The Art Of Narcissistic Men
A narcissistic man is a double-edged sword that you’re convinced won’t hurt the hearts of its protectors before you realize you’re mistaken.
He is your boss. Your boyfriend. Your father. Your lover. Your best friend. Your colleague or your situationship.
He yells like the backseat driver from hell after a wrong turn and a different route alternative to the one he prefers.
He screams at you so loud that you’re sick as you drive to dinner, and then wonders why you don’t have much of an appetite as he stares at your full plate. You claim it’s the seemingly bad sauce after he probes further, since agnolotti is one of your favorites from this place and you don’t want to feel even worse later.
He accuses you of being irrational or stupid when you cry after you’ve only tried to help and tells you to stop with the waterworks as you can’t help but cry in front of a diner full of people.
He loses his license for speeding too many times and loses his mind when you finally get a ticket of your own.
He only cries when he thinks about the loss of the dog or when you were a little girl or occasionally the recent accomplishments you’ve achieved that instigate his arrogant sense of pride, which is only really used so that he can show off to his so-called friends.
He’s more present in conversations that involve him or connect somehow to his life and tunes out like a static radio when it’s less relevant.
He tries to change the subject just to escape a faulted argument and pays for dinner and expensive gifts that are a little gauche to remedy things better.
He chastizes you for incorrectly lodging paperwork you’ve never filed before that you only even did in the first place as an unattached favor and makes you feel incompetent in response.
He tells you that he’ll live overseas with you for two years in what is supposed to be one of your biggest dreams and changes his mind at the last second. He expects you to be a mother and a wife and maintain the house while supporting his dreams instead.
He isn’t fully certain of your birthday and knows that you’re somewhere in your twenties while failing to pinpoint just which one but knows the date of your brothers’ like the back of his hand.
He books flights for a trip he knows he’ll be canceling as the departure date nears, only booking flights initially to show that he really could be there, but ultimately will not be, for one reason or another.
He turns red with anger when you leave the door open as the heater blares but leaves the house with the television on pause and drives with the window open and the air conditioner on.
He talks down to you in a patronizing tone because his masculinity and his extra years clearly make him so much wiser than anything you could ever be.
He smiles like he’s won a game, as if you’ve failed to outsmart him, when you try a method that doesn’t belong to him, which is impossible considering he knows best.
He doesn’t know the meaning of gaslighting and thinks women tend to exaggerate or are falsely superior.
He speaks of your childhood with reinvented memories and exaggerated persona, unable to remember the freeze-dried moments of traumas he helped cement.
He denies that he’s a narcissist and ensures you that it’s all in your head. Ultimately you can’t help but wonder if the collective series of supposedly narcissistic exhibitions are real at all, or if maybe the real problem is you.