wordgasm

1. 20
   Sep
   

   Being The Third Isn’t Exactly a Party

   (a piece for my CL 115 class)

   Everybody hates the girl who comes in between the greatest love teams. We all just love to hate them; from Lorna Tolentino as Belinda in Mano Po 2, to Angelica Panganiban as Rubi. She’s banshee incarnate, the deal breaker, the rotten egg to a really good recipe on a relationship, that black fly on a glass of good chardonnay. But then again, what fun is there in a love story if there wasn’t a conflict?

   Antagonism aside, there is actually more to mistresses than the cheesy movie plots give us. Because in real life, they’re not all alike, they’re not all gold diggers, and certainly, they’re not all there because they actually wanted to.

   It’s the oldest excuse in the book “I swear. I didn’t know he had a girlfriend.” You may roll your eyes at the statement but it may be true. I’m not saying this is applicable to all cases but, you see, a mistress is just like any other girl who falls in love with a man. And regardless if she knew that he was committed in the first place or not, what is a girl to do if the Brad Pitt of her life reciprocated her feelings too?

   No, mistresses aren’t fire truck red lipstick wearing whores waiting outside your boyfriends’ workplaces or classrooms. You may be surprised to know that they could be the sweetest or even the most demure person you’ve come across. It could be your childhood best friend, your life long rival, some girl you’ve never seen or heard of from his office or class, oh and even more interesting: your friend’s mom.

   No, mistresses aren’t actually out to compete with you. Sometimes, they try not to bring you up in a conversation at all. Yes, conversation, don’t even think that all they do is have sex when they meet up with a man. It’s not like they whisper “leave her” in his ear while wearing a jaw dropping set of lingerie or a give-him-the-best-date-ever contest every time they’re with your man. Honestly, they’re also just after companionship and also, already aware that there’s no need for a battle. They know pretty well that they’re never going be winners.

   I’ve always believed that I was a strong and independent woman. And now, to find myself resolving to share someone makes me want to roll over a mineral field or oil depot just to regain vigor. Not that I feel guilty, I just can’t stomach the idea of being second best.

   My friends were almost ready to have me exorcised at one dinner we had. “Think of how we would feel if our boyfriends cheated on us!” They said as if they were you.  “How do you think I feel? Trust me I’ve thought of this. I’ve been thinking of this way too much actually. It’s not like I planned to be a dent on a relationship.” I love my friends of course. And I knew they only meant well. And so to make them complacent, I just said I was going to consider their advice.

   Get it out of your head. I’m not after him because I am necessarily evil. It just so happens that I like him and you just happen to be a casualty. It’s not because you’re imperfect; he just might be bored. It’s not because he doesn’t care about you; he just might not help but care for me too.  It’s actually unfair for us both. But for what it’s worth, the only advantage you have over me is that you came first.

   You know, I’ve been on the other side of the fence myself. I thought that I’d spend forever with this boy who wanted the same thing. But apparently he shifted gears and wanted to do all those plans with someone else—some quiet girl who he noticed looking at him all the time and he, eventually, looked back and hasn’t looked elsewhere since. At least, not back at me. You’d think that I, of all people, wouldn’t do that same thing to anyone else if I already knew how much it hurts. I do, really, I do. And I also thought I wouldn’t be capable of doing it. But like I said, these things just happen and it’s not like I asked for it.

   We’re not heartless. In all honesty, this may hurt us more than it could ever hurt for you.  To know that they would risk a stable relationship just to be with us, it’s exciting to keep a secret between the two of us and even more exciting to release all that pressure when we’re alone, and that they’d actually have to lie to you really really sucks. But hey, we may get our sweet rendezvous with them from time to time. But the end of the day, it’s still you they would come home to. And you can still proudly post on your social network profiles: In a relationship. Yes, he’s mine.