Good Cop, Bad Cop.

OK. So I'm mean, short-tempered, have a nasty mouth, stubborn, insensitive and straightforward. So there. I've said it first and admitted it so nobody has to go around my back and gossip about it next time.

Having said that, I'd rather be a mean bitch who doesn't mince words than someone who doesn't use her brains and is too straight for her own good. Why would I wanna hurt someone unknowingly when I can do it as and when I want it? I'm not particularly close to my polymates but we do hang out often. One day, one of the girls was gossiping about how an acquaintance isn't well liked because he is too starighforward and often says things others don't like to here. She then shifted the topic towards me and asked, "Like sometimes you don't really know when what you said actually hurt someone right?"

I laughed out loud (ok, in a mean way) at her naive question. I don't care if the girls talk about my meanness behind my back, but to ask me something like that is like confessing to actually having discussed this among themselves. It's all about being subtle, you know. She can be such a bimbo sometimes. Anyway, I looked at her (patronisingly) and said, "No, I usually mean what I say, and if the words hurt, it is usually deliberate." It took her and the rest all of 5 quiet seconds to realise that I actually have been a real bitch all these while and not a motormouth who doesn't think before she speaks. Even then, they keep calling me up to hang out after work. Sometimes they laugh at my bitchy antics, sometimes they even ask me advice on how to bitch back at someone.

Of course I've been mean to the people close to me, and there's a reason why they remain close. I often tell the truth, and the truth hurts, and sometimes I add a bit of meanness to put my point through. Hey, there's no point sugar-coating words when I really care about you. At least you hear the hard words from me, and not from someone else who doesn't know you as well as I do. I can be really mean when I dislike someone, but I'd rather not waste my precious wit on someone unworthy. However, all you have to do is attack the fortress I so firmly protect, to have me and my mouth raining enough insults on you to condemn you to your next life. With my Wolverine claws all bared.

What made me write this post? At a recent wedding reception, I met a classmate I haven't seen in ages. She asked me if I still hung out with the usual girls. I said we did, except we didn't see the need to invite her. As a joke, of course. She was stunned, then she laughed and said, "That's you alright. You really haven't changed all these years." I don't know whether I should feel slighted at the fact that throughout poly, my entire class must have thought of me as a first class bitch; or to feel glad that people have come to accept me for what I am, retorts and all.

I'm resigned to the fact that I'll always be someone misunderstood, whether my intentions are good or bad. But since my defensive character has been etched so deeply within me, I guess I have no choice but carry on being who I really am. Someday, people will learn to appreciate me for the bitch in me.