The Sex & Celibacy Interview: The Ember Files - Log 6
Filed as Internal Interrogation Transcript – Institute Archive.
For previous log, Log 5, click here.
Date of Interview: December 2, 2023
Filed: Internal Interrogation
Access Level: Red | Subject: ROOK WETHERELL
Classification: Fractured Myth / Erotic Compulsion / Identity Collapse
Note: Redacted for field study. Use only with subjects exhibiting similar delusional synthesis patterns.
INSTITUTE CONTEXT
Archived as primary interview transcript between Subject 022 (Rook Wetherell) and Narrative Adjudicator Dr. C. Moraine.
Used to analyze erotomanic transference, bipolar-driven seduction patterns, and performative celibacy strategies.
Containment protocol procedures referenced here involve limiting the subject’s capacity to spread psychogenic contamination through narrative entanglement and relational scripting.
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
Moraine: Mara told me you contacted her after nearly twenty years. You’d stayed connected online, but never spoke. Then she posted she was headed to LA - and you called her.
Rook: Yeah, so? I hit up old friends when they’re around. That’s normal, right?
Moraine: She also said that in that first conversation, you told her you were celibate. That you only had platonic relationships with women. She thought it was an odd thing to lead with after two decades of no contact.
Rook: Well, I figured she remembered me as a sex addict. Always chasing ass. Like everybody else in Charleston. I didn’t want her to think that’s why I called.
Moraine: You wanted her to know you had changed?
Rook: Yeah. I did.
Moraine: Did you and Mara ever have sex?
Rook: (long pause) Yeah. But you already knew that, didn’t you?
Moraine: Do I?
Rook: (long pause)
Moraine: She told me it happened once. After you both left the bar you worked at. You talked about coke - she’d never tried it. After your shift, you brought her to your apartment. You did coke. Then had sex.
Rook: I wasn’t sure if she remembered. So I never brought it up. She gets sexual when she’s high, so... you know. I wasn’t gonna say no.
Moraine: How did you feel about having sex with Mara?
Rook: Not good. She wasn’t in my plan. I mean - she’s a woman, so sure, it’s always a possibility. But I didn’t see her like that. She wasn’t a conquest. She was more like a fellow traveler. We were in the bars, watching everybody - like cultural anthropologists. But in the end, we were just as fucked up as everyone else, because there wasn’t anything else to do.
Moraine: So you saw her as above it all - but stuck in the middle of it. Just like you saw yourself.
Rook: Yeah. I did. I still do. Well, not stuck in it. We both got out eventually.
Moraine: Did she fit into your Madonna/Whore complex?
Rook: (laughs) She’s not a Madonna.
Moraine: But she’s not a whore.
Rook: I don’t know. She’s obsessed with sex. You tell me.
Moraine: That split - Madonna versus Whore - rarely has anything to do with the woman herself. It’s how a man keeps himself safe from longing. From needing something he can’t control. It’s a defense against intimacy and shame. Especially in men raised by seductive or enmeshed mothers. It fractures their ability to perceive women as whole. They compartmentalize to survive emotionally.
Rook: Analyze Mara all you want. She’s got her own problems she deals with through sex. That’s why she’s fucking that Vega character. She’s using him like she used me.
Moraine: That sounds more like a description of your behavior toward her. From what I understand, she never pursued you. She simply responded to you reaching out.
Rook: (quiet) Okay. Yes. That’s true. That’s why I trusted her. She didn’t want anything from me. Everybody always wants something. She didn’t ask for anything. Not even sex.
Moraine: Or maybe you never forgot that twenty years ago, you used Mara - emotionally and sexually - then compartmentalized it.
Rook: Nope. Nobody used anybody. It was two drunk people on coke, fucking. A lot of people did that in the 90s. Trust me, Mara fucked around a lot back then and I was nowhere around.
Moraine: Rook, are you impotent?
Rook: No. I choose not to let my dick control me. I don’t get hard on purpose. Ever.
Moraine: You never feel sexual arousal?
Rook: If I feel it, I push it down. Like a monk. Or anyone who’s sworn to celibacy.
Moraine: Abstinence can be spiritual maturity. But it can also be performative self-avoidance. Which is it for you?
Rook: I had to control it. I’ve been a sex addict my whole life. That was my main pursuit - above all else. It’s why a lot of things didn’t turn out the way they were supposed to.
Moraine: Are you proud of that? Your sexual prowess?
Rook: I was. Was really good at it. And I was proud of being able to choose a woman and have her. It meant I mattered. I existed.
Moraine: Even with the women you paid.
Rook: Not the same.
Moraine: How did you do it? How did you get women you didn’t pay to have sex with you?
Rook: It’s a formula. Women want to be seen. But that’s not enough. You have to unsee them - shift your attention to another woman. Make sure the first one sees you flirting with another better looking woman. The trick is, with the second woman, chat up one you know already likes you. So the first one sees that, gets curious, competitive. It’s hormones. It’s chemistry. Women hate each other. It’s easy. I mastered it. It’s why I joined bands, worked in bars. Charleston was full of women who wanted to fuck and feel something. It was a field lab. I played that game every night until I didn’t even feel it anymore.
Moraine: No real emotion involved?
Rook: Some women were interesting. At first. I even ended up dating some of them. But it always ended the same - they’d want to claim me. Nest. I wasn’t having it. I never loved any of them, if that’s what you’re asking.
Moraine: Where did you learn this? That women are competitive and untrustworthy?
Rook: From my mother. My dad would leave on these spiritual quests - off chasing enlightenment - and I was left in a house full of women. I saw behind the curtain. I watched how they used power. How they wore men down. What they said they weren’t getting from men. So I used what I learned. Before they could use me.
I learned from the time I was a kid how to talk to women. Make them feel seen. Admired. Without being creepy.
Moraine: And what gave you that ability?
Rook: Back then I didn’t know. But now - I think it was the bipolarity. The highs made me electric. I could read people. The veil was down. The illness has its benefits.
Moraine: Did you always use that gift to get sex?
Rook: Pretty much. Unless I got distracted by drugs or a party. But the best nights were when I got all three - party, drugs, sex. That was the trifecta.
Moraine: And you never tired of the chase?
Rook: I did. In my 30s, I felt empty. Dead inside. But I couldn’t stop. I didn’t know any other way to operate. So I pushed harder. More drugs. Riskier sex. But by then I was numb.
Moraine: Had you been diagnosed with sex addiction as part of your bipolarity by that point?
Rook: Yeah. Late 20s. But I didn’t go to therapy. I didn’t want to stop. I was afraid of what I’d be without it.
Moraine: And when did the cycle break?
Rook: Mid-30s. The scene in Charleston dried up. People got married. Got arrested. The good bands either made it or gave up. So I left.
Moraine: Where’d you go?
Rook: Los Angeles.
Moraine: Did anything change there?
Rook: Not at first. It got worse. Way worse. More sex. More drugs. Everyone was insane. I almost died trying to keep up. Charleston was amateur hour. Then I got a job in a bar. The owner was a spiritual guru. That changed everything. And in a way - he’s the reason I’m sitting here talking to you now.
Moraine: Then we certainly must follow that thread. From performative celibacy to spiritual projection - Los Angeles may have changed your stage, but not your script.
END TRANSCRIPT
Notes for Field Application
Subject exhibits advanced identity diffusion, erotomanic transference, and mythic substitution.
Sexual behavior is ritualistic, avoidant, and used to delay psychotic collapse.
Mild verbal insight present but untethered from embodied responsibility.
Containment protocol recommended to limit narrative spread and relational destabilization.
END OF LOG 6
To read the next log - Log 7 - click here.
