Introduction to a character you're not supposed to like

When I trip and hurt myself and somebody laughs I immediately think of my old, dear friend Marshall.

Marshall tended to dole out conversation to me in nugget sized chunks, regardless of relevance. "Never say sorry," he told me, apropos of nothing. "To say sorry is a sign of weakness. You should always say instead that you apologise. Allow me to explain.

"Sorry is an adjective, a passive word. When you say 'sorry' you are abbreviating the sentence 'I am sorry'. We can loosely translate this as 'I equals sorry'. You appear, ever so slightly, to be describing your entire being, and in an especially negative way. It's abject. You are identifying yourself to your audience as one with sorrow. It's not good. Not good at all.

"'Apologise', on the other hand, is a verb. A strong, active, doing word. 'I apologise.' The emphasis here is on the subject's actions. It comes from a position of strength. Your audience will look up to you. Do you see? How you present yourself is wrapped up in the language you use. When you use strong, active verbs in place of weak, passive adjectives you become stronger and you appear more active. And vice versa.

"Furthermore! Furthermore, to say 'I apologise' does not constitute an actual apology, in much the same way that saying 'I laugh' does not mean you are laughing. Yet your apologisee will every single time accept it as such. They concede their right to insist upon a genuine apology, and you once again are the stronger participant in this exchange."

"Okay," I said.

"Thank you," I said

Long acquainted though I was with the random topic generator that was Marshall's mind I never became wholly used to it.

"I once dated a girl," he began, and I knew this would have little or nothing to do with the implications of word choice in an apologetic situation. "Though we were clearly physically attracted to each other there was also, and above all else, this passionate intellectual eroticism to our relationship. You know I used to paint lipstick on her labia? We would talk of Sartre up to and after and during the moment of coitus. It's so liberating and refreshing to not be bound by sex talk when having sex.

"The first time we slept together as we undressed and caressed we discussed in depth her family history. She made a number of disparaging remarks about her stepfather, and throughout our dialogue her body language was tight and aggressive. She never mentioned his name, although she happily called her mother Elizabeth, and when she talked of him she punctuated her sentences with a stabbing motion using whatever was to hand. This piqued the pervert deep within me and in the moments between her onanising me and me penetrating her Crimson Sunrise vertical smile I said 'You don't much like your stepfather, do you?'

"She said 'No,'" and Marshall paused for dramatic impact, "'but he did teach me everything I ever wanted to know about sex.'"

Marshall stopped to assess the impact of his story on me.

"Shit," I said, and then I said it again. "Shit."

"Precisely," said Marshall, enjoying my disquiet.

"That poor girl."

I considered the scene Marshall had painted. His monologue had come to an end, and it gradually occurred to me that he was expecting rather more of a reaction than my hiding behind four letter words.

"I imagine that must have put a dampener on your night," I said, finally, in an attempt to show off to Marshall how casual I could be about such and such.

"On the contrary. It was some of the most enjoyable sex I have ever had. She fucked me like she was killing me with her cunt. We went together for eleven months and then her stepfather died and we split up."

"Oh God oh God oh God! For fuck's sake, Marshall! I do wish you hadn't told me that."

"Really?" said Marshall, after an age. He grinned widely.

"I apologise."