Request and Response

"PLEASE," he writes. "PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE Stop what you are doing PLEASE PLEASE PLASE PLEASE".

I answer him.

"You do not seek to understand. You seek only to affect my behavior.

Do you feel this is fair to you? To me?

They behaved illegally. They were wrong. They took away my safety. My privacy. They made me feel violated. I have the right to defend myself - and I never did because of your fear. Do I let your fear take away my rights again?

Even now, they frighten me. I fear for my safety. And I fear for you and your future and your happiness. Neither one of us should have been held hostage to this fear. It was, and is, very wrong.

If Mac has international criminal charges filed against him, then it is because he behaved criminally. Not because I'm "causing problems" for him. I did not break the law. I am the victim.

I will not live in fear and inaction and impotence any longer. These things have undone me and made me a different and dark person. Surely you have some sense that this is true.

Why would you think that I act because I am angry at you? Do you feel that I should be angry at you? Maybe I should be angry because you didn't protect me. Didn't fight for me. But I only feel the sorrow and pain of losing what we had and what we ought to have been. I can't retrieve it. There is not anger. Only sorrow.

But I am angry at them."

He will retrieve the message. And he will still be angry. He will choose not to understand.