The Truth about Oberon and Titiana

Something to get off my chest, after an exchange online with someone who used to be my friend, but now apparently has become an unpleasant stranger.

*****

It looked to be a match made in heaven at first; both of them bloggers, both apparently in love, he, charismatic, she, good looking. They wrote online about their perceptions of love developing, and it was sweet.

Coming out of something rather unpleasant (I wouldn't even bother to call it a relationship.. just an unpleasant exerience) I couldn't help but feel just a little envious. I always seem to get the short end of the stick, in love.

Oberon was my friend first, Titiana his handmaiden. I was never particularly close to her. He was charismatic, and easy to like.

I was close to the common pool of friends we shared, friends from before I had even met him.

I write these truths which I have kept hidden for a long time now, because they no longer seem to matter. Titiana has truly moved on, and is safe now in her brave new world. Everything that transpired... inconsequential memories now.

...when things began to sour, Oberon would gripe ocasionally to us about her paranoia and unwarranted insecurities, and in truth he painted a very persuasive picture. She seemed quite the fruitcake.

Titiana spoke a little to me though, and I realised two things :

The first that every coin has two sides, and whilst she was partly fruity, he was no angel either.

The other obvious thing was that he had many friends to support him; she in contrast had so few to hear her truths.

And so I chose to hear her out.

This angered Oberon, who ordered me to desist - which rankled me, because nobody has that right... nobody at all.

As I heard her story, I was disturbed to find that the truth lay incontrovertibly closer to her side of the coin than his.

Daily exposure to precipitants - writing plays with the Ex as the lead, writing about sexual experiences with her - although she was in the past... repeated trips overseas with the Ex, some concealed, all "on business"....

small wonder for her "paranoia"?

But these were just her words; I am too old to choose sides so simply.

The darker side of the story which my ex-friends will never know, unless they read this entry - he turned her into his sex-toy, constantly telling her they could never be and that he was not with her, that it was Over... then choosing to make love to her afterwards, because presumably, she was there, doable, and attractive.

She was torn between the mixed signals despite all the advice from her own friends and myself to dump him like so much bad rubbish, and felt that there must be some hope left for them.

Double standards : he was free to date, but he was also free to become jealous if she chose to try the same. She was not free to do either.

Triple standards, I was judged a competitor, and ostensibly out for her sex, which apparently incurred feelings of jealousy in him. Ludicrous, since our friendship had always ever been nothing but platonic. She is a creature of silence and self; I am the opposite. We operate on different operating systems. There could never be love between us, other than the little care we showed each other as friends and confidants, and wastrels of time.

Caught in the crossfire, it seemed I had chosen a side - the side that had been wronged. And if there was anything I could do to help, I would : help her move on.

And in the end she did, through various men, and it gladdened me.

I alienated myself from the Group; it did not feel right, and meetings were tense, and forced. In the end it simply proved easier to concentrate on work and exams, and my own personal life... I chose the path of least resistance, and put it all away from me.

And that is the story of Oberon and Titiana.