t realise just how worked up I was about the whole thing until I saw her.

How pathetic this must sound.

But the thing that really got me was the way she was schmoozing the cafe staff.

And I remembered the way she would bitch about people in private and then hug and kiss them in public.

I don’t understand this game.

I don’t play.

And I don’t like being played.

And I realised that despite the fact that I really wasn’t the one in the wrong, somehow I had been the one who had lost a bunch of friends because they were willing to believe a lie (if not an outright lie, then a lie by omission of telling the truth) and a trading group, along with my confidence to manage the Station, my confidence to liaise between Starfleet and Bajor, and well, my confidence. While she had lost, what? Well, me. And apparently that didn’t matter enough to be in touch with me at all for a year.

I thought that after almost a year, I had moved on, and I was over the whole thing. But now I just feel devastated, shattered, exposed, and stupid (how could I have let myself be so taken in, so fooled, and so affected by this?) – the same feeling I had when it all happened last year.

My furious text went like this:

"I apologise 4 walking out. But when a wound is so deep, and surprisingly raw after a year, it’s 2 much 2 discuss it calmly.  Why did u want to meet if u r not ready 2 say sorry? Perhaps u didn’t lie 2 me, but u insulted me and my ferengis in public and then lied about it 2 cover it up. Plus u didn’t tell me about a meeting 2 discuss me! I never play games.  That is no way 2 treat a friend.  How could I ever trust u again when u still won’t even admit what u did? So no, u don’t get 2 ask me about my ferengis.  if u r ready 2 really talk, let me no, but otherwise there really is no basis on which 2 proceed."

Everything would have been forgiveable… everything is forgiveable.  I don’t actually need an apology.  But an acknowledgement would have been helpful.

I think now, that even if the bridges weren’t already burned, they got pretty singed yesterday, and I’m probably sealing the fate of those rickety, precarious bridges by posting this post… but I’m not sure I care anymore. If this person were a friend worth having, she would swallow her pride and be real.  I don’t want to go over those bridges anymore.  I don’t really have time for a trading group that holds meetings to discuss people behind their back, and I don’t have time for friends who are willing to believe a load of crap about me just because I don’t play the high-school girly friend games.

I realised that the last year, I’ve held my Ferengis and Sisko, even my parents at arms’ length, I’ve held current and potential friends at arm’s length, I’ve held my confidence in abeyance, in short I have been in Limbo.  I still, after a year, have yet to start to re-build my shattered life.

If I’m honest I think I can’t help myself continue to hope that all will be resolved, that my conviction about her being an insincere charmer are misplaced, that she would prove it to me by dropping the act, and I would get my ‘real’ friend back….

… but I’m not holding my breath.

Sisko (who rather fancies himself as a therapist) tells me I try too hard, I expect too much, and I don’t know myself.