night, if I tried to see him he didn't have time. It didn't help that he reacted very badly when I went after him aggressively -- too aggressively, I knew, but couldn't help it -- and told him honestly how vulnerable I was. He backed off fast, leaving me more confused than ever. (Though not too confused to think: How stereotypical.) It went beyond being a woman spurned, though. Especially since I believed, intellectually, that he didn't owe it to me not to be busy. He wasn't required to sort me out. And -- since it seemed to be what I was after -- he wasn't obligated to continue hurting me. We'd just met, after all. It was more that I was enraged by how desperately I wanted to be hurt -- and infuriated that someone, anyone, could have such power over me. I had always thrown myself into infatuations; like most people, I'd been known to get angry at the object of my affections. But this was different. Not only was I infatuated, I was aching for something I couldn't reconcile. Even if Richard had been the perfect counselor I had no right to expect, I might have hated him. As it was, I felt toyed with, and found as many other reasons to dislike him as I could. As long as I could focus on wrath, I didn't have to think about my other feelings. It kept me from falling apart. He was away for most of the summer. I went to a few trusted friends for reassurance and validation; giving few details, I allowed my anger to calcify. But Richard ended up surprising me. On a visit to Chicago, he called me every night for a week. The bruises he left took weeks to fade, some of them bleeding and leaving scars. I raged as I covered the worst of them -- but felt also a low-burning fulfillment. One close friend, Andrew, caught sight of a bruise on my leg and cast me a worried look. "That looks pretty bad," he observed, and I could only say, "Yes." By then, I'd well and truly internalized the belief that Richard didn't want to deal with emotional vulnerability, and my furious resentment rem