After writing that last post, it came to me - slowly then all at once - that all my male friends share the same set of characteristics. The generic Friend of Clarissa goes like this: he's smart, intellectual, a bit of an asshole, may be rough around the edges, socially awkward, but witty.

Justin from the previous post matched up with all those characteristics, and yet so did (I realized later) another friend of mine, Jake.

"Wow," he said after I showed him Justin's comments. "They sure forgot the filter when they made this one. Imagine when someone's dog dies. 'Have you owned a dog before? No? Well I'm not surprised.'"

For the first time that night, I laughed. Alvin is the best, kindest, most patient boyfriend I could ever ask for, but he has a tendency to match his emotions to mine. If I get angry at someone, so does he, and whilst I appreciate the pure empathy that he has to give to the world, this time the laugh cred goes to Jake.

But seriously, why is it so hard for smart people to be kind?

We've romanticized this idea of the sarcastic/mean genius, and frankly, it's pissing me off. Think Sheldon from Big Bang Theory, the title characters from House and Bones, Sherlock from both the British and American series, the list goes on, really.

Intelligence, much like commerce, is a valuable commodity. And yet we don't let rich jerks get away with being complete assholes. In fiction and the media, they're painted as the bad guys, whilst the mean, albeit gifted protagonist is the hero. Why is that?

Being knowledgeable about something shouldn't give people a free get out of jail card when it comes to treating other people like, well, human beings. I mean, its 2015.

It's been months, I know. But I finally got back to my laptop and started re-writing the entire story.

This time the main protagonist is a 30 years-old single man, who works as a journalist for the Star. I modeled him slightly after my editor and oh my god I hope he doesn't read this.

I'm finally back to where I left off, at the 10k mark where I previously dropped everything in the face of a sudden and crippling case of The Block. So here we are.

Three nights ago, the big B hit me again, only this time it was more like a debilitating illness that slowly immobilized me over the short span of three days. It's not like I didn't see it coming, I recognized the symptoms as soon as they showed up - the decreasing interest in my story and characters, the drop in my daily word count - but it was like the worse I felt, the less inclined I was to actually do something about it.

D'you know what I mean? Normally when I type, I get into this rhythm, like I find a flow in my head and I space out for a while until something falls - and I don't know where - but now and again this beautiful line shows up in my head and I have to type it down. That's my crack. Only lately, I've been feeling like whatever comes out of my fingers sounds rehearsed. Nothing shows up, everything's cliche, and I'm a farce. Whatever drove me to think I was remotely good at doing this?

Then in a brief flash of insanity, I sent my six chapters over to an acquaintance for editing.

A word about this friend: he's brilliant. He's a genius with the rules and ways of the English word, so maybe it wasn't insanity that I was feeling, but a misguided sort of trust. That's the way the world works right? If we meet, I'm going to assume that we have an unspoken understanding: you'll be kind to me, and I'll be kind to you, and that we both would be, if required, as honest as tact allowed. Anyway I'll get on to that in a moment.

We met at our college's internet lab, back when we were still studying (him, A-levels, and me, mass comm). I was working on a speech; he was sitting beside me. Before that, we'd only spoken briefly and rarely, having had shared a near-forgotten encounter at YMCA camp when I was 12. Other than that, I knew close to nothing about him.

But our previous encounters had always been amicable.  I thought he was witty, if a little awkward, so I sent him a Facebook message. Wanna help beta-read a couple chapters of my WIP?

He consented. I uploaded the file. Then I waited.

The next day I received this message from him:

Him: I just reached the halfway point. And I must say, I am very disappointed.

Me: That's why I passed it to you. Do you have the edits?

Him: I'm only three-quarters through. Did you proofread it first?

Me: No

Him: That explains a lot.

I should have just shut it down then. But I thought, hey, at least he's being honest. The more critique, the more constructive, right? I figured if I wanted to be a better writer, I couldn't afford to be precious. It got a bit worse before I decided that I didn't want to end my day crying into a pillow.

I decided that we had to be professional, so I ignored the barbs.

Me: What I need most is for you to take apart redundant lines with a scalpel. The line editing I can do on my own. Logic errors, inconsistencies, poor style. OH and characterization. I'm a real chump at writing characters.

Him: That's very evident.

For a girl that shouts "Fight me" at every chance I get, I sure do a lot of crying. 

So yeah, Justin, this one's for you.

You're a brilliant proofreader, and everything I wrote got so much better after all the changes. But if I could go back in time, I'd rather not have come to you at all. A good editor attacks the writing, not the writer. He corrects flaws instead of mocking them. You were mean, cynical, sarcastic and intentionally (not to mention unnecessarily) hurtful, and I still have no idea why.

Do you think this makes you better? Or stronger? I get that you're going through a hard time right now, with your depression and all, but surprise! So am I. This isn't a pissing contest. It's me saying that every interaction is a choice we make and boy did you make them. 

If there's anyone who can relate to how cutting words are just as good as cutting arms, it's me. Just ask Alvin, we got into a huge fight because I couldn't tell him what was digging into my flesh. Bless that man, seriously. He spent the next five minutes holding me as I sobbed, then the following ten holding up a pillow to I could throw some punches (because boy did I need to hit something) 

The worst kind of pain is the kind that is so completely unwarranted. If I could be honest with you, I'd march up to your door, rip it off of its hinges, and shout in your face

WHAT THE FUCK DID I EVER DO TO YOU, MAN?

But I'm a coward. So I bit my tongue and took it all in and spent the next two days thinking that I was total crap. 

I don't know if I can keep going with this story now that you've insulted everything inside. I don't eve know if its worth going on.

Funny how some throwaway comments for you could be so soul crushing to someone else.