#8: The State v. Hot Girl Gothic
"The law is reason, free from passion." -Aristotle
THE LIMERENCE TRIAL
Also known as
Maison Kelly v. Her Current Romantic Obsession
Also known as
The State v. Hot Girl Gothic
A courtroom. Stale. Sterile. Musty. The ceiling is made up of those cheap gray squares, like in poor schools, not Christian Academies, so I’ve personally never seen them, but this is what they tell me ceilings often look like for the middle class.
The carpet is grey-green and stained with foodstuff. The walls are white and have the texture of popcorn ceilings. You thought walls couldn’t be popcorned? Well, wake up.
In the upstage center of the room, a judge’s throne. Atop the throne, a judge. He is ugly, he doesn’t have hair, not that being bald makes you ugly, but I’m letting you know in this case it’s not good. He is white, he is pasty, he is not effervescent, nor has he ever contained effervescence. He is wearing Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s full outfit, with the little lacey peter pan collar that in her case meant “I dissent” but in most cases means, “I am Zoella”.
A witness stand upstage left, empty now, but not for long. A full jury upstage right. No one in the jury is particularly beautiful, but one woman does have pretty skinny arms.
The audience is packed. Everyone’s here to see it. They drove here, packed lunches, but they still can’t imagine it. Maison Kelly in the same room as her Current Romantic Obsession? Maison Kelly possibly facing legal repercussions for her crimes of fantasy? Of obsession?
Or, even more unimaginable, will she walk away free from this trial? With her Current Romantic Obsession behind bars for crimes of neglect? Of nonexistence?
Everyone in the courtroom audience is a stranger to each other, but instantly becomes friends over their shared bond. You can hear interjections from their conversations, hundreds on top of each other:
“I want to see her HANGED, frankly!”
“I think she’s cool and honestly gives off French vibes!”
“Three newsletters in one month? Your honor, she’s slaying!”
“I GOTTA see this guy, who wouldn’t love her, she’s insane!”
“Who ever COULD love her, her head is so big and her arms aren’t skinny at all!”
Her arms aren’t skinny enough, it’s true, but there she sits. Just past the audience, downstage right, at one of the long tables where lawyers go. Her pale skin glows against her all-black outfit of mourning. Maison Kelly, reduced to a Chekhovian caricature of herself. Limerence will do that to you.
Her green eyes twinkle underneath her little netted mourning veil, and they are undoubtedly twinkling toward the other table where the opposing lawyer sits. I wish I could tell you which table is the prosecution and which one is the defense, but I honestly don’t know what those words mean, and I don’t think it applies here. Both parties could be put in prison tonight.
Her eyes are twinkling in that direction because there, where her Current Romantic Obsession is supposed to be sitting, stands only an empty chair. His lawyer, present, sits at the table looking strangely serene. Surely he expects his client to arrive. She feels better. And worse. She sips her Diet Coke.
Next to her, her lawyer looks very nervous. First of all, he doesn’t know how this is going to go down because there is simply no legal precedent for a trial of a Girl v. Her Crush. He’s not even sure what he’s trying to prove, beyond what Maison told him in the elevator.
EARLIER, IN THE ELEVATOR:
MAISON KELLY
Please please please be my lawyer for my trial in ten minutes. I have to figure out how to live. I have to figure out if I’m sick in the head. I need to know if I’m guilty of a chronic limerence addiction, or rather if my Current Romantic Obsession is guiltier of neglect. The only way I can figure it out is from a judge’s ruling.
MAISON KELLY’S LAWYER
How much can you pay?
MAISON KELLY
I’ll give you a shout-out on my Insta story!
And it was done. The judge rises, coughs.
JUDGE
Order, order in the court! God, I love my job. I love the things I get to say, just things like that. Most people never get to say that sort of stuff, cartoonish lines like that, but I get to say them every day.
He sits down and bangs his gavel. His hands are veiny and it disgusts Maison, even though her mind should be busy with other things.
JUDGE
Okay, here’s how this thing is gonna go down. First, we will have Maison’s lawyer walk around for a while while he defends her and says what she’s upset about. Then we’ll have her Current Romantic Obsession’s lawyer do the same, walking around, saying stuff, looking at the jury and all that. Let’s start with those things.
Maison looks at her lawyer. She grabs his hand, squeezes it. She whispers, “you’ve got this, king”. He pulls his hand away and gives her a rude look, which is unnecessary and mean honestly.
MAISON’S LAWYER
Thank you for having me, Your Honor, members of the jury, and everyone in the lovely audience tonight. For the next few minutes, I’m gonna talk about Maison’s case, and I’m gonna make you see that she shouldn’t be imprisoned.
I don’t really need to include the exact things he is saying because god I would hope by now you get the gist. Maison is upset because she is in love with this guy but more so because she is in love with the fantasy version of him. She fell so much in love that she got sick over it. She then found out it’s not called “love” it’s called “limerence” and also what if she’s insane? :(
MAISON’S LAWYER
So yeah, she is worried she’s insane, but I think there are a lot of reasons she is feeling this way that aren’t her fault.
