Today I'm thinking about how so much of Colin's narrative speaks to the neurodivergent experience of having to pretend to be someone else as a survival mechanism. Of the pressure in masking because your real, authentic self is rejected or ignored: too weird, too quiet, too loud, too gullible, too soft-heart, too. . .everything. Too anything. And at the same time, not enough.
Colin gets excited about his travels, about his hyperfixations, talks and talks and talks about them, and no one cares. So, Colin shuts up. Colin writes letter after letter, and gets no reply. So, Colin writes in a journal just for himself. Colin tries and tries to make his family proud, tries to marry, tries courting properly, and it blows up in his face. So, Colin chooses not to date, to become a spectator. Colin is yelled at for trying to invest, so he no longer asks or talks about money, doesn't try to rock the boat in his city. Who Colin is, what he wants, ceases to matter, the fabric of him folded smaller and smaller- instead he focuses on the shell. Builds it in image of his older brothers, of the men around him. Mirrors them.
Anthony says he should have taken Colin to brothels, that he's a fool for trying to marry and his engagement blows up- Colin thus goes to brothels. Colin hops from city to city, trying on new personas like outfits, fine tuning each one. Is this it? Will this be what finally makes them accept me? Colin's appeal to the women of the ton is that he does not talk about himself- but about them. That they're wearing beautiful dresses, that surely they'll find husbands. Separating himself from them- cannot tell them of his travels, that he's not the brave one, it was everyone working together to help with the balloon.
Deflect. Never centered. Colin exists on the outskirts as Pen does, he's just hypervisible for his exterior, and invisible otherwise. His charm is that he pleases those around him. His wounds are that the truest version of him cannot accomplish that. Thus, he becomes hyperaware of what his impact is, first to apologize and last to be forgiven. Living for the approval of others is a trap. He knows. He's fallen into it, a bear claw around his ankles.
He feels like the only way he's worthwhile is if he's providing something for someone. An apology, or comfort, or ease, compliments or winks, a laugh or a distraction, good looks or a fantasy. Providing a happy life for Pen by stepping out of the way, his own needs secondary. It's being there for his mum for an escort or a soft heart to heart. It's taking Anthony's disappointment in him and being indulgent to Eloise's insults. It's giving Benedict his special tea and saying hardly anything about why he bought it in the first place. Bringing gifts to family members who did not write back to him as he wandered the world, alone. It's sticking his neck out for Penelope with Jack, it's providing a dance or a rescue or a good time, checking on Marina to make sure she's alive and okay, listening to Phillip. Colin isn't at all comfortable being himself, the himself that is messy, so he covers it in the himself that is useful.
But what he does, what he provides other people, is not his actual worth. He thinks he's being altruistic by stepping aside and languishing in his feelings for Pen, believing she'll be happier in the future with Debling, waiting and waiting and waiting, until that candle burns out and he's at the 11th hour- and when he snaps and goes after her, when he cuts into her dance, when he runs for her in that carriage, he makes a choice for himself that he thinks, in some way, is selfish.
But it isn't. It's what she wants, too. And there's something beautiful in the fact that with Penelope, his being real, what he thinks is so difficult and unwanted, is actually giving her what she has desired all along. They both find fulfillment and contentment in his unmasking. Penelope never wanted the shell. She saw what was beneath it. She loves what's beneath it.
And I think there's something. . .healing, in that narrative. That us ND peeps who mask as a means of fitting in- that will never bring us happiness. Not really. That it didn't bring Colin happiness.
His arc is realizing that he should be his true, authentic self, and that love will bloom from it. And it does.
I don't know. I think I can learn something from that. I think I'm going to carry that with me for a while.
stormborns
dededos
snowghoul
vaporwave
andulkaphoto
annaxmalina
prguitarman
gummygunk
baratheonpilled
