"'How passionately do you believe in our marriage?'
'How passionately do you believe in our marriage?'
It's a fair question, I suppose, the one I have just angled back to David like a tennis player at the net, using the pace and the spin that he put on the ball to my advantage. Any marriage counselor would support my right to ask it, but I know it's a cheat. That's the thing with failing relationships. You can always refuse to answer any question by repeating it. 'Do you love me?' 'Do you want a divorce?' 'Are you happy?' Your partner is invariably as ambivalent as you are, and if he or she is human - that is to say, cowardly but at the same time somehow full of moral self-righteousness - then he or she will not commit themselves through any expression of passion or commitment. After all, the absence of passion or commitment is the reason why the relationship is failing, surely? So in my experience it is both easy and advisable to reduce any serious discussion to a farcical stalemate almost immediately. Years can go by before you have to make a decision."
~ Nick Hornby, How To Be Good
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