He’s talking about how Maison’s life has been shaped in crucial moments by a lack of love, or at least a lack of understandable love. She’s an actress! Shouldn’t this be obvious? So she has learned to cope by having a rich fantasy life. A version of reality in her mind where she is loved. The problem is sometimes her fantasy life causes her to become real-life crazy, and her longing goes from being quirky to just being sad. Those are the moments where it’s like, EW!!
MAISON’S LAWYER
But really, for the most part, she hasn’t hurt anyone! So I think she’s innocent, basically. Because her Current Romantic Obsession, on the other hand, has hurt someone. He has hurt Maison!
Her lawyer brings up a great point here. The judge nods and smiles and closes his eyes. He hasn’t thought about this. Sometimes Maison forgets, too. Sometimes she yells at herself so much for being a crazy limerent psycho that she forgets she is hurting! Because hurting is not sexy, it truly is just sad, and as I’ve said before, that’s honestly disgusting.
MAISON’S LAWYER
And like, yes, she has projected a fantasy onto a real-life man, but is that a crime? It would truly behoove him to step up to the fantasy if you ask me. Is it a crime to expect someone to bend reality for you? Really, is it? What are the laws?
JUDGE
It really depends on if this courtroom is in St. Louis or New York. Thank you for your time, you can sit down now. Now we will hear from Maison’s Current Romantic Obsession’s lawyer.
He’s talking about the guy who was looking really serene earlier. He still does, even after that really good defense from Maison’s lawyer. He’s wearing an all-black silk suit and he has a feather tucked behind his ear. He is jazz, personified.
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION’S LAWYER
Your Honor, girls and boys of the jury, the other lawyer, the courtroom audience, the newsletter audience, and Maison, you stupid, stupid bitch, thank you for having me. I don’t really have a case to make tonight. I don’t even have my client.
Gasps around the courtroom. Everyone looks at each other. Everyone mouths, “huh??”. They shrug their shoulders and scratch their heads.
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION’S LAWYER
I informed him of this case as soon as I caught wind of it. “Hey,” I said, “Maison Kelly sent you a cease and desist.”
Suddenly Maison jumps to standing.
MAISON KELLY
You TALKED TO HIM??? WHAT DID HE SAY!!!!!! WHAT DID HE SAY! WHAT DID HE SAY WHEN YOU SAID MY NAME!
The judge bangs his gavel.
JUDGE
Okay, HELLO!! No no no girl! You GOTTA be shhhhhh!
Maison quiets down but stays standing. She is staring at her Current Romantic Obsession’s Lawyer with stars in her eyes. She looks like an addict, and I’m not saying that to be funny. She is shaking.
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION’S LAWYER
He said, “who?”. And I said “brunette, insane,” and he said “I don’t remember her, and even if I do, she didn’t make much of an impression, and even if she did, the impression was that she was too much, or even worse, perhaps, not enough. And I am going to forget you said her name as soon as I finish this paragraph. And I am going to forget her entirely soon after. And I am going to log into my iPhone every night until I find someone blonde to marry, and then I am gonna marry someone blonde. And I will never read Maison Kelly’s newsletter or tweets again. And I will never think of the time we spent together because for me it was not sacred. It was not even mundane. It was nothing at all.”
The room is so silent, you can hear everyone’s heart beating in iambic pentameter. Maison is still standing, but she looks like her heart has fallen through her ass. Her lawyer looks really awkward too, tbh. The judge is doing that thing like Macauley Culkin in Home Alone where he opens his mouth real wide and puts his hands on his cheeks like OMG!!!
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION’S LAWYER
Boys and girls of the jury, of America, he never loved her. NEVER EVER!! EVER!!!
He walks offstage, down the center aisle, and exits through the back of the audience. Everyone watches him leave and then looks at the judge who is still going OMG!!!! like in Home Alone. Maison takes the witness stand.
MAISON KELLY
Put the cameras on me. Zoom in.
Did I forget to mention that this trial is streaming live on TV? She stares down the barrel of a big television camera.
MAISON KELLY
Current Romantic Obsession, if you’re listening, and you aren’t, because you barely exist at all, not really, not in the way that matters, hear me now. I am NOT giving up this case. You violated my cease and desist. You didn’t cease, and you didn’t desist, or you didn’t cease ceasing, and I don’t know what desist means, no one does, but you didn’t text me, and you didn’t love me, and maybe at the end of the day, that’s what desisting is all about. I want damages for that.
But I also violated my own cease and desist. I kept thinking of you long after the fantasy began to hurt, even on an airplane, even at a party, even with my dad. I did it to myself over and over, bashed myself in the head with all the ways in which I am unloved.
Wait, is she crying? Yeah, and she’s got more snot on her face than any real prophetess or socialite would care to have. She looks stupid. She looks at the judge.
MAISON KELLY
Judge, who won this? Whose fault is it? When will I stop loving him? How will I go on? When will I die? Will I know that I’m dying before I do? Or will I be out like a light? When would I have gotten sick of him anyway? If he actually did love me back? One second? Less than that? Or never? Never ever? Why didn’t I text him? Why did I text him? What do I do? How will I live? How can I learn? Why am I seeping out all over? Why is it all seeping out?
