This is a true story....trigger warning regarding sexual abuse and domestic partner abuse.
I met Lilly on a vanilla dating site - her profile was the only one that I could find relatively locally that stood out. It might have been her flaming red hair, or her flower print frock, but something about her appealed to me.
We started out nicely enough - an exchange of messages on the dating site, and then it moved to a casual text message, then a phone call. We chatted for a few hours getting to know each other - talking about our academic backgrounds, our lives, what we are passionate about etc. In the pit of my belly, I knew it was futile getting to know her because she’s probably very vanilla, and the minute I share my dark secret, she will run for the hills.
So we would text very briefly every day - just a quick hello, here’s what my day looks like - it wasn’t a rule, or protocol - it was just something we did - and phone calls every other day or so.
She said to me one day that she really fancied me, and wanted to get to know me better - that’s when I knew it was time to tell her - to be honest about my lifestyle - it was only fair she knew the truth. I screwed up the courage to tell her and she was neutral about it - she wasn’t horrified, but she wasn’t interested in learning more or participating - her words were “Well, whatever blows your hair back”. She then confided in me about a secret in her past - of incestuous abuse involving a cult - and a child she had by her father.
As time progressed, she shared more about her life with me - about an ex-partner who was abusive to her - who was in BDSM but used it non-consensually against Lilly. She said she worked in a laundry part time, and a beauty saloon part time - and her beauty saloon employer was sponsoring her to become a barber, at the age of 60+.
She told me about the orchestra she used to own, and the female professional tennis player she used to date. She said she was having difficulty with her landlord, and her landlord was forcing her out, but that friends of hers were converting a small apartment complex into loft apartments and housing for homeless - but she was not allowed to have guests spend the night - because of the rules for the indigent tenants.
She also wrote papers on Barocque musicology, from the perspective of queer theory.
She said she had to testify against her former partner, who was being charged by the military, because the partner was in the military, for a number of offenses - impersonating an officer, a weapons charge, theft - and they were including Lilly’s rape complaint against the partner - Lilly had an AVO against her, and had to go up the level of protection once the charges had been levied against the partner.
We were friends on Facebook, she sent me a package of magazines from Sydney, and she was supposed to come down via train one day to Canberra for lunch - but she never did. She told me she wasn’t coming, saying that the stuff with her ex-partner was causing old hurt she thought she hadn’t dealt with.
I would talk to her about my D/s life - nothing blatant, I didn’t think that would be fair, but I did want to include her.
Then, I started to wonder about some of the things she was saying to me - like the abuse - apparently her mother died in jail, 93 years of age, just a few years ago - but I can’t find anything about the case on the internet. Surely something massive like a cult motivated pedophile ring would have made the news - especially if the father had abused his 3 daughters, and produced 4 children from the abuse. She said one of the photos on her Facebook was her, in her younger years, she had modelled. When I did a reverse lookup of the photo, I found it on three fashion blogs in Brazil. She said she was a champion dog breeder and dog judge for many years - but I can find no record of that on the net. I did find a blog listing about the collectables and antiques store she used to own, but the article said she was also a professor of pure maths at the local university - something she NEVER mentioned to me.
Later, in a conversation, she said she hadn’t come down on the train because we didn’t know each other that well, but she wouldn’t have a problem coming to see me now, since I seemed to be okay - I could be trusted.
Problem was, I didn’t feel she could be. How could anyone possibly have so much drama in their life? How many career paths could one person have? Oh, did I mention she was a psychiatric nurse - but she didn’t go to school for it - she learned on the job at the hospital?
I had been rather distant after a recent D/s event - partially because I was tired out by the event, and partially because I was preparing for my family’s visit. We had a conversation Monday, some text messages during the week, and we were supposed to chat on the phone Friday, but the phone conversation never took place. There were no text messages, and just recently I see we are no longer friends on Facebook.
Now, to me, those are all the signs of ghosting - of someone saying they are into you, they like you, but they suddenly just disappear from your life. Thing is, I’m not upset by it. We are really not compatible - she has so much drama and baggage - and I think I’m pretty drama free these days. She’s not into BDSM - which is something I would never do - I would never again get involved with someone vanilla - and so on, and so on.
I don’t know if I will ever hear from Lilly again - part of me wants to know why the silence, why the unfriending - but another part of me thinks “Does it even matter?”
So yeah, I’m pretty sure I’ve been ghosted, but I don’t mind - I think I’m going to let this go organic. I think perhaps the Universe did me a big favour - I mean, I don’t have to be the bad guy, there doesn’t need to be some painful confrontation, my trust wasn’t broken - because there was very little trust extended to begin with (take that as a lesson kids - never give anyone complete trust until you get to know them - because you never know when the mask will slip) - and my heart wasn’t hurt.
Maybe at some point I’ll hear from Lilly again, but somehow I doubt it, and I’m okay with that - honestly.
