Invincibility by Association

A new phenomenon I've thought about some recently is Clark's uncanny ability to make his targets believe they can behave outrageously and get away with it. He will, in fact, talk others into doing things he himself is not brave enough to do, yet somehow he is able to convince them that even though he won't do something, they are within their rights to do so. He can even convince them it's a good idea.

Case in point: the ex-business partner Mallory. He talked her into creating a giant scene in a public venue, very much a public place, but one that is frequented by the same group of people over and over. She offended the people there horribly. However, he then somehow managed to talk her into returning there for a casual visit. Of course, this made her look ridiculous, vicious, and insane all at once, because everyone there knew remembered what she'd done. She, however, had obviously been bolstered by him that she had every right to do so, and that there was nothing wrong with the move. And yes, she had every right to be in a public place. But rights and being downright stupid aren't the same thing. As a note, also, please keep in mind that he was in said place at the time, and even while he had been the person to invite her to come and bolstered her courage to her face, behind her back he was telling everyone in the place how he couldn't believe she came, etc.

It's something I dealt with recently, actually, having run into what I think of as his "target family." This is an actual family of people who are not his primary targets, but his fallbacks, and, incidentally, the persons he currently uses to back him financially, both in life (food, shelter, clothing, etc.) and in his crazy, half-baked ideas. He trashes them openly behind their backs and even admits to others that he is "only using them." In fact, he treats them terribly, but he has also love-bombed them to such an extent and attached himself to their lives so thoroughly that they practically worship him. The Matriarch, which is another post for another time, as well as the spawn, who we'll call Trina, might as well be the poster-children for what I've come to think of as moron mode--the condition you have when you begin to realize something is "off" about a sociopath, but you value him as a friend so much that you overlook the discrepancies. In fact, it's my belief this is the very reason you hear about so many serial killers, etc., having wives or girlfriends who didn't "know" what their sociopath was. You think to yourself, "Wow, she's so stupid. How could she have not realized?" Easy. She was in moron mode. It's the combination of being love-bombed and lied to and is the direct result of your sociopath emotionally attaching himself to you, parasite-style. He has done exactly what he needs to do to a target: made himself the perfect companion so that no matter what awful things you hear, you won't believe it of him, because it's not the person you know. I digress...

Anyway, I ran into the target fallback family, and Trina was unbelievably shocked when I was less than congenial to her. She went so far as to comment on my "rudeness," when in reality, over the past months after Clark had painted me crazy to them, she had publicly threatened me (Charles Manson cult-esque, anyone?). Yet, here she was, brazenly expecting me to be polite and courteous to her as though nothing had happened.

All I could think of in that moment was the incident of Mallory returning to "the scene of the crime," and how because of her associations with Clark, she'd been under his spell to the point where she completely believed that she could take actions without consequences. It is because he lives in a world where he doesn't live by the same social cues the rest of us do, but it is because for him, the rules are not the same. Most of us understand what is acceptable and what is not, but in his world, anything is acceptable if he would like it to be. (Yet, God forbid someone does the same thing to him. It would be unforgiveable. There is very much a double standard in behavior expectations in that way. It's very Hitler, but again...another story for another time.)

Home Away from Home

Wow. I'm sorry to have neglected this poor little blog for so long. After a time, I stopped thinking about all of this constantly, though it's always an underlying current in my mind. Today, though, I started to remember that it is the same reason why people can't find enough information when they're abandoned, so here I am, to post another update.

Well, well, in my last post, I referenced how I'd later find out why we couldn't go to his apartment. The short answer would be that one thing Clark was not good at as a sociopath was maintaining focus to follow through with anything. He was, however, very good at getting what he wanted in the short term. So, just like he moved from target to target on whim, so did he move from home to home.

The cycle, I learned( particularly in hindsight) was something like this: lock target who can either furnish room in their home or pay for a home for him, use home until the home has nothing left to offer and begins to fall into ruins, abandon home for new home. (Ha! Sound familiar?)

You might wonder what I mean when I say he let a home fall into ruins. Well, let me clarify. Clark was always far too busy juggling lies and his own whims and targeting people to bother with piteous things like cleaning or laundry. Those things would only get done for one of two reasons: 1.) he could use taking his laundry to a target's home as an excuse to visit for some ulterior motive or 2.) he would clean so as to present himself a certain way to a certain target. This became a particular problem when combined with another problem: he makes his living leeching off of other people. Therefore, if he somehow manages to estrange his current financier, he will in no way be paying bills or rent.

I remember the day we "couldn't go to his apartment" because it was "a mess." I stayed in the car while he went inside, however, and got his clothes together to leave to spend the night elsewhere. It was a few months later that he was at my house when he received a phone call telling him he was being kicked out of his apartment. His things would have to be put into storage by the next day, but unexplicably, he couldn't be persuaded to "get help" with this from me. I know now that it was because he got help from another target who had heard different circumstances surrounding his eviction. That's another important rule of the sociopath's: never, ever let other targets talk to each other without you present, but I digress...

I would later learn his rent was months overdue, and one reason he had not been staying at his apartment--ever--was because his electricity and water had been turned off long ago due to his not paying the bills. Strangely, though, as a sociopath, this actually worked to his advantage. It worked as one of those infamous pity ploys I've talked about. "There was a mix-up at the power company," or "I've been having money trouble for so long but I had too much pride to tell anyone, and now I'm in a mess!" (*cue crocodile tears*).

It happened several times when I knew him and that I know of since. And sadly, that isn't where it ends. Like targets and homes, pets were another thing subject to his whims, but that's again, another story for another time. I guess the moral of this story would be, again, if you've gotten THAT close to someone and yet, something of this nature is being kept from you...there's probably a good reason why.