The judge bangs his gavel. His face looks normal, not like OMG anymore. He looks very serious and he starts writing down a lot of stuff. The jury also looks very serious. They are all writing stuff down too, on legal pads, on sticky notes, on their arms and legs. They are pulling out calculators and abacuses and iPod touches. A LOT of math and work is being done. They are figuring out the verdict.
Maison Kelly sits alone at the witness stand. She is bearing witness. The witness stand is the highest point in this room. It kind of looks like she’s about to be burned at the stake.
JUDGE
Okay, I have mine! Do you guys have yours?
The jury nods and makes little cartoon beeping sounds that seem to mean “yes”.
JUDGE
Omg, yes!! Okay, what did you guys decide?
The jury beeps at him. Do you know what I mean? Like little chirps. Meepmeepmeep.
JUDGE
Woah, me too.
Meepmeepmeep!!!
JUDGE
Yeah, I can’t believe this! I have never delivered a ruling like this before in all my life of being a judge, but here it is.
Maison Elizabeth Kelly, you have been found guilty on all counts. And more.
The room gasps one gasp all at once.
JUDGE
I’ll give you the rundown. You’re guilty on:
1 count of torturing yourself with a delusional fantasy
1 count of first-degree murder of months of your life in service of the aforementioned delusional fantasy
1 count of kidnapping a man and turning him into a myth
3 counts of holding that myth hostage (putting him in your newsletter)
10 counts of treason against yourself and your independence
10 counts of destruction of property (your brain cells, your heart, your hopes, your dreams, your nervous system, your apartment is so messy)
1,000 counts of denying your own desires until they grow arms and legs and learn to riot against you.
And not finally, but fatally, you’re guilty of being mortal, and of going to die someday. You’re sooo guilty of going to die.
Maison leans over the side of the witness stand and throws up. Then she sits upright again.
MAISON KELLY
I know. I know you’re right. I’m really sorry. I just wanted my life to be bigger. I wanted something illimitable to happen to me. I wanted the chance to love him.
Suddenly, the doors in the very back of the courtroom open up, and like the gates of heaven, golden light pours in. Once everyone’s eyes adjust, we see him. Current Romantic Obsession. He made it. He strides down the aisle, through the courtroom audience, towards the judge’s throne. Everyone is agog and/or aghast.
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION
Maison, I made a mistake!
JUDGE
HELLO! No! This is a prison trial, not a wedding or a Taylor Swift album! You cannot object; you cannot speak now! I take my job very seriously, I just LOVE being a judge. I can’t even think about it too long because I will cry tears of divine GRATITUDE. So show me some RESPECT!! Sit down RIGHT NOW!
Maison’s Current Romantic Obsession finally sits in the chair designated for him, next to his jazzy lawyer.
JUDGE
Nevertheless, I persist. Maison is NOT the only criminal here! Current Romantic Obsession, you too are guilty on all counts! I mean, Jesus, you really dropped the ball! Like okay, you would HATE having the greatest love story the world has ever known?? You would HATE that? What the fuck is wrong with you!
You should’ve loved her selflessly from the moment you met. Maybe it’s not realistic, no, but hell, I’m a romantic, and more than that, I’m a moralist. It just would’ve been the right thing to do. So, in order to fix the ways in which you have wronged Maison, you must promise to love her, in a healthy and detached way, from now until the end of time.
Maison looks at her Current Romantic Obsession fully for the first time in a long time. Their actual time together, in real life and physical space, was so brief and so long ago. It takes her brain a minute to catch up. She surveys his eyes, his hair, his stature. She still thinks he is really beautiful. It wasn’t all lies, the fantasy version. It wasn’t all lies.
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION
Maison, I am so sorry. I really do love you. What do you say? Will you join me in a healthy and nonlimerent union to last forever, knowing each other truly and deeply until we both die?
Maison gasps! OMG! Isn’t this what she wanted? What she’s wanted her whole life?
CURRENT ROMANTIC OBSESSION
Will you love me even when you don’t feel like it? Will you change in front of me? Will you hear me when I’m in the bathroom? Will you listen as all your friends slowly and permanently pair your name with mine? Will you sit behind the ampersand? Will you join the public? Will you enter traditional society? Will you tell the fireflies goodbye? Will you delete your newsletter? Will you marry me?
The crowd is silent. They don’t even breathe. They’re about to witness the most historic case ending of all time. Maison’s about to respond. Oh my god. I can’t believe this. I somehow know exactly what she’s gonna say. Don’t you?
MAISON KELLY
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I actually feel cured now, of my love for you, but thanks for all this! Thanks guys for coming!
She leaves the witness stand. She leaves the courtroom through a side door. She leaves the party. She leaves. End of trial.
This was edition #8 of Hot Girl Gothic. If you missed edition #7, the second edition about this Current Romantic Obsession, check back in your email (spam and promotions too) and mark it as important, or click here.