BYBR Discussion - Prologue
Hi, everyone! It's time for this week's discussion of BYBR and we start with the Prologue. Spoiler alerts won't really apply to the prologue, but please be aware that as we get into later chapters, It'll be almost impossible for me to be spoiler free in this type of discussion. I will label those posts as such. Remember that you can read and comment on any of the past chapters anytime you want. The discussion series begins here: BYBR Discussion - Framed.
The Prologue serves to set Brian's mindset somewhere in the future, and when we begin, he's looking back at much of his relationship with Justin in hindsight. In fact, the name of this series was going to be Hindsight and somewhere there's a 35K word draft that I trashed because it had no objective. The one thing it did do, though, was birth an original character that I'll reveal later. Another feature of the prologue is to illustrate that Brian isn't above a little melodrama. In the first section of this prologue, Brian is confronting his own insecurities about his relationship with Justin and making it clear to himself that his love for him is very real and permanent.
When he left for New York, you comforted yourself with stiff drinks and rationales: falling in love with him was never the main objective. It was more of a nuisance really, something that just kept interfering with your single-minded, hard-headed obsession to take care of him whether he wanted you to or not.
I've always believed that one of the reasons Brian ultimately fell for Justin was because he put so much energy into denying the relationship that eventually, the relationship had to exist. A denial of nothing cannot stand; a denial of something is a different matter altogether. So by being able to compartmentalize his feelings in the beginning, the relationship was allowed to grow in another room that Brian's mind rarely wandered into. And at some point, when he does wander back to that room and open the door, there's a thriving tropical rainforest encompassing the enire space even though he only left behind a houseplant in mostly darkness. He also begins to accept his own self-doubt and validate some of his self-loathing:
So you told yourself that it was just like you’d suspected all along-he didn’t like what he saw. Didn’t surprise you; you didn’t much like it either.
He feels self-pity encroaching so he does what he always does in the face of negative emotions; he drinks and passes out.
Dream sequences have a decent size role in BYBR, and this first one is one of my favorites. Before Brian gets drunk and falls asleep, he's admitting to himself that he made mistakes with Justin. The dream is a validation of that belief. He finds himself in Ibiza, in a paradise that anything but paradise to him. He can only see Justin from a distance, a metaphor of the years they spent apart. His dream-self fears that the separation from Justin was a mistake, that he wasn't ready, and that because of the separation, he had to be cared for by someone else. And in his mind, that would be Ethan.
Brian's insecurities roast him on this beach. He can see Justin, but he can't get to him. Ethan confirms that there's a problem, but offers no solution; he's there to guilt and excoriate Brian. In a way, Ethan is Brian's inner-self in this dream world; he's Brian's internal critic superimposed over someone he can easily hate. After all, Brian is a fairly powerful, rich man at this point, and there are few people left who could even take Brian to task. (Except maybe Justin, but he's in trouble.) Despite all of Brian's best intentions for Justin, something has gone very wrong, and Brian battles with whether to blame himself or not.
Justin's chore in this dream is painful. He's in salty water with open wounds trying to wash them away. The stinging pain must be horrible, but he's behaving like a child, like it doesn't bother him.He just wants attention. Ethan is the bridge between Justin and Brian so Brian can't really get away from him. When Ethan follows him to the parking lot and stops Brian from getting in the passenger side of his car, Brian questions his own actions, subconsciously acknowledging that even in this dream in this crazy circumstance, he's still having trouble getting in the driver's seat and taking charge. He's afraid of the responsibility it will bring and/or afraid that he will fail. Ethan senses his indecision, and makes it crystal clear for Brian:
Ethan looked at you like you were a contemptuous idiot and laughed, “He can’t swim, Brian. He never could.”
Hmmm... What's your interpretation of that last sentence? I'll share mine in the comments sometime this week. Thanks for reading along and participating! :) Plum
Next week is BYBR-Chapter 1-Indication on Sunday, May 5, 2019.
The Prologue serves to set Brian's mindset somewhere in the future, and when we begin, he's looking back at much of his relationship with Justin in hindsight. In fact, the name of this series was going to be Hindsight and somewhere there's a 35K word draft that I trashed because it had no objective. The one thing it did do, though, was birth an original character that I'll reveal later. Another feature of the prologue is to illustrate that Brian isn't above a little melodrama. In the first section of this prologue, Brian is confronting his own insecurities about his relationship with Justin and making it clear to himself that his love for him is very real and permanent.
When he left for New York, you comforted yourself with stiff drinks and rationales: falling in love with him was never the main objective. It was more of a nuisance really, something that just kept interfering with your single-minded, hard-headed obsession to take care of him whether he wanted you to or not.
I've always believed that one of the reasons Brian ultimately fell for Justin was because he put so much energy into denying the relationship that eventually, the relationship had to exist. A denial of nothing cannot stand; a denial of something is a different matter altogether. So by being able to compartmentalize his feelings in the beginning, the relationship was allowed to grow in another room that Brian's mind rarely wandered into. And at some point, when he does wander back to that room and open the door, there's a thriving tropical rainforest encompassing the enire space even though he only left behind a houseplant in mostly darkness. He also begins to accept his own self-doubt and validate some of his self-loathing:
So you told yourself that it was just like you’d suspected all along-he didn’t like what he saw. Didn’t surprise you; you didn’t much like it either.
He feels self-pity encroaching so he does what he always does in the face of negative emotions; he drinks and passes out.
Dream sequences have a decent size role in BYBR, and this first one is one of my favorites. Before Brian gets drunk and falls asleep, he's admitting to himself that he made mistakes with Justin. The dream is a validation of that belief. He finds himself in Ibiza, in a paradise that anything but paradise to him. He can only see Justin from a distance, a metaphor of the years they spent apart. His dream-self fears that the separation from Justin was a mistake, that he wasn't ready, and that because of the separation, he had to be cared for by someone else. And in his mind, that would be Ethan.
Brian's insecurities roast him on this beach. He can see Justin, but he can't get to him. Ethan confirms that there's a problem, but offers no solution; he's there to guilt and excoriate Brian. In a way, Ethan is Brian's inner-self in this dream world; he's Brian's internal critic superimposed over someone he can easily hate. After all, Brian is a fairly powerful, rich man at this point, and there are few people left who could even take Brian to task. (Except maybe Justin, but he's in trouble.) Despite all of Brian's best intentions for Justin, something has gone very wrong, and Brian battles with whether to blame himself or not.
Justin's chore in this dream is painful. He's in salty water with open wounds trying to wash them away. The stinging pain must be horrible, but he's behaving like a child, like it doesn't bother him.He just wants attention. Ethan is the bridge between Justin and Brian so Brian can't really get away from him. When Ethan follows him to the parking lot and stops Brian from getting in the passenger side of his car, Brian questions his own actions, subconsciously acknowledging that even in this dream in this crazy circumstance, he's still having trouble getting in the driver's seat and taking charge. He's afraid of the responsibility it will bring and/or afraid that he will fail. Ethan senses his indecision, and makes it crystal clear for Brian:
Ethan looked at you like you were a contemptuous idiot and laughed, “He can’t swim, Brian. He never could.”
Hmmm... What's your interpretation of that last sentence? I'll share mine in the comments sometime this week. Thanks for reading along and participating! :) Plum
Next week is BYBR-Chapter 1-Indication on Sunday, May 5, 2019.