[He has been much the same way indeed. Even - especially - when allowing others to believe they had the privilege to spend time with him when he was simply out for a meal, it was on his terms. Sexual partners for the sake of sex even more so.]
If I betray it, I am no longer myself, and the man I am now would want you to end me anyway.
[Just like there was no threat in McGillis's words, Celeste's were similarly matter-of-fact. With some, age brings a sharp loss in humanity. Even if he hadn't decided to hold on to aspects of his own, he still would be unsettled by the kind of change in himself that would make him do that sort of harm.]
...Another dubious honor we share, it seems.
[Sure, twenty years of sex work did put him in contact with many others with similar sob stories. That didn't mean he interacted with them. That didn't mean he shared his own. McGillis was isolated among the upper crust, and Celeste isolated himself among the lowest. It wasn't as though finding others to commiserate would help their station, anyway. No, time was better spent crafting masks and clawing upwards so they wouldn't have to recognize themselves in others.
And then they found themselves here.
Celeste is the only one who gets it. McGillis is the only one he's allowed to get it. So they can understand, and accept, and, maybe, just a little bit of the horror can be lessened.]
cw: discussion of rape continued
If I betray it, I am no longer myself, and the man I am now would want you to end me anyway.
[Just like there was no threat in McGillis's words, Celeste's were similarly matter-of-fact. With some, age brings a sharp loss in humanity. Even if he hadn't decided to hold on to aspects of his own, he still would be unsettled by the kind of change in himself that would make him do that sort of harm.]
...Another dubious honor we share, it seems.
[Sure, twenty years of sex work did put him in contact with many others with similar sob stories. That didn't mean he interacted with them. That didn't mean he shared his own. McGillis was isolated among the upper crust, and Celeste isolated himself among the lowest. It wasn't as though finding others to commiserate would help their station, anyway. No, time was better spent crafting masks and clawing upwards so they wouldn't have to recognize themselves in others.
And then they found themselves here.
Celeste is the only one who gets it. McGillis is the only one he's allowed to get it. So they can understand, and accept, and, maybe, just a little bit of the horror can be lessened.]